"Hope is the only thing stronger than fear."
Mary Anderson's P.O.V
"Mary, this is insane. I can't believe you called me here because of something like this." My husband muttered beside me, his eyes scanning the walls of Gloria's bedroom.
Ben had shown up twenty minutes after I called him. He hadn't spoken a single word until now, only staring at the walls with a blank expression on his face. Gloria had left the room five minutes ago, saying she wanted to give us some privacy.
I looked wide-eyed at Ben, shocked. "Something like this?" I repeated his words. "Ben, how aren't you seeing this?"
He puffed out a long breath, his eyes moving slowly as if he was still sleeping. He looked awful, weary with the burden of long-closed eyes. His breath didn't fool me at all though. He had been drinking. I just knew it.
I tried not to be angry about it. I tried to remember that this was difficult for him too, that maybe the pressure of finding Kelly was starting to weight on his shoulders and demanding some sort of release. But I couldn't. I was so angry at him, so frustrated that he had chosen to drown in his sorrow.
But then again, I had chosen the same path too. The only difference was that I didn't have the frustration of a failed investigation in my hands. Until now.
"Look, Mary, all of these cases are from other towns, miles away from Bedford. These are completely different cases, different ages, different stories. The gap between the kidnaps is too big, you can't -"
"You are blind, Ben," I interrupted him, shaking my head. How couldn't he see the same as me? "It doesn't matter if the disappearances took place in different towns, or if the gap between them all is too long. That just shows that whoever took our daughter was careful enough not to kidnap them all the same time." I heaved a breath, tightening my hands.
"Ben, all these kids haven't appeared until now. After all those years, there is still no sign of them, no bodies dumped, nothing. Seven kids, Ben, seven. Don't you think that's strange?"
"It is strange!" He fired back. "But that's not the point here. There's nothing to prove they were all kidnapped by the same person, there's nothing-"
"But she saw him." I interrupted him again.
Before Ben had arrived, Gloria had told me how she had seen her son five years after he had been kidnapped. She said he was with a woman and two other kids. She didn't remember them well because she was only looking at Charlie. Yet, it only proved her theory even more.
"Gloria saw Charlie, and he was with two other kids. You can't ignore that too."
Ben sighed, closing his eyes. "That woman is crazy, Mary. She came to my office drunk, you can't possibly believe in a word..." He swallowed back the words, a cold shadow flashing before his eyes.
I didn't say anything. I was afraid that if I opened my mouth ugly things would be thrown and smashed at each other. I was afraid that if I opened my mouth a war would start between us. And I didn't have time for a war. No time at all.
Ben ran his fingers through his unruly hair, exhaling a deep long breath. His shoulders loosened and he looked at me. "You're right," he murmured in a tone of voice that I knew like the palm of my hand, a tone of voice I loved. He was finally acting like the man I'd fallen for. "I'm acting like a jerk. You're right, Mary. This might be the first clue we have in while. We can't throw that away. I have to hear what Gloria has to say."
I nodded, relieved that he was finally on board. I accepted the hand he was extending me, and together we made our way to the living room. Gloria was sat on the sofa with a cup of coffee in her hands, the entire house immobile around her. She got up once she felt our presence, her eyes connecting with mine in an instance.
"Ben wants to hear the whole story," I told her, gripping my hand around Ben's. She nodded quietly, some strands of her hair falling over her eyes as she sat down again.
I didn't miss it though. I didn't think anyone would. The crack... It had been there all along, waiting patiently to be torn apart. Gloria had been patient. During years and years and years, with life continuously betraying her and shouting at her dreams, she had never lost hope. She had never stopped trying to tear the crack apart.
I sat in front of Gloria. Ben sat beside me a few seconds later, weaving his fingers together.
"Where do I start?" She breathed, looking at the both of us.
"You can start by explaining why you have tons of close cases pinned to your bedroom's walls," Ben said, his eyebrows pulled into a focused frown.
She nodded, moving some strands of hair away. "Right, so you already know that I saw Charlie five years after he was kidnapped. Obviously, I went to the police station to tell them my statement, but they didn't believe me. They thought I was crazy, a lunatic, so they sent me home. For a while, I thought the same. If no one believed me, why should I?" She paused, sighing deeply.
