Lost and Found (23 page)

Dark spots began to explode around me and I panicked, feeling consciousness fade away
as my vision clouded over. Another glance of the man's face and I saw a strong jaw
with a mouth pulled back in a sinister grin. He was enjoying it - taking my life.
Releasing my frantic grip on his hands, I jabbed a thumb into his left eyeball and
then pinched the inside of his right arm as hard as I could. With a painful grunt
quickly followed by a startled cry, the man's hands were gone and my lungs inflated,
sucking air in with ravenous need.

I was
so
wrong. In that moment, as I lay gasping for air, I knew I was wrong - maybe my life
was worth fighting for. And fight I did.

For just a second I was worried I had swallowed my tongue - I couldn't feel it, my
mouth was swollen and doing a bang up job of sucking oxygen in as fast as I needed
it, so I snorted air in and out of my nose instead, sounding not too different from
an excited pig. The pressure on my hips eased slightly and I launched my torso forward,
slapping my hands at anything and everything I could find. That's how it went for
a minute or two - like children play fighting we slapped at each other. Eventually
my brain remembered how to form a fist and I balled up a hand and nearly pulled my
shoulder out of socket with a right hook to his jaw. It knocked the man off of me
and I rolled away, slithering over the side of the bed onto the floor like a snake,
taking a pillow and the bedside lamp with me.

Hoping Drake would hear the commotion, I pulled the small table down as well, and
grabbed for the glass I used before bed. Nearly slicing the tip of my finger off,
I found the broken base of the drinking cup and hurled it at the dark figure still
hunched over on the bed. With a satisfying
thunk,
it struck the side of his head and for a second I saw nothing from my bedroom floor
view. And then he was up and off the bed, rushing out of the room and into the hallway
in a drunken stagger.

The fan was still making its whooshing-wumping droll as I sat stunned and gasping
on the carpet, unable to scream, unsure of what to do. And then Drake's words came
back to me,
"There was a guy that took off…"
and I knew what was going on. He was there. In the house. The man Drake saw run away
from the warehouse. Seemed we were followed after all.

"Mariah,"
I wheezed.

***

My limbs shook as I crawled around the foot of the bed, seeing no sign of any movement
in the hall. Like a dog, I moved on all fours toward the door, noting the dark smear
along the wooden frame left by someone's hand. Good. I had drawn blood.

The hallway was empty. And quiet. It was the kind of quiet where you know something
bad is lurking nearby just waiting for the right moment to strike, just as quiet as
Mariah's prison was. My ankles popped as I used the wall to stand, my slight frame
suddenly feeling like the weight of a car.

"Drake…Mariah?" The words were scratchy in my throat, like broken glass lined my larynx.
There was no answer, just the same no-sound response from the empty shell house.

Drake's room was closer, so I slid against the wall, upsetting picture frames from
a family long dead until I reached his room. The door was wide open but there was
no sign of him in the messy bed. The night allowed the slightest amount of light in
through one of the windows, and along the ban of white that reached out like a finger
toward me was a small pool of blood. Not enough to be fatal, but possibly enough to
be missed.

Like an idiot, I had left my room without my gun. I had nothing to fight with but
my two hands. Peering down the hall, I was able to see that Mariah's door was still
closed so I pushed off the wall with a soft grunt and swayed back to my own room,
being careful to step around the broken glass that sat pointy side up on the carpet.

The gun wasn't in the nightstand. Resisting the urge to rip my hair out in giant fistfuls,
I snatched the broken glass up and padded back out into the hall, the air hot and
dry in my throat. The fabric of my white shirt tightened around my chest as I heaved
in and out, still struggling to get a full breath into my lungs. My cheeks flamed
with heat as anger coursed through me; I was damn tired of people trying to choke
me to death.

Something thumped from Mariah's room and I inched closer to her door, stepping carefully,
the glass gripped so tight in my bleeding hand that I couldn't feel the cut on my
finger any longer. My pulse raced, my heart thudded wildly and my stomach cramped
nervously. With my hand on the brass doorknob, I put my ear to the wood, listening
to the sounds within the room.

It was as if someone was repeatedly pounding on something soft. With a sharp inhale,
I realized what it was. A beating. Turn the knob slowly, I kicked open the door and
raised my hand above my head, ready to throw the glass at the first person who rushed
me.

Drake was kneeling next to Mariah's bed, his face bleeding profusely, his arms secured
behind his back. The man from my room stood over him, his arm frozen in the air while
Mariah rocked herself on the bed.

