1I can hear Them. They are now setting up for poker night. Above my head the scuffing of the large dining room table being repositioned is loud and overbearing, the sounds of extra chairs being pulled up to compensate for the lack of fine chairs and the many additional players arriving shortly. It must be Thursday. They only do this on Thursday nights. The reason I know this is because the day they took me was a Wednesday, and I knew when they said "Good morning" after the first night what day it was. That very night they repeated the same steps they were now.
I cannot surmise the number of times I have overheard the preparations for Thursday Night Poker with the Boys. And, because I know the traditions of this night so very well by now, I know what must come soon. They do the same thing to me as they would with the dining room table. They never break routine, they do as They plan.
Within seconds of thinking this, the door to my right opens, flooding light, and shows the pair of brown Adidas sneakers I know well by now.
No, there are not just two of them—Army boots and Adidas—there is one more, but his shoes change, so I call him Miscellaneous in my head.
Army, Adidas, and Miscellaneous are my captors.
I know what you're thinking: how can you classify them by their shoes?
The answer: that is all I know of them.
The Day had begun normally, a summer day in which I was planning to go to the beach with my family. The sun was shining, bright and white and yellow. There were no clouds, a slight breeze that ruffled my hair and swiped strands across my eyes. I never brushed them away, preferring the soft, silky feel of it against my cheeks. I was a curious girl that summer, fancying going off by myself to discover new things in our yard. Different types of butterflies that I never cared to notice before; how grasses in varying places on our lawn grew singularly from one another; which trees were young and which were old and what breed of tree it was in the first place—how to tell them apart. I was doing that when It happened, studying the differences between two trees—a Dagwood and a Maple—when suddenly the shadow of a man appeared behind me, casting me in darkness while the sun bleached the rest of my surroundings. I had wandered away from the car to do my exploring, and now I had thought it to be my father wanting to bring me back to the van so as to go to the beach before traffic set in. Thinking innocent thoughts—about Dad, the beach, Mom, my older brother—I turned to face him. However, the sun that was behind him blinded me, shielding his face, before a heavy burlap sack was thrown over my head. Without a conscious thought, I knew that any sound I made would be muffled and muted by the thick material. There was no point in screaming. Before I knew it I was hauled upside down—over his shoulder I realized later—and was being carried away. I pieced together in my mind what must have been the sequence of events, considering I was in the sack I knew no concrete facts. But, considering They brought me newspaper clippings of how my parents did not know how I could have possibly disappeared, I figure that He must have carried me through the woods behind my house, blending in with the darkness cast by the summer sun falling heavily on the canopy of leaves overhead. I know we walked for a long while because, after a few minutes of listening to the heavy gruntings of the one who carried me and then later the added voices of his two accomplices, I began to count my breaths, wondering how many seconds it took for each one and how much farther they could walk in that amount of time.
Before I knew it I heard the click of a key in a lock, the sounds of a house filtering through the sack. I suppose we entered through the back door so as not to attract attention from the street. The moment they opened the door to the basement and walked down the stairs that I now loathe so, I knew we were in a basement thanks to the smell (a smell I know well after such a time). It was dank and musty and filled with mildew and rat droppings. I thought it vile and disgusting. In the back of my mind I realized I would have to stay here because they would never let me out again. Fear clenched me viciously, a vise that closed tightly over my lungs. In that moment I couldn't breathe, I couldn't speak; I could only cry, so that was what I did. I spilled tears like a leaky faucet, incessantly letting the drops fall across my cherub face. Adidas was the one who came up to me, saw the tears, and slapped me. My face was numb and the tears stopped. Shocked that I had just received my first slap, I could not make a sound. I didn't scream I just stared at him with wide eyes and wondered how someone could be so cruel. Of course, I couldn't see his face—and never would—but I certainly could hear him. Speak he did, and when he did he simply said, "Better stop those tears now. They're not going to do you any good." He lead the others out of the basement and immediately started moving furniture over my head, what I now know of as poker night.
I knew they gambled in these games, but I wondered if my captors ever won anything from these games.
Mostly I wondered if they were gambling me.
I really hoped so, at least then, I could leave this goddamn basement.
The clock mocked me from its corner in the darkness. You will never leave you are here to stay I will never stop ticking this is your life now I hope you're happy I hope your family loved you because you'll never see them again You are trapped with me and this gives me joy you are stuck here.
It was right, always right. How could something so steady be wrong?
I curled in a ball, sorry for myself, sorry for my family.
Jumping now, as overhead I heard as well as felt the quick and final slam of a fist upon a table. Apparently there was a light fixture hanging in this basement, because I heard it tickle and swing due to the impact of the fist.
I hope I never have to meet that fist when angry.
Though I listened hard, there were no other telltale signs of activity Upstairs. Without much else to do, I closed my eyes and drifted to sleep. Yet, before I did, I heard a mouse scuttle in the corner.
The last thing I did was wish for the mouse to escape. At least then something on the Outside would know my story.
That was something at least…
{and then there was nothing.}