by Yessi Smith
In the distance, Travis and Leeloo are already playing on the beach. Like the reclusive creeper I’ve become, I watch Travis throw a large rock into the water, and Leeloo willingly crashes through the waves and dives down to retrieve it. When Leeloo resurfaces, she swims to shore where she shakes the excess water onto Travis, who throws his head back in laughter. They look so carefree.
My lips twitch into a smile when Travis glances up at my house. He waves at me when he sees me spying on them. Feeling timid from last night, I slightly lift my hand and wave back. He shouts something in my direction, but before I have time to ask him what he said, he takes off running in the other direction with Leeloo running on his heels.
Without thinking about what my limbs seem to be doing on their own, I jog down the pathway we share and run a little faster than normal, so I can catch up to them.
“Hey,” I say when I reach him, pretending as if I were not out of breath.
“Hey yourself,” he responds, smiling at me. “Wanna race?” he asks with a mischievous look in his eyes.
My lungs already hurt from the exertion it took to reach him. What the hell? I could use a little fun in my life.
“Sure,” I reply.
We slow down until we are standing next to each other. My chest heaves while my eyes roam the shore.
“But I say go.”
“If you think it’ll help.”
I squint in his direction, a coy smile playing on my lips. Oh, it’ll help.
Once I give the command to go, I wait a second after he takes off. I then place my foot in front of his ankles, causing him to trip and fall face-first into the sand. Before I can see his reaction, I run. But my laughter slows me down, and I eventually have to stop because my stomach begins to hurt. With my hands on my knees and the wind playing with my hair, I look back at Travis, who’s running toward me like a man on a mission.
I run again, feeling the freedom I sought creep into my heart. Travis quickly catches up to me and places his arms around my waist. He swings me in the air and saddles me on his shoulders, and I’m left staring at his perfect ass. Normally, the proximity of our bodies and me not being in control would scare me, but I can’t stop laughing.
Even after he throws me into the water, laughter continues to bubble out of me.
“You think you’re funny?” he asks me.
Fierce eyes take me, and all the humor evaporates. I know that look. Pleasure coils down my spine as his eyes devour me. I sink myself into the water, trying to collect my thoughts, but my thoughts are as volatile as my heartbeat.
When I come up for air, Travis’s lips crash into mine, and I begin to fall into an abyss I don’t want to escape.
I open my mouth for him, an offering of so much more than he realizes. He is, in a sense, my first kiss. My hands run through his wet hair as his hands caress my back when he lifts me. I put my legs around his waist and gently bite his lip when a moan escapes me.
A wave slams into us, and underwater, I forget everything and panic. Alarms ring in my ears, terrifying me with the sudden realization that I can’t breathe and someone is holding me under the water. Each wave ploughs into me, but I refuse to accept my fate. I fight against him, against the fury of the ocean, and make my way to the surface, away from the arms that mean me harm.
“Let me go!” I yell at him, as I gasp for air, pounding my fist against his hard chest, tears rolling down my cheeks.
Once free, I scramble out of the water, falling several times before I reach the sand. My breathing’s an erratic intake of air, followed by sobbing exhales. With my limbs shaking, I manage to sit on the sand where I rock myself as my body shakes from the memories it remembers, but I don’t.
With the tranquility gone and my nightmares redeemed, the air vibrates with the fear and confusion emitted from my body. Travis sits next to me, and he puts an arm around me. I want to move away from his touch, but he pulls me closer to him until I’m nothing more than a crying mess leaning against his bare chest. He smoothes my hair back and whispers words of comfort until the floodgates close, and the body tremors stop.
Water drifts to where we sit, the sand rolling in the waves. The vastness of the ocean leaves me barren. My fears mingle with the cool breeze, the fragments of a normal life sinking to the bottom of the sea.
Normal. As if I knew what that meant.
“I’m not crazy.” I peek at him behind wet eyelashes and see nothing but concern in his eyes.
“That’s questionable, Holly,” he responds after a moment.
I snap my head at him, ready to defend myself and send him to hell, but I’m met with his half smile, so I smile apprehensively back at him.
“Maybe,” I relent. “But you’re the one kissing a crazy person,” I joke.
His laughter envelops me, washes away the pain and the fear. And I drown in him.
He nuzzles the side of my neck until I look at him, and our lips meet again. Just once, his lips barely touch mine, as if requesting permission from me, so I push my lips firmly onto his. This time, the kiss is slower, less intrusive, and sweeter. But my heart rate and breathing escalate all the same. I’m left breathless when we finish our kiss.
I look into Travis’s eyes and find empathy and a desire to understand. Why he has chosen me, I don’t know. But it seems I’ve chosen him as well.
“I was abducted a few months back,” I say, holding my hand up so that he won’t speak. “Kidnapped,” I state, needing to clarify further. “I don’t remember it, but I was missing for six months.”
With the sea roaring and the wind flirting on our bare skin, I continue to tell him a story I’ve heard dozens of times, only it feels more personal this time. The story’s never told from my point of view. It’s from what the police have assumed to be correct. We know the date I went missing and when I was found wandering through Poppa’s woods. The many injuries I sustained along with the time frame leave us with small hints of what the actual story is.
