Page 13 of Her Last Audition


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Lockdown

My head is poundingwhen I wake up and my first thought is that I better not be getting sick. I’ll never get a gig then. I feel cold and reach down to pull up my blanket and feel sequined fabric, instead. My eyes fly open as recognition and remembrance hits. The last thing I remember is staring into the eyes of a scarred man before everything went dark.

I can’t stop myself from hyperventilating as I sit up, still wearing the ridiculous red dress which has ridden up, revealing my panties. A whimper leaves me as I tug down the fabric and my eyes shoot around the room. It’s tiny, barely more than a closet, with faded and peeled wallpaper that’s yellow with age. There are no windows, and even the heat vent in the corner of the wall is boarded over. There is a tiny electronic device in one corner and I wonder if I’m being watched, eliciting a shiver from my insides. Other than the cot I’m lying on, the room is devoid of furniture, and though it smells musty, it’s cold.

Across from the cot, there is an open doorway, and through it, I can see a toilet. Beside that is another door with a heavy lock and something resembling a dog door at the bottom.

Images of movies and documentaries of people waking up in rooms like this fill my head and I’m breathing so rapidly I have to slow it down so I don’t pass out.

It’s the dog door that sets me into a true panic. Why would that be there?

I scramble off the bed and toward it, flinging it open and poking my head out as far as it goes.

“Help!” I scream, but my voice sounds small even in my own ears. My eyes widen as I take in the hallway and the doors identical to my own to be on both sides.

“Please, help me!” I shout again, but my voice seems to get lost in the hall, like something is muffling it. Somewhere within the building, I hear a door slam shut.

“Can you hear me? Please, someone, help!”

I try to push myself through the tiny opening, but nothing more than my head will fit through. Really, I know it’s futile, even as I struggle to get through, calling down the hall.

In the distance, I hear heavy footsteps.

I hesitate, not quite willing to forgo calling for help, but at the same time, realizing how stupid that sounds. People don’t kidnap other people and then put them in places where they can yell for help.

“If we’re to work together, witnesses to such things cannot be accepted.”

Did I really hear that? What did I witness?

I strain to make sense of the bits I saw when I entered the building. Lots of heavy smoke and shouts, the smell of salt and copper. Something raw, gritty. People exchanging slips of paper, drinking, and the big platform in the middle.

Some kind of fight?

As the sound of the footsteps approach, I pull back into the room, forcing myself onto the cot. I try to appear non-existent in the corner of it.

The footsteps get closer and closer until I’m sure they must be just outside the door. My eyes dart around frantically, wishing there was any kind of weapon, but even the toilet has no lid or tank to help me. This room is the one meant for captives.

Then what?

I hardly breathe, wondering if the person on the other side of the door is going to come in. Who are they? What do they want?

The severity of my situation really starts to kick in. Where the hell am I? What happened?

I go back to what I do remember, take it step by step.

I went to that audition and had trouble finding the place. I went inside of the building I thought was correct, and was grabbed by those men.

My lip quivers when I think of the men in that room. All large, scary men.

I thought the man who grabbed me was terrifying, but he was nothing compared to the other one. The big one with a large scar, and some kind of burn on one side of his face, reaching up to his hairline. He looked better suited as some ancient Viking swinging a battle-ax than in that dingy office.

He didn’t tell them to take me away, though. And there was something in his expression, under the scowl, that made me look again. Then there was the guy with the suit.

A shudder runs through me when I think of him and the way he looked at me. It was him who—A hand flies up to my neck and I feel the tiny sore spot. I was right, he injected me with something.

Warnings from high school about needles and the risks of HIV and hepatitis pop into my mind and I shake my head. Hardly what I need to be worried about right now.

I have a horrible feeling that whatever is next, STDs won’t be the real problem.

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
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