Morgan
Drip, drip, drip.
The sound of water droplets that ting against metal, have my eyelashes fluttering open as I lay outstretched on my back. The sound of a newborn infant crying, dances around my throbbing head.
Where am I? Whose baby is that?
“It’s a boy. Morgan, we have a son, I have a son.” Reid is sobbing and laughing at the same time.
“Reid,” I choke out through a thick throat as I stare at a blurred white panel.
"Mummy, mummy, did you see me twirl?" Aleeha’s happiness echoes around me.
"I think you are the prettiest ballerina." I can hear my voice, but I’m not speaking.
Aleeha laughs. It’s truly the sweetest sound.
“Mum, where are you? Why did you leave us?”
“Brax,” I breathe.
“Why would you hurt us like this?” His voice trembles with heartbreak.
“I didn’t leave you.” I’m desperate as I bolt into an upright position, clasping my hands momentarily on either side of my head, hoping to limit the constant thrumming plaguing me.
“I know what you did, Morgan. I thought you loved me?” Reid’s words are laced with disgust.
“Reid. I do. I love you. What did I do?” I’m confused as my eyes dart from left to right. My sight remains blurred and my surroundings flash by as if I’m in a car hurtling through a dark tunnel with limited lighting.
There’s silence.
Drip, drip, drip.
I blink furiously as I hunch my body into a tight ball and wrap my arms around my knees. I’m frightened. My body is aching all over, and I’m nauseous.
I hear a newborn infant crying, and this sound causes my heart to sprint and my tears to spill.
“We have our girl, Morgan. She’s beautiful.” I can hear the pride in Reid’s shaking voice, just as I did on the day of our daughter’s birth. Today is not that day. I’m not sure what is happening to me, but I have enough sense to know ten years have passed since her arrival into this world. I shiver as my breathing becomes rapid. “Help me,” I whisper, fearing for my own sanity.
The room grows quiet again, apart from the sound of my heartbeat pounding in my ears, and a whistling noise coming from my nose as I take quick and short breaths. A flicker of light grows brighter, and with its presence, my fuzzy vision becomes slightly clearer.
“Hello,” I shudder.
There’s no reply.
Rectangular concrete blocks, the colour of a silver bullet, hold me in a stare. I watch as they zoom in and out with my strained sight. Where am I?
Drip, drip, drip.
I rotate my head over my shoulder and stop when I locate a metal sink with a rusty tap. Every drop of clear water leaking from the spout has me hypnotised. I’m thirsty, so very thirsty that I run my tongue over my bottom lip and swing my legs off what I now realise is a navy stretcher, but I stop myself midway and place my feet firmly back from where I removed them.
I’m scared.
Scanning the concrete floor, I settle my vision on four thick wooden legs. I swallow hard through my dry throat as I close my eyes and reopen them only after I tilt my chin slightly upwards. A table. It’s not bare, in fact it looks cluttered.
“I see the drugs have worn off.” His voice is calm. The voice of my captor.
I close my eyes once more.
“Red, welcome to your room. You won’t be here long, but we have work to do before we get back to our game.”
“I want to go home,” I whisper.
“Well I want to fucking kill you, but I have to be patient, so how about we focus on one thing at a time?”
“Why?” I cry out hoarse.
He laughs. “Look at me, Red. Go on. Can you see a wolf?”
Slowly, I fold back my eyelids and shift my head towards the sound of his voice. I’m halted by a projection screen taking up a large space, covering the concrete blocks at the foot of the bed. Azure blue eyes and full lips are the only features I can see of the man who has taken me, the one who proclaims himself to be the wolf, as his top half fills the screen. A black mask covers the remainder of his face, head and neck, and black clothing keeps his identity hidden.
“What did I do that could make you want to hurt me so bad?” I stare deep into his eyes, wondering how they can look so beautiful, yet be filled with a murderous hate.
“I don’t want to hurt you, Red. I want to kill you.” He throws back his head with his chuckle. When he regains his composure, he glares at me again through the screen. “But, it wouldn’t be fun for me if we didn’t play a little cat and mouse chase first.”
“Please,” I beg.
“Begging gets you nowhere, Red. You never heard the pleas of others, so why should I hear yours?” His tone is eerily calm, not ferocious like someone teeming with hate would normally react.
I gulp, hoping to swallow my fear. It doesn’t work, because my fear is not only clawing up my airway, it’s swirling in my stomach and filling my blood with each pulsation of my erratic heartbeat.
“Here’s your instructions, Red. Listen carefully.”
“Let me go home.”
“Shut up,” he barks. He’s instantly angry, and it’s as if someone flipped a switch and his previous composure is torn away from him.
I pinch my swollen lips tight together.
“You have one hour. The backpack I put together for you is sitting on the barrel beside the table.”
Flicking my eyes from the screen I scan my surroundings until the metal barrel comes into view with the backpack sitting on top.
“Look at me.” His words are delivered softly, yet there is no warmth in them — The wolf’s heart is sculpted out of ice.
