Still Missing (12 page)

Later that day I learned how to pluck feathers off a duck. I'll never forget the smell. Tears welled up and spilled over the whole time, and no matter how often he told me to stop crying, and God knows I tried, sobs kept breaking free. With every feather I pulled out of that duck's body, my guilt mounted. If I hadn't tamed him, he'd still be alive.

When it was time to sit down and eat our roast duck dinner, I froze. The Freak sat opposite me, and between us, arranged on a big platter, was my duck. I had given in to demand after demand, but watching him carve up my symbol of freedom, I hated him like never before. My hand couldn't lift the fork to my mouth. It didn't take him long to notice.

"Eat your dinner, Annie."

The only movement was tears down my face. It was bad enough I was the reason it was dead--I couldn't
eat
it. The Freak grabbed a handful of meat, strode over to me, pried my mouth open, and shoved it in. While I gagged and choked--drowning in duck--he screamed at me.

"Chew it!"

His other hand held the back of my head so I couldn't pull away, and once he'd shoved my mouth full, he clamped his other hand over my lips. I ate my duck. I had to.

The Freak went back to eating his. I was mesmerized by the flashing metal of his fork and knife as he carefully cut the duck into small pieces on his plate. Aware of my attention, he slowly brought the fork to his mouth and delicately took a piece off with his teeth. His lips closed around it, his eyelashes fluttered down, and he gave a sigh of pleasure. As he leisurely chewed, he opened his eyes to stare at me. Finally he swallowed.

Then he smiled.

That night was the first time I couldn't look at my daughter while she nursed. She was drinking the duck, drinking my beautiful duck, and I wondered if she could taste my pain.

Last night it was damn hard to stay out of the closet, Doc. My room was so dark, pitch-dark, and I kept thinking that something was reaching for me, but when I turned on the flashlight I keep by my bed, there was nothing. I tried sleeping with a candle, but that just made creepy flickering shadows on the wall. I turned on all the lights, but then I was wide awake. Which only made it that much easier to hear every creak in my house, and it's an old house--lots of creaks. So the good news is I never slept in the closet last night, Doc; bad news is there sure are some crappy late-night TV shows.

It did give me time to think about fear and all that stuff you told me on how PTSD manifests in different ways, but I still can't tell you exactly why sleeping in the closet makes me feel safer. All I know is, something about the bed just feels so exposed. There are so many ways I could be gotten to--from my feet, left side, right side, or even from above--too much empty space pressing in on me.

The more painful the stuff I tell you, the more I want to--need to--sleep in the closet. You asked what it is I'm trying to keep away from me, and maybe this is a good time to go into the granddaddy of all my lingering side effects--this paranoid itch that won't go away no matter how much I scratch.

I just can't seem to shake the overwhelming feeling I'm
still
not safe. And I know it's whacked, because the cops have been totally cool about keeping me up to date on the investigation, especially this one cop, Gary--man, the poor guy probably wishes he'd never given me his cell number--and they'd have told me if I was still in danger. They bloody well
have
to. That's their whole deal--protect the people and all that crap. So what the fuck?

Please don't give me any of the It's-just-PTSD-natural-after-your-experience garbage. Look, I get that I came home with major hang-ups and fear and shit. Like I said, I thought about everything you told me--even did some research on the Internet. Hell, I was
hoping
that was all it was, but there's something different about this. Feels too real.

That's where you come in, Doc. You have to help me get rid of this obsession that I'm still not safe. That
someone
or
something
is out to get me. Don't worry, I'm not expecting some instant shrink just-add-bullshit porridge answer. Give it some thought. Maybe I'll have it all figured out in a couple of weeks when you're back from your holiday--wouldn't it be nice if this shit was that easy.

Thanks for referring me to another shrink, but I'll wait for you to come back. For some strange reason, I have trust issues.

Nice to see you back, Doc. At least one of us is relaxed. Just giving you a hard time--I don't doubt for one minute you needed a break from all this doom and gloom. You do a good job of hiding it, but I know this stuff gets to you. Right from our first session I noticed whenever I talk about something intense, you rip off a corner of your note pad and roll it into a ball with your fingers. The faster you roll, the harder this shit's hitting you. We all give ourselves away somehow.

Like I said, I'm glad you had a nice time, but I'm a hell of a lot gladder you're back. Sure could have used you last week. And no, not just because of all that someone's-still-out-to-get-me crap I was talking about last time, although that vulture is still hovering in the background--something else happened. I saw my ex, in a grocery store, picking out apples with some girl.... God, the way he smiled at her
killed
me. And the way she tilted her head back--in her tight white turtleneck and designer jeans--laughing at something he'd said...

Before they spotted me and I had to see Luke's beautiful smile turn sympathetic, I ducked around the corner. Basket ditched in the middle of the store, I walked out, head down, and jumped in my car with my heart beating faster than a crack addict's. Trying not to squeal my tires in my desperation to get the hell out of there, I pulled around the back of the store, parked far away from any other cars, and with my head on the steering wheel, cried my eyes out.

