Stay With Me

I.

“No, no…look at me, hey, look at me when I’m talking to you.”

He looked, but he didn’t see, didn’t listen. He had stopped talking four days ago. It was easy though, to pretend, anything to get them off his back, for now.

The man, the monster, was still talking, and he was still looking, but he didn’t see, didn’t hear anything, willed himself to not see, to not hear, because there was only one person he wanted to see, that one voice he wanted to hear, and that person was somewhere here but wasn’t here.

II.

On the fifth day, he caved. He speaks, because he couldn’t stand off the fear any longer, the pain of not knowing because he had to know, he had to.

“I want to see him.”

The man behind the ski mask (the monster) smirked. He wasn’t sure how he knew this, he just did.

III.

Five days ago, he could see him and he wished he hadn’t.

They had cuffed him to the wall and beat the crap out of him and he could do nothing, tied down to a chair with thick ropes, forced to see the torture of his little brother.

Nick had swallowed the pain, only allowed himself a few soft gasps when it got too much, but there was only so much a man could handle. When he started screaming and crying, and then pleaded and begged, he closed his eyes because he wasn’t strong enough to see what the young man had been reduced to.

Five days ago, he could see him and wished he hadn’t, and someone up there must have heard his little prayer and they took his little brother away.

IV.

“He’s still alive.”

“I need to see him.”

Four days ago, he had stopped talking, stopped asking questions. It only seemed to feed on their anger, and he would only get more cuts on his body, another wound to bleed, another exposed flesh for bacteria and germs to infect. He stopped talking and they left him alone and he wondered what happened to his little brother, if anyone knew they were missing, if anyone were looking for them.

He could see very well in the dark, had adjusted to it, nothingness had become his friend. He kept his ears peeled for Nicky, but he heard nothing. There were crickets creaking in the nights, distant barking from stray dogs, branches snapping and rifles being loaded somewhere out there, but he had learnt to not listen to those sounds, because he only wanted to hear that one voice, but Nick remained lost to him, so he heard nothing.

V.

Four days ago they dragged his broken brother out of the room they were kept in and the last thing he saw was Nick’s eyes, shimmering with unshed tears, full of fear, silently pleading him for help. Nick would have yelled, screamed his name, throw some choice words at those men (monsters) in ski masks, but his face was swollen from all the punches he had received for the first two days they were in that room, he was sure they had managed to break Nick’s jaw.

“Where are you taking him!”

“What do you want from us!”

“Hey, answer me damn it!”

It all fell to deaf ears, so he stopped.

But on the fifth day he caved and spoke, because now, now he was really afraid, and he needed to know.

VI.

“Look, I just need to see him okay? Why did you take him away? Why separate us?”

So many ‘why’. He was almost certain his questions wouldn’t be met with any satisfactory answers, but had to at least try, hopefully the same someone who had heard his prayers four days ago would hear this one and cut his some slack.

He got a slap across the face and his bruised lips started to bleed again and when they forced the drink down his throat, he could taste copper, could taste blood mixed with water and he forced it down, needed to stay alive, because he was no good to Nicky if he was dead.

VII.

On the seventh day (a whole damn week), they came into the room and turned on the lights. They marched straight to him and if they had noticed the state he was in, had smelt the stench concoction of sweat, blood, a week old urine on the floor or the leaking puss from all the infected wounds on his body, it didn’t seem to affect them, didn’t slow down their strides.

The one with the dark blue ski mask (the blue monster) charged at him first. Another fist to the jaw, another kick to the legs and every single wound were torn, bleeding a new.

“They think we’re fuckin’ joking!” The one with the blue mask ranted. “Well I’ll show ‘em what the fuckin’ joke is!” Another blow to the head.

The one with the red ski mask (the red monster) held his accomplice back before he could throw another punch in. “Send them another package,” he said curtly. The red ski mask guy (monster) just grunted and walked away.

“Hey,” the blue mask one called back. “Make it double this time.”

This seemed to satisfy his accomplice, and as the door slammed behind them, the fear only grew in him.

“If this goes on, I’m afraid I’m gonna have to kill ya.”

And he thought a quick death was a gift, because being killed slowly by infection and whatever else that was going on in his body wasn’t a walk in the park either.

“If blood didn’t sway them, a dead body fuckin’ would.”

And even in his state of semi-consciousness, he knew what this meant. Knew that whatever deal, threat, that they had sent to JIVE, wasn’t working out the way they had planned. He could almost hear it (almost, because lately he didn’t hear anything, nothing), those men hiding behind their expensive suits and in the safety of their lavishly decorated room, telling the kidnappers (the monsters) ‘we don’t negotiate with criminals’.

Those men would benefit regardless of the outcome. After all, no publicity is bad publicity, even at the cost of two dead Backstreet Boys.

