Waiting in the Throes

Chapter 17: Weathering the Storm

The weekend was a hellish hazy nightmare. After crippling me with the burn to the sole of my foot, using the household iron, Phil and Al had left me in Phil’s room, shivering and writhing in pain. Though the snow kept coming down Phil went off to work, leaving like any other ordinary work day– though slightly in a rush after spending his time beating me for running, instead of scraping the snow off of his truck. Al was the one who bathed me and gave me painkillers, and left me locked in my room.  Even in my drug-induced haze, I knew why my captors had done what they did. Burning the sole of my foot with the iron had made me not only incapable of running, but incapable of doing just about anything for myself. It made me easy prey. It made their plans for our “anniversary” that Saturday– a second attempt at a threesome– much easier since for them since I couldn’t get away. By the end of the weekend, the snow had stopped. The news was back to reporting things unrelated to snow, but they didn’t come back to me. My face was never shown on the news again.

The weeks passed and I was gradually weaned off of the painkillers. By the time I had been cut off, I could still feel the constant sting of burnt flesh on the bottom of my foot, still smell the injured skin– though I knew it was all in my head. The ball of my foot and the outside edge had gotten the worst of the burns, though my heel and toes weren’t in great shape either. I knew severe damage had been done, there were numb places on my foot, and places that felt like I was being stabbed with a knife with every step. I limped around the house, someone’s eyes constantly on me. I wasn’t allowed to watch the news anymore and slowly, the days started to smear into one another. I found it increasingly difficult to keep track of each passing day, and with every new, degrading experience I could feel myself and everything I was slipping away.

I lay in bed one night in early June thinking, Al asleep beside me in his usual position, but instead of arm wrapped around me, he was closer to the edge of the mattress on his side of the bed on the warm night. Since the day I had tried to run, I never spent a night without being shackled to the bedframe. I had already lost so much of myself and every time I thought of my family, my friends, my old life, a sharp pain my chest would begin, and I would replay even the most mundane images of memories in my head. It had to stop, it hurt more every time I thought of anything pre-abduction. I had to lock it away somewhere, all of it, keep it in a box, in some dusty corner of my brain, locked tight, never to be opened again. I swallowed hard, tonight I would let myself think of everyone and everything one last time, and then that would be it. I knew though, I would want to cheat, and so I let myself have one thing, one little token– Jason. He was attainable, I might see him again, and thinking of him wouldn’t break open the box in the back of my head. Decision made, I rolled over onto my side and let memories of my life, pre-abduction wash over me– and sobbed.

***

It was the first major heat wave of the summer and sweat rolled down my back. I sat on the porch swing on the front Veranda of the farmhouse with my left foot tethered to the newly constructed railing. It was a Wednesday afternoon near the middle of June. Just over a week had passed since I had broken down and locked everything about my old life away. I hadn’t been very good at it though, and mundane things had pushed my old life to the forefront more than I could handle so I had quickly figured out a very sick way to deal with everything; all I had to do was provoke Phil, and then my brain and body became occupied with dealing with his wrath. My aching muscles and bruised body were a testament to how effective the method was– and how often I slipped up.

Today Al was at work and that left me alone with Phil, who had taken an uncharacteristic risk letting me outside. I hadn’t set foot outdoors since my last attempt at escape during the snow storm. I looked out into the distance and could see the gathering of almost black clouds. The wind was starting to pick up, rustling through the trees and the grasses in the surrounding fields. It was going to pour rain, probably within the next half hour or more. I vaguely wondered what would happen if someone came up the driveway and saw me. Phil had gone inside after he’d heard the phone ring, leaving me alone. I closed my eyes and listened for the sound of the crunching of gravel, praying in silence that someone would pull up the long drive, turned around in the middle of nowhere, asking for directions or something, and see me, chained to the porch.

My little fantasy was interrupted at the sound of the screen door opening. My eyes flashed open as Phil stepped out onto the porch holding a bottle of water.

“Well that came on fast,” he commented, staring out at the cloud formation that was moving ever closer. I nodded absently and kept staring blankly out towards the road. I could just see it, and not a single car had passed in the time I had been outside– about half an hour.

“You know generally when someone talks to you, you’re supposed to say something in return,” Phil snipped.

“Sorry,” I mumbled. Phil nodded and continued.

“So you’ll never guess who that was,” he said nonchalantly, sitting down in one of the wooden chairs on the veranda next to the swing. I glanced at him before I remembered he probably wanted a verbal response.

“Who?” I asked with no enthusiasm what-so-ever. Phil cracked the seal on the bottle of water and took a sip before answering me.

“Richard.”

My stomach twisted into a knot the second I heard his name. I wanted so badly to ask about Jason, but I knew it would be a bad move. The anniversary of his abduction had passed last week and I had only been able to give it a passing thought before I had been forced to contend with my own problems again. I couldn’t help but feel like if I indicated I liked anything or anyone, Phil would take it or them away from me.

“Oh,” I said mechanically, waiting for him to elaborate. The first rumblings of thunder sounded in the distance. The wind rustled through the trees of the property, an insistent song of warning.

