Darkroom Read online

  Darkroom

  by

  Poppet

  A Wild Wolf Publication

  Published by Wild Wolf Publishing in 2010

  Copyright © 2009 Author Poppet

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publishers, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed by a newspaper, magazine or journal.

  First print

  All Characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  ISBN: 978-1-907954-02-3

  www.wildwolfpublishing.com

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This book is dedicated to my mother.

  Despite the odds, she survived.

  I love you, Mum.

  Chapter 1

  The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance; he will bathe his feet in the blood of the wicked.

  ~ Psalm 58:10

  Wind is stronger. Trees bow to wind. The force cannot be ignored. The tree although resistant, has no choice. If it does not bow, it will break.

  That's my choice. Will I bow? Or will I break?

  It smells filthy. Fighting back a gag. Tears sting. My nose burning from ragged breath. Can't scream with this plastic smelling tape on my mouth. Can hardly breathe. All I see is light sneaking in from under the locked door. Have to get a grip. Haven't had water or contact for so long. I have no idea how to reckon days here. Wherever here is. I have to save the body fluids or I'll dehydrate.

  Oh God …

  Rocking myself, simply terrified.

  Please help me. Someone hear my prayers.

  Why me?

  Chapter 2

  Then beware and be afraid of the sword of divine vengeance,

  for wrathful are the punishments of that sword,

  that you may know there is a judgement.

  ~ Job 19:29

  No!

  Shaking violently. Can't see. Pain. Oh Jesus! I hardly recognise the screaming as coming from me. Feel the thud before ears register. Like bone imploding against bone inside my head. Crunching teeth. Burning mingled with immediate numb. The blood in my mouth is all I taste – smell – swallow.

  Shocked. Just – want – pain – to – stop. Throbbing pounding through right cheek. A low moan escapes; broken agony.

  "Crawl in the dirt. Dirty whore." His voice a loathing sneer.

  THUD.

  Breathe. Forcing myself to slowly, carefully, keep breathing. Nothing too deep. Deep causes severe pain. Tears sear like acid. Oh god. Can't take the pain. Can't breathe. Excruciating pain in eye. Dust breathing in. Tasting the foul floor I'm prone on. Tape removed from mouth, sensitive lips exposed.

  "P … p … please."

  "You have dirty knees from crawling."

  CRUNCH.

  Shuddering … can't … please … oh fuck … why? The forceful impact an instant cathartic explosion. Huddled over now, forehead on hard gritty floor, spit. Cough. Burning bile infuses the blood.

  "P … please."

  Hollow laughter mocks me. "P … please." Footsteps crunch behind me and he pauses, shivers skim my nape. "Did you say please when you were fucking them in dark alleys saturated in stench?"

  Breath whispers down my nape, squeezing my eyes shut tightly attempting to shut him and this fear out.

  "Did your mommy teach you to say please so that vulnerable men would think you're adorable? You abuse that word." Blasting breath into my ear, his voice so even and calculated, "This is why I must chastise you."

  The crack is reinforced with agony in my temple. I'm unaware that he finds watching my trickling purged blood, meditational.

  "Father, Jesus, please …"

  "I will cut out your tongue if you continue to pray with an insincere heart. You can't deceive God the way you deceive loins."

  The monotony of his voice would be soothing in a therapist's office, but here, it solidifies my marrow with terror.

  Chapter 3

  Fear is a darkroom where negatives develop.

  ~Usman B. Asif

  "What makes you poor, Shauna?"

  "You know my name?"

  STING.

  Instantly quivers begin again. Please, no more pain. Squeezing eyes behind the filthy rag that smells of grease, I'm frozen. Movement means pain. The stinging doesn't abate. Hot wetness runs down skin under my shirt. Clenching teeth. Ache. I ache everywhere. Terrified, I stay still, petrified like ancient wood, frozen like a bug captured in amber.

  "Life is a series of choices. Do you like torture so much, you provoke me?"

