Reckless Endangerment (closed)

[ezwriter]

"Stay," she asks him, looking up.

His pretty girl doesn't want him to leave. He has fed her and he has cuffed her. He whipped her, and then they made love. He is strong and in control and isn't that what he's read about? The others always angry and thrashing and making him lose his temper.

Because this time right away he had shown her who was in charge. How he went about his business with confidence. And when she challenged him, she paid for her defiance. He glanced down where his cord has marked her perfect skin. His mark and his seed claiming her, changing hate to love. Even after the stale Lucky Charms for breakfast.

So now his rabbit beckons. Sweet, in just her glasses and cuffs. His cock stirs again. Nature telling him... his plans for the day can be rearranged. Things can wait.

He approaches and strokes her cheek, sweeps her bangs back where they spill over her eyes. And he smiles.

"Yes, pretty rabbit. Again," he says. And then catching himself, calibrates gradually to a sterner tone. "Up on your elbows and knees."

He helps her assume the position on the mattress. She is facing the mirror again, supporting her weight on her knees and cuffed forearms and chin. He slips his boots off and lowers his pants and briefs to the floor before crawling onto the mattress behind her.

"Open for me, sweetheart," he tells her, trying to meet her gaze in the mirror. Now his strong hands are between her legs to coax her reluctant thighs apart. His fingers test her first. She is still not wet for him. He reaches his hand forward at her chin.

"Spit," he commands her.

It's enough. Thick and mucus-y from the milk. He coats his gorged knob and positions it inside her labia, steadying her hips as he presses into it. He watches his reflection as he enters her. Watches the whole thing in the mirror. His thrusts. The graceful cello-like curve of back waist hips. Her hips are slender, but not overly so. He watches himself talk to her as he fucks her once more.

"That's right. That's my sweet rabbit. Yeah fucking you. Who owns your cunt now? That's right. That's right. That's right. Ohhhhhhhh."

This is where he releases into her, lasting longer than before if discharging less. He reaches to place his hand between her shoulder blades. It is a gesture somewhere between soothing and pinning her as his breathing slows and his erection softens inside her.

"That's my sweetheart. That's my good rabbit."

He holds her for a few moments, apprising their reflection, her turned head and upper body seen through the vertical bars of the footboard.

When he slips free of her vagina, he rises and dresses.

"Now I have to go. I'll be back later. I won't gag you. No one lives within 4 miles. If you want to scream, you can. But I can barely hear the screaming when I'm the cabin." He laces his second boot. "You've earned another word, rabbit.

[saysalice]

She watches him carefully, her cajoling tone on that one word resonating in her ears as the last sound in the room, her sweet expression frozen on her face as she watches him for the smallest tic of mistrust. He is coming back; but as he nears the bed she feels every muscle in her body tense up, and hopes he won't notice, naked as she is. She is ready to jump up and flee, as far as the bungee will allow, at the first flare of temper.

But he touches her face, and she smiles in answer, relieved, as he brushes her hair out of her eyes. He is still in a tender mood, and he will stay -

Yes, he says, again. She finds herself biting her lower lip hard - hard - hard enough to make it bleed. This isn't what she meant, when he says up on elbows and knees on the bed, and helps her, turning her to face the mirror. And he is ready to go again - good Lord! She didn't think - catching a glimpse of him in the mirror and then herself, and composing her face for him, the weakest little smile - she didn't think she would have to do this again...so soon. He's insatiable.

Her face pinches around the eyes as she feels his hands between her legs, spreading her. She's not - she's not ready for this again, but what did she think?

"Ohoooh - " she yelps as his fingers dip into her - an ambiguous sound, especially paired with her tremulous smile - she might be very excited...except, as he's just discovered, she isn't wet. Her eyes are too wide in the mirror as she tries to read his expression - is he offended? - but he only cups his hand under her mouth and tells her to spit. She winces almost imperceptibly - she doesn't spit - and obeys.

She has to grit her teeth on a grin as he enters her again from behind and somehow it feels harder, this time, minimally restrained, with her whole face exposed in the mirror and free but not free to be vocal. All of her concentration is focused on keeping her face neutral, keeping her sounds complimentary - at least she has had enough experience faking it. But her body remains terribly rigid and won't move with him to make it better for herself.

Her grunts and groans of horror and desperation as he thrusts and thrusts into her - the now familiar bludgeoning length and aching girth of his cock - they could be sex sounds. And she knows enough to make the expected responses, though her tone is slightly querulous, gasping through clenched teeth: "You do-ooh...you own my cuh-unt...you do, baby...?"

Saving Keith, she reminds herself silently, maybe saving his life right now - as he pants and groans behind her, rearing up as he starts to come again, resting his palm flat between her shoulders - not too firmly, just a gesture, she thinks - possessive, letting her know he hasn't forgotten her, even in this moment, like some men do.

She begins to relax or despair, feeling him ease off at last, feeling him lean into her again to embrace her like this, and seeing her tiny smile in the mirror, nearly buried in the mattress, and the rest of her like a wild animal trapped under him.

And after a moment, he's getting up again - good God, the man doesn't rest! - intent on running his errands. If Keith is one of them, she's only bought him another half hour, at best. She lies despondent on the bed, a faint smile on her lips, trying to look lazy and content, basking in the afterglow as she watches him dress. He's telling her matter-of-factly that no one will hear her scream while he's gone, and she pretends to ignore it - though of course she won't take him at his word.

He says she's earned another word, and she sits up, curling her knees up to her chest, shrugging her shoulders deeply - a bit awkward, in the sleeve - as if she would hug herself if she could. Smirking coyly at him, fluttering her lashes playfully - what the hell is she doing? Wriggling just a little on the bare mattress, she sighs, "Hurry..."

It's not until he's left and closed the door and she's slumped over expressionless on the bed, exhausted by her perilous playacting, that she remembers what he said - that he can only barely hear screaming from in here, when he's in the cabin. Until now, she's been gagged since he brought her here.

Like the sex, the worst shock is that it still shocks her.

[ezwriter]

He takes the truck and heads down the hill to 395 for the drive into Bishop. They'll have more of what he needs, the prices are better and he's been to the Von's there often enough. Not a stranger. Won't draw attention.

Fruit, she said, so he heads to the produce section first. What? Apples, oranges. He puts them in plastic bags. A pineapple. It's a symbol of welcome, he knows. Expensive, though. Nearly $4, but it's a kindness he can show her.

He fills his cart. Eggs and bread. She wants to try what he likes. Macaroni and cheese. Cans of soup. She'll need multivitamins. Milk. He's at the dairy case when he realizes. The glass of milk. The bowl of cereal. He's left them inside. Stupid. The glass. Is in there with her. But she's cuffed. She's cuffed but ungagged. He's left them ungagged before but with wrist cuffs they could never reach with their mouths or the steel handcuffs. She could, in theory, with her teeth pry open the buckles, then the velcro binding and then she's free. But the room is locked. What could she get? The shears, the glass - broken into shards. But that's all. The door was double locked and then padlocked. No windows. She might with the shears punch through the plywood roof. Could she? Punch a rabbit hole? His rabbit. 3/4 inch plywood, standing on the cabinet? Worst case, that's just worst case and that would take some time. Lots of time. Her arms would be sore and weakened from her capture, he assured himself.

No, fuck, stop doing this to yourself. But the first day, he was so careless like this. It was because he let her talk. Her words. "Stay" and "Hurry". Maybe no more words. But he liked how they made him feel. Oh she knew that. Treacherous slut. She used her words and her pretty and made a fool of him. The Fool. Gloucester. Blinded Lear. Regan. Left her ungagged with the glass in there. He'd show her.

He finished his shopping with urgency now. Food yes, enough. Tampons? He still had some. Antibiotic ointment. The generic. Gauze. If he were going to buy the shaving gel, he'd have to put the pineapple back. Welcome. No. Contemptible whore, she won't undo me.

At the checkout, he counts his money again. He had $30 plus the three and change from her purse. His hands find the extra lump of her keys. He pulls them out and regards them. Her apartment. There'd be things to steal and sell. But not now. The cops would be all over it. And that was way too long a drive to make again. A few weeks. Be smart and patient. Her car. He could steal it and sell it. Fuck no. Stupid. They'd be watching it. Be smart.