“He wants to know if Al and I have any time off coming up,” he added. I very carefully controlled my reaction. Richard wanted Phil and Al, and assumedly me to go and visit him. My mind’s first reaction was to feel… excitement? No that wasn’t right… but it was something. I nodded slowly, but Phil was watching me, his gaze steady even as a loud clap of thunder sounded in the distance.

“What?” I snapped, frustrated. I hated the way he looked at me, always calculating. He was so good at hiding what he was really thinking when he wanted to, and after the mask dropped, it was always too late.

“Aren’t you excited to see your friend again?” he asked. An incredibly loud crack ripped through the air and I jumped. The wind whipped through the trees, and after pulling myself away from the back of the swing, whispered up the back of my t-shirt, cooling my sweaty skin. I shivered and shrugged. How could I be excited with the tone of voice Phil was using? The one that told me he was excited for reasons I knew and dreaded. I felt the first stray rain drop’s icy kiss on my arm. I glanced down and watched the droplet roll off to the side.

“Don’t tell me you don’t want to see him again…”

I looked up sharply at Phil’s tone. He was moving off the chair, setting his water down on the small table beside him before he moved to sit next to me on the swing. It rocked backwards a moment and I immediately tensed, though I had learned to do it slowly, body coiling in gradually from the inside out. A few more stray droplets hit the skin on my arm. I could smell the crisp dampness starting to permeate the air, over-taking the dusty smell of heat. I looked out towards the road and swallowed. The dark sky seemed to have moved forward quickly, like a time lapsed scenario in a documentary. The clouds had moved in and stolen the last bit of warmth from the sun. I swallowed hard and could not control my flinch when Phil’s fingers traced up the back of my neck, lightly threading in my hair. Any wrong answer now would mean me getting thrown to the floor by my hair.

“I bet you think about him all the time,” Phil said, his voice low. I turned slightly to look at him, scared of what he was plotting.

“No, I don’t,” I said flatly. I almost instantly regretted it. What if we didn’t go visit? As selfish as it was, I wanted to see my only friend in the world again.

“Really?” Phil said, pulling back from me, his face an expression of mock disbelief. “Do you really like older men that much more?” I immediately looked down at my lap, my fingers tangled in one another, nested in the soft flannel plaid of an old pair of pyjama pants. I swallowed as much of my panic down as possible. Things had turned bad so quickly. Phil’s fingers began to tighten in my hair as he established a solid grip, not yet enough to injure, but enough to pull on my nerve endings, sending a chill down my spine.

“Do you fantasize about him fucking you again?” he asked, voice low. It was really windy now, and the patter of rain started to pick up, like the crescendo of an orchestra.

“No,” I croaked. My mind raced back to that day, every detail still in high definition in my head, the smell of Jason’s sweat, the look of panic on his face when the bedside drawer had been empty, the broken look of resignation when he realized what he’d have to do if he wanted either of us to escape relatively unscathed.  Phil looked amused at my reply.

“Do you think of me? Al?” he asked, pausing before his lips curled into a sneer, “Richard?”

“No,” I repeated, this time more sharply. Phil moved closer to me, pushing my head to the side so that his lips had access to my throat. His other hand gripped my thigh. I successfully swallowed the whimper trying to claw its way from my lips. Last night had marked two months of captivity, and Phil and Al had marked the occasion accordingly, in what I was afraid was becoming a very painful tradition.

“It’s been so long since I’ve fucked out in the rain,” he murmured into my ear. I flinched away from him, ribcage bumping into the wooden arm of the swing. Very suddenly, he switched positions, the swing pitching backwards and forwards as he braced one arm on the back of the swing, the other on the arm beside me, caging me between him and the swing. I looked up sharply at the sudden switch in position and was met with Phil’s satisfied sneer, and I wanted to do nothing but wipe the self-satisfied smirk from his face.

“So, are you going to fuck me here on the swing or out on the lawn?” I mocked. My words hit Phil like a slap in the face. A few tense seconds passed before his sneer returned and his grip on the back of the swing abruptly moved to my neck.

“If I fucked you how you deserve it, we’d break the swing, so we’d better move,” Phil purred before he tossed me to the wooden slats of the porch. I just managed to throw my arms up to head to protect it from injury and hit the wood on my side. I watched Phil climb over me to unlock the other end of the anklet, clasped around the porch rail and resisted every urge I had to kick him as hard as I could in the balls. Phil picked up the length of chain and pulled and I instantly regretted my remarks when the metal bit into my skin.

“Don’t please, please don’t,” I whimpered, all vestiges of cockiness gone. The storm was picking up intensity, rain coming down harder and harder. Thunder cracked above our heads and lightening ripped through the sky. As we passed the railing I grabbed the end post, realizing just what I was in for.

“Let go,” Phil growled. I shook my head.

“Please… I want to go inside,” I whined. Inside I wasn’t a human lightening rod because of the metal anklet on my foot. Inside Phil had his vicious toys, but he also had lube, and I would take the risk of the torture he could inflict on me there over being raped with no lube on the front lawn. Inside my isolation was less prominent, it wasn’t rubbed in my face like this would be. Phil pulled harder on the metal chain, wrapping it around his fist before pulling so hard that for a few seconds my torso and legs lifted from the steps before I let go of the porch railing in defeat.

