“Miriam, you’re awake!” he said. He sounded cheerful, even excited. As if he hadn’t knocked her out and kidnapped her. He was wearing a three-piece suit with a pale blue tie.
Miriam moved to brush past him, thinking it was worth trying to just walk out; he grabbed her, pushed her back away from the door. “What do you want, Ben?” she asked.
“What do I want? I want to spend time with you. That’s all.” He pushed the cart over to the sitting area, laid the food out on the table, held a chair out and gestured to it. There was a bottle of Johnny Walker Black on the cart, open and a quarter-empty; Ben picked up the bottle and drank from it, hissing at the burn.
“Ben, you knocked me out,” Miriam said. “I don’t know what craziness you have planned, but it’s not going to work. We’re done.”
Ben crossed the room in two quick strides, yanked her by the arm and shoved her down into the seat. “It’s not craziness,” he said. “I just want to talk to you. I’m sorry I hit you. I know I promised I wouldn’t, and I won’t. I really have changed, I promise.”
Miriam tried to get up, but he held her down. “Let me go, Ben! I don’t want to talk to you. You haven’t changed! This is kidnapping, don’t you realize that? I don’t want to be here. I want to go home.”
Ben’s voice hardened and she caught a glimpse of the rage behind the mask of calm. “You’ll stay here, and you’ll listen to me. We’re going to have a nice dinner together, do you understand?” Ben sat down unsteadily, unbuttoning his suit coat and taking a long swig from the bottle of Johnny Walker still in his fist. The butt of a handgun peeked above his waistline; the situation was suddenly much more precarious, with that little detail.
Ben smirked, realizing she’d seen the gun. “You’ll stay, and we’ll talk,” he repeated. Watching him, Miriam realized he was past being merely drunk; that bottle of Johnny may not have been his first.
“Sure, Ben. That’s fine.” Miriam slid her chair in, opened the cloth napkin roll and spread it on her lap: she knew Ben wanted the ceremony, the process, the trappings of niceness. Ben nodded, approving.
He pulled the tops off the plates with a flourish. “I got you a salad, see? You don’t like steak, so I got you a salad instead.” He said this in a tone that almost begged her to see how much he’d changed, that he could listen.
Miriam nodded, picked at the salad with a trembling fork. “Thank you, Ben. That was very considerate of you.” She was too terrified to be able to eat, but she had to pretend, keep Ben happy until she could escape.
“I’m really sorry I brought you here under these circumstances, Miri,” Ben said between bites. “It wasn’t how I wanted to do this. When that…thing with Rachel happened, and when you had to go to the hospital, it made me realize how special you are. I haven’t been treating you very well, I know. I’ve been an asshole, and I’m sorry. You deserve better; I’ll give you better, I promise. This is a new start.”
“Why are you doing this? This isn’t you, Ben. You don’t need to do this. Just let me go.”
Ben froze, hands in the process of cutting steak. He spoke, but didn’t look up. “I don’t know.” This was said quietly, almost under his breath. Then Miriam watched his fingers tighten around the steak knife, watched his veins throb as the rage boiled the surface. “You’re mine! That’s why! Because you can’t just–just walk away from me like that. You’re mine, Miriam.”
“I’m not an object, Ben. I don’t belong to you,” Miriam heard the words rolling off of her lips, but she couldn’t stop them. Reckless honesty was flooding through her. “You can get help, Ben. There are therapists–”
“I don’t need help! I don’t need therapy!” he shouted. But then he subsided, and said more quietly, “I’m not crazy, I don’t need no damned psychiatrist.”
Miriam chose her words with care, knowing she was treading on dangerous ground. “A therapist is different than a psychiatrist, I think, Ben. A therapist would just talk to you, and listen to you. It’s just a way of learning to deal with what’s inside, I think. Beth from work, she goes to one, and she was telling me about how much it helped her–”
“I’m not going to a therapist, Miri. I don’t want to, and I don’t need to.” He took a drink from the nearly-empty bottle, slid his chair back and tossed his napkin on his plate, clearly dismissing the subject. He came around the table and knelt next to Miriam, taking her hands in his. “Listen, I–I’m really, really sorry about the way I’ve been recently. I really do love you, and only you. You belong to me. We belong together.” He reached into his blazer pocket, pulled out a small black box.
