Graduation Night, continued....
Roger woke up feeling nauseous. He recognized the fact that he was in his own bed but when he tried to sit up, he found that he couldn’t move. He lifted his head and saw that his arms and legs were handcuffed to the bedposts.
The memory of what had happened this morning came flooding back. His confession, Joy’s confession... Joy shooting him in the chest, the wooziness he had felt almost immediately after. She must have shot him with a tranquilizer.
How could this be? How could the woman he had loved for over a year have been deceiving him all this time? It all seemed like a horrible nightmare.
Joy entered the room, wearing what appeared to be a blue plastic gown. As she smiled down at him, the look on her face seemed completely unfamiliar to him. “Hello, Roger,” she said. “I see you’re awake.”
“Joy,” he managed. His mouth felt very dry. “What are you doing?”
“What do you think?” Joy replied. “I’m getting my revenge on you for what you did to my sister. What you did to my family. You were too spineless to take your medicine eleven years ago so now I’m going to force-feed it to you.”
Roger squeezed his eyes shut. “Why now? Why didn’t you do this when we first met?”
Joy smiled. “It hurts more this way, doesn’t it? Besides, I wanted to hear a confession from your own mouth. I had to be sure.”
“Joy, please don’t do this...” Roger whispered.
But Joy wasn’t listening to him. She was reaching down for something under the bed. When she stood up again, he could see it was some sort of mechanical saw.
“What... what’s that?” Roger asked.
“My sister is dead,” Joy said. “She’s lying in a casket buried under six feet of dirt.” She blinked. “I’m going to saw off your legs, Roger.”
The gravity of what Joy had just said did not hit him until the saw was an inch away from the skin of his thigh. Roger screamed, struggling against the handcuffs that held his limbs in place. The pain, when the saw came down, was excruciating. He screamed and cried until the agony overwhelmed him, and he fainted.
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Roger awoke again many hours later. He felt so lightheaded that when he tried to lift his head for a second, he immediately had to drop it back down again. He tried to move his arms and felt that they were still restrained. He tried to move his legs and had the strangest sensation of moving them but not quite. His legs hurt very badly—enough to bring tears to his eyes.
Roger made another attempt to lift his head and was more successful this time. He looked down at his body and to his horror, he saw that his legs were gone from the mid-thigh down. The stumps that were left had been wrapped in bloody bandages. The sheets he lay on were soaked in blood. Roger dropped his head back down against the bed, breathing hard. He couldn’t believe this was happening.
“Hello, Roger.” It was Joy, suddenly standing above him. “You were bleeding quite heavily. Luckily for you, I’m a registered nurse.”
“Where... where are my legs?” Roger gasped.
“I’ve disposed of them,” Joy replied. “Can’t have anyone finding the evidence, can we?”
Roger began sobbing almost hysterically. He couldn’t believe she had cut off his legs. Just like that, she had turned him into a cripple, a freak.
“Oh, shut up,” Joy snapped at him. “God, you’re such a fucking baby. No wonder you could never get laid.”
“Joy...”
“You’re about to have some company,” Joy said. “Your buddy Adam is going to be here soon.”
“He... he is?”
“He wanted to have a little talk with us, remember?” Joy smiled. “He’s going to get quite a surprise.”
“Adam... wasn’t responsible for what happened. It was me... you should leave him alone.”
“You know, I was going to do that,” Joy said thoughtfully. “I mean, he did lie to save your sorry ass and he deserves to suffer for that. But I was thinking that because he was crippled, maybe I’d cut him a break. He’s suffered a lot already. Except now that I’ve met him, I’m realizing that he isn’t suffering all that much. He’s got a great job and he’s dating that little tart Brynne...”
“It’s all an act, he’s not happy,” Roger said, but he knew it was useless. Joy was going to do what she wanted to do, regardless of what he told her.
“I have to say, I feel a little bad about it,” Joy said with a wink. “After all, that Adam is a very attractive guy, even in the wheelchair. Maybe he and I can have a little fun before I mutilate him. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a really good fuck, Roger.”
Roger felt his face burn. He still felt stunned that Joy had betrayed him this way. Yes, he had killed her sister. But it had been an accident, goddamn it. He didn’t deserve to be sliced apart, piece by piece. He felt tears springing to his eyes as he realized that Joy had won and he was truly at her mercy.