I feel the warmth of his hands, the space between my skin and his touch shrinking.
The door slams open, and it slams shut again.
I can’t see anything until blood sprays across my face.
Axel collapses to the floor. My head lolls to the side, the room tilting. And I can see a man standing there in a white ski mask.
He drives the knife down again into Axel’s chest. Again. And again.
I blink. My eyes blur, and 2014 floods back in. I remember it like it was just yesterday.
2014.
Justin took me to the basement.
He pushed me into the glass cage and snapped a collar around my neck. The metal was cold and had a green glow.
“If you scream,” he said, “I will turn it on.”
He pointed around the room, toward the wall beyond the glass. He told me this was where he kept the bad boys and girls who tried to fight him. His smile was evil. He knew he was untouchable because he was a cop.
Whatever game he was playing with our lives, I lost.
I tried to scream anyway.
The collar bit into my skin, burning my neck.
A jolt tore through my body. My knees gave out, and I hit the glass floor; the sound of my bones cracking against it was louder than my own voice. I dragged myself up and slammed my palms against the walls.
He slammed back from the other side, his face twisted, his mouth moving as he shouted towards me.
He told me no one would believe me. He told me he worked on these kinds of cases. He knew how stories like mine ended. That he would kill me, and no one would find the body.
He pulled me out of the cage and shoved me toward the stairs.
He told me he would do it again. And again. Until I stopped fighting.
So I stopped.
I let him hit me until my skin became dark shades of yellow and purple under his hands. Until every breath felt like it scraped my ribs on the way in. When he was finished, he threw the words at me like another strike.
“Get the fuck up and make us dinner.”
I tried.
My feet slid out from under me. The floor tilted. I went down.
The belt snapped across my back again. I gasped and forced my hands under me. I pushed. My arms shook. I got to my knees, then my feet. The world spun, but I kept moving. One step. Then another. The basement door was at the top, just a few steps away, yet it felt so far.
I reached it, opened it, and walked out.
Mom was in the living room, a bottle of whiskey loose in her hand. Her eyes narrowed at me, like she was trying to focus through fog.
“I want pasta,” she said, and stumbled toward the couch.
I swallowed.
The house was quiet. Sofia made no sound, so I told myself she was asleep.
