Two: The Office Building
Maureen sat, leaning against the glossy cement block wall of the mid-nineties single-story office building. Her head drooped to the side, a vacant expression on her face. She only slept an hour the night before, awakened by her dreams with a start. A surreal vision of seeing herself standing on the roof of an old friend's high-rise apartment building, the sky glowing orange still playing against her eyelids. In the dream, she watched herself watching Atlanta fall into the hands of the dead. Smoke and explosions in the streets, screams coming from below, the huge propellers of a military chopper beating the sky as it twirled and plummeted towards her. She had been awake ever since, alternating between focusing on the tiniest of noises inside the building and zoning out.
The past weeks had been a revolving door of pure hell. The days seemed to blend together. Each day seemed to have neither a beginning nor an end. Her hunger was a vague thought; no longer a nagging feeling in the pit of her stomach. She stopped eating three days ago, in the evening. It was something she could attempt to control when nothing else could.
The laughter of the men across from her brought her back to reality. "You okay Peaches?" One of the men snickered. Her eyes darted around the room, her head foggy. Their voices echoed in her ears. She dragged the back of her hand across her clammy forehead in an effort to clear her head. She blinked hard. "I think she's lost it. Being on this hunger strike and all."
"You hungry?" Another man stood holding a can of baked beans.
Hunger? Yeah, she was hungry. She must be hungry. But she wasn't going to eat. She didn't want to do anything that they wanted her to.
"Come on, you gotta eat. You need your strength for later." He nudged her leg and smiled unkindly.
She knew she should feel hot in the building with its still, oppressive afternoon air, but she was cold. Her body felt disconnected from her mind and her dress was soaked with cold sweat. The man bent between her legs and waved the spoon in front of her face. A big bite that threatened to fall off the spoon and into her lap.
She shifted and winced, trying to keep her neck from stiffening up. The man placed the spoon directly in front of her lips, the spoon just touching her bottom lip. She closed her eyes and looked away and wiped the sweet sauce from her bottom lip using her shoulder.
Another man said, "If you know what's good for ya you'd eat that. You're gonna piss him off," he warned.
Told you she ain't one tad bit grateful for what we've provided for 'er," He turned his attention back to her. "Could've left you for dead like the rest of yer group, but we gave you a safe place to rest that pretty little head of yours, fed ya, showed ya a good ol' time. And we don't get one word of thanks."
"How about you just leave me alone or put me down," she garbled.
"Put 'er down, you hear that Andy. Damn, bitch must be desperate. I think we might just have to put 'er on suicide watch, Landry!" The three laughed. "You really don't like us much, do you, hon? Or are you still sad over your people? You only knew 'em a week. How much could you possibly miss them?"
A lot, she thought. She missed their kindness and the way that they took her into their group without a second thought. What were the chances that she would get another opportunity like that again? She guessed there wasn't much of a chance and started preparing herself for worst-case scenarios weeks ago. Still, there was some little, faint fire inside of her that never quite would die no matter how bad things got.
They all stiffened and Maureen's eyes widened at the creaking of the door to the side entrance. The large man slammed it behind him, carrying a bag of supplies over his shoulder. "Hey," he growled, "Appleton, Landry boys! What the fuck are you three doing? Don't tell me you're all just sitting around while I'm out there risking my life."
"No!", "Taking care of 'er", "Yeah, uh huh," the three men stammered all at once.
"Didn't know you were gone," the man named Andy squeaked out.
"Make sure she eats and drinks some. Don't tell me it takes the three of y'all to fix her up, either. Then send her to me. One of you morons, start organizing supplies and someone make a FUCKING pot of coffee." He moved quickly to the next room, not so much as glancing at Maureen, and slammed the door to the office behind him.
The men worked diligently from that point on. One took out the coffee press and measured the grounds. The man still kneeling in front of her shoved the spoonful of beans into her mouth, holding her chin, making sure she didn't spit any out. She swallowed the beans with minimal chewing, trying not to think of them so that she didn't gag. She was defeated in her hunger strike and she found herself wanting to spit the food back in their faces, but she was too exhausted and she was smarter than that.
The coffee, she readily accepted. She loved coffee. She couldn't turn it down no matter how bad it was. The weak, tepid liquid hurt her dry throat at first, and, then, gradually it washed down her throat and warmed her just enough to start feeling a little more human.
After they finished with her they stood her up. Their hasty, jerking movements made her head spin. They had to half carry-half walk her into the room not only because she was weak, but also due to her general unwillingness to help them, and sat her in the chair in front of their leader. The men waited for words of instruction, but only received an impatient glare before they left the room.
"You've officially overstayed your welcome," He began. The look in Maureen's dead eyes turned to anger and confusion crossed her face. They were keeping her here. She wanted to leave. "I think you've paid your dues. You're only a distraction to us now. You'll leave in the morning."
"What?" She whispered, her brow creasing slightly and cocking her head. She never thought that she would get the chance to leave, assuming that when they were through with her that they would take her life and discard her body.