I take in his lips. They are large and shaped perfectly. They appear soft and welcoming. This causes me to tremble, because these lips are reminiscent of those my husband and his brother have been blessed with.
“Red …” He wears a haunting smile. “You have one hour to write your goodbyes to your family. This is your only chance to leave a piece of you behind for them. Don’t waste it.”
I shake my head as I sob, “No, no, no … Please. I can’t. I won’t.”
“You will do it!” he snaps.
“No!” I yell. “I won’t. Why are you doing this? Who are you?”
“Shut your fucking mouth or I will tear the lungs out of your body. Or should I stop your beating heart with my bare hands?” He smirks. “Red, I will not rest until you live through the torture that you yourself have created. It’s you who made me who I am. It’s your fault all those women died. Their blood is on your hands. Their deaths are stained to your conscience.”
“I didn’t do anything. I’ve never hurt anyone.” My heart sprints faster as I drop my head.
“You’ve tortured people, Red. I guess we’re no different, you and I … we’re made from the same cloth and all that shit.” His laughter booms and my body trembles in response.
“Let me go home,” I sob.
“This is your home. It houses your mistakes. Fuck! They were costly, huh?” He speaks casually, yet he’s smug.
I don’t reply. I can’t. My tongue won’t move to form the words. My throat has seized.
“Morgan Amelia Banks, you took something from me I can’t get back, and now I’m taking something from you —your freedom — your life — your forever. Now fucking do as I say or it’s game over, bitch.”
I cry so hard my shoulders shake from the force, and my nose becomes instantly stuffy with mucus.
“Your one hour will start soon.”
I glare at the Wolf through my tear soaked eyes and before I have a chance to speak another word, he’s gone, and the screen becomes blank. I open my mouth wide and release a blood curling scream, a scream that is arduous. My heart shatters into a million pieces. I don’t want to say goodbye. I want to live.
Let me live.
The ground is cold beneath my soles when I find the strength to place them on the floor. I want to snatch them back from the chill, but I don’t. I need to do as he instructed. I groan as I use my arms to push my body from the stretcher. My knees crack as I stand. My hip clunks loudly when I’m almost upright, and I grimace from the instant ache. I’m battered, broken and bruised.
Shuffling my feet, I slowly work my way towards the small desk. It’s excessively littered with paper and books, and this keeps me moving. Maybe there’s a clue in this mess.
"I, Reid, take thee, Morgan, to be my wife. To have and to hold, for better, for worse, in sickness and in health, till death do us part."
Reid’s voice is loud, so loud I clutch my hands to my ears and squeeze my eyes tightly shut as I halt on the spot. Twisting my neck, I eye the projection screen and see my husband dressed in the same grey tailored suit he wore on the day we exchanged our vows and became husband and wife.
My arms go limp and drop to my sides when I gasp at the sight of myself adorned in my mother’s fishtail wedding dress. I can see the pond with the white lily pads bobbing up and down in front of us, and I can also see my family and friends. I try to reach out my arms. I want to touch them, hold them. But my arms won’t budge because they’re as heavy as lead.
“Morgan Amelia Cuttings, do you promise to cherish, Reid Elis Banks? Support him, love him unconditionally and without conviction for the remainder of your life?”
Dave Jury, a close friend of my father, and celebrant, speaks these words through a small microphone attached to a headset. My mind screams for him to sense my trouble, and to get my Dad and Reid to come help me.
“I do.” I smile as Reid slides a thin gold band down my finger.
Flashing. Lots of flashing has me slowly lowering to the floor and as my bottom meets the concrete, I yelp from a sharp pain shooting up my spine.
“Tinkle, tinkle, ittle tar. How’d I nunder what dew are. Tup adove da world toe high, ike a diamond in da sty …”
Aleeha is so tiny as she twirls in her black glitter tutu and she sings. Reid is sitting on the lounge chair clapping along whilst a much younger Brax sits crossed legged on the floor beside her, banging two wooden spoons on top of an overturned saucepan.
“My babies. My little babies,” I cry out, wrapping my arms around my chest attempting to shelter my breaking heart.
“Daddy. Mummy. I love it. It’s just what I wanted. This is the best birthday ever.”
Brax is only six years old as he wears his ninja turtle pyjamas and climbs onto a new bike with a big blue bow stuck to its front.
Tucking my head into my arms, I rock. My heartache increases further as I realise this man has my home movies. He’s been in my house and invaded my privacy, my life. How else would he have these?
“Oh Red. So many memories. You better get off the floor and write those letters or you’re going to leave the people you were supposed to love and protect with fucking nothing. What a terrible mother that would make you.”
I dry wretch the moment I see the ski mask and those eyes.
Photographs begin shooting across the screen drowning out the image of the Wolf, until he’s completely gone. Picture upon picture continue to layer on top of each other, and they play out my life in snapshots. As much as I want to look away right now, I can’t, because I can’t leave my family. I can’t turn my back on them, not now, not ever. I have to fight.