6. Chapter 6
Noah
Cigarettes aren’t ideal, but they’re better than heroin, and unlike heroin, I happen to have a packet of cigarettes at home.
Auntie was a smoker. By the end, she struggled holding a cigarette on her own, so I used to help her smoke while we sat on the patio together, gazing out over the yard.
Her life would have been cut short with or without cigarettes, so I thought nothing of it.
With Asher, it’s different, but at least he might calm down if he gets to smoke.
At least he might stop hating me so much.
Just wait, my Goldilocks. I’ll create a sanctuary for you, void of temptations. You won’t be free, but you’ll be safe.
Soon enough, I’ll make him understand that I know how he’s feeling.
I might not know about drug withdrawal, but I know about the crawling feeling in his heart that led him to try drugs in the first place.
We are the same, he and I. We both have difficulties getting through life.
We just have different ways of dealing with those difficulties. We are kindred spirits in that respect.
I’ll make him see, and when he does, he’ll also understand that I’m the only person in his life he can depend on. His ex-girlfriend doesn’t care about his well-being, and neither do his enabling friends or his bully of a big brother.
Out of sheer curiosity, I unlock his phone with the new PIN code I set for it. Yeah, that’s what I thought: His last message to his brother was fourteen months ago, and it’s left on read. After that, nothing.
As for his parents, it seems like his mom sends him money every week.
My eyes widen at the amount. His parents must be pretty rich, then.
I should have figured; Ethan used to come to school dressed in the most fashionable designer clothes.
Even though we went to the same school, he lived in a world far removed from mine.
Maybe my poverty was the reason he and his friends singled me out.
One of the reasons, at least?…?You don’t call someone Dead Eye just for their threadbare clothes and DIY haircut.
After a bit of searching, I find Auntie’s cigarette stash in the closet. Her clothes are still here, as are all her belongings. I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of them when she passed, and I didn’t think I’d live long enough for it to matter.
I return to the basement. Asher glares at me suspiciously at my approach as usual, but when he sees what I hold in my hands, his eyes light up.
We sit in silence for a while as Asher enjoys his smoke. His eyes slide shut, his mouth tilting into a dimpled smile. I can’t help but stare at him, and when he opens his eyes again, he smirks, as if he knows something I don’t.
Well, I do know it; for all the power I hold over him with imprisonment and chains, at least he gets to goad me with the fact that I like him, and he doesn’t like me back.
“Noah,” he says, my name a floaty breath on his tongue.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
The acrid smoke floats my way as he exhales without a care. I don’t mind; he can do anything to me, as long as it makes him like me just a little.
“You’re welcome,” I mumble.
“Do you have any more?”
“Yeah, but?…?you shouldn’t smoke. It’s bad for you.”
He widens his eyes. “What, really?”
I frown. “Uh, yeah?…”
He rolls his eyes dramatically. “Christ, you’re clueless. As if I didn’t already know that. Hey, it’s not weed, at least, right? Or heroin.” He flashes a boyish grin, as if that was funny.
It’s not funny to me. He should take care of himself better, treat his body better. But I’m not really one to talk.
“You’re not that good with sarcasm, are you?” Asher asks. “Is that why my brother and his friends were afraid of you?”
“I don’t know,” I mumble. “Are you afraid of me?”
He takes another deep drag of the cigarette and squints as he looks at me through the smoke. “Would you blame me? You do scary things, like locking me up in your basement like some BDSM sex slave.”
“You’re not my sex slave.”
“Yeah, no, I’ve kind of figured that out.” He narrows his eyes. “Are you straight? Is that why?”
I shake my head.
“What, then? Are you a virgin?”
A chill goes through me. Is it that obvious? For some reason, I don’t want him to know. My lack of sexual experience has never bothered me much, but I don’t want him to see me as lesser because of it.
“I just don’t like to force people,” I mutter.
“But you don’t mind locking people up against their will?”
Something inside me curls up and turns cold. I look down at my lap, stroking my fingertips over my knuckles. When I look up, I notice Asher’s gaze on me.
“How about hurting me?” he asks, nodding to my hands. “Would you do that if I tried to escape?”
I look at him for a long time, contemplating. His cigarette is down to the filter now, and the ember has fizzled out on its own.
“If you try to escape, I need to make sure you don’t,” I say finally. “For your own good.”
Asher flicks the cigarette to the floor. “Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he mutters.
He sounds disappointed though. Maybe he hoped I would say I’d never hurt him, but I need to make sure he doesn’t hurt himself, and keeping him here is just a means of making sure that doesn’t happen. Why can’t he see that?
