Duct Tape (WIP)

         The sick fuck outsmarted me.
         That was my first thought when I came to, after the horrendous throbbing in my head cleared my mind's sludge-like haze. Because I couldn't see shit in the room's undisturbed blackness, I took a quick inventory of my situation by feel alone. Bound by the wrists, ankles, and torso to a bare wooden armchair, I figured Finch used the same duct tape he'd wound tight and sticky across my mouth.
         While straining against the tape...
         (Fuck you, Finch, and fuck the inventor of duct tape)
         ...heavy, snorting exhalations puffed out of my nose. I sounded like a mad bull pawing the dirt--and probably stunk just like one, too. The sweltering heat of the black room left me stewing in my own rank juices. Sweat dribbled from my hairline down my face, sometimes sloping into my eyes to sting the shit out of them. I decided I must be in the attic, where the summer heat was trapped right along with me.
         When a rectangle of yellowed light appeared before my eyes, my guess was confirmed. I sat in a shadowed, sectioned-off area of the attic, facing a wall. The light came through an eye-level, makeshift peephole where the fucker removed a wood slat for my viewing pleasure.
         The pulse in my neck and temples jumped and pumped at the sight beyond the rectangle, in memory, in expectation. I strained harder against the tape with my eyes locked on the familiar scene taking place on the other side of the wall.
         She was there, as expected.
         Alex Mills.
         At first, the task force thought she was Finch's accomplice, but after digging up her missing person's report, we came to suspect her of being his longterm captive and likely his greatest victim. Nineteen now, she went missing ten years ago, ten years with a serial killing psycho who enjoyed performing.
         Alex looked mostly the same since I last saw her a little over two years ago. Black hair, pale hazel eyes, average height but rail thin. She had the same spaced-out, serene look about her—couldn't be sure if it was due to drugs or a defense mechanism.
         She sat on the bare floor, caressing the bristles of the ritual hairbrush, while her head swayed back and forth as she hummed to herself.
         Finch, who resembled a middle-aged hipster version of Buddy Christ, ushered a little towheaded girl, maybe five or six, over to Alex. She wore a short, pink sundress with white sandals and her face had the soft features of friendly innocence. Alex smiled reassuringly at the girl's questioning glance and patted the floor in front of her. "Have a seat. I'll brush that lovely long hair for you."
         As the girl sat down with her little legs criss-crossed, Alex raised her dreamy gaze up to my peephole. For a split second, her eyes cleared to convey something desperate, hopeless and apologetic. Then her left eye ticked and the distanced daze returned as she began brushing the girl's hair.
         Off to the side, Finch pushed a button on an old boombox perched on a stack of boxes. As the music piped-up, an eerie shiver rippled over my sweat-soaked skin. I've learned to fucking hate the soothing tones of Beautiful Dreamer. It's become the background music of my nightmares.
         Another part of the ritual, Beautiful Dreamer was Finch's special kill song.
         The countdown was on. He'd strike at the seventh line, where it says: Gone are the cares of life's busy throng. I knew, because I've witnessed it before. I couldn't stop it then.
         Beautiful dreamer, wake unto me,
         Grunt-huffing through flaring nostrils, I bucked in the chair to no effect.
         Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee;
         Alex's lips moved along with the song's lyrics while she tranquilly dragged the brush through the little girl's hair. The girl's big doe eyes fluttered closed as she relaxed and enjoyed the beauty treatment.
         Sounds of the rude world, heard in the day,
         Behind the girls, Finch smiled at me, then spread his lanky arms wide before sweeping one across his abdomen, making a theatrical bow for my benefit.
         Lull'd by the moonlight have all pass'd away!
         Bile climbed up my throat and my skittering mind tried to deny what was coming.
         (Not again. Not again, you fuck. This can't be fucking happening again.)
         Beautiful dreamer, queen of my song,
         The fucker taped me good. It was so tight, my straining against it didn't have wiggle room to even tear out the hair on my arms. It tried to tear my skin, but even then there wasn't enough leeway. Finch drew my attention when he reached for something beside the boombox. A sly, toothy grin stretched his thin, beard-framed lips as he held up a nasty-looking Bowie knife. He crept forward in cartoon-criminal fashion.
         List while I woo thee with soft melody;
         Trying with all my might to buck and strain my way out of the damned chair, I watched, helplessly, as he tiptoed toward the girls. My eyes began to mist and burn in anger, in frustration, in despair, and in horror.
         Finch squatted down beside Alex. Silently, he made a show of aiming his knife tip at the little girl's back; all the while her eyes remained closed, a sweet smile on her cherubic face.
         (Oh, God, he's about to do it. That poor girl! Oh, God. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck.)
         Gone are the cares of life's busy throng....