“Shira, really, this isn’t like you. It’s a beginner’s mistake—don’t answer him at all,” said the other voice. It was Alex, the pretend cop from before. “I have an idea! Send him to me! I’ll teach him a lesson that will shake him up properly.”
“I don’t know.” She hesitated. The idea of handing her patient over to Alex didn’t feel right to her. But she felt so helpless in the present situation. Maybe Alex’s different approach could help her solve the problem.
“You understand that he’s not a slave you can inflict pain on, right?” She stated the obvious.
Ben was filled with terror. The last thing he wanted was to be in Alex’s hands.
“You’re giving this too much thought. Trust me. I know where my limits are when it comes to ‘normal’ people. You have my word that I’ll treat him gently but determinedly.”
“Umm! Umm!” Ben yelled futilely into the gag and shook his head. He realized Shira was apprehensive and that Alex was taking advantage of her weakness. He didn’t trust Alex.
“Quiet!” Alex barked at him.
Ben became silent.
“You see. He needs more assertiveness. You’re too gentle with him.”
Shira was convinced.
“Umm! Umm!” Ben went wild again.
“Come. Help me,” Alex said to a few more people who had apparently been in the room that whole time.
Ben wasn’t going to leave that easily. He went wild, writhing his body so that the other men couldn’t lead him outside the house. Finally, they grabbed him under his armpits so that his feet couldn’t touch the ground. He kicked in the air with all his might, trying to drop himself to the floor.
“Ah!” Alex blurted. One of the strongest, highest kicks hit his nose as he tried to help restrain Ben, and it began to bleed. He tried to remain calm as he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and held it to stop the flow.
“It’s fine—I’ll handle him. Don’t worry,” he told Shira with restrained anger after she tried to help him. He was trying to hide the anger boiling inside him.
Shira nodded.
“Carry on, then. Bring me the leg cuffs,” Alex ordered.
Ben wriggled and yelled into the gag again.
Shira watched with concern. Ben refused to surrender to the cuffs—on the contrary, he writhed and resisted. One leg was secured but the second one managed to escape. A moment later, four hands grabbed it and it, too, was bound. Another pull on the cuffs toward his back, and his legs were folded and tied to the arm strap behind his back. This time, three men carried him outside. Shira remained inside.
Alex ordered his men to place Ben on the hot ground. He bent over and turned Ben on his side. “You’re going to have fun with me,” he said menacingly.
He got up, made sure Shira was no longer in sight, and kicked the bound man’s stomach hard. Ben didn’t expect it; thus, he couldn’t defend himself or fold in. He yelled futilely through his gag and writhed with pain.
Alex checked Ben that there were no signs of a wound and then said, “Load him in the back.”
DAY 60
Darkness. Ben couldn’t see a thing. Muffled voices were heard in the background. It felt like nighttime. His stomach hurt as did his diaphragm. He felt terrible pain in his right leg, and the muscles in his arms burned. The sensei’s words echoed in his head. Be glad it hurts, it means you’re alive!
He breathed through the pain and remained in the here and now, in his aching body.
DAY 61
Shira was restless in the days after Alex took Ben away. Doubt began to gnaw at her, the same doubt all those “experts” had tried to warn her of. “Ben is not a regular patient—he is an extremely difficult case.” And now their words had become a reality, thrown right in her face. For the first time since the treatment began, she started to question herself. What if she couldn’t help him change? What if he went through all of that hardship, only to leave angry and frustrated? And what would her colleagues think of her? She would have to take a leave—maybe even return to her old job as a nurse.
These thoughts gave her no respite. To the contrary, they only intensified, stirring her emotions and raising her concern that something bad was about to happen—not to her, but to Ben. She tried to ignore those feelings. To stay calm, she kept telling herself that she trusted Alex. Ben was a tough one, and Alex would keep him in line.
She tried to continue writing new content for her book to keep herself busy, but she couldn’t think of anything. When she finally wrote something, her sentences were elusive and unclear. The past two days had exhausted her, and she couldn’t eat or sleep properly.
DAY 62
At the end of the third day after Ben had left, during dinner, Shira’s cell phone rang and snapped her out of her thoughts.
“Hello,” she replied. The voice on the other end spoke.
“I’m coming right over!” she said, and jumped out of her chair. She grabbed her car keys and left the house.
When she arrived at Alex’s house, she rang the doorbell and waited. No one answered. She decided to walk down a side path that led to the back of the house. Though she had never visited his house before, she remembered Alex bragging about the lair he had built in his backyard. This is where he ran his S&M operation.
Shira arrived at a cave-like structure that covered the entire backyard area. The entrance led to a long, dark hallway, from which loud yet indiscernible voices emanated. She walked determinedly toward a large hall. Her hands were folded at her chest, and her legs strode quickly.
The large hall was dimly lit and looked bizarre and alien to her. The shadows cast on the walls by the contraptions and curtains confused her—she didn’t know where the objects began and where they ended. Metal chains and various types of cuffs hung from the walls and the ceiling. Different sized cages stood side by side.