Phil dragged me to the lawn until we were hidden from the road by the tall grass of the fields. It was pouring now. The rain was rapidly soaking into the ground, soaking me through my t-shirt and pyjama pants from both sides. I scrambled backwards, my fingers sinking into the wet ground but my assailant was on top of me in seconds, fingers roughly pulling my shirt over my head. Another clap of thunder sounded and my heart rate accelerated. Phil’s lips moved but I couldn’t hear him over the sound. He tossed my soaked t-shirt to the side in a wet pile before his fingers moved to the waist of my pants. I kicked and squirmed underneath him, the wet fabric clinging to my skin, making it difficult for Phil to remove. He peeled the pants down to my knees and yanked forcefully until the fabric tangled around the metal chain at the ankle of my healing foot.

 “Turn over,” he ordered, undoing his own belt, fingers clumsy with urgency. When I didn’t immediately do as I was told he reached forwards and grabbed me, turning me harshly onto my stomach. When I felt him positioning himself I opened my mouth to scream, and it felt like to entire world was against me. A clap of thunder sounded, nearly drowning out my miserable cry, and in the silence after the thunderous clap, Phil shoved my face into the dirt and grass, effectively muffling the rest of my protest with the earth. I inhaled bits of earth and grass, until my cry was cut short but the sudden, all too familiar pain of penetration.

I watched the mud and bits of grass flow down the drain as Phil’s hands moved over my skin, scrubbing both of us clean with soap that smelled artificially fresh and clean. It was the same soap I’d used the first night. The jump in temperature from the rain outside to the shower inside had shocked my system and I was shaking hard under the older man’s hands. I closed my eyes, trying to focus on the warm water running over my skin, trying to ignore the hands firmly scrubbing away the dirt and grass and other refuse.

“Need me to turn the water up?” Phil asked, voice steady, gentle even. I shook my head. He was always like this after he had done even the most despicable things to me. When his needs were satiated, he became human again, if only for a little while. Phil ignored me and turned behind him, adjusting the taps with one hand while the other steadily held onto my hip. The water got a couple of degrees hotter, but it wasn’t unpleasant, and my shaking gradually slowed. Heat radiated from my core, the dry burn unable to be healed from the warm flow of water even when Phil separated my muscles so that water would run over my abused orifice. I flinched away from him, taking half a step forward.

“Don’t,” I said weakly in protest. Phil murmured something about making me clean but after a few seconds he stopped, opting to lean over and pick up the bottle of shampoo on the edge of the tub.

“Tilt your head back,” he prompted, as the sound of the plastic cap springing open filled the enclosed ceramic space.

***

“Brennan please… eat,” Al cajoled. It was a day and a half after the rain storm and the last thing I felt like doing was eating. I was a shaking, feverish mess and had been unable to stop throwing up since I had woke up that morning and without warning, puked in the trash basket barely within reach of Al’s bed. I had been terrified at the thought of being caught but Al hadn’t got angry. Instead he had immediately shifted into nurse mode, treating me partly like a patient, and partly like the lover he chose to pretend I was.

I shook my head, closing my eyes to keep from getting sick at the sight of the writhing green jello in the bowl in front of me that Al was holding. I burrowed under the blankets and tried to breathe evenly, another wave of nausea rearing its ugly head. It was one of the only times in the past several weeks that I was left untethered and it was mainly from the necessity to allow me to run for the bathroom with very little warning.

“Brennan you have to at least drink something,” Al said, setting the bowl of gelatin down on the tray beside him on the nightstand table. He picked up a bottle of red liquid that looked like fruit punch, but from the label I could tell was some sort of medical supplement. He shook it vigorously in one hand before cracking the safety seal open.

“Leave me alone,” I rasped. My throat still burned in the wake of stomach acid, which seemed to be the only thing coming up anymore. Al however had reached the end of his responsibilities as a nurse and transitioned into less professional techniques. He sighed and crawled over me, getting behind me to scoop me into a seated position leaned against him, at the headboard. My head spun, blood rushing to all the wrong places, and I watched the room seem to teeter on its axis before settling. Holding both of my arms down with one arm, Al brought the bottle to my lips.

“Drink,” he commanded. I turned my head to the side and pursed my lips.

“Come on, stop that,” Al ordered, frustration beginning to tint his tone.

“Let me go,” I said weakly, “and I’ll drink it myself.” He eased his arm from my waist slowly and put the bottle in one of my empty hands. I hesitated as long as I could before holding my breath and bringing to bottle to my lips. The liquid didn’t have much of a smell or taste thankfully. It was like the watered down juice they handed out at school track meets.

“So, I came across your stuff the other day while I was doing some re-organizing,” Al said casually as I slowly sipped at the drink. It wasn’t that bad, in fact as much as I hated to admit it, the juice made my burned throat feel a lot better. I didn’t say anything and let him continue.

“According to your driver’s license your birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks.” The date popped into my head July 7,1990. Immediately I blanked out, refusing to move any closer to the subject in my brain. I could feel the box in the back of my head rattling determinedly and I cringed.

