An Untamed State Read online

  “Baby?”

  “What?

  “Are you okay?”

  “No, Michael, I am not.”

  “Open the door.”

  I ignored my husband. I counted to one hundred. After the first week, I started to believe my release was imminent so I played counting games. I thought, “I will count to one thousand and then I will be free.” I counted over and over again and hours would pass and I counted more. I paced the length of my cage and counted. I counted the number of cars that sped by while the sun was out. I counted how many of them were playing the radio loudly. I counted the cracks in the walls and ceiling. The Commander or TiPierre came and used me and I counted through that, the number of thrusts, the number of times they ran their hands or tongues over my body, the number of times TiPierre told me something unbearable and romantic, the number of times he slid his tongue between my lips, the number of times the Commander ran his knife across my back or held his burning cigarette between my thighs, elsewhere. When they were done, I started counting again, how long until they returned. I counted to one thousand in the hopes that in so many moments, I would be free. I lost track of the number of times and the number of banalities and indignities I counted.

  Michael knocked again, louder this time. “Open the door, baby.”

  I counted to ten and slowly opened the door. He stepped inside. It was the two of us in a viciously small space. A small cry escaped my lips. I looked around frantically. Michael looked at me, confused. The shaking started again. I tried to fold myself into myself so no parts of our bodies were touching but it was impossible. I knew he was my husband but I did not know. He was a man.

  “Don’t hurt me,” was all I could say.

  He looked stricken. He held his hands behind his back. “I could never hurt you. I just wanted to check on you.”

  I stepped back toward the toilet. There really was no room. I wondered how I might tear through the walls. I held my hands in front of my body. I no longer recognized Michael.

  “Don’t hurt me,” I said again. “Whatever you do to me, don’t hurt me.” Surrender was all I had left.

  Suddenly it all became too much, being trapped in too finite a space, a cage, with a man, any man, the security agent, my father, the rise of my skin beneath heat, the rise of my body beneath seven men for thirteen days, everything broken inside of me, the wail of the horn, the ringing in my ears, the leash around my neck, the cries of my child as I was torn away from everything I love. My knees buckled. I fell into a quiet place where I felt nothing.

  Everything was silent and suddenly there was a rush of noise, muffled, and stale air. I opened my eyes, and slowly realized I was in Michael’s arms as he pressed a cool cloth to my forehead. I looked around and could see the aisle to my right and the closed cockpit door to my left. My face flushed brightly. I sat up quickly, too quickly and grabbed Michael to steady myself.

  “This is embarrassing.”

  “Shhh,” Michael said. “This is nothing of the sort.”

  “Where is the baby?”

  Michael smiled tightly. “He’s fine; one of the flight attendants is looking after him. He’s charming her to death.”

  “I would like to not be on the floor anymore.”

  He pushed me forward, carefully, then stood and helped me to my feet. I wobbled but he held me firmly. He would not let me fall. As we walked the few steps to our seats he said, “You need to eat something and we’re going to the hospital as soon as we land.”

  I shook my head so hard it made me dizzy. “I’m not putting myself through that. It is not going to happen.”

  “Okay, okay. One thing at a time.”

  “One thing, my ass, Michael.”

  “Mireille, you are in no condition to make decisions for yourself right now. We are going to the hospital and that’s that.”

  I shook my head. I would run when we entered the terminal. I would run away. He could not make me go to any hospital. I said nothing.

  Michael helped me into my seat, fastened my seat belt, and soon a flight attendant brought me a meal. I ignored her pity as she handed me the small tray. I sank into the seat. It was so overwhelming to understand what was required of me. I looked out the window at the thick whorls of cloud surrounding us. Michael excused himself and returned quickly with our boy.

  “Eat something,” he said, nudging the steaming tray toward me.

  I kept looking out the window. “I don’t know how.”

  I heard the sound of plastic being removed, smelled something that seemed like food. I did not want to eat. I did not want anything inside me.

