Page 111 of Nowhere Good

None of it mattered, because this wasn’t real.

It was a nightmare. She’d wake up soon.

The thought comforted her as the warm feeling flowed through her veins again. Ah, right. Everything was good.

She’d almost forgotten, for a moment, that she was made of liquid sunshine.

The next time Claire became aware of the world, she was floating in warm water. It felt so nice as her eyes fluttered open to a calm, yellowy light, the type of warmth that reminded her of a porch on a summer night. Homey and familiar. Someone was scrubbing her arm. The smell of lavender soap reached her nose.

She let her head lull to the side and rested her eyes. That dark blue gaze appeared in her mind again, but when her eyelids fluttered back open, it was Dillon’s brown eyes that were staring at her. He looked angry. Don’t be angry.

They were in the bathroom. Her childhood bathroom in the farmhouse, upstairs, in the massive porcelain tub. She used to take baths in here when she was a little girl, but she was big now. Her body was long and naked.

“Why’d you have to drag me into this?” Dillon roughly scrubbed her with a loofah. “I hate you. You have no idea how much I hate you.”

As much as he scrubbed the other parts of her body, the itch on her forearms wouldn’t go away. “I’m still so itchy, Dillon…”

“Don’t scratch, you’ll get blood in the bath. You just stopped bleeding.”

She looked down. Her arms were covered in red stripes. “Why’d you scratch me?”

“I didn’t. You did it to yourself. Shut up and don’t get sick again. You need to be clean.”

Claire let her head roll back, her hair floating like seaweed in the frothy water.

It could’ve been minutes or days or hours or months. But as quickly as Claire had slipped into cosmic bliss, she’d plummeted back to a living hell that never seemed to end.

“Please, I need something.” She didn’t know if anyone was there to hear her; the room was pitch black. She’d woken minutes or hours before to dead silence. The metal floor of the cage was glacial beneath her. She had clothes on, a top and shorts, but no socks. Her feet were frozen, heavy. She stood on them anyway, fingering the bars to support herself. “Dillon? Daddy? Someone… I’m ready to come out… I’ll be good…”

No one came for her.

Not for hours, or maybe just minutes.

There was a creaking sound, then footsteps, then the light from the lantern returned. Her dad ducked low to enter the room.

“Daddy.” She grabbed onto the bars of the cage. “I’m confused. Whatever I did, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. Can I please come out now? I’ll be good, I promise.”

Her dad held the lantern up. The shadows darkened half his face, making it look like he was wearing a mask. But he was her only salvation. The only one who could set her free. “You don’t remember what you did, sweetheart? I find that hard to believe. You were goin’ behind our backs and talkin’ to a detective. You remember now, right?”

A detective.

Blue eyes, a dimpled smile.

A fantasy.

Fantasies were trouble; she’d learned that before.

That was why she was here.

“Right. Him.”

“You told me all about him. All the things you told him. You remember now?”

Not really. She could vaguely remember being questioned, but she mostly remembered puking. That was why her throat was so sore. “Y-yes, I’m sorry. I told him I thought maybe you… maybe you sold drugs… maybe you killed Mom… but I was confused.”

Her dad’s smile was satisfied. “You were confused indeed. And who is that over there?” He held the lantern to her right, illuminating the clothed skeleton against the wall. It had scared her before, but looked more like a prop now.

Claire remembered, but she didn’t care. She’d say anything to get out and do anything to stay out.