Together We Fall

Jonas

Eliana followed Elliot down a long hallway. To either side of her was cells, cots and toilets filled them but no one was inside. She wondered where they were, if these were just empty for the time being. Somehow though, she still felt as if she were being watched. Her skin felt like it was crawling, alive, goosebumps creeping up her flesh sending a chill down her spine.
Elliot stopped at the end of the hall, a closed door in front of him. He turned his body so she could slide by. As Eliana slipped by him, Elliot stuck his hand out, causing her to abruptly stop as her midsection connected with his palm.
"I'll warn you now," He started. "Jonas isn't in his right mind. He refuses his medications and force feeding isn't working."
"I got it." Eliana replied. She forced her best determined voice but it fell flat. Elliot's eyes softened and she knew he saw right through her.
"Look miss, if we could do this any other way we would. We need this information and he won't spit it out unless you're the one he tells. If he says anything that you cannot handle, feel free to get up and come back to this door. There's cameras everywhere, we'll be watching you and he'll be handcuffed to the table. It's bolted into the floor so he won't be able to pick it up or move. Both his hands and his feet are held."
Eliana nodded, her hands starting to sweat as she turned toward the door.
"I'm serious, Eliana. If he does anything out of the ordinary or anything that makes you feel uncomfortable or unsafe, you can leave. I don't care if he doesn't spill, we'll find it later rather than sooner." Elliot's voice was kind, something that Eliana was grateful for. Even if she failed at getting the information he needed, he assured her they would find it out somehow. Another part of her knew she wouldn't be able to walk back through this door until the task was completed though. Something in her refused to allow failure, refused to allow any shred of disappointment to blacken her life.
"Thank you, detective. I'll be careful."
Elliot flashed her one more smile, one so genuine that even his eyes lit up. "Good luck."
Elliot backed away from the door, his body turning as his shoes let out hollow thunks as they led him back down the hall. He branched off somewhere to the right before Eliana could bring herself to peer back at the closed door. She trusted Elliot more than anyone. Sometimes more than herself. He had been her shoulder when her dad died, a friend of Koran for years before her birth. Elliot knew her from the time she came into this world and stood by her even after everyone she loved was gone. She was eternally thankful for his help and friendship. The situation at hand didn't change that.
She closed her eyes, sucking in a deep breath before pushing the door open. The oxygen left her as quickly as it had entered her when he appeared.
The room was empty, large and just as gloomy as the rest of the prison. There were few windows, only three and they had thick metal bars on them so thin that even a chipmunk couldn't shimmy through. Bright lights shined from overhead, shadowing the natural light that peered through the glass panes on the walls. The room wasn't large, maybe the size of a bedroom in an apartment. In one corner was a vending machine that lit up with half of its contents gone. On the other was lines of stacked up chairs that had intense looking chains wrapped around them that screwed into the walls. In the middle of the room lay a table and two chairs, one on either side facing each other. In one of those chairs was a tall, muscular man. He didn't look all that different from when she had seen him last all those years ago. His hair was thinner now and greying. It's color almost matching her eyes. His arms were large, round masses that would make even the best weightlifter sneer. His body was covered in a jumpsuit, the same color of grey as the walls that housed them. His chest, even under the fabric, was still very broad and hard. His nipples were solid beneath it, obviously playing in the cold, still air that wrapped around the room. He didn't say a word as she took a step in. Her heels made dull clicks on the hard floor as she slowly made her way toward him. It wasn't until she was right in front of him, about to lean down into the open chair that he finally looked up. His eyes were a piercing green, so clear and beautiful that she understood how he had pulled so many gorgeous women when she was younger. He had never not had a woman on his arm, all of them spanning across the board, different in all their own ways. Different races, tax brackets, backgrounds, struggles. One thing about him is that he never had a type.
"Hello Eli." He greeted. His voice was husky, almost seductive. Eliana cringed at the nickname, one that she completed rid herself of after everything came out about him.
"Hi Jonas," She started. "Why did you want to see me?"
