by Bryan Smith
And she just hadn’t been able to help it, the words springing to her mouth too fast to call back. “Oh, just get on with it, Toad-man.”
“Toad-man” was what many at SIMRC called Mr. Cheney in private conversation, and it was an apt description. He was short and thick through the middle, with doughy flesh below his chin and too-pink lips that made him look like…well, like a toad.
Seething, he spoke through gritted teeth: “What…did…you…say?”
In those moments, she’d felt like she was hanging from the edge of a high cliff by her fingertips. It was easier to just let go. She lashed out again. “You heard me, Toad-man.” She looked over her shoulder then and saw how red his fat face had become. “I don’t buy any of your bullshit. You’re right, you know. Satan’s got his big red claws in me, and I fucking love it. I can’t wait to suck his giant red cock in hell.”
Looking back, she couldn’t believe the things she’d said. She should have known she was going too far. But she could not have known what was about to happen.
He drew the paddle back and swung it forward with all his might, swatting her hard enough to send her sprawling against the desk. Then he did it again. And again. Hitting her harder than anyone had ever hit her before. Over and over. It hurt. Oh fuck, had it hurt. She cried. Begged him to stop. But he kept hitting her. And he raged at her, calling her all sorts of names, the worst she’d ever heard. Like nothing else she’d ever heard from the mouth of a supposedly righteous man. Then she heard the clatter of the paddle hitting the floor. Next she felt his weight on top of her, pressing her against the desk, robbing her of her breath. The feel of his hard-on brought a rush of bile to her mouth. She begged him to stop, but he wouldn’t. He lifted her dress and pushed her panties down. Dropped his trousers and forced his way in, raped her right there in his office, the son of a bitch, holding his meaty hand over her mouth to muffle her cries. She was a virgin. There was blood. It was all sweaty and messy, and it was the worst thing that had ever happened to her. The worst thing that could ever happen to her, and after it was over she wanted to die.
And he told her, “You must never speak of this to anyone. Not ever. If you do, I’ll hire someone to kill you.”
She believed him and made the promise he wanted to hear. Then she returned to her room and began to plot her escape. She couldn’t bear the idea of staying here even one more day, much less through the end of the school year. That night she’d managed to place her tearful call to Wayne. The next day she’d realized this was a mistake. Wayne couldn’t help her. He was just a kid, as powerless as she was. She would have to do this herself.
With maybe a little help.
She clicked the button on her watch again.
10:07.
She sighed.
And then she heard a very soft sound from the other side of the door, something that might have been the tread of feet on the tiled floor. A light, cautious sound. Then the sound stopped and she heard someone breathing. She curled her right hand into a fist to still the trembling.
Then she rapped softly on the door three times.
The signal they’d arranged.
She glanced down and saw the silver doorknob began to turn. There a small metallic snick and the door began to move inward, muted light from the hallway spilling into the room. Then she saw his face and tears of joy filled her eyes. She rushed through the opening and threw her arms around him, burying her wet face against his neck.
David Heinrich, a gay punk kid from Chicago, returned the embrace and whispered in her ear. “Hush, girl. We need to get moving.”
She stepped out of the embrace and stared up at him, still smiling. “I know, I know. I’m sorry. I see you got the key.”
David grinned and flashed a wedge of silver, the key he’d used to unlock her door. Then he closed a palm around it and said, “Mr. Closet Case got very distracted while I was blowing him in the broom closet this afternoon.”
Mr. Closet Case was what David called Henry Wilkins, a day shift guard at the SIMRC.
Melissa slung the strap of her bag over a shoulder. “Lucky for us. Will that get us out the back way?”
David shrugged. “Don’t know. Not sure we’ll even need it after this.” He put a hand on her shoulder, steering her away from the open door. “Enough yakking. Let’s move.”
Melissa nodded. She didn’t need convincing on that part. She turned to reach for the doorknob when a lamp inside the room suddenly snapped on.
“Hey!” the voice of Lindy Wallace, her roommate, cried out. “Melissa, what’s going on?”
