𝐁𝐄𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐘 𝐈𝐍 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐇 by A.P.Mary

11.

We enter an office, where I sit on a small couch, supervised by two brothers.

The blonde guy who flirted with Nisha is leaning on the desk in front of me, and I suddenly feel quite inferior under his eyes. His eyes fierce, glasses shiny, and his chin up. "We finally meet formally." I lean back uncomfortably, overlapping my legs as I fight with the urge to scream out of frustration. This is all but formal.

"Good morning to you too," I respond seriously, my eyes rolling back as I almost faint from the smell of roses. It makes me vomit. "Just to keep the formalities going, could you please get those rose scented candles out of this room? I'm about to throw up," the blonde nods, signing with his head to his brother's to get them out. He must be the older brother; authority is written all over his face.

As he makes his way to open the window, he starts muttering  a low 'good to know.' "So, my brother informed me about the code; how were you able to decipher it?" I stare at the ceiling, confused, but when I remember what happened ten minutes ago.

"I simply learned it as a kid." He turns around and stares at me as if I'm stupid. I heel his eyes burying me down under earth, and the only thought that comes to mind is: If him and Nisha have a kid, that kid will have traumas. 

"Interesting quality to learn for a kid. Then tell me, why would a kid want to learn such a strange language?" Now I'm the one looking at him as if he's stupid.

"to be prepared for any eventuality." I simply say. He gets annoyed if I respond too soon. He comes back in front of me.

"Prepared for what exactly?" he says with a hard r, making his strong Italian accent come out.

"Either for the day I would meet those who murdered my entire family or for a science project, you choose. But just so you know, I didn't go to school," I say, looking forward without letting my voice quiver or sound vulnerable. The right end of his mouth turns upwards, and he whispers more to himself than to me, 'I assumed.'

I'm about to jump him.

"They turned out to be useful in the end; not really the exact people, but the descendants of them would do."  Their last name gave their whole identity away. May I never forget that day that haunts me in my nightmares, flashbacks, thoughts, and actions. "But of course you're not here for a therapy session; you have something I need."

I smile "I overestimated your understanding skills; you guys don't really grasp the fact that we don't have those files. I would tell you this in Italian, but I'm not really skilled in the language." I might have gone too far, sounding too cocky for someone with their hands tied and a knife at their throat. What made me understand that? The back of his hand kissed my face roughly two consecutive times. I should thank Angelo for that pill; I'm completely numb.

"Angelo portala via" [Angelo, take her away]. Angelo took my arms, and he led me out of the room, greeting his brothers with a nod. We go down the stairs when suddenly he puts a hand on my back. I flinch so hard that I lose my balance, falling to the ground—or so I thought I would end up.

His hand grasps my arm, rescuing me from passionately kissing the concrete. 

"Punch me, slap me, kick me, but do not ever touch my fucking back again," and I sit on the cold chair again. He just looks at me, and after that, he escorts himself out of the room, not tying me down anymore. What a day 

~

I'm still alive, and I don't know if I like it or not.

I'm killing ants with my thumb as I form a rare type of scoliosis on the floor, and my newly cut hair is currently in a state where all of its strands are pointing in different directions, making me look like a psychopath in an abandoned mental hospital. Suddenly the door opens, but at the moment, exterminating ants is the only thing that peaks my interest right now. What forces me to look at him is his own hand gripping my jaw to face him directly. He must have some sort of fetish for gripping my face

"You need to come with me; you either follow or I make you follow me." His strict tone creeps me out, as do the ghosts of the ants I've killed, but I don't reply, walking behind him towards the same study. A camera and a pair of strings speak before the other men do, and I cannot help but sit on the wooden chair as I get tied up to it.

"Now, all you have to do is tell your friends you are alright and that they should hand in the documents before you turn into food for ants and worms six feet under " 

Ants: the revenge

I stare at the camera, and when the blonde guy waves to start, I try to stop laughing at my own joke and form a plausible message that satisfied both parties.

"Well, hello guys, I'm here tied up on a chair, and I know Blaise will joke about this, but I wanted to say that I'm fine; the concrete is pretty uncomfortable, but I cannot have a bed for some reasons. I named two ants after you before I caressed them too hard and killed them—"get to the point," Angelo hissed, pointing a gun towards me. Rude—well, they won't release me until you give them those files we spoke about the first night here, and I hope you guys are doing alright. Nisha, please don't have panic attacks; we'll get out of this situation." The guy filming abruptly stopped the recording, and a sudden cold wave perturbed me: am I going to see them again? Am I going to die before we meet? Before two guys took my arms, I suddenly stopped them, saying, "Wait, I have a question."

No one moves, and I continue as the older guy signs to go on "What happens if they don't have what you want?". The look they shared killed the small hope I cultivated

"Most probably, we'll send you and your crew to the judgment day early," a bible joke, funny. I stop those two from taking me away. "Please let me have twenty minutes with you; I really need answers." He shook his head at my pathetic exasperation, and out of fury, I started tearing up. Fuck my body responses

"You definitely won't have this privilege. Toglietela dal cazzo" [take her the fuck away]. Angelo and Giacomo proceed to take me with all their strength away from there, and as I try to get out of their grip, I start tearing up even harder, fury persuading me. They throw me in the basement again, and after they lock the door, I start bawling my eyes out.

When I'm sad, I cry; when I'm angry, I cry; when I'm nostalgic, I cry; and when I feel absolutely nothing, I fucking cry. It's not out of sensibility or weakness, but it's either this or I do something I will definitely regret later.

I slide down the wall, and I feel a slight relief when the bumpy wall scratches my back. I get up and I start moving my back up and down the wall, and as my skin starts hurting at the point to not bear it anymore, I stop. I sit down.

Ten, twenty, or thirty minutes pass, but I cannot fall asleep. The white walls are too bright and the concrete is too spiky to soften, but something else makes me wake up again.

The door opens again slowly, revealing a person that wasn't supposed to be there. "Are you the grim reaper?"

"Not too far from it," Angelo whispers as he closes the door without making any noise. He sits down on what was my chair, and he dismissively says:

"Twenty minutes only".

Qui es-tu?