Jonas's face lit up into a grin. "Awe, come on Eli. Don't play the tough game with me. We were friends once, ya know? Besties as you kids say? Why treat me as if you hate me?"
Eliana shivered, which in turn visibility excited the man sitting across from her. Her eyes trailed down his arms to his hands that were bound to the table by a thick pair of handcuffs. She was confident he couldn't move, couldn't touch or hurt her but the fear still bubbled just below her surface.
"We were never friends." She responded. Jonas's face went dark, only for a second. Although it was there and gone in an instant, Eliana recognized it. She had seen it with him before when he was dealing with what he called a "tough bitch" in reference to his many girlfriends. He had gotten physically violent with them before, a slap here or a rough grab there. Eliana always let it go, pushing herself to see the good in him. After all, he had never hurt her.
"Don't be like that baby girl. I wanted to see a familiar friendly face. It's lonely in here, no one ever visits. Every now and then I get a sweet note from an admirer but never from anyone I know. It's sad in here. Am I not allowed to feel sad?" His words dripped with something she didn't recognize. A few years ago, she would have felt terrible for Jonas, even after all he had done. Before she had seen the atrocities up close, before she had read the things victims had said about their entrapment. He continued before she could. "Do you remember when you were what... 12? A little thing. You were wearing that cute little striped bikini suit your dad bought you at the little shop in town. You looked stunning, even as a girl. Now you're even more... I dunno, wow. That's my first vivid memory of you. Well, that and your birth. Leann was beautiful so it didn't shock me when you were gorgeous. Thank god you don't look like Koran. That ugly fucker had only one thing going for him and that was the thing that hung between his legs. You know Leann and I hooked up a few years before you were born? That was fucking... I dunno, mind blowing."
The words made her skin burn, the smell almost touching her nose. The air around them hardened, her lungs struggling to hold in the hostile oxygen. She wanted to hit him, scream and beat her fists into the flesh of his face until nothing was left but a large black hole. Karma for all he had done.
"I love your faces, Eli," Jonas whispered. Eliana's eyes drifted up to his and the emotion behind them sent terror roaring down her cells. "God, you are just like your mother and I love it. You even smell like her. Why do you try and cover it up with perfume? Vanilla, huh? Never would've taken you for a vanilla girl. I like the aroma of your natural body. Maybe next time you'll wear nothing for me? Let me smell you."
"Stop." Eliana warned. Her teeth stuck together, grinding against one another like two knives. Shark pain touched her gums, straddling her jaw but she ignored it.
"Stop what, baby girl? I'll never get that picture of you in a bikini out of my mind. It was striped, right? Pink and green. Leann would be so proud of you."
"What do you want, Jonas? You didn't bring me here for a trip down memory lane." She pushed the words out against her better judgment, trying to touch each syllable with venom that she knew wasn't convincing.
"Alright, let's cut the bullshit and talk then. I wanted to tell you about some shit they want to know but I also wanted to tell you about some shit that you didn't know about yourself."
Eliana's mind tumbled. About herself? What could Jonas possibly know that she doesn't? Was he having someone stalk her on the outside? Was he paying them? With what, his lousy commissary money that was primarily funded by other sickos?
"Don't worry, I won't bring out the big guns yet. I'll enjoy my time of watching you tear yourself apart to figure out what I will say before I actually say it," Jonas grinned. His teeth were perfect, white and straight. He might've had braces at one point but she didn't know for sure. Little lines formed on the outsides of his lips. Dimples that curved into his skin. Eliana had always found dimples to be attractive but now they revolted her. "Leann was in labor with you for 47 hours. I remember Koran and I going up to the hospital every day that visiting hours opened. Your mom was a tough bitch, she refused to have anyone in the room with her, forced everyone to leave at the end of each day so she could enjoy her peace with you. Pitocin wasn't working, the peanut balls weren't working, the balloon wasn't breaking her water. Leann was in so much pain and she loved every single second of it. She refused to get an epidural, refused any kind of pain meds. She loved the beasty sounds she made when the contractions hit. Loved the guttural screams she let out as you started to make your way into the world. At hour 45, Koran got called by her doctor. He told him to get to the hospital as fast as possible, that something had gone wrong."