“Noah,” he says, and this time, my name on his tongue lacks that breathy tone from before. “Can you leave me alone?”
“Didn’t you enjoy the cigarette?”
“The cigarette has nothing to do with it. I just want you out of my face, that’s all.”
“Why?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Asher says, voice higher now. “Maybe because you’re creeping me the fuck out. Maybe because I don’t know you, and I don’t know what you’re up to. Maybe because you just admitted you’ll hurt me.”
“I didn’t say I will hurt you,” I protest. “I just said that if I have to, I’ll make sure you stay here. For your own good.”
“Stop saying that!” Asher brings both his hands to the sides of his head, covering his ears. “Fuck, you’re so annoying.”
“Annoying?”
“Yes! And weird. So leave me alone.”
That, I can understand. I know I’m a weirdo and a freak. I’ve been called those things countless times.
I rise from the chair, intent on leaving Asher alone like he wants, but before I have time to turn around fully, he speaks up.
“Don’t you have a job, by the way?”
I glance at him over my shoulder. “I did. But I quit.”
“Why? Don’t you need money?”
I shrug, unwilling to tell the truth. The truth is, I quit after Auntie died, as I saw no reason to go on, and in the weeks since her passing, all I’ve done is work up the courage to take the final step toward the abyss.
“Never mind,” Asher sighs. “I don’t even want to know. I don’t want to know anything about you. I just want you to leave me alone.”
My chest twists uncomfortably. If he doesn’t want to look at me any longer, I won’t force him.
I turn to leave, but during our conversation, he grew pale, his brow dewy with sweat, so I stay put to ask, “Are you okay?”
“No,” he mumbles. “I feel sick.”
“Is it the cigarette?”
“Yeah. I think it made it worse.”
“Do you want anything?”
“Just some water.”
I bring him a bottle, and he sips it quietly, frowning, hand shaking so badly he spills it onto his chin. It trickles down his clavicle and disappears under his shirt.
“Anything else?” I ask.
“No. I told you to leave.” He crawls up into a ball, shivering and shaking. The room stinks of his cold sweat and the sharp tang of his expulsions.
When I turn to go, his breathing grows louder, and just as I’m about to take the first step upstairs, he calls behind me.
“Wait!”
I turn back around, eager to bring him anything he needs to ease his pain. “Yes?”
“I’m bored down here. Can you at least give me something to do?”
We could talk. We could get to know each other. But I know he doesn’t want that, and right now, he’s not even capable of such a thing, so instead, I go upstairs and fetch a handful of books from the shelf.
When we didn’t bake bread or smoke cigarettes on the porch, Auntie and I used to spend hours in the living room with the fire crackling, reading our books. Aside from Auntie, books have been my only trusted companion in life.
When I bring them downstairs, Asher wrinkles his nose. I can tell he’s recently thrown up again from the way he wipes his wet chin. Either that, or he’s been crying. Maybe both.
“What’s this?” He holds up a worn hardcover.
“ Crime and Punishment .”
He smiles cruelly. “I knew you were a nerd.”
The slur doesn’t hit me as hard as he probably intended. I shrug, and my nonreaction makes him drop the smile for a glare.
“Is this what you do all day long? Read books ?”
I shrug again.
“Well, it’s boring.”
“Okay.”
“I wanna watch TV or something.”
“I don’t have a TV.” Auntie used to say TVs rot your mind.
“What?” Asher says with a huff of laughter. “You’re even weirder than I thought.”
Heat rises to my cheeks. Oh, how I hate it when he calls me weird, like the kids at school used to, and oh, how I hate the way he smirks in triumph when he sees my reaction to his accomplished insult.
He seems to revel in it, glaring at me with the same sadistic glint in his eyes as his bully of a big brother.
“Fine.” I hold out a hand. “If you don’t want the books, you don’t need to have them.”
“No. I want them.” He crawls up the bed, flinching away from the mere suggestion of my touch. His face is ghostly pale, enhancing the dark bags under his eyes, and his skin is covered in cold sweat.
I’ll give him a bath soon, but right now, he’s too prickly for me to even dare make the suggestion.
I want to take care of him, but he won’t let me.
He won’t stop fighting me at every turn, making fun of me whenever he gets the chance.
I suppose I shouldn’t blame him, considering the predicament he’s in.
He would make it easier on himself if he just surrendered to it though.
I’ll give him anything he asks, except for two things: freedom and drugs.
But those two seem to be the only things he wants.
I empty the bucket and bring him a second one to make it easier for him to manage his needs.
“If you need anything else, just call for me.”
“It’s nice to be such a spoiled guest,” he says dryly.
This time, I understand the sarcasm.