Miriam’s heart seized, realizing what he was about to do. “Ben, no, please don’t. I–” she could barely choke the words past the coiled, throbbing knot of vomit in her throat.
Ben squeezed her hand with sudden, savage strength, and she silenced as he continued. “Just listen. I love you. I really do. I know I haven’t been the easiest to be around, but I’ll change that, I promise. I want to be with you forever.” He opened the box, revealing a diamond ring gleaming against the black velvet. “Miriam, will you marry me?”
He said this with a pistol in his waistband, the butt poking out of his jacket, just inches away from her. Miriam was frozen, her breath coming in panting, ragged gasps of panic. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t even blink her eyelids. He was serious, kneeling in the classic proposal position, waiting.
The bubble of fear trapping her in place popped, and she rose to her feet, calming her breath and steadying her trembling hands. “Ben….” she met his eyes, let the fires blaze up hot in her belly as she spoke: “No. I won’t. I can’t. I don’t love you, and I don’t think I ever have. I may have wanted to, and tried to, and convinced myself that I did, but…I don’t. I needed you to protect me from Nick, but I never, ever loved you. And you don’t love me, you’re just doing this to keep me, not because you really care about me.”
Ben was shaking his head in denial. “What? What are you saying Miriam? I thought…”
Miriam backed away, edging slowly toward the door behind her. “No, Ben, I don’t think you did think. Or you thought wrong. What I’m saying is that I will not marry you, not now, not ever.” A few more feet…just keep him shocked a bit longer… “I don’t know what had you convinced that this was a good idea, Ben, but it wasn’t. You kidnap me…and then you propose? Can you see how that might be just a bit…I don’t know…contradictory?”
Ben closed the ring box and slipped it into the inside pocket of his jacket. His hand didn’t quite reach for his gun, but almost. “Miriam, I didn’t kidnap you–”
“Shut up, Ben!” Miriam was breathless with panic, with the baking heat of her anger, with reckless, mad fury. He had a gun and a unhealthy dose of craziness, yet Miriam chose this moment to tell him the deepest truths inside her. “I don’t want to ever see you again. We’re done! I broke up with you that day on the road, when I told you I’d kill you if I saw you again. Apparently that didn’t sink in. I can’t stand you, Ben. You’re selfish and abusive and arrogant. You only care about you, and you always have, you just disguised it when we first met. I’m done, Ben. Goodbye.” The door bumped against her back, and she grasped the handle in leaf-shaking fingers, turned it, gave Ben one last glance, and ran out. She heard him bellow curses and fumble with the doorknob, heard the door slam open and he was behind her, running after her.
Miriam ran, bare feet slapping against the carpeted floor. She was running aimlessly, following the endless hallway until she came to a bank of elevators. Ben was close behind, so she threw herself against the crash-bar to the stairs, noting with something like horror that she was on the 10th floor. She’d made her gambit, now she had to play it through. She could have stopped and let her magic burn Ben to a crisp, but the last time she’d let her magic out she’d nearly destroyed Comerica Park. If she did it here, with the flurry of emotions running through her, she might very well make the entire hotel go up in flames.
No, Miriam refused. Sh
e had to deal with Ben without it.
Stairs flew under her feet with reckless speed, bruising her heels and sending lances of pain up her legs and into her back, but every instinct inside her screamed for her to run, run, run. Just before she fled, she’d seen the mask of calm on Ben’s face slip, the facade of sanity crumbling to show the pounding rage and thundering madness that lay beneath. He wouldn’t let her go, not without a fight. And a fight would mean destruction she wasn’t ready to allow.
A stitch in her side stole her breath, slowed her flight. She heard Ben on the stairs above her, growling and cursing. After what seemed like a lifetime of descending stairs, Miriam finally burst out into a hallway filled with people coming and going. Most were heading in the same direction, so she darted in among the crowd, hoping to lose Ben in the crush of people. The crowd dispersed around her into the main floor of the casino, and Miriam was inundated with sound, overwhelmed by jangling slot machines and people chattering, card dealers jabbering their patter; she was choked by a thick haze of cigarette smoke, the cloud of nicotine rolling in a visible fog. People were everywhere, milling and chatting and drinking and smoking, playing slot machines and hunched over card tables.