"Well, look who decided to join the party," he said before bringing his fist down
on Drake's face again. Blood sprayed the side of the bedspread.

"Stop!" I pleaded. My voice was shrill and damaged.

Mariah's rocking motion slowed when I spoke, but she stayed in the fetal position
with her head tucked down tight. She wouldn't look up. Inside the room, the man stood
up tall, turning to face me with an unwelcoming smile. His hair was shaved down almost
to the scalp, making the sharp angles of his thin face stand out. He showed off a
defined brow, high cheekbones and a jutting chin. His sculpted jaw line was bloodied
on one side where the busted glass hit his temple. If it wasn't for the injuries and
wicked glint in his eye, he could have passed for handsome.

"Come on in, have a seat," he gestured to the bed and I continued to only stare at
him with my hand still ready to throw the glass. With a theatric sigh, he stepped
around Drake and sat down on the edge of the bed, patting the place beside him. Still
I only looked at him. "Now, now. Didn't your parents tell you in was rude to stare
at people?"

With an exhale, I cleared my throat before speaking, "Who the hell are you? What do
you want?"

The man laughed. It was an almost genuine laugh for someone. My eyes squinted into
the darkness as the twenty-something year old shifted on the blankets, crossing his
legs and patting at the mattress again.

"Come sit down and I'll fill you in," he said with a grin. White teeth glinted back
at me as he tilted his head to the side, catching the starlight from beyond the open
window.

"I have a better idea," I said, tightening my grip on the broken glass, "I think you
should get the fuck out of my house before I split your face open."

He laughed hollowly. "
Your
house? I don't recall seeing your face smiling back at me from all those expensive
picture frames on the wall."

"It's my place now. And you need to get out," I hissed. My arm was getting tired.

"You know," he stood up and turned his back to me, "I think we got off on the wrong
foot. Let's start over, shall we? My name's Hunter and it seems I'm in need of a new
crew thanks to you guys."

"Get out!"
I screamed. At least, I tried to. My voice sounded strangled.

When he turned around with a gun in his hand, I threw the glass with all my might,
which wasn't much. It struck his mouth before landing on the floor, splitting his
upper lip. Stumbling into the room, I flailed at the wall until my hand found the
light switch. When the room lit up, we were all temporary dazed from the glow but
he was faster on his feet. With a grunt, he had his arms around my waist and lifted
me off the ground effortlessly. My body bounced onto the bed and his fist pounded
into the side of my head three times before all went black.

The faintest trace of carpet deodorizer was the first conscious thing I noticed. That
and the throbbing ache that came from the side of my head. It was hard to straighten
my legs for some reason and moving my hands sent pain up my arms. Something scratchy
tightened around my wrists every time I moved a centimeter.

"Riley."

"Mmm."

"Riley. Open your eyes."

"Connor…?"

I followed the gentle sound of his voice with my head, opening my eyes as prompted,
even though the sunlight amplified the painful humming in my brain. Drake's battered
face stared back at me. He wasn't my Connor. It was impossible to see what his expression
was buried beneath the bloody cuts and bruises but his eyes said enough. There was
sadness and pain there.

"Drake?" I struggled to right myself but my body wouldn't cooperate.

"You okay?"

"I can't move." With my eyes closed the pain was almost worse.

"Riley, we don't have much time," he said, waiting for me to look at him once more.
When my eyes were open again, he nodded at the bed. We were still in Mariah's room
but she wasn't there.

"Where is she?"

"He took her. Riley, this is
bad
."

We looked at each other. Both of us having so much to say but not knowing where to
start. The realization that I wanted to know more about Drake before we died overwhelmed
me and question after question cramped my already swollen brain.
Where are you from? Did you have a family? Were you a dad? A good lover? What's your
favorite song? Your favorite food? Are you a cake or pie person? Beach or mountains?
What do you like to read? Do you read? Who are you? Who are you really?

He spit onto the carpet - a globby mix of blood and saliva. The shirt he slept in
was soaked in a scarlet color along the bottom. "Your stitches," I said.

"Least of my problems, don't you think?" He tried to smile but his puffy lips barely
moved.

It was rope that was tied around my wrist and ankles, that's why I couldn't move.
I had a burning rash on my skin where the rough cord rubbed me raw.
Hog-tied.
The bastard had tied me up like an animal. The only thing I could do was roll on
my stomach from one side to the other.

"You need to get that glass, cut the ropes," he said, nodding his head toward the
bed.

