Page 55 of Don't Speak

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

When I open my eyes again, I’m lying on an old mattress in one of the psych rooms. My arm is handcuffed to the rusted railing.

Tears form in my eyes when I feel a breeze caress my legs, and I look down and realize that my pants are gone.

I’m in nothing but a tank top and underwear, and that realization sends a paralyzing sense of fear through my body.

I don’t feel any pain between my legs, so I feel slightly relieved by that small grace.

I don’t know what time it is, but I can at least tell that it is daylight outside.

I can’t help but lie here and think about all the what-ifs.

What if I don’t survive this? What if I never see Dean again?

Oh my god, Dean. He had to have heard me scream.

He must have seen my stuff on the ground. Is he looking for me?

The tears begin to fall, and I roll over, facing the wall.

The handcuffs are a little too tight, and my hand feels like it's going numb.

The throbbing in my hand from where James stabbed a scalpel through it is starting to dissipate with the numbness taking over.

I lie here for what feels like hours before the door creaks open.

Using my other hand, I quickly wipe the tears away, not wanting to give him the satisfaction.

I slowly turn back around, but when I do, my eyes widen in surprise.

“Mom?” My voice cracks. My throat is so dry.

“Yeah, Nikki. It’s me.” She carries in a tray with what looks like a sandwich and a bottle of water on it. When she finally moves closer, I notice her hands are cuffed together. Aside from that, she actually looks… sober.

“They told me you disappeared,” I say, bewildered.

“Sean grabbed me from the house. I’ve been here ever since.”

“And.. you’re… sober?”

“Well, when you’re stuck in here without booze, the only way to go is up, I guess. Although, the first couple of nights were a bitch. Withdrawals suck ass.”

“You need to eat and drink something. Sean had me bring this to you.” She hands me the sandwich and water bottle, and I immediately scarf it down. I can’t remember the last time I ate.

As I’m taking the last bite, I look up at her.

I really look at her this time, noticing things I hadn’t when she first came in and handed me the tray.

She sports a yellowish bruise on her right eye, probably a couple of days old.

There’s dried blood on her shirt and under her nose.

Her arms and legs are covered in more bruises and some scratches.

It’s when I look at her hands that nausea threatens to expel what little I’ve eaten.

On her left hand, she’s missing her ring finger, and on the right, it’s her pinky.

By the looks of it, Sean has been busy. I swallow the lump in my throat and fight back the tears in my eyes.

“He blames us for ruining his life. He’s angry.” She looks away as though she’s feeling ashamed. Part of me feels sorry for her, the unhealed little girl inside who still loves her mother. The other part feels empty. Like I just don’t have it in me to care. Not after everything she’s done.

All I can do is stare at her, my eyes roaming her body and finding something new with every glance.

When I can’t take it anymore, I look away.

“That's why he won’t let me have any alcohol. He wants me to… feel it.” I can’t remember the last time I saw her sober.

If I had gotten the sober version of her more often than not, I think my life would have turned out much differently.

Before it got out of control, she was a great mom.

When she’s sober, she’s calm, happy, and fun to be around.

I think that’s why my brain and my heart have such a battle with each other when it comes to her.

I constantly mourn what I could have had with her.

“Has he told you how long he plans to keep us here?”

“No. I don’t honestly know what his plans are.”

I look down at the tray, tears threatening to make their appearance again. I can’t help but think about how much I miss Dean.

“Can I sit?” she asks, snapping me back to reality. She motions to the spot beside me on the bed. I nod, scooting over to make room.

“There’s something I never told you about Sean. You think that I did nothing, Nikki, and you would be right. I didn’t do what I should have when it mattered the most. But I did do something.”

I look at her in utter confusion, my eyes making contact with her ocean blues. “What do you mean?”

“After I forced you to… recant your statement, I told the guys about what happened.”

When my mother references ‘the guys,’ I know she’s talking about the motorcycle club she used to run with. My mother and Sean used to ride, and they made friends in certain places. I grew up in and out of biker bars. Probably some of the few good memories I actually have.

“The beat him, Nikki. They beat him and left him on the side of the road. It was pretty bad. He was in the hospital recovering for months. Afterward, he was excommunicated from every club in the area.”

My jaw is wide open, and my eyebrows are raised in surprise.

I never knew that happened. The trial never mentioned anything either.

They must have silenced him. Obviously, their tactics didn’t work too well, though, considering it didn’t scare him into not doing it again.

Thoughts of Dean’s sister cross my mind.

If I had just told my mother no and that I wanted to pursue charges, no matter what that would have done to her, maybe she’d still be alive.

“You were supposed to protect me.” I sob.

“I needed my mom, and you just kept choosing men and alcohol over me. I was never good enough for you, but you were always the one person I needed most.” I feel anger starting to fester, and I snap my head at her.

“You made me LIE! You chose your own self-preservation; you leveraged what little happiness I had and manipulated me into lying about everything that happened to me! I’ve been utterly brOKEN as a human because of you.

I’ve struggled to truly trust anyone because of you.

I have walls higher than Mt. Everest built around my heart because of YOU!

Because the one person who was supposed to love me and keep me safe more than anyone else DIDN’T CHOOSE ME.

So if you didn’t, how could I expect anyone else to?

!” I’m full-on screaming at this point. Everything I’ve built up over the years spills from my mouth.

I’ve pushed myself into the corner, wanting to just be far away from her at this moment.

“Sorry to interrupt this little mother-daughter bonding moment,” a voice says, goosebumps erupting on my skin. Sean stands in the doorway, his arms crossed, holding a gun. A gun . My heart begins to race, the fear of the unknown becoming a bit too much for me to handle.

“I see your mother has already filled you in on some of the details.”

