Deprived

Chapter 26

Night filled the room and met Maize on the bed, awake. Her eyes stung from all the crying. Her mind was muddled with dead-end plans of escape. Earlier, when she'd thought about escaping through the window, she'd seen three agents patrolling the grounds. Stinking Capital agents were always around! They were like demons ready to pull you down to Inon. But even if they weren't there she wouldn't jump. If she did take the leap, it would take the use of her arms, her legs at least. More likely it would take her life.

The more she thought about it, though, the more appealing jumping sounded.

Nelly had been checking on Maize the entire evening. Maize was so distraught about having to marry President Aberdeen that she cried out with rage that she would kill herself because death would be more palatable.

President Aberdeen couldn't just kill her, he had to torture her. And marrying him would be torture. A never-ending cycle of entrapment. A dis to freedom and female independence.

According to the analog clock on the wall, gray-lit by the moonlight, it was 1:00 a.m.

Maize scraped her body up from the bed for the hundredth time. She needed to move. When her brain got too still, strange thoughts entered her mind, thoughts of having sex with President Aberdeen on their wedding night and then murdering him afterward. In her mind, she was walking, bound, to the gallows with a smile on her face to meet a horrible death. She had gone mad.

Outside, above the night-darkened trees, the lights in the city shone brightly in the distance, and she wished she could escape there. She wished she could be anywhere but in the President's mansion, a prisoner, waiting to be his young bride. Her stomach churned at the thought.

Nelly tried to get her to drink a stinky cup of some concoction that would soothe her upset stomach. But after two sips of the hot liquid, she pushed the drink aside to get cold.

There were no more tears left in her. She'd cried for an hour straight after Nelly told her. She'd never been much of a crier, but all the years of stored-up tears had finally broken out. She'd cried until she was all cried out. Now, her eyes felt tight, and her cheeks were stiff from salty, dried-up tears.

She looked at the picture on the wall. A veil of darkness hanging over it. Nelly had given her a tiny device to use after lights-out. Maize picked up the torch from the night table and clicked it on. The beam of light searched the wall for the painting, and when it was found, Maize walked towards it. It was so beautiful. Her eyelids fluttered as she stared at the white animal near the river. She thought she saw it wave hello, but when she looked again, it was still. All she ever wanted was to live in a place like that with her family and be free. A right all humans should have.

She sat on the edge of the bed. With one hand covering her face. What angered her the most was that she had no way of escaping that place. She was like a pet. She was in a cage.

The door remained locked. Even though Nelly sympathized with her, she dared not leave it unlocked.

Her only option was the single window in the room, but that was shut tight and it was too high. A death trap.

The insides of her mouth were dry and the smell of her own breath was unbearable. She headed to the bathroom and poured herself a glass of water. She took small sips afraid that if she drank too fast, she'd vomit.

The muscles throughout her body ached. Instead of sitting on the bed, she paced the floor some more. Clicking the torch in her hand on and off. If only she could click a button to fix her life, heal Liam, bring her father back from the dead. But life wasn't that easy. It was always a challenge.