Yours insanely

78.Blood in the water

You felt your body swaying, as if you were floating, when your eyes opened slowly again.

It was a small yacht. You'd seen the exterior when you regained consciousness last evening.

You remember sunset, as if the light in your life was disappearing too.

The cabin you were left in was dark.

Your hands and feet were still bound, but the tape on your mouth fell off at a point when you were kicked in the mouth.

The blood you tasted the last time you were awake had dried, only leaving a metallic aftertaste behind.

For more than a year, you escaped even being near his shadow.

But the last few hours- or days, you're not sure, made up for it.

You lay awake on the floor for a while, all the energy in your body lost, despite the drug having worn off long back.

The door opened suddenly, making you flinch before you started to scramble back to the wall.

Well, you attempted to.

Your hands had been tied behind your back the whole time.

Every part of your body hurt, and try as you might, you couldn't move an inch.

Your uncle walked in and stood before you, staring at you for a few seconds.

Bending your head down and away from him, you tried to pretend that he wasn't there.

You thought you could fool yourself into believing that your life was perfect all along.

Everyone else is happy, so why can't you be too?

This was just a nightmare.

You felt clarity when he grabbed you by your hair, starting to drag you out.

And it was a nightmare indeed. One that you were living.

Your worst fears become your reality once again.

Some kind of light made you squint your eyes, and you couldn't even react any more than that.

Then there was confusion when he let you go, walking away as your body slumped down on the wooden floor.

You felt too many emotions again, and you couldn't comprehend any of them.

They were never enough. Always too much. And those emotions made you a simple, complicated, perfectly flawed mess.

Your uncle stood dangerously close to the bow of the yacht, holding a bucket and emptying its contents into the ocean.

"How difficult it must've been," you heard his voice and tried opening your eyes again.

It was sunlight, you realized. The light that made you squint your eyes.

"To leave home, all the memories attached," he went on. "Going to a new place, trying to start a life there, and then not even looking back at that home."

It was then you noticed what he'd been dropping in the water. Live bait, and dead too, their cold brine appearing red.

The swaying made you feel sick, and your stomach was hurting from an earlier blow too.

Your uncle walked to the other side of the yacht, maybe thinking you couldn't see, but he was clearly within your line of sight.

Despite the grogginess, you watched as he pulled out a gun, trying to check if there were bullets.

You noticed the way he tried to pull back the slide before hiding it in his woolen sweater again.

And for the first time in almost a day, there was a tiny flicker in your eyes.