Page 6 of Sparrow

That brings me sharply back down to Earth and I pull my thoughts back together, half furious with myself. I don’t have time to stand here staring up at the sky like some sort of dreamer.

Weeks or months ago I was kidnapped, and I still don’t know why. I don’t know where the fuck I am or why I’m here, and that alone is dangerous.

So is the fact that there don’t seem to be many buildings around.

That thought brings a surge of worry with it, and my brain suddenly begins to supply me with all the reasons there might not be buildings around.

My kidnappers being done with me and needing a place where no one can find my body is at the top of the list.

The man in charge pulls me forward and around him, and then shoves me up a walkway, and only now do I realize that I completely missed the other building in the area: a small cottage with a wraparound porch, one light twinkling in the window and honest-to-God flowers in the flower box below it. The thing is charming in a way you only find in the country and is the last thing I’m expecting to see.

I’m used to being kept in what feels like basements and attics while my kidnappers do whatever they’re doing, and this time they’ve brought me to something that looks like it belongs in the English countryside.

What the actual fuck is going on here?

I don’t bother to ask–I already know how that will go–and walk forward when the guy shoves me in the back. I don’t know what we’re doing here or how long I’m going to stay this time, but if it means I get to stay in an actual house rather than a basement, it’s an improvement. Maybe it means things are looking up.

Maybe it means I’ll finally be able to cobble together a plan.

It’s a pipe dream and I know it, but as I walk up the steps to the little house I let myself believe–just for a moment–that it might be true.

The place is decorated like a fucking vacation home. Like one of those tiny cabins in the mountain you rent with your friends when you want a weekend away at the lake. Rough wood floors matched by walls built out of whole logs, and throw rugs that look like they’ve been made by someone’s grandma. A ratty couch takes up one wall and several overstuffed armchairs take up another, and in the corner sits a round table that looks like it’s seen better years. I can see another room on the other side of this one, with a bed taking up most of the space, and to the left sits a tiny kitchen. Barely big enough to hold an oven and a coffee maker.

But a kitchen.

It’s been weeks–months?–since I got to cook.

Months since I’ve had coffee.

The man, of course, doesn’t give me any explanation for any of this. He shoves me into the room and drops a bag of things on the floor with a clunk. “Stay here,” he snaps.

Like I actually have any choice.

“For how long?” I risk asking.

I turn and watch him carefully, looking for any sign that he might actually hit me this time, but he’s too busy sneering at his phone.

“Until someone tells me different.”

He doesn’t give me anything more than that. Just casts me one long, disgusted look, like I’m somehow disappointing him even now, and then turns and leaves me alone, slamming the door behind him.

I watch the door for a moment, confused at that look, and then shake my head.

Even my kidnappers are disappointed in me.

I can’t even manage to get kidnapped correctly.

Maybe they should have asked my father before they bothered taking me. Asked him if he’d ever found me satisfactory in any way or if he’s bother paying them whatever they were asking to get me back.

He would have told them no and we could have avoided this whole mess, and that’s the problem right there. Because I might be his only daughter, and look exactly like the wife who died years ago, but that’s never meant I was worth anything to him.

The opposite, actually.

I turn and make my way into the little house, cataloguing the furniture while I let my mind run through the facts as I know them. I still don’t know who kidnapped me or what they’re trying to do, but I know I’ve been in their hands for some time. I tried to keep track for a while, but without pen or paper, there was no way to count, and in the end it became too difficult. I couldn’t tell day from night or Monday from Tuesday, and the constant failure started to wear on me.

One day, I stopped trying. And I never picked it back up again.

I wonder now, for the five hundredth time, where my friends are. I wonder if anyone went back for Taryn and if she’s been kidnapped too, or if she got away–and if she did, whether she sent anyone after us.