EIGHT ROCK
Four dead because of me. Probably five. And if that scream's anything to go by, it's about to be six.
Jessica died because I couldn't control myself better. I never found out what happened to mother. He never told me. After the police came, we left quickly. She was with us when we set off, the three of us crammed in the tiny car, no one talking, mother crying quietly to herself.
We spent a month sleeping in the car. Halfway through, she just wasn't there anymore. I woke up and it was me and father. I started to ask where she was but he spoke as if I hadn't said anything. "I've found somewhere for us to live," he said, starting the engine and setting off. "The perfect place."
We were in that halfway house for two weeks before coming here. I've been held in here ever since. This is the world I know. My memory of everything outside has faded apart from her. That is clear and ever present.
I do remember driving into a forest to get here, an ominous stone building appearing out of the trees, down a bumpy rutted track, miles from anywhere.
Jessica gone. Mother gone. The women he brought me, all gone.
The first one was called Sally. I had changed in the intervening years of my confinement, growing stubble on my chin, my muscles starting to swell despite the confines of my cell. I exercised every day, there wasn't much else to do. I would see how many sit ups I could do whilst holding my breath, then try to beat my record.
The first fight came as a shock. He came in and told me he had found a way to earn us some money. He looked excited, his eyes lit up. "Do you want to help me?" he asked.
I nodded, what choice did I have?
In the next room, he'd removed all the furniture. There were cameras in each corner and in the middle, a free-standing punch bag. I stood looking at the punch bag, not knowing what to do.
"Hit it," he said, nodding at me.
It was the first time I'd ever heard anything like praise from him. Each time I punched the bag, he would mutter, "Good, better, harder, come on." The words came coming. Sometimes praise, sometimes harsh criticism but I was so starved of encouragement, I did everything I could to impress him.
The first fight was a month later. The man he brought in was taller and stronger than me. I almost lost an eye during that one. It took weeks to recover afterwards, the swelling to my face making it impossible to eat, I could only drink. I lost a tooth and my left ear rang so loudly I struggled to sleep at night.
He cursed me for my failure and made me train harder. I won the second fight. This man was taller too, a tattoo of a heart on his arm, inked blood dripping from it. He underestimated me. I was faster than him. He was dragged out at the end, mumbling threats through a broken jaw.
Father never told me what the cameras were for but I could guess. People were watching and betting on the outcome, that was why he was so cross when I lost and so happy when I won.
He gave me Sally as a reward. She was drugged up and drooling, her head lolling in the chair. She giggled every now and then at jokes only she could hear.
"I got her for you," he said, standing beside her. "Take her."
I couldn't do it. I stood next to the chair, wanting to get hard, wanting to fuck her, even before I really knew what fucking was. But I couldn't do it.
He was furious. She died in the chair. I had to watch. He didn't feed her, telling me I could stop it, I could keep her alive if I just took her. I couldn't. I can still hear her plaintive moans getting weaker some nights, when I forget to shut my brain down properly.
He tried twice more. I refused twice more. He didn't bother starving those two, just cut them in the chairs, the blood pooling on the floor. The last one was still alive when he dragged her out, I never even learned her name.
"What will it take to get a grandchild?" he asked me one day, spitting the question through the bars. Then as he stared at me, he seemed to realise. "I know who you want."
I nodded eagerly when he suggested her.
This time he brought me the one I can't see die. He knows that. It is an impossible choice. She will be taken by me or killed by him.
It's inspired, in the most twisted of ways. I want her more than anything. And now he's taken her away and she's just screamed, the sound audible even through the solid door in the far wall. What is he doing to her?
I try the hatch but he has fixed it. My one chance, wasted. And for what? Would it have mattered so much if she'd got a bit wet? Did I have to play the knight in shining armour like a fool?
If I'd kept my nerve, I could have been out now, find her, run with her, get somewhere in the house where we were alone.
And then what? Fuck her?
My body reacts and I reach down, rubbing the front of my boxer shorts. Just as my cock twitches in response, the red light in the cell comes on. There is no time to think about her anymore. It is time to fight again.
Has he done this deliberately? Timed it so I have to choose between listening to her being tortured or fight?
But he did promise me her if I win. So I'm going to win. She might be damaged but she'll still be mine. If he doesn't go back on his word. Whether she wants me or not, she'll be mine. If she knew what the alternative was, she'd thank me. Perhaps she will. I stamp on that thought as I open the door and step out of the cell into the next room. Time to focus.
My opponent is in there, ready for me. He gives me a wicked grin. He is wiry, punching the air as he steps towards me. Who are they betting on out there? The smart money will be on me. I take a step forward and nod. We begin.