37. Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Six
Allie
T he detectives called and said they'd finished processing the scene of the basement. The cellar. The way Parsons sounded on the phone, I knew he realized how wrong he'd been about everything I said. I don't know why, but I blurted out, "I need to see it."
Now, standing outside the house with Jax and our friends, I am not completely certain I want to. I know I need to, but I feel my nerves kick up.
"Are you sure you want to do this, Allie?" Shields asks.
"You said you wanted me to walk you through that night," I say, clearing my throat. "And I need to see the place I lived in for years. Two birds, one stone, right?"
"I'd like to go, too," Sage says. "I've heard... Allie's shared some things, and I... I need to see it. I need to know if what I see in my mind is what is actually down there."
The tremble in her voice tells me she's as scared as I am, and I don't think I ever really considered what it was like for them. To know but not know. Jax clears his throat, and all three guys raise their hands to signal they'd like to go inside, too.
"Put booties on when you walk through the house. I think you should prepare yourselves, though. It's not going to be easy," Parsons says.
Hearing him, of all people, say this makes my stomach bobble. Maybe this is a bad idea.
No, I have to. I have to see it one last time to stop seeing it when I close my eyes at night.
We walk through the back door to retrace my steps that night except in reverse, and we slip the blue booties on that I have only ever seen in hospitals and fancy houses for sale. The light in the windows makes everything look different, and I move to the area I hid when I heard rustling before I escaped.
"I stood here and waited for someone to come out through one of the doors when I got upstairs because I heard something. It turned out to just be a really big mouse," I say with a nod and nervous chuckle.
"Did anyone else live here?" Jax asks.
Shields shakes her head. "It doesn't appear so. The chairs and small table are the only furniture up here like Allie said, and they belonged to the original owner."
I still can't wrap my head around the fact that this was Laura. I always knew something wasn't right with her, but I never expected her to have an alternate personality. Although, she is smart. She could fake it, but everything I've heard would be far too elaborate and planned. I mean, she had a second phone for someone who never answered it.
We walk downstairs, careful in the dim lighting. It feels weird walking down instead of up, and when we reach the dirt floor at the bottom, Benji gasps behind me. Lights have been set up for us to see everything, and I stare in amazement at what the space truly looks like .
"It looks… different," I say as I walk towards the cot I spent more time on than I ever want to calculate. "Smaller. I only had a flashlight or the light when I showered, so I never really took in how closed in this was."
My stomach knots as I see the five-gallon pale I used as my toilet in the corner that had been emptied that day, but the smell is still putrid. The cot has the thin blanket I used with an almost flat pillow. Rugs line the floor, and I look over to see the makeshift shower setup.
"Besides looking smaller, does anything look different?"
I shake my head as I crouch down in front of the three-shelf bookcase. "No, it's exactly the same as I left it," I say, my voice barely above a whisper. "All the books I read are still here. I have most of them memorized."
"At least she gave you something to do?" Sage offers, but I hear the panic in her voice. Looking back, I see her clinging to Drew's hand with a death grip, and I almost smile.
"Can you walk us through that day, Allie?" Parsons asks, his voice gentler than I've ever heard it.
Swallowing, I nod. "Uh, yeah. I was on the cot," I say and move towards it. "May I?" He nods, and I sit on it, noticing how truly uncomfortable it feels under me now that it’s been a while since I was last here. "They-she came down with the tray of food and a fresh set of clothes under her arm. It was shower day, and I knew the drill. She walked over and grabbed the shackle key. She unlocked me, and I walked over to the shower where she hung a light on the wall."
We move towards the shower, and I point at the spot where the mechanic's light hung. "We found a light in the garage. It must be where she kept it," Shields says.
"I stripped down while she turned on the water. I stood under it, and it was cold. It was always cold, and I would rinse off. No soap. I only got soap once every five showers, and I never really had a time limit. But that day, I did. She wanted me to hurry."
