Frozen in Time - Radia Al Rashid (best book club books .txt) 📗

that’s how we call each other.” She gives a small grin. “I’m Ava, she’s Alice, she’s Brielle, right there, she’s Elle and she is Fallon.” She introduces all of them.

“I’m Evelyn, I believe I already told you so. Call me Eve.”

“We’re kinda name-twins.” Ava smiles.

“Seems to be.” I try to smile but end up wincing…with the intense pain.

“Why haven’t anyone found you guys yet? Didn’t your parents file any case or do anything to get you back?”

“Actually, we don’t have parents. We have lived in the same orphanage from the time we were very little. So, when we got kidnapped, the orphanage authority tried to look for us but as some rebellious teenagers often flee from the orphanage on monthly basis, they stopped midway thinking the same happened to us.” Brielle sighs.

“O my God! I’m so sorry that you guys are going through these all on your own.” I feel genuinely guilty at this. They don’t deserve all these punishments.

“No, it’s fine! It’s not your fault, right? What about you? As far as we can remember, the master guy used to tell us that, he wanted to punish all the girls named Julia. Some Julia must have done something to him to make him do the filthy acts to us now. but anyway, why are you here? You’re clearly not Julia.” Fallon chimes in. She looks in a better state than the other four. She must be really quiet and more tolerant than the others.

“How old are you guys?” I feel so hurt to hear their story. I feel like dying out of guilt.

“We’re sixteen, only Elle is fifteen.” Ava replies.

This is it! They are so young. How can I forgive myself knowing all these young, innocent girls are rotting in this hell instead of enjoying their sweet sixteen? God! Why are you doing this to me?

“You haven’t said yet, why are you here?”

“That’s because my sister is the Julia who rejected him back in college. Yes, I’m responsible for your sufferings. I’m so sorry.” I burst into tears.

They seem to be startled at my reply. Staying quiet for a while, Ava speaks again, “It’s fine, Eve. Your sister didn’t know he was this dangerous when she rejected him. And besides, she could’ve died if she didn’t reject him to begin with. He’s so dangerous.” Her remarks make me even more guilty.

“I promise, I’ll try my best to get all of you out of here even if I myself cannot escape. It’s my promise.”

“No, if we can get out, we’ll all get out together.” Elle puts her hand on my arm.

“Please, don’t feel bad. They’ve hurt you more severely than they did to any of us. So, don’t feel bad.” She utters.

I sniff, “Guys! Have you ever tried to reach that window?” I point at the tiny window which is situated totally out of the reach.

“No! this seems totally impossible. It’s very high up there.” Ava shrugs.

I turn to Brielle, “Why did the she-devil beat you up in the morning?”

“I wanted to run away when she opened the door.”

“Is there a door? Where?” I can feel a flickering hope.

“It’s downstairs and if you think you can reach there, I must break your hope. You can’t.” she looks really sad.

“Why not? How did you get there?”

“That’s because we have to mop the floor and do chores every day. I was mopping the living room floor when Allegra opened the door. She actually did it to test me but all I could think at that moment was I had to run away and inform the police.” Tears start to pool in her eyes.

“Is it Scott’s house? I mean, the house where he lives in?”

“Yeah, apparently! We’re at the third floor now. the second floor and the living room downstairs are really gorgeous. Allegra makes us do all the chores but she told us beforehand that someone else would come very soon who’d only do Scott’s personal tasks. So, I don’t think you can ever reach that door. Besides, after Brielle’s incident, this is totally unlikely of Allegra to open the door again.” Fallon shrugs.

“Goddamnit!” I feel like bashing my head against the wall. “Does she beat you up every day?”

“No! only if we say no to the master or do anything wrong or against the rules.” Fallon states.

“This is so messed up!” I don’t see any light of hope anywhere.

The door screeches open making all of us jump.

“Where is the hussy? Is she awake?” the she-devil gives me a dark stare.

I gulp and nod struggling to stop myself from blurting out the cursed words that are fighting hard to come out.

“The master ordered to plaster your filthy hand,” she angrily tugs at my arm making me scream with pain.

“Don’t shout like a fricking banshee all the time. Or else I’ll break those vocal cords of yours.” She sounds livid. The perverted psycho must have scorned her again.

I remain silent biting on my lower lip to stall any more scream to slip out.

She finishes putting the bandage on my wrist where the bone seems to be broken. She adds more intentional tugging and pushing to make the process inhumanely painful. All the way, I keep biting my lip while weeping in silence.

“I will kill you someday! With my own hands.” She whispers in my ears before leaving.

 

Chapter Twenty

 

The next morning starts with a slightly good news when Elle runs to the room from downstairs, “Guys! Guess what I just heard.” She lowers her voice in a whisper.

