Isolated Property - Bonus Scene 05

He smiled too, not his cocky smile, but some broken thing that was still learning how to use those muscles again. He took her hand and led her to the kitchen, stopping for a moment when she swayed as dark spots danced in her vision, and scooping her up to carry her the rest of the way.

He put a plate of rice and eggs in front of her, a spoon stuck into the rice for her. She waited, her hands crossed in her lap until he came back with coffee. He smiled again, more confident this time when he saw she wasn't feeding herself. He took up the spoon and gave her a small mouthful.

Taste exploded on her tongue, as if every grain of salt and every ounce of fat was making itself known to her for the first time ever. She moaned with pleasure and swallowed it quickly, opening her mouth for more.

"Go easy, Angel." His voice sounded more normal now, a brightness in his vowels returned that dulled when he was too far down a dark place. "You gotta let your stomach adjust."

She nodded obediently and let him set the pace.

"Things are going to change, Angel," he waited to speak until after the first few mouthfuls so she was able to focus on more than just food. He was right, her stomach was filling rapidly. "I don't want to leave you in that position ever again, so we're gonna get you back on your feet and then you'll start coming with me on patrols." She nodded, eager to accommodate him. "You're good now, you know how to behave and I think you're ready."

Avery smiled, swallowing another bite. "I'll come with you anywhere." She did not want to be left alone again.

"I know, Angel. You're my good girl."

"Thank you."

The smile on his face was pure now, he beamed at her as she did him. "That's right."

She couldn't make it more than halfway through the food. The joy of the first taste settled back to blandness quickly, the pace still not slow enough to accommodate her shrunken stomach and she felt the food like a weight just under her ribcage. "Harrison," she started to say but the food was already coming back up. She turned and hurried back to the bathroom, holding her vomit in her hand and praying she made it to the toilet before the next wave came.

He followed her more slowly, walking in on her hunched over the bowl as she lost most of what he'd fed her. One large hand soothed her, pulling her hair back and running down her back. It was no use though, the smelly stuff was already matting the dull blond strands. He reached over and turned on the shower, letting it run hot until she'd finished heaving.

"Wash up, take your time. I'll clean the kitchen and make you something easier on the stomach."

He left her then and she crawled into the shower, letting the hot water run over her, reviving her a bit. She stood, embracing the steaming spray on her body, feeling more human again. She drank deeply again and cleaned the taste of vomit away. It was the first shower she'd taken alone in what must have been a year at this point. She turned the temperature up, enjoying how it turned her skin pink.

Avery was washing shampoo out of her hair when she heard the thud of his ax outside. If he was chopping wood it was a good sign, it helped bring him back down to earth. She listened further, waiting until he hit the rhythm she was looking for, the one that had been the soundtrack to many of her hours spent waiting for his mind to settle.

Maybe things would change.

He'd put a smoothie for her on the kitchen table. She left it there on her way to the back porch. She needed both hands anyway. She left white plaster marks on the door as she pushed it open but quickly returned her grip. The wood pile was off to the left and the support beam to the porch room partially hid him from her view.

She took one step to the side and swung the pistol up.

Muscle memory was an amazing thing. Despite the weakness she felt, and the weight both physical and emotional of the cuffs on her wrist, or the cool spring evening air on her wet skin, she knew exactly when she had her shot lined up. It was the same feeling she'd had when she was 10 and she had hit her dad's furthest target for the first time, the same as the test for her instructor license at the shooting range, the same as in basic training. Her arms complied, her eyes lined up the shot, her muscles tensed to hold her steady and she pulled the trigger.

The first two shots hit him in the upper left chest and shoulder. The third went over him as he fell. The fourth took out his right arm at the bicep that was still clutching the ax. She paused, listening to his wheezing breath before she stepped down off the porch. She walked over slowly, gun aimed at his chest as he struggled to make it rise. She saw the left side wasn't heaving like the right. The bullet missed his heart but got his lung. Her suspicions were confirmed when she came up next to him and his mouth was full of blood. He coughed wetly and sent it spraying into the air. For a moment she stood there, watching the dark liquid pour out of his wounds and onto the grass, his face turned towards her in shock and pain. She saw it there, the lost man who had so desperately sought sanctuary, his eye pleading to make her violence towards him untrue, the true fear of finally losing.