"And you knew this because she clapped?" Parsons asks.
I can't tear my eyes from the shower walls as I step inside and touch the dirty, grimy space that was supposed to clean me. "Yeah, that was her signal for me to move. I did, and she even hurried me along to dry off. I only ever had a raggedy old hand towel to use, and because she rushed me, I remember the clothes being damp after I put them on because my skin was still wet. I walked back along the rugs that were meant to keep me from getting the cot muddy, and she shackled me back up. She set the tray of food there," I say, pointing to an area with what looks like fuzzy mold, "and then she left."
"What did she give you to eat?"
Dry heaving, I close my eyes and will the bile to stay down. "Bread, water, and some tomato broth-like soup. Every day. It never changed."
I walk back over to the cot and sit down, suddenly dizzy and nauseous. Parsons kneels in front of me, his hand on my shoulder. "Then what happened, Allie?"
"I was laying on the cot playing with the flashlight. I wasn't hungry. I was never really hungry and only ate because I had to. Uh, I was trying to decide what to do. I wasn't tired, but I didn't know if I wanted to read. The light fell, and I noticed it reflected on something over by the shower on the floor. I realized the key had fallen off the hook, and I was able to reach it. It was just outside where my fingers could extend, but I tugged, cutting my skin a little, and I got the key."
"Can you show us?"
Pulling out a pen, Parsons hands it to Shields, and she sets it on the ground. She looks at me and asks, "Was it about here? "
I nod and move over to where the shackles are on the floor. Tugging them to extend as far as they'll reach, I get down on all fours and reach out. "Yeah, it was right about there."
"You got it and unlocked yourself. Then what?" Parsons asks.
"I froze. For some reason, I expected some type of alarm to sound, and I just stood here for a few minutes. Maybe longer. My sense of time was all screwed up, and I even considered locking myself back up because I thought it could be a test. Then I realized it was my only chance to get out of here, and that's when I went upstairs. I heard a noise and stood in the shadows, but it was just the mouse. Then I ran out the back door and into the woods."
Standing up, I dust off my knees and hands. I look at the faces of Jax and our friends for the first time, and they all look sick. I can't say I feel much different right now.
"Why... why would Laura do this?" Sage asks, tears falling with every blink of her eyelashes. "And why did she hurt Ms. Moran?"
Drew wraps her up in his arms and hugs her tightly. For the first time, I see them as a real couple. The way he cares for her is obvious as he tries to console her even though he looks as ashen as she does.
"It all comes down to Jax," Parsons says. "Heidi Moran wanted to hold her back a year, which would take her out of classes with Jax. The psychiatrist believes that was the moment when her psyche broke. That's when Natalie Gill was born."
I swallow the rising bile because there's nowhere to vomit in here. Nowhere besides my makeshift toilet, and I think that would be a never-ending carousel I’d never get off once it started.
"Laura and Natalie are the same person," Benji says. "I can't wrap my head around it."
"Laura was the person you all knew. The one in love with Jax who followed him around. Natalie was the one who did all of the bad things Laura wanted to do," Shields says.
"So... when I thought she was talking on the phone all those times, she wasn't really on the phone, was she?" Drew asks.
"No, she was likely talking to herself," she says. "Natalie had a phone and rented this house, but she never made one phone call or text, and all payments came from Laura's bank account."
Jax bends over and rests his hands on his knees. "This was all because of me?"
"It's not your fault," I say and walk over to him. "You were the object of her obsession, and there's nothing you could have done."
"She almost killed you, and then she held you hostage in this shithole prison for seven years. Because she wanted me . How can I not think this is my fault, Allie? How can you... how can you look at me and not hate me? I mean, I look around here, and I hate me because she did this. Because she wanted me to herself."
I wrap my arms around him and force him to stand upright. "You are only in control of yourself. You couldn't have stopped her. We all thought Laura was harmless, remember? Annoying and always around, but she never seemed threatening. I know I never looked at her and thought she would hurt me one day."
