Finish Me

The night was crisp, the autumn breeze blowing in through the cracked window. It seemed as if nothing could destroy the peace Amethyst and her family felt as they lounged in their living room.

“How about a midnight snack?” her dad piped up. Amethyst smiled in agreement.

“It’s my turn to pick something,” she replied as she bolted up out of her chair, a silly grin across her flawless face. She made her way into the kitchen, opening the cabinet to peer in at the array of snacks. She opted on a trail mix and brought it back into the living room, where her mom was strapping her baby brother into his high chair.

“Amethyst, do you mind grabbing Julian’s bottle?”

Amethyst carried the snack bowl with her as she ambled back into the kitchen, popping a few mini pretzels. That’s when she heard the sudden loud bang, the sharp piercing sound of glass breaking and hitting the ground with a shatter.

She jumped, the trail mix scattering all over the counters and littering the floor. She spun around wildly just on time to see a boot stick its way through the mess of what was left of their back door. Shards of glass covered the entrance. She began to back away, until a man in a black ski mask appeared, and she froze in her tracks.

“Amethyst! What happened?” her mom and dad yelled in unison from the living room. She heard their clambering feet pounding her way, then stopping at a sudden halt.

Another man stepped in. They were both tall, husky and burly. The baby bottle slipped from Amethyst’s fingers, hitting the ground with a thud. Her heart was pounding in her ears, thumping against her chest when she realized the men were holding guns.

Amethyst’s dad seemed to wake up from the shock and quickly pulled himself in front of his daughter and wife.

“Who the hell are you?” her dad yelled. He was trying to sound brave, she could tell. But she knew him, and the quaver in his voice was detectable from a mile off. He was no match for them. He wasn’t even a match for one. Aside from the weapons they yielded, they themselves were taller, heavier, carrying arms of thick muscles.

Please, please, she thought, just take what you want and leave.

“We’re in charge of you, starting now. And you’re all going to step back into that room.”

It was the man who had first stepped in. Even his voice was enormous, low, bouncing off the walls. She wanted to scream at her dad when he stepped forward and spoke back.

“You’re not getting anything. Get out or else.”

They didn’t seem fazed by this threat. In fact, they seemed amused. Snickering, they looked her short dad over.

“Hmm, I see. This is gonna be a hard fight, Ronnie,” he said in mockery to the man standing next to him. They both stepped forward, slamming the head of their guns against her dad’s chest. Her mom shrieked. Amethyst’s heart seemed to skip a beat.

“Get back. Now.”

And so they did as they were told. Like cattle, they were ushered into their own living room on command, and Amethyst watched as her mom ran to Julian’s side, clutching him in her hands.

“We want all of your money, now. Every bill, every last cent. I want your credit cards too, and your safe if you have one. Everything you’ve got.”

This seemed to take her dad aback. She watched as he licked his lips uneasily. She could only watch helplessly from where she stood as her dad faced the vile men.

“Ok, ok,” he said, holding his hands up. “But I’ll have to leave this room. There’s nothing in here.”

The bigger guy turned to the other one and said loud and clear, “Ron, follow him. Make sure he doesn’t make a run for it.”

The man nodded in triumph and pushed her dad’s back, causing him to stumble forward. He found his footing and quickly began to lead the way. With them gone, the first thief turned back to Amethyst and her mom, looking them over with a greedy smirk across his dirty mouth.

“How lovely. Two women right at our feet. And not totally bad looking either. In fact, I think I’ve got the hots for you there.”

Amethyst swallowed back a gasp, almost choking on the lump in her throat when she realized he was speaking in her direction. He gave a wink that sent chills running down her spine.

“You leave my daughter alone,” her mom defended her. She sounded so small, so frail from where she stood by her baby brother, hands balled into fists by her side.

The man laughed ruefully. “Look here missy; I can say whatever the hell I want to anyone I fucking want. Understand?”

Her mom made no move to show she had heard him, and instead continued staring at him in anger. The thief strolled about the room as if he owned the place, inspecting everything in sight, knocking things over when he could find no value in the item.

It seemed like a lifetime before there was any sign of her dad and the other burglar being present. There was a crash from upstairs, and then they both came rushing down. The man came stomping into the room, his hand locked tightly around her dad’s upper arm.

“The bastard won’t tell me where the safe is.”

Amethyst watched as the guy looked at the Ronnie thief, then her dad as he figured out how to handle this situation. His gaze flickered over to her mom, and he held the gun up, aiming for her. “Find the safe, or your wife goes bye-bye.”

Everything in the room seemed to freeze. She could see her mom was pleading with her eyes, telling her husband to give them whatever they wanted. And so he agreed.

