On cue the rope snagged against her thumb joint, which stopped her hand from sliding out. All hope fled.
She tried squeezing her fingers into the smallest fist possible, but still the rope would not move.
No! No! No! she silently screamed while pulling with all her might.
It came out.
Samantha was so stunned that she failed to realize her right hand was sitting in her lap, and that the rope around her left had fallen to the floor.
She was free.
Panic hit.
She turned her head toward the door while her right hand rubbed the rawness of her left, and then the left of her right. If it’s unlocked I could - she failed to finish her thought, the idea of freedom after the longest day of her life was almost too much to bear.
Oh God, what if I’m home tonight. Please God let me get home.
She crawled over to the door and used the handle to stand. Her legs shook with exhaustion while her hands shook with excitement. Her mind was racing.
Please . . .
She twisted the handle.
It was unlocked.
She pressed her body against the cool metal door and then eased herself back and pulled. It opened less than a centimeter before catching on something.
No, her mind said weakly.
She pulled again.
The door didn’t get past the obstacle.
NO!
Somehow the door was locked on the outside, only not through the knob. Something was attaching it to the wall.
Samantha fell to her knees crying, her fists clenched, her mind screaming with frustration and sadness. Jimmy had planned for this. The little bastard had put some kind of lock on the outside just in case she got free, and now, once he found out she had tried to escape, he would punish her.
He would do -
Knowing how awful it would be Samantha couldn’t finish the thought and collapsed into herself on the floor, her body rolled into a crude ball, her hands hanging onto her knees. Sobs echoed through the room while tears dampened her face and then the floor.
If only she had fought him off in the beginning. If only she had been more alert while walking home. If only this, if only that; the list could go on and on.
The word “fought” stuck in her mind.
She brought her head up from her legs as an idea made itself known. Her wet eyes crossed the room and stared at the shelves of food and water.
I could fight him off.
This hung in the air as if spoken out loud, waiting for criticisms. None came. Using an object from the shelf as a weapon, or the shelf itself, would give her an advantage Jimmy was not expecting, which meant he would not be prepared for it, which further meant she could easily get the upper hand. All it would take was one good solid blow to the head and Samantha could be free. One hit as he walked through the door and Samantha would be on her way home.
In her mind she saw Jimmy toppling over as the blow knocked all sense from him. She would then run through the door and out into the yard. From there she would get to the road and head home.
HOME.
The word sounded fantastic, unlike anything else she had ever wanted. Never before had it seemed like such a wonderful place. All she had to do was hit him hard enough. Once down Jimmy would have no chance at catching her and she would get home.
What if it doesn’t work?
The question went unanswered. If she thought about failing it would fail, and if she failed the consequences would be far worse than anything her mind could conjure up, of this she was sure.
* * *
When one thought of bullies they often pictured them living in nasty rundown houses or trailers whose outside walls were just a preview for the horrors inflicted upon them within while growing up, something which they were always trying to make up for at school by picking on the weaker kids. This wasn’t the case with Brett Murphy. Instead his house was like all the others in the neighborhood areas of Ashland Creek, alas, a bit worn from the harsh winter, but nowhere near as rundown as Hollywood would have pictured it. To everyone that knew the family too his parents didn’t seem that bad, and in fact, they weren’t. Like most middle class families they had provided Brett and his older brother Brian with a wonderful childhood, one free from the dramas that many unlucky kids faced all across the country. They also had stayed together despite a marital affair that had occurred when Brett was ten. None of it mattered, though, because Brett still had grown up bad, and, judging by the path he was taking, would continue to be bad well into adulthood.
Of course Brett never thought about any of this, nor would he have cared if someone pointed it out to him. In fact, all he cared about at the moment was making Jimmy pay for elbowing him in the gut earlier and now that he had his bike he was pretty sure that outcome would arrive soon. What he wasn’t counting on was it happening so quickly, or that his older brother Brian would side with the two fuck heads.
It all started the moment Brett pulled into the driveway, parked and started to get the bike out from the backseat - the piece of shit had actually scratched his car while the three had been getting it in, which pissed him off even more.
Brian was sitting on the front porch when Brett pulled up drinking a soda, relaxing after a day spent getting in shape for the military, a career he would be starting in June after having talked to a recruiter in Haddonfield a month earlier - all because the construction company he had been working for ever since he graduated in 2004 had gone bankrupt.
“Where’d you get the bike?” Brian asked once he saw Brett struggling to get it out of the backseat.
“I found it,” Brett said.
“Really?” Brian’s voice was skeptical. “Who did you ‘find it’ from?”
“What do you care?” Brett asked. The bike popped free, the tires bouncing on the ground.
“I really don’t, unless it was ‘found’ from someone who didn’t know they had lost it and might want it back.”
Brett shook his head and started walking the bike toward the house. A second later a car pulled up to the house. Shouts followed.
Brett turned and saw Jimmy and his little brother coming up the driveway, the brother shouting at him to give the bike back.
“Make me!” Brett shouted back at the stupid sophomore.
