Page 78 of Boneyard HEA

The monsters might have bugs in here, but they can’t be that good?

A flashback blows in. Their hands are on me, in me, violating me in every way. The cuts, the bruises, the abnormal things they do. I won’t think. I won’t think. The barbed wire flogger that left score marks on my legs until Aaron screamed at them to stop. His scream still echoes in my head when I think of it. To my shock, they stopped and only threatened to amputate my left finger instead.

I eye the circular cut that weeps there, flexing that finger.

It’s almost a certainty they will do it, one day.

How many days will this last?

Stop. Stop thinking about it.

Just. Stop.

Om mani padme hum.

I dedicate myself to breathing in and out in long, measured breaths. And when I’m calm, I see the girl and her bandaged finger, where the red leaks through the white. Hers is only a stump.

Fuck.

Om mani padme hummm. Is that from Buddhism? Or is it yoga? It’s a meditation chant of some sort.

I imagine myself googling it, tapping the phone, with the world at my fingertips, as it should be. One day, that will be true again. Soon, soon, soon.

I rock my head back until it bumps the wall behind where I sit, and I meditate some more.

I can’t tell if it is day or night outside except from the hints of their behavior.

Hours pass. Or I think they do. I’m bursting to go to the toilet again.

The other woman has wakened a few times, and opened her eyes, then closed them again. I should have said something. I think I’m afraid of hearing her story and how long she’s been here.

Maybe they aren’t coming back? If they don’t ever return, there’s another option for us—starving to death or dying of thirst. Years from now, they’ll find our skeletons still chained to this wall. Everyone does other things in day-to-day life, so this will just be them going fucking grocery shopping or something. Serial killer and rapists must need to buy groceries.

I hear a distant sound and find Aaron has sat up and is looking at me. He holds out his hand, and we intermesh our fingers, one of his looping over my cut one. I don’t flinch. I embrace the small pain. Anything for human contact with someone who really is human.

“How you doing?” He raises his eyebrows. Around his eyes is red, the same as mine must be.

“I’m okay? You?”

He shrugs. “I’ve had better days. Should’ve booked a different holiday.”

I snort-laugh at that, before my amusement dies under the weight of reality.

“Are they gone? The house is silent. Normally you hear them?” I’ve dropped to a whisper, like we’ve been doing.

He copies me, glances at the sleeping girl with the mussed-up red hair. “Maybe?”

“Are these at all like removable?” I poke the metal ring our chains are attached to. “Could we rock them? Dig them out?”

“Chewing off our hands would be more doable. You’d need a chisel. We don’t even have a belt buckle.”

“Oh.” Disappointment rings in that one word. “Damn. But, we have metal chains? Can we sort of wrap them around something and pull?”

“If we were Hercules, that might work?”

“Okay.” I inhale. “What are we going to do?”

We’ve discussed escape ideas before. Nothing that sounded possible came up.