It was dark. I slowly opened my eyes to readjust to the new lighting. I looked around the room. Cement wall were rotting while rusted poles surrounded me with ripped curtains hugging them very loosely. There were beds with metal frames all galore. I tried to move my arms and legs only to find out that I had been strapped down to bed. Bed, old cement walls, and rusting metal, I must be in a hospital.  It sounds like one of those horror movies when the guy get tortured for doing an unspeakable deed only to for their rescuer to come in too late to save the guy. I hope that’s not the situation I’m in right now. I started to squirm around hoping to get loose. The velcro straps burn so much. Despite the room being so dark I knew my wrist and legs were a vibrant red.  I need to get out, now!

I screamed “Hello? Anybody here?” I took a deep breath “Hello! Help me! Somebody help me! Anybody”

I attempted to move my wrist again urgently as if the more I moved the better chance I had of escaping this prison scene. The chains holding down the velcro starts keep hitting the metal bed frame

“Anybody! Please!” I pleaded. “Anybody please, just help me!”

My mouth was starting to run dry. How long was I unconscious? What day is it? Oh god, I’m going to have a whole bunch of homework if I don’t get out of here quick enough. I need water.

“Boy, do you look like a pile of mess.” A strange man said in a husky voice almost as if he was a chain smoker with irreversible side-effects left behind in his lungs and vocal chords.  He coughed.

“Don’t worry my boy. You’ve done nothing wrong.  We got we wanted.”

A light began to flicker above me. I guess one of the ceiling lights made my bed, and only my bed visible leaving the elder gentleman in the dark. He had the picture. The picture of the alluring women. I raised my hands to try to get the photo, forgetting the important detail that I was still chained to the bed.

The man tsked, “Now, now, you didn’t forget that you’re still tried down did you? Don’t worry we don’t intend to hurt you. We just wanted the photo and ask you some questions about it.”

He walked around the bed I was strapped down to making my feel more and more claustrophobic.

“Who are you? How did you find it? It’s mine you know! You can’t have it”

“As if I need your approval to have it Emerson. Yeah, that’s right I know your name. I’ve been looking after you ever since. Um, what was his name? You know the short, scrawny guy, with jagged brown hair”

The strange man snapped his fingers as if the more he snapped the better chances of remembering the kids name.

“Jack” I heard another deep, yet quiet voice. 

There was one man in the shadows. I was too busy focusing on the strange man’s voice that I didn’t realize there was another man in the background. He looked very familiar to me. Like I knew him very well. My thoughts were interrupted.

“Yeah, Jack. Such a nice fellow. Too bad for him though. You know the saying babbers get stabbers.” He chuckled.
 

“Uh, boss, I think you meant snitches get stitches.” Again the deep voiced man spoke.
 

“I know what the saying is, we do this all the time, we may as well have some fun while we’re at it”

“What are you talking about! Get my out of this thing! People will know I’m missing. The police are probably looking for me right now.”

The strange gentleman rushed toward my bed forcing me to took at his horrendous face.

“ Oh we’re hoping they’ll you. They’ll find you just like they found little Jack- dead. Now unless you want to end up like him, you’re going to have to give me some answers.”

I stood still. I didn't know Jack very well, but that doesn’t excuse me from grieving his death or being scared that I could be the next victim.

I spoke as calmly as I could. “Okay, I’ll tell you what I know.”

The strange man spoke,

“Now we’re getting somewhere. How did you find the photo?”

“I was taking a shower the day before school started and the water just went cold. I heard a popping sound in the basement so I grabbed my flashlight and went to check the boiler. That was when I saw that photo for the first time. I tried to grab it but my arms were long enough or skinny enough to reach it.”

“Who else knows about the photo?”

“I don’t the exact people right now but all I know is that a guy named Cecil and my friend Gerald are the only ones that know about it.”

“What about your parents?”

“I live alone. My mother overdosed on some pills since she couldn’t handle my father leaving to find work. Even after my mother’s death my father still hasn’t learned his lesson and continues to work abroad, not even giving me the time of day. Not like he used too.”

“Why didn’t you just keep the photo to yourself? Why did you tell someone about it?

“I trusted Gerald. I’ve known him for a long time so I thought that he was reliable enough to keep it a secert. I was hoping he would’ve gotten the photo for me. He had all the qualities long, skinny, arms.”

“Okay, last question. Since your life depends on it I must remind you to answer it very carefully. What do you know about this photo?”

“The only thing I know about this photo is that I found it in the bottom of my basement.”

I took a deep breath.  “Now can I ask you a question?”

The mobster guy stopped roaming back and forth around my bed. He sat down on one of the old metal beds across from me and smirked

“Sure, kid. What do you want to know?”

“What makes that photo so important that you have to kill a life over it, or many from what I assume.”

He sighed and gave me an answer as if by now it’s just a story he has memorized by heart. From what I can guess probably because it wasn’t his first run around when looking for this photo.

“This photo,” he explained as he waved it around in between his fingers “is the only evidence that connects me to the murder of this women. It’s the only proof that she existed. You wouldn't have been in this situation if one of my former colleges didn’t steal it from my office and hid it in secret location. You don’t know how long it took me to find this photo. How many lives I took. How many dead ends that I approached. But now, none of that matters.”

The man looks up and takes something out of his jacket. It was dark but I still knew what that shiny contraption was. A lighter. He held it at the bottom of the corner of the polaroid. The yellow and red flame set the photo ablaze as it made a variety of crackling noises like fire wood.

I yelled “No no no no no no! Stop that! That’s mine!” I mored more sporadic. I kicked my legs, punch my knuckles on the metal bars, I twisted and turned. He can’t do that. He can’t do that ‘

“It’s mine. My photo. Mine!” I roared repeatedly. “Mine, mine, mine”

“Ugh, stop yammering.” The mobster grumbled

There was a sharp pain in my stomach. I gasped hoping that the more I breathed the better the chances it wouldn’t be by last. My feet began to feel numb and heavy. My legs felt there were just dead weight. The tips of my fingers began to tingle with an indescribable burn. My arms felt like burdensome steel bars magnetized to the metal bed frame.

The more I tried to move in the twisted straps of the bed the more the pain flooded into my lungs. Leaving me to feel like I was being drowned in mid-air. I coughed with little drops of crimson flying all over my dark grey t-shirt. The visions of the strange gentleman kept fading back and forth. Making all of my sense become useless expect my hearing.

“Goodnight, Emerson.”

My ears began to ring. My visions became cloudy and I felt tired. I closed my eyes hoping that the sleep would stop the pain.