“I know,” I rasped, trying to control the persistent rattle and resulting anxiety. No, no, no! Brennan did not exist before now, there was no life before Al and Phil, forget about before. There is no before.

“We’ll have to do something special that day,” Al said tenderly, one arm wrapping around my stomach. I let my head drop back against his shoulder, partly so he could see my face, but mostly out of exhaustion being sick, and trying to keep old memories from flooding my senses.

“No,” I said simply.

“Come on, it’s your birthday, there has to be something you want,” he said with a soft smile.

“What I want, you won’t give me.”

It took several seconds for me to realize I had said what I was thinking out loud. It was Al’s fingers digging into my side that gave it away. My breath hitched in my throat and I immediately started to coil into myself. But Al didn’t move to hurt me. He took a deep breath in and let it out in a puff.

“It’s okay,” he said, his voice barely holding onto its calm, “Richard said you would take a while to adjust to everything. I keep forgetting that it really hasn’t been that long.” His fingers slipped under the baggy hoodie I was wearing. They felt so cold against my skin I immediately stiffened in response, my flesh breaking out in goose bumps at the almost frost-bitten sensation.

“So what else do you want?” he coaxed, his arm bumping into my hand, urging me to drink more of the bland juice. I took another sip, the cooling liquid flowing down my throat to a stomach that was still very unsure of all of this.

“Stop leaving me alone with Phil.” I had made the same plea before, the morning after Al had brought me in from my punishment in the barn. I shuddered at the thought.

“Brennan…” Al’s tone was lightly chastising, his fingers brushing delicately over the sweaty skin of my stomach.

“Please?” I added, feeling a twinge of shame and desperation. I was asking one rapist, to save me from the other. ‘This is how Stockholm Syndrome starts’ the voice in the back of my head taunted.

“Brennan I can’t do that, we’ve been very careful to arrange a schedule that benefits everyone– including you.” I choked on the sip of juice I had just taken, convulsing into a coughing spasm. Al swiped the juice from my hand and deftly set it on the nightstand table.

“Would you rather we leave you tied up all day? Alone locked in the basement or the barn?” Al asked. When I stayed silent, actually contemplating the alternative for just a few seconds too long for his taste Al sighed.

“We agreed this was what we wanted, one additional member in our relationship, I can’t tell him hands off when we are equals.” I had to swallow down my protest at the use of the word ‘relationship’ when I spoke, or the use of the word ‘equals’ for that matter.

“Do you know what he does to me when you’re not here?” I asked, my voice strained from coughing. Al leaned over and grabbed the abandoned bottle of fruit drink and put it in my hand again.

“He tortures me,” I continued, voice dropping, shaking as I finished. Al sighed.

“I know he likes to play a bit rough but–”

“But what?” I said, not defiantly, but in defeat.

“You do too.” I twisted so sharply under his arm that I actually felt my stomach cramp and my stiff back crack in protest. Al gripped me suddenly; like he was afraid I would run.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he chastised. I closed my eyes; the sudden movement had brought with it a wave of nausea. I concentrated on breathing through my mouth, not getting sick.

“Be honest with yourself. Part of you wants it,” Al said evenly, voice low and steady, “You wouldn’t constantly do things to warrant punishment if you didn’t subconsciously want to be disciplined.” I could feel myself start shaking again as the chill passed down my spine. I could hear the echo of the same tone he had used when he had woken up after I’d stabbed him with the syringe full of sedative that had been meant for me.

“You like the pain and the dominance, you like being controlled,” Al said simply, “if you admit that, you’ll learn to actually enjoy him.” Al’s lips were on my collarbone.

“He loves making you cum,” he breathed into my ear.

“Stop,” I whined. There were a thousand things I wanted to say to him. Like how until them I hadn’t really known what I liked. How now, I didn’t like sex at all, never even wanted to ever be naked around anyone ever again. But I kept my mouth shut. Al moved away from me as suddenly as he had grabbed me.

“Drink,” he ordered curtly, abruptly signalling the end of all discussion. I did as I was told, finally finishing off the watered down juice.

“I’ll think of something to get you,” he said thoughtfully, “…if you’re good.”

It was several days before I felt well enough to get out of bed, and thankfully, Phil seemed to take mercy on me for once in my life and let me stay curled in a miserable ball in Al’s bed. I hadn’t slept in my room since I’d tried to run. Phil would check on me a couple of times a day, waking me from sleep to leave bottle of the same meal of vitamin supplemented juice and jello, along with a warning that it had better be gone by the time he came back. Sometimes I could stomach it, others I couldn’t and despite the threats, he never did anything about it. When I started to feel healthy again, I did nothing different than when I was sick. I stayed in bed, buried under the blankets, the drapes drawn closed over the open windows, and I slept. The ‘head in the sand’ routine worked for a few days until I woke up one afternoon with a start to see Phil sitting on the edge of the bed, watching me. His hand clamped down on my knee when I jumped at the sight of him. The honeymoon was over, no more locking myself away in bed, playing sick, he wasn’t going to believe me anymore. I swallowed hard, afraid to look away from him. Keeping eye contact with me, Phil slowly released my knee and gathered the duvet in his fist, pulling the blankets away from me, before his own body weight at the side of the bed prevented him from getting them past halfway down my thighs. Luckily I was wearing a t-shirt and dark blue pyjama pants again for the third day in a row.

