OPHELIA: Chapter 34

Blurb

Elizabeth Lockwick wants one thing… to ensure Ophelia remains dead.

For years she’s weaved a life seen through rose-coloured glasses in idyllic Vermont with her husband Sebastian Lockwick, an alluring man with a broken moral compass, whose intent lies in protecting his wife. However, apart from her unorthodox understanding of Sebastian’s dark and gritty hidden nature, she finds herself slipping away from her sanity in maintaining this picturesque life.

After receiving a gruesome gift from an unknown sender threatening to expose her, she finds herself haunted and possibly hunted by her buried past.

In order to make things right for herself and ensure that her secret is hidden, she reluctantly travels back to her sleepy small hometown in Wisconsin. A town where young girls seem to be mysteriously disappearing. There, she reunites with the dysfunctional Pierre-Louis’, a French-American family who sheltered her in their manor in her time of need.

With time slipping away, she struggles with her guilt and a dangerous affair and realizes that perhaps Ophelia wasn’t dead after all these years.

Elizabeth suddenly finds herself caught in a game of cat and mouse, unsure of which she really is this time and who she can trust.

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Chapter 34

Vivian rattled through the contents of her car glovebox and grabbed out the second bottle of whisky. She emptied the remaining of the bottle down her throat, feeling it burn into her insides.

“F**k!” She screamed, tossing it outside. The bottled shattered against the tree trunk as she slammed her hands against the steering wheel. “F**k! F**k! F**k!”

All these years for nothing. Wasted. She’d been so cautious, so precise. And yet, that old piece of shit was managing to wrap his shriveled dick around Sebastian’s conscience. She never though her step-brother to be this stupid. Was he? What game was he now playing? Nothing was making sense to her anymore. Seeing him in Rose Gap, at the funeral. Was he aware? No. He couldn’t be. There was something else about him. A spitefulness. That look in his eyes today. Determination. A challenge. Something more. She had followed him after the funeral to only see him meeting again with his father. Why? Why would he even be entertaining that man? That man. He disgusted her. She groaned, feeling her head spin and split in half. Home. Home was where she needed to be right now. She couldn’t focus outside anymore. Could she drive? She felt so intoxicated.

“Not everyone has a handsome young man to take them back home safely.” She chuckled loosely and turned the music up as Etta James ‘I’d rather go blind’ played. “Some of us- have to take-” she reversed the car which hit the back of the car to a tree, “-our drunk a** back home-” she pulled off, “-ourselves.”

Vivian pulled into the driveway with a screech and stumbled out her car towards the house door. The air was slightly warmer inside yet so suffocating as it had always been.

“You’re home late.” Her mother’s voice chuckled in the dark as she sat upon the single sofa. She puffed out a cloud of white smoke into the darkness between them.

“Mother,” she greeted, with not a joy in her tone.

“Where have you been?”

She ignored her question and looked around the living room hall. “Why are all the lights off?”

Her mother let out a soft laugh, “I’m a blind woman, what use will lights do for me?”

“Hell of a blind woman if you ask me,” Vivian rolled her eyes at her response, “And I meant, where is Terilla?”

 “Oh, I don’t know. She must be somewhere around.”

There was a flush of anger and rage that filtrated through her bloodstream. “Am I the only responsible one around here? You treat me like a servant and not like a daughter. You don’t even know where Terilla is! You don’t even care about her, you only care about your bloody reputation!”

“Shhh,” she quieted, “You make too much noise.”

Vivian’s eyes fell to the staircase which led to the rooms upstairs. As a child she always found that the stairs were too many. She was nothing but a small creature in a big empty house with little love. A memory flashed before her eyes. A memory that often repeated itself.

