HASTINGS, LILLIAN PEYTON

she wished she could remember how she'd gotten here, or at least the handful of moments that occurred before her capture, but she couldn't really piece anything together. there were holes pierced all throughout her memory, only allowing her to catch small segments of the night before. the blonde could remember felix dragging her off to this abandoned warehouse for some party that she didn't want to attend. to be honest, she hated going to these gang rallies, but what choice did she have when she was dating the head of it all? wasn't like it took her all that long to slip back into old habits either. admittedly, lily was doing her very best to get herself clean, but it wasn't that easy a task when there were parties every night and suddenly one drink turned to two and two turned to four and so on. then eventually she would smoke a little bit of this or that. whatever people handed to her because she lost all sense of judgment once she reached a certain level of intoxication. of course she was regretting her decision to let her better judgment slip away from her last night because now she was tethered to a chair. the blonde pulled at her restraints but nearly yelped when the coarse rope bit into her tender flesh. pain wasn't unfamiliar to her, but her body was sore and her head was also throbbing. she wanted to touch the back of her head, just to feel what kind of damage had been done, but her arms still wouldn't break lose from their restraints and that's when the panic really started to set in.

lily began to rock back and forth on the chair, struggling to get it to tip far enough back that it would fall and splinter underneath her so she could find a way out. usually she was pretty good at running away. it was a talent of hers. her legs were swift and agile, removing her from particularly sticky situations, but they could never carry her far enough away. once she reached a certain point, something always brought her right back to the beginning. the blonde had to bite her tongue to keep herself from screaming out in frustration. she hoped that felix was awake and that he was out looking for her, because this situation was becoming more and more hopeless by the second. her wrists were starting to be rubbed raw against the ropes but they still weren't loosening up. at least parts of last night were coming back to her now. felix wanted her to go out to the van to grab more beers for the party. why he would ever send her to carry in cases of beer when she could hardly stand up straight was beyond her, but lily didn't typically make a habit of objecting to his requests. just a few more months and then she should have enough money to leave him in the dust behind her. all she needed to do was to play pretend for a little while longer and then she could leave... unless he got her killed first. lillian wasn't too sure where this particular instance was going to leave her, but the men who grabbed her last night were pretty hostile. they didn't even give her a chance to fight for her freedom. just hit her over the head with something hard and then there was nothing.

when he opened his mouth and spoke to her, she clenched her jaw like just the sound of his voice was offensive to her. his tone was menacingly charming, matching that dangerous flare in his eyes. he looked like he was about to enjoy whatever he had in store for her, and that frightened her. still, she held her shoulders back and her head up high, staring him straight in the face. "i wouldn't take it even if i thought you actually had the intention to give it to me." her own voice was cold, but she knew that the odds of her instilling any kind of fear within this man were nonexistent. still, lily wasn't a woman who could just stick her tail between her legs and submit. living with her boyfriend and his group of thugs had given her a harder exterior and a stronger spirit to break. which... maybe wasn't such a good thing in this instance.

"oh, are we?" the blonde scoffed, nearly rolled her eyes too, but stopped short when a strong hand came down a little too hard on her delicate shoulder. she could make herself look as big as she wanted, but that didn't change the fact that she was about as fragile as a piece of glass. his fingers tightened his grip, making her flinch as the pain traveled all down her arm and extended across her back. regardless of the pain, she struggled against his hold, trying to free her shoulder from his grasp. this made him clutch tighter, probably bruising the skin underneath his fingers. what stopped her, however, was the dead calm of his voice. it chilled her straight to the bone and got her to to stop moving almost immediately. "what happens if i don't cooperate?" lily didn't know what he was going to do with the information she give him. she didn't know if he was going to somehow use it against her... though it probably wouldn't matter considering he would probably just kill her if she didn't give him anything at all. his hand gripped at her shoulder so tightly that she feared he was going to shatter the bone if he so much as twitched his fingers around her skin a little more. "fuck!" she hissed through her teeth, winching underneath the pain and pressure of his hand. "fine! i'll... i'll tell you." he didn't appear to be completely convinced, but his hand did loosen its hold a little bit. "my name is lillian hastings. i'm twenty years old and i... i'm a waitress at a diner. does that cover the minimum details?" it probably would have been in her best interest to lose the attitude, but she could hardly help herself. when you lived with the kind of men that she did, you had to assert yourself or else they would walk all over you.