She wasn't supposed to be there. He was mine. I should be the girl picking out apples with him. Eventually I drove home, but I couldn't stop crying and I never did get any groceries. Ended up eating hard cheese on stale crackers that night while I pictured them cuddling in bed on a Sunday morning, or him kissing her with his hands wrapped in that beautiful hair. Hell, by the time my mind was done with it they were pretty much engaged and naming their future children.

In those few seconds he looked so fucking
happy
, and I wanted to be the only woman who could make him smile like that. Just talking about it is making me feel all crazy inside. I know I'm supposed to want him to be okay, want what's best for him and all that, but man, oh, man--does it have to be someone like her? Miss Perfect Blonde, so clean in her white turtleneck I felt dirty just looking at her. I used to wear clothes like hers, used to
want
to wear clothes like that.

I wonder if this woman, this
stranger
, knows all about me. She's probably a nice person too--can't see him dating someone who isn't. Maybe she feels sorry for me. God, I hope not. I'm doing a damn good job of that on my own.

After The Freak killed the duck, a piece of me tore off and left a black hole in its place. Terror moved in and brought a giant hand gripping my heart and guts. Over the next couple of days whenever I watched him pick my daughter up, examine her, hell, even walk by her basket, the hand squeezed harder.

One morning she was fussing in her bed and I was about to pick her up when he beat me to it. A little cry escaped from the bundle in his arms; she was still wrapped in her blanket as he bounced her. He put his face close to hers and said, "Stop it." I held my breath, but she was quiet, and he smiled with pride. I knew it was the bouncing, not the words, that had calmed her, but I wasn't suicidal enough to set him straight.

"She listens well," he said. "But at this age their brains are sponges, easily poisoned by society. It's good she's here. Here she'll learn
real
values, values I'll instill in her, but most of all she'll learn respect."

Shit, how the hell was I going to deal with this?

"Sometimes kids, you know, they test their boundaries and she might not understand what you're trying to...teach her. But it won't mean she's bad or doesn't respect you, it's just what kids do."

"No, it's not what kids do--it's what parents allow them to do."

He didn't seem upset by the conversation, so I said, "Maybe it's good if a child has curiosity and tests authority? You told me the women you knew before always made bad decisions over men and their careers, but maybe they were just rebelling because they weren't allowed to think for themselves when they were younger."

Still calm, he said, "Is that what your mother did? Raised you to be free-thinking?" Sure, I was free to think exactly like her.

"No, but that's why I want to give my daughter a better life. Don't you want your child to have a better life than you had?"

He stopped bouncing her. "What are you implying?"

Oh, shit.

"Nothing! I'm just concerned you might have some expectations that aren't--"

"Expectations? Yes, I have expectations, Annie. I expect my daughter to respect her father. I expect my daughter to grow up to be a lady--not some whore spreading her legs for any man who comes along. I don't think that's expecting too much, do you? Or are you trying to raise my daughter to be a whore?"

"That's not at all what I'm trying to say--"

"Do you know what happens to girls who grow up thinking they can do whatever they please? I worked in a logging camp for a while." The Freak was a
logger
? "And there was a female helicopter pilot. She said her father told her she could be whatever she wanted. He was a fool. When I met her, her boyfriend--one of the idiot loggers in camp--had just discarded her."

Well, he didn't seem to have a good opinion of loggers, so maybe he was a foreman or worked in the office.

"I listened to her talk about this Neanderthal and let her cry all her pathetic tears on my shoulder for six months. She started saying she wished she could find a nice man, so I asked her out, but she said she wasn't ready. So I waited. Then one day she told me she wanted to go for a walk. Alone. But I saw him leave the camp a few minutes later, and I followed him."

He bounced the baby faster and faster and she began to whimper. "They were in the woods on a blanket, and she was letting this man, this man she despised, this man who threw her away like garbage, do things to her. So I waited until he left and tried to talk to her, tried to tell her he was only going to hurt her again, but she told me to mind my own business and walked away from me.
Away from me!
After everything I'd done to try to protect her, she was going to go back to that man. I had to save her. She left me no choice." His arms tightened around the baby.

I stepped forward with my hands out.

"You're hurting her."

"She hurt me."
He jerked his head as the baby began to wail, then stared down at her like he didn't know how she got there. He shoved her into my arms, almost dropping her in the process, and stalked toward the door. With his hands gripping the frame, he said over his shoulder, "If she becomes one of them..." He shook his head. "I can't let that happen." Then he slammed the door behind him, leaving me to quiet the baby and wish I could break down and bawl myself.

He came back in after an hour with his face serene and made his way over to the baby basket. "I think if you take a look at what I've spared her from, Annie--the diseases, drugs, and pedophiles running rampant down there--and then ask yourself if you really want what's best for our daughter, or what you think is best for you..." He crouched over her and smiled down. "You'll realize it's time you put her life above your own." His smile disappeared as he looked up to stare hard at me. "Can you do that, Annie?" My eyes dropped to his hands resting on her tiny body--hands that had killed at least one person and done God only knows what to that helicopter pilot.