  “I’ll help,” Michael said.

  I sat quietly and let him feed me because I was too tired to protest. I didn’t care about the other passengers murmuring and staring. I simply opened my mouth when he told me and chewed when he told me and swallowed when he told me and sipped when he told me. I tasted nothing, felt nothing, was nothing.

  Even though there were camera flashes going off and so much shouting, so many bodies wanting something from me, I knew Mona was near. There is a secret language between sisters who are close. After we made it through customs, a gaggle of reporters waited, shouting questions, wanting to know what happened, if I would ever return to Haiti and on and on. I had no answers. All I saw was the red of their lips and open mouths, the whites of their teeth, how they swarmed around us, trying to trap me in a new cage.

  Michael covered Christophe’s head with a blanket and I clutched his arm, hiding behind my sunglasses as we made our way to baggage claim. I did not answer their questions. I said nothing. I simply stared at the ground, tried to count how many steps it would take to get out of the airport, to get home, to get away. When a reporter got too close, Michael growled, literally growled. I felt the tension in his arm, how he was coiled, ready to lash out at anything. We were both feral now.

  Mona was standing by the luggage carousel with her husband. I saw her, my sister, the keeper of my secrets, and I let go of Michael’s arm and walked toward her. I thought, “If I can get to my sister, I will feel better, I will feel alive.” I counted the steps. Mona smiled, tried to hug me but I flinched, shook my head. She nodded, said, “Let’s walk.” We began moving toward the deserted end of the terminal. Michael tried to follow but Mona waved him away. As we walked, I stared at the small groups of people on the curb waiting for loved ones to pick them up. We sat near an empty carousel that was still revolving slowly. I held the arms of the chair as I lowered myself, wincing softly.

  “I’m glad you’re home, Miri. I cannot begin to know what you’ve been through but you are alive. We will fix this.”

  A sharp pain shot through my heart. I grabbed my chest. I tried to find the words to explain to my sister that I was not alive, that the sister she remembered was dead. A man wearing a blue jumpsuit walked past us pushing a loud floor buffer. We watched him and sat silently for a long while.

  “It should have been me. I’m the one who’s in the motherland all the time. I wish it had been me,” Mona finally said.

  I turned to face her. “Don’t. Do not say that. This shouldn’t happen to anyone.”

  Mona gently traced a bruise on my right cheek. Her touch was so gentle it made me think she could wipe all my bruises away. “You look fucking terrible, kid.”

  “He took thirteen days to pay for me, Mona. Thirteen days. He abandoned me.” I tried to breathe but the memory of a pair of strong hands wrapped around my throat made it nearly impossible. I gripped the arm of my chair.

  My sister sucked the air sharply. She nodded. “I know. There’s nothing I can say to make this right. I don’t understand how this happened.”

  I grabbed her arm, gripping her tightly. “Don’t ever go back there. Promise me. They’ll take you too and they will hurt you in ways you cannot imagine.”

  Mona covered my hand with hers. “Oh honey. We are going to get you through this.”

  I looked toward the other end of the terminal, where Michael stood with Chr
istophe and Carlito, surrounded by our baggage. “I want you to promise me something.”

  “Anything, Miri. Anything.”

  “If something happens to me, don’t let the child forget who his mother was. You’re his godmother, and if I can’t . . . If I cannot take care of him, be the mother he deserves.”

  Mona took my hand between both of hers and brought it to her lips. Her touch was soft. It was nice, in that moment, to smell her and feel the warmth of her skin and to hear her voice. “Don’t talk like that. You are safe now.”

  “There’s no such thing as safe,” I snapped. “Just promise me you could love that boy like he was your own if I needed you to.”

  She slid closer to me, pulled me into her arms even though I resisted at first, even though her touch made my skin crawl and my body shudder. Mona kissed the top of my head. “I already do love your son like that, you know I do.” I had no fight left. I stopped trying to pull away and let my sister hold me. I wrapped my arms around her, my body curving into hers the way it always had, like we were two halves of one whole. I did not cry but I held on, so very tightly.

