eats a PowerBar, has a bit of water, and then stands. She cries out for help with what little voice she has left again and again. Then she slams herself into the door again: once, twice, three times. Again. Again. Other shoulder, same thing. She kicks at the door with one leg, then the other. Then she lies on the floor and kicks with both legs.
Finally, her body aching, she lies on the bare, fusty-smelling mattress and stares dully upward.
All those times she read in the newspaper or online about women being abducted and later killed. She would stare into their faces and try to imagine how it happened, what it might have been like, if they were in some way responsible. She would look at them and feel so bad for them and for those who loved them. But she would also feel as though these events happened in some kind of parallel universe. Such a thing would never happen to her. She would look at those women’s eyes, their hair, the shapes of their mouths, the necklaces they might be wearing, and she would wonder, How did they feel? Well, now she knows. She is both terrified and angry, more at herself than at the man. She let this happen. She fell for a stupid ploy, she got willingly into the car. She lies there, alert for any sound, trying to think of what else she might do.
He said he was going to get someone he wanted her to be nice to, and then he’d let her go. She doubts he’ll let her go. She wonders if he really is bringing someone or if he himself will come back. Or not. She knows nothing about him, really. She could not gauge the caliber of his personality, she did not know what kind of approach to take with him, what kind of psychology might work in her favor. She has a way with people, she can almost always find a way into their affection, but not this time. As soon as she got in the car, the man’s eyes went flat as a fish’s. She doesn’t think anything she might say or do will reach him. And what of the person he is supposedly bringing back? Anyone complicit with the man who took her will not be interested in listening to Sadie’s pleas for help.
So it’s possible she will be used, and killed. She feels it as a horrible abstraction; she can’t imagine that it will really happen to her. But if it does, she hopes it’s quick. She hopes she can make a picture in her mind of something beautiful to see when everything happens. She hopes that, in her last moments, she will be able focus on what else there was in her life, things separate and distinct from this awful day.
But she might survive. She might be able to convince them to let her go, when they are done with her, or even before. She’d read once in the newspaper about a woman who awakened from a sound sleep to a man who had broken into her house with the intention of murdering her (as he had several other women). She offered a simple question— What do you need? —and the man broke down before her, collapsed to the floor and began weeping, pressing his fists against a face over which he’d pulled a nylon stocking, and then he pulled the stocking off. She said she saw him then as a dangerous but wounded animal, and she spoke kindly to him, thinking that, if he killed her, at least her last act would have been one of compassion.
“What a California reaction,” her mother had said, with some measure of what Sadie read as contempt, after she, too, saw the story. But Sadie felt she understood that woman’s response. When your life is so close to being over and you know it, isn’t it possible you might offer your greatest act of generosity?
When her ancient cat, Shadow, died recently, Sadie asked her mother not to take him to the vet, since it was clear the time was nigh. “Are you sure?” Irene asked, and Sadie said yes, she was sure. She told her mother, who stood weeping in the hall, that she wanted to be alone with him, was that all right? Irene nodded. Sadie took the cat into her bedroom, under the covers with her. She spoke gently to him,
Finally, her body aching, she lies on the bare, fusty-smelling mattress and stares dully upward.
All those times she read in the newspaper or online about women being abducted and later killed. She would stare into their faces and try to imagine how it happened, what it might have been like, if they were in some way responsible. She would look at them and feel so bad for them and for those who loved them. But she would also feel as though these events happened in some kind of parallel universe. Such a thing would never happen to her. She would look at those women’s eyes, their hair, the shapes of their mouths, the necklaces they might be wearing, and she would wonder, How did they feel? Well, now she knows. She is both terrified and angry, more at herself than at the man. She let this happen. She fell for a stupid ploy, she got willingly into the car. She lies there, alert for any sound, trying to think of what else she might do.
He said he was going to get someone he wanted her to be nice to, and then he’d let her go. She doubts he’ll let her go. She wonders if he really is bringing someone or if he himself will come back. Or not. She knows nothing about him, really. She could not gauge the caliber of his personality, she did not know what kind of approach to take with him, what kind of psychology might work in her favor. She has a way with people, she can almost always find a way into their affection, but not this time. As soon as she got in the car, the man’s eyes went flat as a fish’s. She doesn’t think anything she might say or do will reach him. And what of the person he is supposedly bringing back? Anyone complicit with the man who took her will not be interested in listening to Sadie’s pleas for help.
So it’s possible she will be used, and killed. She feels it as a horrible abstraction; she can’t imagine that it will really happen to her. But if it does, she hopes it’s quick. She hopes she can make a picture in her mind of something beautiful to see when everything happens. She hopes that, in her last moments, she will be able focus on what else there was in her life, things separate and distinct from this awful day.
But she might survive. She might be able to convince them to let her go, when they are done with her, or even before. She’d read once in the newspaper about a woman who awakened from a sound sleep to a man who had broken into her house with the intention of murdering her (as he had several other women). She offered a simple question— What do you need? —and the man broke down before her, collapsed to the floor and began weeping, pressing his fists against a face over which he’d pulled a nylon stocking, and then he pulled the stocking off. She said she saw him then as a dangerous but wounded animal, and she spoke kindly to him, thinking that, if he killed her, at least her last act would have been one of compassion.
“What a California reaction,” her mother had said, with some measure of what Sadie read as contempt, after she, too, saw the story. But Sadie felt she understood that woman’s response. When your life is so close to being over and you know it, isn’t it possible you might offer your greatest act of generosity?
When her ancient cat, Shadow, died recently, Sadie asked her mother not to take him to the vet, since it was clear the time was nigh. “Are you sure?” Irene asked, and Sadie said yes, she was sure. She told her mother, who stood weeping in the hall, that she wanted to be alone with him, was that all right? Irene nodded. Sadie took the cat into her bedroom, under the covers with her. She spoke gently to him,
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