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I feel a prick on the back of my neck. Then, my world goes dark.
What the fuck did I do last night?My eyes feel like they’re glued shut, and my head is pounding worse than any hangover I’ve ever experienced.Wait, did I go out drinking?
I’m still keeping my eyes shut because the light in my room is blinding.Why would I have left the light on? Rookie move.I reach for my nightstand, hoping there is at least a water bottle or something there because my mouth feels like the Sahara. When my arm swings towards my nightstand, it hits nothing. I move my hand around, searching for the surface of the table, but am met with empty space.
My eyes finally force themselves open and are met with that damn blinding light. I scan the room and realize, almost immediately, that I’m not in my bedroom. Actually, I’m not even sure where I am. The room is completely bare aside from the uncomfortable bed I’m in, which I don’t know how that wasn’t a dead giveaway; my aching body must have distracted me from noticing that. The walls are a dull gray color, and the floor is just plain cement. My eyes come into focus more, and I recognize that the walls are also cement which means I must be in a warehouse or basement.
I force my body to twist because wherever I’m at, I need to get the hell out of here. When I twist, though, my right foot is held back. There is a metal cuff wrapped around my ankle that is linked to the bed by a chain.
Fuck!
I tug at the chain when my memory starts to resurface. Andrei was trying to screw me over on our deal, but I was getting ready to walk out the door.Wasn’t I?Ivan was there. He has to be behind this, which means that nod Andrei gave to him was not to get out of my way at all.
This can’t be good.
Tugging on the chain and metal bedpost is doing nothing but making noise. It must have been too much noise because I hear footsteps outside the door. The handle starts to turn, and a loud creaking noise follows as the door is opened.
“Why don’t you look more excited to see me?” Ivan’s body fills the doorway. He remains standing there instead of moving towards me, which I’m grateful for at this moment.They want me for something, so he won’t hurt me.I keep telling myself that, as though it will make the panic building in my chest ease up. It’s not working.
Words don’t come out, and my chest feels like it’s about to explode from my body. Being in a vulnerable position with this man is something I never wanted to experience. I’ve been fortunate to have never been alone with this man so far. Now he stands before me, and I literally cannot flee.
“I asked you a question, Katia. Aren’t you excited to see me?” His voice almost sounds joyful, probably because he’s enjoying this.
“No,” I answer. “You are the last person I’d ever want to be around.”
His eyes narrow on me.Now, he’s upset.He steps into the room and moves toward the bed I’m chained to. “I’m so glad you are choosing the hard way.”
What? The hard way? Did I even have a choice?
My eyes go wide as he steps closer to the bed, now standing directly beside it, and looks down at me. I try to keep my composure because I don’t want him to sense my fear.
“I’m going to enjoy breaking you.” He presses down on my shoulders, forcing me to lay back on the bed. My arms try to swing violently at him, and my fingers reach up to dig into any skin of his I can find.
Keep fighting, Katia. Natalia and Alexie will be here soon.
PRESENT DAY
If you had asked me a year ago where I’d find myself in five years, my answer would’ve been doing hair and makeup for the New York elite. I’d proudly say I owned my salon and had a successful career doing something I loved. Now, if you ask me that question today, my answer would be just wishing for death.I want it all to end.
A year ago, I woke up in a basement which I, unfortunately, found out was a part of Ivan’s home. This had been their plan all along. Andrei was stringing me along to see how desperate he could make me and hoped that I would go willingly.Like hell, I would have done it then.Back then, I had hope and felt confident in standing up to them.Now, I might do anything just to get by. Ivan said he would break me, and he did. I didn’t make it easy on him by any means, but I realized that trying to make things difficult for them would only make it harder on me. It wasn’t worth it after a while, and I gave in.
I hoped and prayed every night that when the door opened, it would be Natalia or Alexie walking in to save me. They never came. If they found me now, they would probably be so disappointed in how easily I gave up.Are they even looking for me, though?Ivan takes joy in showing me pictures of Natalia, now happily living her life in Chicago. She works for the government and is dating a few men, none of which are Alexie. Ivan told me Alexie died and that it didn’t take long for Natalia to move on. At first, there was no way I believed it, but picture after picture and video after video painted a different story.I’ve been left alone, and my friends aren’t coming. Maybe things would have been different if I just told Natalia how I felt.
I can pinpoint the exact moment I gave up. While I was still in the basement, Ivan would torture me to get me to do things. He never forced himself on me, which was always a surprise as I expected it each day, but he would make me crawl on the floor, work out to the point of exhaustion, and scrub the floor with a toothbrush. Anything I didn’t do perfectly right, or even if I did, he would pretend I didn’t, and he would hit me. There were other times he would burn me with something or make small knicks in my skin with a razor blade. It was always a game to him.
Then one day, he came into my room. I was still in the basement, and he was practically beaming. He said that I kept making it hard on myself, so he had his next lesson ready for me.He then snapped his fingers, and a guard, one I recognized because he’d always taken pleasure in coming into my room while I was sleeping, walked in, smiling at me. He was not alone. He dragged a girl with him. Her wrists and feet were shackled, and there was a hood covering her head. My heart raced, wondering who it could be. Looking at the state of the girl, I felt guilty in hoping that it wasn’t someone I knew.
Ivan walks over to her and removes the hood. Her hair covers her face, and it is bright red. When he pushes her hair away, I don’t recognize her, but I notice hair coloring framing her face and some spots along her neck.Did he dye her hair red? What the fuck is happening?
Her eyes stay down, but I can’t stop looking at her. Ivan grabs her wrists and drags her over to a hook hanging from the ceiling.When did he put that there?I don’t remember seeing it before. He puts the chain linking her wrists on the hook, so she is standing on her toes in the middle of the room. She groans in pain as her body is stretched. She’s so frail looking.What has he done to her already?
“Let her go!” I demand.
Ivan turns to look at me, where I’m chained to my bed and laughs. That laugh is evil, and my fear is not for myself, it is for the poor girl in front of me.
I don’t know how much time has passed, but my throat is hoarse from screaming so much. I just watched Ivan brutally torture, rape, and murder the innocent girl he brought into the room. He left her body hanging from the hook in the ceiling and said he will replace her with a new girl each day until I start to listen. That was the moment I knew that no one else would be hurt because I couldn’t follow orders. Right then, my life no longer meant anything.
Once I stopped fighting Ivan, I was moved upstairs and was given supervised privileges. By supervised, I mean a camera was on me at all times, or someone was watching me. Yes, this included in the shower. Guards would say they were told to keep an eye on me while I was there. I know they were lying, but I had already stopped resisting. I even quit fighting when they wanted more. Especially after the first time a guard put his hands on me, and I fought him. Ivan stormed in mid-struggle, and I thought for sure he was going to kill the guard for touching me. Instead, he punched me in the face and stomach a few times until I almost blacked out. But he knew where to hit, so I stayed conscious, and then he let the guard finish while he watched.