Sage nods in agreement. "I always thought I could take her, if needed. I only thought about it a handful of times since the fifth grade, but I never thought she'd beat me."
"When it comes to Laura, you probably could have," Parsons says. "But Natalie may have been a different story. We saw the shift when Laura became Natalie, and it was the creepiest thing I've ever seen. "
"She described herself as a five-foot-ten woman with charcoal hair and a strong build. Claims she placed second in shotput in high school," Shields says. "When she had her outburst, it took four of us to subdue her while the doctor sedated her."
"That's oddly specific for a made-up person, isn't it?" I ask, my arms still around Jax who trembles.
"She created an entire personality and life for Natalie. She was extremely thorough."
Standing in silence, it seems none of us quite know what to say. My boyfriend and friends now know firsthand what life was like for me when I was gone, and it's a strange feeling. Part of me wishes they hadn't come down here to keep them from truly visualizing this because it's a lot to digest.
"There's something else," Parsons says. "More of an interesting something than evidence. While we talked to Laura's mother, she confirmed she’d known Laura needed help for some time. She tried for years, but Laura always resisted. She's extremely intelligent and knew how to answer the questions correctly to stay out of treatment. Her mother never knew Natalie's name, but when she was told, she was in tears. Laura was originally a twin, and her twin died in the womb."
"Why did Natalie's name make her cry?" Drew asks, his face scrunched in what looks like disgust.
"Because Natalie was the name they gave the one who died. They never told Laura, and it's not documented anywhere."
I look at Sage, and she looks as freaked out as I feel. "What's going to happen to Laura?"
"She's been admitted to the state mental facility. She's getting treatment, but right now, Natalie appears to be the dominant personality. She made her appearance when we confronted Laura with the evidence, and we've been told they haven't seen Laura since," Shields says.
"The doctor believes that with Natalie being in control, she took the blame for Laura. Laura is free, in their shared mind, which is why Natalie's the one everyone sees," Parsons says.
The information hits me like a train. "I almost feel bad for her."
"I don't," Jax says, his voice hard. "I hope they lock her up, throw away the key, and give her lots of shock therapy."
"This isn't your fault," I say.
"It feels like it's my fault."
"We're going to leave here, and we are never going to come back. There won't be any more conversations about what my life was like here because it's over, and we're going to move forward. The only person responsible for this is Laura. Or Natalie. Whomever. Okay?"
Nodding, he rubs his hand over his face. "Okay."
"I think getting out of here and never talking about this again is the best idea I've ever heard," Sage says. "Except when I tell this to my therapist because holy shit is this messed up."
We walk up the stairs and stop outside. "Jax?"
He looks at me with so much fear in his eyes that I feel my heart breaking. "Do you still love me?"
"Only with my entire being."
He presses his lips against mine, and I know we're going to have an adjustment period as we both process everything. But it finally feels like this nightmare is over.
"You know what I just realized?" Benji asks.
"What?" Sage responds.
I pull away and look at him, and he looks confused. "She had Natalie listed as the maid of honor. She was somehow going to be the bride and a bridesmaid at the same time. Do you think she was going to have one of those dresses that's two put together and sewn in the middle? She could turn one way to be the bride and another to be a bridesmaid?"
Laughing, I pull him into my arms. "I love you, Benji. Please don't ever change."
"Hey, hey, your man is right here, Allie. We need to keep our love a secret around him."
Jax punches him as I release him, but he's found a way to relieve the tension hanging over us, and for that I’m grateful. "Shut up, dude."
"How was she going to pull that off?" I ask. "Oh man, now I wish I would've waited to come back until the wedding because it's going to bug me."
"You shut up, too," Jax says, lifting me into his arms, but he smiles and kisses me.
This was a lot, but I think we’re going to be okay. We’re all going to be okay now.