Coming to, Bernadette’s head felt like it’d burst open with each throb to the rhythm of her arteries. Opening her eyes, she found herself sitting inside a claustrophobic concrete room, even smaller than a prison cell. The lights dim, the person who placed her there at least considered the state she would find herself in upon waking, the light soothing to her sore brain.
Naked shoulders rose with goosebumps, the cold making Bernadette grimace. Unpleasant, it wasn’t just a chill, but freezing‒ she guessed in single digits (in summer, nonetheless!). It wasn’t just the temperature either, anxiety burned at the bottom of her stomach as soon as her thoughts gathered.
It was only Bernadette, slumped in a wooden chair inside a concrete room.
Despite the thrumming of her head, she stood up without easing herself. Blood rushed down and the space in front of her eyes, trapping her in pitch black for almost a minute.
When her senses came back, she found someone standing in front of her, as if on cue.
“Hello there,” Bernadette’s eyes stilled at the figure in front. Their voice familiar, she connected the dots quick.
Her voice rough and hoarse, she replied, “Hey, Anette. What’s with the set-up?”
Anette´s lips twitched up, putting a hand on her sister’s shoulder, “I thought a dog house was fit for one.”
Bernadette’s forehead crinkled and her eyes glared into the other,
“Shut up,” Bernadette swat the hand off her shoulder. Forcing into a firmer stance, she took a few steps back. Stopping after almost tangling with the chair behind her, she looked at the other again. Anette’s cheeks stifled a laugh.
“Come on, don’t you want to relive the old times, just the three of us and the world‒” just as the sister went to finish the thought, Bernadette interrupted with a shake of her head.
Anette heaved an overexaggerated sigh, “I’ll get you into a more negotiable space, then.”
Her sister offered a hand, but Bernadette looked at it before pulling both of her own behind her back. With a dramatized swat of her hand, Anette led the way out of the cold room. After walking out, two people similar to the one previously abducting her appeared at Bernadette’s sides, sending a flash of cold down her spine.
Her frown deepened as she looked at them, “What? Why are they still masked?”
Anette didn’t spare a glance to her before replying, “I’m just taking care that the mad rabbit you’ve been staying with doesn’t use her trump card to kill them all.”
“I doubt she would even come back for me,” Bernadette uttered under her breath. Not that she’d say she’s more glad to be with her sister, but she also doubted everyone back at the hideout wanted her there at all.
She drew in a heavy breath, shaking her head and instead taking in the surroundings. For her sister’s tastes, the house proved too lavish. The wallpapers rich and images along the walls framed in extravagant golden framings. The tiles that lined the bottom clean, the house was contrast to grimy tiles on the bathroom floors at their parent’s house. Or was it their house?
“This is borrowed,” her sister confirmed to let her thoughts rest, and the next few minutes passed in echoing silence.
The silence made the blood pumping by her ears all the more audible, accompanied by a feeling of unease, forgetting something important. She’s sure she hasn’t felt like this in the last three days, had stress started tearing her apart when she saw her sister’s face?
Stopping beside a framed photograph that caught her eye in particular, color drained from her face and it’s like a single piece of that empty puzzle shakily fell into place, with a splitting headache.
The night in New York at this time had been frigid, it being middle of December. Three figures scurried through the busy street in SoHo, holding hands to not lose each other in the dizzying lights and people galore. Between Anette in the front and Bernadette in the back (pulled the most, not enthusiastic about the trip), a girl with shoulder-length raven hair smiled a gleaming smile that lit up the space around them like its own neon sign.
Bernadette whacked her brain, but as familiar as the face was, the name escaped the tip of her tongue. The two of them looked identical, now that she sees Anette’s smiling face beside her. Since when was she beside her, now?
The three pulled inside a smaller café bursting with people. Nevertheless, they managed to sneak a seat beside the large windows looking out into scarce snowfall. Shedding their thin damp coats, they didn’t order a single thing. Even without the drinks to warm them, a familiarity of their own warmed them plenty.