Eliana stared at him, hard. Her eyes struggled to find anything in his own that suggested he was lying. Her father hadn't told her much about her mother, never the story of her birth. All she knew was how fatal it had been in the end for her.
"Anyways, Koran begged me to come with him and I agreed. I thought Leann was going to kick our asses when we came back but no. She was so white, almost see through. She had lost so much blood trying to have you and kept putting off a cesarean. Your father cried. He sat beside her and held her hand. It was sweet to watch but all I wanted was to be in his place. See, I loved your mom and I was also jealous of your dad. I deserved to be the one holding her, whispering that it would be okay, watching as she brought my child into this world. Koran never deserved that. That was a whole lotta woman and he didn't know what to do with her."
Eliana smiled, sadness taking over her brain as she listened to his words. She didn't trust Jonas, she couldn't let herself but she was struggling with that now. She hung to every word, every letter as they dropped off his tongue.
"The doctor came back in with his team. Leann told your dad she loved him and to take care of you before she knocked out. She was unconscious for about 20 minutes before the doctors pushed your dad for permission to do the surgery. He agreed and I held him up as they wheeled your mom away. My heart broke for her, for you, but not for Koran. Even though I hugged his shoulders and let him put all his weight on me, I feigned caring. I was a pro, baby girl. I could've been someone big, an actor maybe."
"What happened?" Eliana pushed. Jonas was the first person to ever tell her anything like this before and she wanted to hear it all.
"They took Leann away for what felt like an eternity but it was only a couple hours. The doctor came out all clean and told Koran and I to take a seat. Your dad smiled as he sat but I knew. I already knew what that bastard was going to tell us. When he did, your dad broke out into tears. He wanted her alive, not you. I on the other hand, I wanted you and not Leann. I had already had my fun with her and while it broke something in me that she was gone without so much as a goodbye, I had you now. Koran didn't want to hold you. Refused to even look at you so I did it all. I took my shirt off, sat down and held you on my skin. Your face was so precious. Your gummy smile was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life."
Eliana's face felt heavy, warm. Her eyes burned as the tears threatened to fall over her ducts. She shook her head a bit, trying to rid herself of them but they fell anyways. She felt them trace paths down her cheeks, felt them lead over her flesh as they left nothing but a thin layer of wet in their wake.
"Don't cry, Eli," Jonas whispered. His eyes were on her, visible sorrow in his eyes that she couldn't comprehend. Just a second ago he was talking about liking her in a bikini and now he was feeling sorry for her for something that he broke. Something that she wanted him to break. "It'll all be okay. Girl, you got Leann in you. You'll be fine, you're strong. I can tell from the way you're taking my bullshit. It takes a special kind of motherfucker to handle me. I can be a bit vain, I apologize. I just wanted you to know. I've always cared about you, Eli. Before Koran even looked at you I was there. Cradling you, bathing you, changing and feeding you. You were my princess. I knew I had to be there to care for you. Little did I know how much Leann actually flooded through your veins. You were a wild thing as you got older. Once you hit puberty, it was like you wanted nothing to do with your dad and I. I'll admit it, I was hurt but I clung to the hope that one day you'd see me as something special. Something worth something."
"You loved her?" Eliana asked. "My mom? Did you actually or what was it?"
"I loved her," Jonas started. "She was the sun in my dark, dark world. The one that pulled me from the long list of complaints against me. She helped me see how good I could be."
"But you're not good." Eliana replied. Their eyes met once more and something in his cracked.
"No, no I'm not. But I could be," He breathed. "For you."
Eliana felt her stomach drop. Felt every liter of blood in her body turn to ice. He was flirting with her. Jonas wanted her.
"You're sick." She whispered. She wanted to say it louder, more hostile but it caught in her throat. She sounded like a mouse, quiet and cautious.
"Welcome to this world, baby girl," Jonas grinned. Eliana wanted to beat him with the chair she was sitting on. Beat him with the plastic until his nose popped out of place, until fragments of bone and blood covered her from head to toe. "Welcome to my torment."