Burn Daughters Page 19

  Grace yanked me forward.

  Oh God, she was going to kill me! I was dead. No one would be left to help Evie. No one would help me. I fell into the grass, sobbing. I didn’t bother trying to get up. I just lay there on the damp ground ready to surrender.

  Grace tugged. “Git up.”

  I raised my tied hands in front of my face. “I can’t,” I told her. “I can’t take another step, Grace. I can’t.” I exhaled all the breath from my lungs. “I’m so tired. I’ve nothing left.” But then I heard my name called. I forced my head up and looked toward the abandoned farmhouse. Again, I heard my name. My eyes lifted to the window on the second floor.

  Up in that window stood Evie. The sight of her so far away broke my heart, but renewed my strength. I was sick of getting pushed around. I was sick of people telling me how I should act and who I should like. I was sick of Momma’s blind eye. I was sick and tired of being weak and expecting everything to magically get better. I was sick of waiting. I was sick of everyone taking a piece of me until there was nothing left. Mostly I was sick of being stuck on the Keller’s property.

  “Git up!” Grace ordered again, yanking and tugging in a fit of rage.

  And Grace’s newest rage all over her dog, King. A small laugh escaped at the thought of Clay stealing the dog right out from under her nose.

  Focusing on Evie standing high up in that window, I got to my feet. My chest swelled with so much emotion I could barely contain it. “It’s going to be okay, Evie,” I cried out. The back of Grace’s hand came down hard across my jaw. It didn’t stop me from speaking the truth. “It’s ok,” I yelled out. “Don’t be afraid!”

  The dogs circled me, growling deeply. Grace kicked at them, and hollered, “They have King!”

  “End this now and let us go. You’ll get King back.”

  “We’ll git my dog,” she said, tugging at the leash and dragging me along. “Those bastards are going to burn in hell for what they have done.” She shrieked up at the farmhouse, shaking a fist. “Bring me my dog!”

  I could barely manage to walk. I went down to my knees and was forced back up, only to fall down again. I was pulled to my feet and struggled to stay upright. All the while, I was elated. There was hope. The others were safe. Evie was going to be fine even if I wasn’t. Somehow I would make sure of it.

  Every ounce of strength I’d regained bled from me at the sight of the rack Grace used to butcher her deer. I screamed and struggled, willing to do just about anything to get away. The tripod spun and creaked in the wind, looking too much like the dinner bell. Grace was going to skin me, and then cut me into tiny pieces.

  While my sister watched.

  The dogs crawled in low and nipped at my bare ankles. Teeth broke the skin. Grace shooed the excited dogs away. “She’s mine,” she growled.

  I kicked and squirmed, but five days of hunger had stolen all my strength and balance.

  “Be still,” Grace warned, grabbing a handful of my hair.

  “Okay!” I heard the voice filter down from the second story window. “We’ll give you the dog. But first you have to let her go.”

  Grace untied my wrist.

  “Thank you,” I told her. I thought she was doing as Clay had instructed, but Grace had other plans. Plans she’d made before she ever removed me from that awful cage. She took my right hand and bound it with a leather strap, stretching my arm up and sliding the leather over the end of one of the tripod bars.

  I fought back, resisted, but it was not enough.

  Grace grabbed my other wrist and fixed it in the same manner. My arm was pulled up on the opposite end of the tripod until my arm was raised high in the air like the other one.

  “Don’t come out, Evie,” I shouted, knowing my sister was watching from the upstairs window. “Whatever happens, don’t you come out, you hear!” My voice cracked. “Clay, don’t let her see this.”

  “We’ll kill him,” they warned Grace, but she paid no attention.

  She wrenched me up by a rope that was draped over a branch. I twisted and turned in the air, my wrist feeling as if they might snap in two. My toes skimmed the ground. Grace gave me just enough footing to touch otherwise my arms would have popped out of their sockets. My sides stretched. My muscles felt like rubber bands about to snap. I hung there, suspended, and the tripod began to turn in the wind. It squeaked, slowly rotating. I was at its mercy. Whichever direction it chose to go, I had to follow on my tip-toes.

