ADAM

 

I was standing under the stream of a hot shower, but I couldn’t remember how I got there. I could barely stand on my own feet because of the drowsiness the drugs were causing. Some shampoo got in my eye and it stung and I tried to push it out. I forced my eyes to open and saw someone standing next to me, rubbing their hands on my chest, and it wasn’t anyone I knew.

It was a woman. She must have been in her fifties at least, judging by the plethora of wrinkles on her face. “Mom?”

The woman looked at me with a gentle gaze. “I’m not your real mother,” she said. “But feel free to think of me as a mom substitute. My name is Angie.”

I don’t know why I said that. My mother was dead. She couldn’t possibly have been her. My own mother could never bring up such affection for me. Even though the situation was bothering me, for some reason, I wasn’t afraid of her.

“Who…” my words tailed off. I couldn’t remember what I was going to say.

“You’re probably wondering what’s going on,” she said gently. “I’ll try to explain. Marcus Troy employs me for all kinds of jobs, mostly clean up. I guess you could say, I’m a glorified maid. I was told to help you get showered and dressed.” In the current circumstances, she was the least odd thing. I felt like I was being primed for an auction.

The fever was gone. That was something. Most of the pain had also lessened. But the extreme drowsiness was still there.

After the shower, the woman took me back to the room and handed me a new pair of jeans and a red t-shirt. I stared at them for a long time.

“He’s expecting you,” Angie said. “He doesn’t like to wait.”

Of course not, I thought to myself. The man who owns everyone doesn’t like to wait. What a wonderful surprise! But I knew, she was just doing her job. I got dressed and she opened the door. I was expecting Marcus, but instead I saw another face. This one I recognized from my time with Rho. His name was Ian and he was close to Marcus, and Marcus trusted him obviously to send him for me. Unlike Angie, Ian looked at peace with his job. He grabbed my arm, and dragged me out the door without a word.

Ian was muscle Marcus used to keep him safe and do just about everything else. He wasn’t ugly exactly but rather plain looking with a face hardened by a rough life, and he was always sporting a severe look. He wasn’t old, must have been in his thirties, but his demeanor was of a much older man. I don’t think life had been kind to him. He was rude and didn’t bother hiding it. “If you don’t give me reason to hit you,” he said, when we reached the threshold of a room, “then I won’t.”

I realized then why Marcus was fond of this man. Ian enjoyed his position in the gang. He liked that Marcus let him call the shots and allowed him to be independent. Marcus wanted someone who was constantly pissing everyone off and acting like a dick in general. And Ian took the position seriously.

He placed his hand on the doorknob and pushed. He pulled me in before I could protest and locked the door from inside. We were standing in a foyer. Dimly lit and adorned with modern abstract works. The thin form of a boy in tattered clothing had been carved out of plaster, sat on top of a wood pedestal under one of the paintings; the boy’s demeanor vaguely reminiscent of a beat down Oliver Twist.

Ian led me through the hallway into the next chamber, an elegant living area fit for large entertaining or sitting comfortably around the fireplace. The view from the window showed the outdoor pool. Distressed exposed beams and hand scraped hickory wood floors, gave the place a certain rustic charm with a traditional, graceful appearance. Inlaid tile arches adorned the ceilings, and marble flooring complimented the interior, and there was a large television set in an antique vintage dark finish made shelf, next to the fireplace.

Ian pushed me a little harder, when we reached another entrance. This one was closed, but I could hear the faint sounds of people conversing coming from within. I almost resisted going further but Ian tightened his grip on my arm. “Keep walking.”

Another door opened, and we walked into an even larger room this time, another fireplace, another TV shelf, more paintings. The room looked familiar for some reason, and I couldn’t understand why, until I saw the Richter on the far wall. Everything that happened in the room that night, came back. There was a large empty bed, next to the painting, with a bedside table and designer lamps. The floor was more hardwood with a rug that covered the area under the bed and the ottoman.

To one side, there was a low coffee table, dark wood, and distressed finish, with sofas that Marcus had flown in from Europe. I saw Marcus, reclining on one of the armchairs with a drink, across from the bed which was empty. There were other people in the room, but I refused to look at them.

“Hello, Adam,” Marcus said. “Nice to see you again.” The way he said it, like everything was normal, like it was routine to force other people to do their bidding and keep them locked up.

 “Won’t kill you to say something nice,” Ian said, but Marcus raised his hand to shut him up.

“It’s okay,” Marcus said, and stood and walked up to me. “He’s angry, I understand.” He ran his fingers over my cheek. “He will warm up to me. I know.” He took hold of my hand. “I have a surprise for you Adam,” he said, and his expression was of a child who just received his new favorite toy. It was obvious he was playing one of his games. Games that would leave me worse off than before. That would end in more pain and misery. More torture.

