Chapter 14 #4
“Yeah,” I agreed lamely. Cursing was still hard for me, though I was doing better with “That Bastard”.
It seemed to fit him better than his birth name.
“I tried to make sense of it. After what I’d seen on television and been taught by my tutors, I was his wife.
I was the one he was supposed to be lying with.
” I shook my head. “He made me stay in the basement with them, cleaning them and fixing up their hair and bodies for him when he got home from work. They hated me, not even realizing I was just as much a prisoner. Only my chains were mental, forced on me since I was a small child.”
“Can I ask you something?”
I nodded, dreading what I thought was coming.
“Other than your wedding night, did he touch you again?”
I had to take a deep breath before confessing. “Once. Do you remember Ayame?”
“The other woman who was in the basement with you and Nishi,” he responded automatically.
“She was one of the women in that basement when he brought me down that first time. There were two others as well, Mitsuko and Sayuri. Sayuri, well, she was awful towards me. Not that I can blame her. But that changed when she…” I closed my eyes. “She became pregnant.”
Tangaloa stiffened. “Samantha?”
I nodded, unable to look at him. I did not want to see his judgement as he learned she was not biologically mine.
I felt his lips on my head as his hand ran up my back. “I already knew she wasn’t yours, baby.”
I stiffened, my head lifting up so quickly that I clipped his chin. “Ow!” I cried out, clutching my head. “Wait, you knew?”
He rubbed his chin as he nodded. “I guessed in that basement, but I knew when her blood tests came back a few weeks ago and she wasn’t a genetic match for you.”
Fear coursed through me, but when I tried to scramble off him, he tightened his hold on me. “Let me up! I have to—”
“You have to do nothing, because it changes nothing,” he corrected, not yielding. “You are her mother, Maisy. DNA does not change that.” He held my gaze, letting my fear rescind. “But I would like to know how she came into your life.”
I flinched. “We all had birth control implants. He had a doctor come to the house to…check his new purchases. Before we were married, he…did the same for me. Only, I did not know that was what he was doing. I was put to sleep for the procedure. They made it sound like it was normal, like every woman is knocked unconscious to have her virginity verified for marriage.” I was both angry and embarrassed by my ignorance, making my voice small as I added, “Dr. Akamu and I believe that is when he also gave me my tattoo.”
I felt his hand just above it on my back. “I guessed as much.”
I turned my face into his chest. “You must think me so foolish, not having known it was there.”
He flicked my ear. It didn’t hurt, but it did startle me into sitting upright. I came face to face with his scowl. “There’s not a damn thing that was done to you that I think you ‘foolish’ for. And don’t you ever let me hear you say that again.”
I swallowed hard and nodded.
More gently, he said, “Now, tell me about Samantha please.”
“Sayuri became pregnant. Her implant failed. Dr. Akamu says it’s rare, but it can happen.
It wasn’t obvious at first, but when it was…
” I closed my eyes, the echoes of her cries still ringing in my head.
“He tried to beat it out of her. The baby,” I clarified.
“Samantha. He hit Sayuri, over and over and over and over again. Like it was her fault that she was repeatedly raped and became pregnant.” The words tasted like ash, I was filled with such hatred.
“I begged… For the first time in years, I begged. I told him that a baby was a blessing, that it would make his stance at work better. I told him anything and everything I could, remembering the proud fathers on TV whenever their wives announced they were pregnant. I knew it was a wife’s duty to conceive, but I did not know at the time that the implant was what kept me from getting pregnant. ”
My body was shaking at this point. I couldn’t help it. I felt angry, hurt, and shame, but was also so sure in my knowledge that I had done the right thing. I hoped Tangaloa saw it the same way. If he was the man I believed him to be, he would.
“Mr. D—That Bastard,” I corrected. “He made me prove what I was saying. I didn’t understand. I was standing between a beaten Sayuri and him, and I had no idea how I was supposed to ‘prove’ that a baby was a blessing. He made me…”
“You don’t have to say it.” Tangaloa kissed my head again. “I don’t need to know the details unless you need to say it.”
But I shook my head. He had to know, had to understand the sacrifices I had made to ensure Samantha’s life and safety. He had to understand that I did not steal her from her birth mother.
I tried to find the words, but they got stuck in my throat. I fidgeted on his lap, and as soon as I realized he was willing to loosen his arms this time, I sprang from him. This was going to be hard enough as it was. I didn’t think I could be touching Tangaloa as I told him the rest.
“He made me get on my knees. I didn’t know what fellatio was.
I saw him…put it in the others’ mouths, but it wasn’t something taught to me.
Not like what I now know is missionary sex.
” I kept my back to him. More than not wanting to see him, I didn’t want him to see me.
“I’ll spare you the details of what happened next.
I’m sure you can guess. As someone who had never performed oral sex before, you can imagine how…
disappointed,” I chose with disgust, “he was at my efforts.
“Sayuri was still there. I realize now I didn’t even ask her if she wanted to carry a baby.
It should have been her choice all along, but I couldn’t stand the idea of him beating her until she miscarried.