He paid for the groceries and still had a few bucks for gas. He could sell the Chevy in Independence later in the week. The Mexicans will buy 'em no questions asked for a few hundred bucks.

The scenarios played through his on the drive home. At worst she was loose with the shears but locked inside, maybe she could stash them inside the cuff and fasten herself back into them. Could she? The velcro yes, but the straps with the buckle. Could she. Was she that adept with her mouth? With her teeth? And then waiting to pounce and stab him when he untied her? It was his own fucking fault - a pretty girl again. Always winning. Or was she standing now naked behind the door waiting to strike when he entered, his arms full of groceries? Ready this time to strike surely and violently and repeatedly. And then finding clothes - the girls, his own. Taking his keys his truck, down the hill and him on the floor, twisting clutching his neck and chest, gaping, burping purple blood.

Shit, calm down. You're paranoid. He set the groceries down on the counter and grabbed the kitchen knife. Stepping slowly, quietly over the loose gravel, he makes his way from the cabin to the shed. She would have heard the truck approach and know she needed to finish quickly whatever subterfuge she'd been up to.

He slips the key into the padlock quietly. Turns it and unlatches it, sets it gently on the hasp. And now quickly, suddenly opens the deadbolt and throws the door open, his free hand clutching the hilt of the knife.

[saysalice]

For a while, she just lies on the bed. The clotted growl of wheels spinning in the gravel just outside tells her that he is, in fact, gone. It's the first time she's been able to relax since she left the bar with him. She's astonished to realize that she could sleep - she closes her eyes for longer than a blink, and the temptation to surrender to her weariness is almost irresistable - it was a very long, wakeful, restless night. For an hour, she guesses - or more, or less - he will be away, he won't burst through the door ready to beat her and kiss her and fuck her. He's left her alone. Awake, she will only worry about what he might be off doing to Keith, or what he might want to do with her when he comes back...so much easier - more productive, really - to rest her body and her mind while she can. The bed isn't cushy, but it's horizontal. She could sleep...

Regan jerks herself up into a sitting position, then puts her feet to the floor and makes herself stand, shaking it off. Sleep when you're dead, she thinks irritably. He's left her alone with all this freedom - and she's going to waste it on a nap? Go getting complacent and you might as well be dead.

First order of business is to test the bounds of the cable - can she reach the door? No, not quite. But she knows it wouldn't do any good, anyway, she's heard him lock it and lock it and lock it. She walks around to the cabinet and tries the drawers, angling her body to hook her fingers under the knobs. One opens; inside is the length of electrical cord he whipped her with last night, and the blue panties. She makes herself fish them out. Still damp, at least a few sizes too big - he didn't buy them for her - and yes it's blood - Regan drops them at once and slams the drawer shut. Her shoulders are shaking. She makes herself try the other drawers, but finds them locked.

She screams now, she faces the door and needs to scream and it comes out shrill and harsh and panicky, "Someone help me PLEASE! Let me out, let me out of here! Please! Help me!"

But the volume is strangely dampened, the sound fills her own ears. In her heart, she knows he was telling her the truth. No one can hear her.

Disheartened, desperate, she turns from the cabinet and looks wildly around the room - no windows, of course not. No way out. She has never felt such suffocating claustrophobia, she has not had the leisure until now to fully appreciate the implications of her capture - she is his: for his use, at his mercy - and she is a prisoner. Whether she ever leaves here, whether she eats or lives or dies is all up to him. No one knows where she is, and no one will ever know to look for her here. He is the only person in the world who knows she is alive, and he's fucking crazy. There's blood on the panties - why is there so much blood on the panties?

"Stop," she says aloud, "stop - stop..." She sits on the edge of the bed again, and her eyes fall on the cereal bowl and the milk glass, left on the chair when he came back to fuck her. The floor is concrete...the glass would break into a thousand pieces. She only needs one big one. It doesn't have to be this way. She's been so afraid that he will kill her, but has not allowed herself to entertain for long the growing realization that he probably won't. She's only 23, she could live for years and years like this.

Doesn't have to be this way. In the cuff, her wrists are secured awkwardly to her elbows, but she could - maybe - wedge a very sharp piece firmly between her bare heels. Lean over and open her wrist - lickety-split...she has time. And the next girl will wonder, whose blood is that, on the mattress?

It's a brave thought, but she sits on the bed just staring at the glass for a long time. Someone might have seen her get into his car - someone might be looking for her now, someone might be close. And she can't wait? It hasn't even been 24 hours, and she's ready to end it all? Only, she may not have another chance. And it might be years and years of this.

Tears blur her vision and she blinks them away angrily. She stands up to reach for the glass - she can always tell him she dropped it - and steps on the handle of the shears, sticking out from under the bed.

Oh God - ! Thoughts of suicide vanish as she crouches and leans over, scrabbling with her fingertips to pull the scissors to her. She could kill him with these - she could kill him. Get him in the same spot she dug her heel in, and it'll be his blood on the bed, on the floor. He'll never see it coming - not now - not from his sweet, good little rabbit with her batting eyelashes and pursed lips and pliant flesh. It would only take once, one good hard jab, deep - she could do it, this time. And then - anything she wants. Stop at the cabin for clothes - no, fuck that! Just get in goddamn car and peel out, get the fuck out of here!

It's intoxicating, and the steel feels so good in her hand, though she has to juggle to get a decent grip...that could be a problem. Slow down. Think about this.

Her arms are bound in front of her, so that her hold on the shears is at her opposite elbow. Awkward - God, terribly awkward, and she can't hide them, so she will have to strike immediately as he comes through the door. And she can't reach the door, on this cable. He will have a few seconds out of her reach to react and change his mind.

If she could get this cuff off, she would have a much better chance of cutting him. She eyes the buckles and the velcro - she can probably get it open with her teeth - but wait just a minute...think. She's still naked, and he's still stronger. It's a small space to attack him in - and even if she succeeds, she'll have to get past him, to get out. She'll have to be very sure he's down the first time. She's read or heard somewhere that most women injured with weapons have had their own defensive weapons taken and used against them. If he gets the shears and uses them on her...at once, without question, she knows that she wants to live.

But they feel too good, in her hand. She can't put them back. He's forgotten them once, and left them here. If he sees them, he'll certainly take them away. Regan climbs onto the bed again and leans over on the far side to push the scissors between the mattress and the frame. Keep working on his trust, give him no reason to doubt or suspect - look at how much freedom she's won in a day. He'll take the cuff off, eventually - he'll want her to caress him, surely - and then...

There's the sound of his car crawling up the last rise of the hill, and she pulls away from the edge of the bed and stretches out, like she's been napping. She even closes her eyes - but she can't keep them closed, not when she knows Daddy's home. She is all nerves, lounging casually on the bed. She can't believe she thought she could sleep, she can't believe she thought she could die. Hope is a secret pair of sharp twin blades, within her reach, just under the mattress. He can come in and fuck her now on this bed; she'll know what waits for him. He won't find them. He won't miss them.

The door flies open without warning, startling a gasp from her, and some skittering, up against the cold headboard. He came silently, stealthily, intent on surprising her - that's new - and his face is awful. Something's changed since he left, and Regan is immediately wary. She sees the knife in his hand - her gaze slides automatically to the left corner of the mattress, before she can stop herself. With her arms bound, she'll never get to the shears before he gets to her. She freezes, a rabbit's instinct, tensed to spring if he comes at her with the knife.

She is tethered, she is trapped, she won't last long...but she'll fight all the way down.

[ezwriter]

The door knob smacks the wall as he bursts in, commando-like, poised to strike with knife advancing. But she is there where he left her, curled and startled on the mattress. Gazing up at him. Her cuffed arms are bound in front of her, tethered to the cable in the floor. She watches as he takes slow deliberate steps, knife out, facing her as he rounds the bed to check for sure: the buckles cinched tight as he'd left her. No teethmarks as far as he can see. He checks both sides of the cuff for any hint of the shears. The drawers are closed and locked. Only then, only then does he let his weapon drop to his side.