  In the car, Michael said, “We’re going to the hospital,” but he was less confident than before.

  I grabbed the car door as we sped along. “I will throw myself out of this car if you do not take me directly home.”

  Michael gripped the steering wheel tighter and I opened the door, wind buffeting us. He reached across my body and pulled the door shut, cursing. “Jesus Christ, Miri.”

  “I am not going to the hospital. If you drive me there, I will run and you will never see me again, so you decide.”

  “Fine,” Michael grumbled. “We’ll go home for now.”

  When we pulled into the driveway, Michael shut off the car and said, “We’re here.”

  I choked on something sharp. There was no place where I belonged. “I don’t have a home anymore,” I said, dully.

  He reached for me and I shrank away, jumped out of the car, and walked to the edge of the driveway, listening to the sprinklers quietly watering our lawn.

  The house was quiet, the air stale, when we finally made it inside. Christophe was asleep in his father’s arms and Michael took the baby to his room, got him settled. I went to the kitchen, reached in the third ceramic jar next to the stove where I stashed cigarettes. I poured myself a tall glass of gin, dropped in a few ice cubes, watched as they sank and slowly rose back to the surface.

  Out on the lanai, gray wisps of smoke slowly rose up around me. I held my drink against my forehead and wished for the leash around my neck to loosen. I drank my gin slow and steady until there was only a thin sliver of ice rolling around the bottom of the glass. I lay back on the chaise longue, enjoying the numbness in my face. For the first time in a long time, nothing hurt. I rolled onto my side and curled into a tight ball. It was a warm night, only a light breeze. Every once in a while, the leaves from the palm trees above rustled softly. There was a time when the sound made me smile. It was nice to be outside, to be free from walls, to be out of a cage. I felt like the smallest little thing beneath the great Florida sky. The leash loosened. I could breathe again.

  The pale light of morning sun woke me. I shivered. A blanket covered me so I pulled it tightly. Michael lay in the chaise next to mine, clutching a baby monitor in his hand. “Today is Tuesday,” I thought. I ached even though I was dead.

  I reached over and shook Michael awake. He stirred slowly. “What are you doing out here?” I asked, softly, as if I didn’t want to wake him up too much.

  He rubbed his face, the morning stubble making a scratchy sound. “You were here.”

  I held my hand against his shoulder. I didn’t trust myself to do anything more. “I’m going to get ready.”

  “For what?”

  “It’s Tuesday. I have to go to work.”

  Michael looked at me like I had lost my mind. I did not appreciate it. “That’s completely insane, Mireille.”

  “Don’t you call me crazy, Michael Scott Jameson. Work is the only thing I know how to do right now.”

  He gaped as I walked away. I heard him muttering, “Don’t act crazy, then.”

  I took a long, hot shower, grateful for American plumbing, and dressed carefully, trying to choose clothes that would mask the evidence of my ordeal—a long-sleeved white blouse and gray slacks. My clothes were very loose. I tried to cover the bruises on my face as best I could. I never was good at applying makeup, usually relied on Mona or a girlfriend to make me prettier when an occasion called for it. Michael paced the bedroom as I dressed, making idle threats. I ignored him. I had a job, one I was good at. At work, things would make sense.

  When I finished dressing, I turned to Michael, who stood in the bedroom doorway, his large body filling the frame. I tried not to panic. I forced myself to smile. “How do I look?”

  Michael shook his head. “You look like shit and completely exhausted. Babe, be reasonable. I can’t allow you to go to work.”

  I stood across from my husband, and tried to raise myself to my full height, which is not much. Fortunately, I was wearing heels. “Allow me?”

  He shut the bedroom door and it suddenly became harder to breathe. A thin sheen of sweat spread across my chest, my blouse clinging to my body.