I’d been taught all about pregnancies and miscarriages in my lessons, so that I was familiar with.
But the one thing that was also made clear to me was that it was the husband’s choice about whether or not the wife is allowed to have a baby or keep her baby.
So at the time, I was under the misconception that it was That Bastard’s right to choose. ”
I looked down at my nails, having been absentmindedly picking at my cuticle until I made it bleed. Ow.
“He made me pleasure Sayuri. Perform oral on her. She was still laying there, beaten, and he made me put my mouth on her. Be-between her legs,” I clarified, stuttering slightly.
“I wasn’t sure what I was doing, or how.
A part of me will always question if what I did was pure selfishness or if it was sacrifice to save an unborn child.
At the time, I did not have any intention of raising the baby or taking her from her mother.
“I remember looking at her. Sayuri. I’m not sure why, exactly.
She’d always hated me. Fought me when I was assigned getting her ready for That Bastard.
She even bit me once. But as I knelt down between her legs, something passed between us.
An understanding, I think. That we would do anything to save her baby.
” I licked my lips as I confessed, “So I did as I was told.
Everything I was told. And as I…pleasured Sayuri, That Bastard took his pleasure out on me.
Over and over again, each time making me touch or kiss or insert something into Sayuri.
“And when it was over, he locked me inside with her. Told me that if I wanted the baby so badly, I could take care of the,” I flinched, recalling his wording, “cow who bred her.” I walked around the opposite side of the bed from Tangaloa to where I’d been sitting earlier and gulped down my remaining water.
I did not look at him, and I turned my back again as soon as I could.
“It was a difficult pregnancy to say the least. But he left both of us alone during that time. Somehow, through it all, we became friends. Sayuri explained to me a lot of what happened and what was happening in that basement. She told me about her family back in Japan and how she was out at a nightclub one night, and when she left her friends to go to the bathroom, she was drugged and abducted. Since neither of us was a doctor, we had to rely on the knowledge I’d learned about pregnancy and her instinct to guide us.
“And then, several months later, Samantha was born. She was…incredible.” My chin quivered with emotion, both happy and sad. I hadn’t brought my daughter into this world through my own body, but I’d worked so hard to save her, to do everything I could for her.
I sniffled, knowing the worse confession was yet to come.
“Sayuri let me name her. I chose ‘Samantha’ after Elizabeth Montgomery’s character on Bewitched.
It was one of the few shows I had been allowed to watch, and I always admired Samantha’s determination to break free of her culture and become her own woman.
” I started picking at my nail again. “About a week after Samantha was born, That Bastard came into our room for the first time. I stupidly thought he was there to see his daughter. But even after nearly a decade of living with him, I was still just as na?ve as I had been when I was a child.” I had a hard time keeping my voice steady as I continued speaking.
“He wasn’t there for Samantha or me. He was there for Sayuri.
He… He hosted a party that night. The first that I knew of, or the first since I’d come to live with him.
“I was kept in the basement, so I don’t know specifically what happened that night, but he brought me up the next morning to clean.
And there, in the living room, was Sayuri’s body.
She was…” I had to cover my mouth as I gagged.
“They broke her. There was so much blood, and her jaw was twisted like it was fractured or dislocated. Her body was riddled with cuts and burns, and there was a rope around her neck. But not like a noose, like a dog collar. The carpet was so stained, the walls and the furniture all splattered too. He made me clean everything, but wouldn’t let me touch her.
A little bit later, two men came in wearing all white outfits.
They were completely covered, I couldn’t even see their faces. And they took Sayuri’s body away.”
I covered my mouth, breathing through my nose for several long minutes.
“We discussed a lot of things in the months I was locked in Sayuri’s room with her.
One of the most important was the safety of her baby.
I don’t know how she knew, but she guessed her fate.
Maybe I did something, maybe I pushed That Bastard to get rid of her like she was yesterday’s trash…
” I shook my head, trying to hold back my tears.
“But she made me swear that I would look after Samantha. After Sayuri’s murder, I kept my promise.
I don’t know when she became my daughter over my charge, and I don’t care. All I know is that she’s mine.
“I did everything he asked of me. I became the best wife I could be. During the day, I cooked and cleaned. When she was a baby, he kept her locked in a dog crate while he was at work. I could just barely reach her through the bars to feed her, but I had to wait until he was home to unlock the crate so I could comfort and change her. As soon as she was released from the crate, I was banished below with her. His dinner waited for him already on the table, and then I would clean up the next morning when I was released from the basement as he got ready for work. Once she was potty trained, he forced her to stay in the basement while I cooked and cleaned upstairs all day. I hated it, hated being separated from her, but she was my bargaining chip, my incentive. If I misbehaved, he wouldn’t unlock the basement so I could get to her.
“And then about six months before you showed up, Mitsuko, the other woman in the basement, died. I don’t know what happened, only that those men in white came again to get the body.
Ayame, the woman who you rescued when you came for Nishi, was his only captive for some time.
And then Nishi was brought down…and you know the rest.”