Melissa groaned, her dreams of escape dying abruptly in that moment.
Lindy’s voice was so loud. Someone would hear. Someone would come.
Lindy was sitting up in bed, her arm extended toward the lamp behind her. Her eyes were bleary and she was dressed in her pajamas. She hopped out of the bed and padded over to them. Melissa remained rooted to the spot as the girl approached, helpless to do anything else, paralyzed by panic. Lindy stuck her head through the open doorway, gawked for a moment at David, who glared at her, and then turned a disbelieving gaze on Melissa.
“Holy shit. Are you guys escaping?”
Melissa heaved a sigh. No point denying it now. “We were, at least until you opened your big mouth.”
She glanced up and down the hallway. Still empty. But someone was bound to show up soon.
Then Lindy surprised her. “Let me come with you.”
Melissa blinked. “Um…”
“Fuck.” David invested the one word with enough scorn to make both girls flinch. He turned Melissa around and pushed her back into the room. He pushed the door most of the way shut, holding it open with a finger. Then he directed a sneer at Lindy. “Throw some clothes on, girl.”
“Yay!” Lindy bounced up and down like an idiot.
Melissa wanted to slap her.
But the girl surprised her again, quickly doing as she was told. She rooted through the drawers of a dresser and was fully clothed in just over a minute.
David opened the door again and peered around its edge to check that the way was still clear.
It was.
And they filed out of the room, David shutting the door behind them. They hurried down the empty hallway, clattered down the staircase, and within moments had made it to the bottom floor of the building. Melissa was stunned by how smoothly their exodus from the building had been to this point.
Then they reached a rear door, where they paused long enough for David to peer through a frosted glass window.
He frowned. “Huh. That’s weird.”
Melissa pushed him aside and peered through the same window. Her mouth dropped open. It took her a moment to process what she was seeing, and even then she could make no sense of it.
She looked at David. “What the fuck is up with that?”
David shook his head. “I don’t know. They look…all fucked up.”
8: SOMETHING IN THE WAY
The rain had slackened some by the time the SIMRC building came into view. The flashes of lightning and booms of thunder became less frequent. But the journey back to the center had been slowed by a bit of rotten luck. A late model Cadillac had slipped into position in front of them from a side road early on and had remained there the whole way back, maintaining a steady pace of about fifteen miles beneath the speed limit as the two vehicles crawled along the snaking rural road. Wayne fumed and hurled curses at the Cad’s driver. Because while it made sense to exercise some degree of caution on a road as dark and windy as this one, especially in these conditions, this was taking caution to insane extremes. The weather was improving. There were no other vehicles on the road.
It was maddening.
Though he had been tempted to pass the Cad, Wayne had elected to play it safe instead of letting his frustration get the better of him. It was still very wet out there. He didn’t want to go slewing into a ditch when Melissa was counting on him. So when the two vehicles went around a bend and the SIMRC
building loomed into view, he breathed a sigh of relief. “Finally.”
Steve turned off the radio and lit the cigarette he’d just wedged into a corner of his mouth. “You know what your ride needs, bro? Side-mounted missiles. Some James Bond kinda shit like that.”
Wayne grunted. “Yeah. No shit.”
The Cadillac’s left blinker came on, a steady red pulse in the darkness.
Steve flipped his Zippo shut and dropped it in a front pocket of his denim jacket. “Well, shit. Look where slowpoke is going.”
Wayne laid a hand on the gearshift. His heart began to gallop. What he was about to do was both reckless and highly illegal. Doing this would be the true point of no return. He could go to jail for what he was about to do. Thinking about the hard reality of the situation terrified him.
Fuck it.
“Hold tight.”
Steve frowned around his cigarette. “What are you…oh…oh shit.”
He hurriedly pulled on his seat belt as Wayne shifted gears and slammed the Cherokee’s gas pedal to the floor. The Cherokee lurched forward, its rear end fishtailing for just a moment on the slick street, then it gained speed rapidly and bore down on the still-slowing Cadillac.
