-This chapter is a bit depressing, sorry:( Again, it's a little shorter than usual but I hope you all enjoy it anyway.
Mullet Fingers awoke in the hospital. His mother was standing over him, looking incredibly sour. Mullet Fingers felt a surge of hatred rush through his veins.
"Your friend's parents called and said you were in the hospital and that I needed to come right away. Do you have any idea how much this is costing me? Boy oh boy I'm gonna make your life hell when you're outta here. And don't think of trying to run away, the hospitals put extra security in here to make sure you don't." She said, loathing him.
Mullet Fingers glared at her. Lonna glared at him.
Later that day, he was released from the hospital. All the way out, his mother held onto him by his hair. Once outside, she rummaged through her purse and pulled out two sets of handcuffs. One pair went on his wrists and the other on his ankles. She pushed him into the backseat of the car and roared off. Once they got home, Mullet Fingers saw that there were some men working at metal boxes in each corner of the yard. Lonna had a nasty grin on her face as they pulled into the driveway. She dragged him into the house and threw him down on the sofa. She then sent Beatrice to get a small box from the kitchen. Beatrice looked apologetic as she handed the box to her stepmother. In it were four, what looked like, large bracelets. Lonna took the handcuffs off her son and replaced them with the bracelets.
"You put one toe out of this yard and you'll be electrocuted by these. Five minutes of it and you'll be dead. As long as you stay here you work for what you eat. When you aren't working, you're locked in your room. There's to be no speaking to him, Beatrice." She said, turning to her stepdaughter "He's our servant. If I catch you two talking, he'll be beaten and you'll be locked in your room for a week. Ah yes, and I also got you a little present." Said Lonna, picking a box up off the table and opening it.
In it was a pair of shoes and socks. "If I see you without these on you'll be beaten and lose your meal privileges for a week." She said, forcing him to put them on.
She then dismissed him to his room. When he got up there, he found his window barred and a security camera in the top corner. There room was bare except for a blanket and pillow on the floor. On his bedroom door was a little flap which assumed was to push meals through. He knelt down and pushed at it, and found it couldn't be opened from the inside. He let out a deep sigh and lay down on the floor. His shoes were so tight that he felt as though they'd cut off circulation from his feet. He sat up again and examined the electrocuting bracelets. They were metal. There was no way he could force it off. Three hours later, a meal popped through the flap on his door. It was half a piece of moldy bread and some expired mayonnaise. He three small bites, then put it back on the plate. He didn't know when his next meal would be and decided to save it in case he really needed food. A short while later, Lonna opened the door and said:
"We've finished our dinner, you can clean the dishes now. Do a good job and I'll give you half a glass of milk before you go to bed."
He went downstairs and got right to washing dishes. Beatrice walked through the kitchen several times but made sure not to so much as look at him at risk of getting him beaten. After finishing with the dishes, he was given a glass of bad milk and sent off to bed. At seven, metal blinds came down outside his window. He curled up under his blanket and drifted quietly off to sleep.
"Honey, we can't keep them here forever. First thing tomorrow we're taking them back to the owl sanctuary." Said Mrs Eberhardt sadly to Roy.
He'd been up most of last night, being lectured by his father. His parents had been beyond angry when he came home after looking for Mullet Fingers. They permitted him to keep the owls at their house for one more day before they took them back to the owl sanctuary. They did so the next morning. Each one hopped happily back to it's den.
It was the last day of summer. Mr Eberhardt had found out that Beatrice's stepbrother had been found and was back at home.
"Maybe things are going to be alright with him now." Said Mrs Eberhardt.
"Fat chance. She's probably being horrid to him. Can't you call social services to go check up on him or something, dad?" Roy asked.
"We need a legit ament reason for them to conduct a survey, Roy, and we have no proof that Mrs Leep is mistreating her son." Said Mr Eberhardt.
Roy read in the paper a day later that James Howan had been fired by Mother Paula's the day after word leaked that they had had something to do with Napoleon Bridger Leep's injuries during the weekend. After a quick breakfast, Roy went out to meet the school bus.
It was a dreary first day of school in Coconut Cove. Roy took his usual seat near the front of the bus. He looked hopefully out the window th see if maybe, just maybe, Mullet Fingers had begun school with Beatrice. Roy was disappointed to see only Beatrice waiting at the next stop. She came and sat down next to him.
"Well? What's been going on?" Roy asked quietly.
Beatrice looked really upset. "I'm sorry, Roy, I can't talk about him to you. Lonna's says she'll beat him if I do." She said sadly.
"How will she know?" Roy asked.
"For one, she knows your dad's in law enforcement and would send someone over right away if he knew. And secondly, she's arranged for the teachers and the bus driver to keep an eye on us while we ride the bus. And wors-"
"Sorry, you two can't sit together." Said the bus driver who had walked over to Roy and Beatrice.
Beatrice got up and moved. Roy looked out the window, somehow hoping he'd see Mullet Fingers running down the sidewalk again. Once at school, he met up with Garret, who immediately started telling him about Hawaii. Roy didn't listen to a word he said. He noticed that most of the teachers were eying him unusually. He didn't listen to a word his teachers said all day long. When he got home, he didn't dare mention a word Beatrice had said to his parents.
"Oh...yeah he's doing all right. He won't be at school for a few days because he's still recovering from a concussion he got when he hit his head." Roy lied when his parents asked about Mullet Fingers.
"Well see honey? Didn't I tell you'd things would work out for him?" Said Mrs Eberhardt pleasantly.
Roy felt ill for the rest of the day.
Mullet Fingers was covered by his blanket in his room. There was no heating in there, he was freezing. He was right to save the bread, Lonna hadn't given him any meals since the night he returned from the hospital. There were little drips of blood on his bedroom floor. He'd risked going downstairs barefoot. As punishment, Lonna poured out a bag of broken glass on the patio and forced him to jump up and down on it for half an hour. He also lost meal privileges for, as he'd been warned, a week. By the end of the week, he'd lost a dangerous amount of weight. His skin was getting paler. He had bags under his eyes from lack of sleep. He'd walked passed Beatrice one night and could have sworn she'd burst into tears. The thing he hated most about the way Lonna was treating him was how it was effecting his stepsister. She too looked much skinnier. He hadn't said a word all week. Not a peep. He refused to talk to anyone but Beatrice, and since he wasn't allowed to speak to her anymore he didn't talk at all. On Thursday, he'd been forced to clean out the basement and was rewarded with a three minute shower, no hot water. It was cold and quick, but refreshing. He'd been given Friday off, likely because Friday was Beatrice's chore day. One would think that Napoleon Bridger Leep would have spent the day plotting ways of getting out of his predicament. But no. He'd given up trying to get away. He saw no point.
Late Friday night, he was paid a visit by Leon Leep. "Here," he said shoving three chocolate bars, a small bag of chips and a pop into his stepson's hands "Your mother won't be happy about this but it's not fair that you don't get to eat."
Mullet Fingers ripped open the bag of chips and began scarfing them down.
"I'm really sorry your mother's getting away with this, but I can't stop her. If I tried to, she said she'd send Beatrice off to military school, and I know neither of us want that to happen." Said Leon as Mullet Fingers ate.
He stayed until Mullet Fingers had finished eating before taking the garbage and departing, locking the door behind him.
Mullet Fingers felt very grateful to his stepfather. He was the closest thing to a caring parent that Mullet Fingers had ever had. At least someone in the world cared what happened to him.