My Life: Congrats, You Lost Me

Chapter 25 - My Person

****August 30th****

Cole walks into the room, just like ever other day, but this time he walks close to me. No, not this early.... Why would you do this twice. Once is already sick you bast-

"You've gathered a lot of regulars. You are really bringing me in a lot of money," he says. His voice like this, from this close, makes me sick. Every day there are 5-7 of the same guys who come in night after night. 4 of them have wedding rings on their fingers. "I thought I'd give you a bit of a treat..." He walks over to the plate that always sat just out of my reach that was full of food. He had replaced it since the first day. I hadn't eaten since then. He gave me water in a styrofoam bowl he sat on the floor and kicked to me. 

He kicks the plate to where I can reach it and backs up against the wall. "Eat," he says. "Unless you'd like to keep starving yourself. It might make ya look prettier. You know, without all that extra weight."

I glare at him and he moves from the wall, towards the plate. I shuffle over to it just as he's about to reach it. He manages to grab it from under me, lifting it above my head. There I was, begging for food, all chained up like a dog to it's master. He uses a plastic knife to push a single bean over the edge of the plate and onto the disgusting floor in front of me. I frown for a moment but eat it anyway. My stomach growls louder than it had in a while.

"Oh does the little girl want some more," he taunts. He was still fairly close to me, just over a foot from me, holding the plate over my head. He scrapes off a pile of beans and a single cracker, letting them splat onto the floor, the stale cracker shattering against it. I pick it up in my dirty hand and savor the flavor of the beans. 

I look down as I eat, staring at Cole's feet. They were within my reach, and he wasn't much bigger than I was. He bends over with the plate, dumping the rest of the cold food onto the floor. I eat slowly watching his feet as he stands there and watches me.

I already felt better now that I had food on my stomach. I look over Cole and see that he had his gun in his pocket and a kitchen knife hooked through his belt loop. I stand up on shaky legs and Cole looks at me questioningly. "Get on your knees. You don't stand unless I tell you to stand." I kick out with my prosthetic leg, hitting the gun in his pocket. It fires down at his leg and he falls to his knees. He pulls it out of his pocket and aims it at my head.

"Go ahead, I'm your only money, though." He moves his finger to the trigger and my heart starts racing and pounding so loud I'm surprised he couldn't hear it. Sweat was pouring down his face and I could tell his leg was really hurting him. "Shoot me." I hold open my arms and close my eyes. I hear him shuffle around on the floor. I hear him pull the trigger and the click of it too. But next I hear a gunshot ring out through the small building. I open my eyes to find Cole lying in an ever growing pool of his own blood. 

I look around frantically to see where the gunshot came from. Soon enough I can tell without even seeing him. "Jessie." That was all I needed to hear. My ears were ringing, but I saw Allan running towards me from the entrance of the building, a gun in his hand, followed by 5 police officers. He drops his gun on the floor and I hear it thud against the hard wood. 

My eyes were teary and I try to run towards him, but fall when shackles pull my feet from under me. I tug on the rusty shackles angrily. Allan and 2 other officers help break the rusty metal. It didn't take them long to get me out of there. My ankle where the shackle dug into real skin was bleeding and had rust surrounding it.

"Get her to a hospital to get her fixed up," one of the officers said. As soon as I heard hospital all of my joy at being freed died. 

"Becca," I mumble. Allan looks at me a bit confused. I repeat myself, stronger and louder this time. "Becca, where is she." He looks at me sadly and takes my hand. "Oh my God..." I drop down onto my knees, forcing the officers to carry me out into an ambulance they had called. I let out heavy sobs as I'm loaded into the truck, Allan along with me.