  Oh Lord, make it stop! My tongue stuck to the side of my mouth. I could do nothing to save myself. I was too weak.

  “Let her go!” I heard the words coming from the upstairs window. “She hasn’t done anything wrong. Let her down. You’re going to kill her! We’re sending him out. Turn her loose!”

  “You come out with him. I want cha’ll out. Right now! Out of father’s house!” Grace lifted her arm. The rod struck my back. I bellowed in pain. Lord no! Another agonizing blow came, and I collapsed, all my weight suspended by the rack. My shoulders felt as if they would dislocate. My own weight was my enemy. I cried out for Grace to have mercy on me, but it only fueled her. She struck with renewed rage. “I’m going to let the dogs feed on her if you do not come out. YOU HEAR ME! OUT! ALL of you.”

  “Don’t do it, Clay!” I screamed out. “You keep Evie safe. Whatever happens, YOU KEEP HER SAFE!”

  The dogs grew frantic; low, slowly rising growls coming from them. They were waiting for dinner. They lunged at my legs. Their teeth ripped at the dress. My screams only fueled them and heighten their anticipation I knew it, but I couldn’t shut my mouth. I had never been so afraid.

  Teeth caught my skin and tore.

  I felt one of the dog’s teeth go deep into my Achilles tendon. Puncturing. It was the one spot I hated shaving because thoughts of cuts made there by the razor always made my skin crawl. This was worse. It was a sharp, hot pain. I cried out and kicked my leg to keep my heel away from the nipping dog. Warm blood ran down my foot.

  Another dog grazed my thigh. Red blood appeared in the fabric of the dress Grace forced me to put on. The sight of the bright blood grew, bleeding out into the antique fabric.

  Grace lifted her arm, preparing to strike again with the Reverends Rod. I wasn’t sure I could take another hit. My back still throbbed from the last. Heat radiated through every single muscle. I was fire. Completely beaten. She was going to kill me, if not, then her dogs were willing to do the job of finishing me off.

  “Stop it!” I heard my sister sob. “You’re killing her!”

  I lifted myself up with a final gasp. “I love you, Evie!” The words caught in my throat, but it had to be said. I prayed they were loud enough to be heard.

  Chapter TwentyThree

  Grace heard the words, I was sure of it. Just as I had given up and accepted the fact that I may not make it out alive, she lowered her arm and let the rod clatter to the ground. Her gaze remained steady on me. She trembled, the anger and rage slowly leaking from her body. On her cheeks…I swear I saw tears. They glistened over her pasty-white flesh. Wet. Human emotion.

  Had Grace never heard the words, I love you?

  She reached for one of the leather straps and started to loosen it.

  I didn’t ask, I didn’t have the strength to, but Grace answered the question inside my head. “I’m letting you go,” she told me. “You and the little girl.”

  She was letting us go. Finally, Grace had gotten it! Maybe not that her father was wrong, but that a person without mercy and compassion…is a person lost.

  Turning my head to the side, I watched from heavy-lidded eyes as Grace fumbled with the straps and wondered, what things had Grace yelled from her cage to her father? What words had she used to try to get him to understand, to feel?

  Her dogs still circle, unable to understand that it was over. Grace shooed them away. I believe I saw disappointment in their wild eyes. Her fingers were like ice against my skin. She struggled with loosening the strap. My shoulder muscles burned so bad that I co
uld hardly wait to relax them.

  But before Grace could get me down there was a loud slapping sound like a screen door caught by a strong wind. The sound paralyzed the dogs and quieted their growls. I lifted my head and forced my eyes toward the sound. The back door of our abandoned house stood wide open, beckoning. My stomach dropped. “Evie.” Her name was barely whispered.

  What was Clay thinking, exposing them? Letting the dogs in. More or less purposely calling them to them. Just like when Emily had chanced running, the dog’s attention was diverted. They lifted their heads immediately. Their heads turned from me to our abandoned house. The dogs sprinted toward the opened door, trampling over one another, snarling and nipping. In their fervor to get inside, the dogs forgot about me. One by one, Grace’s horde entered the house.