Her mother had been to church. Her mother always went to church. She was a faithful woman. A principle woman. A good woman. At least, that’s what her mother told her she was. Vivian frowned at her reflection from the mirror. She was seventeen and yet felt like twelve. Her mother never allowed her to make her own decisions. Mother always knew best. And she was always right. At least, that’s what she said. This house was so lonely, filled with too many people. The servants only ever did their jobs. Her mother was barely ever at home. Her biological father was a dead-beat and a wh*re according to her mother, which is why she remarried Joseph Lockwick. Vivian of course knew that was untrue, her father was a good man. Joseph Lockwick, however, was the ‘master of the manor’ in which her mother worked for. Yet, instead of this beautiful castle Vivian assumed it to be, she found herself in his cold chilling house. Her mother, Mariette, painted a false fairytale for her. Joseph Lockwick was an odd, strange man, he looked like he committed a crime and was always on edge with his temper. He would often, easily, snap for the simplest of things. There was a time Vivian had even recalled watching him kiss a maid in the pantry whilst her mother went to church.

Sebastian Lockwick, the younger of the Lockwick brothers, had been attending boarding school. His visits were often short and not very frequent. Vivian had tried to befriend him once as he was the same age as her. It would have been nice to have a friend around for a change, but he was always often by himself. She always thought he was distressed about his mother’s dead. His cold, dismissive, and uncaring behaviour however remained the same for years. The older of the Lockwick brother’s- Jame- who was seven years older than her, however, took every chance to be as close to her as possible as the years went by. Yet, there was an uneasiness about his presence around her. They way he’d call her into the room alone to ask her questions that often was about her body. He claimed he was studying to be a doctor. He claimed that ‘this is what doctors do’. The way he’d look at her. The way he’d touch her. ‘Examine’ her.

Vivian wanted to burn herself on the parts he would touch her. It went on for years until she grew up a little more and understood that she didn’t like the way he was being around her. One day, when she refused to speak to him, he barged into her room at midnight and held her down. Fondling with her breast, and sensitive parts of her body. She remembered crying and asking him to stop. He never stopped. It went on for a while and he carefully used threats to keep her silence.

That night, she was seventeen. Her birthday. Yet, everyone forgot. She never had a birthday party like the kids at her school. She sat before her reflection as she braided her hair on either sides and looked out the window. There was smoke a little distance away from the house. Was there a forest fire? Her head snapped back when suddenly she heard Jame’s voice approaching, calling her name.

“Open the door, you little b*tch.” He rattled the door in a hushed voice.

 She had to get out of here. She had to hide.

The doorbell suddenly rang.

“Oh who the fk…” Jame’s voice softened as he descended the staircase.

This was her chance. Vivian dashed out the room and went into the empty guest room, hiding into the closet. She sat there, praying. Praying for God to protect her. Praying so that he won’t find her. The sound of distance talking soon filled the empty air. Was that a little girl’s voice? No. She must have been imagining things. The voices grew stronger, nearer. Vivian hugged onto her body. The door of the guestroom opened. Jame was pushing the frantic looking girl inside. She was crying. She looked younger than her. Thirteen? Fourteen maybe?

Why was she crying? Jame was lying to her. Telling her that someone was coming. What was happening? What was he doing? The turned to leave but grabbed her by the wrist back. She seemed shocked. Resistant. Vivian’s body froze in fear. He pushed her to the floor a way a monster would do. He was touching her. Ripping her clothes off. Vivian felt herself choke and her stomach knotted. The girl was crying. Begging. Pushing him to no avail. Pleading. Useless. He was inside of her. He was… he was hurting her. Vivian felt like she couldn’t breathe. Her voice was empty and breathless. Her body was shaking in fear. Hot liquid soaked through her pants.

Jame’s father had entered the room shortly after. His mouth was filled with filthy swears. They had thought the girl was dead. Quickly, the father instructed to drag the girl out of the house and bury her near the well in the forest at the back of the house. Vivian ran into her room, shaking like a leaf and threw up on the floor. She sobbed. She watched through the window, and saw Jame and his father entering back into the house. They headed into their separate rooms as if nothing happened. They were such monsters Vivian thought. Was the girl really dead? Who was she? Her heart was aching with these thoughts.

