Chasing Tomorrow

Jeff braced himself for another blow, but none came. What’s he waiting for?

He tried to put himself in Cooper’s shoes, to get inside his mind-set—not easy given that the man was clearly a card-carrying fruit loop.

He’s talking to you. That means he wants to engage in a dialogue.

He could easily have killed you by now, but he hasn’t.

Why not?

What does he want?

What does he need that you have?

Jeff’s mind was a blank. But he knew he had to do something, say something. He had to keep Cooper engaged. On instinct he said, “I’ll tell you what I think. I think this has nothing to do with the Lord, and everything to do with Tracy.”

Cooper erupted. “DON’T SAY HER NAME!”

Jeff thought, Jackpot.

“Why shouldn’t I say her name? She is my wife, after all.”

Cooper made an awful, howling noise like a dying animal.

“No. No no no. She is not your wife!”

“Sure she is. We never actually divorced.”

“It doesn’t matter. You defiled her. You took what was mine. You took something beautiful, something perfect, and you made it filthy. Like YOU.”

Jeff heard the little man scrabbling around on the floor. Then he felt himself being rolled over onto his stomach and the thin garment he was wearing being ripped off his back.

“You will atone.” Cooper let out a wild shriek, then struck Jeff hard on the back with some sort of crude whip. It felt as if it were made from electrical wire, with sharp metal tips that ripped into Jeff’s flesh like razors.

Jeff screamed

“You WILL atone.”

The whip came down again.

And again.

And again.

The pain was beyond words, beyond anything Jeff had ever experienced.

He was still screaming, but the sound seemed to be coming from outside him now. Inside, he had shut down, waiting for oblivion, knowing that it must surely come soon.

The last thing Jeff remembered was the sound of Daniel Cooper’s labored breathing, the little man gasping with exertion as the blows kept raining down. Then, like a lover, the silence rushed up to greet him.

“DO YOU PLAY CHESS?”

Jeff opened his eyes. He could see nothing but blackness. For a second he panicked. I’m blind! The bastard’s blinded me!

But then he remembered the cloth bandage over his eyes and took a breath. He waited for the pain to shoot through his rib cage as air entered his lungs. Or for his headache to return or his raw, flayed back to start screaming. But all the agony he’d felt before was gone. It was miraculous. Wonderful.

It wasn’t long before the obvious thought struck him:

Cooper must have drugged me.