Then there was a tremendous crash and the boys’ bodies jerked against their restraints. Steve’s cigarette popped out of his mouth and he let out a whoop. The Cadillac’s driver lost control of his car for a wild moment and swerved across the double yellow line. Wayne downshifted and backed off as the Cadillac swung back into its proper lane and then moved over to the shoulder of the road. Wayne slowed and pulled up behind it.
The Cadillac’s driver’s side door popped open and a fat man in a cheap brown suit heaved himself out. The man was bald and had a pudgy pink face. He looked kind of like a human toad. He shook a fist as he approached the Cherokee, his mouth moving as he screamed words that were lost to the swirling wind.
Wayne cranked his window down and in a moment the man’s pudgy face was filling that space. “You goddamn careless punks. Look what you did to my beautiful car.” He waved a hand at the Cadillac. Wayne looked. The Cad’s rear bumper was dented pretty badly, but he doubted he’d inflicted anything more than cosmetic damage.
Wayne shrugged and smiled. “Sorry about that, dude.”
The fat man spluttered. “You…you…you’re sorry? That’s it? You worthless, rotten punk. I saw you speed up. You did that on purpose. What’s the matter with you?”
Wayne’s expression hardened. “I need you to help me with something, toady.”
The fat man’s eyes went wide and his face turned scarlet. “Wh-WHAT!?”
Steve snickered. “Whoa…dude’s gonna stroke out if you’re not careful, bro.”
“Fuck being careful. It’s time to take care of business.”
“TCB, I can dig it. You and the King.”
Wayne lifted the Colt.45 from his lap and pointed the barrel at the man’s nose.
“Like I said, you’re gonna help us with something. You’re a teacher or something at the center there, right? Well, you’re gonna get us in.”
The man’s mouth moved up and down, but no sound came out. Then his eyes rolled back, displaying only white, and he fell with a heavy thump to the cold, hard ground.
Wayne shook his head. “Lame.”
He opened the door and stepped out into the rain.
9: DIRTY DEEDS DONE DIRT CHEAP
The door was adjacent to a large laundry room. This part of the building was where a lot of the blue collar behind-the-scenes work was done. Also housed here were the main maintenance facilities, kitchen, and a dingy break room where the lowly wage slaves dined on cheap microwave dinners and vending machine snacks. The teachers and so-called spiritual advisers rarely ventured down here, which was why Melissa was so shocked to hear Sybil Huffington’s cultured voice emanating from the far end of the hallway that stretched to her left.
Her head jerked in that direction, away from the view of the staggering drunks—she assumed they were drunks—outside. The hallway ended at a wall and then branched to the left. Miss Huffington’s voice was coming closer, from just around that corner. And now she heard a man’s voice. She couldn’t make out what was being said, but it hardly mattered. Any moment now the queen bitch of the SIMRC would step into view and she and her friends would be in a world of shit.
She seized David by a bicep and dragged him away from the door. His gaze had still been riveted to the drunks outside. He spun toward her, confusion writ large in his angular features. Then he too heard the voices.
He grimaced. “Aw, shit.”
Lindy let out a squeak and hurried past Melissa, back the way they had come. Melissa followed with David in tow, but she had to wonder what the point was. They were stupid to have even tried this. There were too many obstacles and too many unforeseen complications. They were going to get caught, and in a short enough time she would again find herself at the mercy of Mark Cheney.
No.
She wouldn’t let that happen, ever. She’d sooner die. And if that sick son of a bitch ever dared to whip out that tiny dick of his in her presence again, she was going to tear it off. Rip it off and feed it to him.
At the end of this stretch of hallway was a large metal door. Through that was a staircase. They could go back that way and get back to their rooms in a hurry. In theory. But it looked like Lindy had no intention of doing that. Good for her. The chick was ditzy as hell, but she had guts. They followed her through an open archway into the tiny break room. It was about the size of one of the classrooms on the third floor and was dominated by several small round tables and a number of gray metal folding chairs. Three vending machines stood against the far wall. There was nowhere to hide, except maybe under the little tables, but only a blind person would miss three teenagers huddled under those things.
David ran a hand through his wavy hair. “We’re fucked.”