“You’re losing weight,” he said matter-of-factly, eyes skimming over my frame. I said nothing. I hadn’t really noticed, I avoided looking at my reflection whenever possible, even with the mirror above the bed, I made a conscious effort to never catch more than a glimpse of myself from the corner of my eye. It didn’t surprise me to hear the observation. Though I rarely looked at my reflection I had noticed a few changes; how cold I always seemed to feel now, the sharpness of my hipbones where they jutted out just above where the pyjama pants always seemed to fall, slightly too loose on my hips. Phil’s hand released the quilt, and seemed to float above my leg before moving to the hem of my shirt, pulling it up with his head tilted to the side. I flinched, the cool air rushing up my shirt and dimpling my skin. I started to breathe harder. Just leave me alone, please just leave me alone. His fingers danced over the skin on my stomach and finally I looked away from him, my eyes unfortunately moving to the mirror above me. If I hadn’t felt Phil’s fingers on my skin, in the exact place the mirror displayed them, there would have been a total disconnect with who I saw in the mirror, and who I was.

My hair had grown shaggy and messy looking, especially combined with the fact that I hadn’t shaved in days and now had a sufficient growth of stubble across my chin and gaunt cheeks. I avoided looking at the rest of my face after a mere second’s eye contact with my reflection. Phil’s thumb was brushing over my left hipbone, the prominent bone making a valley between my thigh and stomach. My arms hung limply at my sides, the right one lightly clutching the sheets beside me, the left lose and strewn out on the bed beside me. It had never been the same since the break, feeling weak and shaky whenever it was forced to bear much weight. I watched Phil’s other hand push up the other side of my shirt, watched my reflection shrink away from his hands, sinking as far into the mattress as the furniture would let me go. This was not Phil’s usual approach. He always moved quickly, taking what he wanted right away, swiftly dealing punishment when I did not fall in line. Slow and steady was not his style. My entire body was waiting in a suspended state of tension for abuse.

“So you’re not going to talk to me now?” Phil taunted, but the usual jeer in his tone was absent. I tore my eyes away from the mirror above me to look at him and access his mood.

“What do you want?” I replied dully.

“I want you to get up and have a shower, you’re all sweaty,” Phil replied, pulling his hands out from under my shirt. I nodded and slowly sat up. From now on I would bite my tongue and prove to Phil and Al that I didn’t get any pleasure from being ‘disciplined’ by them. A sick sensation churned my stomach because of course, in attempting to prove both men wrong, I was giving in. Maybe that was the idea in the first place. Phil moved so that I could stand up. As much as I didn’t want to do anything to please him, I needed the shower, I just hoped I would be alone. He watched me circle the foot of the bed and smirked when I headed to the bathroom.

“My bathroom.”

The order came just as my toes touched the tile. I froze and turned slowly, sure he had waited on purpose to gauge exactly how compliant I was going to be. The fleeting thought of locking myself into the bathroom was gone as fast as it came. Jason’s words floated to the surface of my mind…

Bide your time, be smart and wait until you know you can run… Make them think they are breaking you down.

I stopped, shoulders sagging in defeat and tried to tell myself that this wasn’t giving in, this was survival. I turned back and walked around the end of the bed again, eyes on the floor. Phil opened the bedroom door and I walked past him, felt his hand fall to the small of my back, guiding me to his room. Once past the threshold I mechanically walked to the bathroom, his hand barely touching me. I listened as he closed the bathroom door behind us, turning the lock with a solid click. I stared around the windowless room, clutching my elbows when he stepped up behind me, his chest just grazing my shoulder blades as he leaned forward and issued the order:

“Strip.”

I pulled at the bottom of my shirt, wincing as my skin stretched over my muscles and bones, sore from another whipping with the electrical cord. In the sterile, small space I heard Phil’s sharp inhale. I dropped the fabric at my side in a heather-gray puddle, my fingertips dumbly pulling at the drawstring on the pyjama pants next. I faltered for a few seconds before slowly pushing the fabric away from my hips, bending hesitantly to pull each foot from the legs of the pyjama bottoms. There was a sharp exhale as I stood back up. I couldn’t tell whether Phil was getting off from the scars and welts that criss-crossed over my back and thighs, or the fact that I was actually submitting to him without question this time. I soon had my answer.

“Turn around.”

I did so slowly, hazarding a glance at Phil’s face. His eyes burned with lust and I swallowed hard. Whatever he was going to make me do couldn’t have been worse than what I had already suffered through. I looked away the second Phil’s eyes met mine, concentrating instead on the tile floor in front of me.

“Get on your knees.”

My legs wobbled unsteadily, reflecting the resisting force in the back of my head but I forced myself down, knees crashing into the floor gracelessly. I stared at a line of grout between Phil’s feet, breathing steadily in and out, trying to control myself. I wanted to run, cry, scream, fight, do anything except what I was told but I remained where I was on the floor.