  “What are you doing?” I asked, my throat dry.

  “I am doing what’s best for you,” Michael said.

  My hands started shaking and I looked around the room for something, anything, tried to assess how I could protect myself and make my way out of this new cage.

  Michael held his hands out to me. “You’re in no condition to go to work. We are going to the hospital, and together, we will start to figure out what we need to do to get you better.”

  I held on to the wall behind me. “I’ve fucking told you about the hospital. Shut up about it, already.” I looked down at my feet. “Please get out of my way.”

  He crossed his arms across his chest, stood his ground. He was a bully.

  “I basically spent the past two weeks,” I said, my breath coming faster and faster, “locked in a cage, and you’re seriously going to try and keep me trapped in my own house?”

  Michael snapped. “You wouldn’t have been in that situation if we weren’t in that hellhole in the first place but you had to drag us down there when we could have gone anywhere else for vacation.”

  I was stunned. “How soon the truth comes out. You blame me for being kidnapped.” I bit my lower lip and nodded. “That’s rich. Wow.”

  We were silent for several moments.

  “I’m sorry,” Michael said. “I didn’t mean it like that, not at all. I just want to get you looked at. Miri, you look terrible.”

  “So you’ve said but that is beside the point. You cannot trap me in this room.”

  “I’m not trapping you, Mireille. I am trying to help you.”

  I looked to our bedroom window, two stories up. Below, there were hedges, Bermuda grass, too long. I raised my head and looked Michael in the eye. “You know me well enough to know I will throw myself right out that window if you don’t get out of my way.” I pounded the wall. “You can’t keep me locked up.”

  “I am not locking you up,” Michael said. “I am keeping you safe.” The calm confidence in his voice enraged me.

  “You know nothing about keeping me safe. You showed me that the day I was taken, too, so don’t sit there and lecture me on something you know nothing about.”

  Michael gasped, his face darkening. “That is incredibly unfair. You don’t know what I went through. Even you said I was taken too. Come on.”

  “What you went through?” I said. “What you went through. Please spare me how hard this is for you right now. Please.” I ran to the window and opened it, looked down at the ground, did not care how far I might fall. I needed to be out of that room with the closed door and the walls that threatened to fall in on me and the man I barely recognized, the man who could hurt me. Michael rushed to me, gathering me as gentl
y as he could in his arms, my back to his chest.

  “Don’t do that,” he whispered into my hair.

  I kicked wildly. “Put me down,” I shouted, even though my voice was ragged, hoarse, and not very loud at all. “Get your hands off me.” I gasped, trying to swallow air. A loud ringing filled my head. If Michael didn’t let me out of the room, I was going to lose it completely. I tried to figure out what he wanted from me, what I needed to say for him to let me go, for me to open the door, for me to get away. I started babbling. I don’t even know what I said.

  When I had worn myself all the way out, Michael said, “I am going to let you go if you promise not to do anything crazy.”

  I nodded, went limp in his arms.

  Michael loosened his grip a little but didn’t let me go. “Promise?”

  “I promise,” I said. “I can’t leave the house. I understand.”

  “Do you?” Michael asked. I nodded again. He let go of me and turned me around. “We need to get you examined, and then we can figure out how and when for you to get back to work. You need time and doctors and . . . time.”

  I wanted to tell Michael he had no idea what I needed because I had no idea what I needed. I looked at the door to my right. It was only a few steps away, no more than ten feet. I was fast, or I had once been fast. I was faster than Michael with his big, corn-fed body that lumbered when he ran. He was still too close. He had long arms. I had to be smart. I was no one. I could do anything.

  I reached up and pressed my hand against his cheek, stood on the tips of my toes, kissed his chin. “I don’t know what I was thinking,” I said. “I guess I just want to feel normal.”

  Michael’s shoulders dropped. He covered my hand with his, rubbing his thumb across my knuckles. “Of course you do, and you will.”