The Neighbor

3.

I open my eyes slowly as I try and adjust my eyes to the dark. As I look at my surroundings I come to the conclusion that I'm in a basement. My hands and feet bound to a chair and my mouth covered with duct tape, the cloth making my mouth dry. My breathing quickened and a tear rolled down my cheek as I realized that this wasn't a nightmare I could wake up from.

"Well, well, well, look who's awake. Have a good nap sleeping beauty?" The light turned on and blinded me for a second. He pulled up a chair and sat in front of me making direct eye contact with me. "Now, I know you might be a little scared at the moment... but can I ask you kindly to CALM THE FUCK DOWN!"

I flinched at his voice which caused me to cry even more. He looked at me and sighed, he then put his hand on my face and proceeded to wipe the tears away.

"I'm sorry, that was uncalled for. I consider myself a reasonable and calm guy, but when someone steps out of line... that's when I lose my shit and I can't help but feel the need to teach them a lesson."

I didn't know what to do. This guy obviously had some issues but he thinks that what he's doing right now is justifiable. All I could do was listen to him.

"Hey, so I decided that I should probably take the tape off, but there's the possibility of you screaming your lungs out which would then lead me to never taking it off again. So I'm going to ask you this one time. Are you going to stay quiet if I take the tape off?"

I nodded my head. He ripped it off slowly and took the cloth out, despite my first thought being to yell I clenched my mouth so no noise would come out.

"Good job, I'm glad you actually listened otherwise I would of had to punish you. Now, I have a few rules I need you to follow if we're going to make this situation work. 1. Speak only when given permission to, 2. Don't scream or raise your voice, and 3. If you don't want to die right away, try and stay on my good side."

I just stared at him not knowing if he would hurt me if I spoke right now. He got up and headed for the stairs, in that moment I couldn't help but say something. "Wait... please I know what I did wrong and I'm really sorry. Please... I don't want to be here anymore, I'm scared, tired, and hurt. Can't you just let me go, I won't tell anyone I swear." He stopped, turned around, and headed over to me. My heart was pounding. What was he going to do, is he going to kill me? He took out a pocket knife, put it against my face.

"You broke rule number 1...". He then cut my cheek, I groaned. He put his hand over my mouth.

"Hmm... well since you don't like to follow instructions, maybe I should do something worse than a scratch so you can understand how serious I am."

"I'm sorry..." I muffled through his hand. He then ran the knife down my shirt all the way to my pants, he pressed the knife near my crotch. I started to freak out, he was seriously going to do this, my breathing quickened and I shut my eyes preparing for the worst.

"Have you learned the lesson yet kiddo?", I nodded. "Good now I'm going to take my hand off and you're not going to say a word."

He then took his hand off and I took a big breath, just as I was starting to get myself to calm down he brought the knife up and stabbed my leg, he then twisted it. At this point I couldn't even let out a sound, I breathed in and tears poured down my face.

"Shshshsh... it's ok, sorry kid but I needed to let you know that you can't get off that easy."

I looked at him with anger, he didn't seem to like that, so he reached for the knife and pulled it out. I groaned and I started to get light headed when I saw the amount of blood coming out of my leg.

"That look doesn't suit you, especially with those blue eyes of yours. I wonder how you would feel after I gouged them out, but I suspect you wouldn't want that to happen, right?"

"P-please don't, I learned my lesson, I'm sorry." I responded with a faint voice.

"Alright, I'll cut you some slack tonight." He started to walk away but stopped and said, "Oh I don't think we've been properly introduced yet, my name is Nicholas James. What's yours?"

I took a deep breath and said, "John Rider." Nick then turned off the light, walked up the stairs, and closed the basement door, leaving me in the dark alone. I cried for an hour until I finally drifted off and fell asleep.
•••
Welp that was a lot, but at least we now know their names.