A red Oldsmobile accelerated down a woodchip trail targeting the subject ahead. It was a woman around twenty-three with matching eyes that matched her hair. She was running for her life, panting and telling herself not to stop. The man in the car was her ex-boyfriend, who had trouble understanding restraining orders.
She wanted to scream for help. The woman knew she would pass out if she yelled. Her heart felt like an overinflated balloon about to burst. Her lungs couldn't keep up with her legs. The woman panicked as the car came closer and ran off the trail to find herself climbing through an obstacle course of tree branches and logs.
Even when her worn out sneakers hit the mud, she kept on moving. The car stopped and she wasted no time listening for the door to shut. Her arms pushed hanging twigs out of her eyes as the man followed her tracks.
"You can't run from me forever, Cherie!" his accent echoed. "No one will find you here but me!"
His ex ignored him and continued to run. She chocked back when her scarf got tangled in a branch. The woman ripped it off and proceeded, more frightened now that he was getting closer. This was just like in the wild, except this time she wasn't the lioness her friends knew her as; she was the zebra. A zebra separated from her herd and taken to a lions pride of one.
It was not to eat her. This lion saw the zebra's stripes differently from the others. She was a black horse with white stripes in his eyes and he was not going to let other's admire her.
The woman found herself at a dead end. She stopped and looked up the stone wall that blocked her. Beyond belief, she was tired and getting dizzy but she didn't want him to find her. She tried to use the little rocks to climb with. Unfortunately it was nothing like the rock climbing at her summer camp.
She kept pulling herself up. When she saw the top, a figure was waiting. An angel to her. "Please…" she wheezed. "Help…" she let out one hand for the suited figure to grab. He just stood where he was like a rock.
Slowly she began slipping. Her hand waved in his eyes begging to be held. It was too late, as she fell off the wall and hit the dirt below. The trees and sky mashed together in her vision until pure night enclosed them.
The lion came forward to his prey and laughed in victory. In his hand was her scarf.
"Oh dear, you're in trouble now."
Ariadne's eyes opened. That was the second nightmare and two too many. The stress overwhelmed her as she laid her head back on the pillow and began sobbing.
Minutes passed as she cried on the pillow when the door started clicking. A very angry looking Jean stomped in, wearing his bathrobe.
"What the fuck are you doing?" he snapped. "I could hear you all the way from my room!"
"I'm sorry." She chocked. "I just had a bad dream."
"A nightmare, eh? Well do I look like your mere to you?"
"No." she replied confused at his question. "You are nothing like my mother."
"Then stop crying like a baby!"
"You acting like my dad!" she shot back before realizing what she had said. Ariadne covered her eyes and continued to weep. "If your going to beat me with a belt, do it on my torso because there are enough welts on my back as it is."
She didn't expect any sympathy from this man but she wanted to send her message strait out.
"I'm sorry."
"What?" she was suddenly confused.
"I shouldn't treat you like this." He said crossing his arms. "You just make it so hard."
"How is it my fault?"
"I need to make sure you stay with me." Jean explained. "I don't want anyone else to have you."
"So your sorry for hitting me? You're sorry for kidnapping me? Are you going to try that every time? Hurt me in some way and just say you're sorry?" She began to ask a stack of questions as she normally would. "Your sorry for being possessive?"
"That's enough!" Jean snapped. "Shut your mouth or I'll chain you up and shove this in your mouth!" Out of his pocket came a thick rubber ball connected to leather straps with buckles on the ends. "I heard these things make the users jaw stretch."
Ariadne wanted to know where he got that and why it was in his pocket but instead she sighed and shut her mouth.
"Good." Jean put the gag back in his pocket. "Now get up. I can't get back to sleep since you've woken me. So now you'll have to do chores."
She got out of bed and stood in front of him. "Ok. What do you want me to do?"
"Get me a bottle of wine and serve me a glass." He ordered. "It's in the kitchen."
Ariadne went down the stairs into the kitchen to see the bottle in the fridge. The green glass was full of fresh wine from his family's vineyard. She took it out and looked around the kitchen for a bottle opener.
During her search, she came across a drug she wasn't familiar with. They were like dissolvable tablets but for sleep. Revenge was the only thing on her mind then.
"You wanna play with fire?" she asked him even though he wasn't in the room. "Then get burned."
Ariadne opened the bottle and snapped a tablet in half, dropping both pieces into the wine. She was surprised at how fast they faded. To make things better, the wine still appeared the way it did before.
"What the hell is taking so long?" Jean called.
"I'm coming!" Ariadne replied, pouring the wine in a glass. She walked out with the glass and handed it to him.
Ariadne then found herself cleaning Jeans room. He wanted everything to be absolutely spotless. His poster frames were to be cleared, his counters were to be dusted and his bed sheets had to be made.
