Read Stacking in Rivertown for Free Online Page B

something stupid. A few kids giggled. I marked them. I’d beat the shit out of them later.
    “Big birds with green and blue wings, ma’am?”
    I was thinking about the magazine I found in one of the Dumpsters where Mama looked for her groceries. On the front it said: “Africa, Land of Wonders.” I took it home, angling for extra credit.
    “We’re not talking about the birds,” Miss Summers said. “We’re talking about Zaire.”
    “The birds are more interesting, ma’am.”
    She sent me to the back to sit in the corner. So there I was next to the imbecile. I have no idea what his name was. Miss Summers forgot about me, so I stared at him.
    He’s a bird from Africa, I thought. Look at that nose and the way he curves over his wing. No wonder. Somebody made a mistake and he got dumped in the whole wrong country. Somebody should take him home.
    I knew that I would take him there if I knew the way. It would be so good to go home.

    That’s when ice-cold water starts peeling off my skin. I must have fallen asleep. It’s a high-pressure spray. I try to turn away in the cage, but another spray hits me from the other side. Now I’m freezing.
    I hear them leave.
    They come back every so often and spray me again. I never get any sleep.
    After seven or eight doses of this, the two boys drag me out. They put me on my knees with my wrists still cuffed behind to my ankles, and then buckle a collar around my neck, hooking it somewhere above.
    That’s a nasty position. You lose all the feeling in your legs and arms, and it hurts like hell. They wind something else around my neck, leaving the grip dangling down my back. I know what it is. It has BETH written on the handle. Ben is playing me ripe. They spray me with water again and leave. I wait, shivering.
    That’s when the ghosts come like they’d never been gone. In the basement, when you get the ghosts, Ben knows that you’re almost ready. And now the ghosts whisper all around me. I feel their breath against my face. As I watch their twisting shapes forming behind the tape on my eyes, I miss the fact that Ben has come into the room.
    “You thought you’d take your time,” he says. “I’ve got five years stored up for you.”
    His hand rests on my head, then slides down and lifts my chin. Ben’s other hand reaches behind my head and loosens the gag.
    “You’re not going to make it home until Monday morning,” he says. “I’ll put the phone up to your ear and you tell that to Jeremy.”
    “Fuck, Ben,” I say as soon as the gag is out.
    He slaps me.
    I hear him dialing. The phone is against my head.
    “Hello.”
    Jeremy’s so cheerful to answer the phone, as though it’s always good news. I never answer the phone unless I have to.
    “It’s me, Jeremy. Something more has come up. I won’t make it in until Monday sometime.”
    “Are you sick, sweetie? You sound sick.”
    No, just fucking scared shitless.
    “Doing these talk things gets on my nerves,” I say. “I’ll be glad to get home.” If I ever get home. That’s a big if.
    “You’re so sensitive, honey. You need to get a thicker skin.”
    Thinking about Ben’s whip around my neck, I say, “I’ll work on it. See you Monday.”
    Ben takes the phone away. “Are you thirsty?”
    I nod my head. He holds a bottle to my mouth and I drink. Gatorade. Ben swears by its beneficial properties. He always hands it out after the plays.
    I hear the empty bottle hit the floor behind me. Then I feel him unwind the whip.
    In my book, there’s nothing worse than being whipped bound and blind. I know how to fake the punches, how to drop. I know how to play the men so they don’t hurt me too much. But when you’re bound, there’s not a damn thing you can do about a whip but take every stitch. And Ben is a mean whipper. To him, it’s all about business.
    He whips me front and back. I lose count after sixteen. When he’s done, he says, “You’re back home, Beth. You’re back with your family.”
    That’s