“Well? What are you waiting for?”

Without outwardly saying it, I knew what Phil was demanding, and it echoed around the room, assaulting my eardrums from all sides. I drew in a deep, shuddering breath, trying not to be obvious but failed miserably. The air left my lungs in a noisy rattle as my shaking hands reached up towards the front of Phil’s jeans. I fumbled blindly, keeping my eyes on the tile floor as my fingers found the metal snap. It freed itself from the hole with a pop that seemed to resound in the small room. I grabbed the zipper and pulled it down the second I had it in my fingers, just wanting to get my hands away from him. I rubbed them down my bare thighs, like I was wiping my hands clean of something dirty. A hand reached out and fingers curled behind my jaw, pulling me forward and an almost silent whine escaped from the back of my throat but I complied.

“Look at me.”

Fingers dug into the base of my skull but did not force me to look at him. I had to do it on my own so very slowly I raised my head, eyes leveling for only a few brief seconds at the splayed open crotch of Phil’s jeans before traveling up, forcing me to lean my head back. I stopped at his collarbones and steeled myself to look in his eyes from where I crouched, groveling on the tile floor of the bathroom. When I did his lips pulled up on one side, smirking down at me.

“You’re a good little whore.”

The last remark hit me like a punch in the gut and I almost reeled back– except his hand kept me in place. I feel dirty and it has nothing to do with being unshowered, and everything to do with being naked, on my knees, knowing it was my own doing. Phil bent down close so he can look right at me, his face inches from mine.

“Now go shower,” he said evenly before finally letting go of the back of my head. He leaned over to the medicine cabinet beside the sink and withdrew a blue handled razor, the plastic guard still on it and set it on the counter.

“Don’t forget to shave.” Then he walked out of the room without fully shutting the door behind him, leaving me on the floor. I wanted to curl up into a ball and cry, instead I crawled to the tub and turned on the taps. As I waited for the water to heat up I obediently grabbed the razor from the counter and returned to the shower. I knelt down and felt the water before cranking the heat up as high as I thought I could bear and then climbed into the tub. The claw foot tub had been modernized and had a shower head mounted on the wall above it. I pulled the release and the taps gave a subtle shudder before the water sprayed out of the shower head above me, stinging at first before becoming therapeutically hot– baptism-by-fire hot.

I stood under the steady stream of water praying that Phil wouldn’t decide to come back in the room. I stared down at the razor in my hand and found myself wondering if I could smash it quickly enough to free the sharp blades encased in the head and…

…and do what? Kill yourself? Bleed out at the bottom of the tub and make all the fighting, all the pain you have endured all for nothing? What if he catches you? Then what?

The razor dropped from my hand, loudly clattering to the bottom of the tub. As much as part of me wanted to, I wasn’t brave enough to take the plunge and commit to taking my own life. There was enough of me left that I still had the tiniest shred of will remaining. I numbly went through the motions of a shower, shampooing my hair, scrubbing my skin clean before I bent and picked up the razor. There was a container of shaving cream sitting in a shower caddy on the wall with the shampoo and soap. I grabbed the shaving cream and slathered it onto my face. Normally I shaved in front of a mirror, but that had been before– now I didn’t care what I looked like. I dragged the razor over my skin hastily, not caring when it snagged on hairs and my skin. Finally finished, I hesitated before turning off the taps. Staying in the shower meant I would get a few more precious minutes alone, but staying in too long would make Phil come looking for me, and if he felt the need to come looking, that would mean trouble. Reluctantly I reached for the taps and turned them off.

“Took you long enough.”

I jumped when the shower curtain was yanked back, feet slipping across the slick surface of the tub floor. Phil reached in and grabbed my elbow, to keep me from falling. His eyes moved over me, one quick up and down before he released me.

“You’re not done.”

“W-what?” I stuttered, not understanding. Did I smell or something? Still have shaving cream on my face?

“I told you to shave,” Phil replied, eyebrows arched. I stared back at him dumbly for what felt like an entire minute before I realized what he meant. My stomach churned as I swallowed hard, remembering his comments the day I had been branded.

“Or do you want me to do it?” I pulled back from him so fast I slipped again, but regained my balance on my own just as his arm shot out and caught me once again.

“Don’t–” I bit my tongue before I got out the rest- ‘touch me’.

“Everything– from navel to asshole,” he ordered, “I’ll let you decide what you want to do with your legs.” Then he turned from the shower and strolled casually from the room, leaving the door in its same, half open position. I stared after him for a few seconds before I heard him shout from the bedroom: “I don’t hear water running!” and immediately moved my hands to the taps.

I let the water run over my cooling skin for a few minutes before shakily picking up the shaving cream and lathering it between my hands. I’d done ‘maintenance’ on my body hair before, but not under duress, and not to look like a porn star. I swallowed hard as I thought of the fact that I had now been filmed in sexual acts twice. In Phil’s mind, I probably was a porn star– his porn star. Revulsion caused me to shudder and I hesitated before bringing the razor to my skin, and taking a deep breath to steady myself, did as I was told.