"It took me a while to finally get back on my feet. Charlie was the main the reason to that. He remained so alive in me. I felt him in every fiber of my being. He was out there. I was sure of it. I had to bring him home."
"Everything changed then," she continued. "If the police wouldn't help me find my son, I would have to find him myself. I began my investigation by gathering everything I could find; newspapers, pieces of information here and there. I even wrote a list of the things that happened a week before Charlie disappeared. I did everything that I could and still, everything led to nothing."
She tightened her grip around her hands, looking down at them.
"Until one day. I was searching on the internet, looking out for some jobs in the area, when I found an article about a little girl who had disappeared in Blacksburg. I read the whole article; how the girl's parents had left their child alone in the car to get coffee around the corner; how she wasn't there after they came back minutes later; how devastated they were; how the police was doing everything to find her, but the odd thing about the article was how they had been here in Bedford for a family vacation one day before. That was when everything clicked."
She got up, a determinate expression on her face. Without a word, she exited the living room, returning a few seconds later with the newspapers pinned on her bedroom walls.
She placed them carefully on the round table, organizing them in a certain order. "So I searched for more abduction cases in the region of Virginia. I only selected the ones that hadn't been solved until now. I found many disappearances throughout the years. The first one was my son Charlie," she said, pointing at his photo. "Of course there were a few long before him, but those cases were already solved, the body had been found and the guilty one arrested. There was nothing in there, so I kept looking. I found the next one in Strasburg."
She pointed at the second picture. It was that boy named Jake.
"He was kidnapped two years after my Charlie. The third one was a baby in Vienna a year later. Then I found a girl named Hannah two years after the baby. Charlie would be fifteen at the time, the exact age I saw him in front of the grocery shop here in Bedford." She ran her fingers through some papers beside the newspapers.
"It all clicked together," she repeated. "I saw my son with a girl and a small boy, and although I don't remember them well, I know they can only be Thomas and Hannah."
"Why couldn't the boy be Jake?" Ben asked her, looking down at the journals.
"Because he was twelve years old when he disappeared, and the boy I saw was very little, three years old according to my calculus."
Ben nodded, his eyes stretching at the information she was providing him. One would think he was impressed. He should be. Gloria looked like a serious detective right now.
"All the known abductions took place in Northern Virginia, but the fact that I saw my son again here in Bedford only proves that the unsubs likely work and live here as well, in a home that is probably isolated and filled with seemingly excessive security measures."
Ben sighed gravely, pinching the bridge of his nose. "I don't get it. Why didn't you show me this before?"
"It wouldn't change anything," she said. "Besides, I told you how I thought your daughter's case was connected with Charlie's. You didn't believe me."
Ben's face dropped, and he cursed silently. He picked up the last picture, his eyes crying with no tears. I found his hand and squeezed it.
"Have you tried to talk with the other parents?" I asked her.
She smiled sadly. "Yes, but they didn't listen to me. It looks like they found their own kind of closure." I nodded, understanding what she was saying.
"I made a drawing of the woman I saw. I mean, I tried to," she said, handing me the draft. The woman in the paper was blonde, her eyes black coal, face rigid and firm. I had never seen her before in my life.
"Read me your list," Ben said all of a sudden, his knuckles white as he put down Kelly's photo. "The one with the things that happened before Charlie was kidnapped. If we want to start somewhere we must start by finding a crossing point, a signature, something that connects all these cases."
Gloria nodded obediently and picked it up. "Monday: I went shopping with Charlie, he needed a new bath suit for his swim classes; Tuesday: Charlie and I went visiting my mother, he fell asleep on the couch; Wednesday: Charlie sprained his foot playing soccer with his friends, I took him to the hospital, the doctor said it wasn't serious and sent us home; Thursday: I had an emergency at my work and I couldn't take Charlie to school, he went alone on his bike. Charlie disappeared."
My breathing staggered. "Can you repeat what happened Wednesday, please?" I asked her.
"Yes, of course. Charlie sprained his foot playing soccer with his friends, I took him to the hospital, the -"
"Stop there," I looked up at Ben. His eyes were widen with realization too. "Kelly went to the hospital one day before she was kidnapped too."