Sitting and exchanging words with fervor, the giddy youth pointed to teenage Bernadette’s neck on which hung a small polaroid camera. She seemed to hesitate but the three urged on with muffled voices.
Huddled together, holding the camera in front of them, Bernadette clicked the button on the device. A flash alerted the people around them. Their minds relieved though, after seeing it’s just three kids taking a picture, they returned to their own respective business.
A genuine, happy smile played upon Bernadette’s lips in that photo.
Yellowed, now, it hanged on that extravagant wall.
A yank sent her back to her senses, her brain still raw after the memory invading it.
“Did I tell you to do that?” Anette’s voice sounded different; Bernadette could see her teeth gnashed at the individual who took hold of her arm. The thin fingers hastily let go of her, the person distancing themselves from both the woman with a shake in their shoulders.
As the cogs of her brain returned to function, the ravenette noticed the pain in the wrist the masked individual pulled, biting her tongue not to hiss.
The two progressed and Bernadette averted her eyes from the familiar photos, making her head ache but not letting her memories be as vivid as the one before. The third person that followed the two sisters around still lingered in the back of Bernadette’s mind, but she knew best not to inquire Anette until it’s dire. Her sister’s shoulders hunched, and her mouth was pulled almost uncomfortably in a smile.
The group came upon a large arch leading into an equally extravagant dining room filled with dozen exquisite wooden chairs, way too many for the four of them anyway. They seated themselves, Anette pulling a chair at the side of her top seat, the guards sliding out a chair from the opposite end of the obnoxiously long table for Bernadette.
“Now,” Anette cleared her throat as she sat down, “I suppose you remembered at least something with all the pictures I put up, I really had a hard time digging through our things, you know.”
Bernadette couldn’t help but frown again, although hiding it beneath her hand which she propped up on the table. She shook her head, keeping her eyes away from her sister.
The smile on Anette’s face frayed, “Oh, really? Do you not remember her?” the sister sat back, “Who knew you’d dump your dear sister just as easy as that?”
“Come on, don’t you want to relive the old times, just the three of us and the world‒”
“Sister?” Bernadette croaked. When were there three of them?
Anette’s eyes crinkled, she clenched the palm resting on the table, knuckles white as a sheet.
“Oh, sorry I forgot to mention the important part, that’d surely jog your memory,” she leaned over the table, “You’re a sister killer. Would that be better to say?”
Bernadette’s throat felt dry, rumbling through her memory to no avail, There’s no sister. Only two of us What sister?
But she also can never recount anything before her seventeenth year.
Anette stared at her puzzled expression, equally puzzled herself, although she showed it with a glare that pierced the other’s skull.
“I can’t believe you,” Anette let her lips turn down. The chair behind her let out a sharp sound when she stood up, making her sister wince.
Anette turned her back toward Bernadette, and as soon as she did, two pairs of hands squeezed at her biceps and hauled her out of the chair. The marble flooring slid under her feet whilst they dragged her, making it difficult to kick around once her brain caught up to the fact.
Once she felt the chill of a pair of metal handcuffs, her fear only grew and made her stomp the ground with more vigor. Without a sound, Bernadette kicked at the tiled floor and the feet of the assailants. Although they seemed young (younger than her for a landslide), the two managed to restrain her with ease. Be it due to her drowsiness or their genuine strength, they managed to haul her back to the prison room. The wound on her left wrist burned, and she hoped it didn’t open on the way.
They forced her down onto the chair, shoulder burning when they yanked her cuffed hands behind the back rest. As soon as they’d done that, they seemed to hurry out quite distressed. She couldn’t discern the mutters between them, though.
Left in the room, Bernadette tried to yank her arms free with returned fear. Distracted by trying to escape, she didn’t notice a figure step in.
A familiar, somber tone made Bernadette freeze in place, hallway up the chair.
Nadra's lips upturned into a grin, “Long time no see, eh?”