I'm A Mess || l.c

20- Stone Cold

I opened my eyes to find that I was laying on the hard, stone cold floor. My head pounded and I couldn't bring myself to get up. I must have fainted. It seemed as if I had been brought into the basement.

"She's up," I heard Marissa whisper. I turned to the other side and saw her, Claire, Harris, and James standing in a line next to each other, as if they were an audience and I was merely laying here to provide them entertainment.

"Get up," Claire ordered.

I obliged, not wanting to do anything that would make them want to harm me. My eyes briefly scanned their bodies to check for weapons. There didn't seem to be any on them.

But then, what was I here for?

"So, you're probably wondering why you're here," Harris said, with yet another smirk. "James, the floor is yours."

I watched as James cleared his throat, looking slightly more nervous than he did just an hour ago.

"I ... Lauren, first of all, I just want to say thank you."

"Thank you?" I whispered under my breath. I cleared my throat.

"Thank you?" I tried again. "Um, what for?"

"For not going to the police."

"Huh?"

"Come on, James, you're too damn slow!" Claire remarked as she rolled her eyes and made her way over to me. 

"He saw you that night in Florida, love," she explained as she touched my shoulder and looked at me up and down. What was she doing?

"Didn't think you'd get caught, did you? And he bet he saw you the night after where he had to murder an innocent, too."

"Sheesh, how did you get such a loyal one, J? Still blows my mind to this day that you're not in jail yet," Marissa laughed.

He murdered someone as well?! And that too, an innocent person?! I had to be in some kind of horror movie. Things like this just didn't happen in real life!

My heart sank as I came to realise that not only was the love of my life a drug dealer, but he was also a killer. But, hang on a second. I never saw him murder anyone that night. I was with my friends the entire time.

I decided to relay this information to them. It only made sense that they were bringing me in this basement to either kill me or torture me for knowing that James murdered someone. If I told them I didn't see him murder anyone then, surely, they would have let me go?

Harris laughed hysterically, slapping his hands on his knees as he fell to the ground.

"Are you – are you that stupid?!" he asked between laughs. "It doesn't matter now if you didn't actually see him that night. What matters now is that you know what happened. Sweetie, we can't let you go now that you have this information."

"Guys, we can just sort something out. We don't have to resort to this," James announced to his family with a shaky voice.

"Nah, let her go," Marissa replied, blowing a bubble from her chewing gum as Claire left the basement. Maybe she couldn't bear to watch me suffer?

She came back, holding a gun. Nope, that certainly wasn't it.

I tried to focus, to come up with some strategy to leave, despite the pounding of my heart and my headache, which seemed to get worse as each second passed. I remembered back to that one episode in Grey's Anatomy where Dr. April Kepner had a gun pointed to her and she stopped the shooter from pulling the trigger by telling him her life story. Maybe I could try that here? There was no harm in trying.

"Please. I-I have five sisters. And, and five brothers. My parents don't even know I'm here but I know that they love me and wouldn't be able to stand the news of me passing away. I have huge dreams of one day becoming a doctor, getting married, moving to New Zealand, having four children, a-and living a long, happy life. I'm just a simple girl, with big dreams, who keeps her mouth shut most of the time. A simple girl who is deeply in love with your brother," I declared, as I turned my gaze to James. His eyes were welled up with tears, but he wasn't letting them fall onto his face. He turned away at that moment, not being able to maintain eye contact with me.

"Just let her go," James spoke softly, after a few seconds.

"No can do."

Just then, a loud bang erupted, and I naturally screamed in response, my legs somehow pushing me to run out of the basement. I didn't stop, not even for a second, as I ran out of there, passing by the living room, the kitchen, and finally the front door. The chill of the winter air didn't faze me as I continued to escape what I was now calling the 'hell house'. I didn't know where I was going, to be frank, but I needed to get as far away from here as possible.

I noticed a car, which had driven past me, slow down until I was at its level. It continued driving at the pace at which I was running.

No, it couldn't possibly be. Was it ... one of them?

I had just left.