Chapter 37
Hollow banging came from another room.
Adriana slowly opened her eyes to the harsh ceiling lights.
From another room, Cindy’s strangled cry grew into raw wailing, then a barely audible whimper. “The darkness. Please let me out.”
Adriana wondered how long she had been out before slipping back into painful consciousness.
The skin on her arms and legs felt hard from dried paint. Her shivering body tried to break free of this brittle hold, her stomach ached for food, her mouth was cotton dry, her panties and skirt were soaked, and she was tired.
Cindy screamed hoarsely, “It’s dark!”
Mary was trying to turn her daughter. Adriana gritted her teeth, and if her wrists weren’t so sore, she would have tried slipping out of her binds again. She didn’t have many friends, and the few she had, she valued. Cindy wasn’t like most other kids. She had never teased Adriana before. In fact, Cindy never made fun of anyone. The spray-paint incident wasn’t like her at all.
Why did her mother need to turn her against Adriana of all people? Mary had custody of Cindy again. Why couldn’t Cindy and Adriana still be friends?
Despite aching and stinging wrists, she yanked on her binds.
“Things are crawling on me,” Cindy shrieked like a chicken being plucked. “I can feel them.”
Adriana was so upset that she screamed. She kept it short though because she didn’t want Mary to return and lock her away where she would be good to no one.
She looked around the room, searching for something that could free her. The knives were ten feet away on the kitchen counter. Her binds were rope. But the only way she could reach a knife was if there were an earthquake and one slid or bounced over to her.
To her left was the side of a cabinet. She couldn’t see the top. She got her leg under her and pushed herself up, sliding up the poll against her back. On the countertop were crumpled papers, bread crumbs, and a line of black ants.
She wished she were an ant. Then she could crawl right out of her binds.
Several feet in front of her, the cushiony booth seat almost circled a small tabletop. Nothing there could cut through rope.
How was she going to free herself? She had to, not just for her sake but for Cindy’s as well. Cindy’s parents were crazy. No wonder the girl ran away after she was returned to them.
Adriana didn’t understand the difficulty some parents had of treating their children nicely. What was so hard about being kind? Parents were supposed to love because children needed that. Parents should know better. She wished the government made people pass exams and classes and get licensed before becoming a parent.
She let herself slide back down the poll to the carpeted floor, which made a squishing noise as she sat in her pee. It made her disgusted with herself.
Cindy’s whimpers and cries rose, and it was too much.
If Adriana could plug her ears, she would have. But she was forced to hear, as though this were Mary and Joe’s master plan of torture.
It wasn’t just that they didn’t know how to love. It was that they actively tried to destroy love, going out of their way to damage and break people. Who spends the energy to do that? Why would somebody want that? If they didn’t know how to love, wouldn’t they rather just sit on the couch and watch TV, or play videogames, or ride roller coasters all day, or lay on a beautiful beach soaking up the sun? Why would they have a child, and then think of ways to make her and her friend suffer?
“Please, Mommy. I won’t be bad anymore,” Cindy cried with defeat drowning her voice.
Adriana thought it strange that of all people, Cindy wanted her mother now, but Adriana found herself wanting Mary too. She needed Mary to come back, feed her, give her water, dry herself, give her a jacket, and take these damn ropes off.
She shouted to her friend, “Hang in there, girl!”
A whimper was all that answered.
She tilted her head back. Maybe smarter thoughts would come with her head this way. The pole rose into the ceiling of the mobile home. Behind and above her, a picture hung on the wall of a dead cow in a green pasture with black flies crawling on it. The picture was in a wooden frame and protected by glass. What kind of sick people would want to look at a dead cow with flies eating it?
She hated being tied. It reminded her of being handicapped. In a sense she was tied in her life, not free to do things other children could. She pulled on the rope with all her might, but it was no use.
Her friend was quiet now.
This scared her more than anything else. Cindy may have given in, her spirit crushed by her parents again. How many times could a spirit be crushed before dying?