Miriam glanced behind her to see Ben standing on his tiptoes, scanning the crowd. He saw her, and set out after her, shoving people aside, spilling drinks and earning hateful looks. Her dress made her stand out, she realized, the silver standing out in stark contrast to the street clothes of the rest of the crowd. She’d hoped the bustle of people milling around her would be a hindrance to Ben, but it was proving as much so to her as to him. She wasn’t as willing as he was to push and shove people out of the way, but rather was trying to duck around and slip between. The crowd was a source of both comfort and hindrance in another way as well: she knew Ben wouldn’t try anything too crazy surrounded by crowds and watched by cameras and security officers.
Ben was closing in, his suit coat buttoned now, concealing the weapon, but she could still see the butt distorting the line of his blazer. A rush of panic shot through her; she wasn’t sure he wouldn’t use it, even here. He was striding with bullish purpose through the crowd, eyes fixed on her, rage burning, jealousy and hurt and confusion stamped on his face. He hated her now, and he wouldn’t stop until he had her. God knows what he would do if he caught her.
Miriam, turned back to glance back at Ben, ran smack into a huge, sweating, pear-shaped man in overalls, dragging an oxygen tank with cannulas inserted in his nose, a pumpkin-round face covered in a thick beard that hung over his broad chest. Beady brown eyes glanced down at her and he said in a gasping voice so deep it made her bones rattle, “you in trouble, little miss? She saw Ben a few feet away, shook her head and pushed past the man. She heard him stop Ben, heard the man grunt in surprise as Ben shoved him to the side. It was enough of a distraction to let Miriam get farther ahead, and that enraged Ben even more. There was a clear area ahead of Miriam, a break in the crowd; she broke into a run, not caring about the stares she drew. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, flowing in brown waves behind her as she ran. She wanted to glance behind her to see if she was getting any farther away, but she was afraid of running into someone again and losing her momentum.
Miriam realized she had no idea where she was going. She was running blindly, trying to get away from Ben. The casino was mammoth and expansive and maze-like, row after row of slot machines all lined up and marching away into the distance, panic blinding her from seeing directional signs. She passed by a darkened lounge with blue low-lights, people swilling booze from highballs, oblivious to her plight. She rounded a corner, glancing back as she did to see Ben less than ten feet away, striding confidently, his hand in the pocket of his suit coat, holding the pistol most likely; there was a smirk on his lips, a quirky smile of hunger complementing the glittering anger in his eyes. He saw her glance at him, and his grin widened. He curled a finger at her, beckoning. She shook her head in denial automatically, not meaning to respond.
She slammed into yet another body, this time a smaller, softer one. Miriam was doused in wetness, slewed around to see an attractive, Arabic-looking girl about Miriam’s own age standing in shock and outrage, an empty tray in one hand and a pile of foaming beer bottles on the ground, her skimpy black waitress uniform soaked. The waitress was wearing a bodice that did little but prop her breasts up, and an apron covering her thighs, and black tights, but little else. Miriam wasn’t sure she was actually wearing a skirt at all, just a shirt and the apron. Despite the fear gripping her, Miriam felt a strange kinship to the woman, a connection she couldn’t explain, a kind of familiarity, even though Miriam was sure she’d never seen her before in her life. The waitress was a little taller than Miriam, beautiful in an exotic way.
“Do I know you?” The waitress asked, curiosity written plain on her face. The waitress touched Miriam’s forehead with a finger, and Miriam felt a bolt of electricity rush through her, felt her magic respond to the girl’s touch, reaching out for the similar magic stretching in a silvery tendril toward Miriam’s. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Ben stalking after her, the pistol in his hand now, held against his leg. Slipping on the spilled beer, Miriam stumbled into a run, bounced off another man, barely hearing his yells of surprise.