though he released his crushing grip on her shoulder, it still ached after the pressure was gone. the impression of his fingers would soon mark her skin, but lillian doubted anyone would notice because they would probably blend in with the other cuts and bruises on her skin. at one point in time, she could have sworn she had the softest, palest skin imaginable. now she was tainted. it was usually pretty difficult to tell which bruises were fresh and which were not. "had you been paying attention, you would have noted that i didn't tell you my birthday." her snarky remark earned her a quick slap across the face which split her lip at the corner. the metallic tang of blood filled her mouth, but she didn't bother to spit it out. then she thought briefly on who could have possibly put her in this chair. she supposed that maybe felix could have done it. maybe he heard whispers about her plan for escape and was doing this to test her loyalty, but lily was smart. she hadn't told anyone about her plans because she didn't bother to ever let anyone that close to her. so perhaps it was an enemy of his? some rival gang that was trying to attack felix by harming her? probably would have been viewed as a smart plan, but lily doubted that he even noticed her absence yet. her boyfriend was extremely possessive, yes, but only when she was actually there. right now he was probably stumbling around his house, looking for the bathroom to throw up or the fridge to grab another beer. "sure. a few faces come to mind." he didn't seem too impressed with her curt answer, but it wasn't enough to earn her another hit across the face. 

"no, i guess it wouldn't... considering i didn't give you any names or descriptions. are you reading all of this off a script?" the blonde cocked her head to the side and smiled innocently at him, but only for a second because his arms stretched behind his back and swung around full force to knock her head in the other direction. this time she coughed and spit out blood, spraying her own shoulder and arm with the warm crimson liquid. "fuck you!" the words were hissed through her bloodstained teeth but he didn't seem all that frightened by her menacing tone. made sense considering not very many men would ever find themselves shaking in their boots because of a petite, bruised blonde who was tied to a chair. a girl could dream though, couldn't she? "what do you mean, don't start being defiant? i've been giving you hell since the second you walked in here." again, not that it was really doing her any good, but she couldn't help it. lily was a wounded animal with her back against the wall and the only way she knew how to defend herself was to use her words and bitch, hoping that maybe they would get tired of her and call it quits. of course that usually wasn't how things ended up going, but at least she would have the satisfaction of knowing that they were incapable of breaking her. that was something she prided herself in. lillian, for the most part, thought herself to be a relatively quiet wallflower. she kept to herself and smiled politely at her customers in the cafe. her heart was gentle for the most part, but she couldn't afford to be weak when her life was the way it was. it was because of her boyfriend that she learned to build walls around herself and toughen her character. defiance was something she thrived off of, even if it wasn't usually put out on open display. lily was sneaky and secretive. sure she was friendly, but no one ever really learned anything about who she truly was or where she wanted to go in life because she wouldn't allow it. trust wasn't something she ever handed like candy. not after the hell she'd traveled through. "i'm the kind of girl who's too good for you, so i'm not going to bother wasting my breath on trying to explain myself to you." with that, she earned herself a hard hit to the gut which knocked the wind right out of her. 

it took her a minute to catch her breath again, and even then she could only just make out the nonsense that he was rambling off to her. she didn't understand why he wanted to know all these personal things about her. maybe this was felix doing this to her. maybe he was trying to truly get under her skin so he could figure out who is girlfriend really was. this sent cold shivers down her spine and knots formed in her stomach. had someone found out about her plan? did one of his guys stumble into her apartment and find the fake i.d. and the thick wad of cash she'd been saving for almost a year now? panic caused her pupils to turn into pinpricks as she stared at the man. he wouldn't get anything out of her. even if it meant losing her life over it, she wouldn't utter a single word that would give away her plot for escape. "i am who i am. how i act is who i am. what i say is who i am. i can't know what other people would say because i'm not a mind reader." this was only somewhat true. lily felt pretty confident that she knew what some people would say about her. felix's men might call her a trick. a beautiful little whore that they wanted a piece of. and maybe that's what she was. or had been before felix claimed her as his own. somewhere during high school she had slipped into the cold hard grasp of drugs and lost herself completely to the life of addiction that came with it. she went from a straight a student who showed all kinds of promise to a skinny little druggie who everyone felt bad for but wouldn't dare to reach out and help because of the people she became associated with. the men and women who sat in her diner probably looked at her and thought 'wow, what a sweet girl' because her smile was always so gentle and charming, just like her words. who lillian was depended on the people she was around and how comfortable she felt with them. either way, she supposed that they were all bits and pieces of her. she wouldn't consider herself to be fake, but rather that she shielding some parts of her personality from certain areas of her life. "why don't you tell me what you thinking of me, huh?" a sinister smile appeared on his lips as she stepped closer to her, sending shivers of repulse through her body. his breath was in her ear now, heavy and infused with bloodlust. his lips were so close to her ear as his fingers wrapped tightly around her throat. 