We all exchanged glances. Then, Gloria spoke, "It can't be a coincidence."
"No, it can't." Ben agreed. "Gloria, bring your drawings and the kids photos. We are going to the hospital."
...
Ben Anderson's P.O.V
It was midnight and the hospital's parking lot was practically empty.
"Let's go," I said.
We walked towards the receptionist balcony where a blonde lady leaned carelessly against the chair, typing on the keyboard.
I cleared my throat, looking sideways. The lady lifted her head. "Hi, sir, how can I help you?"
I showed her my cop badge, reading her name on the tap of her shirt. "Mrs. Lindsay, I'm an FBI agent. I need to ask you a few questions."
She straightened up immediately, flushing slightly. "Mr. Officer, h-how can I help you?"
I looked at Gloria beside me, asking her for the drawing. She handed it to me, her hands trembling nervously. "I need to know if this woman was in this establishment on September 5 at ten o'clock for an appointment with Doctor Grey, please."
She looked down at the photo. "What's her name, please?"
"We don't know the woman's name. That's why we gave you the drawing." Gloria stated, clenching her hands repeatedly to stop them from trembling. Mary appeared beside her in a second, clapping hold of her hands and squeezing them. She smiled comfortingly at her. It was as though she was telling her something only Gloria could understand.
The receptionist righted her glasses, arching us an eyebrow. She shook her head tenuously and looked up at me. "I need her name. Otherwise, I can't find her file. I'm sorry."
I cursed inwardly and leaned over the balcony. "Just look out for Doctor Grey's patients on September 5 and try to find someone who matches this woman's appearance. We just want to know if she was here that day."
She nodded quietly, typing on her keyboard, her eyes diverting to the drawing every three seconds. I darted my eyes to Mary and Gloria, who were holding hands and looking expectantly at the receptionist. I twisted the ring on my finger, my stomach pinching in anticipation.
"I'm sorry," Lindsay lamented. "No one seems to match that woman's appearance."
"Then look at the other days. She has to be one of her patients."
"Mr. Officer, with all due respect, Doctor Grey's patients are almost countless. You can't expect me to look out for this woman in the middle of all those files. It would take days. If only you knew her name it would be much easier."
"But we don't know her name," It was Mary's turn to interject, a muscle twisting involuntarily at the corner of her eye. "Can you please call Doctor Grey then? She might recognize her from one of her patients."
"I'm afraid Doctor Grey is on vacations at the moment."
I cursed, but out loud this time. "There must be something you can do."
She scratched the tip of her nose. "Well, I could give you her email. Then, you would just have to send her the drawing and she would give you the information you want."
"No," I banged my fist on the balcony. "We can't wait that long. It has to be now."
"Is there any problem here?" A severe voice asked.
"Nurse Alice," Lindsay seemed relieved. "This officer here wants some information of one of our patients. Maybe, you will be able to help."
I gazed the nurse once she approached us. The woman was clearly old, but fighting every step of the way. Her hair was a jet black and the white skin of her face looked too wrinkled. I would give her sixty-years-old or more, but since she still worked I couldn't be sure.
Her gaze fell on me. "How can I help you, Officer?"
"He wants to know if this woman is one of Doctor Grey's patients," Lindsay answered for me, handling her the drawing.
Nurse Alice pursed her flat lips, blinking her eyes a few times before looking up. "I know this woman. She's not one of Doctor Grey's patients, but her son was."
"Her son?" I asked, dazzled.
She nodded, walking around the balcony and leaning towards the computer. Lindsay got up immediately, allowing her to sit down.
"I was finishing my internship here in the hospital when I met her, twenty-five years ago. I was Doctor Grey's assistant, and Dorothy's son was one of her regular patients," she paused, typing fast on the keyboard. She turned the screen to us. "Here's his file. His name was Vince, a very good boy, quiet and sensitive. It was a huge loss for the hospital when he died. We all loved the boy," she sighed, sadness written in every line and crease on her face. "His mother still comes here once in a while. She likes to sit beside the children's area. Vince loved to play there."