He heaves a deep breath, and turns from her. The glass and bowl are on the tray on the floor where he'd left them. Remove it now, he tells himself. No more loose ends. No more possibilities. And the knife in his hand. That especially. What will she shove through his neck next? He sets it down on the tray and lifts it.

None of it. None of it was true. He drives himself crazy like this. He wants to smack the crazy from his head sometimes. And he sees the look in her eyes as she sees the look in his eyes. Coiled and wary, both of him. She's caught him off guard again, as if he's the rabbit, hopping frenzied pointless laps inside his cage. When HE'S IN CHARGE. It's her words and her pretty, he knows. It's her eyes - taking things from his eyes.

So he slips her glasses from her nose and folds them up and sets them aside on the cabinet.

"I got fruit and some food," he says, making conversation. He's too unsettled to say much more. He remembers the pineapple he'd left aside at the checkout lane. She would have enjoyed that maybe. A nice surprise. When he has more money. More to give her. He can give her more words for now because she was good. She laid there like he told her. But every word she says seems his undoing. And now he owes her two. Why shouldn't she get them because of his mad imaginings? That's not her fault, that's your fault, he tells himself. It's like what the poets say about love; exquisite excruciating madness.

He looks down at her now. It's better without her glasses.

With his foot, he slides the chair around so it faces the mirror.

"All week on Ricki Lake they're doing makeovers. It's because it's November sweeps, do you know what that it - it's when they measure the ratings of the shows which is how they base the rates they charge advertisers for the commercials they run on the shows so they do their most popular shows to get people to watch and makeovers are very popular. I think, I think we're going to do a makeover, rabbit. After your breakup. It's a whole new start for you. Sit in the chair. When I come back you'll get to say two more words."

What the fuck. What the fuck was that rambling bullshit? Are you nine? Are you fucking nine, he asks himself as he carries off the glass and the bowl and the kitchen knife on the tray. With his elbow he pulls the heavy door shut behind him. No more stupid chances. No more scaring himself.

He puts the tray down in the kitchen. Unpacking the grocery bag, he has time to settle himself, taking deep long breath. He moves deliberately, putting the milk in the refrigerator, the cans and boxes in the pantry.

In the bathroom he peels the crusted Band-Aid from his neck and examines it. Scabbed but very tender to the touch. The antibiotic ointment will help he hopes. He dresses the wound and tapes clean gauze over it.

Finally, he returns to the shed, takes one last breath before he turns his key in the deadbolt and enters, a razor and can of shaving gel in his hand. Lime he got. She likes fruit.

[saysalice]

He stalks around the bed like an animal - large cat, she thinks as she trembles, staying very, very still - like a large cat advancing on its cornered prey, and he holds the knife out like he's ready to use it. For all of her preoccupation with death, she knows now that she doesn't want to die. Not here. She is completely petrified, afraid to blink and set him off. He has never before felt the need to hold a weapon on her. It's new, and she wonders frantically what's changed since he left her.

He's been looking her over - looking for what, she doesn't know. She wants to smile for him, but her face won't cooperate. She tries to keep her eyes on his face, but she can't stand to let the knife out of her sight for a second. If she even sees it twitch in her direction, she will dive under the bed, she thinks.

At last, at last he turns away. Glancing around the room. She is shuddering helplessly, suddenly so glad that she didn't try anything stupid with the shears. She'd made a bad mistake of thinking she could know what to expect of him, beginning to think she was handling him, plying him and playing him with her sweet words and sweet looks. Forgetting that this is his world, she's in. The rules today may not be the rules tomorrow.

He sets the knife down and she can breathe again, painful gasps - and oh God he's walking up to her again - she cannot help stiffening all over, raising her cuffed arms in defense and whimpering fearfully through her tightly closed lips. He reaches for her face and only plucks her glasses off. He steps away, and everything's a blur. She won't see it coming if he picks up the knife again.

He's bought some food, he says. Regan tries and tries to smile, but can't do it. She hears the scrape of the metal chair legs on the concrete and then he's babbling on about some daytime television show and she is nodding, trying to keep up, but it doesn't make any sense to her. Sit in the chair, he says, and she nods and watches him leave with the tray and the knife.

When the door closes behind him, she bursts into a brief spate of sobs. Nothing happened, she reminds and reassures herself, nothing happened, really - but God, it was too close. In a mood like that he is unfathomable - dangerous - deadly. She will have to watch his moods more carefully, and watch herself.

With tears still flooding her already blurred vision, she scrambles off the side of the bed and works awkwardly with her bound arms to retrieve the scissors from under the mattress. No more fucking around - that was too close. He didn't find them or even ask about them, but - well, makeovers, he said - something about makeovers. She didn't fully grasp what he was getting at, or what brought that thought on, after the incredibly tense moments before, but - a makeover - he might cut her hair, and he might want the scissors. And when he can't find them, he'll know she took them. If he demands to know - now - she will be too afraid to lie to him. And when he sees that she's concealed them, hidden them from him...

She doesn't want to let them go, but she's lost her nerve entirely. She tosses the shears under the bed with a clatter - they might have been absently kicked there. He'll find them without too much trouble, if he looks. There will be other opportunities, she assures herself, still weeping.

She moves around the bed and sits in the cold chair in front of the mirror, tucking her chin and nudging at her face with her bare shoulders, trying to wipe away the tears - what will he think, if he sees that she's been crying? He must know that he scared her, bursting in here, brandishing the knife. Even if she was completely guiltless - especially then - wouldn't she be scared? Won't it please him? Will it? She snuffles and gulps and tries to get herself under control. So afraid of setting him off again.

Staring at her smeary image in the mirror, she tries to remember what he said. Makeovers, we're going to do a makeover, a whole new start for you. She tries to think of what he means to do. If he is going to keep her, it's smart to change her appearance - she's read of kidnappers who drag children into mall bathrooms to dye their hair. Cut her hair, maybe. Slap some makeup on her - does he think it will make her happy, or make her sexy? Or maybe - she can't stop thinking of the knife he brought in here - maybe he means a more drastic makeover. Maybe he'll cut her face up with the knife so that no one will ever recognize her, so that no one will ever love her, even if she gets free. Her eyes are misting up again. She has to stop.

She hears the key in the deadbolt, this time, opening much less dramatically than before. She squints up at him, but can't make out what he has in his hands. A can of some sort, and she can hear the keys, but she's not sure what else.

Two words, he said, and she knows she should say something, she should be grateful for these little favors he grants her - use them or lose them. But she can't think of what to say, what would be wise, under the circumstances. She's not feeling very talkative, all of a sudden.

[ezwriter]

They all cry at some point.

Fragile and alone. Bound and naked in her chair. She's trying to stifle her sobs as he enters and closes the door behind him. He sees her lips pressed tight, the streaks of wet trailing down her chin as she stiffens at his approach. This one is struggling hard against the current of emotions, straining for control. It will soon exhaust her, he knows.

Her eyes are helpless, tracking movement now. He can make her eyes wet, but not her cunt. No matter. No matter. Things are moving forward. The anxious hours of the morning are behind him. She is secure. No surprises. She's perched on the chair like he told her.

"Your two words, rabbit? You get two words."

He's unlocked the cabinet and looking for the shears. They should be here. There's a metallic clatter as he sorts through the implements. But the scissors should be on top. He'd just used them the night before. A new jolt of adrenaline. His mind back to top gear, spinning. She couldn't have gotten into the drawer. On top here where he's left her purse and her shoes. No. On the bed? There. On the floor. But he would have heard the clatter? Or he'd left them on top of the bed. Careless. Careless could cost him. He'd seen what she tried to do with the shoe. He saw her terror at the end of his knife. It's whoever has the weapons.

He will show her. He clears a space on the top of the cabinet and reaches inside to display a few of his implements so she will know. The nipple clamps with alligator clips. The dental pliers for girls who bite when they're told to suck. The hook for fat girls who try to run away. She can not see, but she will hear as each lands with a heavy clank against the wooden top. But they're not for good girls. They don't have to be for her.

He reaches to the floor to snatch up the shears and moves to stand behind her. He's over her and she's balling up as small as she can in her chair.

