Ugly Beautiful (17 page)

'I was with you and I was in your cottage. But my memory, my mind was just a blank canvas. I couldn't remember anything. I couldn't even hear her or remember her and all the sick, evil, twisted things she'd done. I thought she was gone Jason. I thought she was gone forever.'

Jason closed his eyes and shook his head. He took a deep, hard breath before speaking again.

'I still don't understand this Haley. I don't understand why you can't just help me and let me take you away from this fucking mad house. If your sister's sleeping she won't know what's happening. And as soon as I can get you as far and as safely away from her and this shit pit, hell hole as I possible can, I'll come back. I'll come back and I'll put that sick, twisted fuck out her goddamn misery for good. I will terminally end her presence here on this planet so she need never bother you, or any poor sucker again for that matter. I swear it. If it's the last thing I do so help me God. I fucking swear it.'

A deathly silence crept into the cellar. Haley pondered hard over Jason's words. The harrowing silence was eventually broken by a gentle snort from the still sleeping and mutilated Gary. Jason stared intensely at Haley who remained with her head bowed. He looked for some kind of acknowledgement or reaction from her that told him she understood him. That she would help him escape. That they would leave this grim hell hole together. Haley wiped her tears and finally broke her silence.

'You still don't understand do you?'

'No. I don't understand. I don't understand any of this sick shit. It's a complete fucking, insane nightmare. I only understand that I want us both out of here. Out of this bloody torture chamber, right this second.'

Haley shook her head in anguish. More tears flowed down her previous and now dry, teardrop trail.

'It can't happen Jason. I cannot leave here with you now or ever.'

'Why Haley? Why can't you?' Jason raised his voice, becoming more frustrated by the second. Haley glanced at him with her upset and teary eyes. She glared directly into his fractured soul.

'Look at me Jason. Just look at me.'

Jason stared at her. He looked deep into her eyes and peered straight into her soul, just like she had done to him.

'What do you see Jason?' whispered Haley. 'What do you see?'

'I...I see…I see you Haley. I see you and your love for me and my love for you. That's all I can see.'

'Then you are truly blind. And so is your love for me. Where do you think my sister sleeps Jason? Where do you think my sick, evil, twisted sister sleeps huh?'

Jason stared even harder at Haley. The realisation of his deepest and darkest, unspoken, unrealised and nightmarish thoughts slowly began to surface from the farthest rancid regions of his mind, gradually unfolding in front of his eyes like they had always been there. They were just on a different frequency. But now, they made absolute concrete sense.

'She is my sister Jason.' Haley continued full of despair. 'But we are two of the same person. Two minds occupying one body.'

Jason's face drained of all colour when Haley pointed firmly towards her head.

'She sleeps Jason, but not for long.'

Jason remained speechless. Too lost for words to even utter any rational thoughts. He wanted to cry. He wanted to scream. He wanted to strike out. He scrunched his eyes up and tensely shook his head. He fought every last vein, muscle and urge inside his entire body not to explode in defeat.

'Yes, we could run away together Jason.' said Haley gently and smiling warmly. 'We could run to the end of the Earth. But we could never truly be together. We could never, ever truly hide from her. She would always find me... always. We would never be free.'

Haley stroked Jason's cheek while he continued to shake his head in a silent rage.

'And when she does find me again, and she will Jason. I would never be able to protect you.'

Haley moved closer to Jason's face, kissing him softly upon the cheek. Jason stopped shaking. He became motionless, keeping his eyes firmly shut. He too had a chance to return Haley's gesture upon her own cheek, or even to take in a deep smell of her hair, but he refrained from doing so.

'You have... You have two personalities.' Jason spoke, breaking free from his speechless trance and opening his eyes once more to meet her gaze.

'Yes.' Haley replied, feeling ashamed of her terrible affliction. Jason sighed, still trying to take everything in. Still fighting the tears, the torments inside his own head and the whole horrific nightmare he found himself in. The crazy psycho blonde woman, Gary's disgusting, torturous disfigurement, Haley's sudden reappearance followed by her chilling confession. But Jason’s deeply rooted stubbornness inside refused to be defeated.

Jason spoke. Saying the first thing that entered his mind.

'You never tried to get any help? I mean, there must be people out there who can help you Haley. How long have you been like this for?'

Haley smiled warmly again.

'She's too far gone for any help Jason. And this is her body too after all. As hard as this might be for you to accept. She made me. She created me first.'

'But how? How can this even be possible? It's just so completely unreal... It's ridiculous.'

Haley took a deep breath and glanced towards the cellar floor.

'She made me up in her childhood Jason. It was right about the time her father forced her to kill for the very first time in her life.'

'Her father?' Jason replied, concerned now that there were more people in the house to deal with.

'He was an evil man. The absolute worst. He would abuse her so bad for as long as I can remember.'

'What happened to him? Is he still alive. Is he here?'

Haley glanced away with a distant look in her eyes.

