The Forgotten Girl

Chapter 19

Maddie

I’m not sure how I pass out this time, but as soon as I wake up, I know I’ve lost a lot of time. It makes me nauseous, knowing I can lose control like that, but at the same time, I’m glad I didn’t have to deal with the man.

When I open my eyes, I’m in my bed. The sun is trickling through the window and my skull feels like it’s been split open.

“Maddie, relax,” my mother says from my bedside. She’s sitting in a chair, dressed in tan slacks and a blue blouse, her hair is in a bun, her makeup done, and a magazine is on her lap. “You’re okay.”

I press my hand to my aching head as I catch my breath. “What happened?” I glance around at my room, clean as can be, the computer shut down, and the buttons put away. She cleaned up my room while I was out, which means she saw the buttons, saw the article I had opened. “Did you clean up my room?”

“Yes, it was filthy.” She sets the magazine down on the floor and leans forward in the chair, taking my hand in hers. “I did it while you were sleeping.”

I yawn, trying to decide if that’s what happened. Did I finally just fall asleep. “Sleeping? But what about the person that broke into the house? What happened to him?”

Her forehead creases. “Maddie, there wasn’t anyone in the house. After I called the cops, I came out of the room and you were lying in the hallway like you fainted… you woke up and said something about there being a man, but the cops checked the house and there were no signs of a break in... They did a few tests on you and said you showed signs of exhaustion.” She feels my forehead as if she’s checking for a fever. “Why didn’t you tell me you haven’t been sleeping very well?”

“I’ve been sleeping fine,” I lie, slanting away from her touch. “And if there was no man in the house then why did the alarm go off? I was… there was…” I’m at-a-loss for words. It’s difficult to defend myself when my mental stability is tottering from side to side and I can’t quite remember what happened, yet it feels like I should.

“The cops said it happens sometimes,” she explains, giving my hand a squeeze. “That even the slightest bump against a window can set it off.”

I’m not buying it at all. I’ve hallucinated before and what happened last night was too real to be one. “But I saw someone… I know I did.” I sift through my memories, through the haziness, to what I think I saw. “It was a man. He was tall and he… He called me a whore.”

My mother winces at the word. “Maddie, you passed out. How long has it been since you’ve gotten a good night’s rest?”

I tilt my head away from her hand. “I already said I’ve been sleeping fine... And I know what I saw. There was someone in the house and he did something to me... made me black out somehow.”

“I’m tired of arguing with you about this stuff.” She pulls her hand away from mine and touches the base of her neck. “Get some rest.” She gets to her feet. “I’ll come check on you in a while.”

“I know what I saw, mom. And you just need to tell me—”

She walks out of the room and shuts the door behind her. She’s lying, but the question is why? What is she hiding from me that’s so terrible she can’t even speak of it? Is it about me being in the hospital? My insanity? Or is it something else. How much does she know about me?

I get up out of bed and go over to the closet. She didn’t say a word about the box of buttons either, which I find odd. Unless I put them in my closet, but I’m pretty sure I left them out on my bed. When I get to the shelf, I know they’re gone before I even check. It’s like I can feel their absence. I check anyway and discover I’m right. I rummage through the rest of the shelves, under my bed, through my drawers. I start to panic and not because of the fact that I had Sydney’s button in there and the oval ones as well. I panic because they’re gone. They’re gone and I realize just how much I needed them. How much counting them has soothed me.

“Count the buttons,” he whispers. “Count the buttons and focus on that. Not the screaming.”

But they’re gone and now I can hear the screaming, echoing inside my head. Over and over again. The pain. The blood. He tells me to do things I don’t want to do. Lily does them so much better. She seems like a natural at this. Like nothing bothers her. She tells me I’m weak for not being able to do it.

“But I can’t turn it off,” I whisper. “The pain.”

“Then you’ll never make it,” she replies with a tired smile. “That’s life. Only the strong survive.”

“I want to be strong,” I say over the screams, the blood, the begging. “Just like you.”

Her smile broadens as she tucks a strand of her blond hair behind her ear, then sticks out her arm. “Then be strong like me.” Her other hand moves toward me and she hands me a knife. “Make me bleed,” she says. “And don’t feel bad about it.”

I shake my head in horror. “I can’t.”

She gives me this all-knowing smile. “I knew it.” She starts to put the knife behind her. “And he knows it too. That’s why he always picks you to go up there. Because you never fight back.”

“Don’t listen to her,” the boy says from behind me. He’s sitting in the corner in the shadows, tied up as usual. “You don’t want to be like her.”

I want to listen to him, but hearing Lily doubt me so much makes me want to hurt her, bleed the doubt right out of her. So even though it makes me feel sick to my stomach, I take the knife from her and with a trembling hand, I cut and for the briefest moment, if feels right, just like he always told me it would.

“Wow,” Lily says, cupping her wrist with wonder on her face. “I really didn’t think you had it in you.”

“Me neither,” I whisper, my voice faint as I watch the blood drip from her wrist to the floor and paint the concrete with dots. I wish I could erase them somehow, erase how easy it was to hurt her.

The memory fades and I look down at my wrist for a scar, knowing that if I slit Lily’s I had to have done it to myself. But my skin is smooth and flawless, the only thing on it is a powerful vein carrying blood, the beat of it matching the screaming still streaming through my head over and over again.

“Mom,” I shout as I sink onto my bed, trying to breathe through the noise. “Mom, get in here.”

Moments later the door flies open and she rushes in. Her eyes grow big as she takes in the sight of me, cupping my wrist, my skin damp, my eyelids wanting to close and shut out the noise. “Jesus, what’s wrong? Are you sick?” she asks, examining me over.

I shake my head, my fingernails digging into my own skin. “No, I just need my buttons.”

There’s a pause. It’s only the beat of my heart, but it seems like a lifetime passes by. I’ve said my secret aloud, admitted how much I need those buttons. But the real shocking part is, she doesn’t look the least bit shocked.

“I threw them away,” she says in a firm voice, then she turns away without a second glance back, leaving me to drown in the screams.