I lay staring at the ceiling while Hayden finished drying off in the bathroom. The scent of sweaty bodies lingered in the air as I lay on a fresh set of sheets, but the breeze from the open window would soon take care of that.
Hayden returned naked to the bedroom and lay next to me, smelling of soap. Even after all these months of anger and separation, it felt natural having him in my bed. His cell phone rang on the nightstand—his daughter’s ringtone. It was their usual time to talk before her bedtime.
“Mind if I take this?”
“Go ahead.”
He reached for his phone and answered. “Hi, Princess. What? Oh, that’s amazing! The highest in your class? Did she really say that? Well, she’s the teacher; she knows what she’s talkingabout.” He glanced at me. “Hey, Princess, remember Curly? I’m with him now.”
I didn’t know if it was smart of him to mention me, but maybe he wanted to send me a message.
He whispered, “She wants to say hello, but feel free to say no.”
“It’s okay.” I took the phone. “Hi, Maya. I heard you’re the smartest girl in class.”
For the next five minutes, I said very little as Maya talked my ear off. It felt good hearing her voice again. Hayden lay facing me, making me self-conscious. I signaled him to look away, and he responded by sucking on my nipple.
The call ended when Maya’s mom told her it was time for bed.
“Thank you,” Hayden said and put his phone away.
We lay in silence, my body tense as I waited for him to ask me to share more of my past. He eventually said, “We can wait until tomorrow to talk.”
Knowing I wouldn’t be able to sleep with that conversation looming, I said, “Let’s start and see how it goes.” I turned off the light next to my bed, washing the room in darkness. “Please don’t interrupt me when I speak, unless you feel you have to.”
“Understood.” He covered us with a blanket but kept his distance.
I shut my eyes and began to speak.
CHAPTER NINE
1992
“Good morning, sunshine.”
Bo shut the metal door behind him, the impact echoing through the small room. I remained motionless on the thin, dirty mattress.
“Hey, I said good morning.”
I had no way of knowing if it was morning or night; the only source of light was a single bulb, casting a milky glow that never turned off.
“Morning,” I mumbled, my tongue dry and sticky.
“Brought you food and water. Are you gonna eat, or should I shove it down your throat again?”
My pathetic attempt at a hunger strike hadn’t been fruitful, and I was doing myself no favors by staying weak. “I’ll eat.”
He placed the tray and a bottle of water on the floor next to my head. Vegetables, cheese, bread, and two boiled eggs. It smelled good, and not just because it was the scent of something other than my unwashed flesh. I moved to sit and grabbed the bottle of water, drinking half of it before I could stop.
Bo sat next to me on the mattress, grunting because of the low height, yet he hadn’t brought a chair in all the time I’d been here. He said it had been two weeks, but I didn’t trust him.
I ate while he watched, my stomach grumbling.
“You know that you can get a better room, and aren’t you sick of this dirty underwear?”
The same promises every day, tempting me with better conditions if I only agreed to play along.
“I don’t know where we are, and I won’t tell anyone you took me. Just let me—”
