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Log inRegisterForumsProse - Fiction and NonfictionFiction ShowcaseThe Prisoner - Short Story (4000 words) Thread starterNosretap23 Start dateJul 7, 2014 Not open for further replies.NNosretap23WF VeteranJul 7, 2014#1Prisoner
By Christopher Patterson
The constant dripping. Stale, moldy moisture collected in the far corner, clinging to the rough stone. When the stone could hold no more, when it had gorged itself on the sick, rancid water, it would release its feast in quick droplets. Drops. Dripping. Always dripping. Maddening drops, falling to their deaths, falling to my madness. They fell, silently. Every explosion of dingy, sickening water launched deafening roars through my head. Oh, my head. The pain. The ripple of every splash. Pain. Rising in magnitude with every strike, every beat of the watery drum. I wish my skull would just explode, I wish I would just die. Then the noise would cease. But, knowing my luck, it would probably follow beyond the grave.
The pain swells inside my brain and rolls to my neck. I can't move. I can't sit. I can't stand. I can't lie still. Oh, the pain. My neck to my shoulder, then my back. My arms. My legs. They rattle with every explosion. My stomach twists. I retch, but I have nothing to retch. The silent, deafening sound builds inside me, coalesces in a cruel orgy of pain and torment and torture.
Then, I let it loose. I can't hold it in anymore. It tears at me, rips at my stomach, wrenches my muscles. I have to let it go. I have to scream it out. I know how it must have sounded. It must have sounded crazy, demented, but it was the only way. After I scream at my stonewalls, my stone ceiling, the tiny slit they called a window—the only proof the sun still existed—the heavy, wooden door, after I scream it away, the pain is gone. The sound hushed. But only for a moment.
The wooden heel of a baton whips across my face. The pain returns. Oh, the pain. It thuds into my ribs. Pain ripples through my body again. I try to gasp for air. My lungs burn. My body goes numb. There it is, what I was waiting for—the numbness. The first time it happened, I thought that was it, I thought I was done, dead. The second time it happened, I thought that was it. I thought I was dead. The third time it happened, surely, that was the last. After a dozen times, I realized it would happen another dozen times, a hundred times, a thousand times. Maybe it would stop at a thousand—if I was lucky.
I curl up onto my patch of hay. A beaten cat. I stare at my door. It wasn't really mine. No, it was. I had earned it. An opening lay in the door, a barred opening where people could look in. I could never look out. Sometimes, after, eyes sat there, in that opening. Most of the time blue eyes, sometimes green eyes. Once, they were grey eyes. I never saw them again. A guest, maybe. They unclothed me, saw through the tatters of my clothing, years past anything but rags. I was a beast to those eyes, some roving animal. I was a man, until those beautiful, cruel, sapphire eyes burned into me. A wild beast, beaten into submission.
Those eyes, a whistle, the click of a tongue. I crawled closer. Food, scraps, pushed through the bars. It fell to the floor—greens, a potato, and, oh, could it be, yes, meat. My teeth hurt. Half must've been gone by now. Most were knocked loose the first time those eyes came to my cell. The hand of those eyes passed though the opening. I bit it. What do they say, "Never bite the hand that feeds you." I learned my lesson that night. I was surprised when those blue eyes came back, but never again would their hand pass through that opening.
I am truly an animal, some beast, some bird with clipped wings. Maybe my humanity is there, somewhere, deep inside me, hiding with my soul. If I still had one. No, it wasn't possible. Beasts have no souls.
My soul had escaped this cell, long ago, when I did not have the courage to. It left me alone to hunt small, brown mice too unfortunate to find their way into my world. Left me to feed on beetles and fleas small enough to crawl under my rotting, oak door. Left me to stick my tongue out over broken, yellowed teeth and strain for the small drops of sour water as they dripped from the darkness of my ceiling. The damned dripping. Dripping. Always dripping. Just stop. Stop. If it would just stop, I think I could die. I could die in quiet darkness. Quiet. Silence. That brought a smile to my face.
The damn dripping. The sound is trapped inside me again. I have to let it out. No. Not twice in one day. That hasn't happened since I first arrived, when my will was still strong, still with me. I have to scream. I breathe. The air is hot, thick, rank. It bites my lungs. It bites my nose. Rot. Death. Had I ever heard anything but the damned dripping, the sound of wood breaking bone, the sound of curses from harsh tongues? Had I ever smelled anything but rot, death? Had I ever felt anything other than pain?
Yes. I hear the babbling of a running river. I hear the song of a sparrow. I smell new rain, fresh dirt, lavender. I feel a warm fire, a feather pillow, a woman's skin.
"I need out! Help! Please! Make it stop! Help! Make it stop! Stop!"
"Why you lil' wanka'. Didn't we already do this once today? I thought I told you to bloody shut your mouth."
I feel the crunch of wood on my cheekbone. More pain. Bone—a knuckles—on my chin. Even more pain. Wood again, this time on my shoulder. It brings me to my knees. A knee to my chest. A foot to my groin. I can't breathe. Wood beats against my ribs. It's like a chorus of drums, from one to another and back again. I feel it. I hear it. Something breaks, I'm sure of it. My vision narrowed then. Black got blacker. Numb got number. Silence got quieter. I roll to my back. Looking up, I see his head, gleaming bald and sweaty in what little light my slit—my window—allowed into my cell. A dirty face. Dirty hands. I wonder if my face looked that dirty. Dead, brown eyes. I wonder if my eyes looked dead, only blue. I see his mirthless smile. I hear his humorless laugh. It's worse than the dripping. Then. Silence. Darkness.