Suzie and the Monsters by Francis Franklin

Author:Francis Franklin
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2012-09-16T14:00:00+00:00

Caveat Emptor (Thursday)

Cleo’s fever finally breaks about three o’clock in the morning. It’s very dark and quiet, no street lights, no traffic, the men have been asleep for the past hour. There’s only Cleo and me, dark shadows in a dark nest. I’m wrapped around her, keeping her warm.

‘Is it over?’ she whispers.

‘No,’ I whisper back. ‘There are buckets by the bed if you need throw up.’

‘I don’t want to... oh, God. Why did you have to say that.’ She leans over the edge of the bed as best she can with her wrists cuffed and chained, breathing heavily. Suddenly she convulses, and vomits into the bucket. The bedroom is filled with a vile stench, and I rush to open the windows.

Cleo groans, but it’s not over. For the next couple of hours she’s hanging her head over the bucket, swearing and crying from the pain and general awfulness of it. At some point the diarrhoea and menstrual bleeding kick in as well, and I’m glad I put polythene over the mattress. It’s a mess in here. By five o’clock it seems to be mostly over, however, Cleo wiped out by exhaustion. Leaving a clean bucket by the bed, I take the other buckets out into the garden and bury the black, soupy contents under a thick layer of earth. I pull the soiled sheets from Cleo, put them in a black bag and throw them in the wheelie bin outside.

I clean a bucket and fill it with warm soapy water and spend time cleaning Cleo and the polythene. I have to freshen the soapy water several times before I’m satisfied, and with the sickening smell of excrement and vomit finally gone I close the windows. With dawn approaching I can see how desperately pale and thin she is. I work a clean sheet between Cleo and the polythene, and cover her with the duvet again to keep her warm.

I find my knife and a box of plasters, and take a glass from the kitchen through to the men’s bedroom. They’re both still fast asleep. I wake up Danny carefully and quickly put him into a trance. ‘I’m going to take some blood,’ I tell him. ‘Don’t fight. It won’t hurt.’

I pierce his wrist with the tip of my knife, and let the blood trickle into the glass. When it is nearly full, I put a plaster over the cut and send Danny back to sleep. At some point Adam has woken up and is watching me, but doesn’t say anything, and neither do I. I just carry the knife and glass away with me.

Cleo wakes up instantly when I enter her room, her eyes following the glass as if it holds the most precious thing in the world, which it does. Tied to the bed like she is, it wouldn’t be easy for her to drink, so I’ve brought the key to unlock her wrists. Sitting up quickly, she takes the glass and pours the contents down her throat, and is soon licking the blood from the sides.

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