  I don't dare reply.

  "What makes you poor Shauna?"

  Shaking my head. He makes me so terrified I can feel my womb contracting. No matter what I say, it will be wrong. Just another excuse to beat me until I succumb to darkness. Despite cracked lips and dry mouth, hot tears begin saturating the cloth on my eyes. Soaking it with desperation.

  "Your choices. You think beauty gives you rite of passage. Charm, a reason to take. Sex, a reason to lay waste, like a vampire. Taking from the willing until they have nothing left to give you. Then you move on."

  CRACK!

  "You are empty."

  I am paused, waiting for the pain to subside before daring to speak. My life suspended like a dragonfly hovering over water. "Why? Do I know you? Did I hurt you?"

  Grip covering my face, squeezing. Breath washing over me. "You are poor because you are empty."

  His breath mingled with hate is forceful as it rushes into my nostrils. Detonating a fear grenade. Clothing rustles as he moves slowly behind me. It's enough to start the tremors. When he moves behind me; the pain is about to begin again. Punishment for sinning. How can it be sinning if you're not a believer of a book written over two thousand years ago? Every hair follicle on my scalp prickles with the sound of scraping. The rattle reminiscent of a metal chain. Tinkling, like many safety pins in an old metal tin.

  "Please. I'll repent – change – forgive me. Please … please …" My hoarse voice dissipates as my throat closes, half choking on mucous and tears. Crawling, in restrained spurts, unable to stand, shimmying over hard gritty surface, desperate to get space between me and the whoosh flinging past my ear.

  "No one can hear you scream. I am curing you with salt. It burns. It purifies you of your filth. One day you will thank me for this exorcism."

  Quivering breath. Can't – too … too much – mommy – oh god … The burning in my skin, like he sunk hooks into me and ripped them out.

  "No!"

  Oh fuck. Wrenching me by hair, my face smashes down, connecting with hard unyielding …

  SCREEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM!

  "Ought you not to know that the Lord, the God of Israel, gave the kingship over Israel to David forever, even to him and to his sons by a covenant of salt? 2 Chronicles 13:5; Even Mark insists in verse nine, 'For everyone shall be salted with fire.' You ask why? Salt burns and it purifies. This is your new covenant."

  Can't. Burning. Uncontrollable shudders. Unbearable. Burning. Flinching away when he touches my face, unsettling when the gloved hand wipes under the blindfold as if to wipe away my tears. I must know him. He feels remorse, I'm almost sure of it.

  "One day you will understan
d, you left me no choice."

  His tone borders on affectionate, the hand lingers too long on my shoulder. Psychotic, schizophrenic, maniac. He's mad.

  "Who are you?"

  "Your angel. Vengeance."

  Chapter 4

  Character, like a photograph, develops in darkness.

  ~Yousuf Karsh.

  Day by day I wash her clean, returning purity to her. Purity of thought, spirit, soul and body. I am a holistic healer. My art is subtle. My craft honed. My methods questioned, but always with result. Like cures like. A simple homeopathic principle.

  When in the deepest throes of agony, all pretence is stripped, and I finally see her soul through surprising blue eyes. A precious sight to behold. It makes me unbearably hard when I stare at her unmasked vulnerability. As crystal liquid moistens lashes, making them darker, I get harder. Blind to me due to medication, I stare deeply into eyes, watch her lips trembling. It makes her wild, untamed. The way she must have been when young and unstained.

  I am retraining my angel, to stop falling; falling wantonly. I shall show her a new way. She is nearly there now. Absently I hold white lace to my nose, inhaling her core scent as I stare into her eyes. Soon she will pass out. The body cannot maintain that level of vigilance and fear. Coupled with the sedative, within sixty seconds my little whoring angel will slumber sweetly.