Maybe it's the crickety metallic click of the shears opening and closing that's caused her to draw her cuffed arms up in front of her chest.

"Arms down," he tells her. And, yes, she knows he could slice her nipples clean off if he decided to. For now he just wants to look at them.

"Are you ready for you new look, Princess? You're going to look so pretty for me."

He takes a shock of her thick dark hair in one hand and clips through it with the scissors. And another. Randomly. And another. The handfuls of shorn hair falling and dispersing against her pale pretty heaving shoulders, sliding off her to the floor.

"Hold still. Hold still," he tells her.

[saysalice]

She watches him in the mirror without turning her head, afraid to confront him like that, with her direct gaze. Too hard to tell, in this mood. She has to be careful.

Two words, he reminds her, and she shifts uneasily in the chair. She doesn't need reminding, she feels the pressure to say something - keep the dialogue going, don't become a silent creature, an object to be acted upon - remind him that you are human... But she's so afraid of saying the wrong thing, now. She doesn't want to waste those words. She nods, unsure if he will see it, but says nothing. Her mind is racing; what would he like to hear, right now?

He has stepped behind her and is opening the cabinet. Her eyes are glued to the mirror, but she can only see the shape of him as he begins to rummage through the contents and she hears the clash of metal - many metal things. The shears are still on the floor. She shudders, and won't let herself look at them, or think of them as an option. What's in the drawer, what's he got in store for her now?

As if he has sensed her thoughts, she can hear him taking things out, one by one - deliberately slow, it seems - the sound of solid metal thumping against the hollow wood. She can't see that far, or begin to guess what he's taking out for her. He'd said he was going to do a makeover - what's he going to do to her?

"I'm scared," she whispers - it's two words, but she can't be sure he's heard her. He is bending down to swipe up the shears for good measure, and comes over to stand behind her chair. She can't take her eyes off the mirror, and can't help cringing away from him, a little, as he opens and closes them next to her ear.

Arms down, he says - she didn't realize that she had drawn up so defensively. She makes herself obey, and can see her breasts rising and falling heavily in the mirror. He asks her if she's ready to be pretty for him, and she tries again to smile - and can tell, even without seeing it, that it is a distorted, grimacing caricature of her earlier coquetry. Her eyes sting with tears.

"I'm scared," she says again - a louder whimper, this time, and probably not what he wants to hear, but she can't help it. She whines anxiously through closed lips and feels one tear fall as he takes her by the hair with the scissors in his other hand and - clips through a hank of hair. Her shoulders begin to shake helplessly - in relief, that of all the horrific things she's been imagining, this is what he wants to do - and in terror, that he may still do - anything, anything he wants to her, and she can't hope to stop him.

Hold still, he is saying, and she snuffles frantically, choking on the sobs, trying to pull herself together.

[ezwriter]

It's good she was scared. She's supposed to be scared. He doesn't have to answer. For now he's reaching down to secure fistfuls of hair. It was cute but harder to cut than the long-haired girls'. Especially with her convulsing, shuddering, sliding in the seat.

"Hold still," he cautions her again, pulling her shoulders back strongly against the chair. "Hold still or you'll get hurt."

As he works, patches of her hair give way to patches of scalp, a rough, uneven chopping as the shears move randomly here and there, snipping varying lengths of hair. Her bangs now. His hand is on her forehead stretching them out so the shears can trim them down. Inches of hair, shards of hair tumbling away off her shaking back and shoulders until it is all just wisps. A half-inch at most, clumps and patches of pale skull skin. His fingers can pinch and hold no more.

He sets the scissors on the counter and reaches for the shaving gel, tilts it toward his freehand and presses out a palm full.

"You're going to be the prettiest girl for miles," he tells her as he works the gel into the remnants of her hair. It changes from a gelatinous sludge to a thick foam as he coats her scalp with both hands.

He's reaches for the razor. A new disposable twin blade from the bathroom. He steadies her head with his hand. He needs to be firm with her. This is for her own good that she holds still.

"Hold the fuck still!!" he snarls in her ear. His fingers are a claw inside the back of her neck again. He gives her a moment to settle before he shaves the first swath from her forehead up the crown to her neckline. He wipes what's gathered on a towel and repeats the action, the short strands of her hair gathering in the foamy clump that accumulates with each swipe. He'll need several passes, assessing his progress closely until finally her head is shaven clean. He towels her scalp dry and appraises his work in the mirror. She is a head and nipples and a trimmed patch of bush.

He would fuck her but he's still spent from the morning. Later, he tells himself. For now, a shorter lead so there's no danger. Change out the cuffs so she can't hide anything. From a hook, he takes two 2-foot cable leads with clasps at either end, tethering each ankle to a hook in the floor.

"Let's take that big cuff off," he says as he kneels before her now and unbuckles the arm restraints. Slipping her out of it, he fits each wrist with a reinforced cuff similar to those on her ankles. They close with velcro and cinch with a strap. A D ring is stitched securely into each. Returning to her with a second pair of cables about three feet long, he secures one end of each into the floor and clips the free hook into her wrist cuffs. The length lets her stand with her hands at her side, allowing them to move them freely, but not lifting them much higher than three feet from the floor. She could sit or sit on the floor or stand in place or use her bucket. She could no longer reach the bed or the cabinet where the implements lay.

"You'll help me sweep this up later," he told her as he returned to her with her glasses and slid them up her nose.

"What do you think?"

"Now you're my pretty little bird," he told her in the mirror. "I'll be back to feed you lunch. You'll have three words then."

He left with the shave gel and the razor and the gloppy wet towel. The door closed. The deadbolt. The padlock. Footsteps receding on gravel.

[saysalice]

He tells her again to hold still, only this time it sounds like a threat - though of course she knows it's dangerous to squirm when he's got the scissors - he may mean by accident. He may mean that. He puts her firmly back into the chair and the gesture calls to mind an uneasy memory of being put in her place like this, by an adult, when she was a restless young girl. A teacher or a parent - someone made her sit up straight like this, back against the chair, told her sternly to stop fidgeting. With the memory comes the rush of emotions she felt then: guilt and fear and submission to authority. It's not entirely welcome, but it will serve her now, so she doesn't fight it. She is still, feeling him hack away at her hair.

It should bother her - it does bother her, feeling great clumps of it fall tickling away and the chill against her scalp as he bares it, bit by uneven bit. Her $75 haircut, her chestnut chunky highlights, reduced to tatters in minutes. And then she hears the spurt of an aerosol can, behind her, and catches a faint whiff of citrus, and knows before he begins smearing the cold gel on her shorn skull and tells her how pretty, that he intends to go all the way. She ought to be more upset, but she's still so relieved that it's her hair and not her face.

Still, she swallows hard as he takes up the razor and holds her head with one hand and tells her again, sharply, cursing - unlike anyone in her memory - with a warning hand firm at the back of her neck, to hold still. She doesn't even dare to nod. After a moment, she feels the first stroke of the razor, moving gently across her skull. Okay, she thinks, okay - it's okay. He doesn't want to hurt her, he doesn't want to damage her...not incidentally, anyway. She's not sure what it's worth.

As she watches, the vague smear of white disappears in strips, in the mirror, until there is nothing but flesh tones. He wipes her down when he's finished, and then crouches in front of her chair to remove the arm cuff. She wishes now that she had saved her two words, to say "thank you", as she stretches and flexes her arms - but then he's off to the cabinet and back again with another pair. It takes a measured effort to keep from showing her disappointment as he buckles her in and clamps her down and she sees how restricted she will be, again. Without her hair, she can't hide her face from him. The mirror will help her remember.

She nods and then catches herself on a gasp as he approaches with his hands on either side of her face - will she ever get used to this, this little thing that no one's ever done for her? Her world comes into crisp clarity again, and of course she looks in the mirror, and she sees her naked face crumple.

She'd thought she was okay, that it was just hair and not flesh, thank God - until she saw herself. This strange, bare, pale alien-looking creature, all eyes and ears and bony scalp, streaked faintly pink after the close shave - she doesn't know this person, Keith wouldn't know this person. It will grow it will grow her brain is gabbling urgently at her, aware of his gaze in her peripheral vision and his unheard question. It will grow it's just hair smile for him - SMILE!

