Chapter 7

No. There’s no way.

I’m a…murderer?

I’m…

I’m a monster.

Just like them.

“What? I don’t- I don’t understand. I have never wanted to hurt anyone, why would I- I don’t even know how I would’ve managed that! You saw how they kept me in chains! I couldn’t even walk, I was- I was so weak,” I explain emphatically, but Lucinda just shakes her head.

“I don’t know how you did it, but…listen, Jess,” she stops for a moment, giving my hands another squeeze. “I can only tell you what I know. But I’ll tell you everything I know, alright?”

Nodding, feeling like I’m in a trance, I let Lucinda tell her story.

“They were my friendly neighbours. My parents got on well with them, but I always thought that they were a little creepy…in particular, the husband. Mr Robert ‘Bobby’ Sanders.”

I recoil at the name.

Thank fuck I go by Jester and Jessica now.

“One day, I was walking home with my girlfriend, Milly,” Lucinda explains, and my heart breaks for her. Milly wasn’t just her friend - she loved her. “And I said hello to Mr Sanders as I walked past his house - he was out in the front yard, clipping the rose bush that his wife had planted a few months before. He waved back to us, and asked who my ‘friend’ was. I just said her name was Milly, and then explained that we had to get back in time for dinner, as it was getting dark. He said goodbye to us, and I didn’t see him for a few weeks. Until one day, I was out for a run in the morning, and someone attacked me - I lost consciousness and when I came to, I was in a dark basement, chained up, with a metal plaque above my head with my name on it,” Lucinda shivers at the memory, and I instinctively wrap an arm around her shoulders.

“And then I saw Milly next to me, with her own name plaque. It was- disgusting. There were six other people tied up - four girls and two boys. They were all younger than Milly and I - we were around 17 at this time - and some looked as young as 10 or 11. They all had name plaques.” Lucinda shuts her eyes, before snapping them open again, as if knowing that shutting them will just make the memories worse.

“You don’t have to do this, Lucinda,” I whisper through Scilla’s voice. I don’t want to make her relive something so traumatic just for my sake. But she shakes her head, taking my hand in hers again and smoothing her thumb across the back of my hand.

“It’s ok. You should know, and I’ve always wanted to tell someone who- who knew what it was like. So, anyway…it was as if time didn’t even exist, down there. I don’t know how long Milly and I had been there, just that Milly was kidnapped before me. We were all left alone for a long time, but we could hear screaming. We just didn’t know where it was coming from. But…it must have been you,” Lucinda squeezes my hand, and I feel bile rising in my throat. Scilla wraps her soul around mine comfortingly, and I feel a small smile ghost across my lips at the gesture.

“After that, Mr Sanders eventually appeared, with his wife. They were laughing as he wiped blood off his hands and onto his jeans, whilst Mrs Sanders praised him- it was sick and made me want to throw up. And after that was when the real hell began,” Lucinda shivers again, and quickly moves on.

“Milly and I tried to escape, but…it didn’t go to plan. We’d managed to pick the locks on all of our chains, when the Sanders were supposed to be out for the day. We split up into different groups, trying to find a way out of the underground complex they had beneath the house. Milly and I found you, and…I’m so sorry, Jess. I should’ve helped her get you out, instead of trying to leave you there. I’m so sorry,” she weeps, sagging into my chest as Scilla and I both go to wrap our arms around her in a tight hug.

“It’s ok,” I whisper. “It’s not your fault, and I don’t blame you one bit. I’m just- I’m so sorry. It’s my fault Milly died.”

Lucinda pulls back, shaking her head vehemently. “Not at all! You did nothing wrong, Jess. It’s my fault she died - I was a coward, and when I heard the door, I- I just ran. I hid upstairs, in the main part of the house, thinking that Milly was right behind me, but then I heard the gunshot and I just- I knew we’d failed. I heard Mrs Sanders shouting, and one of the other kids screaming, and I thought for sure I would be killed, just like them. There were more gunshots, and Mrs Sanders screaming, and I knew it was my chance. I ran out of the house, sure they’d come after me, but…no one followed. I ran all the way to the police, and told them everything about the kidnapping, the torture and how- how they were going to kill us. I was sure they were going to kill us. But by the time the police went over there, apparently…the Sanders were already dead. All three of them.”

I let out a breath, realising that in all that commotion, I must have killed my parents. When? How? Did I shoot them, like they did to Milly? Did they shoot me? 

“The police did however find some living people in that house. Not Milly, not you, not your parents. Not all of the other kids. But one of the boys survived, and one of the youngest girls too. And we were all taken in for questioning, and the investigation was a whole massive news scandal. It turns out that we weren’t their first murder victims too - they’d killed others before us, too. They estimated that the Sanders couple had abducted and tortured around 13 children, including Milly, you and me, and that they killed between 7 and 10 of them. But they couldn’t- they couldn’t find all the bodies, so they don’t know for sure the exact number of victims.”

Swallowing thickly, I take another look at Lucinda. She doesn't look like a 17 year old, and instead seems to be somewhere around her early to mid twenties, in which case…

“How long has it been? Since I died?” I whisper. I had assumed that I was released from Hell’s waiting room quickly after my death, when I became an evil spirit, but I don’t even know how long I was in Hell’s waiting room.

“Seven years.”

I sigh. “What do you know about me? Like- how old was I? Did people know about me? You knew I was the Sanders’ son, and you said we were neighbours, so…”

Lucinda shakes her head, bringing me into another hug. “You died when you were 19. So I guess that makes you 26 now, unless you’re eternally 19. And I never knew the Sanders had a son, until after they kidnapped me. They’d talk about you sometimes - discuss what they were going to do next. It was- horrible. So, maybe this is unfair of me to say, but - thank you for killing them. You rid us of our abusers, and saved the lives of those two kids who were still in the house. You saved us,  Jess.”

No.

No I didn’t.

“I didn’t mean to kill them,” I whisper. I am certain of that. Even after they’d killed Milly. Even after everything.

I never meant to hurt anyone.