9. Colton
NINE
COLTON
I know I’m alive because there are fleeting moments of awareness, seconds of rational thought, instances of sanity. There’s a deeply hidden corner of my brain that is Colton, alert and aware.
But the rest of me ain’t so lucky.
“Stop,” I manage to call out, though the voice that speaks the word is so unlike mine, I almost wonder if I’m not alone. It’s raspier but also weaker, belonging to a man who cannot protect himself, a man who would beg for his life.
That’s not me. That’s not what’s going on.
Turning onto my side, my eyes are open but it’s dark. Despite the lack of natural light, I know my vision is fuzzy. With my hands tucked beneath my head, I slip one out and attempt to focus on it, but I can’t even tell if I still have gloves on or not. I let my eye fall shut, realizing only one opened. I run my fingers over the eye that didn’t open and find it swollen and sore. Just the light touch has my stomach tensing, the rest of my body bearing that same deep ache.
The doorknob at the top of the stairs twists, but I don’t move because my brain has been playing tricks on me. I thought I heard the door a hundred times before now, and the effort to be ready for whoever is up there isn’t worth the gamble of a false alarm.
I woke two days ago and found a small plate of food. A sandwich, but I couldn’t tell what was in it. I ate it in the dark with filthy hands while I shivered and shook, the noise of my chains clinking the concrete my only company. There was an apple, and I could tell it was fresh from the orchard. I ate that, and I sipped a mug of what I think was soup but could’ve easily just been bone broth. A day after that, I woke to a bowl of soup and a thick chunk of bread, which I devoured in a matter of minutes. Yet despite being fed the last two days, I’ve never felt so weak. My body doesn’t want to work. The scariest part is that my brain doesn’t seem to mind, either.
With my eyes squeezed closed and my body racked with bone-deep fatigue, I try to count the days I’ve been down here and wonder if the police have even come by the Conway property. Nash and Carsyn likely called right away, telling them just where I went and why I was going.
The fact there hasn’t been a rescue tells me what I need to know: the Buffalo Trails police department isn't coming.
Six days. That’s how long I think it’s been. Maybe seven.
Forrest was down here yesterday, telling me I had a chance of a lifetime if I’d quit being such a pussy. I know he was there, he wasn’t some evil figment of my imagination either, because he brought his ugly face close to mine when I refused to reply. I’d recognize the stench of monster anywhere. He threatened me that if I didn’t join in his efforts, he’d have to kill me. But until he could do that, he’d hold me and torture me.
As if I hadn’t worked that out already.
He told me he’d be back today, but because it’s dark and I can’t seem to muster the energy to lift my head, I can’t see him. Despite the fact I haven’t had nearly enough food to keep all six feet five inches and two hundred twenty pounds of me sustained, I’ve had enough that I shouldn’t be so goddamn weak.
I should be up, trying to tear the metal guardrail from the wall, trying to take the steel-framed bed apart—I should be trying to do something to make a tool, craft a shiv, anything that can help me get out of here or attack Forrest.
But… I can’t.
As of now, opening my eyes feels like a challenge. And very quickly, even thinking does too. So instead of Forrest’s human trafficking operation, my kid sister waiting for me just a few miles away, the state of my father’s ranch, my family name on the line—instead of worrying about any of that, I keep my good eye closed and grow comfortable and safe in a cozy fantasy.
Even in my reduced mental capacity, I know it’s a fantasy, yet it feels a lot like an old memory of a former life, safe and beautiful, with an edge of sadness, too.
Still, I happily go there.
I’m on my horse, Murphy, the same mare I rode from age eleven to seventeen. Her mane dances in the breeze as her powerful body mechanizes beneath me, each lengthy stride controlled and powerful. At my belly, Kinleigh’s small hands are locked together, her breasts pressed firmly to my back.
With her lips tickling the bottom of my earlobe, she whispers, “Let’s make dandelion chains in the grass.”
Excitement spreads through my shoulders in electric little pops as I tug the rein, leading Murphy to our favorite pasture behind her dad’s place. Once we’re there, I hop off and help her down, despite the fact that she’s a farm girl and doesn’t need my help.
Her hands stroke up my chest, and I notice her hands are aged now, too. Tipping my hat back, I take a look at her face, and see Kinleigh Conway as a twenty-six-year-old.
I haven’t seen her since she was sixteen, but in this dream, she’s all grown up, here with me, on the land where we fell in love. Her hair is fuller and longer, and she’s grown into womanhood beautifully, full curves and ample softness causing the crotch of my denim to tighten.
Is this what she looks like now? Did my brain render a version of Kinleigh? My arms move against the cot, the shackle clanking against the bed frame as I blindly reach into the darkness, wanting to discover that this dream is blending with reality, and that all grown-up Kinleigh is here, in the cellar, saving me. Loving me.
Except, she stays there, her hands on my chest, a pink-lipped grin on her face filling my concave, depleted chest with hope and light. I smile back, and she rocks to her toes, pressing her soft mouth to mine.
“Before we pick dandelions,” she whispers against my lips, my body so comfortable it almost hurts, because I know I’m only conjuring this up in my head. “There’s something I want to show you.”
I nod, and then her horse is there, the same horse she rode to my place at least a hundred times over the years. I can’t imagine that horse is still alive today, but in my delirium, I smile at the sight of my girl saddling up her wild mare.
Time elapses, I suppose, because logically I know the ride through the pasture back to my place, which is where we’re heading, is nearly ten minutes. But just moments later, our horses have stopped and without getting off of them, we’re standing hand in hand between them, staring at the massive structure in front of us.
“Where’d my house go?” I ask, remembering my childhood home looking much different. I was just there a few days ago and though it had been years since I was there, it all looked the same.
But this isn’t a ranchette built in the 70s with an easy sunset as a backdrop. This is a place I’ve never seen before. Completely new.
I point at the potted begonia near the porch steps. It’s the same plant, same fuzzy pink flowers, same aged terracotta with an ominous crack down the center where the pot slipped from Mom’s hands years ago.
“That’s Mom’s begonia,” I tell Kinleigh, I suppose to make the argument that we’re in the same location where my home once was.
But when I twist to face her, her eyes are wide, glistening, and full of joy.
“It’s the only thing we saved.”
I look back at the structure, which is so big it looks like two houses instead of one. Three stories high, the home has more windows than I’ve ever seen, all giving way to nothing inside as they’re covered in white shutters. This house bears the same wraparound porch that most ranchettes possess, but it’s one unlike I’ve ever seen. The wood planks are finished, polished and shining, and beneath the row of tall-backed rocking chairs is a nice rug. There are potted plants and stacks of books, a sweating pitcher of iced tea with ornate glasses stacked beside it. My eyes veer to the corner of the porch, where a puppy sits in a bed, chewing on a piece of rawhide. The red lacquer front door glints in the sun and I bring a hand above my eyes to shield myself from the vibrant shine. Near the door is a small sign, a small chalk sketch of a dandelion with Kinleigh’s handwriting beneath scrawling the word Welcome.
“We did it.” She smiles up at me, and though I’m taking in this massive property that looks like a dream, I feel her eyes on me and she tugs at my arm, attempting to drag me toward the place. “Come on,” she whispers, skipping out in front of me a few paces, casting a toothy smile over her shoulder, honey hair a mess in the wind.
I reach for her hand but then she’s gone.
The house is gone.
It’s all gone as darkness envelops me once again.