Just My Luck(91)

I wish my mum and dad were here.

Where are they? They will be coming for me. I know that.

I cling to that. They will come for me soon. They will have called the police and there will be a massive search for me already underway. Mum will be insisting that helicopters with big beaming lights scan the dark night, Dad will be walking through fields searching for me with gangs of other people too, everyone who came to the party will be looking for me. We have friends, we have resources, they will find me. I listen hopefully for the sound of a helicopter engine or my dad calling my name. Nothing.

I think we are in a barn or farm building of some sort. The ground is uneven and doesn’t feel tiled or wooden, it feels like earth, but I can’t be sure because I’m too woozy: shock, drink, dehydration, plain old-fashioned terror. All this combined has left me confused, unsteady. I’m sat on a hard, plastic chair, my arms tied to it behind my back and my legs splayed, tied to each front leg. The rope is thick and hurts my wrists. I am freezing cold and my feet have gone numb. I’m parched. When they tied me to the chair, they took off the tape from my mouth.

‘Don’t scream. No one hear you. I hit you if you scream. I hurt you. Understand.’

I nodded. I understood. Totally. Still, I thought as soon as they take the tape off, I’ll scream, but ripping off the tape was so painful I didn’t scream, I was too shocked. Stunned. Then there was a moment where a plastic bottle of water was put to my lips. I chose the water over yelling. It wasn’t really a matter of choice. It was about survival. Instinctually, I gulped it down, a lot of it running down my chin and neck. Before I’d had enough, the bottle was snatched away. ‘Make a message for your mother,’ one man instructs in a heavy, Eastern European accent. ‘Mum, Mum, please. Do what they say. I’m frightened, Mum, please.’ I don’t get chance to say any more before they gagged me again, this time with a scarf. The thin fabric of the scarf means I can breathe a bit better than I could through the tape, but it holds my mouth open unnaturally, cuts into the edges of my lips. I think my mouth is bleeding.

No one has interacted with me since then. Maybe an hour ago, maybe four or five. I don’t know. I can’t tell. From time to time, I can hear the three men talk between themselves. They don’t say much. I think they are waiting for something. I gather at least one of them is playing a game on his phone because intermittently he throws up a small cheer and the other men laugh at him.

They are playing games. I am shaking, bruised, bound.

I try not to panic or, you know, despair. I think I finally understand that word as I fight it. I used to use it a lot with Megan when we were about thirteen, ‘Megan, I despair of you!’ I’d say if she like mucked up her eyeliner or something and we’d both laugh so hard. Now I know what despair might mean. What if my parents can’t find me? What if these men are going to rape and kill me? That’s like, what men do, right? I feel my body tremble so violently I make the chair rattle. I don’t know if it’s cold or fear. Both are ripping through my body, squeezing every internal organ. The rope on my wrists and ankles rubs painfully.

No. Stop. I can’t think that way.

They play games, that makes them human, right?

Or maybe just psychopaths. Maybe they play games and then rape and kill.

I think that most likely I have been kidnapped for money. If these men were going to rape me, they would have done so by now. But they are waiting for something. A message from a boss, word of a drop-off. I allow myself a moment of hope; they won’t hurt me if they want money for me. Then I hear movement. They are coming towards me. All three at once. They are untying my feet, my hands. I should run, fight, kick, but pins and needles, numbness – something – stops me. I collapse like a sack of potatoes. I hate my body for not being as strong as my mind. I don’t want to give in but I have no ability to fight. One man picks me up. I start to cry. No, no, no. He throws me, like I’m a doll, and I land on a mattress, on the floor. The mattress is thin and cheap and as I land, I feel the impact of the ground underneath. No. No. Please no.

One of them takes my right hand and ties it to something solid. I pull but there’s no give. I can’t sit up. I can only lie down on the mattress. I scramble about, thrashing, wriggling, trying to dodge them but I don’t know how, I don’t know where they are. They are not touching me yet. Just watching me I suppose. Checking I’m secure and can’t escape. I realise I am wetting myself. I try to clench and stop, but it just comes, I feel it on my thigh. A warm gush. The smell of ammonia.

‘Piss, piss,’ yells one of the men. I can hear his disgust. Neither of the other two responds. I am crying but the tears can’t escape, the tape on my eyes is so tight. I think I am going to go blind. I think I am going to suffocate. I am going to die rolling around in my own wee and maybe that’s the best I can hope for, dying now.

Someone kicks me in the stomach. I scream and pull up my legs to protect my baby.





39


Lexi


Terror is leaking in, a drop at a time. Drip, drip. The clock tick tocks and the hours pass. Now there is enough terror that we can drown in it. No one suggests we change into our pyjamas, clean our teeth, get some sleep. I’m glad because doing something so automatic and familiar and ordinary would be a betrayal. Ridley, Jennifer and Fred all nap for periods of time on chairs and the sofa in the kitchen. Every time they wake with a start, they look guilty, embarrassed that their frail bodies have overwhelmed them with the need to sleep. They rub their eyes, mumble, ‘Any news?’ As there is none, they fall back to sleep. I can’t blame them. Their being awake doesn’t help anything, I’m glad that Jennifer in particular isn’t hovering around Jake, looking concerned, patting his shoulder, squeezing his arm. I’m under such extreme pressure I don’t know how long I can continue to turn a blind eye to the way she searches for a connection with him, tries to assert her special place with him. Has she always been that way? How have I missed it for so long?