Crack Attack: A Collection of One-Shots and Other Disturbing Shit

Proofless - Chapter 6

            Cool fingers are spindling over my wrist and I snap back into consciousness with a violent jerk. Dark brown eyes are watching me in concern but all I can do is curl in on myself in annoyance. He knows I don't feel well and I don't feel like playing Wheel of Fortune with the rest of my body at this particular moment. I want to get out of here just as much as he does, but I wouldn't be a whole lot of help during the great escape when I can barely walk to the bathroom. I haven't given up - I just can't handle any more fun and games with Erica right now.

"Go back to sleep. I need at least another day or two, man. I still feel like I'm going to be sick." He looks disappointed but he nods and sprawls out next to me again, folding the label from his water bottle over and over again in different shapes as we listen to the car rumble out onto the street and out into the world.

---

"You know what time it is, cuties. It's time to clean up for dinner!" I try not to laugh at the disappointed look on Preston's face as he has to pack up our game of Lego Battleship on his side of the bedspread mountain. What the fuck have our lives become? I try not to look directly at her to keep her from getting suspicious and flying back into full rage mode, but I notice that she brought down the usual dinner tray with a dish towel covering it this time. Whatever this is going to turn into, it's nothing I want to be involved with. I just hope that my stomach can handle me eating her mystery meal."Snap it up or you're gonna be late to your date!"

"What?" Preston asks stupidly, and I can't say that I understand it any more than he does. She tsks playfully at him as she walks over to check around him for a weapon and unlock his chain and he just looks even more confused.

"I knew you'd forget about it. I bet you both did, didn't you? Well, that's why I'm here to help you, honey. Today's the four-year anniversary of the first video you two did together. Isn't that exciting?" She is practically dancing on the spot in the doorway as she glances over at me to see my reaction before she goes back to watching Preston do his business. Although it's touching that she knew that, the fact that she is making such a big deal of it is actually starting to scare me. I have a bad feeling about tonight.

"I mean... You didn't hafta do anything for it. It's just a video, you know?"

"But it's not just any video. It's the very first one, you silly goose," she explains as she locks him to the bed and bops him on the tip of the nose. He makes that annoyed snuffling sound that he always makes when he is about to punch me for messing with him. "As your biggest fan, I just can't let the most important day of the year go by without celebrating it with you!" Preston is starting to look distrustful, too. Whatever grandiose ideas she has for us, we don't have a choice but to go along with it. "What about you, Robbie? Did you forget, too?" I need to stay on her good side so she isn't so short-tempered with me all of the time, and this is a great opportunity to start working on that.

"I didn't realize it was so soon. I would have known if I knew it was almost June already." It takes a minute for that to sink in: today is either May 28th or 29th and I remember seeing that it was May 9th on my phone the day I flew down to Texas. When I woke up the next morning, we were down here in this nightmare fuel basement. She pats me approvingly on the shoulder before she turns my arm to see the keyhole, her eyes examining the lock for any sign of me screwing with it again. I would give my house and brand new car to be out of here right now; does she accept that as a method of payment?

"Color me impressed! Maybe one of you does pay attention!" Oh, I pay attention alright, and I notice that her grip tightens on the taser as I pull the chain through the hole and slip past her to stretch my legs. With my luck, I will inherit the blood clots from my mom's side of the family and end up having a heart attack down here while Preston snores and farts himself to death half a meter away from me. She watches me intently like she always does and I try to pretend that she isn't there. Seriously, though. If I died down here, what would she do with my body? It's pretty much guaranteed that if Preston died, she would kill me so that I could go with him. Would she bury me in her backyard and have a funeral with Preston chained up and gagged behind her, or is she too crazy for that? Would she cook me and feed me to him? Would she try to preserve my body on the bed so that we would be stuck down here together forever? I try to wash that train of thought out of my head with cold water from the sink. "Now let's get this show on the road! Sitsitsitsitsit!" She all but shoves me back on the bed and hurriedly locks my cuffs again before she walks back over toward the dresser and... dims the lights. What the holy living fuck is this now?

"Hey, Erica..."

"Shhh shhh shhh. Just sit back and relax and let me take care of everything. This is your special night, sweetie." We are awkwardly leaning back against the headboard with our hands barely reaching our laps because of the chains, waiting like dogs for her to feed us whatever she has cooked up tonight. When she comes over to make Preston reposition himself so that he is partially facing me and directs me to do the same, I can't help but imagine us as being her dolls and her sitting us up in the little chairs on either side of a plastic table. I know I have wondered this a hundred times before... but what the hell is wrong with this woman? She goes over to get the covered tray of food, placing it down in front of us and yanking the towel away before she pulls out her phone and aims it at us and the massive mixing bowl of spaghetti and meatballs. "Okay now, smile you two! Remember today's a special day!" I somehow plaster on a fake smile and take the plastic fork that Preston offers me, now 100% sure where this is heading.

I don't like this.

Not at all.

Does she get off on this creepy shit?

She continues taking pictures of us while we eat in our usual eerie silence, trying not to look at each other so we won't somehow invoke her wrath. After the hair pin incident two days ago, my stomach still hurts and I'm in no mood to gorge myself on dollar store quality food. Her dreams of us ever having a Lady and the Tramp moment together be damned, I can't make myself eat any more. I pretend to be eating when I am actually just picking at the food and she buys it. It's no surprise when Preston finishes both of our shares. When the forks scrape together at the bottom of the bowl, she puts her unlocked phone down on the dresser and gets up to move the tray off of the bed. I wish I could get to that phone somehow - we would be out of here so fast that her fire engine red hair would turn into actual fire.

"And now that you two hungry babies are all filled up, it's time to read the next chapter!"