'She killed him... eventually. But not before she succumbed to his evil ways. Now she won't even talk about him or acknowledge him or her childhood anymore. She refuses to acknowledge anything about her past. She completely lives in the present, trapped in her own psychotic little bubble world.'

Haley paused, thinking hard.

'So she just made you up. Right out of thin air.'

Haley glanced at Jason.

'No. There's more too it than that.'

'Well tell me?' insisted Jason.

'She also had a real life sister. A real, living breathing twin sister, who were more close to each other than any other two little girls could ever hope to be.'

'You were the sister?'

'Yes. I also ended up being the first person she ever killed. We were eleven years old. Our father locked us down here in this very cellar for weeks, months on end maybe. He told us that until one of us ended the other ones life we would never be allowed to eat or see daylight again. In the end... it was only she that emerged to see the victorious light of day.'

Jason bowed his head in sorrow. And he thought all this time that he had such a difficult upbringing.

'I'm so sorry Haley.'

Haley let out a tiny half hearted smile.

'And because we knew each other so well. Because we were so close. She took a big part of me inside her just so she could deal with all the guilt and emotion of killing her twin. She wanted desperately for me to live on inside her you know, and that is exactly what happened. She had conversations with me at all hours of the day and night. Every single day for years and years until she became so intertwined with both personalities that she could no longer differentiate between the two of us.'

'And what about your mother? What happened to her?'

'I have no memory of my Mother. But you can bet your life it wasn't a happy ever after ending for her either. I do know that our father only ever wanted girls and all of the other babies born before and after us, were put into the big old storage freezer in this very cellar.'

Jason glanced over at the large freezer with a look of sorrow. He remembered Haley's chilling dream back at the cottage and how he never believed, or hoped, that it could ever be true.

'So your dream, the girls, the freezer full of babies, this place… it was all real?'

'Yes.' replied Haley with a whisper.

'And did you or your sister ever become pregnant from the father?'

Haley hung her head shamefully before replying.

'No. He wasn't that way inclined. But I think from all the beatings he inflicted upon us as children, then her as a teenager, he made us incapable of ever having children of our own. But as sick as this may sound. She actually became very close to our father Jason. Especially after she ended my life. I think father was shocked, surprised and proud that one of us had finally come out of his cellar. And with that came a new found respect for his only living daughter.'

Haley took more deep breaths. A large wave of relief engulfed her, a relief that she could finally get all of this pent up horror, off her chest, at long last. She'd never had the chance nor opportunity to confess her horrible and rancid family history to anyone before. But she felt very grateful for the opportunity.

'And because of that new found respect for her, he began to let her help him kill. Animals at first... people later. I remember how the two of them used to enjoy travelling down to the bigger cities, especially late at night to kill the odd homeless person or random prostitute. Father psychopath and daughter psychopath side by side. I suppose you could say I became her conscience in a way. But after all these years of such evilness festering inside of her, she has no need for a conscience.'

'There must be a way to help you Haley. Please... Just give me a chance to at least try.'

Haley remained silent.

'But you have to get me out of here first. Then I can help you get better. I can help you get rid of this... of her'

'Jason, I can't beat her.' snapped Haley. 'Haven't you been listening to a single word I've said. She is too strong for me. We would only get so far before she took over, and then she would kill you.'

'Well what about if I restrain you or tie you up and take you to a good hospital. I've got plenty of money. I could pay for a really good doctor to look after you, help you get through all this.'

'And then what Jason? You'll come and visit me in jail for the next fifty years when they find out about all the people she brutally tortured and murdered?'

Haley closed her eyes and shook her head, her mind made up.

'Haley Please. We've got to at least try. We have to?'

Haley suddenly jerked and twisted unnaturally, she then held her head in pain.

'Haley?'

'She's stirring Jason.' Haley cried, struggling to balance herself.

'Then we haven't got much time. You need to untie me right now so I can get you out of here. So I can help you.'

'You really think...You really believe you can help me Jason? Really?' cried Haley.

'Haley, I swear to you. Get me out of here and I will help you.' replied Jason sternly. 'I promise you that much? As long as you let me try then there can still be some hope for you… for us.'

The pain inside Haley's head gradually receded, yet it still hovered over her, threatening to return at any moment. Haley staggered up to her feet and leaned over Jason's prison chair. She started unbinding the thick ropes tied all around him. Suddenly Haley winced in pain, ceasing to untie Jason for a brief moment, while the pain returned. She held her head in even greater agony.

'Come on Haley. You can fight her.' Jason shouted, desperate and reassuringly. 'Fight that bitch. I know you can beat her Haley. I know you can stand up to her.'

Haley shook her head vigorously, trying to shake the immense pain away. She put all of her focus and concentration into untying Jason. Still squinting with pain she untied his legs and moved hastily onto his arms and hands while remaining in a determined silence throughout the whole process, trying her damnedest to focus on the job at hand. In no time Haley had uncoiled the thin lair of wire from around Jason's chest and arms too, as well as the thick rope, leaving just the handcuffs around his wrists which lay behind his back.