Page 67 of Teach Me How To Fly

He seemed to think that I was the same stupid, silly girl he used to do as he pleased with.

“I guess it’s been hard to be locked in for so much time, right?”

How did he know about this?

I didn’t mention a thing about being kept in the house all these years, nor did I tell him that my father kept me away fromliving my life. Did someone keep him updated on what I was doing?

“I haven’t been locked anywhere,” I briefly lied, trying to believe myself so he wouldn’t notice it. “You must be affected by the pills you’re taking here.”

He smiled, and my body trembled with fear as if I waited for him to tell me to count to six.

Fuck. No. Control yourself, Annalise.

“I don’t need pills to know the truth, Annalisa. Remember, I’ve been on this earth for much longer than you, so I know better.”

He was intimidating, but I didn’t want to show him that he was successfully manipulating me and turning me into that vulnerable girl he was taking advantage of. I had to show him that nothing he had done to me made me what he wanted me to become. He was just gaslighting me and playing the “I’m older, I know better, and you should respect me” card, and I wasn’t buying any of it.

Now, I was the woman no one could ever destroy again.

“I’m not here for your predicaments, Sylvian,” I quickly said, putting my elbows on the edge of the table. “I’m going to ask you some questions, and you have to give me the correct answers.”

His smile disappeared, and I was convinced that if it wasn’t for him being tied up on the chair, he would’ve put his hands on the table to get closer to me. I saw the little movement of his feet when he heard what I said, but he couldn’t do more than that considering how well he was tied there.

“And why would I do that?”

“I’ll offer you something in exchange for your answers.”

He kept the silence a few more moments, and then he let his lips curve up into a smile.

“You are too old now to give me what I’d want from you,” he said, licking his lips as he looked at me up and down.

I knew he was portraying me small in his mind now, and that made my stomach twist with a strong need of wanting to puke. I wanted to burst out in painful cries, to shout in his face everything I couldn’t when I was little, yet I managed to refrain myself and be content with just gulping the lump that got stuck in my throat.

This was the moment I was either going to convince him or make him not want to cooperate with me.

“Think about anything you want and I’ll give it to you.”

He narrowed his eyes at me and licked his lips, then he let out of his mouth a penetrating laugh that made me uncomfortable.

I was scared of what he was going to tell me, but I had to accept it. I needed answers, and if I was sure about a thing, it was that a bad person always told the harsh, painful truth to you just to hurt you even more.

“Freedom. I want freedom,” he said with his honeyed tone of voice.

I saw that answer coming from him.

I looked him in the eyes as I was analyzing the entire situation, and I knew how hard it was going to be for me to get him out of the sanatorium. Little Annalise freaked out at the thought of that, but the woman I was now didn’t.

I was scared that if he got out of the sanatorium, he would’ve done to other children the same things he did to me and that wasn’t an option. He wasn’t going to get out of here, but he didn’t have to know that.

He was going to rot here.

“Deal,” I lied freely, confident in my words to make him believe me.

“What guarantee do I have that you’ll get me out of here?”

That was what I wanted him to ask me because that was the beginning of my well put stage play.

“I have nothing left in my life. I have no one I could call family, everyone around me lied to me, and I sincerely don’t care if I step out of this room and die. I just want to know the truth, that’s all I have left, and for that, I’ll give you your freedom.”

---