Regan feels her lips stretch wide over too many teeth. She is allowed to answer his questions. "I love it," she says quietly, feebly - it's the right answer. Pretty little bird. Plucked and fucked. Caged and cabled - little bird fluttering on a tight string. Three words after lunch, he says, and she nods, smiling. Closing her eyes as soon as he's out the door, listening to him lock her in again.

After several moments, she remembers the sounds earlier on the cabinet behind her. She stands without opening her eyes until she has turned away from the mirror, to look at what he has placed there. The sight of the glittering metal objects makes her sit down again at once. Her white face stares back at her, her bared teeth in an ugly grimace as she breathes hard, trying not to panic. He had them within arm's reach and he didn't use them, she reminds herself, he only shaved her head...but maybe the makeover isn't finished. Maybe after lunch he'll take all of her teeth, too, to complete her new look.

She yanks on the cables, knowing they will hold, hurting herself, and then closes her eyes again, sitting in the chair, shaking uncontrollably, unable to cry. He'll be back with lunch, and she'll have three words. There's nothinig she can do except wait for his return, and pray.

[ezwriter]

"I'm scared." She tells the truth.
"I love it." She lies.

She will say anything at this point and so the rationing of words he's allotted her makes sense. He doesn't want to deal with blabbering or the inconvenience of a gag - the constant removing and refitting, securing the straw.

He finishes his eggs then makes hers. Two for her. Scrambled will be the neatest way as he will have to feed her still. And toast. And milk. A plastic cup this time. A plastic plate.

He unlocks the locks and finds her hunched in her chair, shoulders shaking where he left her. He carries in a second folding chair and places it beside hers. He wants to spend some time over lunch with her.

"I made you eggs and toast," he tells her. Do you want to use your three words now or after lunch?"

He leaves and returns with the food, setting the milk cup on the concrete floor by his side. He cuts a bite-size mass of the eggs and spears it with the fork, extending it toward her mouth.

He sees her discomfort at the looming sight of her new self in the mirror. "You'll get used to it he tells her. " And then, "Now you can be whoever we want." And then, "You're very pretty to me."

[saysalice]

He returns and sets a chair next to hers. It makes her nervous - if he wants to get at her, down at her level, if he wants to take his time, the chair makes sense. But maybe he just wants to sit. And anyway, she would still be nervous if he elected to stand over her, or even to sit on the bed behind her, out of her view. Until she can begin to anticipate him, she will always be wary of him.

Regan forces another smile when he says he's made lunch - she must always, always try to show her gratitude when he decides to feed her. She murmurs, "Thank you," aloud, risking it as an acceptable answer - she'll be allowed to thank him, won't she? Won't he like that? Stay on his good side, with the pliers out, for God's sake.

She wants very desperately to use her three words, to nod in the direction of the cabinet and ask: "What're those for?" But she's too afraid that she knows the answer. She is reverting to puerile, nonsensical logic - maybe if she doesn't remind him of the implements he's set aside, or look at them, he'll forget that he wanted to use them on her.

She can't think of another three words, so she shakes her head and answers, "After lunch, please."

He goes out again and comes back with the eggs and toast he promised. The plastic plate and cup do not escape her attention - something's definitely changed; he doesn't trust her with real dishes anymore. Could he have guessed how close she came to breaking the glass and using it to escape? More likely, she thinks, he has only thought of how she might harm him.

He sits in the chair next to her and, as she watches, begins cutting up the eggs with a fork. She hesitates for just a second before opening her mouth as he guides the fork to her. Trying not to imagine what he might have put in it - drugs, poison...or something else. She has no choice but to trust him - to eat, even if she can't trust him. She's so entirely dependent upon him, she thinks again, miserably - even with plastic dishes, he won't let her feed herself.

You'll get used to it, she hears him say - a terrible shock, and she wonders again if he is a mind reader - but then sees him looking at her in the mirror. Now you can be whoever we want. She can't keep a small tremor from twitching her shoulders as she opens her mouth again for his forkful of eggs. What does he want her to be?

Please don't let me forget who I really am, she thinks suddenly, and the randomness of this disturbing thought tugs at her face - but she is chewing, he might not notice. Stupid, hysterical thought. Everything he does to her and says to her reminds her of who she really is, who she's supposed to be - that she isn't this person.

You're very pretty to me. She swallows the eggs, takes a sip of the milk he holds up to her. Smiles. Makes herself look at him.

"I'm glad," she answers quietly. It's the truth. She must keep him pleased with her.

"What's your name?" she asks, on impulse - three words. He might lie or not tell her - or he might be angry and hurt her, if he thinks she is trying for information with which to incriminate him, if he still believes she might escape - she wonders if he still believes it. It's too late, she's asked. The answer isn't so important, but he might warm to her, hearing his name on her lips, believing that she wants to know him.

[ezwriter]

He likes that she's smiling, that's she's eating, that she's asked him his name. Everything is okay. After lashing out last night - well, you couldn't blame her. It must have been terrifying. He was a stranger then. But she learned what would happen, seen what he's capable of. Carrots and sticks. That's how rabbits learn. He'd been so panicked at the store. Imagining all sorts of grim scenarios. But now he can see, everything was alright. She is settling in.

"I liked when you called me 'sweetheart'," he answers. "That's my name."

He feeds her the rest of her eggs and toast and makes sure she finishes her milk. He says, "I hope you like the eggs. Maybe you could cook some time. Do you cook?" He holds that out to her, the promise, the carrot. She's eating so well for him.

And when she's done, he crosses to the counter and replaces the three implements he'd taken from the drawer and relocks it. No need for them now, but she got the idea.

"I'll be right back, he tells her" and returns soon with a broom, a dustpan, the paper grocery bag. "Here, we can do this together." Stand. He pulls the chair from beneath her, her hands still tethered to the floor so she can't lift them much above her waist. But she can hold the dustpan while he sweeps up the strands and hanks of her hair that litter the floor, sweeping it into a dark tangled pile that he directs into the tray of the dustpan. Not such a pile with her short cropped locks. He has her empty the pan into the paper bag and when the floor's been cleared he deposits her shoes and her purse inside and crumples the bag closed, setting it by the door.

He takes the pan from her hands and sets it aside with the broom.

"That was your old hair," he says to her sadness. "But now you can have any hair you want." He's moved to a second set of drawers - these unlocked - and opens the top one. He doesn't take all the wigs out, just three for her to choose from today. And he lays them out on the bed. The first is blonde, shoulder-length tresses with frosted highlights. The next is long straight chestnut colored gathered in a ponytail. The last is a short black bob.

"Which do you want?"

[saysalice]

He says she can call him 'sweetheart', and Regan feels an unexpected twinge of disappointment. There is power in knowing a name - remember Rumpelstiltskin. 'Sweetheart' will mean nothing, if she should ever get out of here. Perhaps the question was more conniving than she gave herself credit for.

She smiles again. "Yes, sweetheart..." The word wants to catch in her throat, her intonation is a little off as she forces it out. More difficult to smile for him, flirt with him, since he came in with the knife.

She is full, but eats the rest of the eggs and toast dutifully, and blinks at him as she sips the last of the milk. "They're lovely," she answers automatically, "Yummy. Thank you."

Looking away, afraid that the eagerness will show in her eyes, and that he won't like it. "I - I like to cook," she answers carefully. "I'd like to cook for you." It's hard to say.

The thought of poisoned food flits through her mind again and she keeps her eyes averted. Get out of this room, see the inside of his house. She smiles. Yes, she'd like that. "I could learn to make what you like."

He steps behind her. She doesn't move, listening to the sound of metal objects shifting on the top of the cabinet. All of her pretty little plans fly apart like fragile soap bubbles. She watches his back in the mirror and sees him open the drawer again. Putting them away, locking them up. Her relief aches in her chest and her face in the mirror is not quite right - she is glad when he steps out for a moment, so she can collect herself. She'll have to get better at this.

When he returns with the broom and dustpan, she is more composed and her little smile is almost natural. She is feeling overwhelmingly grateful again, that he has changed his mind about using the scary metal instruments - and slightly annoyed with herself, that she should feel glad and lucky and thankful that he has decided for the moment not to hurt her. It isn't right.

