Fooled

"DO YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE DEALING WITH?"

"Do you?" I say as I remove my contacts and smile at her.

Chained to a post on the wall, my prey glares at me.

Streaks of black running down her cheeks; all her makeup smearing.

How revolting.

"People will be looking for me you know! So how about you do us both a favor and let me go!"

"You all say the same thing…"

I grab a towel and line up all my tools on it, and then roll it up.

Smiling all the while, I walk up to her, crouch down, and unroll the towel in front of her.

I point at the tool on the left end.

"Do you know what this one is called?"

She doesn't take her gaze off of the contents on the towel.

I pick up the tool and rub my fingers on the blade.

"Welcome to cooking 101. Today, you will learn how one uses these tools to cut…"

I rub the blade against her tearstained cheeks and she stares at it fearfully.

"…skin, and prepare an animal for dinner."

She tries to sob, but no sound escapes those overly glossed lips.

"Now."

I sit with my legs crossed in front of her; the towel of utensils between us.

"Tell me Ms. Stone, what is the one I'm holding called?"

"Please, please, please, please. I can give you whatever you want. Do you wa-want money? I have lots and l-lots of i-it. Just please, PLEASE, LET ME GO!"

Her shrieks bounce off the walls of our little room on the outskirts of the city.

She starts mumbling things, her eyes glaze over; oh how I love the boundaries of human sanity.

"That is not quite the right answer Ms. Stone. This one I'm holding here is a Forschner Victorinox Butcher knife. Makes very clean cuts. See?"

I rub my thumb against it, smiling as the blood oozes.

She stares at the blood in the disbelief, then back at me.

"Oh, I have an idea…how about we play a game."

She tries so hard to escape my touch; I grab her face, using my bloodied hand and make her face me.

"Ok, now that I have the whole class' attention, let me explain. The rules are simple; you have only one shot to get this right….you have to guess which one of these knives is the one that is used to skin the animal….if you get it right, I will unchain you. Deal?"

A small spark of hope enters her otherwise darkened, chocolate eyes, and she nods.

The chain rattles as she sits straight up and studies the knives on the towel.

Long wisps of orange fall effortlessly against her cheeks, somehow softening the lines of stress on her face.

As she concentrates on the knives, I slip the one in my hand back onto the towel.

Clank. Clank. Clank.

She puts her hands together as though she is praying and then moves them in front of her chin.

I watch those honey eyes fill up with tears again as she shakes her head and turns to another knife to study.

Grunting, she lowers her hands and settles them on her lap.

The time goes on painfully slow, when will she understand?

Abruptly, she looks up at me with those cold eyes.

I walk to the fridge and pull out my jam.

Settling the jar between my legs, I watch as she lifts a hand and points to the knife.