Ariadne tied her hair back in a low ponytail and started spraying the glass over the posters with Windex. It reminded her of the time she used to work at Blockbuster. There was a guy there who was so good at cleaning windows, that people mistook them for open doors. At least twenty people hit the glass one day and she would watch without warning them and say 'Are you ok?' as if she didn't know.
As she wiped the glass over The Phantom of the Opera poster, Ariadne put herself in Christine's position. If she was kidnapped at the same time as the singer, Jean would have most likely made her wear a wedding dress and marry him. The idea of being Jean's wife and living as a homemaker didn't please her so much.
Where's Raoul when you need him?
She was dusting his nightstand when she heard music. It was the song that played whenever Jules called. The phone was singing 'Your making me live now honey. Your making me live'. Ariadne's eyes rolled into the direction of the phone, which was still in the sack. With slight hesitation she answered it.
"Hi Jules."
"I've called you a million times. Where the hell are you?" the red head asked. "The police are looking everywhere for you. Everyone is worried sick."
Ariadne sighed and swallowed a lump. "I wish I could tell you."
"What's going on?" The architect looked around the room and listened for sounds outside.
"Jean took me."
"That son of a bitch." Jules growled.
"I shouldn't have left the house, I mean I just wanted some coffee and he must have drugged me or something because I was knocked out and woke up in the trunk of his car."
"Oh my God." Jules gasped. "Do you know where you are?"
"No." Ariadne's throat started to clog up. "And I have no way of getting back."
"Cherie!" Ariadne jumped back as Jean's voice came into range.
"He's coming." She told Jules. "If I never see you again Jules, I just want you to know that you're the greatest friend I ever had and I'd be nowhere without you." Ariadne could hear Jules sniffling in the background.
"Please come home."
As the door opened, she slammed the phone shut and threw it back in the sack.
"What did I just see you do?" he asked. Ariadne felt like an angry policeman was confronting her. "Did you just call someone?"
She was surprised that he didn't hide the phone in the first place or even take it off. She assumed that there were not only dumb jocks but dumb thespians too. "No."
"You just did!" he protested.
"The person called me, I didn't even tell her where I was!" she insisted.
"Your terrible liar." He sneered. "Who did you call?"
"Jules called me!" Ariadne repeated. "I mean it."
Jean walked towards her. "I've seen some awful actresses but you make the top of the cake."
"I am not an actress." Said Ariadne insecurely. As Jean came nearer, she turned in the opposite direction and ran out the door. He outran her when she got to the main room. Like a football player, he tackled her down and pressed her against the floor. As she struggled to get up, he flipped her over on her back and pulled her ponytail out.
"You are a dead bitch." Jean hissed putting his knees against her legs.
Where the hell is Arthur? Ariadne wondered. Jean took a hold of both her shoulders and pulled her left shoulder forward, taking the bone out of its place. She screamed bloody murder as she felt at her new swelling lump.
"Stop!" she cried. "Please stop it!"
"No." Jean took the left elbow and bent it sideways, slightly angling the lower arm. Ariadne sobbed for mercy as pain set in her entire arm.
"It hurts!"
"Then you should have fucking obeyed me!" He roared, getting off her legs. Jean moved down to her left leg and examined her knee. Ariadne's eyes widened when she found out what he was going to do.
"No, no, no, no, no!" she screamed as he pushed her knee backwards. The bones literally crunched like breaking wood. Jean looked rather pleased at his work. He didn't know he had that strength. Ariadne however was crying out loud in agony.
"Next time, you obey." He whispered in her ear harshly. Jean left her lying there and went to the kitchen to get his wine. In one gulp, he swallowed all of it. Then he walked back to teach his 'present' a lesson.
Ariadne whimpered as he unzipped his pants. "Anything but that, please!"
His fingers froze. What was happening? He felt dizzy and assumed he was getting drunk. But off a little wine? His legs seemed to shut down like a factory with a power outage.
Jean was down, knocked out on the floor. Ariadne was alone but not to her benefit. He would wake up in an hour's time and then be angry enough to rape her for sure. She sobbed to herself and tried to use the right side of her body to crawl out the door.
Outside, she could hear a car pulling in. Ariadne fell back onto the floor as her arm and leg ached. The door opened but she could barely see a thing.
The moment Arthur saw her on the floor he wasted no time running to her side. He checked her pulse, causing her to open her eyes and look up at him. "My God…" he looked at her injured figure. Her left arm was entirely red and swelling up in two locations. "You're going to be ok." He assured her, taking her right hand.
Ariadne felt a sense of warmth when his hand embraced hers.
"Can you hear me Ariadne?" She nodded weakly. "I'm going to be very careful but I need you to stay strong for me." Ariadne nodded again. She soon felt herself being lifted in the air and put against his chest. "I got you." Arthur had a firm grip on her as he carried her out of the house.