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Pax sits back down on the floor in the same place he’d been. He resumes staring at the wall, his eyes wide open and unblinking.
My chest quivers, my hands shake.
He’s not fighting?
This isn’t like him.
I scan his surroundings. It’s definitely our bedroom. It’s our bed, our night-tables. My gaze stops on the night-table. The nursery monitor is there, and the screen is on.
Something… something looks like it’s moving. But I can’t see it clearly enough. It almost looks like the outline of a small person. Maybe a child.
Is it Zuzu?
Please, God, I pray again. Please. I’ll give you anything. Take my life, not theirs.
I sink to the floor and watch the screen.
It’s the only thing I can do.
21
Chapter Twenty
Pax
Time has no meaning now.
At some points, it passes slowly, and at others, it passes quickly. It all depends on what is in the box.
This time, it is cocaine. For the fourth time today.
He has planned the exact drugs that will counter each other out throughout the day… some speed me up, some slow me down. They’re carefully planned to keep me alive. To keep me going. To keep me suffering.
“Is Mila alive?” I ask when a note is shoved under the door.
There is no answer. I doubt they can hear me.
This note also tells me to look in the top dresser drawer.
Two boxes of granola bars and a dozen bottles of water are there. I ignore them. I’m not hungry. My heart is racing though. The cocaine speeds it up and I’m flying and I’m numb, and all of my emotions are dulled like I’m sinking in a murky pond.
I’m worried about Zuzu and Mila, I know that I am, but at the moment, I don’t actually feel it. I don’t feel the emotions that should accompany my thoughts. They’re gone. Leroy has taken them from me. In theory and in practice. In reality and in my head.
I glance at the nursery monitor.
Zuzu is sleeping. She’s safe on the bed, and she’s sleeping.
I can’t save her.
They are going to kill me here. I know they are. I want to look inside all of the boxes, but at the same time, I don’t want to know just yet how they’ve planned my end.
Will it be a fatal dose of heroin?
Will it be too much cocaine?
Maybe they’ll make me drink antifreeze.
It’s hard to say.