“Adam, meet my friends,” he said, and pushed me in the direction of the other sofa on which his friends sat, the same ones I’d tried to ignore. I lifted my head to see their faces. There were two of them. One guy was grinning wildly, with a cigar in hand, and a ridiculously perverted look on his face. “Hi, Adam,” the man said, and Marcus stood behind me and nuzzled my neck. “That’s Henry Witton. I’m sure you’ve heard about him; the Congressman needs no introduction.”

Words seemed stuck in my throat. I had this sinking feeling—something bad was about to happen.

Marcus turned me a little to meet the second man. “And of course, you recognize Mr. Krakovski.” At first, the name meant nothing, it didn’t even register. It had been a while since I’d heard that name being repeated because the man it belonged to, was my legal guardian, thanks to my mother.

His face was the first thing I saw. He seemed to have grown larger in the past year I hadn’t seen him. I remembered the last thing he said to me before I tried to kill myself. Wherever you go, I will find you. The world is not a big enough place to hide from Sergei Krakovski. And then his men beat me up on his orders.

I couldn’t run. I didn’t even bother trying. Sergei wasn’t smiling. I knew what that look meant. I saw it frequently when I was growing up. I knew it meant his belt was coming off. I knew it meant I would be in bed for days, crying in agony, lying about it to Marcelo, not being able to tell anyone what really happened.

Sergei downed his drink, and grimaced. “Hello, Adam.”

Marcus let go of me. “I believe the two of you have a lot to discuss,” he said, and joined Sergei and Witton on the sofa. Sergei was still glowering at me. And then, he stood.

“You know how much time I spent looking for you, after you disappeared?” Sergei said, walking up to me. “You cost me money, and after all I did for you and your whore mother, that’s the thanks I get?” He almost looked hurt. “I would have taken care of you. I offered you my heart, a place in my family, and all the good things money can buy, and you ran! Like a fucking traitor. You betrayed me.”

There was no point trying to get him to understand. Everything felt meaningless. His heavy fist landed on my face, and his ring cut the skin on my cheek. I stood there, waiting for him to unleash his worst. I knew it was coming. You live with someone for all those years and you notice their routines.

“Traitors deserve to be punished, Sergei.” It was Marcus. “You wanted him. I gave him to you. For tonight, he’s all yours. Do with him as you please.” I didn’t know what I was supposed to think. It hurt that Marcus hurt me, and tore me away from Rho, but it hurt even worse now, when he gave me up to Sergei. It was almost as if they wanted me to feel devastated. They wanted me to confront the worst form of loneliness. “Thought you were in love with me, Marcus. Now, you’re selling me off to him?”

I don’t know why I was still expecting him to stand up for me, or save me. It was obvious everything he said was a lie. He didn’t love me. He wanted to have me. He didn’t want my soul. My body was the only thing of value to him. I never got an answer from Marcus, but Sergei hit me again. This time the blow cut my lip. I was angry. I wanted to give them a taste of their own medicine, I wanted them to suffer, but I knew it was an absurd thought. “It’s about loyalty,” Sergei said, when he was done hitting me. “Marcus and I are brothers now. Do you understand?”

And what about loyalty to me, I wanted to ask but I was weary. I didn’t want to get hit in the face again. So, I stayed silent. Sergei looked at me, but he was talking to Marcus. “Your generosity will not be forgotten, Marcus. I give you my word.”

Trading me off like a piece of furniture. Here, I’m done playing with him, why don’t you take him tonight? This is what I had been running away from, this was why I left home, why I wanted to stay hidden. This was the reason, I tried to kill myself. Because I knew I would end up here somehow, and I still did, despite all that, I was trapped. Perhaps, I shouldn’t have bothered. Some things in life you can’t get away from. You can’t outrun fate. Your feet can try but you’ll still be in the universe’s version of a hamster wheel. Running, but not getting anywhere.

Sergei stood behind me. “You shouldn’t have tried to run,” he said, in a low voice, that only I could hear. I had fantasies about this man. Every time the lack of a father bothered me, and kept me from sleeping at night, I would dream about Sergei. I would make up imaginary conversations with him that ended in him telling me I was his son all along, he kept it from me because an alien race was after us and they would have abducted his real offspring. When I said Father, the man I pictured was Sergei. I didn’t even know my own father, I didn’t know what a father was supposed to be, until Sergei taught me. I don’t think Sergei ever realized the extent of betrayal I felt from him; or how much it hurt deep down. I wanted to end my life because of it. None of it made any difference.

