Chapter 196

• I tried to think, to figure out how long I’d been here. How long after you stop taking the pill do you become fertile again? I had no idea, but I didn’t think I’d been there that long. A week, maybe? Two?
• My thoughts were cut off when I was hit with the cold water from the hose again. He rinsed my hair and body thoroughly and then left me shivering in the corner, my teeth chattering, as he wound it back up and left it near the front door. Then he stepped inside the house and came right back out with a dingy white towel in his hands. He gave it to me and I immediately wrapped it around my body, soaking up what moisture I could before I rubbed it briskly over the rest of me, drying my hair as best as I could.
• When I was finished, he held his hand out for the towel, but I quickly wrapped it around myself again. “No,” I told him with a shake of my head that made the world tilt around me. I was hungry. And thirsty. And I could feel the panic rising inside of me as the drugs wore off. The thought of walking back inside of that house without something covering me making me feel nauseous. “No,” I said it again. I knew he understood that word. It was the same in both languages. Besides, he spoke some English.