Grabbing her sneakers, she snuck out of the house and headed into the forest. The air was cool and chilling. It stabbed her achingly into her heart. She fell and bruised her knee on a few twigs and rocks as she went deeper into the forest with a little flashlight. There it was, the moisty old unused well sat solemnly a few feet away from her. She walked further ahead when suddenly she tumbled down a little sloped hill. Her right hand hit fresh undug dirt. The light flashed upon what seemed to be a shallow grave.

With her small hands, she began digging into the dirt. Please be alive. Please don’t die. God. Her hands worked as fast as her heart was skipping. She dug and dug. Faint voices were suddenly heard from a distance. Vivian felt a shock of panic lace through her body. What if that was Jame and Mr. Lockwick? She felt numb. Her stomach felt gutted. She had to run.

God saved Vivian that day. God protected her. But he didn’t protect that little girl. That day, she wasn’t sure if her prayer had been a blessing or a sin.

Vivian looked at her mother, who moved near the window where the moonlight highlighted her white bleached hair. Her murky blue eyes ate into her soul as he threw the cigar she was smoking away.

“You knew, didn’t you?” Vivian scowled, looking back at her mother holding her stick, “You always knew what Jame was doing to me.”

She let out a soft scoff, “That dead boy again, Vivian? Why must you dwell on the past so often?”

She didn’t need her mother’s answer. She already knew the truth. Although, her response, confirmed it.

“You selfish c*nt,” Vivian iced, “You think I don’t know what you made Joseph do to his wife. I know you’re the one who made him kill her.”

“Whatever happened between Joseph and his wife is amongst them, not me,” she sighed, in boredom.

Vivian scoffed. “All of you are cynical. Isaac’s the only idiot here who thinks that Terilla is his daughter. We all know that the father is Joseph.”

Within a second, Mariette’s walking stick slashed through the air and struck Vivian on the head. She staggered back, clutching onto the white sofa. Blood leaked from her forehead to her mouth. A sudden shock of pain throbbed within her. The salty tang of metallic blood slipped into the corner of her lips. She groaned and slipped into a dizzy unconsciousness.

“Thread lightly with me, daughter.”

The lights buzzed around her. Pain trickled through her body. Her head ached severely. Vivian pushed herself up and staggered back. It was 3am on the dot she noticed. How long was she out? She groaned and walked up the staircase. Had Terilla been home? Endless questions circled her mind. The sound of soft humming rhythmed from the nearby room.

“Terilla?” She knocked on the slightly ajar door and entered.

The young girl sat on the floor humming, combing her hair, and looking at herself in the mirror. “You look awful. Saw you bleeding on the floor downstairs.”

Vivian sighed. “Where were you?” She asked noticing the girl’s usual party outfit.

“Out.”

“You can’t keep doing this nonsense. You know what’s going on in this town. You could end up dead if you’re not careful.”

“No one will miss me anyway,” she smiled. “Your head’s still bleeding.”

Vivian walked towards the edge of the girl’s soft pink bed and sat at the edge. She took a shallow breath and looked at the floor deep in a thought. “We could leave,” she suddenly suggested.

Terilla’s eyebrows perched up as she turned back to her morbid and troubled looking sister. She let out a little giggle. “Me and you?”

“Yes.” Vivian frowned, tiredly, “We can start over. We don’t need her, Rilla.”

“Oh please, you don’t even like me. And besides, I’m not leaving mommy.”

“Terilla,” Vivian warned, “It’s not safe.”

The young girl rolled her eyes in a scoff. “Stop pretending to care about me. I actually prefer seeing you as a b*tch rather than this pitiful thing.” She stood and began fluffing her pillows on her bed, “I heard Sebby is back in town, is that true?”

“Why does it even matter?”

“Oh no reason, I just heard. Why is he back?”

Vivian ignored her question and stood. She exhaled and walked towards the door, “It’s late, get some rest.”

**

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