"A-Angel," he gasped, the blood pouring over his chin as he lifted his head and tried to reach for her.

"Fuck you, Harrison." She raised the gun again and put the fifth one in his right cheek and out the top of his head.

"I win."

His face was still, completely. The mark below his right eye might have been a trick of the light in the evening, though the blood streaked from his mouth was harder to explain. She crouched where she was, the pistol balanced on her right knee, finger still on the trigger in case he rose again. Her eyes locked on his chest. No movement.

The plaster under her fingernails irritated her. Her left thumb picked absently at the other fingers before a sharp pain under her nail drew her attention. A small ribbon of red wove itself through the white.

"Fuck." she muttered. Cuts under the nail were the worst.

She'd been careful when she'd taken the mirror off the wall so it couldn't be glass, more likely some splinter from the wall got caught. The water had been running, and the regular thunk of his ax helped her time her movements between logs. The mirror had been painted in so it took force she didn't deserve to have in her state to wedge the small nail file from the medicine cabinet between the frame and the wall. Once the crack had started though, the mirror came away easily.

The steam from the shower was filling the room as she felt along the wall for the square she'd hollowed out so many months ago. Pure plaster felt different than the painted plastered wall and it gave a little when she pressed on it. The steam helped. Nail file and fingers dug in, the softening white crumbling as she clawed at it. Would it still be there? Had he found this one too? Maybe he'd known about it all along and just let her believe there was one last tiny shred of hope? Was this was all part of his plan? She was failing his test, there was no way to hide what she was doing now.

The ax was still falling outside.

Whatever thoughts had entered her head, somehow her body knew to keep moving; some part of her that had held out against everything he'd done was in charge even as the panicked, beaten part of her sobbed for their rebellion. When the plastic of the moisture barrier bag came into view it didn't matter. She crushed the weeping girl in her head. Weakness and hunger were forgotten. A strong surge of hope, something so visceral it almost felt like a blow to her chest from the inside, carried her to the floor as her fingers worked to open the seal.

It wasn't until the layers of vapor paper were gone and she'd slid the clip into the gun smoothly, a testament to her thorough care before she'd sealed it away, that reality set in. This was it. She had him. Hatred, fury and delight swirled inside her. He was never going to touch her again. She'd never cared for anything as much as she did for the weapon in her hand. Deliverance. Revenge. Fucking victory.

And it had delivered her, effortlessly loading the bullet, not one particle of rust to slow the hammer or to obstruct the path of the bullet through the barrel. It gave her his death, her freedom, when nothing and no one else had been able to.

His face hadn't changed, even as the evening moved to night. The rest of his head on the ground behind him glistened softly in the porch light. Her heart slowed as she took in his death, and the full weight of her weakened state began making itself known again. She stood up slowly, her eyes still on his body. He looked so scared, his eyes wide, mouth open in shock. Good.

The smoothie was still cool when she got back inside, he'd made her his favorite with blueberries and banana. The sugar helped steady her. She put the handgun on the table and sat, shivering. Her fingers went to the buckles on her wrist cuffs and she quickly dislodged them, tossing the heavy things on the table, followed by the ankle cuffs. She struggled with the collar, the buckle was stiff and she couldn't see it well. She walked back to the bathroom, stepping on the mess of plaster dust and chunks on the floor so she could use the mirror propped against the mutilated wall. Finally her thumbnail slid under the tight strap so she could ease the prong out of the hole. When she got it off she threw it into the mess on the floor and didn't look back.

His clothes were in the closet, neat little rectangles; she chose a long flannel and a pair of boxers, leaving a pile of discarded options on the floor. She passed the forbidden door down to the basement on her way back to the kitchen. There was a padlock. She wasn't interested in going back to the body outside to find his keys just yet.

Everything felt unfamiliar now that she could simply reach out and touch it, walk where and when she wanted. The only thing she'd been allowed to do was make coffee and tea so she did that first, but hunger won out before the kettle boiled. The fridge was stocked and overwhelming with options. She hadn't decided what she got to put in her mouth in so long. She grabbed an apple, and then a block of cheese and sat down with a sharp knife, eating slices of both directly from the blade. Her toes ran over the bolts that held the kitchen table in place when he'd been using her on it. She ducked her head to get a look at them. A wrench would do to get those out. She needed to find his tools.

