The Great Below

The Escape: Part 4

"Did you see how everyone was dying to help you?" His voice boomed inside the cabin of the truck, so loud she covered her ears. "Was everyone as compassionate as you'd hoped?"

Octavia curled, weak and panting, into the crook of the door. Outside, the lights of distant houses swirled past. More betrayers.

"They don't care about you. I care. You don't appreciate it, but I care. When you weren't at home, I went looking. Do you think those people will come looking for you?"

"You left it unlocked on purpose," she said.

Victor swung the car into a lot underneath their apartment building and parked. "I am teaching you a valuable lesson. Now, give me the shoes."

There it was – that feeling of electricity in the air. He wasn't done yet. Octavia felt it like a chill across her neck, which could easily have been mistaken for the chill consuming her whole body despite the blasting of the truck's heater. She didn't look directly at him. Instead she remained slumped against her seatbelt, hoping he could see how fiercely she was learning this lesson. "I need shoes," she said, and clenched her teeth.

He lunged, tearing the sandals from her feet. She yelled as the thin plastic whacked her forearms, her hands, the top of her head. Hot tears rolled down her face, a salty mix of pain and embarrassment. It was over in seconds, then Victor got out of the truck and threw her new shoes into an overflowing dumpster at the edge of the lot.

He opened her door and his hands came out, gentle again. He helped her out of her seatbelt and onto the ground, steadying her on her bare feet. Everything was sore and aching. She was afraid she might have peed herself, but she was so drenched that she no longer cared.

"I can carry you," he said.

Silence. She shook her head, long hair a stringy mess.

"I'll carry you."

She pulled away, backing into the passenger door with a clang.

He stopped. Waited. "I got a job offer."

Octavia looked up, confident that the worst was behind them. They stood close enough to the edge of the lot that rain still drizzled on one side of them, running harmlessly in tiny rivers under her feet. If she looked over Victor's shoulder, she could still glimpse her pretty blue sandals at the top of the trash.

"This job is different, though. We have to move for a while," he continued.

There was something disconcerting in the tone of his voice. It wasn't easy to pinpoint: a waver, a note of sadness perhaps. One big hand clenched and relaxed, clenched and relaxed on the frame of the truck's bed.

"I won't be able to do this job if we don't trust each other. I have sheltered you. I have kept you safe, but I can't do it forever. Where we're going – I mean, I'll bring the handcuffs and whatever I can, but I can't promise it's safe. It's a lot of money though. We need this job. And because there are only so many ways I can protect you, I need to give you this now, before we move." He fumbled in his pocket for something and she prayed it wasn't another device like the one he'd used earlier.

A soft black box. A ring box. She looked down and past it, eyes glazing over for a moment. On the asphalt, a wimpy little worm inched its way back up the ramp toward grass, a journey that would take a lifetime in worm years. Most didn't make it, in Octavia's experience, which created a sad post-rain graveyard of dried husks, curled and paralyzed. A handful of other worms, all ejected from their homes by the rain, had already been smashed by Victor's tires.

"Open it," he said, a hopeful warmth in his cheeks. Octavia had never seen this look on him before – nervous.

Her fingers were slippery and her muscles shot, but she snapped it open. There was a gleaming silver band with a single, modest stone in the center. Beautiful. She didn't have to glance up to feel the weight of Victor watching her.

"What do you think?"

Victor lived in a land of his own logic – if he doubted his nonsense about protecting her, rather than holding her prisoner against her will, he never betrayed it. His fantasy was water-tight, enough to cause her an occasional slip, a moment of hesitation. She imagined Victor lived for it: that brief second when she asked herself if he was right. If she was crazy. There was a term for that kind of domestic abuse, and Octavia only knew it because she loved old black-and-white movies. Gas-lighting.

But there were small comforts, despite Victor's abuse. She had a place to sleep and a roof over her head. She had food and 'protection,' and why couldn't she handle just one more night of it? Had sitting on that train ruined her? Had the deep, coughing breath of gas station hot dog air?

One more night. Something would come along tomorrow. Octavia spread the idea like a balm. She couldn't imagine what she looked like to Victor right now. She couldn't conjure a thing in response, and if there was a punishment, she would take it. The box tilted awkwardly on her flattened palm, as if it poisoned her to touch it.

"Just think about it," Victor barked. His hand came down hard, snatching it away and stuffing it back into his pocket.

Octavia retrieved her album before Victor locked up, and when he turned to head upstairs she quickly bent to scoop up the scrawny worm, who wriggled and coated her hand in slime. She started up the ramp and deposited him safely back in the yellow grass, undetected.

Victor waited at the highest stair, holding the security door for her. "If you ever pull a stunt like this again," he said, "I'll fucking kill you."