I decided to be Goth when my life started falling apart. My parents divorced in the worst way, my cat died, my goldfish died, and my little brother ran away from home never to be found again. First were the black outfits. The original intent was grieving for the dead pets, but somehow it became my wardrobe. Then I got a ton of piercings at the mall, and started wearing tons of thick make-up. My family didn’t even notice, though it’s not like I had much of that left anyways. My teachers tried to ignore it until I began coming to school late, smelling of alcohol (though I was never drunk), and occasionally ditching. I was sent to multiple counselors, notes and phone calls were made to my parents, and my friends even got in on it, suggesting I go to a counselor or something. I ignored it all.
At first I had rules about not drinking, or doing drugs, but when my drink was buzzed at a late night party, I was addicted to it at first sip. I was suddenly a druggie, and an alcoholic. I even chose liquor over getting my driver’s license. Eventually I dropped out of school completely and spent my days at parties being drunk, drugged, sick, or a mix.
Where were my parents, friends and counselors during all that time? Well, I refused to see a counselor, causing the loss of all my friends, save one, and my parents were basically out of the picture. Being divorced and all, I only had one parent at a time, and my mom was constantly out of the country, and my dad spent all his time at work, leaving before the sun got up, and coming back long after the time he assumed I had gone to bed. The one friend I still had is an idiot. He thought he could help me. His plans might have worked if I took the time to listen to him, but I didn’t. It was painfully obvious that Jake cared for me far more than I even did. It was almost insane the way he would help to cover my trails, came to rescue whenever I needed aid, he even skipped school to lend me hand a couple times. If I had let him council me back into better habits though, I would never have gotten into the terrible mess that is my life.
One night as I stumbled my way back to my house from a crazy party, a car pulled up beside me. Someone rolled down the window and offered me a lift. I was so stoned that I couldn’t even tell what color the car was, or figure out if the voice was male or female. Assuming it was Jake, I headed towards the car. In the fuzzy street lamp light, the van cast a dark shadow over me as I got closer to it. That isn’t right; Jake drives a small car, not a big van. By the time that epiphany reached my brain though, it was too late for me to do anything. The sliding door was open, and a black-gloved hand was pulling me into the car. The suddenness of it shook me awake, and I tried to scream, but there was a hand stuffing a rag into my mouth. The van sped away from the curb as the door closed. There were two people in the car, not including me. I strained to make sense of their words through my drunk and tired head. “She’s drunker than I thought humanly possible,”?
“Then we’re doin’ her ‘rents a fava,”
“True, but that means she can’t possibly be virgin,”
“She a pertty one, just gotta lose da make-up. Maybe we’ll get a good price on ‘er anyways,”
“Egrlafamerfin!” I tried to say, forgetting there was a rag stuffed in my mouth. The man next to me pulled the rag out so I could speak. “I am a virgin!” I repeated, annoyed. And it was true too, out of all my partying; I have never once had sex. It was one thing in my life that I was sure of. “Oh, really?” said the driver,
“Yeah really, I could never be a mother with the way I am,”
“Amazin’,” whistled the man next to me.
I glared at him. “Where are you taking me?” I demanded, suddenly remembering I was being kidnapped,
“Ha, says the drunk, underage girl who just hopped into a random car and shared her virgin state with her captors,” I stayed quiet after that remark. It was really stupid of me to come near the car, in fact, I probably completely deserved this.
We got on the highway and drove a while before I really started to feel my hangover coming. “Can I have a drink of water?” I begged,
“Sorry kid, we don’t have any,” replied the driver. The man sitting next to me had partially fallen asleep since I had been behaving. Ugh, this is the worst headache I’ve ever had! I tried to suffice with leaning my head against the window, but the road had a few bumps, and the vibrations only made me feel worse. Eventually I ended up lying across the seat with my head on the sleeping man’s lap. When I woke up, we were at a gas station. I knew from experience that if I tried to sit up, my head would pound, threatening to burst, and I might throw up. Instead, I asked in a soft voice, “Where are we?”
The man replied, “Chicago.” So we were still in Illinois, just like, 40,000 miles away from where I lived. Oh that’s great. “What’s your name?” I asked,
“Why do you ask?”
“So I have something to call you by,” There was a long pause, in which I imagined he spent thinking of all the other girls he had kidnapped calling him dirty words that I would never say. Believe it or not, though I had broken almost all of my rules to live by, there are still two principles that I will keep for as long as I live;
1.
No profanity
2.