  Grace forgot about me too. She stood void of all movement. Back to being frozen.

  Mostly I remember the quiet, the quiet before the storm. The door stared back. Black and empty. Then suddenly the door was swallowed by bursting flames. Blinding hot. Oranges and reds. Burning.

  Grace’s face washed pale. “King!” she roared. She tore at her hair. “NO! Not King!” Impulsively, she rushed forward and paused briefly before ducking under the flames over the doorway.

  Grace vanished through the opening. “I’m a good mommy,” echoed in my mind. “I’m a good mommy.”

  I hung there in utter disbelief. I watched as the windows of each room gushed heavy plumes of smoke like the nostrils of a sleeping dragon. The fire raged. Devoured. I was overcome by sorrow and grief as the bones of the house began to collapse under the fury of the fire. The center of the roof caved, everything under it buried. Just like Old Man Keller chest, the house was destroyed. Soon to be forgotten taking with it…the past.

  My eyes glazed over; my vision distorted from the wall of immense heat. The wind shifted and brought nauseating fumes with it. My lungs burned. I gasped for air. Coughed. Strangled.

  Windows burst. Glass sprayed. The fire popped and crackled.

  My lids pulled a blanket of darkness over my eyes. There were flashes. That’s all I could recall. Images. Intermittent. No real sense to my thoughts. Scattered. In and out of consciousness. A blurred figure striding towards me. The figure shrouded by the hazy fumes emitted by the angry fire. He passed through the cloud as if it was nothing, confidently coming towards me like an angel sent for me and me alone. Beautiful.

  Then came the weightlessness.

  The relief.

  The absence of pain.

  I curled into the warmth enveloping me. “It’s okay, Mill,” he whispered in my ear, “I’ve got you.”

  Chapter TwentyFour

  I draw my feet up into the leather recliner. Hug my knees to my chest. The chair is sage green. The wall’s a boring beige color. The room is freezing. I don’t know why they keep it so cold. Maybe so we won’t stay any longer than we have to. If I could I’d stay forever, because here is better than home with Frank.

  Dr. Beaker slides his pen in the pocket of his shirt and shuts my swollen file, laying it on the floor by his chair. He leans forward, elbows on his knees, his hands cupped. Never has he looked at me so solidly in the eyes. There is pity there. I don’t like it.

  “Are we done?” I ask.

  “Not quite. This is good. This is the first time we’ve gotten this far.” He wrings his hands, holding my gaze. “Millie, how did it end? What do you see?”

  I choke on the words. “Everyone dies.” I touch my chest. “I felt the flames. There were no screams, only silence. No one could have survived that fire.”

  “You did.”

  “Only because I wasn’t in the house with Evie, where I should’ve been.”

  He passes me a box of tissues and scoots his chair closer, leaning in my direction. “You have remorse because you survived, Millie. But you shouldn’t have remorse.”

  “There’s no reason for me to survive,” I say. “I have no purpose.”

  “You have every reason to have made it through this tragedy.” He sits back. “Do you know what I believe the definition of Grace is?”

  I shake my head while wiping my nose.

  “Unmerited love and forgiveness. People don’t always do the right thing. They do the best they can. You did your best.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” I ask, “Because nothing can make me feel better.”

  Dr. Beaker rubs his face in frustration and exhales. “So, that’s it.” His steady eyes hold mine. He’s assessing me again.

  “I thought the pen was up,” I say, “You can’t write down how screwed up I am without your pen.”

  “How did you get down?” Dr. Beaker asks. “Who freed you?”

  It’s okay, Mill, I’ve got you. I shake my head to clear it. “I don’t know.”

  “Yes. You do know. Come on, think hard.”

  Dr. Beaker is relentless. Why won’t he just let me be? Why is he forcing this? I rub the space between my brows. Think, think, think Millie! “I remember seeing red,” I say, “A Firefighters hat, I think.” No. A red shirt. I saw a red shirt. Red as blood moving through the hazy fumes.

