Prompt 2- Raggdolly

A forced breath escapes through her lips, shoving her from the placid calm of sleep and into the raw darkness. A haze encases her mind, and  she is unsure of what startled her awake. Her eyes, unable to focus, refuse to find purchase on solid, tangible objects. No familiar shapes or windows, only a single flaming light burns in the middle of the room, lighting up the walls with a subtle red glow and illuminating a figure in front of her with streaks of fire through-out his hair. She feels stretched, as though her thin body is a leather hide between two racks, hung out to dry.

She asks 'hello' into the darkness, and the figure turns to her in response. The weight of the man crushes the bed springs under them. His eyes are hiding in the shadow, and sudden fingers on her cheek startle her. “You're finally awake,” he says. There is a smile in his tone, even though his face doesn't reveal such a thing. Something about his voice strikes familiar and she struggles to find the memory. It's recent. “I was beginning to think you didn’t make it. That would've been disappointing.” He leans in closer. “I didn't want to find a new girl so soon.”

She sees him, now; the wild strands of hair lacquered toward the ceiling, the angular set of his jaw and straight bridge of his nose between those vivid green eyes. She saw him when she sat at the bar, waiting for her friend, Lauren. He offered her a drink, along with a lovely smile. She remembers the full set of lips, and pieces of their night begin to shape. She weaves them together, one by one with efficient timing while staring into his curious eyes. I'll never forget his face.

"Where am I?” she asks, and tries her best to move, to sit up and speak with him, but she's held in place. Binds cinch her wrists together at the head of the bed. Her feet are done in the same fashion. “And why am I like this?” She moves more forcefully now, praying to undo herself.

“Don't you remember anything about last night?” He stands from the mattress, moving through the glowing red room to a counter. Several developing photographs hang from a line behind him.

“It's fuzzy,” she says, and it is. She can't remember how she managed to become tied to a bed in a dark room.

“Well, you agreed to be my model for this series I'm doing.”

“I did?”

He nods, rotating the tip of wooden tongs in a dish. “You were quite enthusiastic about it.”

“And why am I like this now?”

“For the photos, of course. I was thinking of taking more.”

She didn't remember consenting to pose for any pictures. Perhaps it was the alcohol not allowing the moment to surface. When she pulls on the binds imprisoning her she groans. “The cuffs are a little tight. Do you think you can loosen them?”

He pulls a piece of thick paper from a solution. While hanging it he says, “They're supposed to be tight. It's what my piece is about: terror.” He turns toward her again, advancing with thoughtful steps.

She squirms a little more, finally seeing the forms in the photographs which are hanging behind him. It's her, posed in strange ways with make-up smeared on her face. Some are naked. Others not. Then, there are some with black lingerie – simple lace, nothing more. She looks to her body, seeing the lace with bare skin underneath. “I don't want to do this anymore,” she says, wanting to pull her hands free. She tries, and is unable. The ties are too tight and pull her skin raw with each movement.

The young man is standing next to her, reaching, touching. His finger traces the line of her seized arm. “I remember you saying that last night, too, right before you swallowed my cock in that pretty mouth of yours.”

His finger falls across her cheek and her lips. Her eyes widen at the sudden hit of memory. They did. “We...”

A lovely smile splits his face. “Oh, yeah. We fucked like it was the last night on Earth, doll. And, I've gotta say, that thing you did with your tongue.” He closes his eyes, as though the very specific motion flourishes fresh in his mind. “I've never come so hard.”

“Well, I've changed my mind, now. Could you please untie me?”

“No.”

Her brow furrows, and heat builds under her skin as he turns away from her, back to the counter. “Let me go now! You can't hold me against my will! You're breaking the law, asshole!”

“You know the law, do you?”

“As a matter of fact, I do! My dad is the sheriff of this county! When he finds out about this he's going to shove his gun so far up your ass you'll spit bullets!”

He sits on the bed again, having retrieved a small jar and spinning the cap to open it. He appears amused, not at all worried as she would like him to be. “Oh? Is he? Well, then, we better make these pictures extra special for daddy then, shouldn't we?” Using his fingertip, he scrapes a bloody, creamy substance from the glass canister to smear it on her skin.

She tries to fight him, wiggling from side to side, but he manages to finish painting her lips and cheeks with the runny rouge. The wet, slick of the substance extends beyond her lips, making her seem more like a comic book villain than a model. The taste is familiar, yet strange. Metallic and chalky, like blood and cheap foundation.

Before capping the lid onto the small container, he applies the mix to himself, tracing round and round his mouth. Red, full lips smack together. “There,” he smiles, “now I'm beautiful, too!”

And at this sight, she is unable to keep the little composure she has been able to retain. Her resolve is fleeting, casting off into the forsaken room she's placed in, and she buries the side of her face into her shoulder to hide the only way she can.

“Keep that pose,” he says, grabbing a freshly loaded camera from his counter. He does away with the flash and begins taking pictures of a dark form on the bed, crying into her shoulder. "Show me how much it hurts."

Some days later, a thick brown envelope arrives at the police department. No return address, only to the care of Sheriff Charlie Swan. The uneasy, worried sheriff pinches the metal clasps together and folds the flap to pull the contents from inside. His hands are shaky, a result from nerves and caffeine. Endless days searching for his daughter, disappeared into thin air.

When he realizes who and what the photos are, he cups his hand over his gaping mouth. This wasn't the first set he'd seen. There were more scattered throughout town a few months back, the same format depicting a girl, Jessica Stanley, the same way. Like Jessica, the sheriff's beloved daughter had also disappeared without a trace for days on end.

His vision blurs through a thick onset of tears, and he feels a bout of nausea rising in his core. There she is, as if by dark magic. Hours, days, spent looking for her and she was there on that paper, crying. Her face smeared with what looks to be blood, and her mascara blackening the tender flesh under her eyes. He feels he can't look at the stack sent to him, but he finds the next, then the next. Each progressively worse. Her skin appears to melt from her bones. Burned. Gone completely as though she were made of wax. Chemical burns, no doubt like Jessica, as well.

Sheriff Swan heaves at the final picture, emptying his stomach onto the floor of his office. He can't imagine this reality. He can't live in a world where she doesn't exist. It isn't supposed to be this way! She can't be like this. Not truly. It takes him a minute before he's able to look at the photo again, hoping to determine it's falseness, but his eyes don't lie. His daughter is no more. A pile of blood and bones, pieces of skin and a flap of paper with the words she was great scrawled boldly across it.

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IDK about y'all, but this freaked me the hell out. I think I read with my hand over my mouth the entire time! Awesome, right?!?! There might be a little shift in the line up as one of us *side eyes Nerdy* might have had a little too much fun at the carnival yesterday and injured her hand. Good news is, we're not going to have to amputate *puts away butcher's knife* but she is having a little difficulty typing. Either way, we'll see you creeps tomorrow!!

~The Unholy Trinity