Mercy

With an arm clenched around my wrist as a cautionary measure and a prescription bag grasped loosely in the other hand, I allowed myself to be dragged into the visitor’s parking lot at the hospital much to my chagrin. I was terrified that I would look up to find my own car innocently occupying one of the many spaces reserved for the anxious loved ones of countless sickly patients residing in the facility looming before them, so I kept my eyes fixed upon the ground in front of me. If I kept my eyes concentrated on the cigarette butts, discarded wads of gum, and fast food wrappers that littered the concrete beneath my feet, I couldn’t possibly make eye contact with the merciless being operating my vehicle. I feared that if such an instance occurred, I would crumble right on the spot and tear myself from Jakob Armstrong’s hesitant, yet firm, hold to scurry away into the depths of that ill-omened car, allowing myself to be Elliot’s prey once more in fear of him harming Billie Joe or his son to get to me. I wanted to prevent such pandemonium from ever arising to save Jakob from any further emotional trauma inflicted by that masochistic prick, yet I failed to realize that subjecting myself to Elliot’s vice-like grip once more would be just as psychologically crippling, if not more, for me to endure. I merely assumed that it was the notorious whore in me begging for another go. Just one more rape, just one more sadistic assault…I could take it. I deserved to keep taking it.

Heaving a sigh, I recognized my self-deprecation was exactly the sort of mindless, internal sacrilege profoundly advised against by the Mistress of Mindfuckery herself. She concluded that I was chronically depressed and quite possibly suffering from a mild form of post-traumatic stress disorder. With a scoff and an unimpressed roll of the eyes, I found it increasingly difficult to feel any form of liberation in her findings. A goddamn toddler with an unnatural aptitude for absorbing the legal jargon laced within each episode of Law and Order could have come up with a more impressive diagnosis, yet somehow I managed to keep my misgivings locked inside to fester alongside my unspoken trauma. Lorraine already seemed to know the minor details from what Billie must have babbled to her before demanding to see me, but even that troubled me. Not once did I verbalize having been coached into silence with the use of an electric shock collar, never had I spoken of being locked away in a closet with nothing but a sandwich and my captor’s sperm keeping me alive, and I certainly never described how unbearably my skin crawled with repugnance every time Elliot pressed his body against mine. More importantly, I kept to myself how, despite my revulsion, I craved his contact after a while. Everything that went on in my mind, right down to the fucking song I hummed for Cadence before she was viciously stolen from me, Billie appeared to have mysteriously soaked into his mind like a dehydrated sponge.

If I didn’t know any better, I would have pegged the old man as a victim of Elliot’s as well, but I knew it was impossible. Regardless of how simple it would have been to break an elderly victim, the vile creature refused to prey upon men older than him. I supposed it had something to do with an unspoken intimidation or abhorrence he may have acquired for the elderly over the years, or perhaps overpowering men his age or younger was merely an element in Elliot’s underlying, pedophilic urges. I wouldn’t be staggered in the least if his next victim turned out to be an unfortunate, lonely teenage boy from Bumfuck, Arkansas, who had been electronically lured into the lion’s lair with the promise of money and security. Hell, those seemingly pleasant offers had been enough to peel my sorry ass out of the laps of countless filthy men…only to be thrust right back into the lap of an even more menacingly smutty man.

The more I mulled it over, however, the more it became abundantly apparent that Elliot would not rest until I was forever in his possession or dead. It was a simple reality, and I’d embraced it the moment he allowed me to attend work after being imprisoned for so long.

“C’mon, Fairy, quit draggin’ your feet,” Billie Joe grumbled sullenly from his wheelchair, arms crossed in juvenile defiance at the oxygen tubes protruding from his nostrils and cascading victoriously about his neck and abdomen. The way in which he furiously muttered under his breath was enough of a precursor for everyone within a five hundred foot radius to become aware of his disdain for the contraption. He could breathe on his own, goddammit, and he sure as hell ain’t gonna have some robot breathing for ‘im. I grinned at the inflexion my inner-monologue had made in honor of the old bastard, but the smile faded rapidly as I found my gaze had been brought upward.

