The Last House on Needless Street(56)

‘I do remember when he brought me here. I liked the house, it was dusty and dirty, and Mom never let me play in the dirt. I liked the peepholes in the plywood; I thought they were like portholes in a ship. I said so, and he told me I was very smart. He told me his name was Ted and that he was taking care of me while my parents were out. I didn’t think anything was wrong. Why would I? It had happened before, me being left with people, neighbours and such. My parents went to a lot of parties. My mother always used to come into my room to kiss me goodnight, before she left for the evening. I remember her scent. Geraniums. I used to call them “germamiums”. God, I was so dumb when I was little. I guess that’s how I ended up here. What was I talking about?’

You were telling me about the day Ted ... took ... you, I say. Each word feels like a little piece of gravel on my tongue.

‘Yeah,’ says Lauren. ‘I was so hot, that day, my bathing suit or underwear or whatever itched. I complained to Ted, said I was boiling. Maybe that was what gave him the idea. He told me there was ice cream in the freezer in the kitchen, and that I could go and get it. The kitchen was a mess, a pile of unwashed plates in the sink, old takeout food piled high on the counters. I liked it, it seemed like he wasn’t a regular grown-up.

‘It was in the corner, a big chest freezer with a padlock on it. I’d seen ones like it in garages and basements. Never in a kitchen before, though. The padlock was undone so I lifted the lid. I was expecting a rush of freezing air on my face, but it didn’t come. Then I saw the freezer was unplugged at the wall. I felt hands under my arms and I was flying up and over down into the freezer, onto the soft blankets. I had my own blanket with me too. He let me keep that. It’s yellow with blue butterflies. Soft. The butterflies are faded now. I still wasn’t afraid, even though it smelled like old chicken inside there. But then the lid came down and I was alone. There were stars in the black, like stab wounds in the sky. It was the air holes he had pierced in the lid. I shouted for the man to let me out.

‘“You’re safe, now,” he said. “This is for your own good.”

‘I remembered his name, and I knew that names were real important to grown-ups, so I tried to say, “Please, let me out, Ted.” But I had trouble saying my ‘d’s, back then. So it came out “Teb”. And when he wouldn’t let me out I thought that was why – I got his name wrong, and that made him mad. It took me a while to figure out that he would never let me go, no matter how I said it.

‘At first, for a long time, I lived in the box. He trickled water through the holes and I opened my mouth and drank it. He gave me pieces of candy the same way. Sometimes cookies or a chicken finger. He played the music really loud, all day and all night. The sad woman who sings. I thought that maybe I was in the hell they used to warn us about, at Sunday school. But hell was supposed to be full of fire, and it was very wet and cold, where I was, cold to the bone. After a while I didn’t notice any of it any more, not even the smell. Time stopped being a line and flattened out.

‘I had to learn a new language, for my body and my mind. The language of the box. It meant instead of walking, I just moved my feet an inch or two. That was a journey. Instead of jumping up and down or dancing, which I had once liked to do, I clenched and unclenched my fists. Sometimes I bit my cheek, to taste blood. I pretended it was food.

‘If I made noise or kicked at the sides of the box, boiling water came through the holes. I couldn’t see, but I knew the burns were bad, because of the way my skin came off. Kind of like snakeskin. It smelled bad and I wanted to die with how bad it hurt.

‘One day the music stopped. Above me, there was an explosion of light. I had to keep my eyes closed, it was too bright, I had been in the dark for too long. I heard him say, “Let’s get you clean.”

‘He lifted me out of the box. I cried because I thought there would be more boiling water, but it was cool, from the faucet. I think he bathed me standing in the sink. Afterwards he put something soothing on my burns and covered them with gauze.

‘“I put boards up over the windows for you,” he said. “It’s dim in here. You can try opening your eyes.”

‘I did – just a crack at first, and then a squint. The house was dim and huge. Everything juddered and shook. My eyes had forgotten how to see distances, because I had been in the box for so long.

‘He gave me a sandwich – ham, cheese and tomato. It was the first vegetable I had eaten in weeks and my body lit up with it. I used to push the tomato round my plate, before, in my old life. Makes me laugh, now. While I ate he cleaned up the box and put new blankets in there. I shivered at that – I wanted to scream. It meant I was going back in. The second I finished my sandwich, he put the music back on. That woman. How I hate her.

‘“Get in,” he said. I shook my head. “I made it all nice for you. Get in.” When I wouldn’t he poured something from a gallon jug into the bottom of the box. It had a sour smell that made my throat tingle. “The blankets are all soaking wet now,” he said. “What a waste of my time.” Then he picked me up, put me back in the box and closed the lid. I’ll never forget the sound of the padlock closing, right next to my ear. Snick, like a blade through an apple.

‘The bottom of the freezer was filled with vinegar. It was like fire on my burned skin. The fumes caught in my throat and made my eyes water. He poured more hot water in through the air holes. That was bad, it seemed like the air had turned to acid.