Held (9 page)
Authors: Edeet Ravel
A dreadful thought came to me.
Everyone reacts that
way
—did he mean all the other girls he’d brought to this warehouse? What if the entire prisoner exchange story was invented, what if he was nothing more than a psychotic kidnapper, playacting a role to disguise his real intention?
Maybe he was delusional, like people who think they’re Napoleon—maybe he thought he was some kind of revolutionary hero, and he was lying about contacting the media. The other guy had to be working for him—how could he not be? Someone gave him the key. Someone who knew what he was like.
“How do you know everyone reacts that way?” I asked, trying to hide my fear.
“It’s common knowledge,” he said. “I’ve never taken anyone hostage before, if that’s what you’re wondering. There are no skeletons buried in the backyard.”
I was suddenly too tired to think. The hot, sweet tea made me drowsy and I wondered vaguely if it was drugged. I didn’t care if it was. I wanted to sleep. “Why were my fingers stiff like that?” I asked.
“Just stress. How do you feel?”
“Like a house landed on my head,” I said, my voice barely audible. “Even though I was the good witch.”
“I’ll get you some painkillers.”
“Your friend. Your friend,” I said, panicking at the thought of being left alone.
“I can promise you nothing like this will happen again. I know it’s impossible for you to trust me now. But I don’t even know what went on. And it would help me if you told me, so I can get you what you need.”
I didn’t answer. I was too wiped out. Instead I took his hand and held it.
I don’t know why I took his hand. I think I was just desperate. Desperate to have a friend, desperate to believe him. I knew now that I was on the brink of real disaster and that he was the only one standing between me and that disaster. I could have been left on the floor to die. Instead I was in bed drinking tea.
He pulled his hand away and said, “I think you have a fever. I’ll go get something to bring it down and for your stomach. I’ll return in an hour or so. No one else will come—I’m putting the combination lock on the outside.”
“I want my teddy bear,” I whispered. I was growing more confused by the minute, and it really did seem to me that he could go upstairs and fetch me my old teddy bear.
“I’ll be back soon.”
He left. I wanted to sleep, but every small noise startled me, even the sound of my own body moving on the mattress. I thought I was in a hospital, then in an ambulance, then on a sofa at home. When I remembered that I was in the warehouse, I was afraid that the brutal man would kill the kinder man and come back. He’d break the combination lock and finish me off. Or else this was just another lie, another part of the game they were playing with me, to drive me crazy. I was so anxious and afraid that when I heard the door opening I nearly jumped out of my skin.
“It’s me,” he said.
He was carrying a cardboard box containing linen, towels, and underwear. He set the box down and put the combination lock in place. I never thought I’d be happy to see that door locked.
He handed me a stuffed monkey, a white T-shirt, and navy sweatpants. “I couldn’t find a bear—I wanted to get back right away,” he said.
I put on the improvised pajamas. The T-shirt was twice my size, but the sweatpants were a woman’s small.
I found it strangely comforting that the T-shirt was too big for me; it was as if I were being protected by someone larger and stronger. The sweatpants smelled of lavender and I wondered whether they belonged to the woman who had been on the plane with us.
My hostage-taker mopped the floor with strong cleanser and opened the door to let in fresh air. “If it’s okay with you, I would also like to check your temperature,” he said.
“Is this your T-shirt?” I asked.
“Yes. I brought you some pills for fever and pain, and something for your stomach.”
He handed me two pills and I swallowed them. I hoped they weren’t arsenic.
No, he needs me alive
, I thought.
He
wouldn’t have bought me the monkey
. Then I swallowed a teaspoon of something pink from a bottle. He began shaking a thin glass thermometer.
“What are you doing?”
“Bringing the mercury down.”
“Why don’t you have a normal thermometer?” I asked, suddenly afraid again.
“I have a digital one, but it doesn’t work properly.”
I slid the thermometer under my tongue. When the minute was up, I squinted at it but couldn’t see anything. “I can’t read it,” I told him.
He took a look. “Just move it until you get the right light. 103.2. You have to drink more water or you’ll dehydrate.”
“I want to go home,” I wailed.
He sat down next to the bed and said, “I’ll stay until you fall asleep.”
“I can’t sleep,” I told him. “When I shut my eyes I see him. I see him in a tunnel.”
“Do you want me to read to you?” he asked.
I nodded. He began reading
David Copperfield
from where I’d left off, and I fell asleep to the sound of his voice.
Interview with Allegra Mills
Allegra talks about the roller coaster of pain and hope that followed the devastating news.
A
llegra Mills was teaching a jazz ballet class at her Happy Sprites Dance School in Chicago when the phone call came. The caller was the father of her daughter’s best friend, Angie Shaw; Allegra’s heart froze at the sound of his voice. Her worst fears were confirmed when Reggie Shaw told her that her daughter, Chloe, had gone missing in Greece. Allegra talks about the roller coaster of pain and hope that followed the devastating news.