And have good manners
“Call me Ed,” He finally replied,
“Okay Ed, I’m Isabelle,”
He grunted, but didn’t say anything. For what seemed like a long time, we sat there in silence. Well, me lain across the seat with my head in his lap, and him sitting. Then Mr. Driver came back, and we headed down a couple streets before turning into a large building. As the big door closed behind us, Ed told me to get up. I did so slowly in an attempt not to re-arouse my head ache. We all got out of the car and I was blind-folded and led along until we came to a tiny bedroom with black-out tape over the window. There the blind-fold was taken off, and I was left on my own. There were a couple books and a small paper plate with a pile of toast and a paper bowl filled with fruits alongside a pitcher of water and a couple plastic cups. I drank three cups of water, then fell onto the bed and went straight to sleep.
It was early the next morning, or so I thought, when someone shook me awake, or should I say slapped me awake. I yelped when I felt the pang on my cheek, and reached out to hit whoever it was. It’s probably Dustin. No, Dustin left, Isy! Don’t forget that! There was a smacking noise as my palm connected with a cheek. “Argh!” Oops. “Sorry Dad, but five more minutes.” I mumbled. Hmm,that isn’t right either. Dad should be at work by now. I opened my eyes just as a cup of cold water came down on my head. I screamed and jolted up out of bed. Looking around, I realized that I wasn’t even at home, much less being woken up by my dad. I didn’t recognize the men standing by my bed. One was holding an empty cup, and they were whispering quietly together in what seemed like a foreign language. “You are finally awake,” one of them said. He had a very heavy accent, and spoke slowly. “Yes,” the other said, “We were afraid you were dead. Then we would have lost $800,000,”
“Huh?” I asked,
“You are a very expensive girl, but that’s what comes with being a virgin,” I pondered his word for a bit before realizing that I had just been sold as some sort of sex slave by Ed and Mr. Driver. The two men stepped closer to me and I backed up against the wall. One of them picked up a rope that was lying on the floor. He whispered to his buddy and they began inching towards me. The door was right next to me, but I would have to distract them if I wanted to get away. “What are your names?” I asked them,
“You are to call me Laurent,” replied one quickly,
“And I, James,” replied the other. Okay, that didn’t help me at all. I screamed. “What is it?!” yelped Laurent,
“There’s an ENORMOUS spider over there!” I screamed, “I think it’s poisonous!”
James turned around, and Laurent followed suit exclaiming, “I’ll take care of it,” I saw my chance and ran out the door, slamming it hard behind me. I sprinted down the hall and tripped my way down the stairs.
I must have been on the third floor or something because there were a lot of stairs. I knew they were following close behind me, but all I could hear was the thumping of my heart. I have to get out of here! When I finally reached the ground floor, I ran wildly to the door that looked like it lead to outside. I was right, and as I stumbled into the bright sunshine, I became aware of the alarms sounding within the building. I threw myself towards the main street where I saw people. Not watching where I was going, I flew through the grid-like city, wishing that I would find somewhere to hide. I came to a large park and dived into it hoping for a large group of bushes or something. Seeing nothing of the sort, I tried to climb into a tree. When that failed, I sat at its base, and curled into a ball, trying to catch my breath, and stay hidden from view.
When I was ready to move on, I first went to a water fountain and scrubbed as much of the make-up of my face as possible, and let my long hair down to cover my face. I grabbed an unguarded jacket off of a chair, and put it on. It was huge, but that was okay with me. I listened to the music playing from the stage, and set off. I have no idea why there was a stage and dance floor in the middle of a park, but oh well. Sticking to the trees, I danced my way in between people, constantly keeping an eye out for my hunters. When I saw them, I kept my head down and continued walking, but when the jacket blew up in the wind, letting my unique black skirt with zillions of sparkles shine in the sun, one of them pointed at me, and I burst into a run. They chased me to the end of the block.
What seemed like the easiest way to get far away from them was to run diagonally to the corner of the next sidewalk. They were a ways behind me, and I suddenly got a text message. I took my phone out real quick thinking, why do I care about answering a text message at a time like this? It was Jake with his weekly warning. This week it was, ‘always cross streets at the cross walk!’ oh great. The two men were almost caught up with me, so I flung myself into the busy street. The first couple minutes seemed like I might make it to the other side, but there was a sudden screeching of brakes, and it felt like a dozen cars were coming at me at once. Then there was the truck.
My vision was blurring, and everything seemed to go in slow motion for a moment, then it all sped up to far faster than reality could ever go. I felt a pain in my side that spread throughout me. I screamed with all my might, and then there was nothing, nothing but my last scream echoing through the city.