With my head bowed I said, "Yes, yes, I can."

For the rest of that day every nerve in my body screamed at me to run, and my legs ached from unreleased adrenaline coursing through them. My hands shook--I dropped dishes, clothes, soap, everything. The more frustrated he became, the more things I dropped, and the more my legs cramped. The smallest sound made me jump, and if he moved fast, my blood surged in my veins and I broke out in a sweat.

The next day he packed up a small bag with a change of clothes and took off without saying a word about where he was going. My relief was underscored by my terror that he'd finally had enough of us and wasn't going to come back. My frantic fingers searched the cabin top to bottom again, but there was no way out. He came back the next day, and I still didn't have a clue how I was going to get my child out of this hell.

Wherever he'd been, he brought back germs, and soon he started coughing and sneezing. True to form, he was a demanding patient. Not only did I have to care for the baby and do my chores, I now had to wipe his brow every five fucking seconds, keep the fire going, and bring him blankets hot from the dryer--his idea, not mine--while he languished in bed. I prayed he'd develop pneumonia and die.

He made me read to him until my throat became raspy. I wished I could just play poker with him like I used to with my stepdad. Wayne wasn't the wipe-your-brow kind of guy, which was just fine by me, but he did teach me to play cards when I was sick. At the first sign of a sniffle he'd whip out a pack and we'd go at it for hours. I loved the feel of cards in my hands, the numbers, the set order of them. Mostly I loved winning, and he had to teach me increasingly harder games so he could beat me once in a while.

By the second day coughs wracked The Freak's body, and I paused from my reading to say, "Do you have any medicine?"

As if I was threatening to pour something down his throat right there and then, he grabbed my arm, dug his nails in, and said, "No! No medicine."

"It might help."

"Medicine is
poison
." Against my arm his hand burned with fever.

"Maybe if you went to town and found a doctor--"

"Doctors are even worse than medicine! Doctors are what killed my mother. If she'd just let me take care of her she'd have been fine, but they pumped their poisons into her and she got sicker and sicker. They
killed
her." Even through a stuffed-up nose his contempt infused every syllable.

After a few days he stopped coughing, but the baby began crying at night and waking up every couple of hours. When I reached my hand down to her she felt warm. I tried to comfort her as soon as she woke up, but once I wasn't fast enough and he threw a pillow at her bed.

Another time he wouldn't let me go to her, saying, "Keep reading, she just wants attention." I wanted to take care of my daughter, I wanted to keep us both alive. I kept reading.

Her wails grew louder. He ripped the book out of my hands.

"Make her stop or I will."

My tone as calm and reassuring as I could make it, I lifted her out of her bed and said, "I think she might be getting sick too."

"She's fine. You just have to learn how to control her." He buried his head under the pillow. I had the insane urge to go over and press my whole body down on the pillow, but then his head popped up and he said, "Get me a fresh glass of water, and this time make it cold." I gave him a cheerful smile while inside another piece of me snapped off and spun away.

The next morning, earlier than usual, she woke me crying. I picked her up right away and tiptoed around, trying to calm her down, but it was too late. The Freak jumped out of bed and threw his clothes on while glaring at me.

"I'm sorry, but I think she's really sick."

He stalked outside. I lay back in bed and got ready to nurse her. It was one of my favorite things to do with her. I loved the way she stared up at me, one small hand resting on my breast, how her belly swelled up when she was full, how her little bottom fit my hand perfectly. Everything about her was so delicate--her hands with their little lines and tiny finger-nails, her smooth cheeks, her silky dark eyelashes.

Usually after she was finished nursing I kissed every part of her, starting at her toes and her soft instep. Once I got up to her hands, I'd pretend to nibble her fingertips and work my way back down her arm. For the grand finale, I'd blow on her belly until she emitted happy little squeaks.

But today my normally happy baby was restless and edgy, and every time I tried to nurse her she moved her mouth away from my nipple. Her skin was hot to the touch and her cheeks were circles of red, like someone had drawn a clown's face on her. Her belly looked distended and I thought she might have gas, so I walked around with her, but she threw up all over my shoulder and finally just cried herself to sleep. I'd never felt so helpless in my life. I was terrified of what The Freak might do if I told him, but I had to get her some help.

"The baby's really sick, she needs a doctor," I said as soon as he came back inside.

He glanced at me. "Start breakfast."

During breakfast she started crying in her basket and I moved to get her, but he held his hand up and said, "Stop. Going to her only reinforces negative behavior. Finish your meal."

Her wails ripped the air apart, and as she inhaled between each lusty cry, I thought I heard a wet rattle in her chest.

"She's not doing well. Can we please get to a doctor? I know your mom died, but she had cancer--it wasn't the doctors that killed her. You can tie me up in the van and take her in." I hesitated for a second. "Or I'll wait here and you can just take her, okay?" Had I really said that? She'd be
alone
with him. But she'd get help.