the air in her lungs was quickly burnt out, turned into carbon dioxide that she couldn't expel from her body because her windpipe was being crushed by his powerful grasp. her face turned red as he whispered into her ear... and then he let go and air rushed in through her nose and mouth as she struggled to catch her breath. impulse had her wanting to scream at him, but she held her tongue and decided to keep quiet this time. energy was fading fast from her body and she figured that saving some of it might prove to be a smart idea for now. "has who always been there for me? my parents? siblings? no. i don't even know who those people are anymore." once upon a time, lily was the youngest of two and lived in a decent home with two working class parents who wanted more for their children. they were pushed to do well in school, which they did. both she and her brother were smart children who got along as well as any other brother and sister might have. they fought, but he was older and obviously a little protective over his precious, innocent little sister. no one bullied her because if they did, they'd have her brother to answer to who was always the biggest kid in the class and about four years older than her. she always looked up to her brother and went to him whenever she was in need of advice or a shoulder to cry on. he helped her with her homework and practiced with her when she was on the soccer team in middle school. once high school came for her and ended for him however, her brother signed his life away to the military and left her alone. of course this broke her heart, but he promised to return to her. lily held onto that promise for the first two years of her high school career and listened to him when he told her to keep her grades up and to work hard so that she wouldn't have to struggle when it came time for her to college. he said that he would help her when he came home... but he never did come home. two men in uniform came knocking on their door during her junior year to tell her family that their beloved son had died honorably on the battle field. that moment changed the rest of her life. it shattered the perfect little bubble she'd wrapped herself in and allowed all the bad outside forces to flood in and take her over. lily discovered the magical medicine called alcohol which led her down a path that had drugs and sex at the end of it. her grades fell and her body turned too fragile for her to play sports any longer. her parents tried to push her back onto the right path, but she wasn't having any of it. it was too late anyway. she never really came home because she fell into the grasp of this gang that one of her best friends at the time was a part of. she became a regular groupie and hung around them whenever she could. they drank, did drugs, partied, and slept together. this was her life for a few years until felix, their leader laid eyes on her and decided to make her his. when he came into her life, everything became so much worse. he was rough and demanding and she was starting to become tired of this lifestyle. she wanted out, but he wouldn't let her. the blonde made the mistake of arguing with him about it one time and it landed her a few nights in the hospital because he beat her so bad. after that night she never spoke of it again and instead kept everything to herself. one day she would get away, but only when no one saw it coming and she knew that she would have a few days to get as far away from this place as she possibly could. "i lived here my whole life. i graduated high school, got a job, bought an apartment, and continued to live here. that's my life. it's not that interesting." he didn't believe her and lily couldn't blame him. a woman who fought back with a man who was beating the shit out of her couldn't have lived an ordinary life. she was too hardened to be as normal a girl as she said she was. 

another slap was delivered to her face, but the skin was desensitized even though her lips burst and started bleeding. lily didn't flinch or cry out, just let it happen. "i'm sorry that it wasn't up to your standards." lily spit more blood out on the floor and let her head hang limp. she was too tired to hold it up any longer. "my boyfriend's name is felix. surely he must be looking for me at this point. he's sort of the possessive type." truth was, he probably wasn't looking for her yet, but he would be soon. when he finally noticed that she wasn't there to keep his bed warm or tend to him when his headache became too out of control he would call her phone a thousand times before deciding that she was missing and then he would send the troops out to find and kill anyone who laid a hand on her. 

he attempted to get under her skin again. mentioning someone that she brought up... but the only person she had called by name was felix, and lily seriously doubted that her boyfriend was the next person to be interrogated. even if he was, she couldn't find it in her heart to be all that upset about it. regardless, she pput on a show of feeling distressed and panicked. she struggled in her seat and screamed out just as the point of a needle found her neck and broke through the skin. a few seconds later her vision began to fade and she found her way back into blissful unconsciousness.