I gazed at the boy's file on the screen. His name was Vince Campbell Frost, born on March 12 of 1987. I checked the cause of death. He had died of leukemia on November 29. He was only ten years old.
My eyes widened when I looked up at the small photo with the information below, and before I could even react, Gloria's strident voice pierced through the air.
"But that's Charlie!" The color had drained from her face, her hands twisting and shaking like leaves on the wind as she pointed towards the photo. "That's not her son. He's my son, my Charlie."
Mary looked dazed as well, steadying Gloria to prevent her from falling. They were right to be startled. The boy in that photo looked exactly like Charlie, if not even the same.
"There must be some mistake. Are you sure this is his file?" I asked Nurse Alice who looked just as startled as we were.
She blinked her eyes a few times. "Yes, I'm sure. This is the boy's file. I have here some of the mother's information, should I send it to you?"
"Yes, please," I wrote my email and my contact in a piece of paper and handed it to her. "Send all of it, and call me as soon as Doctor Grey returns from her vacations."
She nodded, giving me back the drawing. "Yes, of course. I must know, though, is there any-"
"That should be all, thanks," I said, slipping fifty dollars to each one of them to bride their silent. I was now closer to find my daughter's captors than I had ever been before. The last thing I needed was the press to mess that up.
"Where are we going?" Mary asked. I opened the door and slide in the car, putting my seat belt and starting the engine. "Ben, what are you doing? Stop, we must do something."
"We will," I passed her my phone. "Check out my email." I bent over, taking my GPS from the glove box. "Did she send it already?"
She nodded. "Good, now write down the address on the file. We are going to that house and we are going to find that woman."
...
Kelly's P.O.V
Three days had passed since I had last seen Murphy and made up that lie. Miss Dorothy had reached her sweetest level. She allowed us to be in the living room for as long as we wished. She bought me five dresses and new shoes. Every night she would let us watch a movie of our choice, and in the mornings she would take us to the lake and let us swim if we wanted.
It was in one of those mornings, while Vince, Thomas and I swam in the lake, that Miss Dorothy called me to sit beside her on the grass and asked me how I was feeling. I was shocked but still alert. Hannah knew my secret. What if she told Miss Dorothy the truth? Yet, deep down, I knew she wouldn't. The last thing she wanted was for Murphy to come back.
Mr. Colton hadn't been around so much. Apparently, he had been busy at work. Vince told me he was a private gardener. He didn't work for a company or anything like that. Instead, he worked on his own so he wouldn't have to depend on anyone. I remembered Murphy mentioning something about Vince helping Mr. Colton sometimes, so I asked him about it.
He didn't open up much about the subject, only that he helped him when he needed. He was still quite reserved about these subjects, especially now that I had been so focused on getting out of here.
I had made a list of the things I knew and the things I did not know. The base of my plan was basically convincing Miss Dorothy to take us out of the house, which wasn't very hard since I was in her good graces. I took my chance in one of those movie nights when she asked me if I needed something. I said I would like to go shopping with her, get some air. It didn't work that well since she bought me all those clothes the next day. I didn't know how she did it. For all I knew she didn't even leave the house.
But then again, maybe she had someone on the outside working for her. It couldn't be Mr. Colton since he was certainly doing his own things during the day. I doubted it would be Jonathan either since he was now probably too busy dealing with his son to have time for shopping.
Apart from my certitude in escaping, Vince hadn't changed his mind about leaving. I didn't try to convince him otherwise. Instead, I gave him space.
Vince was the reason for my sanity in this place. I had grabbed onto him for salvation and forgot there was none. There was no light here. Vince wasn't going to save me. He wasn't enough. Not until I got out of here anyway.
Every day, I would follow a routine. A sort of list with the things I needed to do every day. The list went somewhat like this: 1- Discreetly ask Miss Dorothy to let us out of the house (excluding the trips to the lake of course); 2- Find out the main key of all the locks of the house; 3- Convince Vince to escape with me and Thomas (this one was still in progress); 4- Continue my reading/ writing lessons with Thomas; 5- Stop feeling guilty for Hannah. She's alone because she wants to.
