My Way to Freedom

Chapter 5: Recovery

Four hours later I awoke to a slave driver (not the one who tried to kill me yesterday but another one) busting through the door. “039826 are you aware that you have not showed up to work today and you are therefore liable to twenty-five lashings?” he asked me with a sneer.

“Oh, really?” I asked sarcastically, giving an innocent smile “I had absolutely no idea that that's what happened when I don't show up for work. Thank you for informing me. Now, if you can kindly place my door back on its hinges, then that would be just lovely.”

For a moment he just stared at me, evidently trying to process what just happened through his thick head. When he figured it out he smiled, obviously amused by my attempt to confuse him. “Nice try, why aren't you at work today?”

“Well, maybe because I can't move!” I bared my teeth at him as I lunged toward him but I shrunk back in pain when the skin on my back stretched and a scab burst.

“And, why can't you move?” he asked, apparently not knowing that my back had been covered with scabs and bruises.

Barely keeping from rolling my eyes I hardened my jaw and rolled over on to my stomach and to the floor, showing him my back. He must have been relatively new because he gasped slightly when he saw the still barely bleeding gashes that rested upon bruise after bruise on my back that peeked out of my bandages. “Is that enough reason for you?” I said rolling back on to my mat with an attitude that I shouldn't have been using, but I didn't care because if he sentenced me to more whippings I would die and finally be out of pain.

“Yes, quite enough, thank you. You will return to work tomorrow and if you don't show up you will be liable for your actions. This time and this time only you are excused of your actions.” He then lifted his hat “Good day to you 089824”

“Excuse me, it's 039826 or Kinzie if you'd please.”

“Of course 0 8. 98 2 4.” he said stressing the numbers he got wrong as if taunting me to try and make him stop,  but I remembered my last attempt to make him stop and it hadn't necessarily turnout well for me. I then told myself I would avoid the subject with Ashley at all costs.

……………………………………………………….

“Kinzie?” I heard Ash's tiny voice at the door as she walked in.

“Yeah, I'm in here”

“Okay, go ahead and get up, we have to change your bandages again.” Ash said and inwardly I groan. This usually hurts when I actually am able to feel and think, but I got up anyways and steeled myself for the bandage changing.

Ash walked in with the roll of bandages and I stood up a little straighter, trying to show that I was ready and confident, but inside I really was not. All I wanted to do at the moment is lie down, but Ash wouldn't accept that so I stood up straight. As she pulled off the existing blood soaked bandages I tried not to struggle, and I really tried not to make any sounds of grief or pain, but I can't help but give a small yelp of pain as one of her fingernails scrape one of my delicate scabs.

“I'm sorry, are you okay?” she asked as soon as that yelp escaped my lips.

“I'm fine,” I said, then seeing her still concerned face I say “Really I am, you just barely grazed one of my scabs” I said, biting the inside of my cheek to keep from any more sounds. This was the most difficult when she started wrapping the new bandages tightly from where my armpits start to where my torso ends. “I'm going back to work tomorrow,”

“What? NO! You should stay in bed for at least two more weeks if you want your back to heal properly.”

“Ash,”