"Don't worry, you take care of me tonight and I'll fix you up real well for supplies." His tone was even and virtually uncaring. This entitled prick wanted more from her and still was just going to toss her into the street. Could she even be surprised at this point?
She grasped at the words that she would need to assemble a full sentence but struggled to find them. "I," she trailed off. Her thoughts were headed into a full tailspin. She was too weak to be on her own. Whatever she had - emotional exhaustion, starvation, or some bug that was making her sick - was keeping her weak and groggy. This was her chance though. She understood how high the stakes were and steadied herself for whatever she would need to do to make it out alive.
The man ran his hands through his dark hair impatiently, clearly annoyed by her inability to function fully at the moment. "We're moving out tomorrow. Found a good truck and now we're ready to head west. I hear it's better out there. And you're a liability."
Her existence was now measured in terms like a distraction, a plaything, a whore, a bitch, a liability. She was reduced to these things. She was a useless thing to them now, not even a person. "You scavenged all my group's things, right?" Her voice was sad and full of acceptance. "I need my things at the very least. I think I've earned that right." She said this in the meekest of ways, not even convincing herself.
"You can have a few items and what's rightfully yours. Your belongs and whatever you earn after tonight. Just depends on how good you are," he clarified. "Come here." He stood up and moved from behind the desk, waving her to him. She shook her head and snapped her eyes shut in a vain attempt at refusal, but he grabbed her by the arm and pulled her to him. Her heart raced, the beat humming in her temples. His hand was on the back of her neck, his fingers pressing on the sensitive area causing her to shrink under him. He leaned her over the desk. There was a coffee cup full of cigarette butts next to her. It read, 'World's Best Boss'. She decided to focus on the mug. She just had to hang on for one more night. If she could do that, then maybe she could make it just one more day. Then, one more day and one more day…
He tugged at her underwear and let them fall around her ankles. He grasped her long, red hair in preparation to keep her in place as he entered her carelessly. She tried her best not to let on how much everything hurt. Underneath her, the ink blotter on the desk kept sliding back and forth with each thrust. It made it hard to focus on the coffee cup so she began skimming the dates on the ink blotter calendar. Meetings were written in red, and some pieces of unused tape were stuck to the page. Lunch at Connolly's with Harvey was written on the 28th of May. The day the first reports of the outbreak began to come in. She wondered if the person who worked here ever got to have lunch with Harvey.
Her aching insides kept drawing her attention away from the blotter. She told herself not to think about it, but each thrust was more painful than the last, her body now fully rejecting him. She felt torn up and torn down. She winced and bit her lip to distract herself as her whole body became tenser and tenser. "Relax," he growled. One hand was on her upper back, most of his weight leaning on that hand. The other grabbed her, painfully squeezing her waist until he had enough. Maureen closed her eyes and held it all in. She wouldn't cry.
Mack's world ended when his wife died. She was one of those ungodly things now. He liked this distraction. He stared at her scars as he used the girl again. Old cigarette burns formed figurative constellations on her body. They were on her arms, her back, her stomach, and her ass. He thought he saw Scorpio on her shoulder blade, but it could have just been the booze making him see it. He searched for other patterns on her branded skin. He felt urged to leave his mark on her too.
He finished and grabbed his last cigarette from behind his ear and lit it as she moved to pull up her underwear, thinking this signaled the end. His lips wrapped around the filter and hot-boxed the cigarette, trying to make the cherry hot and red. "Something to remember our last night together." It didn't hit her what exactly he was about to do until he told her to hold still. "Stop." He gritted his teeth and put his two hundred or so pounds of body weight to use.
The men outside the door heard her pleading for the man to stop. They could hear the struggle, things crashing to the floor. There was panic in her voice. Unsure of what he was doing to her, they all looked at each other with worry and confusion riddling their faces, unsure if they should do anything. Their necks craned towards the door. Screaming took over the pleading which gave way to sobbing. The men all looked away when the girl shuffled out of the room with tears rolling down her flushed face. The scent of burning flesh lingered from the office.
The younger Landry twin brother, who was only younger by a few minutes, stood but faltered. She looked too fragile to touch. Like the lightest touch from the tip of his finger would shatter her to the core and cause her to tumble to the floor into a thousand tiny pieces.
His stomach told him exactly how repulsed he was before his brain. He hadn't really realized all this time what they were doing or what kind of scars they were leaving. He grabbed the piss bucket and hurled. The elder brother looked more repulsed by his brother than by the sight of the woman sitting in front of them. "After all we've seen and this is what finally makes you toss your cookies?"
The man wiped his mouth and spat one more time before gulping his water. He glared at his brother. "Fuck off," he growled and turned to see the redhead crumpled on the floor in the corner of the room. He grabbed a blanket from the pile and threw it over her before he lost the nerve to help her.
Maureen didn't move, she kept her breathing shallow, her heartbeat even louder now and her lungs aching for oxygen-rich breaths. A lack of endorphins coursed through her body to soothe her searing flesh adequately enough. She was absolutely exhausted and sleep overtook her in minutes.