It was working pretty fine. I had actually just finished my lessons with Thomas. It was overwhelming how fast he learned. He had fallen asleep half an hour ago, curled around my leg and his doll Elisabeth. I was stroking his soft curls, scribbling on a paper a potential plan in case Miss Dorothy gave in into my requests when I heard his voice.
"I need to show you something," He was sat on the sofa, his eyes strained on the night outside.
I furrowed. "Show me what?"
He looked up at me. "Is he sleeping?"
I nodded. Vince got up and headed to the window, his hand fisting inside his pocket jeans. "Come here, Kell."
I flushed at the nickname. No one had ever called me Kell before. Once I was in front of him, a five step distance separating us, I noticed something metallic on his hand.
"What's that?"
He opened his palm, his eyes glinting along with the moonlight. "A key." He answered, twisting it in his palm. He leaned towards the small padlock on the window.
"Vince, what are you..." I stopped mid-sentence when he pushed the window up, letting the smell of the night fill the room and lift up the power. The roof peaked directly in front of the bedroom window. It didn't look that much stable. "What... how did you..."
"I will explain later." Without a second word he prompted himself and climbed to the roof. I gasped horrified, sticking my head outside. Vince was already climbing to the top, though.
"Vince!" I called out for him. This was seriously not happening right now. "What are you doing? Come back here."
He turned himself slightly, his eyes connecting with mine. "Do you need help climbing up?"
I blinked. Was he serious right now? "I'm not going to climb up, Vince. It's too dangerous. Now, please come back, it's not safe up there."
"C'mon, Kell. I will help you." He said, descending the roof and stretching his hand for me.
"I'm not going to climb it."
"Why not?" He paused, his eyes widening. "Are you afraid of heights?"
I bit my lip. "No..." I dragged out the word. "I don't think so."
"C'mon, then. You will love once you are here." I sighed in defeat and accepted his hand.
The roof was shaped like a valley, ranging below our feet. We sat on the very top, and although it was uncomfortable to sit in a V-shape, I hardly noticed it. I was lost in the breeze caressing my face and the starlight night sky that stretched above our heads like a blanket of stars and constellations.
"I told you would like it." Vince murmured beside me, looking up at the sky.
"How did you get that key?"
He sighed, glancing distantly at me. "My birthday is coming. I will be nineteen by the end of this month." My body went numb for a few seconds. I shivered momentarily, blinking the pain away. Vince observed me for a while. Then he let out a breath. "It's just a day, Kell, like any other."
"No, it's not," I argued. "It's your nineteenth anniversary and you're going to spend it in this hell."
"Not hell," he said, quickly. "It can never be hell if you're here, Kell." My stomach pinched dangerously, my cheeks growing impossibly warm. I looked away.
Your family needs you.
I sighed, knowing my inner voice was right. I cleared my throat, changing the subject. "So I suppose she gave you this key as a present."
"She didn't give me the key. She asked me what I wanted, and I asked for this."
My chin nearly fell. "Are saying of all the things you could have chosen, you chose this?" I asked, outraged. He could have chosen so many things. He could have chosen to leave the house. Miss Dorothy would gladly fulfill his wish. I was certain of it. She loved him.
"Yes." He said it like a little boy whose wish had just come true, like a bird whose wings have been returned after decades without flying. I felt a dull ache in the pit of my stomach, and yet I tried to stay firm. I was still mad at him.
"When I was a kid I used to climb the roof of my house at night." He started telling me, his eyes getting lost in that remote horizon that was his childhood.
"I felt like I was under a mantra of infinitude, like I was one step away from touching the sky. I would look up at the stars and question life. Where does it all end and where does it all begin? What lies behind the border of the universe? What if we didn't exist? What if nothing existed? That last question terrorized me the most. What if nothing existed? I would even find myself repeating-"
"The word nothing in your head thousands of times until the inevitability of the answer was too scary to go on." I completed him.
Vince's eyes were as wide as they could stretch. "How did you know?" He asked, shocked.
"I used to do the same thing." I told him. "I think everybody does it."
He nodded, darting his eyes to the mantra of stars above our heads. "It's not fair." He said after a while, sighing. "It's not fair that they get to be so beautiful up there when everything is so ugly down here."
"Not you." I mouthed the words without thinking.
