Here's part 10. Next one might not come till next year. Depends. Thanks Kris for editing! Enjoy.
Feedback to rock_on _summer@yahoo.com -- good makes me happy -- bad makes me better.
Liddy
Disclaimer: I wrote this, don't copy it unless you ask. This is fiction. Ifthere are people who are similar to people in the story or have the samename, I didn't intend it. Beware, teen sex, gay sex! Don't like that don'tenter, you have been warned.
I was still shell shocked by the recent call and while part of me wanted to do what the kidnapper wanted, like a good boy scout thinking he is safe from harm as long as he follows the rules, my more rebellious instincts screamed that I couldn't trust the guy to keep up his part of the pact even if I fulfilled mine -- not that I even knew how to do that yet. Another problem -- or the solution to it all - was standing in front of me right now, chewing on a raw carrot.
"Where's your lover?" Eddie asked, breaking the carrot into half with a loud snap, stuffing half of it into his mouth. I just stared up at him. Would he even be able to help? He was smart and strong and he had strong nerves. A lot stronger then mine.
"Lucy?" he looked closer at my face, pretending to knock at my forehead "Anybody home?"
I shook myself.
"What?" I asked distracted by another snap of the carrot.
"Your man? Where is he?" he asked again, giving me a skeptical look.
"Ehm, at work?" I lied uncertainly while Eddie finished off the carrot and started digging around in our fridge for a cold beer.
"When's he coming back?" he asked, opening the can with a loud pop. Neither Case nor I drank beer very often, we kept it in there just for Eddie.
"I don't know! What's with the questions?" I snapped. For the first time ever I wanted Eddie out of my house.
"Gee, is it that time of the month already?" he asked, then stepped closer and put his hand on my shoulder and looked me in the eye. "Are you guys fighting again?" he asked seriously and very gently. I was on the verge of flinging myself into his strong arms and begging him to make it all go away like in a very cheap, very cheesy 50s movie -- but then again, I wasn't that much of a girl. What to do? Ask Eddie? Strong, smart and resourceful Eddie for help and risk Casey getting hurt? Or sit it out? I felt like a deer in the headlights. Run or stay? Except for this was not just about me.
"Eddie" I whispered "Help me" Just then the phone rang and I picked up immediately.
All I heard was heaving, followed by a pained squeal that tugged at my heart.
"Don't you forget your promise" I heard the creep say, then he disconnected.
"What's wrong?" Eddie asked.
"I need you to leave, please" I pleaded.
"Why? What's wrong?"
"I've got to go and pick something up. So you've got to leave, too" I told him.
"You just asked me to help you, Lucy, what's wrong, please tell me how I can help!" he argued.
"You can't. Trust me. It's better if you leave now. Sorry. Bye" and I basically shoved him out the door, beer can still in his hand, puzzled look on his face. Of course I knew I wouldn't get rid of him this easily. The couple of seconds behind the closed door gave me not enough time to compose myself but if I wanted Case to be ok I had to be convincing now. He knocked on the door and I opened.
"Please Eddie. I love you, but right now there is nothing you can do for me but leave. We'll be fine. Can you just come back tomorrow and then everything will be back to normal? Ok?" Yeah right, back to normal. Case was either going to end up in a dumpster or back home. But either way I would never forget this.
"What? No way! You need my help, I'll camp in front of your door until you tell me what you need help with! It's that simple" he said matter of factly and didn't budge one inch.
Great. I started mentally kicking myself. Ok. How could I fix this? When everything fails -- lie. I took a deep breath and tried to look ashamed.
"Its not...well...Case is actually. Yes we had a little fight, but he just called and said he had a surprise for me when he got home so...you know you're always welcome here but sometimes, you know especially after we fight and I'm hoping we'll make up soon... we'll just need some privacy?" I said as I tried my best to look ashamed. Which I was, I was lying to my friend after all.
"Oh" he said, a big understanding grin on his face. He arranged my curls, petted my cheek and straightened the collar of my shirt before unwrinkeling my sleeves "now that I understand. You look great, Lucy."
I gave him an eye roll.