  The doctor leans forward. “Yes. Keep going. The light from the fire is what brought the town out. That’s how they found you, but you were already safe. There’s only one option, Millie, only one person left in that house that was strong enough to get you down. Is it possible he finished what you two started in the staircase with the moonshine?”

  “No.” I shake my head.

  “No?” Dr. Beaker’s eyes narrow. “Why not? Why is it so hard for you to believe?”

  “Because nothing good ever happens?” If he got me down, then maybe he got Evie out too before the fire. Is it possible? My knee starts to bounce with nervous tension. “I can’t,” I tell Dr. Beaker.

  “Yes you can. You’re strong, Millicent. Stronger than you think. All those people waiting to hear your story, it’s because you inspire them.”

  “I was caged,” I tell him. “I couldn’t get myself out. I’m a victim. I’ve always been a victim.”

  Dr. Beaker’s chair scratched over the floor as he scooted closers. He held my gaze. “You’re wrong. The ability to fight is not what makes the hero, Millicent. A hero is someone willing to sacrifice everything to help others. You protected your sister, and you sacrificed your own safety to do it. That makes you a hero. Love is the answer to all things. Love is vital. It’s key. Grace and her dogs were an example of what happens when there is a lack of love.”

  So many muddled thoughts. I can almost grasp it. It’s so close. The memory.

  “Could you excuse me for a moment?” Dr. Beaker exits the room.

  I’m not certain where my thoughts wander, they just wander until there’s a light knock at the door. The door opens. Dr. Beaker walks into the room, and steps aside, out of the way of a person entering behind him.

  My stomach drops. I immediately turn away, angling my body so that all there is before me is the beige wall. My throat closes. I can’t swallow. No matter how hard I try, I cannot swallow.

  I go back, back to the raging fire and the scorching heat. I retrace those last few moments. I’m about to explode. I’m in a room with no windows. Literally. I want to flee, but there is no escape, no way to get away. There’s ringing in my ears. The walls constrict, and I shut my eyes: I hear a muddled voice, “Millie. Millie, look.” There’s a small tug at my elbow. A persistent nudge. I ignore it. Can’t. Can’t believe. Too good to be true! I rock back and forth, back and forth. Baby in a cradle. Sister. Me. Babies in a cradle. Cradle comfort me. Rock me, rock me, back and forth, back and forth. Comfort. Comfort in rhythm.

  Only bad ever happens. Only bad…. He hovers over my bed, my sister only a few feet away, unaware. His stealthy movements. Predator-like. The strong smell of Bourbon pollutes the air. His presence heavy on me late at night. Weighing me down. Suffocating. Have to turn my head to breathe. He’s so heavy. His fat hand clamped over my mouth, damp and salty over my
lips. He whispers, quietly. “Hush, we don’t want to wake your sister.”

  Momma, drunk, passed out on the couch again. Why doesn’t she protect us? Why doesn’t she protect me?

  Bad.

  Bad.

  Bad…can’t trust!

  The dogs.

  The fear.

  The torment.

  Becoming Grace.

  I’m inside the cage. My body forced against the wires. Shredded. Strained, pushed through by the force of all the things shouldering against me, competing for my surrender. All my fears bear against me. I think the cage keeps it out, but it’s all in there with me, locked away, buried. Grace. The dogs. Frank. Momma. My insecurities. Fear of the unknown. The cage trying to contain. To keep me. To destroy me.

  Preventing Life. Love. Happiness.

  I don’t want to be caged! I want to love! I want to live! I don’t want to be Grace! Everything that is suppressed deep down spews and the cage I’ve built draws its last gasping breath. The door opens, and I am set free. No longer imprisoned.

  Hands touch my face, cupping it gently. My eyes slowly open to dozens of freckles. Beautiful, sweet freckles! Good. “I love you, too,” my sister says.

  We don’t have to accept the past as our future. Going forth, we can make a conscience decision to shed our rough start and put on a fresh beginning and reinvent. And there lies the true freedom. We have that right. The right to choose.