Sunny
Drip, drip, drip
Drip, drip
Dripdripdrip
The rhythm matches my pulse - or maybe my pulse matches it. Hard to tell which came first: consciousness or the water's methodical torture.
His favourite game - water dripping while I waited for his footsteps.
My neck screams as I lift my head, muscles remembering different hands, and different basements. The pain feels sharp, recent - whoever grabbed me in the mall knew exactly where to apply pressure. Just like he did.
Not again. Please, God, not again.
Darkness presses against my eyes like a living thing. The concrete floors bite into bare knees, and that realisation hits harder than the drug hangover - my pants are gone. Ice races up my spine as I catalogue what else might be missing, what else they might have done while I was unconscious.
He liked taking pieces of clothing. Said it made me vulnerable. Made me his.
But this feels different. Clinical almost, if violation can be clinical. My shirt's still on - I can feel the fabric against my ribs when I breathe. He would have stripped me completely. Like to watch me shiver.
The air sits heavy in my lungs, damp and stale. Each breath feels like I'm drowning slowly. My arms stretch wide, chains rattling when I test them - another echo of old nightmares. Four years of running from him, and I still end up chained in darkness.
Did he find me? Track me down despite the measures I've gone through? Despite the guards and gates and guns?
"Think," I whisper, voice bouncing off unseen walls. "This is different. It has to be different."
But is it? The setup feels like his signature - the anticipation, the helplessness, the dripping water driving me slowly mad. He always did love psychological torture before the physical pain began.
I try standing, my skull cracking against low concrete. The chains jangle their mocking music. I'm not Captain America, my mind supplies hysterically. Just the stupid girl who thought she could outrun her past.
A phone rings - my phone - somewhere behind me.The sound triggers fresh memories:
No service in the mall.
Rough hands, chemical-sweet cloth.
"Sorry, sir-" looking up into cold eyes.
Black mask, red stripes like bleeding eyes.
The mask... that details snag like a hangnail. He never hid his face from me. He wanted me to see every expression, wanted his face burned into my nightmares.
"Different," I whisper again. "This is different."
But somehow that's worse. Because if it isn't him... who the hell has me? And why the show? The chains, the water, the darkness - it's too choreographed. Too familiar, yet foreign. T
The phone rings again. Someone's looking for me.
Someone's going to be too late.
Just like last time, whispers the voice that sounds like his. Just like every time.
My breath comes faster, the camp air insufficient. Spots dance in darkness as panic claws up my throat. The dripping water speeds up - or maybe that's just my fracturing mind.
He always said I'd never really escape. That someday he'd find me, remind me who I belonged to.
But the mask. The mall. The men who moved like professionals, not like his brutal chaos.
YOU ARE READING
Pyro
عاطفيةLet me tell you my story, the one about how I died. Don't worry, though. I came back. They say when someone shares their story, they're sharing their burden. Seeking someone to help carry the weight that bends their shoulders, hoping their troubles...
