Chapter 12

Viv woke slowly, her body sore. She must have slept really funky. Her head was pounding. She didn’t even remember them drinking. She frowned, trying to remember what had happened last night. Oh. Shit. Demon lady. Where was Thomas? She sat up quickly, which caused a clanking sound. Her eyes flew all the way open, as she looked down and saw that she had an ankle cuff on. It was attached to a chain, which was connected to a metal hook in the wall. She pulled it, but it didn’t budge. She was in a room, a cot thrown against the wall, a bucket in the corner. This was looking exactly like the movies that played at Halloween.

“Thomas?” she whispered. The room was so dark, she couldn’t see much. There was a sliver of light coming in from a window, but it wasn’t enough to see around the room. Putting her arms out in front of her, back of her hands out first like she saw in a movie once so you didn’t break a finger feeling around, she slowly shuffled around the space. The chain made a horrible screeching sound as it scraped across the floor. Stupid, she scolded herself. She was trying to be quiet. She bent down to hold the chain off the ground with one hand. The floor was cold, and she realized that her socks and shoes were gone.

Chain held high, she resumed her shuffle around the room. She didn’t want to break her toe on anything, so she went very slowly. She had just reached the other side of the room when the chain ran out of length. Lowering herself to the floor, she lay on her stomach, spreading her hands and non-chained leg out. She probably looked like she was making a weird snow angel. There was nothing. How could there be nothing? Where was Thomas, she thought, tears slowly escaping.

As the sun came up, she looked around the room, the growing light showing just how screwed she was. The flooring was ancient looking, cracked and worn, dirty. Everything was dirty. The window was a single pane, cracked and missing part of the upper left corner. The drapes were tattered and barely hanging on to the rod. The cot was the newest-looking thing there besides the bucket. Was the bucket for the bathroom? The room was otherwise empty. The door was missing the door handle, so even if she could reach it, she didn’t think she could open it. The floral wallpaper was hideous and water stained. Large drooping flowers surrounded her. The ceiling was peeling, parts of the drywall missing to the point where she could see bare boards. There were a few dents or holes in the drywall scattered through the room. Maybe if she tried to look through the holes?

Grabbing the chain, she moved to the closest one. Viv slowly pushed her finger through the hole. She could barely touch the other side. Using her fist, she carefully opened the hole large enough to fit her hand. This was probably a stupid idea, she thought to herself. Who knew what was hiding in the walls. But she had to find Thomas. Taking a deep breath, she slid her hand through the hole. Once she reached the other side, she managed to scratch out a small opening on the other side, just enough to fit her finger. Crooking her finger, she tried pulling back toward herself. If the drywall she was destroying fell between the walls, the demoness might not notice that she was messing with the walls, she reasoned. She didn’t get far, only about a quarter-sized hole, but she could see the hallway. There was some really gross-looking burnt orange carpet that had once been popular. She didn’t see anyone in her limited view.

Moving to the wall with the cot, she had a few more options for holes. Viv tried to look through each one to see if there was a hole on the other side that she could use. Toward the back corner, it looked like there could be catty-corner holes, they were diagonal from each other, but she thought she could use them. It would be easier than trying to create a new hole with her finger again. Holding her breath, she slid her arm in the hole on her side, trying to angle her arm so that she would be lined up with the hole on the other side. She felt drywall, but not the hole. Viv huffed out a breath, feeling around cautiously. She winced as she felt cobwebs, hoping a spider wasn’t now crawling on her. She scratched herself on a screw sticking out of the wood and in the back of her mind she wondered when she last had a tetanus shot. Her fingers finally felt a rougher surface, uneven and torn. She leaned hard against the wall, her feet pushing off the ground, trying to give her as much arm length as possible. She finally could just barely grip the edge of the other hole with her fingertips. Some of her fingers didn’t want to bend and she was stuck using mostly her pointer finger and thumb. Pulling as hard as she could, she managed to tear a little piece off, but she lost the grip she had and fell backwards. The drywall scraped her arm, but she pushed herself back into position, adjusting so she had one leg pushing off the wall behind her to counterbalance when she pulled again. She found the hole quicker this time, getting a slightly better grip. She eventually managed to make a six-inch hole and could see a little bit into the room.