“Oh we’ll make you you motherfucker,” the brother said, his pace quickening, fist clenched.
Brett wasn’t sure if he could actually take the two of them by himself and quickly started running with the bike toward the backyard. Once back there he would grab the shovel he knew was lying by the rear of the garage. Brian stopped him before he even made it to the fence gate.
Jimmy and his brother were soon there as well.
“This is your bike?” Brian asked while looking at Jimmy’s brother.
“No, it’s his.” He nodded toward Jimmy.
“The fuck it is, I found the bike in the woods,” Brett said and tried to jerk the bike away from Brian.
Brian’s grip was too strong and the bike stayed within it.
“After you saw me lean it against the tree to take a piss,” Jimmy said.
“Bullshit. You were nowhere near it, unless you were hiding in the woods because you know you can’t take me in a real fight.”
“I’ll take you right now,” Jimmy said.
“Whoa,” Brian snapped. “No one is taking anyone.” He turned to Brett. “If the bike is his give it back to him.”
“But - ” Brett started.
“I said give it back to him.”
“What’s going on out there?” Brett’s mother echoed from the porch.
“Nothing, Mom,” Brian said. “Just a little high school misunderstanding that is being worked out.” He turned back to Brett. “Right?”
“Fine!” Brett snapped. “I’ll give it back.”
Brian let go of the bike. The moment he did that Brett rammed it into Jimmy’s shins and then tried to jump on him, but tripped over the bike.
“Fucker!�
� someone shouted and the next thing he knew someone - probably the little brother - was on top of him pressing his face into the grass with both hands.
“Hey, get off him,” Brian snapped.
Brett felt the weight removed from his back. A second later he felt himself being pulled to his feet and yanked away from Jimmy and his little brother. “Stupid idiot, let me go!” Brett snapped.
Brian didn’t and said, “Take your bike and get out of here.” He then pushed Brett to the ground and said, “Don’t you realize you could be arrested for taking his bike like that? What were you thinking?”
Brett didn’t answer him, but not out of defiance. Instead all he could think about was Jimmy and how badly the shithead was going to suffer for this. He was going to get him for embarrassing him in front of his brother. He would make him pay.
* * *
Megan got in an argument with her father during dinner about the Samantha King situation and eventually stormed out of the room. How could he not realize it? Samantha King had been kidnapped. Anyone could see it.
Unfortunately, most in town had not seen it. Megan had realized this at school and that had been part of the reason why she was so pissed off. Everyone just agreed that a kidnapping couldn’t happen in Ashland Creek and that Samantha King had run away. But it simply wasn’t true. She would not have run away.
In the backyard Megan sat on the porch swing and looked out at the surrounding forest wondering if Samantha was out there somewhere? Hadn’t she once heard that most kidnap victims were kept within a few miles of their home?
Most kidnap victims are killed in forty-eight hours.
This thought didn’t settle well in her head. Samantha was her best friend and the thought of her being killed by someone was too much to bear. Not to mention the fact that other terrible things were probably happening as well.
If only her father would do something about it. Then, if Samantha were close by they would find her. What if she was out in the woods at that very moment, tied to a tree or something? Why couldn’t her father just get together a search party and explore a little?
Why couldn’t her father act like a real police officer? Why couldn’t he just investigate a little?
“Megan?” her father called.
“What?” she asked without turning toward him.
Her voice changed his mind and he went back inside. That was fine by Megan. There was no way for her to convince him of what she knew so what was the point in even talking?
Slowly the sun began to set. Megan watched it for twenty minutes before getting up and going inside. Her butt and back hurt where the wooden slats had been pressing into her. She rubbed the indentations away and went up to her room where she grabbed her car keys and then headed out to the driveway. It wasn’t unusual for her to just go for a drive through town without telling anyone, so her parents weren’t too concerned when, for the next hour, they didn’t know where she was. No one thought anything terrible had happened. Terrible things didn’t happen in Ashland Creek. Small towns were perfect.
* * *
Jimmy’s right shin had a nasty gash in it, yet didn’t hurt all that much once the pain of the blow to the bone went away, that was, until he poured peroxide all over it in the bathroom at home. That hurt like a son of a bitch, but then was over as abruptly as it started. Finished with that he and Alan played some Goldeneye battles, all of which Alan dominated.
“Wow, I kicked your ass, just like I started to kick Brett’s ass once he was down on the ground,” Alan said after winning the second game. They had played in a neutral level - neutral meaning neither one had a clear advantage, this one being Facility - and Alan had started out in the bathroom area, which he mined really well and then ventured out in the main areas. Jimmy, whose mind wasn’t really on the game, started on the opposite side of the level and began mining those starting locations, but then ran into one of his own mines killing himself and got thrown into the cycle Alan had created. After that it was one sided for the rest of the game and Jimmy never even came close to beating Alan. “Did you see that dumbass trip over the bike? Man that was priceless.”
Jimmy smiled.
