Kristin didn’t know why Soothe had been so worried. Up until now, the old guy hadn’t so much as touched her or asked her to do anything, never mind anything else. Okay, he was definitely creepy, but by now she was used to creepy. And if he did want to have sex with her, she’d do what she’d learned to do and just pretend she was somewhere else.
Hanger had been mad when he left. Something to do with how her hair had been cut had meant he’d gotten less money, and that had put him in such a bad mood that she’d been happy to stay behind.
After Hanger left, the old guy had given her a tour of the place. It was huge, like something from MTV Cribs. He took a lot of time to point out all the photographs where he was with famous people. She just went along with it. She had no idea who most of them were.
When he’d finished showing her around, he’d told her to help herself to anything in this huge refrigerator. She’d made herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and ate it with a big glass of cold milk.
At that point he disappeared. As she was cleaning up, she caught herself looking at this wooden knife block. She’d remembered how Soothe always carried a knife, just in case things got crazy.
If she took one from the block, he was sure to notice. She opened some drawers and found a small chopping knife, but just before she could take it out and hide it, he came back.
“I’m afraid I have company soon, Kristin,” he said. “I can’t have them seeing you, so if it would be okay with you, I’d prefer if you were out of sight.”
“Sure,” she said.
She’d been so hungry and so caught up in everything that she hadn’t so much as thought about getting out of this place. Now she kind of regretted that, although she had no idea where they even were, never mind how she would get out without anyone seeing her.
“In that case, follow me.”
They went down a stone staircase that led to the basement, only this basement was like a whole other house. There was a wine cellar and next to it was like this huge home movie theatre, except rather than seats it had three huge beds. You could lie in bed and watch a movie.
Her eyes widened as she took it all in. She’d never seen anything like it before.
“You just make yourself comfortable,” he said, walking out again.
She sat down on the edge of the middle bed. She should have asked him how the home theater worked. By the time she got to the door to shout after him, she found it was locked.
Never mind, she thought to herself, she could lie down on the bed and take a nap. The sandwich and the milk had made her sleepy.
As she lay down on her side, she started to feel a little woozy. She was awake, but her head was swimming and she felt out of it.
Then the lights went out, and the room was plunged into complete darkness. It was dark that when she lifted her hand up in front of her face, she couldn’t see it.
It stayed like that for a few minutes. Pitch black darkness. She tried to get comfy. What did it matter that the lights were off? She was going to take a nap.
Still lightheaded, she closed her eyes. Slowly, she began to drift off.
Next thing she knew, the room filled with the sound of a woman screaming. The scream seemed to come from all directions.
Kristin opened her eyes. It was still dark, then suddenly the screen lit up, and a movie started to play.
There was a young girl. She was around the same age as Kristin, and she had long blonde hair. She was tied down on a bed. It was the same bed as the one Kristin was lying on right now, but the girl on screen had her wrists and ankles tied to the frame and she was naked.
She was screaming, stopping only to take a breath so that she could scream again. Her whole body shook. She wrenched at her restraints, but she couldn’t seem to free herself.
Kristin started to sit up as the scream from the speakers got louder and louder. On screen a man appeared. He was old and wrinkled and naked apart from a mask.
Even without seeing the man’s face, she knew who he was. It was the man who lived here, the man whose basement she was in.