  I am forced to be her Nemesis, it's not a yoke to wear frivolously. Unlike Sadie who had her painted fingernails pulled out to show her the futility of vanity. How she screamed when I shaved her locks of bleached hair off, adapted into braids to restrain her. Her vanity became her prison and her pain.

  Shauna has developed well under my tutelage. No longer kept in filth, she reclines daintily on the bed in the cell. Finally my angel is back in white silk, clinging to ethereal curves, highlighting with each breath she inhales. This is a period of Grace for her. She cannot be thankful yet, because she is blinded by the darkness of her sin. I derive no pleasure from this. I am using as little force as I dare, to force the evil out of her soul. I hurt her as little as possible. I know how Father feels. It hurts to punish the ones you love, but if they do not turn from sin, they leave us no choice.

  Returning my thoughts to focus on Shauna, capturing her perfection with a whir of the Sony's shutter. She has been mine for three months. I know her intimate cycle, I place her fragile body in clean silk each day. After bathing her, I indulge in choices of white lace to kiss her folds. White for my angel returned to brilliance.

  The white ribbon is soft and pliable, belying the strength of the adorning restraints. Ribbon does not stretch, nor does it chaff. It's gentle and impenetrable in its poetic captivation of delicate wrists. Despite the dead women who precede this one, and their tarnished opinions, I am not a monster. Shauna's skin is alabaster in its purity, the only character on it are constellations of freckles. I've relished them. Tracing them with my tongue. Joining her dots during the tasting and savouring of delicate nubile skin.

  I pause, overwhelmed with a growing sensation of pride at my accomplishment. She relies on me. She is mine. I will not share her. She cannot know how we have bonded. Unlike her past, she remains undefiled. Soon she will need me, rely on me – willingly, feel safe with me and only me. The next time my angel bends her knees, it will be to worship and adore, me. She doesn't know it, but she will need me to protect her. Of her own volition, she will come to me, and I shall watch over and protect her, at times, even from herself. Possessively I hold her breath lifted breast. I love that she responds to me. Eagerly her body hardens under the touch, pressing with begging into my palm. Soon my love. Soon. It's not easy for either of us.

  Turning from her slumbering form, with those rosy pouting lips partially parted, as if begging for a kiss from God's breath, I kill the light. When she is awake and undrugged I am forced to wear the night vision goggles. I keep my voice gravely and unrecognisable. Ever since a child I've been gifted with the ability to mimic famous voices and accents. She thinks I sound like a five packs a day smoker.

  Soon I shall give my angel her wings back, to see if she can fly. She will never forget when she discovers the tattoo on her lower back. Two little wings in the shape of my V, with "Dirty Angel". All signs of the torture have been corrected. It took my deepest surgeon's skills to reconstruct, but it was necessary. When I release her, and she tells her loved ones of what she endured during her cleansing, they will look for physical evidence, and there is none. She will doubt eventually what she knows to be true. The mind, such a delicate balance. So easy to confuse it, retrain it. Oh yes, one day she will tell me her deepest secrets in confidence, telling me about myself, and I will be the only one to believe her. We will bond through empathy. She will rely on me for validation, giving me trust.

  Shaking my head, I feel annoyed with myself for craving the future now. Now is all we have. Now, it is one step at a time. She may well fall again. When she is half sedated she speaks openly without recollection. Trusting eyes staring sightlessly into mine. I have just one desire I wish to experience. But that takes patience. I have to wait for the inevitable day that she clings to me, seeking haven. Then I shall discover for myself what she looks like blind. The shutter closes on the camera. She is still developing in this dark. Soon her magnificence will be restored in full colour.

  In a moment of banished guard she told me, when I asked her for a secret no one knows, her velvet voice whispered drunkenly, "I go blind during orgasm."

  A fallen angel who sees only the soul as spirits fuse, how precious. This one is innocuous, headily addictive. She is the perfect drug I have been seeking. My dirty little thing. I have kissed every hair follicle, watching her pupils dilate.

  I caught this one falling, before it was too late.