The room seemed to echo when I turned off the taps and pulled the shower curtain aside. Of course, Phil was standing beside the cabinet, holding a towel. I tried to suppress my cringe. He seemed to take no notice.

“Perfect,” he growled perversely, holding out the towel. I snatched it from his outstretched hands and wrapped it around my waist. I could feel my skin burning in shame, shaking in barely controlled frustration and helplessness. I wanted to punch the self-satisfied grin from his face. Instead when he gestured into the bedroom, I obediently walked past him, resigned to whatever he had in store for me.

That night when Al got home was no different than any other night. Phil told Al I had been up, had ate some dinner and was for all intents and purposes, well enough for everything to go back to the normal routine, and it did– until like every other night, I stripped off my clothes to go to bed and tried to get under the sheets before Al could get any ideas. Unfortunately Al did have ideas, and after securing my ankle to the footboard, I felt his hand wander across my hip. I flinched. I just wanted one more day to myself, one more day without someone touching me. His fingertips had just grazed over the now healed brand on my pelvis when they abruptly stopped. I felt even more naked than I normally did. His fingertips experimentally brushed slightly further down and I bit my lower lip, staring into space at the wall ahead of me, trying to remain completely still. Suddenly his hand moved away and ripped the comforter down. I couldn’t help but flinch, afraid of what Al was going to do to me. He sat up abruptly and I fell backwards against the mattress and saw the barely contained anger in his face; his jaw set tightly, eyes unable to move from my hips. For a few terrifying seconds I thought he was going to hit me and then he spoke.

“Did he do this?” he asked after several seconds, in which I felt my heart completely still.

“I-I- he,” I stuttered uselessly, unable to explain exactly what happened. It didn’t matter. Before I could pull together the necessary connections to figure out what was happening, Al was out of the bed, slamming the bedroom door behind him. I listened as another door opened and then the muffled sounds of an argument beginning with “You had no right…” before another door slammed, and everything else, including whatever Phil responded, was muffled. I tried to listen, heart pounding as the two men argued, but I couldn’t make anything out. When I realized that neither man was interested in coming back to deal with me, the tension slowly started to leave my body, but I was no longer tired, instead I listened to the muffled sounds of an argument and stared out the window across from the bed.

I was half asleep when I heard the bedroom door open and close softly. I concentrated on keeping my breathing even and shallow as Al got into bed beside me, and was rewarded with the absence of his touch, other than to pull me closer to him in the usual spooning position. Before I would have cringed, repulsed by his touch, but the impulse was long suppressed because I had already taken so much worse. I had to save my fight for the times that counted.

In the day following Al and Phil’s fight, the tension was thick between them. They did not really speak to one another, but for the necessary exchanges to get through the day. The morning with Al passed by better than any other day had since Jason had left. I showered alone, taking my time so much so that Al came back to check on me, and supervise me when I got dressed. Downstairs I picked at the plate Al sat in front of, ultimately eating just the toast, but he said nothing. When we were done it was much earlier than usual, and when I finally realized why a sick sensation rolled over me. Normally when we woke up Al and I had sex, today we hadn’t. I quickly reminded myself that I should be relieved, happy even, but I couldn’t do it. Things would go back to the way they were before the fight eventually. We wandered into the living room and Al put on a movie I didn’t recognize that was playing on tv and sat down beside me, sighing before he reached into the drawer of the end table and withdrew an eReader.

“It doesn’t have internet– in case you were thinking you could somehow check your facebook page,” he quipped as he flicked it on. I ignored him and tried to adjust my position on the couch to one that was even close to comfortable, but the perpetual chain on my ankle made it impossible for me to lie down with my head on the arm of the couch. If I wanted to lie down, I’d have to put my head in Al’s lap. I shifted and finally got into a position that was close to comfortable, back against the arm of the couch, and lay my head against its back. After a month it had begun to feel like there was a fog seeping into my brain that seemed to dull everything. I hadn’t picked up a book since before exams and I used to read all the time– had even been contemplating declaring a major in English. I hadn’t even done something as mentally stimulating as a crossword puzzle in my time here. With nothing to focus my mind on, I could feel myself sinking deeply into depression, could feel the box in the back of my head rattling persistently and it was growing harder and harder to resist its contents.

“I know what I want for my birthday,” I found myself blurting without thinking. Al looked up from his device and let it drop to his lap before he turned to me slowly, a smile hesitant to come to his lips.

“What?” he asked, his voice genuinely curious. Then I realized that I had been stupid to even open my mouth.

“Something to do,” I said a little more hesitantly, then regretted it immediately, knowing what I had said could be misconstrued depending on Al’s mood, “or something…” I trailed off into a mumble.  It sounded completely stupid, even to me and I immediately became fearful of his reaction. What the hell is the matter with you? Why do you think they would give you anything? Because they fucking owe you for raping you? I doubt they see it that way.

Al smirked.

“Do you honestly think in a house with two men there isn’t at least one game system?” he stood up and crossed the room to the television, opening the cabinet doors of the stand it sat on to reveal both an Xbox and a PS3. He shut the doors again and strolled back to the couch. I didn’t know what to say to that so I stayed silent.