And to tell you the truth, it would have been easier if he was a monster. If I didn’t remember his kindness, I wouldn’t have latched on to him. If we hadn’t had those conversations about baseball and new flavors of ice cream, and if I hadn’t caught him crying every time my mother was mean to me and couldn’t hide her resentment. I don’t know when he became this person? When he stopped being a father and started thinking about things I couldn’t bear to think of, even now? I kept waiting for him to have an epiphany. Or maybe he didn’t change so much as give in to his primal nature. Or maybe he had always been this way, and I hadn’t noticed because I was too wrapped up in fantasy to see the real world. Did that make me a coward like my mother? Finding solace in make-believe? Never having to face the truth.

Sergei grabbed my shoulder, and pushed me to the coffee table, where the two men were still sitting. “I think the Congressman has been waiting long enough,” he said. “Go on, Adam. Why don’t you show him a good time?”

I turned to Sergei, not certain what I was hoping for. “Sergei, you have me, right? You want an apology, you want me to beg, I’ll do whatever you want, please don’t send me to some stranger! Please, I’m begging you!”

I started to cry. For a moment, I saw that same flicker in Sergei’s eyes, the sympathy, the pity, the need to right the wrong. But the next minute, that flicker was gone. “You hurt me, Adam.”

I fell to my knees in front of him. “Please, Sergei! Just take me back, I’ll go with you, wherever you want me to go, just please don’t do this!”

I don’t know what he was thinking, but he grabbed my hair and pulled me up. “Those dreams are over,” he said. “Now, I just want payback. I want to see you become a whore, and I don’t care what it does to you! I’m suffering too, you know that, right? But you’ve hurt me too much for me to forget.” He paused. “I never wanted it to come to this, I wanted to protect you.”

I felt like someone was taking me apart, bit by bit.

Soon there would be nothing left of me to prey on.

Sergei pushed me to the man again, Witton and he had a disgusting look on his face. Witton grabbed my arm and pulled me to him. “On your knees, now.”

Marcus laughed. “Don’t be shy, Adam, we’re all friends here.”

I lowered myself to the floor, in front of Witton. “That’s a pretty mouth you got there,” he said. “I wonder what it looks like around my cock.” He gestured to his crotch. “Take it out and show me what you can do.”

When I didn’t move, Sergei was quick to remind me. “Adam, you really don’t want me to intervene.”

I couldn’t bear to look in Witton’s eyes. I couldn’t stop thinking about the people in that room who were all watching me now, including Ian. I imagined his smug grin and the crude look on his face. I gingerly used my fingers to unbutton Witton’s pants and then lowered the zipper.  But I couldn’t go through with it. I couldn’t make myself do the things they wanted me to do. If they wanted to torture me, they would have to find a way—

My head was yanked back painfully being seized by a tightened fist, and the grip felt like it would rip the hair out of my scalp. Witton scowled at me. “Do it, boy. Or you’ll really suffer this time.”

“Stop wasting our time,” Sergei said. “I’m getting tired of your bullshit.”

I knew I couldn’t stop them. I knew my fate rested in the hands of those men. I knew whatever happened tonight, nothing would ever be the same again. I knew I was looking at another defeat. That they will get what they wanted. And yet, that tiny bit of hope held strong inside me, making me resistant.

They weren’t happy about it. I felt their anger like a burst of negative energy in the room. They saw my resistance as an act of rebellion.

“He’s always been stubborn,” Sergei said. “Even as a kid, he would do things on purpose to piss me off.” I felt him next to me, saw his profile. “We had a ritual, didn’t we, Adam?”

I thought back to the times he used his authority to make sure I was compliant. All the times he used force to control me. My mother must have known. He used to make me scream. Sometimes the neighbors would come and try to save me, but my own mother pretended like it wasn’t happening. Or maybe Sergei merely did what she was too chicken to do to the son with the eyes of a monster. Sergei was powerful. Everyone knew getting involved in his business was a losing battle. No one was willing to risk their lives or of their own children to save me. Even if they did, they wouldn’t win. My mother always considered that kind of power a good thing. She was always in awe of Sergei. Of his rank and reputation as a man who couldn’t be taken down. But I resented him, even in those days. Even when he was no more than an abusive father, because I saw his darkness. Every time he took me to the basement, and locked me up until I came to my senses, or even when he was itching to take out his frustration. I was always the target of his anger.

Sergei grabbed my arm and pulled me up. “I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time,” he said, and pushed me toward the wall. I stood there, numb, while he fumbled with his belt and it came off. Suddenly, something inside me snapped. I wasn’t Adam, I was a child about to receive another thrashing for speaking loudly in the house. For ‘not respecting’ the rules. Or some other made-up crime. Something inside me said, stop cowering, stop fucking letting them win.

I looked up at Sergei, unfazed. “You’re never going to make me agree to this,” I said, and for that one moment felt powerful. “I’m not going to be your whore.”

Sergei laughed. “That’s where you’re wrong, boy,” he started stalking up to me, the belt swinging from one hand. “You are whatever I want you to be.”