“What?” we all ask in unison.

“First of all, they’ll give us food today...”

“Don’t they give you food ever day?” I sound confused.

“Of course not! Sometimes they don’t care to feed us three to four days at stretch.” Perfectly explains why all of them look like walking dead. I let out a sigh.

“What is the second news?” Fallon asks.

“Scott will be out today.”

A huge wave of relief washes over me. Thank God! I’ll not have to face the filthy pig at least, for today!

“This is great!” Ava cautiously states, “But you should go back to work, Elle. Remember? It’s your turn now.”

“Yeah! I’m going.” Elle leaves the room hurriedly.

“Who else lives here?”

“Scott and Allegra. Sometimes, some other guy visits the witch for some filthy business I guess.” Brielle clenches her jaw.

“Are you guys 100% sure that nobody else live here except for these two?”

“Yeah! But why do you ask?”

“We need to do something tonight. At least, we can give a shot.”

“OMG! Are you planning to escape? That’s gonna be too much risk!” Fallon looks scared.

“Without risk, we’d never be able to get out, guys. I’m pretty sure my family and friends are already searching for me. They obviously informed the police as well but can you see any result? It’s already the second day and we haven’t heard from anyone. This pit of hell must be somewhere really distant or else... I don’t know. Listen to me, even if we don’t try, we are going to die here. They’ll continuously torture us making us starve and beating us up every now and then. Isn’t it better to take some risk in trying to get out? Please?”

My little pep talk doesn’t seem to convince them much. They still look confused and scared.

“Why are you so scared? Did you try to run away before?”

“We didn’t but some other girl did.” Fallon gulps.

“Some other girl? where is she? Could she run away?”

“No! She was of around your age and obviously her name was Julia. She told us to join her when she planned the entire thing. We warned her over and over again but she said the same thing as you just did.”

“Okay…go on. What happened?” I feel exhausted and hopeless.

“Scott shot her.”

“What?”

“Yes, she was caught and he literally shot her in her head... before us.” Ava winces probably thinking about the scene.

“O my God!” my head spins.

“This is exactly why we never tried to break out.”

“For how long have you guys been here?”

“Four months.”

“What the…” I feel the threat of tears in my eyes but at the same time, I feel a drive to do something. Scott will be out, which means Allegra will be alone in the house tonight. I have to do something even if I end up being shot. I have to take the risk.

The rest of the day, I haven’t heard anymore fuss or threatening words from the she-devil. I silently constructed a plot in my head although I’m not sure whether my ideas will work or not as I have no clue what does the house actually look like. Besides, to worsen the situation, that guy friend of the witch can come tonight. Still, I am hoping to pull something off. It’s almost evening when all the girl come back to the room.

“What took you guys so long today?”

“She made us do a lot more works than usual. She also said that from now on we’re her servants and she would make us do whatever she wanted.” Elle says exhaustedly.

“Hm, I heard the perverted say that to her the other day. Anyway, guys…”

“Please, don’t you say you still are whimsical about running away. It’s not possible. Allegra might not be alone, there might be other people that we don’t know about.” Brielle warns me.

“How do you know? And why aren’t you willing to give it a shot? Don’t you think we all are going to rot to death in this sinister crypt?”

“Why would we care? We’ve never received any fair treatment being in the orphanage. Here, Allegra can get a little too scary at times but we are pretty much doing everything we used to do back in the orphanage. Now that Scott doesn’t need us anymore, I can’t see any problem with keeping up the occasional outbreaks of Allegra.” Fallon makes me too shocked to utter a reply.

“This is not life, what made you talk like that, Fallon?” Elle looks as shocked as me.

“Really? It’s her sister who made all of us suffer, her rejection enraged the master so much that he lost his sanity and now, here we are…paying for that.” Fallon suddenly becomes completely unrecognizable. Although her words cut through my heart like some venomous dagger, she’s got a point. I guess, I shouldn’t try to convince them in carrying out the plan anymore.

“Fallon!” Brielle cries out.

“It’s okay, Brille. She has a point. Nothing that she said is false. It’s me and my sister that psycho is after. It’s us for whom you guys have been going through so much.” I try not to ignite the fire any further.

“I’m warning you guys once again, do not try to escape. Allegra is not stupid to slip us away like this.” Fallon snaps steadying her eyes on me.

The last few words keep resonating inside my head for a while long. Why would she react so much? She looks better than anyone else in this room, I observed it before. Why would she want to stay here with the she-devil? It doesn’t seem right.

I look at Ava to find her confused and hurt.

“Ava, do you agree with Fallon too?” I whisper at her.

“Of course, not! We all are afraid of the incident that happened with the other Julia but we would never agree on staying here forever without any regret.”

“Okay!