“They should have finished the job,” I spit. “No one would have missed you.” I don’t know where this sense of bravery came from, but the words are coming out a whole lot more confident than I actually feel right now.

“That mouth of yours has always been a problem. Well, for the most part.” He says that last part with a shit-eating grin on his face, and I have to fight back the urge to break down. Being reminded of what he did has always sent me into an immediate panic.

“How was prison life? Did anyone make you their little bitch? I’m surprised to see you still walking, actually. I figured the other inmates would have taken care of that,” I taunt. Stupidly, I must admit.

Sean’s eyes darken, and pure rage graces his facial features. I must have hit a nerve. Suddenly, the gun is pointed in my direction, Sean still standing in the doorway.

“You think you’re so fucking smart, don’t you, Nikki? I wouldn’t have even been in prison if it weren’t for you! The letter that Charlie wrote was circumstantial at best. It was YOUR testimony that landed me behind bars!” he screams, his finger sliding over the trigger.

“You deserved every bit of what you got. You shouldn’t have been touching little girls, you fucking sicko!”

“Nikki! Stop!” my mother chimes in, hysterically crying at this point. She stands next to me, grabbing my hand and yanking on it. It’s no use. I’m just getting started. I have decades of built-up anger at the man standing before me, gun or not. All rationality has left the building.

“Did it make you feel manly? Did taking my innocence away make you feel all tough and strong? Did the big, bad, scary man feel like an alpha male after touching little girls?” I taunt, bringing my voice down in a mocking, baby-ish tone.

“You were worthless then, and you’re still worthless now.

You’ll live and die knowing your legacy on this earth is being a child predator.

No one will mourn you when you’re gone. Aside from your bitch of a son. ”

“That’s it!” he roars. “I’ve had enough!” I close my eyes, and suddenly, the sound of the gun goes off, and it feels like time slows right at that moment. Memories flash in my mind, but this time, only the good ones fill my head. It’s like my mind knows this is it. The end of it all.

Only the bullet never comes. I snap my eyes open, and standing before me, blocking the view of Sean in the doorway, is my mother.

I look down and see a red stain blooming on her chest. Just as her knees buckle, I catch her, trying to hold onto her as much as I can with one arm still chained to the bed.

I bring her down onto the mattress with me, her draped across my body.

The red bloom grows larger, spreading across the entirety of her chest. I pull my hands back to see them covered in blood.

I place them back over the wound, watching her take slow, shallow breaths.

They sound wheezy, and she’s struggling to breathe.

My brain finally catches up with the reality unfolding before me, and images of my childhood flash in my mind.

I get a glimpse of all the good moments we had, playing like a reel in my mind.

Our shopping days when I got to play hooky from school, her teaching me how to pitch in softball since she played too, all the times we ate junk food in her bed and watched movies while Sean was away on business trips.

It’s like my brain knows what is happening to her and is only allowing me to see the good, refusing to taint those memories of her.

“No, no, no! You’re gonna be fine. It’s gonna be fine.

We can fix this.” This time, when the tears form, I let them fall, unable to hold back the dam any longer.

“Why did you do that?!” I scream, looking down at her.

Her body shakes as she tries to get oxygen in.

“I-I-I’m s-s-orry. F-for every-y-y-th-i-ng.

I wish I-I could ha-have be-been a bet-ter mom t-to y-you,” she chokes out, blood starting to form in the corners of her mouth.

She turns those ocean blues to me one last time and says, “I love you, Nikkibug.” Then, she stills, her ocean blue gaze now lifeless before me.

“NO!” I scream. “Mom, please.” I shake her. “Please come back.” My voice cracks, and the tears keep falling.

“How ironic,” Sean mocks. “She couldn’t protect you then, and she died only to leave you and me alone together,” he says with a wicked grin.

He stalks over to me, grabbing my mother out of my lap and dragging her off to the side of the room.

He places the gun on a table out of reach from me.

Then, he strides back over to me, grabbing another pair of handcuffs from his back pocket, and he slaps them onto my free wrist, connecting it to the railing with my other one.

I officially have no way of fighting him off me.

Once he’s satisfied with his restraints, he straddles me, dipping his nose into my neck and inhaling.

“Mmmm, I’ve missed your scent.”

I fight the nausea and lift my neck up, grabbing onto his ear with my teeth and biting down.

He screams and immediately jerks his head away, but not before a piece of his ear is left in my mouth.

He looks down at me with a rage I’ve not seen yet.

I spit out the piece of his ear at him, and before I know it, he smacks me hard across the face.

The pain races up the side of my face, causing my vision to blur momentarily.

“I’m gonna take my sweet time with you. You’ll feel every ounce of my touch on your body, inside and out. Then, and only then, will I kill you. You’ll die knowing I was the last thing to touch you,” he growls.

The tears flow again. “Don’t you fucking dare!”

He leans down and licks the tears falling down my cheek. “You know I love it when you cry for me.”

Taking his hands, he runs them up my shirt, grabbing onto both of my breasts and giving them a rough squeeze. “These are much bigger than I remember,” he comments.

Next, he trails his hands down to the waistline of my underwear.

I know there’s nothing I can do to prevent this, so I decide to do the only thing I can to protect myself.

Disassociate . I travel into the depths of my mind, finding a happy memory I can live in for the moment.

Thoughts of Dean return, and I begin reliving all the moments the two of us shared.

I’m really going to miss him. I hope he finds peace one day about what happened to his sister. He deserves to be happy.

Just as I’m about to give in to the thoughts and check out of reality, Sean’s weight disappears, and I hear the sounds of fists meeting flesh.

I turn my head, trying to make out what’s happening on the floor.

When I’m finally able to focus on the ball of men wrestling beside me, hope fills my chest as I take in the sight of someone I thought I’d never see again.

Dean.