“So, you don’t remember anything?” he asks, caressing small circles on my back.
I lean into him, ignoring the tightness in my chest and listen to my frayed heart swaying in his direction.
“Nothing,” I respond. “No one.” Just the never-ending darkness that cripples my very soul.
Travis kisses me on my shoulder and shakes his head in disbelief. We sit in communal silence for a long time while Travis digests what I’ve told him.
“I’ll help you,” he finally speaks.
I look back at him, not understanding what he means.
“Together, we can try to help you remember.”
I sigh. So many people have tried to help me, and all I’ve done is disappoint them.
“I want to remember, Travis. I really do, but that’s not why I came here.”
“So, why did you come?” he asks.
To find you.
“So I can figure out how to be more independent. So I can learn how to live again.” So I could find a place where I’m not always letting someone down.
Travis nods his head at me, and I know he understands—or at least he wants to.
“So, let’s live.”
He helps me to my feet and puts his arm around my waist. My heart thuds Travis’s name as he guides us along the shore where we walk in unison. The waves beckon to us, but we continue to walk together. We tread on the path destiny has set for us, his hands searing fingerprints into my flawed heart.
I want to live. I want to experience.
“Let’s go ride a bike.” I beam up at him.
“And by bike, you mean…” His eyebrows arch, mocking me.
“A bicycle, Travis.” I roll my eyes and turn so that he can’t see my smile.
“Just be careful you don’t trip and fall on my kickstand.”
Corny. So corny. But still my smile widens.
I sit on the couch downstairs while Erica sleeps off the sleeping medication I gave her this morning.
She woke up agitated, confused, and scared.
Then, she was angry when the words she wanted to form wouldn’t come out. I tried to explain to her that I understood her, but she wouldn’t listen. She thrashed in our bed, trying to stand up before her body was ready, and I was forced to give her a sedative. My soul battered and bruised, I stood by her, holding her hand, wanting nothing more than to comfort her when her body finally rested. Her silent struggles burned me and I tried to hold back my tears when I looked at her, betrayal so obvious in her gaze.
Today is a bad day. Her doctor holds on to hope that things will get better, and he wants to see her quarterly for MRIs, so he can keep a record of her brain to see if there are any changes. I already know there aren’t any, nor will there ever be. In the beginning, hope lingered in the back of my head, but it was far enough out of reach that I wasn’t completely disappointed when I came to realize my Erica was gone forever.
I get up from my chair and begin to pace while our son, Bub, makes us dinner. In his early-twenties, he is still naïve and young and believes everything’s okay. Erica is in her worst state of mind, one in which she appears lucid but nothing of her remains. Previous experience tells me it’ll last a day, possibly two. Then, one day, she’ll wake up, not realizing the torment we went through.
When I told the doctor about her agitations, he suggested I put her in a nursing home, but that’s not an option—not because it’s my duty as her husband to take care of her, but because I would wither without her by my side. She’s my purpose to breathe, to eat, to function. It has always been this way since the day she saved me from my own demons.
Demons she doesn’t know ever existed because she quieted them simply by existing. Demons that were resurrected the day of the accident. Demons that have grown restless since the girl left.
I’ll find her though. She can’t hide from me, but I hope she thinks she can. I hope she thinks she’s safe in her hiding hole, so when I find her, the glory will belong entirely to me.
Unable to keep the yearning at bay, I found another girl. She resembles Holly in stature. Their hair and eye color are also almost identical, but that is where the similarities end.
Where Holly was a fighter, the new girl gives up right away. I don’t have to break her spirit the way I did with Holly. I don’t have to starve her, beat her, tie her up. I don’t have to do any of that.
The momentary joy I’d felt when I took the girl disappeared when I realized how quickly she’d given up.
All that’s left to do is kill her, watch the life go out of her eyes as she nears her death at my hands.
After Erica wakes up from her nap, she allows me to help her with her bath where I sing to her as I massage my fingers through her hair. After dressing her and settling her in bed, I kiss her forehead while she takes more sleep medication.
Mercifully, Bub leaves shortly after that.
Downstairs, I get a Sprite from our refrigerator and pour it halfway into a cup full of ice. Then, I get antifreeze from the garage and fill the other half of the glass with the poison.
I take the concoction to the shed in my backyard where the new girl is waiting for me. Wrinkles crease the corner of my mouth when I open the door and see her shadow in the corner of the room where I left her tied to the wall with chains.
“Don’t be scared.” My voice is barely above a whisper, but still menacing.
She shies away from me as I approach her.
“I’ve made a terrible mistake.” I try to sound apologetic, and my smile widens when she looks back at me, her eyes full of hope.
My body protests with rage when I sit on the floor beside her, but I want her to trust me. I take the cuffs off her wrists, and she immediately rubs them with her fingers.
“I want to make amends before I let you go.”
She nods her head, and like a well-trained dog, she takes the glass from my outstretched hand.
“I won’t tell anyone.” Her eyes search mine, hope brimming to the surface.
I keep the smile on my face to further appease her.
“I swear, I won’t. Just please let me go.”
