Always Watching

hit my hands repeatedly on the lid, kicked up with my feet. Finally, I paused, my breath jerking out of me in angry sobs. How was I going to get out?
    On the other side, Aaron’s muffled voice said, “Daniel, go back to the house. It will be okay—we’ll let her out when she’s released her fear.”
    I yelled, “You’re lying. You’re never going to let me out. The police know I’m here—I called them on my way. They’ll be here any minute.”
    Aaron spoke at the corner of the lid, his voice so close I jumped in the dark. “Now you’re the one lying.”
    I heard a few rustles on the other side, then footsteps walking away.
    I was alone.

 
    CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
    As soon as they left, I hit and pushed up at the lid with my hands over and over and over. The plastic on the inside was old and brittle, breaking in places as I hit it. I peeled some off, ripping the insulation out, and pushed up on the metal of the lid. I still couldn’t break through it. I also tried to use my feet to kick up, but I couldn’t get enough force. Finally, my body bruised and battered, I had to rest, gulping for air, almost hyperventilating. The darkness pressed in, squeezing all the air out of my body. My legs were vibrating, my heart whooshing in my ears. The world tilted sideways and I thought I might pass out. Then I remembered.
    We’re in the field, picking huckleberries, while everyone else is on a walk. The air smells dense and heavy with heat. I’m wearing shorts and a loose T-shirt, but the sweat makes it stick to my body. I keep pulling it away from my front, not liking the way Aaron’s looking at me. My hands are stained red with berries, and I try to wipe them on my shorts. He’s watching me, and says, “I want to meditate.”
    The berries I’ve eaten churn in my stomach, their sweet taste now bitter in my mouth. I know what he really wants.
    I say, “I don’t want to do that anymore.”
    “Don’t you care about your mom?”
    “You’re not helping her. She’s getting worse again.” In the last couple of weeks, she’d been moody and quiet, sleeping in her cabin all day, barely eating.
    He says, “In our meditations, she said that she’s been thinking about killing herself again. I’ve been talking her out of it, healing her. But maybe I don’t want to do that anymore either. Maybe she’d be happier on the other side.”
    I stare at him. He’s telling the truth, I can see it in his face.
    He says, “Lie down, Nadine.”
    I get on my knees and lie on my back in the long dry grass. My eyes are already filling with tears. I try to think about the grass scratching against my leg, the buzz of dragonflies floating in the air nearby. But I’m scared.
    He lies down next to me and presses his mouth against mine. My hands grab helplessly at the poppies. He undoes my jeans shorts, puts his hand down them and touches me between my legs. He yanks them farther down, and rolls on top of me, starts pulling down his shorts, and tries to shove himself inside me.
    It hurts, and I cry out. He presses his mouth harder against mine.
    I twist my face away. “Stop. I don’t want to.” I push at him and hit him with my fists. I kick out, kneeing him in the groin. He yells, cupping himself. I pull up my shorts and take off running for the barn, looking for my mother, my brother, anyone who can help, forgetting in my panic that they’re all on their walk. His footsteps are loud behind me. I make it partway up one of the haystacks when he grabs my foot, pulling me down, until I’m close enough for him to grip my hair, yanking my head back. I try to scream, but he slaps his hand over my mouth. He lets go of my hair, wraps his arm tight around my chest and shoulders, so my arms are pinned, squeezing the breath out of my lungs. Then he lifts me against the side of his body, like a sack of grain, and carries me to the back of the barn, where they’ve been digging a root cellar under the storage room.
    He stops by the hole, turning his body so that I’m over the edge, my feet dangling, and removes his hand from my mouth. I look down. At first I don’t understand why he’s showing the cellar to me. Then I realize the hole is only a few feet deep and wide, and I think he’s going to make me dig, as punishment.
    Then he says, “Do you see, Nadine? Do you see where you’re going?”
    Now I understand. He’s going to put me in the hole.
    I kick and struggle, but he’s holding tight. He steps backward and swings me