The kettle started shrieking and she jumped a bit, hitting her head on the underside of the table. The embedded rings would come out quickly with pliers, but she needed to find a ladder for the ones in the ceiling. The pulley system on the porch could wait for tomorrow. She could have the cabin back to livable fairly quickly. The rocking chair and the couch would make a great bonfire.

She left the apple core and cheese crumbs on the table and walked into the living room, glancing at the furniture. The coffee table would also have to go, she'd been tied to it too many times. The armchair could maybe stay, though he had sat in it with her at his feet so many times. No, it would also burn. The bed certainly. It was going to be a pain to drag all this outside. But she could just pile it all on top of him and watch them all disappear into ash.

Maybe that's what he did with the body of the man who had almost saved her. Knowing Harrison no one would find it. Avery paused, her eyes going back to the padlock on the door to the basement. There was almost surely a phone down there. Did she owe it to that man to reveal herself to the world again? The world that had continued to turn, continued its onward march while she was imprisoned, used and tormented. The same place that had ignored her when she called out for help, that ran on systems that crushed people like her under their heels without so much as a backwards glance.

She could get used to eating at the kitchen table, once she removed all the restraints. Even the bed might survive her purge.

Her body sagged a bit, overwhelmed again. She needed to find a place she hadn't been fucked to sleep. She stopped at the basement door on her way to the bedroom, examining the padlock. The iron skillet in the kitchen made short work of it and she stepped over its twisted remains and down the steps.

There was a large wall of monitors showing night vision scenes from around the property. Avery was impressed. He'd wired the whole woods from the looks of things. His desk was military neat like the rest of the house, except for what she kept leaving behind her. She smiled a little. He'd have hated that. The rest of the desk was bare except for a pad and pen to the right of the keyboard. If her guess was right, anything he thought was worth keeping was in the safe next to the chair. The phone was red, snuggly fit into its cradle on the other side of the keyboard; the coiled cord hung over the edge of the desk, the two sides wrapping around each other to form a lovely spiral.

She sat on the bottom step, dizzy from the light exertion. The cut under her nail bothered her. She hadn't washed her hands from the plaster yet. She didn't mind leaving her fingerprints everywhere. She leaned her head against the wooden banister, closing her eyes. The smell was different down here. Damp but kept, and despite his mania there was no trash or rotting food. She took a deep breath. It didn't even really smell like him, not like the rest of the house. She could sleep down here for tonight. Decide who to call in the morning, she'd waited this long. What was one more day?

Her eyes flew open. What day was it? What time was it? The need to know seized her, pulled her up and through the black spots in her vision. She rushed to the monitor, her eyes seeking out the time stamp.

April 25th, 20:30.

Tears fell before she knew she was crying. 13 months. Almost to the day.

Her hand was on the phone, the number dialed. They'd already be asleep back East but her mom would know what to do, who to call.

"Hello?" a woman's sleep graveled voice answered.

"Mom?"

*****

It has been a rough road for all of us. It's been pretty epic starting my career in medicine just as the pandemic hit. Things started to ease up around May, which gave me space to think about something beyond when I was going to be able to sleep next but didn't quite crack the really entrenched writer's block that set in around 2018. Then, just when I took on a train commute (who doesn't love public transport?) I had the unique joy of learning what it was like to live under rocket fire. The suppressed trauma of a year in the hospital and the corona wards, and the fresh horror of running to bomb shelters and watching rockets streak towards me and my family kind of burst through the barriers in my head so I could torture Avery again and put a bullet in Harrison. Writing bondage scenes is a great distraction from staring out the train window and looking for rocket trails in the sky.

Is this the end? Who knows? If Marvel can make a Black Widow movie I can certainly revive these characters for any number of romps in the future. But for now, this is as much of them as I want to tell, as much as I have left in me.

Also, if you need a palate cleanser, I've updated the Siren epilogue and it's a bit sweeter than this outing.

Thank you to the readers who have written to me over the past few years. I am currently going through all the comments left since I was last on this site and I truly appreciate every one of you. And special thanks to Nora who has never given up on me.