First let me ask you—how are you?
ALLEGRA: The question has to be, for me, how is Chloe? I don’t have time to think about myself.
I think everyone is impressed by your strength and the campaigning
you’ve been doing. Do you feel you’re improving
Chloe’s chances of coming home safely?
ALLEGRA: Yes, I think our work is crucial in every way.
It must be hard to read the darker scenarios that are being
imagined.
ALLEGRA: I know people are concerned and concern makes the imagination run riot. My imagination would run riot too, if I let it. But it doesn’t help anyone. Nor does it help to blame anyone.
I would not be so forgiving of the organizers of the volunteer
program.
ALLEGRA: I can’t waste energy on blaming anyone. The main thing is for people not to forget about Chloe.
I don’t think there’s any chance of that happening. She
sounds like a very special person.
ALLEGRA: Yes, she is. I’m truly lucky.
(continued on page 87)
I woke up covered in sweat. My T-shirt was clinging to me and the sheets felt as if they’d been immersed in water.
It was dark out, but my hostage-taker had left the light on in the bathroom and I saw that he was curled up in a sleeping bag at the other end of the warehouse. I wondered whether I should wake him, but as it turned out, I didn’t need to decide. I began to cough, and the sound woke him. He sat up abruptly. He was wearing a white T-shirt, but he quickly pulled on his long-sleeved white shirt and buttoned it.
“I need a shower,” I said.
“I’ll turn on the boiler,” he answered. He disappeared into the bathroom, then returned to the bed with a bottle of water.
“I’m all sweaty,” I said.
“I’ll change the sheets while you’re in the shower.”
“How long have I been asleep?”
“Nearly fourteen hours.”
When the water had warmed up, I showered, wrapped myself in a clean towel, and came back to bed. It was wonderful being clean again.
He sat on the edge of the mattress and said, “If you tell me what happened, I can try to figure out what might be wrong with you.”
I took his hand and held it to my cheek. It was a beautiful hand, and I kissed it. I had no idea why—it wasn’t something I’d planned. I was just happy to be feeling better, and I felt grateful—if not to him, then to the higher powers that had saved me. Or maybe I was just going mad with loneliness.
He immediately pulled away. “Please remember that you’re here because of me,” he said.
“Are you the leader?” I asked.
“No, I’m not any kind of leader.”
“But you decide things?”
“Not this. This was completely out of bounds. Nothing like it will happen again. Do you think you can tell me what happened?”
But for some reason, I didn’t want to tell him. I didn’t want to tell anyone.
“It will help me figure out what’s wrong with you,” he said.
“Ask your friend,” I said, turning my back to him.
“That’s not possible.”
“Didn’t he tell you?”
“Not the details, no.”
“What did he say?” I asked.
“Only that he’d been here, and that he’d scared you a little.” I felt his anger returning.
“I’m so glad I had that shower. I feel better now. Will you read to me again?”
It was a childish request, but I didn’t care. He’d brought me to this; it was his fault I was sick and alone and helpless. When he’d read to me earlier, I’d been able to imagine that he wasn’t my captor at all. I wanted to feel that again, even if it was only an illusion.
He began to read, and I fell asleep almost immediately.
I don’t remember the next day clearly. I was in an odd state between sleep and wakefulness and I kept having hallucinatory nightmares. In one of them I became convinced that there were slimy, scaly creatures hiding in the warehouse. I crouched on the bed screaming, and my hostage-taker crouched next to me and tried to calm me down. I held on to his arm. “They’re in the room, they’re in the room,” I insisted. “I’ll make them go away,” he said. “I know a magic spell.”
Later I didn’t know whether he had really crouched on my bed and talked to me, or whether that too had been part of the dream. It seemed unlikely that he’d say anything about a magic spell.
During the day, he came and went, but at night he slept in the warehouse, in his sleeping bag. He was afraid to leave me alone for too long, in case I got worse. Maybe he also wanted to make sure the other man wouldn’t come again, even if he’d changed the lock.
He made me potato soup, which I ate with salted crackers. I swallowed the pills and the pink medicine. Every few hours he handed me the thermometer.
I liked the little stuffed monkey. He had brown fur, worried eyes, a happy, friendly smile, and long, spindly arms. I held him next to me, and even talked to him a little. “Poor you,” I told him. “You’re stuck here with me now. We’ll make the best of it.”
My hostage-taker had also brought me a man’s watch, which I asked him to set near the bed. The watch anchored me, reminding me that in the outside world time was passing.
On the fourth or fifth day I began to feel a little better. My appetite returned and I ate bowl after bowl of vegetable stew and rice. I was learning to read my hostage-taker’s body language and his movements, and I could tell as I ate that he was relieved. His face remained expressionless, but his eyes seemed full of hidden messages, and his body was as expressive as an actor’s, though I felt sure he wasn’t aware of it.