“And that guy that was there. What was that like his brother? Man that guy is cool. He like totally realizes Brett is a loser. Good thing too because he lifted me off him without any trouble and probably could have kicked both our asses if he’d wanted to.”
Jimmy knew that lifting Alan was no easy feat because even though he was only a sophomore he was no lightweight. The two of them worked out together all the time, and while he was no body builder by any stretch of the imagination, he was stronger than most in the school and could handle himself pretty well.
“The only problem now is that I really have to watch my back because he is going to be royally pissed,” Jimmy said.
“Oh, I know,” Alan said.
In the movies bullies would back off once they realized their victims had outgrown them and could stand on their own two feet. Brett wasn’t like that though, and Jimmy doubted most real-life bullies were. No. Rather than seeing this as a fight he couldn’t win, Brett was going to escalate things and would keep escalating them until they got out of control. It was just the way he was. And given how stupid he was he would act without thinking, which could cause a serious problem. Jimmy wouldn’t put it past the guy to ram him with his car when he was on his bike just because he would think it was funny and would not consider the resulting consequences.
“The only way to stop him for good is to beat the living shit out of him to the point where he is hospitalized for a while,” Alan continued. “That would probably teach him a lesson, especially if he had to pay the bill.”
“Maybe, but more likely it would just make him more determined to do something worse, or I would end up in jail for assault,” Jimmy said. “I’m telling you, he’s like one of those dogs that’s too far gone to be redeemed and needs to be put down because he won’t stop biting people to death.”
“Ah man, you just insulted some poor dogs.”
Jimmy smiled.
“Another game?” Alan asked.
“Nah,” Jimmy said with a shake of the head. “I think I’m gonna call it a night.”
“Oh, okay. I’d probably just beat you easily again anyway, so for the sake of your ego it’s probably better not to do another round.”
Jimmy laughed and said, “I’ll get you tomorrow.”
“We’ll see,” Alan said while putting the controllers back on the shelf. “We’ll see.”
“Good night.”
“Night.”
Only Jimmy didn’t go to bed. He tried, but thoughts about that nights situation kept him up, as well as thoughts on the entire Samantha King thing, ones which made sleep impossible, especially once the sexual fantasies started. Once that happened he had no choice but to get up and take care of the situation.
* * *
Alan was still awake when Jimmy left around eleven thirty and wondered what he was doing. It was one thing to go riding once or twice a day on the bike, but after eleven at night, and after already riding a few times that day, it started to get weird and was making him think something else was going on. Something that Alan couldn’t even begin to comprehend because Jimmy was so different from everyone else, different to the point where normal teenage activities just didn’t fit with Jimmy.
* * *
Samantha had taken the shelf off the wall and then sat down with it, the long board cradled in her arms ready to be used as a weapon.
The waiting was difficult.
With her back to the wall she listened to every second tick away in her head, knowing that at any moment Jimmy could walk through the door. At that point she would spring up and connect the board with his face and then run like hell.
She slowly drank a bottle of water while waiting and ate several different bags of stale chips and pretzels. The cans of food she left alone because of the risk they had spoiled. What she didn’t know was that the Hood fami
ly had been concerned of this as well and had gone about getting foods that wouldn’t spoil, along with military rations of all kinds. Samantha didn’t realize that the small square packages on one of the shelves were the same type of rations soldiers over in Iraq and Afghanistan were consuming, and really she didn’t care. The chips and pretzels were fine and she ate them rapidly to fill her aching stomach.
The worst part of the wait came when she suddenly needed to use the bathroom, and it wasn’t urine that wanted out. The urge hit and there was no denying it, yet she still tried to wait.
Any second Jimmy could walk in and if she wanted to surprise him she could not be squatting over a bucket. But then ten minutes, and then fifteen minutes went by, and the urge became more and more powerful.
If you had gone earlier you would have been finished, she scolded herself. Now if she went there was the likelihood that Jimmy would walk in.
Samantha could not wait, however, and retrieved the bucket. She put it up against the wall where she had been sitting so she could press her back against the concrete as leverage. Leaning against the wall to her right was the board. If Jimmy came in while she was going she would grab it and nail him with it. The fact that she would be naked with stuff coming out of her would have to be ignored. Escaping this situation was too important, and people who saw her running from the Hood place would eventually understand. Actually, being half naked would be better because people would notice her.
Using the bucket as a toilet when she had to pee was disgusting, but mild compared to what she did now. Taking a shit with your back braced against the wall into a bucket was pure humiliation - even when alone.
Jimmy did not enter while she was doing this and she even managed to clean herself off with a rag. Samantha was then back against the wall, waiting, board in hand, bucket as far away as possible.
And then she dozed off.
There had been a ten-minute battle in which her eyes fought to stay open, but in the end they fell shut and her body drifted off into a deep sleep.
She dreamed of Jimmy chasing her. The air was thick and made it difficult to run for her, but not Jimmy and he quickly caught up. And then she was back in the room hanging from her wrists, naked, while Jimmy forced himself into her. His penis then became a knife and suddenly started slicing her body open upward. The sound of skin tearing filled the air.
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