A bank of doors appeared in the distance, and Miriam headed for them, Ben hot on her heels now. Miriam shoved an overweight older black woman out of the way and slammed into the door, felt it bounce off of her as she caromed into a wall. She was in the back area of the casino, an employee’s-only section of white walls, white linoleum floors and white drop-tile ceilings, a clean, too-bright hallways startlingly silent after the clanging bustle of the casino. Alone now, Miriam sprinted flat-out, her feet slapping loud, her breathing ragged. She heard the doors behind her bang open, fragments of casino-noise and shouts of “you can’t go in there!” following Ben as he pursued Miriam. He had the gun out now, and he lifted it to point it at her, still stalking with long space-eating strides after her, not running, not hurrying. Miriam heard her own panting breath mix with whimpers, smelled the pungent aroma of Pine-sol from the freshly-mopped floor. The hallway ended in a T-intersection and Miriam crashed into the wall and turned left, arbitrarily, hurtled around another corner and another, each time at random, hoping to lose him. She heard Ben’s feet pounding now as he ran to catch up; she heard the unmistakable ratcheting click of the pistol slide being pulled back and released, spurring her on.
She saw an exit sign bathing the hallway red and reflecting off the floor, and Miraim bolted through it to emerge in the low gray darkness of a parking garage, cars scattered between yellow lines, ramps leading away up and down. Miriam headed for the downward ramp, hoping it would lead her outside. The door banged open behind her again, and she knew Ben had found her. At least she was alone out here. If Ben caught her, she’d use her powers. She might destroy a few cars, but no one would die.
No one besides Ben, that is.
Lower and lower she ran, the cars fewer down here. By the time Miriam realized she’d trapped herself, Ben was already blocking the up-ramp, pistol out and held against his leg. He also stood by the the only stairwell. Behind was a concrete wall, blank and damp; a battered green Cadillac sat a few feet to her right, and beyond that the dead-end of the very bottom of the parking garage.
“Nowhere else to run, Miriam.” Ben was gliding toward her like a lion stepping with careful paws through tall grass toward an unsuspecting gazelle. His eyes betrayed him, as they so often did. He was hungry for her, fingers curling at his pants leg as if around her body, as if clutching her throat. Miriam backed away from him, clutching for the magic within her. Terror made her fumble, made the fire sputter. She was desperate, reaching for it, only to find it elusive, now that she finally truly needed it. Ben was within arm’s reach and Miriam ran, only to feel his fingers close around her arm and yank her toward him.
“Ben, don’t,” she pleaded. She knew it was futile, but she pled with him anyway. “I’m s
orry, Ben, I’m sorry….” Ben didn’t answer. He shoved her backward, his heel slipped behind her leg so she tripped to the ground, bashing her head against the concrete floor. She saw stars spinning above her, felt warmth spread out beneath her head. There was a dull glimmering spark of heat in her gut, and she struggled to remain conscious, reached for the guttering fleck of magic, felt it recede, buried by pain and drowned by terror. She wanted to scream with frustration, but the sound trapped in her throat in a hard lump, choking her. Her vision was wavering, spinning. Ben was straddling her, a black folding knife in his hands; the blade was between her breasts and slicing down her belly, ripping open her dress. Ben cut the dress off her arms and wadded it in his hand, pocketing the knife.
“I’m glad you ran, Miriam,” Ben said. “You made this all a lot easier, and a lot more fun.” Miriam thrashed and kicked and bucked, but Ben just laughed and rode it out, seeming to enjoy the fight. There was no Ben left in his eyes, only madness now, only desire and hate and anger.
“I figured something out, Miri,” he said in a conversational tone. “The phone, the car, Rachel? That was all you. You made that happen, somehow. I don’t think you meant to, but you did. So I was thinking about, trying to figure out how it had happened. Then you went all Human Torch on me, and it started to make sense. My sito used to tell me stories as a kid, before my dad brought us over here. She was old school, my sito. She believed all sort of crazy things, demons and angels, djinn and ifrit and all that. She would spit and make hand signs against evil, and she prayed five times a day facing Mecca. Some of those stories had djinni in them. You know what djinni are? Genies. According to sito, djinni were tricky, powerful, and dangerous creatures, but their powers varied from legend to legend. Maybe, I thought, just maybe sito wasn’t so crazy after all. Maybe there is stuff we don’t see, you know? Maybe there’s some truth to the old legends.” Miriam tried again to buck him off, screaming and kicking. Ben shoved the wadded dress into her mouth, prying it open painfully wide. He shoved the cold mouth of the pistol against her forehead, and she went still.
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