Page 46 of Trapped: Until The Darkest Of Night

And then he’s gone…

Chapter

Thirteen

The boy is standing in front of the coffin, a coffin made for a child, for a very, very small child. The size is approximately for a six-year-old. But the boy is older than six, he can’t say exactly how old because it’s never his birthday. He’s grown lately, his pants now reaching his ankles. If he grows another twenty inches, he’ll be as tall as the man.

He’s still staring at the coffin, not knowing what the man intends to do with it. It’s also not as finely worked as the coffins that the man usually sells and that the boy has to polish and oil for hours—actually, it’s a box. The boy knows nothing of family or love, but he knows he would never put his dead child in such a box that was so carelessly thrown together.

“Who’s the coffin for, sir?” He lisps because his tongue is swollen. Every word stings his throat, which the man’s hands wrapped around yesterday and choked him until he almost lost consciousness.

“Well, what do you think?” The monster grins at him.

The boy’s stomach twists into a knot, he knows that grin. It promises danger.

“It’s too small for me, sir,” he dares to say.

The grin widens. “If I break your bones, how small do you think I could fold you up afterward?”

The boy shifts from one foot to the other, there isn’t a muscle that doesn’t hurt. The monster’s fists spared no spot.

“But don’t worry, you little shit, someone else will take your place in the coffin.” The man leaves the workshop and opens the adjacent, high-pitched squeaking steel door.

The boy hears a whimper and a chill runs through his veins.

The man can’t be serious. He only wants to scare him. He has already punished him for trying to escape. He’s not seriously going to…but deep inside he knows what’s going to happen. He knows it even before the man comes in with Blacky in his arms. Blacky’s legs are oddly twisted and he’s yelping and whimpering all the time…

The boy feels something pulling over him. A bell made of ice. Nothing can come close to him anymore. He wants to say something, but he can’t get a word out.

The man throws Blacky on the table. Blacky has only been fully grown for a month, a small retriever mix. The man bought him for himself, but Blacky never loved him, only the boy, the bastard with no name and no age. Eventually, the man gave up and tormented the dog as much as he could, knowing it would hit the boy even harder. Now Blacky is lying there on the table next to the coffin with broken legs.

The man pulls a thick rope from his pocket. “If you cry, if you make a sound, I’ll kill you. And that damn mutt will suffer even more. Maybe then I’ll burn him alive.” He bends Blacky’s legs even further and ties his four paws together.

The boy is standing there. How is he to weep when the horror is so great it mutes him? How should he weep when his chest is so constricted that tears cannot come out?

The dog’s whining is everywhere. Anywhere but under the bell that isolates the boy. He keeps swallowing, but he doesn’t cry. Although he wants to. This time he truly wants to because then the man would finally kill him. What is he supposed to do without Blacky?

Yes, yesterday he still wanted to run away, but he would have come for Blacky at some point. He had promised him that. So he took the key. For the first time, the man forgot to lock away the key for the back door before the boy was locked in the closet. The boy pocketed it, and when the man was in the bathroom, he used it. He unlocked it and ran through the yard. Running, running, he doesn’t remember much more, he can’t remember.

The man punches Blacky in the muzzle, yells for him to shut up. A thin thread of blood drips from Blacky’s lips, but he no longer whines. He just looks at the boy, but the boy can’t help him.

He will be alone again when Blacky is gone. It will be like before. His heart grows so heavy he feels like it’s going to fall out of his body. No, the boy can’t do it, he can’t stand it. Help me! He cries silently, not knowing who is to come. But suddenly there is a glowing red fog inside him.

“Step aside,” says a deep, unfamiliar voice. It comes out of the fog and the boy feels like he’s being pushed out of himself and someone else is stepping in his place.

He’s in the dark again. In this lonely silence of death. In a place without time. He could be in the coffin, he could be in the forest, he could be in the slums, he doesn’t know. He wants to scream, but he is mute. He just listens.

Wasn’t there something? Very quiet in the background? If he breathes shallowly, he can hear it. Yes, there is a voice. It somehow reminds him of the blue of bluebells. Of vastness, of the sky. He knows that voice; it whispers as if not wanting to wake him. He cannot move, but his mind follows the words. They are like wings that carry him to a better place. For a moment, he lets himself be carried away, forgets everything that was.

Coolness caresses my face. Birds are chirping all around me and a woodpecker is hammering somewhere. I blink a few times as if to focus my vision. The branch of a spruce bobs up and down in front of my face looking like a dark green fan. Dazed, I straighten up and try to wipe my eyes with my hand when raw pain shoots through my wrist.

Only then do I recall what happened: I had a flash and chained myself. But then it was twilight, now it’s daylight. Early in the morning. My heart skips a beat.

What did I do with Lou?

Where is she?

Stiff, I get up and take a few steps toward the motorhome. Luckily, I spot Lou right away. She is not lying under the RV as I told her, but sitting against the side. She looks as awful as I feel. Frozen, wet, and neglected, but she seems fine otherwise.

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