Alex had managed to achieve a somber atmosphere in his place, just as he described in his stories. His slaves wandered about the place with no clear purpose.
Shira’s resolve was clear and determined: She had to find Ben. She took a few steps into the hall and looked for him, and when she didn’t see him, she advanced further. The large space looked even bigger from the inside, and she almost made it to the other end as she searched. Then she found him, behind one of the curtains.
She gasped.
He was naked, tied to a pole, with his face to the wall. He was wearing a round gag, was wet from head to toe, and was standing in a huge puddle. A metal chain was tied around his legs, and a long bleeding wound marked his back. Alex was standing a short distance from him, preparing to grant him another red mark. Shira shrieked, but it was too late. Alex managed to strike Ben’s back before he stopped. A new and shorter bleeding mark appeared on his back. Ben groaned in pain.
“What do you think you’re doing!” she screamed. “He’s not some slave you can abuse!”
Alex was silent. Something in Ben’s behavior had carried him to a place where he allowed himself to do as he pleased.
“One of your subordinates called me to complain that you’re torturing Ben and not paying enough attention to the rest of them,” Shira said disdainfully.
Alex glared at one of his slaves, while the slave tried to hide his victorious smile.
“Get him off the pole right now!”
Alex nodded to his slaves, and they released Ben. Shira managed to grab hold of him before he collapsed on the floor.
“Bring me a towel! I have one in my trunk.”
The slaves rushed to follow her command.
Ben was nearly passed out. She removed the gag and the chains wrapped around his legs. A few moments later, the slaves returned and handed her the towel. It was fluffy, soft, and fragrant like all the ones she used at home. Shira took it, spread it open, and covered Ben’s body. The floral fragrance rose in the air and somewhat overpowered the urine stench that emanated
from him.
“Come. We’re getting out of here.”
His hands were still tied and his eyes blindfolded. With her help, he shuffled his way to the car with his head lowered. “Take me home,” Ben mumbled, trembling, as they climbed into the car.
Shira didn’t want to respond and disappoint him by saying he was not ready to end the treatment, so she didn’t reply. She buckled both of them in and drove back to her place. She wasn’t aware of his confused, muddled state—when Ben asked to go “home,” he really envisioned her cozy studio.
Shira stopped the car at the entrance to her house, helped Ben out, and led him inside.
The sweet, familiar smell of home reached his nose—the smell of Shira’s house. Here he felt safe. A sense of relief came over him.
She quickly took him to the shower to wash and clean from him the dirt and stench he had accumulated in the past two and a half days. After the shower, she sat him down at the dining table, wrapped in a new towel. She stood behind him, slowly patting his back, and then removed the towel. She examined the open wounds on his back. They were still bleeding and had left bloodstains on the clean cloth.
She knelt down. “It’s going to burn a little,” she said, and applied an antiseptic solution to the wounds. He writhed in pain quietly. After that, she dressed the area with two large bandages.
While Shira was tending to his wounds, Ben’s thoughts and responses were entirely different than before—every stroke or brush of her hand gave him a pleasurable sensation. He told himself that it was merely a physical reaction—after everything he’d been through, his hormones simply reminded him that he hadn’t had sex in two months. The same feelings would have been stimulated by any woman stroking his body now.
She finished dressing his wounds. “Would you like some hot chocolate?” she offered.
He nodded.
They sat down at the dining table, drinking the hot beverage silently.
He was exhausted. His head was spinning, as he had not yet digested the horrible experience he had undergone.
It was silent in the studio for some time. Shira searched for words to calm them both down. She felt very upset and guilty for letting things get out of hand. She was responsible for Ben while in treatment—she was the caretaker entrusted with making sure nothing bad would happen to him. She couldn’t fathom how Alex dared to take advantage of the situation.
“I truly apologize for Alex’s behavior,” she said, as if trying to pacify Ben. “There’s no reason in the world a person should be allowed to hurt someone else intentionally just because he can.”
Another long moment of eternal silence passed. A silence of being shifted from one end of the universe to the other, and upon return to the material world, being hit hard from the inside. Ben felt as if he had been kicked hard in the stomach, just as Alex had kicked him, but this time with greater force and impact. He suddenly understood the full meaning of Shira’s statement.
All these years, he played the role of an invincible man who could hurt people, and he took advantage of it simply because he could.
“Are you feeling okay?” Shira asked worriedly.
He didn’t respond. He simply didn’t hear her. She wasn’t aware of his unsettled state, but many disturbing thoughts raced in his head at that moment. One insight after another—they dropped like chips in a jackpot.
And then came another powerful and no less painful revelation. What had he done to Fred, his best friend, premeditatedly? All these years, he had treated him badly, not knowing how to appreciate what he had. His closest friend, who remained by his side even when everybody else had given up on him. Fred remained honest with him when everybody else turned phony. He couldn’t see it until now, but Fred was his only true friend. Fred had tried to explain and show Ben his mistakes, but Ben refused to acknowledge them all his life.
Ben was disgusted with himself and who he had pretended to be. He didn’t want to live in the same body with the person named Ben Brattler. He was mad at himself, and he was appalled by the man who had put his best friend on the line. He started trembling.