“I guess it’s kind of stupid for me to ask if you play,” he said, thankfully shrugging off what Phil probably would have seen as a greedy request and therefore a very valid reason to punish me.

“Forget about it,” I muttered, angry at myself for speaking out of place, for opening myself up to potential punishment and humiliation. Al shook his head slowly.

“Uh-uh, you aren’t getting away from things that easily.” He moved closer to me and I stilled, suddenly very afraid of what he might do.

“I know why you asked,” he said cryptically, moving ever closer, invading my personal space as he crawled almost on top of me. His mouth was at my ear.

“Truth is you can’t wait to get a gun in your hand and just empty the magazine into someone’s chest, even if it’s just in a game” he purred. It was true, there was nothing I wanted more than to take a swing with the axe in the backyard, or put either Phil or Al or both at the business end of a magnum, but that chance wasn’t coming anytime soon.

When I didn’t say anything, Al continued to move closer, framing my body between him and the couch, one arm on the back beside my head, the other on the arm of the couch, beside my torso.

“All that pent up frustration with who you are…” His hips ground against mine and his words acted in just the way he intended to. I felt the tension growing in my limbs, the desire to push him off of me.

“You don’t know who I am,” I said lowly, the anger and helplessness and frustration in my head finally swirling out of the fog and up to the surface.

“That’s what you think,” Al continued, “but I can read you like a book.”

“Get off of me,” I muttered.

“You’re gay and you don’t want to admit it to yourself,” Al continued, in a way I would have thought more typical of Phil. It wasn’t that labels bothered me. It was that I did not know enough about myself yet to truly know which one I fit under. He had no right to think he knew who I was just because he had put his dick in me. I couldn’t control myself and with both arms, I reached up and shoved him out of my space. Caught off guard, the larger man tumbled backwards, landing in a tangle of limbs at the other end of the sofa. A lazy smile decorated his features and my frustration grew. I wanted to wind up and punch him as hard as I could, but I stopped, my balled fist clenched at my side, my heart pounding as I waited for retribution. Al lunged forward and I brought my hands up to shield my head instantly, and felt my fist inadvertently made contact with flesh. I looked up sharply, expecting immediate retaliation as was startled to be met with Al’s green eyes, smoldering with…

“Hit me again.” The order was half growled, half moaned. I jumped back in surprise though I had little room to move with him almost directly on top of me. His hips ground down into mine and I squirmed. He was hard– I hit him, and he was hard. Very suddenly his and Phil’s relationship became clearly understood in my head– just as I heard the abrupt scraping sound of the front door opening. Before it has slammed, Al was back in his place, rearranging his hard-on, withdrawing his hand from his pants just as Phil stomped into the kitchen.

“You’re home early,” Al commented, his tone neutral and friendly– the tone you assume after a fight with a loved one when you’re trying to make things better.

“I forgot my lunch,” Phil grumped as he stomped past the couch, clearly not over the argument yet. He went to the refrigerator and pulled out a brown paper bag before turning around, eyes raking over me where I sat on the couch, my nerves shot from what had transpired literally seconds earlier.

“See you tonight,” Phil said politely, pausing to swoop in and deliver a quick peck to Al’s upturned face. The argument was over, and I was in the middle of one seriously fucked up triangle.

Al had barely closed the front door to leave for work before Phil was on top of me, abandoning his usual regime of showering and cleaning before he put his hands all over me, wordlessly pulling at my clothes. At first I was too shocked to do much of anything but squirm away from him before his fingers became impatient, digging into my flesh, aggressively correcting my errant ways. Finally it was too much and I weakly kicked at him with my tethered leg as he stripped the old scrub pants I was wearing mostly off, but the chain weakened the force of the blow and instead my foot clumsily made contact with his thigh.

“Brennan…” Phil’s voice was a warning. I forced myself to breathe, to not utter the words ‘stop’ or ‘please’– those were the words that gave Phil the excuse to get angry, to start the cycle of abuse and sexual torture that fuelled his arousal. I bit down on my tongue, gripping the edge of the couch cushions and the arm of the sofa where I sat, now very slouched from Phil vigorously stripping me. The other still stood fully clothed, staring down at me, making no moves to shed his clothing. I gritted my teeth, preparing for a fast but painful ordeal. The kind where he would strip me naked, just to make me feel degraded but couldn’t be bothered to do more than unbutton his fly to free his erection. After staring at me much longer than usual, Phil sunk to the floor on his knees, shoving the coffee table backwards, a lecherous grin on his face.

His hands ran up my inner thighs, stopping just short of the fabric of the boxers I was wearing and I held my breath in the back of my throat. He was looking up at me, smirking.

“Al is still upset with me,” he mused, then frowned, “If I knew he’d have been this pissed I would have had you shave your thighs too- though they aren’t so bad.” I twitched under his touch, but said nothing, carefully controlling myself as he continued to talk.

“At least it would have been worth it, though maybe I can still make things fun,” Phil purred. His fingers slid up the fronts of my thighs until they reached the waistband of my boxers and slowly peeled them off my legs, fingertips digging into my ass, making me lift myself off of the couch enough for him to pull the fabric away. And like so many other times, I was left naked and unable to go anywhere.