The times Caiden had come onto me when we were teenagers, there was some part of me that wanted it. Always. A demented, deprived part of me that yearned to be filled with something other than hollowness.
Despite the anger, despite the hatred.
This was nothing like how it was with Caiden.
Being wanted and being consumed were two different things. I’d always known that, even when I pretended not to, even when I let myself believe that there was something sickly romantic about our mutual destruction.
Caiden was hunger and violence and hate, but he was always human. He was always, at the root, my equal. We could hurt each other, but never erase.
The man was nothing but devour. He was the black hole at the center of the world, and we were the scraps flung into his event horizon.
It was not an act of wanting, not a collapse of mutual fury or the old, sick ache for absolution through pain.
It was nothing, and that was the point. It was obliteration made flesh. A destruction so complete it left no space for memory or hunger or even hate.
I was only a body here, a sack of needs, a thing to puncture and drain.
I’d spent my whole life fighting not to be an object and now, at the bottom of it all, that was all I was. A shape for his pleasure, a reflection of my own agony, a thing to shred.
There was no power, no transaction, not even the pretense of hunger. Only the fulfillment of some ritual humiliation, the satisfaction of seeing theanimal break.
And I knew he would never stop until he had spooned the last remnants of warmth off my bones.
Afterwards, the man zipped his pants. “You see, son?” he said, not even looking at Caiden. “Nothing in the world can keep a woman from being just what she is. No matter how you cage ‘em, they’ll always show you their true nature.”
Caiden made a sound that was half growl, half sob.
My face was a mask of nothing but inside, my brain curled in on itself, a snail recoiling from the knife.
I saw the man retreat, his footsteps a slow waltz, the door closing behind him with a wet, metallic sigh.
I collapsed, ragged and boneless, onto the filthy cement.
Not even the rats dared approach. I was a beacon of rot, a blend of old agony and fresh shame.
I think I slept, or maybe I just blacked out and woke with a migraine that made my teeth ache.
A warmth pressed to the glass: Caiden’s hand. He was still there, still a living, breathing animal.
He hadn’t looked away. He hadn’t left. I wanted to hate him for it, but for once I couldn’t tell if I was more afraid of being seen or of being left alone in the dark.
At the end of the day, I was grateful for Caiden’s presence, and I realized that we could never go back to how it was when we were kids.
The darkness between us had been eclipsed by some sort of strange new light, a bond forged in pain.
THE PRESENT
AMELIA
I lost count of the days down here. Some days, we were left in the darkness. Going hours without anything to remind us that we were alive.
Shadows screamed and slithered around me. Sleep never came easily. When I did fall into an exhausted slumber, my dreams were filled with nightmares of blood and terror.
I would wake soon after, not being able to fall back into blissful unconsciousness.
For so long, I found comfort in the quiet embrace of the darkness, a solace found in the stillness of night. But now, it was a daunting terror, lathered with haunting shapes and sounds.
The hunger in my body was pushing me over the edge.
