“That’s just a door,” he says, chuckling as if he finds it amusing that I’m scared shitless.
I’m pushed again through another door and then into another one. After which he pulls the cloth away from my face.
And I’m back in that familiar glass cell again.
The only place I didn’t ever want to return to.
But when I turn around and look at Graham once more, I know any place—even this place, this glass prison—is better than being anywhere close to him.
“Tomorrow you’ll put on that dress and lipstick. Understand?” he asks.
I nod, hoping he’ll get me out of the restraints.
Maybe I might even be able to catch him off guard and overpower him. Attack him. Throw the wheelchair at him. Anything.
But then he pulls out a cloth and a bottle from his pocket, dabs the cloth with the liquid, and holds it over my mouth. The same disgusting odor enters my nostrils … and it reminds me of the night he took me.
I struggle. I fight it, I really do. But it’s no use. Within seconds, I feel drowsy again, and my limbs don’t respond to my intentions to move. My vision is hazy, and I fade in and out of consciousness.
I can feel his hands on my wrists and legs, freeing me from the restraints. He lifts my body, holding it close to him as he carries me to the bed and lays me down.
I feel like a puppet on strings.
From the corner of my eye, I can see him walk off with the wheelchair through the door he brought me in. Too late do I regain any bit of control over my body. Too late … because the door’s already shut tightly before I can make my way to it.
I shove the dress and lipstick off me with what little energy I have then I try to clean up. I can’t even sit up straight without seeing the world revolve around me.
“You’ll feel better in a minute,” Graham says as he walks past my glass chamber.
I want to say, “Fuck you,” but as always, my mouth fails me.
I just sit there in silence, waiting for the drugs to leave my system.
Another door closes, and I know by now Graham must be gone. I’m back inside the lonely cell again, but it’s not like before. Something’s changed.
There are three people now.
Chapter Eight
Accompanying Song: “Dr. Ford” by Ramin Djawadi”
Ella
The memory of the girl lying on the bed pulls me out of my haze. I need to talk to her. The mere thought of going to her pushes my body to drive out the drugs quickly.
Focus, Ella. Focus!
My eyes adjust to the spinning motions around me as I get up from the bed and wobble to the glass.
“Don’t,” the man in the cell next to me says. “You’ll get hurt.”
I ignore his pleas and walk until my head hits the glass. Touching it, I slowly slide down until my butt hits the floor. My vision is already improving, and I can clearly see her bed from here.
“Is she awake?” It’s a girl’s voice.
“Yeah,” he says.
“Hey … are you that girl he mentioned?” It’s her. The girl in the other prison.
I nod even though I can still barely make out her figure.
“The drugs wear off quickly. Don’t worry,” she says. “Just breathe deeply.”
She sounds so calm. How could anyone be this calm if they were just taken and put into a small box like some kind of pet?
“It’s okay. I’ve been through the same thing … lots of times, actually,” she says.
But that means she’s been here … before me? I stare at her with my mouth open.
“I’m Syrena. You?”
That’s a beautiful name, I sign.
Her face is already becoming a bit clearer, and I can definitely make out her dark complexion and the curls in her hair.
“She doesn’t talk,” grumpy guy next door says while leaning against the glass.
I look up at him standing just a few feet away, and he crosses his arms and looks away as if he’s upset at something. If only I knew what.
“Oh … you’re mute?” she asks.
I nod. Well, selectively anyway. But it doesn’t matter because it still doesn’t mean I speak. At least not here, in an unknown place with people I don’t know.
The only ones who’ve heard my voice since my sister died are my parents because they’re the only ones I trust.
I’m not expecting my voice to return to me anytime soon.
“No problem,” she says. “I can just ask questions. So the guy next to you, his name is Cage.”
Cage. How fitting.
When she calls out his name, he gazes at me instead of her. And the way he looks at me is just so … overpowering, somehow. Like he wants to possess me. Own me.
Syrena coughs. “Actually, that’s just what Graham calls him. Cage. And then he points at this glass box we’re in, saying Cage every damn day.” She shrugs. “As in ‘Get in the Cage.’ He’s never called him anything other than that.”