"And don't worry. You guys will pull through. You always do. He loves you. Even though he's as cold as a fish sometimes and probably never tells you" I rolled my eyes to that. And my memory shifted to the times Casey had told me he loved me. Anxiety crept up in my chest and made my throat feel dry. It was hard to swallow all the sudden and my eyeballs felt like they were under hot pressure.
Eddie gave me a brief but firm hug, rubbed my cheek warmly and gave me a look that said more then thousand words. That he felt for me, was positive that everything was going to be ok and that he wished I'd be happier soon. I wished I could have had the same calm about myself. Then he got into his car and left.
I breathed a sigh of relief and desperation. Just then the phone ran again, making me jump. I hesitantly picked up.
"Yes?" I asked, my own voice sounding fragile and far away to me.
"Good boy" Mr. Creep told me.
"Tell me what you want" I pleaded.
"Go and buy colours. Gold and blue and light brown. Some baby pink. Acrylic colours. And canvas."
"I have all those things."
I heard the flick of a lighter, a hiss and I heard Case howl in pain and a very loud
"CRAP!" -- trust Case to remember his good manners while being kidnapped by a psycho weirdo! I felt that "crap" sometimes just doesn't cut it.
"Don't talk unless I ask you to. Just a little reminder. I want you to buy new ones for me. Go. Now. I'll be watching you" and he hung up.
Fuck!
I raced to the closest art supply store (which is about 45 minutes away) and bought new colours, oil, canvas, everything. I couldn't shake the knowledge that every minute of my trip made Case's time as a prisoner a minute longer. I used my time in the car to come up with a wonderful heroic plot to save Case. Epic fail. I just thought of a lot of ways he could be killed, burned, cut, bled or shot to death. The severity of the situation gripped me when I came back to our house and he still wasn't there. It was already dark outside when walked through the front door and I wanted nothing more then to see him sitting on the couch, laughing at me. Or maybe walk into a room full of people that all yelled "surprise!" And started celebrating my birthday. Wait. It wasn't my birthday, was it? I called my mom to make sure.
"No honey, it's not your birthday. Are you confused? Have you been drinking?" she asked.
"No mom. Just had a couple of surprises. That's why."
I wanted to tell her right then and there. The signal that somebody was on the other line brought me back to reality.
"Mom, somebody's trying to call. I'll talk to you later ok?"
"Sure you will honey."
With that I switched to the other line.
"Hello!?"
"I just want you to know that I'm listening in on your phone conversations. Be good."
Creepy. There was just no getting away from this guy. I banged my head against the steering wheel and then grabbed my bags to head inside.
I immediately noticed that someone had been here. The house smelled sweet, like basement and soil. My canvas and frame had been moved. I walked a couple of steps into the living room when I noticed that someone was sitting on my couch. I froze in spot. This was not Case. My cell phone rang.
"Yes!?" I answered, eager to hear news about Case but not wanting to step closer to the unmoving small frame that was sitting in the dark of the living room either.
"Walk to the couch."
I really didn't want to. I walked further into the living room, not able to keep my eyes of the stranger on the couch but not able to recognize much in the dark either.
"Turn on the light next to her."
So it was a woman. For some reason that calmed me a little. I was small and light but confident that I could defend myself against an attack coming from a girl. I was right in front of her now and I noticed some strange sounds coming from her. Not like impaired breathing but something like...wetness, slimy movement, like in a bad alien movie.
To turn on the light I had to slightly lean over her, which I really didn't want to do. Each of my movements seemed augmented and only when her hair scraped my cheek it suddenly startled me back into motion. Reaching over quickly, flipping the switch and instinctively jumping back to a safe distance.
She never moved, just stared at me with pale blue eyes, like blind mirrors, her pale red mouth though closed, forming a slight o. She was just a little girl, about 10 years old. Her pale face was framed by a bunch of blond curls and in a bizarre way she fit my imagination of Alice in Wonderland. She was wearing a white gown, decorated like a wedding dress or a the garment that children wear when they are being baptised.
"Step closer" the creepy voice urged.