He takes her chair away and hands her the dustpan, and she gets to her knees on the concrete floor, watching him sweep up the locks of her hair. She doesn't want to help him with this - it feels symbolic, and she wonders if he knows it - this sloughing off and cleaning up and throwing away of her old identity. She holds the dustpan, and when he's swept it all up, she must dump it in the bag. Her hand trembles slightly as she watches her dark shiny locks disappear for good.

It's worse, somehow, to see him toss her shoes and purse in the bag as well. Even emptied and useless to her, it was a small comfort to have them in the room with her. She hadn't realized until now, now that they're destined to end up in some dumpster or - more likely, she thinks - burned. Will he make her do that, too? It would be good to get out of this room.

These last little pieces of her, gone. Destroy the evidence - but it feels like more than that. She lifts her chin bravely to glance in the mirror and remind herself: this face is me; this body is me. He can only destroy so much of her - right? - before it defeats the purpose of taking her...right? Crouched on the floor, she stifles a shiver.

He's speaking to her, moving to another set of drawers, and she can't keep her face from crinkling in distaste as she watches him take out three glossy wigs and lay them on the bed for her. It's too soon - does he know it? - to make her choose which new woman she will be, for him. To make her choose. None of these look like her - she could be any woman, every woman. It makes her feel slightly nauseous, almost strangely insulted. Did he only take her to make her interchangeable?

She has to pick one. It's so hard to think with these strong emotions clouding everything. What will please him the most? If it's symbolic, like she thinks it is - but is she reading too much into it? He laid the blonde one out, first. It's the most unlike her natural look. Gentleman prefer blondes. She points to it and stretches her lips in an approximation of a smile.

Murmuring shyly, "I've always wondered what I would look like, as a blonde."

[ezwriter]

He picks it up and places it on her skin-smooth head, twisting it so it sits right. The golden waves tumble onto her thin pale shoulders.

"Now you're Carol," he tells her. She isn't quite. His bird's skin is young and smooth, her complexion pure, not blotched and leathery from too much tanning. The breasts are wrong, the eyebrows off. But it will do. It always does.

He returns to the cabinet and slides open the bottom drawer, returning with a bunched ball of rayon in a tropical print - lavender with yellow and red hibiscus blooms. He shakes it open. It's a robe with a sash. He unclips the clasps binding her arms to the floor and holds the robe for her to slip her arms into. Then he cinches it at her waist. Regan's lipstick on the counter there isn't right but he has just the thing in the dress-up drawer. A deep carmine. And traces her lips with it, has her spread it evenly.

It's starting to. Come back. He regards her with different eyes than before.

He unclips her ankles now. Taking her by the wrist he leads her back to the bed and locks one wrist into the steel handcuffs he'd first captured her with the night before. The other cuff is locked to the bed slats. He brings her bucket around to the bedside so she can slide off and squat if she needs to.

"I'll be back and we'll play," he says. "And you'll get five words to say." And he takes the Safeway bag with her purse and shoes and hair.

He heads out back where the Chevy is. He wipes the upholstery down with cleanser, pulls out the floor mats tosses them on the fire pit, dousing them with gasoline from a plastic can. He sets the mats ablaze and lights a cigarette. The purse goes into the flames, then the violent spiked shoes one at a time. He crumples the bag with her hair and drops it into the inferno, watching the flames twist in the bright autumn cold.

Carol.
Fucking.
Conners.

[saysalice]

It itches against her sensitive scalp, and the yellow curls tickle her neck and shoulders as he adjusts squarely it on her head. She glances compulsively in the mirrror and the reflection looks nothing like her.

Still my face, it's still my face, she insists to herself silently, though she can see that the shape of it appears changed, framed by all this hair. She has to work, to see herself in the glass.

Now you're Carol.

She can't keep her nose from wrinkling - very briefly. She knew a cranky Carol, friend of a friend, in first year. She doesn't like the name, doesn't like her associations with it, she doesn't want to be Carol. She doesn't like that he has a name picked out for her - won't let her choose one, like the toast and eggs, even the wig. She remembers with a little chill: That Regan was some fucking bitch. Didn't he say then, that she was more of a Cordelia? She doesn't know anything about the Carols he might have met in his life, or what he thinks of them.

As she watches, he returns to the cabinet - she will always watch him now, when there are cabinet drawers involved - and pulls out a ball of fabric. She must be very careful of her face as he lets it unfold and it's quite possibly the ugliest pattern she's ever seen, red and yellow flowers against purple, hurting her eyes. The long blonde wig veils her face as she is still for him, letting him unfasten her arms and slide the robe onto her. It's itchy too, shapeless, not her size, not like anything she's ever worn. Is that the point? He ties her into it, and she doesn't understand - why dress her now, when she's been naked all this time? It's the wrong size, but not as big as the blue panties that weren't bought for her. Who does the dress belong to?

How many girls? Or maybe he just finds the clothes in dumpsters or thrift stores - maybe he has sisters or aunts. He cut Regan's clothes off immediately, when got her home - she parts her lips obediently to let him smudge a bright red color into them - she watched him cut them to shreds. She rubs her lips together. The look in his eyes is fiercely intense, staring at her face. She doesn't understand this - who does he want her to be?

She feels a disheartening flicker of optimism, watching him bend to unfasten her ankles. Taking her to the house? Or - out of here? Like this, no one would ever recog - He takes her hand and draws her only as far as the bed, where the handcuffs are still waiting, and claps her wrist into the open one. He sets the bucket within reach. She wonders if this lingering, persistent hope will save her or crush her, in the end.

He tells her he'll be back to play. To play. She doesn't know that word. She knows hurt and fuck, she knows nice and angry. She doesn't know what he means, "play". It's new, and words are so important, here. She gets five, when he comes back - she must have been a very good little rabbit. She taps with her clashing dark red nails against the metal headboard, counting.

Please let me go home. Sweetheart.

It'll never do. She watches him from behind the mop of hair as he leaves with the last bits of her - no, not the last bits, but she can't see herself in the mirror from this angle. She can only feel: the hot scratchy wig and the cheap wrinkled purple dress, chafing her nipples; the gnaw of the handcuff and the dirty sheet under her, and thick waxy smear of lipstick on her tensed lips.

[ezwriter]

The November sun leans low in the late afternoon, rasping its last gasps of heat for the year. The shadows from the Conners' house angle acoss his window. He doesn't have to look. He knows he's there again, as sure as he knows that Joey will be at football practice till 6 and Mr. Conners is off traveling again. He doesn't have to look but he does. She's moving as if in slow motion, as if in a commercial for something. Something that he needs.

What the fuck, he was thinking. Mom's working late. This thing. Who knows what could happen? He'd read about shit like this. Forum he knew was bullshit. But he'd heard Mike's friend Denny talk about this married chick from his work who'd suck him off. When he turned, she turned. But this time he didn't look away. He looked across the lot, over the fence. She turned her chin to the side and brushed her hair again in a long slow stroke.

He knocked and waited. Knocked again, his heart thudding.

"Come in," she called, halfway down the stairs. He let himself in. From the foyer, looking up, the short-cut floral robe covered only to mid thigh and offered a generous tease of what was higher up. She watched him look at her.

Joey won't be home for awhile, Stevie, she said, her fingers loosening a tangle in her hair. He is breathing. He is inside the Conners house. Just standing and breathing. Or maybe you didn't stop by to see Joey. Did you come by to see me?

He nods his manliest nod. He approaches her. "Yes. I think you're very pretty."

"Yes I do. I think about you a lot."

He kisses her on her lipstick lips.

"I do want to touch you. Is it okay?"

The robe is open so he puts his hand on her breast and she presses into it.

She's whispering in his ear, so close her perfume is so intoxicating. We can go upstairs to my bed. We can do anything you want. "Yeah." He can't even speak because

He puts/She puts her hand on his boner. She rubs her hand against it. HeSheopens his pants and slips inside his briefs and "Oh. Oh. Sorry." THIS TIME he'll show her, taking it out hard and thick and pushing her legs apart to put it in. With his hand on her mouth squeezing and twisting it until lipstick and lip blood smears his palm because now see he can last, he can last, and she's not going to laugh at him again every time now because everyone deserves a second chance. His other hand under the robe, gently stroking, strumming her nipples. He remembers thinking that Joey Conners sucked them as a baby, but that was so long ago.