Suddenly, I felt my cheeks wet. I looked up at the sky. A pattern of drops tumbled like God's own poetry, each drop a single letter in a serenity song.
I glanced up at him. I couldn't help myself. Vince had lifted his face towards the sky, his eyes shut like he enjoyed the feeling of the rain on his skin. We didn't speak. The most absurd thing was that we didn't even need words. Meanwhile, my head was already resting in the mystery that laid between his neck and his arms, his veins calling me to the space in him where my skin didn't dare to touch for so long. We stood there, hearing our breathings soothing as everything stopped around us.
The rain kept hammering down, battering the roof like a hail of bullets and swallowing down our bodies in a blanket of water.
I let out a breath. "If I tell you something, will you promise you won't get mad at me?" I asked him, after a long while.
"I could never be mad at you, Kell."
I gulped, pulling away so that I could look at him better. "Do you remember that day when I found you in the bathroom and thought you were dead?" He nodded distantly, gritting his teeth at the memory. "Before that, I was in your bedroom, and I-I..." I bit the inside of my cheek, forcing myself to continue. "I read the things you wrote. I know I shouldn't have. I know I should have asked you first and all of that, but I just..." I shook my head. "Never mind, I'm sorry."
"What did you read?" His voice was shaky, barely audible.
"Some old poems, but I didn't read them all, just a few." The rain was falling stronger now. Yet, neither of us moved. "Vince, you're a fabulous writer, truly. I never read anything like that. I can really see you becoming a writer in the future."
Vince rolled his eyes at that, his long lashes stuck together in clumps of water. I bumped my shoulder against his slightly. At least, he wasn't mad at me.
"I saw something that startled me, though," I told him, getting to the real subject. Vince arched an eyebrow at me, his lips trembling. "There was a photo of you as a baby along the papers. How's that possible if you were kidnapped at ten years old?"
He sighed gravely and looked down at his tight hands. "I don't think it's me in that photo."
I furrowed. "What do you mean? It looks exactly like you."
"I was sixteen when I found that photo in Miss Dorothy's bedroom. I hide it and stayed with it until this long. I think what always frightened me the most wasn't even the shocking similarities, but what was written behind the photo."
I straightened up, my clothes heavy and glued to my body, my hair dripping water. "I didn't see anything written."
"It's on the back."
"What does it say?"
Vince heaved a breath, staring at the lake that stretched in front of us like a magnificent portrait, glistening and mirroring the dazzling assemblage of glittering stars. "It says: Because I refuse to forget you. Vince Campbell Frost, 29th November of 1997."
He looked at me again, and before I could even open my mouth, he said. "As you probably know, that's not my name, at least not my real one."
What's your real one then? I wanted to ask. Instead, I said. "And what about the date?"
"That's the thing that scares me the most. It's when I was born."
...
Once in the bedroom, Vince gave me one of his sweatshirts and a pair of trousers to wear. I was starting to think that his wardrobe was my wardrobe. A few minutes later, I got out of the bathroom, my hair still quite damp from the rain.
It was pouring down like currents outside, the type of rain that hit your skin as if it would go right through it. Dark clouds had begun to roll in, anticipating a monstrous storm.
I walked up to Thomas to check if he was alright. He was sleeping peacefully, his hair swooped across his sweaty forehead. I covered him better, moving his hair and kissing him gently.
Vince was sat in a blanket across the other side of the room, his legs crossed and eyes closed. I tiptoed my way to him, noticing how he had even set a circle of pillows and two candles to light up the room on the floor. If I didn't know him better I would think this was a pajama party or a yoga session. I couldn't help but smile though. I sat cross-legged, positioning myself across from him and the window.
Moonlight streamed in through the window's glass, lightening the room slightly and making shadows on the wooden floor. Outside, the storm grew in intensity, lightning strikes beginning to repeat every second.
I shivered. "Are you going to sleep on the floor tonight?"
Vince opened his eyes abruptly at the sound of my voice. He shook his head. "No, I don't think so. I just thought I could read you something."
"Something you wrote?"
"No, a short story I read a long time ago." He said, picking up the small book beside him. It was a tale's book.
"Which one?" I asked, approaching him so that I could see him better.