  Chapter 5

  She gives her hand and surrenders; her supports and battlements fall, her walls are thrown down. For this is the vengeance of the Lord: take vengeance on her; as she has done to others, do to her.

  ~ Jeremiah 50:15

  Whir. Shuffle. Clack. I can't move. Breath combs eyelashes. I know you're here. Smell your sweat. Shiver. Inside, where I hide from you; clammy finger pushing obsessively between afraid breasts. Creak. Pine slats groan when you sit with me. How did you make me still? Still like the photograph I know you just took. Hand tracing hair off my spine. I am mine. Not yours. You stroke me like a lover. Sound like you're breathing through a mask. Suffocating inhalations. Raspy.

  Touch, stroke, hand tighten, hurting. Rasp. Clack clunk. Clack clunk. Clack clunk. Metal? Rasp. Cold. So cold. You stole reflexes. Unable to muster a goose-bump to reveal my discomfort. THUMP. Creak. Returning to slide over skin. Rasp. Heated weight on thigh. Pushing on heart. Hot. Feels like leather. I cannot cry. Cannot whimper. Still. Still under your command. Still here. Still afraid. Still eternity. Still living corpse. Subzero still. Wet. Warm. It's a mouth. I die a little more, still in silence, paralysed by you, in fear, in pain.

  Still veiled in post nightmare sheen I pad barefoot to the kitchen. Another city, another country, another hovel. To be fair, this one is rather nice. Since Mom and Dad took pity on my delusional state of mind. I retrieve water, pour, swallow.

  I'm still uncomfortably cold.

  I had therapy. It didn't help. Found in an alley wearing nothing more than a white silk slip, my parents concluded I'd been prostituting myself for drugs. A V tattoo of wings on my lower back was proof that I'd joined a gang of women found drugged to their eyeballs, eyes glazed in cold death. When I became hysterical, they shut me up with tranquillisers and put me in a psychiatric ward for observation. Me, do drugs? I thought they knew me. I'm simply terrified of needles. Yet accumulated track marks between my toes, proof. I confessed to torture, and was told it was a hallucination. A common side effect. My body intact. Just track marks. One more slut. One more good girl gone bad.

  If it was all my imagination, why is he so real? Why does he haunt my sleep? I can still smell him, feel him, hear his gravelly voice siphoning my s
oul out of me. I begged. I prayed. I pleaded. Why for the love of rainbows would I ever take a drug that gave me that kind of high? Cocaine, I've heard, feels like heaven. He called me an angel. Dirty angel. Is that why I took the drugs? So I could fly back again and again to hear my own screams? Taste my own blood?

  Free-falling tears rush to kiss skin. How could I hallucinate that? Wet diamonds falling from your eyes angel. The more you cry, the wealthier you become. Storing riches in Heaven. Could I have imagined Vengeance? An angel called Vengeance? I hate crying now. Wiping tears away. Hiding them in shame. I can't keep on feeding him. I suppose it does sound delusional saying an angel kidnapped me.

  If he isn't real, explain the cards? I thought that by moving to New York he'd never find me. Naively I believed that being amongst many strangers, I could remain anonymous. It took him only three weeks to find me. Flowers arrived. The card from Vengeance. I moved to Alabama. Two weeks, a card and white roses. I went farther, to Melbourne. Then Surrey. Every time he managed to find me. Announcing it with roses and a card. Protecting you angel. Love. Vengeance. I didn't tell my therapist that. They'd simply accuse me of sending them to myself. Feeding my paranoia. Am I mad? Do I? Do I send myself cards and roses, and not remember? Am I really running away from me? Am I really afraid of me?

  But this time I think I've outsmarted him. I've found haven in the cosmopolitan land of South Africa. Hidden high up in a block of apartments in Rondebosch. I like it here. I hope he doesn't find me again. Still so cold. Maybe have a hot bath? What time is it? Three-twenty. Who cares. I can bath any time of day or night I choose.