“Thomas?” she whispered. “Are you there?” She held her breath, her ears straining to hear anything. She heard a little whisper of movement. What was that? Was he waking up? “Thomas?”

Viv swallowed her scream as a mouse dropped onto her bed, scurrying across before falling to the ground and disappearing into a hole. Once the mouse disappeared, there were no more sounds from the other room. Collapsing on the bed, she looked around again, trying to see what she had missed. Her arm was now pulsing in pain, she must have scratched it worse than she thought. Looking at it, she saw a tear in her shirt, but it didn’t really look that bad. Oh. She had forgotten about that somehow. Her hand had a hole in the middle of it from that bitch’s shoe. She hadn’t even noticed she was still bleeding. Gripping the arm sleeve that had a hole in it, she tried to rip her sleeve off. This was much easier in the movies, she thought, grunting as she pulled as hard as she could. This was going nowhere, she had managed to rip it maybe an inch. There was a jagged corner at the windowsill; maybe she could use that to tear it. Viv pulled her shirt off, placing the sleeve over the sharp wood, pulling it taunt. It took several minutes but she finally heard the fabric tearing. She stumbled as it abruptly separated from the rest of the shirt, catching herself on the wall. Viv pulled her shirt on before sitting back on the cot.

This was going to be awkward. She laid the strip of fabric over her leg, resting her hand on top. She really needed to wash it, but there was no sink or water nearby. This house probably didn’t have running water anyway. She tried using the bottom of her shirt to brush as much dirt and grime away from the wound as possible.

“You’re such a dumbass,” she muttered to herself. “Didn’t even remember you had a hole in your hand before you shoved it through the freaking walls.”

It was too late to do anything about it now, other than wrap it up and hope for the best. She held one end against her palm with her thumb, wrapping it around her hand. She crossed the dangling ends, lifting her hand to her face so she could grab one end with her teeth, holding it so she could tie a rough knot. Her stomach growled, making her realize that she hadn’t eaten since lunch yesterday besides the Fun Size Twix.

Viv had no idea how much time passed, other than the sun was fully up.

The door opened, the demoness standing there. “You’re awake, I see. Lovely. Maybe you’ll tell me which one of you is D’s mate.”

“No.”

“Well, that just makes it more fun for me,” she said with a grin. “Oh, by the way. Thomas was such a whiny little bitch that I finally gave in and brought him over to you. I only had one chain, so I had to break his leg so he couldn’t get away. Have fun,” she said cheerfully.

“What?” Viv asked, trying to follow the words spoken and not the cheerleader level of pep in her voice.

The demoness leaned over into the hallway, bending down to grab something.

“Thomas!” Viv rushed forward as the woman threw him into the room. His leg was definitely broken, she thought, swallowing down the bile that threatened to erupt as she watched it flop. At least the bone wasn’t sticking through the skin. Viv dragged the cot over to her friend, trying to figure out how to get him on it. It would be better for him to be off the floor. She wished there was another cot so she could break it apart and use the metal frame to splint his leg. She briefly thought about doing that to the cot now, but figured it was better for him to be off the cold ground. Thomas wasn’t a big guy, but he was taller than her and as a dead weight, she quickly realized there was no way she was going to be able to pick him up enough to get him on the cot.

Gently laying him back on the ground, she looked him over. He had a large knot and cut on his forehead, from the coffee table she thought. There were a lot more bruises though. He had a black eye, red marks around his neck. Pulling his shirt up, his chest was a mass of bruises. She could see individual finger marks along his ribs. She must have been hitting him or dropping him a lot. She couldn’t imagine how he got so many bruises otherwise. She didn’t think the coffee table would explain this, especially the fingerprints. Viv laid his head in her lap, hoping he woke up soon.

“Thomas, I know you’re not going to want to wake up, but I need you to. Just for a minute. There’s a bed here, it’s not much, but it’s at least off the floor. I can’t lift you up, I tried. Please. Please wake up for me.”