And a note.
*I have meetings. Don't leave the apartment. Check the second door on the left in the hallway.
?S*
I crumble the note in my fist. He orders me around like a subordinate.Eat. Stay. Check.
I drink the tea because my throat is dry, but I ignore the food. I’m not hungry for his charity.
My eyes drift to the hallway. The second door on the left.
Curiosity is a disease, and I am terminal.
I walk down the hall. The door is closed. I reach out and turn the handle. It’s unlocked.
I push it open and step inside.
My breath catches in my throat.
It’s a studio.
Not just a room with a desk. It’s a professional-grade art studio. The north-facing wall is entirely glass, letting in the perfect, diffuse light for painting. In the center of the room stands a heavy, wooden easel—an antique, by the look of it, stained with the history of a thousand paintings.
But it’s the supplies that make my knees weak.
Tables lined with rows of Winsor & Newton oil paints, the tubes pristine and untouched. Jars of high-quality brushes in every shape and size. Stacks of stretched canvases leaning against thewall. A drafting table with a complete set of charcoal pencils and graphite sticks.
It’s a fortune. It’s everything I ever dreamed of having but could never afford.
I walk into the room, entranced. I run my fingers over the tubes of paint. Cerulean Blue. Alizarin Crimson. Burnt Umber. The smell of linseed oil and turpentine is faint but present, the perfume of my soul.
He did this.
He knew. He watched me sketching on park benches with cheap charcoal. He watched me staring at supplies in art store windows. He cataloged my desires just like he cataloged my fears.
I feel a tear slide down my cheek.
I hate him for this. I hate him for weaponizing my passion. He’s buying my compliance with beautiful things. He’s making the cage so comfortable, so tailored to my specific shape, that I won't want to fly away.
"I won't paint for you," I whisper fiercely to the empty room. "I won't create anything in this prison."
But my fingers are itching. My mind is already composing images. The gray fog outside. The black sheets. The scar on his eyebrow.
I turn around and flee the room, slamming the door shut. I can't be in there. It’s too seductive. It’s a trap.
I retreat to the living room, pacing back and forth like a caged animal. I need to talk to someone. My dad. Sarah. Anyone.
I find a landline phone on a side table. It looks sleek, modern. I pick it up. There is a dial tone.
I dial my father’s number.
Ring. Ring. Ring.
"We're sorry, the number you have dialed is no longer in service."
I hang up, my hand trembling. Of course. Silas said he made him disappear.
I dial Sarah’s number. She’s my only friend at Parsons.
