“You can’t stand without the wall.”
I want to prove him wrong. Want to swing my legs over the edge of the bed, plant my feet on the marble, and walk out of this room just to spite him.
But I don’t move.
He tilts his head slightly, considering.
“The chef has prepared chicken. Roasted with lemon and herbs, the skin perfectly crisp.” His voice drops, goes soft and warm and unbearably specific. “Fresh bread from the oven. The crust shatters when you tear it apart. Inside, it’s still warm. Soft.”
My mouth floods with saliva. I can’t stop it. Can’t control it.
“Cold water with ice. It’ll shock your throat going down, but you’ll feel it spread through your whole body.” He pauses. “Vegetables roasted in olive oil, a little lemon, salt. Nothing heavy.”
My stomach twists so hard I actually gasp. Cramps that feel like fists squeezing my insides, wringing me out.
He hears it. Of course he does.
“Eight o’clock,tesoro.” He moves toward the door. “I’ll send help.”
“Go to?—”
But he’s already gone. The lock clicks behind him.
I lie there, shaking, my body screaming for everything he just described. The betrayal is complete. My own flesh has turned traitor, flooding with want at the sound of his voice.
Tonight I eat or I break for real.
Possibly both.
The bathroom is no morethan twelve feet away, but it still takes me five minutes to get there.
I roll out of bed and land on my hands and knees on the cold marble. The impact jars through my wrists, my shoulders, myspine. I stay there for a long moment, head hanging, breathing through the wave of dizziness that threatens to pull me under.
Then I crawl. Hands and knees across the floor, fingers gripping the edges of the Persian for leverage, until I manage to drag myself to the doorframe. I use it to pull myself upright and cling to it until the room stops spinning.
The sink is my next target. I lurch toward it, catch myself on the edge, and stare into the polished metal that serves as a mirror.
Jesus Christ.
The woman looking back at me is a ghost. Sallow skin stretched over bones that jut too sharply. Dark circles like bruises under eyes that look too big for my face. My cheekbones could cut glass. My collarbones are visible even through the stained henley.
My hair is the worst of it. An oily, matted nest that hasn’t seen a brush in nearly a week. The auburn looks dull. Dead. Like dried blood left too long in the sun.
You look like you’re dying because you are dying, idiot.
I turn away from my reflection and start to strip.
The henley peels off like a second skin, stiff with dried sweat and the ghost of orange juice. My jeans are harder. My fingers fumble with the button, too weak to manage fine motor control. The denim scrapes down my legs and pools at my feet. Underwear. Bra. All gone.
Every piece of clothing I was wearing when he took me. My last connection to the life before.
I leave them in a heap on the cold tile and don’t look back.
The shower is massive. Glass walls, marble floor, rainfall head that’s bigger than Sal’s pizza from back home. I turn the handle and step under the spray before the water has time to warm.
Cold hits me like a slap. I gasp, stumble and slide down the tile wall until I’m sitting on the floor. Water pounds into the crown of my head, runs in rivers down my face, soaks through the tangled mess of my hair. I draw my knees to my chest and wrap my arms around them, making myself as small as possible.
Okay. Okay. You can do this.