He opened the book. "It's called the chained elephant." He started reading, slowly and stuttering at some parts, the story of a circus elephant that was chained to a stake when he was very, very small. At first, the elephant had tried to break free from the stake, pushing and pulling it with all the strength he had.
I closed my eyes and tried to imagine the little newborn elephant trying to break free from the stake, day after day. I could almost see him falling asleep exhausted by the effort, but still thinking about trying again the next morning.
However, everything was useless, Vince went on. The stake was too strong for a newborn animal, even in the case of an elephant. Until one day, the saddest days of his short life, the little elephant accepted that he could not free himself and surrendered to his fate.
Years went by and the elephant grew strong, strong enough to destroy that stake that stole away so many years of his life. The only problem was that the elephant wouldn't try. The huge and powerful elephant that people saw in the circus wouldn't escape. He thought he was unable to do so.
The poor animal had the failure etched in his memory so much that he wouldn't put his strength to test again. He was convinced that he couldn't break free from the stake, and so he wouldn't. And the worst of all was that he never questioned that memory again.
I felt him in front of me before I could feel anything else, his forehead a few inches away, his fingers brushing against my fingers as if he was trying to comfort me for something I was about to feel.
And he was right. Slow desolate tears ran from my unblinking eyes and dripped steadily into my sweatshirt because this wasn't just a tale he had chosen to tell me. This was his story. He was the elephant.
I soaked on a deep breath, wiping the tears with the back of my thumbs. "It's a really sad story."
"I know," he whispered, his breath caressing my skin. "And it doesn't have a happy ending."
I stared into his eyes. "But it doesn't have to be like that," I told him firmly. "The elephant would never know what he's capable of if he doesn't try again. He will never escape if he doesn't believe that he can. And he can. He can because he has hope."
Vince lost his breath, his face falling into gravity. "But he's afraid."
"He is," I agreed. "But that's what makes him even stronger, the fact that he doesn't let it stop him."
"He knows that now," he said after a long while. "He knows he can't stay there forever, that he can't let her stay there forever because of him. He knows she has to go. And he wants it too. He does."
We looked at each other at the same time. And, at the same time, our arms open. Mine found his back, pulling him towards me, and his hands landed on my shoulders and drew me into his warm chest. We hugged for an eternity, our bodies finding the best in one another. I didn't want to leave this embrace, and I didn't for a long while.
When I did, I said. "Will you leave with me?"
He nodded. "I was waiting for the perfect moment to tell you, but I think now is it. We are going to leave the house on my birthday. We do it every year, ever since my first birthday, they take us to Smith Mountain Lake to go camping. I thought it could be our shot."
My heart nearly exploded, and I cried of happiness. I couldn't believe this was happening right now.
"I need to show you something," Vince said, and something in his voice scared me. He picked up a candle and forwarded me to his closet.
"What is it, Vince?"
"Help me push this aside." We did it like he said, trying to minimize the noise not to wake Thomas. I looked forward, a part of me hoping there would be some secret passage in front of me. But it wasn't. Instead, I was met by a scratched wall, just like mine and Elisabeth's, only this time with words.
I felt his fingers interlacing with mine, giving me the strength to face the son of a bitch that was this world. In front of me laid repetitive phrases.
I looked ahead and read the phrases like prayers in the night. I read them out loud, knowing that it would never be loud enough. Some of those souls, terrible souls, would never be truly free. They belonged to the night, to what God thought it was fair.
Dylan was Here
Beth was Here
Hannah was Here
Thomas was Here
Jake was Here
Vince squeezed my hand. I could feel his tears. They shouted throughout the room, but not loud enough, never loud enough.
I read the last one, which was actually the first one, realizing that nothing would ever be fair again.
Charlie was here
Author's note: ______________
Finally, we know the meaning of the title!! I was so excited for this moment. Tell me everything that u think! Did u like Ben's POV? Are u super confused with this whole information or did u finally pull the strings together?
And what about Vince and Kelly? The story, Vince telling her the reason why he couldn't escape, the roof, the wall... Tell me your thoughts.
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>> gif of Velly at the side when they are on the roof. I will put a song later called 'Lost stars'. I hope u like it. Love u all!