Sinking
914 Words
Sloan wasn’t sure how her life had become such a hollow, meaningless thing.
She shuffled on the concrete floor, raising up on her skinny— too skinny, now— knees to try to see out of the tiny window at the top of the wall in the basement. Her hungry and weak body protested the movement, but her mind craved it. She looked forward to it every night.
If she positioned herself just right, she could see the stars.
She missed being outside the most. She’d been in the basement for two months, and she hadn’t seen anything other than the tiny glimpses of the world she could see through the dirty window. Too far up for her to reach and much too small for it to be an escape, instead it provided her with an anchor— something to remind her that life outside of the hell she was in still existed.
She sighed in relief when she saw the small balls of gas through the window, her breath coming easier.
She’d kept count of the days. Today made sixty. She’d survived sixty days. Sixty days of being fed once every few days, of not enough water— of being leered at by the monster. He hadn’t touched her, but she knew he wanted to. She was sure it was only a matter of time. She could see the lust in his eyes when he looked at her. It made her stomach roll.
The sound of a door rattling alerted her senses, and she scrambled back to her dirty cot in the left corner, almost tripping over the thin white shift dress she was wearing. It was all the monster gave her to wear. Thin, linen, and no undergarments. He brought her a clean one once a week.
Her pulse echoed in her ears as the monster stumbled down the stairs, carrying another person. Sloan knew better than to speak, but her pulse raced as she watched the monster drop a man on the floor. She couldn’t see his face from this angle.
He looked over at her, his eyes suspiciously scanning across her face. He glanced down at the man, unconscious on the floor. “New roommate for you.”
Sloan didn’t speak. She curled in on herself on the bed, trying not to draw too much of his attention.
It seemed to work. The monster grunted, nudging the man with his boot before turning and going back up the stairs. Sloan heard the locks click back into place.
She stared at the man, wondering why he looked familiar. He was made of muscle, with brown that was just long enough to messily pushed back on his head. She wished she knew what color his eyes were.
She rested her chin on her knees. The old Sloan would have run over to help him— the new Sloan was suspicious and cautious. She knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep with him in here, not that she slept much anyway. But what little comfort she had in her basement when the monster was gone was now being invaded— and it made her uneasy.
Why did she need a roommate? What did the monster want him for? She couldn’t understand. The man groaned, and she noticed the bruises on his handsome face. Handsome— yes, he was very handsome, despite looking like he’d been worked over by a baseball bat.
Knowing the monster, he probably had.
Sloan tucked her mouth into the crook of her elbow, hiding her face as she watched him struggle to consciousness. She didn’t want to be noticed or draw attention to herself— she didn’t want a reason to make the monster mad.
“What the fuc..” the man groaned as he squinted his eyes open at the room around him. His voice was warm, deep, and the vibrations of it settled into her bones, bringing a sense of comfort she was unsure about. It confused her.
His eyes scanned the room, panic setting into them, when they finally locked on Sloan. But they didn’t settle on her. They glazed right past her, as if she didn’t even exist.
His eyes were brown. A light, liquid brown that Sloan knew would be breathtaking in the sunlight.
Too bad that was in short supply around here.
“Oh, that motherfucker,” the man growled. He jumped up, barreling towards the locked basement door. “Hey, you f*****g psycho! Let me the f**k out before I f*****g gut you!”
His chest was heaving now, his fists barreling into the door. Sloan knew it wouldn’t do any good. She had beat on that door until her knuckles were bleeding and raw. It had done nothing but make the monster angry with her and refuse to feed her.
Sloan put her hands over her ears. They started ringing, and her vision started to blur. This happened to her a lot now, when something triggered memories of the monster. Of him angry at her for trying to run. Making her remove her dress and stand there while he touched himself. Hitting her so hard she tasted blood when she’d refused. Screaming in her face.
She wasn’t sure when the man stopped yelling, but suddenly, she felt movement in front of her. When she opened her eyes, the man’s warm brown eyes were six inches from her own.
“Holy f*****g s**t,” he whispered. “You’re Sloan Sutton.”
- Writer