I could feel my breathing go faster. I didn't want to step closer to her. Step by step my legs brought me closer to the couch, so that my eyes could see and my brain would start to comprehend what was sitting there on the couch in front of me. Her face would have been pretty had it not been for the dark spots of rotten flesh on her pale face, the sunken eyes, the rigid posture of death. I could now make out the source of the strange sticky sounds as I was looking at the white maggots crawling out of her cheek. She probably had smelled a hundred times better in life, I imagined, baby powder and roses, not rot, soil and decay.
I started breathing through my mouth to avoid catching another whiff. Somewhere I had read that smelling means you breathe in small amounts of the source of smell. The thought had me holding my breath, not wanting to have particles of corpse in my mouth. I imagined them going through my nose into my throat and sitting in my lungs, festering in my blood, poisoning me, turning me into a stiff doll from a horror movie. Like her. It struck me that we would look quite similar, blond curly haired, slight frame, pale skin. The thought of anybody seeing me dead embarrassed me, like people seeing me naked and I wondered what Case would look like in his after life. A pale beauty with worms eating him up?
"I want you to paint her."
"Oh my god!" It escaped my lips before I could help myself. For those words my mom would have slapped me upside the head. I had instructions not to talk but I was standing in my living room with a dead girl that a crazy kidnapper wanted to turn into an arts project. I couldn't have known what that little slip up would cost Case. I heard a loud scream on the phone. Then nothing. He had hung up.
I feverishly started pulling out paint, canvas and brushes and tried to focus. Focus on the empty pale eyes, the ashen hair and transparent lashes, the maggots crawling out of her cheek.
I started to paint with shaky hands, but the unruly hair that once must have been of a shiny golden coulor looked ashen on my canvas. The face empty, no light shimmered in the eyes that I had just painted. I looked at what I had accomplished so far and shook my head. It looked exactly like what it was. A dead girl on a couch.
It seemed that I lost all my ability to paint anything. I tried to go back to the basics. What had I learned in art class? Still live, a bottle, a pear. Something like that. So I started.
The perspective was all wrong. My bottle looked like it was square, the colours were off, there was no expression. I love painting glass. I love how I can let the light break and make it look like jewellery, clean and serene. I tried to focus. I tried to paint a glass that Case had left out on the counter the night before - had it been not even a day since he was gone? -- but instead of sparkling crystal all I could focus on was the smudges of his lip prints around the rim.
I sat there, staring at the blank screen. My phone rang.
"You are done" the voice stated.
"No, I'm...it's not done" I said.
"But you stopped and you painted something. Several paintings" the voice stated again. I looked at what I had accomplished so far, broken glass, a smudgy pear and one single painting of a dead girl that was sitting not even 2 meters away from me.
"I did, but it's not what you want" I said.
"I will be the judge of that. Leave the house" he ordered me.
"Where should I go?" I asked, confused. How was this going to work? He was going to come to my house to pick up the painting. He was not going to like it. Then he would go back to Case and hurt him. Or would he bring Case with him? Kill him in his own house?
"I do not care. Leave" he sounded impatient and I sensed my chance. I could go wherever I wanted to. I could get help. Somehow. I looked up at the ceiling, feeling new hope and there it was. The red dot glowing in the dark, installed in an angle that I couldn't have noticed before. The guy had installed a camera in my home. Very small, but the red dot gave it away. I was sure that this was not the only one and I was sure that he accessed it through a wireless connection. Which meant it could be traced. Somehow.
With a last look at the girl I turned around to leave the house. I didn't have a computer nor the knowledge to trace the stream to the camera. I got into the car staring at the wheel, not really knowing where to drive. He probably had a tracking device on my car, or with a look at the GPS-System he could just trace the computer -- I mean he could listen into my cell phone conversations, why not this, right?
With a sudden epiphany I turned the key to start the engine. The cell phone! Of course! Why hadn't I thought of this before? Case's cell phone had GPS, like most modern cell phones and it could be traced by the phone company if it was lost. The "creep" had used Case's cell phone. If I could locate it I could get to Case. Somehow this seemed too easy. I whizzed down to the next phone store.
Locating a phone was easier then I thought. I claimed to have lost the phone, provided the number and got the coords. How convenient that there was an internet cafe next door and I made out the location of the cell phone only 10 minutes from my house. The creepy thing was, it was at a cemetery.