He does come finally with the bedsprings shaking and the steel clatter of the cuffs against the headrail and the collision of body against body and muffled, snuffling whimpers inside a clenched hand.

"You see? You see, don't you?" He straightens her wig, but he doesn't want to meet her gaze. He remains over her, inside her breathing hard, his chest heaving under his tee shirt. He still doesn't look at her. Just climbs off her and zips his pants back up.

He stands facing away the wall, nowhere else to look. Okay, you can have your five words. Then I'm going to go. Then I'll bring dinner for you later.

[saysalice]

She slips off the side of the bed while he's gone, and uses the bucket. She doesn't want to do it in his presence. Then, climbing back onto the mattress, she stretches out to wait for him - she even slips into a light doze - she would not have thought it possible, under the circumstances, but she is exhausted.

A noise wakes her; she sits up. It comes again - a knock at the door.

She mumbles confusedly, "Come - in?" Knowing he won't hear her. He has the keys. It doesn't make sense...unless it's not him - but she won't, she won't fall for that again.

The door opens and it is him and he stands in the doorway just looking at her, the hair and her lips and the dress - just looking at her with that strange light in his eyes again. He doesn't have a knife, but she is nervous, smiling at him tentatively when he doesn't say anything. They both wait for a long tense moment, staring at each other across the silence. Regan waits for some cue - he doesn't seem angry, but there is something going on now. She knows better than to speak first.

He nods at her, and takes several steps now toward the bed. She doesn't dare move or make a sound, though her whole body stiffens - she doesn't know this mood, she doesn't know what he wants of her.

Yes. I think you're very pretty.

Her lips quirk on another uncertain smile. She waits a beat too long, then parts her lips to say thank you -

Yes I do. I think about you a lot.

His voice is different - milder, and hesitant. He leans in suddenly to kiss her, following her lips even as she jerks back against the headboard before she can stop. She still can't kiss him back, but he doesn't care. His kisses have changed, too - he is tasting her, not claiming her - gentle, but she can feel a thrumming eagerness just behind his soft lips.

I do want to touch you. His voice is husky with desire. Is it okay?

Regan sits up straighter now, staring at him with wide eyes as she feels his hand slip inside the robe to cup her breast, hears his gratified sigh. Is it okay? Something is going on, and she doesn't understand it.

He takes her free hand, her left hand, and rubs it against the crotch of his jeans. She can feel how eager, how horribly erect he is, the thick rigid shape straining against the denim. He opens the fly and puts her hand inside and she wraps her fingers automatically around warm smooth cockflesh - he has never made her fondle him before, has just used it on her, just shoved it in her, ready or not. She is clumsy with her non-dominant hand, like it is someone else's hand.

Does he want a handjob? She's afraid to make the wrong move and only holds him, curling her fingers down the length of him in a light grip, until he says suddenly: Oh. Oh. Sorry.

Then like quicksilver he's brutal on top of her, shoving the awful dress up, forcing her legs apart and thrusting his ready cock into her, taking her face in a merciless grip as she squeals and claws at his wrist with her free hand and feels him fucking himself into her, hard and deep, so deep - hurting her with every snap of his hips. Twisting her bright red mouth between his strong fingers until her teeth tear into her lips and she is sobbing and whimpering, feeling her hot tears run onto his hand as he fucks her - ferocious - has he ever been this angry? Has he always been this angry? Her insides ache raw around him as he batters his length into her, and at the same time he is caressing her nipples so tenderly and Regan snivels, limp on the bouncing mattress under him, the handcuff clanking in time with his thrusts. What just happened? What just happened here?

He comes with his eyes wild on her face, with a noise she hasn't heard before, and it seems a very long, drawn-out climax as he empties himself into her again, laying himself out long against her body. Regan waits, gasping, with her streaming face pinched in his hand for him to be finished.

You see, don't you? He pants, reaching to adjust the wig, still on top of her. She nods under the hand on her face, but he won't look at her now. He won't look at her as he lets her go at last and leaves her on the bed. In fact, he turns to face the wall, and it's new and it's as unnerving as anything else. Regan brings her free hand up to dab at the corner of her mouth and sees blood on her fingers. He's saying she can have five words. What the fuck was that? won't do. She can't think of anything safe.

But he'll go, and she wants him to go. She's afraid of him, like this - the way he looks at her - the way he doesn't look at her. She could shake her head, say nothing - would he be upset? She just wants him to go, but he'll be back. She needs to know.

Very quietly. She keeps her head bowed, in case he turns around. She doesn't want him to catch her staring at him. There is a risk in asking, there is a risk in saying anything, ever - and she doesn't know where he is, right now - but she has to know. "Are we finished playing, now?"

[ezwriter]

"Do you think I'm fucking playing, Carol?!!" he barks at the wall.

He slams the heavy metal door behind him, twists the lock shut and snaps the padlock shut. He stalks past the house and down the dirt drive. Walking. Walking. All the way down to the gate. By the time he returns up the rise to the small A-frame cabin with the darkened storage shed behind, the sky has blackened, the first stars beaming through the clear night air.

[saysalice]

She shrinks up against the headboard with a rattle of chain. The force of his voice is terrifying, even turned away from her - especially, somehow, turned away from her. That he is so enraged and won't look at her - calling her Carol, but not playing now - she doesn't understand this!

Tight in a ball with hunched shoulders and her free arm drawn up defensively, she moans fearfully, "No - no - " but he is tearing the door open and slamming out - if the shack wasn't made of cinder blocks, she would believe walls were shaking with the impact - but it's Regan who's shaking.

He locks her in and he's gone, and she lets out the breath she was holding in a painful wheeze: "Oh fuck...oh fuck..." Dissolving into choking hysterical sobs, curled up shuddering against the headboard, wailing to herself, "I'm gonna die...I'm gonna die here...oh my God..."

It is hours like that - she can't know how long - too afraid to sleep, too afraid to move. She cries herself out until her head aches and her face is puffy and swollen under the long wig. She'd like to rip it off and throw it across the room, tear at the dress with her teeth - she doesn't want to be Carol, this is what he does to Carol - but she doesn't.

It's a long time, she doesn't know how long. The bare bulbs are bright in the windowless space and there is no time, here. There are only his visits. She waits for him to come back - she is terrified of his return, but she needs him to come back. She sobs briefly again at the realization, the horror and the hopelessness of this new life - but she has no more tears left, and she leans back, resigned. He may come back to kill her; he may - more likely - make her wish she was dead...but he must come back. There is nothing else.

She watches the door.

[ezwriter]

He makes himself sit at the table and have a beer, sipping slowly. He knows how he's getting. Not with this one he says to himself. Not so soon.

He showers and lets the warm water run over him. Washing her scent off him. Remaining there. Inhaling. Then, dressing slowly. He would leave her out there. Everything's locked away. But he needs to feed her. It's after eight.

He opens the lock and the door and gathers her dinner. He walks straight ahead without looking but he can feel she's turned away. He can feel her fear like a third presence in the room. No one needed to be Carol right now.

"Take the wig off," he tells her. "Throw it on the floor. Slip out of the robe. Slide it up your arm. It's dinner time." Only when he hears the sounds confirming she's complied does he turn to look at her. She's balled herself, closed herself in a tight question mark facing the far wall. Just as well.

He approaches and places the paper plate on the mattress beside her. A microwaved burrito. She can feed herself with her free hand. He leans over her and reaches for the cuff, unlocks it while he slides the sleeve over her hand and lets the robe fall on the floor beside the blond clump of hair. He can see her face, her lips swollen distorted like a bill. The baby bird again. Her legs pinned up against her belly. He lets the key fob fall by his side and returns to perch on the edge of the bed holding her milk cup. As if an apology, as if for dessert, he offers, "You're up to eight words."

