captor ❀ daniel seavey [ON HOLD]

5 ; backstory

"alison? alison!" a hand waves at me through the glass walls of our rooms. i shake my head, my mind clearing and forcing myself back to the unforgiving reality i was living.

"i've been waving my hand and saying your name for five minutes," zach says, worried. "i never thought you'd come out of whatever trance that monster put you in."

i begin to respond, but before i can, i drop to my knees as visions flash through my mind and a headache swirls into my skull. a brick wall makes itself known in my brain, the word "bexley" being repeated over and over. i see a dark haired boy, though the vision isn't clear enough to be able to clearly recognize his face. i assume it's daniel regardless. he pushes on the cemented stones, causing another of them to protrude from the rest. my mind begins to fog as he pulls the stone from the wall, and a light gleams before the headache and visions disappear suddenly.

"ali!" coll yells, then upon realizing i'm beginning to stand again, asks "are you okay?"

i hesitate, ultimately avoiding her question with my own. "what's bexley?"

jack's breath hitches. "what did you just ask?" he says, voice dark and almost emotionless, but pain being evident through the wavers in his pitch.

"bexley. what is it?"

"how do you know about her?"

i shake my head. "her?"

he repeats his question, this time seemingly a bit angry. "how. do. you. know. about. her." he had his knees loosely tucked to his chest, arms wrapped around his legs and his eyes locked on the floor, not moving an inch.

i choke on the tension in the air. jack coughs, insinuating he was getting impatient. "i... i think something happened while i was with daniel. i saw something... i think i remember seeing something, and i remember the word bexley. i wasn't aware it was a name-"

"bullshit!" jack stood up, no longer hiding his stress and anger in the slightest. "no one remembers what happens when they're with him. he knocks you out with gas and then drugs you up more when he takes you. it's impossible to remember anything with him," jack's voice cracks, and suddenly his tone shifts to one that's fragile. "so be honest. p-please... how the hell do you know bexley?"

my heart ached for the boy. whoever this girl was meant a lot to him, it was evident and utterly sad. "i swear to you, i'm being honest. i don't remember most of what happened, but that's the little bit i do remember."

"dammit," jack grunts, slamming his fist on the plexiglass between our rooms.

"she was important to you, wasn't she?" coll almost whispers, trying to be gentle.

jack sighed, "bexley was my sister." katrina and i look at each other. i make a face as to say, 'did you know about her?' and she responded with one that implied a 'no idea.'

"she was beautiful. absolutely breathtaking. i remember i used to find it so strange how pretty she was. she stuck out in our family, my parents were average looking, and me? i was always the ugly kid. isla, my littler sister, was pretty, but even she never compared to bexley." his eyes well up and he chuckles a bit. "it was kind of funny, because we'd go out in public, and she stood out so much that people would always ask if she was my girlfriend. we'd do that thing where we both repeated no over each other's voice multiple times and tried to explain. but that was before..." a tear slips from jack's eye. i was astonished. this was the most jack had said the entire time i was here, and yet it was the most intrusive story he could possibly be telling. i was curious as to what happened, but i knew better than to ask.

"before what?" zach said, voice cheery. he was just glad there was finally a genuine conversation happening with jack, but boy, was he too stupid for words to explain.

"zach!" katrina muttered, widening her eyes at the boy. "hush!"

"you're such a dweeb," coll joked.

"it's okay," jack said, taking us all by surprise. it was so unusual to see jack being so open and vulnerable. for the short time i'd been here so far, he was secluded. cold. jack took a deep breath in. "before she died."

"oh. wow," mumbled zach, once again earning audible nudges implying he should be quiet.

"she was in a car crash with a drunk driver. died on impact, but the driver of the other car survived. we got money from the court case, but money doesn't make up for losing someone you love."

a stream of apologies and condolences was thrown jack's way from the rest of us, and he dismissed them all.

"i don't need pity," he said, wiping a tear from his flustered cheek. "alison, have you noticed how lenient daniel has been with you?" i shrugged. "he's treated you better than he has any of the rest of us," jack states. coll and katrina chime in to confirm that claim. "you know why?"

i shake my head, a million different thoughts running through my mind. i get a nervous feeling in my gut.

"because you look just like her."

my heart stops and my eyes widen. "what?"

jack sinks to the floor. "spitting image. and daniel, up there? daniel was in love with her." i softly gasp, and katrina takes a seat on her bed.

"that's wild, man," coll lightly chuckles, emphasizing the craziness. "hella bonkers."

"i think daniel's easy on you and treats you nicer because he sees her in you," jack sighs, "i know i sure as hell did from the moment you got here." it was then i realized why jack had resented me so passionately; why he couldn't even look me in the eye, and why he snapped at me for the slightest things. it hurt to look at, talk to, see me. me being here was him reliving the loss, reliving the grief, reliving even the best memories. he didn't want to grieve again.

"watch out, alison," the curly-headed boy's words took me by surprise. "be careful."

"of what?"

"daniel," he looked me in the eyes, vulnerability and honestly flaming up in his expression. "bexley is the entire reason daniel started this experiment in the first place. he believes that in our lucid dreams, we're fully awake. we don't dream in his eyes, we visit the other side. he wants to use us to get in contact with her once again. and if he sees her in you..."

coll speaks up. "...you're going to be his biggest target."

author's note
I UPDATED CAN I GET A ROUND OF APPLAUSE FROM THE MASSES