“I want to.” I move forward and take one of her frigid hands in mine, not wanting her to put down my offered glass of Sprite.
She moves her body away from me.
“But, first, you have to gain your strength.” I motion toward the glass.
After a hesitant second, she brings the glass to her nose and smells it.
“If you’re able to hold that down, I’ll bring you some food. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” I keep my voice calm, as if I were pacifying an infant.
She nods her head, bringing the glass to her lips, and she takes a sip. She sighs when the cold liquid hits her dry mouth, and she raises the glass further, taking huge gulps of her small serving of death.
“Good girl.” I kiss her forehead, much like I did with Erica earlier, and I take a small whiff of her, so I can remember everything about her before she succumbs to the inevitable.
“Tell me a little bit about yourself,” I say after I take the glass away from her and place it beside me on the floor.
Need sends shivers throughout my body. I want to watch her as she slips from reality. It should only take thirty minutes for symptoms to start.
“We’ll just talk for a little while. Once I know you can hold the Sprite down, I’ll get you some soup. Would you like some chicken soup?” I ask.
She reluctantly nods her head.
“Good. Good girl. After you eat and get some rest, you’ll be free to go home.”
“I’d like that.” She nods again. “Thank you.”
She begins to talk to me about her dad, her brother, her dog.
Who gives a shit?
After forty minutes, her eyes begin to glaze over as her speech starts to slur.
She licks her lips once, twice, three times. “Can I have some water?”
“No.” I shake my head, pleased that she’s begun the journey to her demise.
If I had to continue listening to her godforsaken rambling any longer, I’d have had to speed up her death.
I need this. I need to watch her body deteriorate. I need to see her eyes when she realizes death is upon her. It’s the only chance I have to maintain my sanity.
Before I met Erica, I’d hurt the defenseless—animals, small children, anything that wouldn’t dare utter a word about me. Then, I met Erica, and everything changed. I wanted to be a better man for her. She made it easy and suddenly I felt things I didn’t know I was capable of—love, empathy, worry. After her accident, things changed again. Hurting the innocent wasn’t enough.
I had to hurt the guilty.
And when she left me…
“Can you let me go now?” Her eyes spill over with tears as drool dribbles down the side of her mouth.
“No.” I smile at her confused face.
“But…but you said…” She trails off, her eyes clearing with understanding for only a second before her head falls to the side, and she closes her eyes. “I can’t…” Her stomach convulses once before she vomits. She reaches a shaky hand and wipes her mouth where bile dribbles down the corner of her lips and she opens her eyes to look at her wet fingers.
Breathing heavily, she rests her head on the wall and closes her eyes.
“I wanna go home,” she whimpers.
“Not tonight.”
Knowing she can’t escape, I leave her untied in the shed and grab us both a blanket.
It’s going to be a long night.
Morning arrives with a stream of sunlight gleaming through the cracks of the shed door. I regretfully get up to tend to Erica. Breathing has become difficult for the girl, and she no longer tries to speak. Before leaving, I kneel down before her and grasp her wrist in my hand, her weak heartbeat thumping against my fingers.
I take her sleeping face in my hand and smile at her. “You’ll be home soon,” I promise her. “But not yet. My girl needs her breakfast.”
I stand up and walk toward the door, stealing one final glance b
efore I head to my home. Not wanting to take longer than necessary, I pull out a bowl and fill it with cereal. Although Erica always wants milk with her cereal, I serve it dry, so I won’t have to clean up the mess she’d otherwise make.
I hurry upstairs, loudly opening the door, as my voice booms to wake her. She startles, her eyes fluttering open, and stares at me with eyes still glazed over from the heavy dose of sleep medication I gave her last night. I’ll have to give her more, so I won’t be forced to leave the girl alone in the shed until nightfall.
She mumbles my name and closes her eyes when I quickly brush my lips over hers. She blinks back at me a couple of times and tries to smile. Rather than the gesture warming me, I look away from her, irritated that she has taken me away from my task.
“Time to eat, sweetheart.”
Beside her, I sit down on the edge of the bed and hold the bowl of cereal on my lap. I feed her spoon after spoon of dry cereal. I don’t chat her up like I normally do, and I only stop twice so that she can drink orange juice.
After I wipe her mouth, she shifts her body, so I can help her out of bed.
“Not today, sweetheart.” I kiss her forehead while I stare out our bedroom window to where I can see the shed. “You had a bad night and need more rest. Now, be my good girl and take your pills.”
Trusting me, Erica doesn’t ask questions. She just opens her mouth for me, so I put four pills in her mouth and watch her as she swallows. I kiss the side of her lips and tuck her back into bed, not bothering to stay by her side while she drifts back to sleep.
I hurry back to the shed where I find the girl still sleeping. Her muscles twitch in the darkness. My knees creak when I kneel down beside her, the spasms growing in intensity beneath my touch. A small pool of urine laced with blood spills from beneath her.
It won’t be long now.
I shake her awake, and she opens her eyes, only to close them again. So, I shake her even rougher. Her breath comes out in labored gasps, and it’s difficult for her to keep her eyes open, but I continue to shake her, so I can watch her when her heart beats its final beat.