Shira placed her hand on his forehead. “You’re burning up,” she said worriedly. “I’ll get you some medicine.”
But before she managed to return, Ben threw up on the floor. She flinched for a moment, but quickly regained composure.
“Here, take this. It will make you feel better,” she said, and gave him the pill and some water to wash it down with. Then she helped him to his mattress bed.
“Go to sleep. Hopefully you’ll feel better tomorrow and maybe even forget some of what happened at Alex’s.” She went to clean the floor near the dining table.
Ben was no longer thinking about Alex or what had been done to him. All that was far behind him. That was a dull, fading pain compared to the intensity he felt right now. And it was only the beginning.
❧
Ben tossed and turned in bed the whole night. He refused to succumb to sleep, and his body was drenched in sweat. The pill reduced his fever, but he wouldn’t let himself drift off—doing so would be a luxury. No, you will not sleep.
Smoke clouds tilted. Ben refused to sleep; he was overtaken by hallucinations and spoke to himself out of his burning mind.
“You’re not going to sleep until he goes away.” He pointed to another image of himself, which apparently had been there the entire time.
“Do you want me to leave?” The other Ben’s face was painted black, and only his eyes shone. He looked like a terrifying demon. “It’s impossible!” The Ben look-a-like demon laughed. “I’m a part of you!”
“I don’t want you to be a part of me!” Ben bellowed.
“All these years, I’ve taken care of you and made sure you were happy. And now all of a sudden I don’t serve you anymore, so you want to get rid of me?” the demon protested. “I’m not going anywhere, you ungrateful brute!” His voice became distorted. “You think Alex is scary? Let’s see you handle me!” The demon turned into a snake of smoke, writhing toward Ben and jumping deep into his stomach.
“No!” Ben yelled.
He woke up from his dream only to fall back into his tortured sleep. The hallucinations gave him no respite until morning.
DAY 63
Ben’s condition worsened. He rolled from side to side on his mattress restlessly. He wasn’t able to sleep, nor was he fully awake. It was impossible for him to know if he was awake with his eyes blindfolded. He was hallucinating.
Shira’s sense of responsibility was strong enough that she swallowed her pride and notified the head of the organization of his condition.
As she had explained to Ben, the supervisor usually gave the caretakers a free hand to do as they wished; he gave them his full trust and there was no need to involve him in the treatments. The decisions were solely made at the caretaker’s discretion and the patients were their responsibility, but in this case, Shira felt that the situation called for her supervisor’s intervention.
They made plans to meet at her place that same day, and when the man arrived, they sat down in the living room so that Ben wouldn’t hear their conversation.
“I’m glad you could make it on such short notice, Jacob,” she said.
“You sounded concerned on the phone. I had to take this matter seriously. We’re here to help each other. It’s all a matter of trust—I trust you and you trust me. These types of situations may get complicated, and it’s okay to ask for help,” Jacob reassured her.
“Thank you. You’ve always been a good friend.”
He smiled.
“So where do we go from here?” she asked in frustration.
“From what you’ve told me and what I’m seeing now, I believe you have nothing to worry about. This is part of the process Ben is undergoing.”
“Part of the process? What he’s been through at Alex’s?” She was upset, and a tear
rolled down her cheek. She felt guilty for allowing Alex to take Ben.
“It’s okay; calm down,” he said in a fatherly voice. “First off, I spoke to Alex’s group, and he will be reprimanded and warned before action is taken against him. They are strictly prohibited from committing such violence.
“Secondly, I know you. You probably blame yourself, but you couldn’t have known that this would happen with Alex. I couldn’t have either. He’s worked with us for several years and advised us on many important matters.”
Shira relaxed a little. “Maybe it’s better to end the treatment. He’s suffered enough.” She watched Ben through the monitor as he lay shivering on his mattress, wrung out like a wet cloth.
Jacob sighed calmly and took her hand, cupping it with his own large hands. “Look at me, Shira”
She looked straight into his eyes.
“Ben is going through a positive change. An important one. You know him—he’s strong and stubborn like an ox. He can handle it,” he said, then added, “He is a special case indeed, but I’ve seen other patients in a similar condition. This is what the major shift looked like—the moment when they’re suddenly aware of their old behavior and this awareness is hard for them to take. All this would have occurred without Alex’s involvement—Alex only accelerated Ben’s treatment. It may have taken him another month, but eventually, this awareness would have kicked in one way or another.”
She looked at the monitor again to check on Ben. “It doesn’t look like something positive is happening to him.”
Jacob leaned back and let go of her hand. “I may be wrong… Give it another day or two, and if his condition doesn’t improve, call me. I’ll come and take care of everything myself. I’ll take responsibility for his case.”
❧
Shira placed a cold, wet cloth on Ben’s burning forehead. It was late. His condition wasn’t improving, nor was it getting any worse. She did everything in her power to help him. She gave him fever reducers, hooked him up to an IV, and even managed to carry him to the bathroom, where she gave him a lukewarm bath that lowered his body temperature slightly.
The Light Between The Shadows Page 17