"I can't move, Drake," I said through gritted teeth.

"I'm tied to the fucking bed frame, Riley, I can't get it," he hissed.

And so began my roll across the room. It might have been funny under other circumstances,
but my hips hurt from digging into the floor and my limbs objected every time I attempted
to flip myself over like a fish on the shore. After a series of ungraceful revolutions,
I opted to squirm along the floor on my side, using my toes to dig into the carpet
fibers for leverage.

The glass lay on its side, just under the foot of the bed, waiting patiently for me.
My bad shoulder creaked like an old tree branch as I scooted myself closer to what
was left of the cup, dragging my body almost the length of the bed before feeling
the cool glass touch my finger-tips. I imagined myself in a horror flick as I fumbled
with the jagged base, rotating it to fit into my hand securely. In a scary movie,
I would be able to slice through the rope with ease just in time to get away from
the attacker. But it wasn't a movie and using the bottom of a busted drinking glass
slippery with my own blood to cut through one inch of rope was a lot harder than I
thought it would be. Several minutes passed, and the rope had barely begun to fray
when I noticed movement in the far corner of the room. The surprise caused me to jerk
backwards, knocking the glass out of my hand. I wiggled around on my side to get a
better view of whatever it was that shared the room with us.

Hovering in the empty corner was a dark, pulsating mass. It shimmered slightly before
taking the oily shape of a man. Its gloomy color stood out against the pale yellow
of the painted walls like a dark water stain.

With my eyes shut tightly, my head collapsed to the floor as I moaned,
"No, no, no…no…not now, please not now."

"What?" Drake snapped, "Did you drop it? Pick it up!" And then seconds later, "Oh
shit!"

There's only so fast one can move with their hands and feet bound behind them along
carpeting, but I gave it my best, getting maybe four feet before the shadow was standing
just beside me. A feeling of cool foreboding covered me like a wool blanket, pushing
me down into the floor, pinning me in place.

"Go away!"
I cried into the ground. Like a child, I hope that if I couldn't see it, it wouldn't
be real. If I didn't look at it, maybe it would leave.

Voices, small and rushed, echoed around the room in a chaotic chorus. The vibrations
of sound tickled my ear canals. It was the sounds of the lost - wanting to be heard.
I yelped as the bed moved beside me and still I refused to open my eyes. I knew the
shadow man was still there, standing somewhere next to me, I could feel his sorrow,
his anger and pain radiating out into the room like a toxic gas.

It could have been an earthquake but the bed was the only thing that bounced around
the room. So violent was the shaking that the feet of the metal frame actually lifted
off the floor more than once, causing my forehead to bounce against the thick carpet
with soft little thumps. And still I did not open my eyes.

When a banging shook the closed bedroom door from the outside accompanied by shouting
and cursing, I finally looked to see if our intruder was letting himself into the
room or not. The doors had no locks on them but the handle rattled in place as if
stuck. Our attacker continued to scream while the bed shimmied one final time, settling
against my back a good foot away from the wall. The erratic bouncing of the bed was
all the leverage needed for Drake to slip his ropes out from under the frame.

The voices stopped. The shadow man drifted over my trembling feet, hovering only a
moment before it faded back into the yellow corner as if passing through the wall
and then Drake's hands were on me, fumbling clumsily along my wrists. At first, I
thought he was trying to free me, but realized it was the glass he was searching for.

When the bedroom door finally flew open, Drake launched himself forward with the busted
glass held tightly in both hands, the cords of his muscles bulging from both arms
and brought it down into the startled younger man's chest before the two catapulted
into the hallway out of my view. Too afraid to move, I listened to the muffled cries
and grunts of fighting as the struggle moved further away. A piece of wooden furniture
fell over - most likely the small decorative table at the top of the stairs and picture
frames flew off the wall. After an eerie silence, the crunch of breaking glass being
stepped on made me flinch.

"Do it!"
a male voice bellowed.

After a slight pause there was a loud, wet crack, like something was split open and
then - nothing. Someone was still alive though - I could hear their raspy breathing.

"Drake?"

No answer. Then someone from the hall rustled around a bit and thumped against a wall.
Arching my back to loosen the rope behind me, I shifted my legs, rolling to my side
and then upright. With my shoulders pulled back, I crawled forward on my knees until
the hall came into view.

