Flightless Bird

Master of Puppets

It's been nearly two whole months since the day I passed out at the office. I've been trying my best to appease Samuel's needs and my own, so that my mistake would not be repeated.

He found out about the money I was getting from the office, and now has control over that too. At least I am able to pay my bills, though; he leaves me just enough to pay them off and buy groceries, and that's about it. Sometimes I can sneak some cash from the spare jar to cover little things, such as toiletries or a bus ticket when I'm late, but anything else and he'd notice.

So long, dreams of hot showers and a full tummy.

At least I can occasionally sneak something from the coffee bar at work, though most days I'm kept busy enough to not even bother.

Mr. Knightly hardly speaks to me, only asking for things pertaining to work anymore. Occasionally I catch him staring in my direction, but he almost always looks like he could've been looking behind me too. Part of me regrets ruining our friendship so quickly by telling him to stay out of my business. Every punch, slap, kick, hit, whip...everything reminds me of my mistake.

I so wish I could've told him, as part of me tries to convince myself that he could've helped me out of this. The more rational side of knows it was the right thing to do. He was never to know—I couldn't let him be in danger because of me.

He had already helped me too much.

With Samuel's abuse getting more frequent, I've grown numb to feeling like a puppet on a string, following everyone's commands and never getting a moment to breathe. I often wondered how soon it would be until the strings began to snap, and I succumbed to the darkness that threatened if I just gave up.

Ever since that day I've had random coughing fits, which usually involved me coughing up blood. At first they were more infrequent, happening maybe twice a week. Now that Samuel has seemingly gotten bored with all the new money, he returned his favorite form of entertainment: using me as his personal punching bag. Because of this the bloody coughing returned. That and the loss of whatever weight I managed to gain leaves me exhausted most days. I wish my new clothes weren't so loose...I wish my stomach didn't hurt so badly....

I'm fine.

I should at the very least be thankful for the comfortable office and the bits of food I can manage from time to time. I'm glad to not be so stressed out about the debt, but the stress of the job quickly took its place and I'm constantly fatigued, wishing for more out of life....

I can't think this way—I'll take what I can get.

Walking into the office today I immediately turned on my computer, checking the phone for any voicemails.

You have: two missed calls.

I listened quietly as I removed my nice jacket and placed the expensive bag from Mr. Knightly on the window seat, hanging my coat by the door. They were merely calls from the florist, asking about the flower arrangements to be made for the company gala in two weeks, and a certain Mr. Shreve calling to make an appointment with Mr. Knightly again.

Mr. Shreve was the same man I had met at one of my first meetings here, the one who could not keep his perversion to himself. He's been working on merging his company with a smaller chapter of Knightly Industries for several months now, and seemed to take every chance he could to chat me up.

He was horrible.

Thankfully, even if Mr. Knightly wasn't speaking to me besides professionally, he at least saw how uncomfortable Mr. Shreve made me and attempted as best as he could to keep us apart.