That I would follow his demands.
That I wouldn’t fight back.
But even I could only take so much pain.
Until I broke.
And I was fucking shattered.
When his teeth gnawed into my shoulder, the bite so extreme that flashes of light shot through my eyes, and his nails gripped my thigh like cobra fangs, I screamed.
At the top of my lungs.
And then I shouted, “STOP!”
I pushed him away, hurling my body to the farthest cement wall.
His deathly eyes stared at me as my chest pounded, as the blood dripped down my arm. In the filmy, bile-colored light that hung from the ceiling, I could already see the bruises forming on my thigh.
Dark red drips fell off my hand onto the wide-strapped white dress.
I swore I saw steam coming from his mouth.
“You naughty fucking doll.”
I shook my head, swallowing. “I can’t,” I gasped. “I just can’t anymore.”
I needed someone to hug me.
To make him stop hurting me.
To take me out of this basement.
“You’re going to regret this.” He wiped his mouth with his arm, the curly hairs scraping across his facial scruff, making the most dreadful sound. “You just really fucked up.”
His belt rattled, echoing through the room. His breath came out in huffs.
“Have you ever been punished before, Kerry?”
“Isn’t that what this is? Day after day of nothing but punishments?”
I knew I should have kept my mouth shut, but I was already in trouble.
It couldn’t possibly get worse.
He laughed.
It was a cackle that dragged out, extending for several beats.
Like I was on a comedy stage, having delivered the funniest joke he’d ever heard.
The second he quieted, I used all the strength I had left to add, “Fuck you.”
The pain trumped my conscience.
I was done.
I couldn’t take another violation.
The isolation.
The abuse.
The threat that I’d be here for the rest of my life.
Hope was the sun rising each morning. But when you were in a basement with no windows, there was only darkness with no end.
If he wasn’t going to give me an end, then I was going to make one for myself.
“Kerry …” He pushed his glasses high on his nose. “Oh, fucking Kerry.” He rubbed his hands together, like he was washing them with soap. “You are one stupid doll.”
His size didn’t allow him to move fast, so each step added to the buildup.
I stared at his hands, waiting for what they were going to reach for first.
They came forward, and I tried to lean to the side, but there was nowhere to escape.
He grabbed me but not skin or muscle, like I’d anticipated. He gripped the wide straps of the white dress and pulled so hard that it ripped off me.
“You don’t deserve to be taken care of like a good doll.”
I sat, naked, on the floor, hugging my knees.
He held the dress to his face, smelling it. Rubbing the fabric across his rough bristles. “Do you know what happens with dolls I no longer want to play with?” He laughed again, a warning, as though I was about to find out.
But there couldn’t be anything worse than what I’d already gone through.
I couldn’t be hungrier than I was now.
I couldn’t be more battered and bruised.
He took my clothes off the floor and carried them up the stairs, watching me the entire time until he disappeared at the top.
The latch clicked, and one, two, three padlocks followed.
And then the single light that hung in the ceiling turned off.
Filling the room with pitch darkness.
I shivered, running my hands over my arms, feeling the dampness from the blood.
The lack of light made the room feel even colder than normal.
The only things down here to warm me were the cot and Beverly.
With no glow, I couldn’t see her, but I knew she wasn’t far.
I pushed myself down the wall, the grit and sand scratching the skin on my butt. I moved slowly, reaching into the blackness, feeling for her cotton or yarn, clasping the second I touched one.
“Beverly,” I cried. “Hold me.” I set her arms on my shoulders, squeezing her against my chest.
She wasn’t hugging me with the strength I needed.
She wasn’t telling me it was going to be okay.
My shoulder was aching; my thigh was throbbing.
“Oh God, Beverly.” I held the back of her head. “Tell me I’m going to be all right.”
Tears were wetting her hair, my sobs sending tremors through her body.
“Beverly!”
I just needed her voice. I needed her to talk to me. I needed something other than nothing.
I pulled her off me and shook her in the air, trying to wake her up. “Bev—” I started, but a sound cut me off.
A voice.
One that was familiar.
Because I’d heard it once before.
I’d thought it was Beverly’s, but there was no way it could have been hers; it had come from the other side of the wall.
I pressed my ear against the cement.
I listened.
And I heard, “I’m here,” followed by, “Don’t worry, Kerry. He’ll forgive you.”
Forty-Three
Before
Pearl
As my eyes opened, my back slowly lifting off the floor, I could feel the audience staring at me. I could almost hear their long intake of breath, holding the air in their lungs, waiting to see if this final act was a retelling of Romeo and Juliet or if this was our own spin—an ending that wasn’t going to result in my death.
It was a fair question.
Our director had certainly modernized the tale from the set design to the clothing. He’d made changes to the original script to keep the audience guessing.
I’d rehearsed this part hundreds of times onstage and in our apartment, even when I was at Ashe’s.
The setting was Romeo’s home, the floor of his bedroom, a bed behind me that we’d endlessly made love in. As I leaned up from the carpet, he was next to me, our arms still stretched toward each other, our fingers almost touching. From my position, the lack of movement in his chest told me he wasn’t breathing. I pulled myself closer, placing my cheek there, listening.
No sound.
No rise and fall.
When my ear went to his nose and then his mouth, there was no intake of breath.
“No!” Tears streamed down my face, and I tasted them on my lips when I shouted, “Nooo,” again. I pounded his chest with my fists, begging air to move through his lungs. Sobs came out in bursts, each quiver causing more gasps. “Please.” I lifted his head, holding his face in my arms, kissing each part of it. “Please.” I swallowed, the spit becoming too thick for my words to sound clear. “I need you.”
I’d practiced ways to make the lines sound authentic, to make the emotion appear real. But all I had to do was think of Ashe, the way it would feel if he were taken from me, and the tears naturally fell, the idea of him suddenly being gone from my life causing tremors to shake my entire body.
I curled into the crook of his arm, resting my face on the spot where I always cuddled Ashe—the home I had built on my boyfriend’s chest—and gripped his shirt in my palm. “No, Romeo!” I wailed. The sobs made my voice convulse, pain etched deep in my face. “I-I can’t l-live without y-you.”