Mariah stood over a body with an antique brass bookend in one hand. When our eyes
met, she dropped it to the floor where it made a solid thud before falling over. Blood
splatter had sprayed the lower half of her naked legs in the shape of a rainbow. But
there wasn't a pot of gold at the end of this one. Just a broken skull leaking its
contents.

"What'd you do?"
I whispered.

"What I told her to."
A breathy answer came from the slumped figure by the wall.

She grinned at me and nodded, her gums bleeding where a tooth had been knocked out.
Though she had showered the day before, her hair was still a ratty mess and standing
naked in the hall she looked every bit the definition of crazy.

"He's dead," she laughed, "I killed him. He's dead…
dead-dead-dead-dead-dead,"
she cooed and giggled. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up at the sound.

"Mariah. Mariah, can you help me?" I asked, trying to keep my voice calm.

She froze, her face stuck in a manic grin, her bloody slobber drooling from the corner
of her mouth. "Help? Yes,
yes-yes-yes
, Mariah can help you," she said quietly with a series of brisk nods.

No
. That was the answer to my question from the day before. Mariah wasn't going to come
back from the Hell she'd been thrown into.

She was lost forever.

***

I dressed in jeans and a long sleeve top, pulling a thin denim jacket over my shirt
so my cuffs stuck out at the wrists. In the last few days, I had lost another five
pounds or so, as was evident by the way my pants hung from my hips again. Even with
swollen and injured joints, my body swam in my clothing. After tugging on socks and
shoes and pulling my hair back for a braid, I walked through the room taking a mental
image of the supplies I managed to stock up on. There wasn't much, but now that I
was leaving, I realized I didn't want to take any of it with me.

After fidgeting with the strap around my thigh where a new knife was tied in place,
I used the restroom and splashed my face with cold water before smoothing back the
loose strands of my hair.
Water.
All I wanted to pack was water.

When I stepped out into the hall, the body of the boy who was once ruggedly handsome
was still sprawled out on his back on the floor. He was probably a football star at
one time, voted best smile or most likely to succeed by his high school class and
there he was, dead on the top landing of someone else's house, head crushed in by
a sculpted
Rodin
book end. Amazing how the choices you make can determine not only your fate, but
also the fate of those around you. As I stepped over the towel I draped over his face
a few hours before, I caught sight of his closely cropped brown hair and had the sudden
urge to feel it.

Squatting above him, I ran my hand along the top of what was left of his head, feeling
the downy hair prickle my skin. His scalp was almost room temperature. Not that long
before he had been just a kid and in only a year, he morphed into a local thug - the
worst kind of urban monster there was. Taking what he could from those who lost everything.
I wouldn't miss him.

"He's not coming back, you know."

Startled by the sound of Drake's voice, I looked up to find him leaning against his
open doorway, a full backpack draped over one shoulder and a clean shirt dangling
from his hand.

"I don't
want
him to come back. It's just," I looked back down at the boy; Hunter Mariah said his
name was. "I can imagine him being a nice kid before all this. And look what he became."

"Yeah, well, tragedy brings out the worst in some people."

"What has it brought out in us?" I stood up as he pushed out of the doorway and walked
toward me.

Moving a loose section of hair off my face, he let his hand linger for a second too
long on my cheek before dropping it back to his side. "Well, in your case, nothing
bad."

I shook my head in disagreement. There was nothing good left in me.

"Riley.
Riley
, look at me," he shoved his hands in his pockets and I wondered if it was to keep
from touching me again. "You know that dark survivor cloud that's hovering above us,
just drowning us in shadows? Well, you can see my cloud and we can both see Mariah's.
But
you
," he leaned closer and lowered his voice, "I can't see your cloud, though I know
it's gotta be up there somewhere." After he smiled, he walked away. I listened to
him take the stairs down two at a time and not till he got to the bottom did I let
my eyes water up.

***

Mariah shaved her head. While changing and washing my face, she took the clippers
Drake used to trim his hair and removed the guard, shaving her hair clean off. The
torn patches of skin from her time as a captive stood out more but without hair, her
head had a smoother, universal look to it. She stood in the kitchen all smiles, dumping
miscellaneous food items and bottled water into a backpack she found in the guest
bedroom closet. She smelled of fresh sunscreen and lavender body wash.

"I'm so excited, I can't wait!" she gushed to Drake. He stood on the other side of
the counter, picking the chocolate chips out of a bowl of mixed nuts. "Is there snow
up there? In the mountains? I love the snow. I
really
want to see some snow. It's been cold enough. Might as well have snow if it's going
to be cold, you know?"