VIII.

“What do you mean blood?”

“Come again?”

“Blood! You said blood didn’t sway them, what do you mean!”

His shoulders ached, he was fairly certain that the right one was dislocated, the slightest of moves sent black spots dancing in front of his eyes and the light was blinding but he needed to know.

“You said you need to know what’s going on with Nicky,” the red ski mask monster replied. “Now you know.”

And the monster left.

The dark had returned to claim him.

And he still doesn’t know.

IX.

The monster said ‘what’s going on with Nicky’, he didn’t say ‘what we had done to Nicky’ or ‘what had happened to Nicky’, and he had been thinking about this all night (it was either that or listen to the dogs howling and the crickets creaking and phantom footsteps right outside this room) and he wondered what it meant.

Going on was good.

Going on meant it was still happening.

And what was happening had something to do with blood (make it double this time) and he knew it was probably killing Nick slowly, just like these wounds and injuries were killing him, but for now, Nick was still alive.

And that was good enough.

X.

On the eighth day or so he thought, he couldn’t tell anymore, he woke up to the sound of angry voices yelling at each other somewhere outside the room. He couldn’t tell how many people there were out there, didn’t care much.

He tried to shut them all out, his head was pounding and those black dots were now as faithful as his shadows. He never did stop listening for Nick, a gentle sigh would have been assuring enough, but he heard nothing.

And then the door slammed open, the hinges creaked noisily, and the ground reverberated on the impact and he jumped a little, body awaken. The pain in his wrists warned him that he couldn’t afford to make anymore sudden moves, that the ropes had dug too deep into his skin that he might as well have asked them to slit his wrists and be done with it.

But then they dragged Nick in with them, just like they had dragged Nick out some seven days ago and suddenly his body jerk awake, shifting from left to right, trying to get near to his brother. He could feel no pain now, driven by pure adrenalin.

“What did you do to him!” he heard himself yelled even before he realised he had yelled them.

Nick dropped to the ground, looking as filthy as he was. His entire face was a mash of black and blue, yellow and purple; his eyes so swollen that he wasn’t sure if Nick was conscious and had his eyes opened the whole time or not.

His bare arms were sprinkled with dotted scars. Some were as little as an ant bite, some already had scabs on them, some were still red and swollen, others, were already infected with puss.

Blood didn’t sway them.

XI.

There were gunshots everywhere and he didn’t know how he ended up on the floor, freed from the bounds that had kept him immobile for 8 days (or so he thought).

There were shouts, spent bullet cases dropping on the floor (ping! Ping!), sirens were screaming and he wasn’t sure if it was the police or the ambulance (could be both), the smell of gun powder overwhelming and threatening to plunge him back to darkness but there lies Nick, across the room from him, and he hadn’t moved a muscle since.

Perhaps this was how a war would look like. A man was down and no one gets left behind, so he crawled flat on his stomach, arms scraping against chipped, wooden floor, dodging stray bullets that seemed to be coming from every directions and he made it across, dislocated arm and all, made it all the way across the room, made it back to Nick.

XII.

There were tiny dots all over his body, like the ones on his arms. They were like constellations, only not as beautiful. These were hideous, diseased and wrong. These were unwelcome aliens hibernating on his body.

“Oh Nick!” he gasped and he couldn’t cry now, couldn’t break down because it was all up to him. “What have they done to you baby?”

Baby, because it doesn’t really matter if this young one grew up and shot an inch taller than he was, didn’t matter if he could kick his ass on his best days, Nick was still the baby, the one they still coddled and teased on until he got fed up and went to a corner and pouted the rest of the ride away.

And then he heard it.

Despite the war that was raging around them, despite the fact that one of the monsters might come in any second now to finish them off, despite all of that, he finally, finally heard it.

“Kevin…”

And that had been enough, enough for him to make up his mind, enough for him to hold on to and fight for them both.

Smoke started to invade the room, the yelling only grew, more shots had been fired and he began to cough, his eyes burning something fierce. Help was here, all they had to do was hang on and stay alive.

“Stay with me Nicky,” he whispered close to his ear, wanting his voice to be the only thing his little brother could hear right then (forget about the rest bro). He pushed himself up, shielding his brother with his own body, took Nick’s hand in his and squeezed (I’m right here). “I’ll get you out of here.”

“We…”

It took him a while to grasp that. The smoke was getting thicker but at least the shooting fiasco had stopped, just more yelling and running now. He could barely see anything, his eyes were burning and he couldn’t help the tears from spilling, but he gave Nick’s hand another squeeze (I’m not going anywhere) and he nodded his head, or tried to, Nick wouldn’t be able to see anyway, but he nodded and smiled and said, “Yeah, yeah…we’ll get out of here, you and I both.”