The Eyes that Pierce-Part 3

 The others? Who are the others? There is someone else in this house. I know it.

The Eyes that Pierce

-part 3-

 “You wanna see them don’t you?” The man proves my accusations to be true. I’m right, there are more people in this house. I have no idea what to do anymore. I’m in a haze. Is this just the end? Will I just be stuck in this house forever like the man said? 

 I hear something to the right of me. I jolt my head, still not answering the man’s question. A door starts to slowly open on its own, and I see a figure, draped in shadow, peek out. The figure sees me, I’m sure, and rapidly shuts the door. That’s one of “them”, isn’t it? My reactions to everything I see are no longer exciting. I don’t get scared, nervous, or shaky. Those feelings had already overwhelmed me so much that now I’m numb to them. But seeing another person, after what seems like a century, evokes a new, almost positive feeling in me. One I haven’t felt in a while. Another person is in this house with me, and I’m not exactly sure what the new feeling is, but I think it’s hope. I hope it’s hope.

 “Come out Jenny, I have another real friend for you,” the man says to his supposed other victim. 

 “Jenny,” he continues, “Isn’t it a wonderful name? She doesn’t speak much either, so I took matters into my own hands and named her myself.” This man, so evil. The person I saw was short, just a small head peeking out of the door frame. I’m not so numb anymore. I’m furious as I realize it’s just a little girl. How could he kidnap a little girl into his house? So helpless and terrified. At least I’m a grown woman. I don’t live with my parents anymore; I can take care of myself. This girl, she lives a life the complete opposite. Anger bubbles up in me so strong I want to explode. I can’t do anything though. I want to scream at the man, but I just can’t. I’m so helpless, and I realize that I’m just like the little girl.

 The man briskly grabs me by my arm so that not even the strongest person could get away. He opens the door and throws me into the room the girl is in. I stumble and fall, realizing that he has thrown me down basement stairs. I keep falling until I reach the ground in a smack. I lie there for just a second, waiting until my head stops spinning. I’m startled as I feel cold, fleshy stick like objects touch my bare arms. Something shuffles in the room. The girl is with me now. I want to speak to her so badly. I want to reassure her that everything is okay and that I’m not a bad person like our kidnapper. I pick myself up off the cool concrete floor. I look at the girl using the light coming from the TV under the door. From what I can see, she’s so small and young. Her clothes are covered in layers of dirt and grime, so much so that you can’t even see the original color of her shirt. Probably the shirt she was kidnapped with, I think to myself with a shudder. The small part of the basement  I can see has old, unfinished stone walls. The basement looks like that of a house made in the 1800’s. I feel around my ribs as a dull pain starts to form and realize the pain is a giant bruise on my side. I’m surprised that I wasn’t hurt more from my tumble down the stairs.

 “Who are you? What is your name?” The girl is so quiet that I can barely manage to make out her words. 

 I still haven’t spoken yet at all here in the house. I’m glad I still even remember my name.

 “Taylor,” I finally say to the girl. “Everything is okay now,” I continue, “Are you okay?”

 “Yes, Jenny is fine. Everything was okay before you got here too,” the girl says. I’m so confused. This girl is so… strange. The way she talks is so natural and honest. She talks like she really is fine. And in the third person?

 “Jenny loves my dad, and Jenny loves my room.” The girl gazes around the basement like it is Cinderella’s castle. Unlike Jenny stated, she is absolutely not fine. The child in front of me is not mentally okay. She probably was taken here by the man at a young age and probably thinks that this is her home and that the man is her father. 

  The man opens the door to the basement. “Dinner is ready,” he exclaims. The girl bolts up the stairs. She reacts so quickly compared to me that when me and the man make eye contact he shouts, “NOW,” barely giving me a chance to follow them. It’s only while I’m walking up the basement stairs that I smell something, something so putrid and rotten that I almost throw up. The smell is something dead. “The others,” plural, that’s what the man said. Bodies. As I catch a glimpse of the man’s eye I realize it’s probably true. Those cold, dark eyes have witnessed things no normal human would ever see. Those cold, dark eyes watched the actions of the devil. I find it hard to breathe, but what am I supposed to do? That’s right. Nothing.

 I walk to the dining table following Jenny and the man. The other two sit on wooden, creaky chairs leaving me to stand around the grey cracked table. The man goes outside without saying why. Me and Jenny are left to sit in a dark silence together. 

 The man comes back fairly quickly with sticks and foliage in his hands. He places the nature on a cloth on the ground with the exception of two of the sticks in his hands. He quickly strikes the two against each other starting a soft flame. After carefully placing the fire onto the pile, he grabs raw meat with his bare hands off of his wood counter and drops it on the fire- on the fire, on the ground, on a dirty cloth. 

 “Are you ready for dinner?” The man looks at Jenny and me with interest.

 “Yes father!” The girl says with excitement. I still don’t speak. Honestly and obviously, I’m not excited at all. The man once again grabs the meat and literally plops it onto the table- no plates, no utensils, nothing. I smell the smoke from the fire and wonder how the man manages to not burn the house down. As there is still a soft, orange light, the man steps on it with the half of a shoe he wears.

 The man reaches into his pocket and grabs out a knife, the same one I’ve seen many times before. There’s a utensil. He lifts his arm, knife and hand and slams it down on the meat, cutting it into 3 extremely unequal pieces.

 As the man distributes the pieces of meat to each of us  (leaving the largest slice for himself) Jenny states, “Jenny is so happy Taylor is my friend now! Jenny is so excited.”

 “Taylor? No, sweetie. She is your mother now.” My heart drops to my chest. This man kidnapped us for a family, that’s the reason. The sick reason. I grab the giant piece of meat and take an absent-minded bite. But as I chewed I realized something was off. Off in the most disgusting, sinister way that something could feel off…