Page 57 of Trapped: Until The Darkest Of Night

She swallows, unable to take her eyes off her burning hair. It has curled and is partially white. There is a final flash of fire, after which almost everything has evaporated and burned. I turn away and, out of the corner of my eye, see her nervously tugging at the ends of her hair.

“Do you believe me now?” A hint of defiance darkens my words. I want an answer. I did this for her. And for the voice in my head that seems to think a girl’s allure is measured by her hair.

Lou wraps her arms around herself, looking like she’s trying to comfort herself. I probably did the wrong thing again.

“Do you believe me?” I ask again in a lower voice, gazing into the fire.

At some point, I feel her eyes on me and turn to her. Tears flow down her cheeks and drip down her chin to the ground.

“You’re crying.” I shake my head in surprise.

“Am not!” She wipes her eyes a few times with the back of her hand.

“Because of your hair? It’ll grow back.”

She breathes in and out deeply, opens and closes her fingers. She looks like she’s struggling to regain control.

“Things couldn’t go on the way they were. I need you to be less afraid somehow…well, I tried to anyway.”

She doesn’t look at me. “You made me think you were going to kill me.”

“I told you I wasn’t going to hurt you. All you had to do was trust me. It’s not my fault. I wanted… I wanted to make the situation here clear, once and for all.” I shrug, puzzled.

“So you did what had to be done. As is your nature.”

A single laugh escapes me, but it comes across as completely out of place, lonely and lost. “I told you I’m not a good person. Good people do good things.”

“And what do you do?”

I glance at the knife blade. The flames of the fire break on the reflective surface. I turn it slightly and see part of my face. Soot sticks to my chin and the scratch on my forehead, left by Lou, is glowing scarlet.

Too bad you don’t want to know who you are.

I push the voice away and put the hunting knife back in its leather sheath.

“Today, I cut hair. Tomorrow, I’ll build rabbit traps. The day after tomorrow, I’ll tell you where I found you—if you haven’t figured it out by then. Would that be a start?” I force a smile even though I don’t feel like it.

Lou backs away from me toward the spruces until the chain tightens. She doesn’t say anything else, instead looks at the RV, the forest, and then back to me. As if she doesn’t know what to do with herself and her thoughts.

I can’t stop looking at her. The shorter hair makes her appear younger, but her eyes are dull. Something in me pushes to the surface. A feeling, a knowledge that is still wordless and unformed. Lou doesn’t feel any safer with me, but seems completely lost. She is miles away from the girl who obliviously twirled in the evening light. She’s not the girl in my photos anymore.

I recall Dr. Watts’ explanation to me from years ago.

A trauma is always the loss of innocence. Trauma is the loss of a life that could have been lived if the injury had not happened.

All of a sudden I feel sick. It’s me who took the life she could have lived.

The innocence in her eyes, her vitality, her trusting nature—I shook her worldview by revealing what a wicked place this earth can be. She’ll never be the Lou I wanted to kidnap. My Little Miss Sunshine who the little boy was clinging to is gone forever.

Suddenly, I can’t bear the sight of her anymore and turn away. I clutch the silver coin on my bracelet tightly. I told myself I was better than my stepfather because I didn’t abuse Lou for base reasons, but that was a lie. Of course I mistreat her. Of course I torment her. She’s only here to make me feel better.

I take a few deep breaths, fighting back the burning urge to throw up. If I were a good person, I would let her go. Maybe then she would still have a chance to see the world the way it was before that day. But I cannot. Something inside me won’t let me finish that thought. I can’t let her go. Never again. Not ever.

I glance at her furtively. She is completely lost, a small, light shadow against the tall dark conifers. Entirely different from what I imagined. I shake my head. I’m most definitely not a good person. Good people do good things. Things I can’t do.

Chapter

Fifteen

---