[saysalice]

He comes back at last. Regan hears his key in the padlock and turns her face away from the door as he slides the deadbolt open. She hears him enter and waits for him to speak. What kind of life is it, she wonders fleetingly, if she is going to spend so much of it holding her breath?

She waits a moment to be sure she's heard him right, but then gratefully snatches the wig off with her free hand and drops it off the side of the bed. She glances up at him; he seems much more himself, but he still won't look at her. She averts her gaze again, just to be safe. Wriggling determinedly, using her teeth and being careful not to tear it, she manages to get the robe off one arm, over her head and bunched up along her cuffed arm. She would not have thought that she could feel so relieved to be naked before him, again, but the dress and the wig were like words written on her skin in a language she doesn't understand. She is glad to be rid of them.

Still, she cannot fool herself into believing she is any safer, like this. Her lip is still swollen and tastes of blood. She remains curled up at the head of the mattress, defensive, as he turns to her finally and steps closer.

She's surprised when he leans in to unlock the handcuff, taking the robe off her arm. It's the most freedom she's had so far, in this room. He drops the dress onto the floor with the wig, and the jingle of keys at his side catches her eye. For just a moment she sees herself grabbing the bucket and flinging the contents at him, swiping the fob and pushing past him to the door. Locking him in here, taking the car. No more psycho games.

But her split lip is too fresh. He won't melt away like the Wicked Witch of the West. She might buy herself a few seconds of surprise and disgust, but it's no weapon. She reaches for the burrito instead, murmuring, "Thank you."

The hot cheese burns her tongue and the roof of her mouth, and it's surreal to experience such a mundane annoyance in this frightening new existence. She sips the milk and tries to think of eight words - she's surprised that he has decided to allow her more. She'd rather not say anything. Her last choice was so terribly wrong, setting him off again - but like the meals, she's afraid that if she refuses, he will stop offering.

She counts silently. She would like to say: I really want to understand. Please help me.

But does she? It's too soon, his strange mood has spooked her badly, and he's only just started to look at her again. And does she really want to understand what happened here, this afternoon? She's not sure. She has to be careful with her questions.

What else can she say? Something. Something innocuous, nothing that will provoke him. She counts again quickly and looks up at him. "May I please wash myself?" She offers a tiny, shy smile that hurts her mouth. "I must stink."

[ezwriter]

He can look at her more easily with the wig off, with the robe gone. Carol unplugged. She is his naked bird again, sipping her milk through swollen lips, trying to smile. Her legs are blotches of echimosis, healing yellow and gray as the body reassembles itself after the siege. Her naked legs still curled defensively in a reflexive modesty, as if he couldn't find her pussy, as if he didn't own it.

"May I please wash myself? I must stink."

The eight words feel like she's spreading her meek wings. Trying at least. Making herself at home.

"I tell you what, little bird," he tells her, reaching out to stroke her scalp and cheek as she sips, "When you can tell me how many words you get next time, I will wash you."

She's finished her dinner. He takes the plate and cup and sets it outside by the door. He unlocks the storage bin and returns with a woolen blanket - drab green.

"You've had a long day," he says, pulling the sheet over her. Now unfolding the blanket and spreading it across the mattress.

He takes off his pants and lays them on the floor, the disparate keys clattering as they land. He's in his briefs and t-shirt as he flicks off the light switch and settles onto the creaky mattress. He slips under the blanket into the bed beside her.

She's curled away from him. He gathers her. His rough hand stroking the contours of her hunched and huddled form.

[saysalice]

She wonders, almost as soon as they are out of her mouth, at her choice of words. She gets eight, and this is what she's using them for? He may decide at any time to cut her off, and will she regret, then, that she's wasted these words - asking his name, asking for a bath? But she can't think of anything more clever, and she must be safe, at all costs. He is so changeable, she has seen so many different sides of him, today, and understood none of them.

It's a careful choice, a girlish request - she wants to be clean, wants to be appealing to him. If he says no, it's a throwaway request, harmless, and he can feel powerful for denying her even this little thing. If he says yes, maybe he'll take her into the house, to bathe.

She steels herself for his touch. She's seen that his gentlest caresses can turn cruel without the slightest warning - she must always expect it, without ever showing reticence. It is the hardest work of her life, just sharing space with him. He only touches her this time, stroking her face and her bare head lightly, fondly. He calls her little bird again, he is looking her in the eye again.

When you can tell me how many words you get next time, he says. She looks back at him uncertainly. She was expecting a decided yes or no, full control to grant or refuse this favor - not a riddle. She finishes the milk, bewildered. How can she possibly know how many words? He has been allocating them, rather at random, for her good behavior - hasn't he? It hasn't gone incrementally. And she was surprised to get eight, after he stormed out of here - she'd expected him to drop back to one or two again, he seemed so angry. Has she behaved, since he came back to feed her dinner? How many does she deserve? How can she possibly know how he decides on the number?

Regan watches him put the plate and cup outside and return very shortly with a blanket. He doesn't appear to be expecting an answer right away, and she's glad. It's so hard to try to know his mind, every second. He doesn't re-cuff her - that's something - and he's preparing to let her sleep on the bed. She feels a trembly gratitude as he pulls the sheet up over her, and then the blanket, and it's a comforting gesture, she can't help feeling that it is. It has been a very long, difficult day, and she's worn down, she can't keep up this guessing game - she is glad he's decided that it's bedtime, she will be glad to sleep.

The crunch of his keys hitting the floor makes her look up to see him taking his pants off, and a slight tightening of her lips is the only outward sign of her dismay. Not again? But he doesn't undress all the way. He turns the light off and she is plunged into darkness and feels his weight on the mattress beside her. She'd thought he would leave her like last night, and she lies stiffly, feeling the heat of him as he moves closer to her, reaches for her.

The darkness is so complete, and she is so weary, and after his earlier rage and violence his warm hands moving on her bare skin under the blanket are almost soothing. In the dark and the silence and in her frazzled mind, spinning inward on itself like a snail's shell, she could almost believe it's - not Keith, but someone - someone who loves her. In this moment, doesn't he love her? Doesn't he want her to feel good? It's so exhausting to always be resisting, calculating, scheming, weighing her options. His light fingertips are raising goosebumps - her flesh doesn't know the difference.

The sound of his keys on the concrete replays in her mind. She is completely unbound, tonight...caught up in his arms, but perhaps he's a heavy sleeper. She should fight, she thinks, just a little longer - fight this exhaustion and lie here quietly awake until she's sure he's out. So easy, easier than it's ever been so far, to just slip out of the bed and take the keys and go. But she is so ragged - it's been such a day of violent, grueling emotions - and what if he's testing her? What if he doesn't sleep? If he woke up and caught her -

She feels her body quiver with nearly silent little dry sobs, and she pushes herself back into him to feel his warm hard body solid against hers, and his arms enfolding her. The clatter of his keys - she can picture just where they are, in the room. There may not be another chance like this. She arches her back and thrusts her ass up into his briefs, fitting herself more firmly into the curve of his body, and hugs his arms tight around her.

[ezwriter]

He feels her nestled against him. Her body sweet somehow still though the clothes and hair that held her scent were ashes by now in the pit. Not stinking as she claimed.

He feels her delicate shoulders at his chest and the curve her back and draws her closer and she is not resisting for once. She's given up or is too tired to refuse him. Calm finally. After the day of so much. He'd had the medicine to control the swings. But with her, the swings were so violent, not like with the others. She was more powerful than that somehow, something about her. And he held it in his hands. He kissed the skin of her skull and cradled her breasts. His. His palm splayed against her flat belly.

Four times he'd ejaculated into her. He'd whipped her and crushed her face. She is quiet now, but she'll want to leave and he can't imagine himself ever being okay with that. No. It was less than 24 hours ago she'd put this throbbing hole in his neck. His hands reach down to find her free hands, enclosing her right wrist now and drawing it up so he can click the cuff around it once more.

"That's better than last night," he tells them.

They could both sleep easy now and wake up together in the morning. She shifts to relieve the strain on her arm chained to the headboard slat. His hands resume exploring, feeling, listening to the smooth toned flesh of her legs, her hips, her belly.

"Were you on the pill?" he asks.