Shit. If I saw my car with Elliot stewing hatefully inside, I would fucking snap…

“This way, Mike…and for the love of all things holy, do not look to your left,” Jakob recommended, though his command was highly unnecessary due to his steadfast apprehension in permitting my body to part from his. His hand was a claw, digging into my skin and refusing to give any form of release until my being was safely buckled away in his car. It was unnerving how authoritarian Jakob’s role had been the moment he agreed to give his father and me a ride to the old bastard’s house, for I’d expected him to be a bit more…frail. Damaged. In fact, I was appalled at myself by how placid he had been when he first arrived because it meant that I was far more fragile than Jakob. I was a goddamn pansy.

I did not heed his warning. My eyes darted instantaneously to my left, and sure enough, the image of my car materialized before me. Elliot’s presence within the vehicle was absent, so naturally my pulse began to race and my breath began to hitch in my throat. He was out there somewhere, roaming the halls of the hospital or gallivanting about the parking lot in a frantic search for his precious little pet, and I was vulnerable. I was right there, out in the open, and free for the taking. At once, I squirmed against Jakob’s grasp and tried in vain to free myself.

“Don’t even think about it!” Jakob grunted, struggling to keep me under control and retain our course.

“Please, just let me go! I’m the one he wants! I don’t want you to get hurt because of me!” I wailed, stopping dead in my tracks. The man dragging me along was swiftly brought to a halt as well, and a glare so unwavering pulsated from his dark-chocolate eyes that I withered on the spot.

As if Jakob’s gaze wasn’t horrifying enough, the old bastard just had to add, “Keep movin’, Slut.”

Promptly, my body was compelled to follow Jakob’s lead without further faltering.

Throwing his father an appalled grimace, he hissed, “Dad! You are not helping by keeping him trained like that!”

“It ain’t like I’ma keep doin’ this to ‘im forever,” Billie Joe snapped back, contorting his body so he could receive the optimum visual of an open-mouthed, revolted expression grudgingly worn by the nurse maneuvering his wheelchair.

“You say that now, but what happens down the line when you’ve got Mike whipped worse than Elliot had?” Jakob murmured.

“That ain’t gon’ happen, boy, ‘n’ you know it,” the old man growled.

“Well shit, let’s all just keep talking like I don’t even fucking exist,” I spluttered, longing to coil in upon myself and sob away the panicking agony I endured throughout the unexpectedly short distance from the hospital to Jakob’s car. Thankfully, the vehicle appeared to be only a few feet in front of us, and my petrifaction would surely prove to have been futile.

Or not.

“Mikey! I’ve been looking all over for…Jake? What the fuck is going on?”

A frenzied pounding of footsteps grew in intensity with each passing second, mirroring my quickening pulse with a sickening similarity. That voice, that nickname…Elliot was, without a doubt, ready and willing to make damn sure I left that parking lot with him as opposed to leaving with the old bastard and his son.

“Just keep walking, gentlemen. Pay no mind,” the nurse instructed, but she did not need to tell Jakob twice. The man fled to his car, fingers trembling as he struggled to press the button that automatically unlocked his doors. Elliot’s footsteps became louder still.

“Jakob, where are you taking him? Can’t you see he needs me? He’s terrified!” he bellowed. From the chilling volume of his voice, it was evident that he was mere inches away.

Jakob’s tremulous arms pushed me into the backseat and slammed the door behind me, obstructing any further arguments kept under a dull roar virtually inaudible to my ringing ears. Peeking hesitantly through the window, however, I could clearly see Elliot mouth the words Fuck you! to Jakob prior to slapping him harshly across the face. Billie Joe’s eyes flashed with a dangerously venomous gleam, and his knuckles whitened against the purple chrome of his cane. In a metallic, violet flash, the cane flew from its resting spot on the old bastard’s lap and was sent sailing directly into Elliot’s crotch, colliding into its target with disquieting precision. The sadistic bastard crumpled in a pathetic, blubbering heap on the concrete while Jakob and his father piled as quickly as possible into the car with me. Before Elliot even had a chance to regain his composure, the ignition sprang to life and Jakob’s vehicle tore out of the parking lot.

Peering out through the rear window at the wretched form of my ex-boyfriend curled up on the ground, I could only reflect upon how I desired to recant my ridicule towards Billie Joe for picking out such a feminine color for his cane.