The raised temperature, alongside the bright lights, had them in opposite corners of the room, each seeking relief from the walls and floors. In a few more hours, even the floors and walls would become unbearable. Sunshine and I took turns keeping an eye on their progress, and I used my breaks to draft up an overview of my book. After an hour, Sunshine cranked the heat up to fifty, and less than an hour later, one of the little piggies went down. Sunshine's celebratory yelling brought me down, and she pointed to the screen just in time for us to see the second heap fall to the ground. Another ten minutes elapsed, and the last one joined his friends on the floor. The fact that they managed to lie still on that hot concrete floor was proof enough that they were unconscious.
Cranking up the heat accelerated our plan, which was not a bad thing. The next part was my favorite, breaking their bodies was Sunshine's idea, and breaking their mind was mine. Their first meal in three days comprised soup made with hallucinogenic mushrooms along with bread baked with Cannabis. Their water was laced with Lysergic acid diethylamide, better known as acid. We had carefully measured out doses that together would make them wish they were dead without killing them. Individually, either one of the drugs would make them feel good; their combined chemistry, on the other hand, would take them down the worst trip of their lives. Physical assaults could be combated with resilience and effort, there was no defense when your mind turned into your enemy. Sunshine carefully set their food down and joined my efforts to chain them to the wall. I did not want them to kill themselves in drug-induced insanity, where would the fun be in that?
After hosing them down with freezing water, we went back upstairs, not wanting to ease their minds by giving a face to their captors. I was positive that I was not the only woman that they had done unthinkable things to, so this was a victory for their other victims as much as it was for me. It took them longer than I had anticipated to wake up, and I almost went down to check on them, but Sunshine stopped me. We took a break and had dinner out on the terrace. Something about that night was intoxicating, or maybe it was the medicated bread we had partaken in. The cool breeze blew past us carrying with it an undeniable saltiness and hints of coconuts in the air. The stars twinkled with brilliance, lighting up the moonless sky. Unconsciously, my eyes drifted from the beautiful scenery to Sunshine, and I was pleasantly surprised. Her afro had been pulled up into a bun, giving me a clearer view of her face that was currently overtaken by the widest smile I had ever seen on that face.
I threw a tiny rock at her to gain her attention, and that smile somehow widened. I dramatically covered my eyes after signing that her smile was blinding me. She laughed, for the first time since I met the woman, she laughed, and that was a sound I would not forget easily. Her laughter was rich and loud, ringing into the silent night. It tugged at my heart knowing she could not hear the sound of her laughter, but it did not bother her as she doubled up in laughter, clutching her stomach. The sound was infectious and I unwittingly found myself in a fit of my own. My laugh felt wrong but not forced, like a child discovering something new it could do. I had not laughed that hard in a long time. It was then that I realized we were high, and that made me laugh harder.
"We are high." I signed to her when we finally got our fit under control.
"No shit!" she signed back a small smile lingering on her face
"You realize how crazy this situation is, we have three men locked in the basement." I signed getting lost in the movement for a second
She was laughing when I finally got over how my hands felt as I created patterns in the air, admiring the way my hands moved.
"I haven't felt this good since the day I got into my accident. I may have lost my voice and hearing and gotten scars on my body, but the bastard I was trying to take out died. I did not lose anything of value, and I would do it again if, at the end of it, that bastard died."
This was the first time that she had offered any sort of information on her personal life. I knew it had to be the effects of the drugs, so I stifled all the questions her statement elicited. I would rather hear her story when she was comfortable enough to tell me, and not because of the effect of illegal substances. When I had first told her my story after the court trip, she had done nothing but ensure I was seen. When I told her about my rage and my desire to get even, she offered her support, pitching in a few suggestions of her own. 'Everyone deserves their chance to get even ' was what she had told me that night. She had done nothing to talk me out of my slowly solidifying resolve. Every step we have taken since then has solidified our bond. Two women, who had been shown the worst of the world, there wasn't enough empathy between the two of us to stop us from actualizing our insane plans.
"Thank you for helping me with this." I signed to her
"I would do a lot more for you," she answered with a small smile.
I said nothing, choosing to walk back into the house to see if there was any progress with our captives. They were not only awake but were busy shoving their faces with the food we had provided them with. Watching the pathetic pigs stuff themselves, a silent tear dropped down my face and another and another, and before I knew it, I was heaving as sobs raked through my body, attempting to wash my pain away. What they had done to me was excruciating to think about, but the abuse itself lasted an hour or two at most; it was what came after that had engraved itself so deeply into my being that even after more than a decade, the scars were still tender.
The three days that I lay alone in a hospital bed broke me more than the event itself. I stewed in my pain and misery with no one offering me comfort as my world broke over and over in front of me. In those three days, I spent every conscious moment wishing I were dead. When Claire, a stranger, someone who owed me nothing but gave me everything, also my very first visitor, showed up, whatever was left of my spirit broke. I was grateful for her presence, but even as she held me, I felt lonelier than I had ever felt. It was then that I realized just how alone I truly was; I never recovered from that. Despite seeing color, my world felt grey. It was like my essence had evaporated, leaving behind a shell that existed merely for show. Intimacy scared me, and the idea of relying on someone else became an unthinkable thought.
When I finally made it home, I never told my parents anything, not because they never asked, but because I was terrified that my brother had told them the truth and they did not care about me enough to even feel sorry for me. Their withdrawal from me strengthened and silently affirmed my fears, so I withdrew further from the world, holding everyone at arm's length. I had gone through life in a haze, and it wasn't until I saw the rats clinging to life, stuffing their mouths, not pausing to question what they were eating, that it hit me. Even they clung to life in fervor, while I had simply floated above it all, unwilling to engage in anything that could tie me to reality. Claire had been the only strand of hope that lingered in my life, and her absence had caused my mind to buckle even as my heart bled from the loss. I would probably never know what it was to truly love someone, despite my revenge, that realization broke me all over again.
Sunshine's arms enclosed my body, offering comfort, but her kind gesture stung, making me cry even more. Not only did I lose my innocence that vile day, but I also lost my entire family, and nothing has ever been right since then. She held me as I broke down further until I was nothing more than a quivering, sniffling mess. She held me as sleep claimed me, offering me a much-needed respite, and just before I fell into that comforting darkness, I desperately wished it would be my last day.
A bird chirping on my window sill woke me up that next morning, my window was open, letting in the cool morning breeze. The majestic colors of the sunrise illuminated my room and carried with them the scent of renewal. My door swung open, revealing Sunshine, who was uncharacteristically still in her night gown, holding a tray. She set the tray on my bedside table before motioning me to sit up, to which I obliged. She set the tray over my lap and then looked expectantly at me. I offered her a grateful smile, She was another person who deserved the world, someone I could never truly love because my heart was still in pieces.
She shifted on the bed so that she was sitting beside me and opened my laptop. Although several hours had passed, our naked visitors were still in the throes of their drug-induced psychosis. It made for an entertaining watch as we silently ate our breakfast. One rat ran straight into the wall and proceeded to dramatically fall. We both burst out laughing, and surprisingly, even with drugs out of our system, Sunshine's laughter lifted my spirit. We spent our morning watching as our visitors thrashed around in the throes of their temporary insanity, and I admit it brought me more satisfaction than I thought it would. Three days I lay in that hospital, the memory of what they had done to me playing over and over in my head. It took months before I could sleep without the aid of sleeping pills and years before I stopped screaming myself awake. They would remember this experience, only then would it be fair. Three days down, three more to go.