“Maybe not.”
Melissa threw herself flat against the stretch of wall just inside the archway and the others quickly followed suit. They stood very still for long moments. The hallway outside remained quiet for a time, but soon there came the click of heels on hallway tiles. The voices were audible again, though it was mostly Miss Huffington talking. Her tone was animated, verging on agitated, and for a moment Melissa was sure their escape attempt had been detected somehow. But as the voices drew closer—and as the words uttered became clearer—she realized the source of the headmistress’s ire had to be something entirely unrelated to them.
“Something has to be done about the man, Gerald, and I think I’m being damned generous.”
And now the man spoke, his deep voice clear for the first time. “I dunno. I don’t like the bastard either, but two grand is an insult.”
Melissa frowned. She turned her head to glance at David, who shrugged.
The footsteps came to an abrupt halt.
Melissa couldn’t help herself.
She edged sideways a bit, turned, and peered around the edge of the archway. She knew this increased the odds of being discovered, but something within her felt compelled to find out who Miss Huffington was talking to and what they were discussing.
The guard was in the standard black and gray uniform they all wore, but Miss Huffington looked not at all like her normal self. Frowzy. Her hair was a mess and she appeared to have dressed hastily. She looked like a person who’d just jumped out of bed to tend to some emergency. And judging from her general demeanor, this was indeed the case..
“Two thousand dollars is a lot of money, Gerald. Either accept the offer or I’ll find someone else to do it.”
The guard snorted. “Right. He’ll be here any minute, you said. You don’t have time to find someone else.”
Sybil Huffington’s clenched fists were shaking. She clearly ached to slap the man. “You listen to me. I simply can’t afford more right now. If you require an additional payment of, say, another two thousand, it will have to wait another month.”
“Rig
ht. I happen to know you’re not that hard up.”
Sybil unclenched her hands and appeared to take a deep breath. She breathed out slowly and forced a faint smile. “So be it. I’ll do it myself. I’ll even drag his worthless carcass out to the woods and dig a hole for him myself.”
The guard laughed. “Yeah, okay. In this weather? You? I don’t think so. Listen…there is one more, ah…thing…you can do for me to sort of, well…seal the deal.” He laughed again, but this time there was a nervous edge to it. “A non-monetary consideration.”
Sybil’s smile vanished, but she took a slow step toward him. “Yes?”
The guard coughed and ran a hand through his hair. Definitely nervous now. “Yeah, well, you know…I’ve always sort of had the hots for you, and, um…well…”
She took another step toward him. “I see. Understandable.”
Then she dropped to her knees and reached for his zipper. In another moment his fly was undone and his rapidly hardening cock was in her hand. She looked up at him. “Is this what you had in mind?”
A visible shudder rippled through the guard’s entire body. “Y-yes…”
Melissa watched with a mixture of disgust and odd fascination as the headmistress drew the man’s organ into her mouth. Her breath grew short. She gripped the edge of the wall to steady herself. She wondered what was wrong with her. Maybe it was just that she’d never watched two adults engaged in a sex act in real life before. This wasn’t like in the movies at all. There was no swelling music, no creative photography. Just this blunt animal act. The man’s face contorted as if he was in great pain, but the sounds coming from his mouth indicated otherwise. And then, hardly more than two minutes after it had begun, the act was finished. Miss Huffington stood and wiped her mouth with the back of a hand while the still-shaking guard clumsily zipped himself up.
Melissa was stunned to realize she was shaking every bit as hard as the guard. She felt queasy. A sheen of sweat had formed on her forehead. Then she had a mental flash, like a scene from a too-vivid nightmare, except that this nightmare was real, a memory she wished she could excise from her mind forever. She was bent over Mark Cheney’s desk, his heavy weight pinning her down, making the desk blotter beneath her slide every time he thrust against her. She remembered the blandness of the wall behind the desk, adorned only with a signed diploma from some southern university and a framed and autographed picture of President Ronald Reagan. She’d never be able to look at Reagan’s face again without thinking of those awful moments in Cheney’s office.