The Incredible League of Goth Pizza Haters (RH)

Part 67

---Sylvia---
In my panic, I tried to move away but ended up falling back to the concrete floor as the door creaked open. They flicked a switch outside of the room and in the new light I saw it was Philip, and he was holding the gun. I froze as he looked me up and down. I tried to read the look on his face.

It wasn't malice or contempt. Not rage. Nothing I would describe as evil. He looked... scared. Almost as scared as I was until he took a deep breath and his expression hardened. In one hand he held the firearm, the other a cup of water and a granola bar. He set down the food and drink and placed the barrel of the gun in his pocket.

"Roll over," he commanded and I didn't move. He moved forward, grabbing me and rolling me on my stomach. I tried to kick him but he held my legs down, digging his nails into my skin. I struggled as I felt him checking the zip ties and pulling them tighter so they felt like they were cutting off my circulation.

"That's too tight." I hissed.

"It's as tight as I want it to be," he growled. He grabbed my hair and I felt my head beginning to throb and pound again. He pressed my head against the ground and I could feel his hand shaking as he just held me like that for what must've been a whole minute. What was happening? I was envisioning him pulling out the gun and pressing it to the back of my head. Pressing down on the trigger and looking away as my blood and brains stained the floor.

Please, not yet. His grip loosened and then I turned my head and watched him rub his face.

He looked so unsure.

My heart was pounding.

Maybe I could take advantage of that.

"Philip," I pleaded and he looked at me, "Please, please let me go. I'll forget all of this ever happened... I won't tell the police..." My words stumbled off and I was searching for more to continue when he fired back, pissed as ever.

"You think I want to have you tied up down here like this?! You think I want to listen to you scream? I'm not like that.. Sylvia.. You don't get it, you stupid woman. You don't fucking understand.." he snapped and I tried to roll back onto my back so I could sit up. He stood up and backed away, sighing loudly.

"I don't want to fucking die down here!.. There are so many things I haven't done yet."
My anger and fear have been facing each other down ever since I woke up here. And fear stepped back to give anger some room. "Philip, you have to let me go or this won't end well for either of us. I have a following on the internet. I have a family and friends and they'll notice if I go missing. They know I come here-,"

"Shut up." His expression remained hard.

"Philip, please. I,-"

"Shut up." he picked up the granola bar and began unwrapping it. I couldn't help but wonder.. I couldn't help but be paranoid that maybe they wouldn't notice. I'm so introverted that I often used to go days without speaking to anyone. My family knows that. Mena knows that. When would they notice that I was gone? Would Ricky notice? Fuck, I was supposed to skype him... "Are you hungry?"

Yes, and I'm dying of thirst.

"No."

"You need to eat. I don't want you dying down here." He looked me in the eyes and I saw sympathy. None of this was making sense. I felt tears beginning to prick my eyes but I blinked them away. I wasn't crying in front of this bastard, not unless I could use pity to escape. If I was going to die down here with just him, I was going to die with dignity.

"Why not?" he didn't answer but instead held the tip of the granola bar out for me to bite. I didn't move and he attempted to reach out and turn my head but I moved away.

"Sylvia.." I wanted to tell him to fuck off but I wasn't ready to test him with that gun. He gave a sigh and dropped the granola bar on my lap and brought over the water. "You can't drink this without hands."

He was right, I couldn't. But he was wrong to think I was that fucking stupid to drink anything offered by him. It looked like water, smelled like water and probably even tasted like it but I didn't want to even take the risk of being drugged again.

I shook my head and he sighed heavily, looking at the door and then back at me. He set the cup down a few feet away.

"Fine then. Drink it later. I know you will. Rohypnol dehydrates the user." he said.

'The user.' 

He made it sound like taking it was a choice.

He stood up and shuffled around, scratching at his skin.

And then he left.

***

I hated that I was so trapped. I thought back to every kidnapping movie I'd ever seen. I tried to recall every method of escape I'd ever heard of, every survivor's' story on the news. I couldn't remember anything helpful. There were no windows and the only light came from the flickering light bulb overhead. I thought about trying to get to it and somehow using it to break free but it was fit into a topless light against the ceiling. Far out of my reach. And the zip ties were too tight. Far too tight and there was too many.

And I was so thirsty. I'd eaten the granola bar already. I knew the brand. I doubted there'd be drugs in it and there wasn't. It was the water I wasn't sure about and still refused to drink.

The door opened again. I was sat up against the back corner of the wall, trying to think about anything other than water.

Philip stepped in again, looked at the discarded wrapper and the untouched paper cup. He sighed and groaned loudly.

"...You can't make this any easier, can you?"

"What do you mean?" I asked quietly. Picking up the paper cup he came over and tried to press it to my lips. I turned away. I expected him to put down the cup or made some remark about how drugging me was somehow so necessary. Didn't expect him to grab my hair and try to force it down my throat.

I cried out and tried to fight him. In the struggle, I knocked the cup from his hand and the water spilled out into a puddle on the floor.

"Goddamnit," he swore and the door opened again.

When I looked up, my world spun off its axis. This man was in jail.. He has been for years. There's no way he could've escaped.. No way... I haven't seen him in ten years.

Yet, there he was. The man who beat my mother. And me. The man who terrorized my dreams and tried to follow me into consciousness. Who gave me PTSD. Who killed my mother.

My entire body went cold. My stomach upheaved and I thought I was going to vomit up that granola bar. A part of my life I'd been repressing was standing in front of me, glaring down. Holding a syringe needle.

The apparitions I saw at night were nothing. They were shadows, glimpses of a past I left behind. I turn my head. I close my eyes and they're gone. The memories I carry from my youth were underwater. Constantly lost and found and lost again. Molded by the waves and the mood they carry. Whenever I went under I could always resurface. Enter a reality that I knew was real. Where monsters couldn't breathe oxygen and I knew I was safe.

But he had surfaced. Broken through the waves and the shadows to stand in front of me. I opened my eyes and he was still there.

The last time I felt terror like that, my mother died.

My body was a numb sort of cold. 

His words passed by me, right over my head. "Hold her down."

He hardly needed to. My body was fixed and insensible. Everything that followed was a mere series of events I could do nothing to stop.

The stinging of the needle.

The pounding of my heart.

The sleep that pressed down on my chest and held me down till I went.