Page 21 of Fighting Shadows
“I think I know what’s wrong with her, and I’m going to need you to help me.”
“What? I’ll do anything.”
“How long has she been sat in her waste?” I ask him, trying my hardest to keep any judgment from my voice so he doesn’t get defensive.
“Six days? She tried to run when I let her use the toilet, and I warned her. I didn’t expect her to get sick, though,” he says,
“You’ve left her to sit in her shit and piss for six days?” I shout, unable to hold in my anger at the complete lack of fucking common sense.
“She would scream if I even tried to go near her! What else was I supposed to do?”
“Anything other than that. Maybe don’t keep an unwilling girl chained to the bed like a rabid dog.”
“She tried to run,” he says in an attempt to explain like it’ll do any use.
If I weren’t chained to this fucking bed, I’d hook him in the jaw with my fist until he was unable to get up again.
He’s not just an abuser; he’s a fucking idiot too.
Sighing in defeat, I take a deep breath to try to calm myself before I speak to the moron who is now standing before me.
“I need you to remove her underwear and clean her. There’s no point in giving her penicillin if the cause of the problem is still there,” I tell him.
“You don’t look,” Charlie demands, sternly pointing his finger at me, “If you look, I leave her like this.”
“I won’t look,” I say, already lying down on the carpeted floor to stare at the ceiling, “but you need to make sure to clean her properly.”
The sounds of his footfalls on the carpet let me track his movements as he moves between the bathroom and the room, gathering everything he needs.
The sound of him inhaling sharply as he begins to remove her underwear makes me hold my breath.
“Is she ok?” I ask, a slight shake to my voice as I do.
“It looks sore. She has a rash, but it looks angry and infected,” he tells me.
Sucking in a harsh breath, I know exactly what’s wrong, and she needs actual help if she has any hope of getting better. But maybe it is too late.
She’s been like this for days now, and the likelihood is that sepsis is already in her bloodstream.
“Have you cleaned it?” I ask him, trying desperately to find a way to convince him to let her go.
“As much as I can.”
“How bad is the infected area?”
“It’s bad.”
“How fucking bad, Charlie? If you don’t want me looking, then you need to fucking describe it to me. I’m not fucking psychic!” I shout at him, ready to fuck everything, and get up and check her myself.
“It’s over her thighs and in the crease. There’s blood, too.”
“Fuck. OK, you need to go back into my bag, get the antiseptic cream, and lather it on.”
The sound of my bag being moved as he throws everything out of it to the floor makes me wince. Then he’s looming over at me, two different cream tubes in his hand.
“What one?”
“Right one. The other one would smother it and trap the bacteria.”