“Alright. We don’t have an actual safe. We just keep a stash.”

He led the Ronnie thief downstairs this time, while she and her mom stood there in silence for what was to happen next. As they waited, the bigger burglar holding them hostage paced back and forth across the room, still touching everything and looking through their belongings, the gun held tight in his hands.

Amethyst realized that he took no notice of the baby, even as his eyes darted over the room, taking it all in. She felt her heart sink when his eyes landed on the tall glass jar at the back of the room, full to the top with change and covered tightly with a lid.

They kept it on the floor in the corner, partially hidden from view behind a small bedside table. The three of them had begun to fill it when she was only in the third grade, and ever since then they had collected all of their spare change into it. She could remember when she was a child, how excited and triumphant she would become when she spotted a dime on the floor. To find a quarter had been like finding gold. Just earlier this year, a few months after her fifteenth birthday, her dad had told her they could put the money towards her first car.

And now the thief was eying it hungrily.

“How much money is in that back there?” he asked gruffly. Her mom looked up, startled, and warily shifted her gaze in the direction he was pointing. She seemed too shaken to talk, her jaw wobbling in fear. She wouldn’t even look up at him. So Amethyst spoke up for her, even though she herself felt like anything she said, every small move she made, would be held against them all.

“We don’t know. We think close to...five thousand,” she squeaked. Her eyes instantly dropped to the floor as the man’s intense gaze fell on her, drinking in every word she said.

“Five thousand? Not bad. Not bad at all.”

She imagined him salivating for it, thinking about getting his hands around the glass, imagining the things he could buy with it along with the rest of the money they accumulated from them tonight. But when she peered up, she realized the man was still looking straight at her, staring actually. Her body tensed and she quickly looked down again, pressing her hands together, trying not to think of his eyes boring into her. She could feel a sweat coming on, her face heating up with anxiety, her hands flush with fear.

“How old are you?”

Amethyst looked up warily, taking a moment to swallow her growing hysteria. “Fifteen,” she croaked. The guy sneered, literally, as if he was laughing at some inside joke between the two of them.

“Are you a virgin?”

Now it was her time to clam up. She peered down at her feet, eyes wide in incredulity, feeling her heart beat more rapidly against her chest with every second that passed.

“That is none of your damn business,” her mom said, sounding braver than she looked. Her eyebrows were pulled together in a defiant expression. But she had spoken too rashly, for the guy laughed scornfully and took a step closer.

“First of all, everything in a house I hold hostage is my business. And second, I wasn’t talking to you. I was talking to your pretty daughter here.” He turned back to Amethyst. “Now answer the question.”

Amethyst remained silent. She didn’t want to admit that she was indeed a virgin, because after all, is that not what he wanted to hear?

The Ronnie thief came stomping into the room then, still clutching her dad by the arm. He held up a wad of bills enclosed with a rubber band, and waved it in front of the bigger thief, along with her dad’s credit cards. Amethyst hadn’t even known they had that kind of money lying around the house.

“This is at least eight thousand.”

“Victory,” he roared, taking the money greedily. He stuffed it into his cargo pocket and pointed ahead to the jar. “And now we take that.”

The Ronnie thief looked to where he pointed and grinned mischievously. “Nice. How much do ya think is in there?”

Amethyst’s pulse quickened as the first thief turned his attention to her. “Well pretty missy here told me she might have a clue. What is it you said?”

Amethyst swallowed the panic rising in her throat and said for the second time with a trembling voice, “Close to five thousand.”

She saw her dad look at her painfully, his brows pulled together tightly in despair. He knew how much it would hurt her for them to take it. But what were they to do? They were defenseless, left with no choice but to submit and follow orders.

“No. You can’t have that,” her dad suddenly barked. Amethyst froze.

“What’s so special ’bout it? You’ve already given us more than what’s in there,” the Ronnie thief said. The other thief just laughed disdainfully.

“I can have whatever the hell I want. Ya know what? I don’t like you much. Ronnie, take him in the chest.”

“No!” Amethyst and her mom screamed at once. Her head was spinning, and she only wished they had the guts to call out for their neighbors. But she feared it would get them all killed.

“Please, please don’t do this,” her mom cried.

“Chrissy, stay where you are. Please,” her dad said in a tone much too calm for the catastrophe they were in. But the Ronnie thief didn’t fire; instead he took hold of her dad and demanded he move forward to retrieve the coin jar. It was heavy, Amethyst knew this from experience, and her heart hurt to watch her dad struggle to lift it and carry it forward for the greedy burglars. Meanwhile, as the first thief marched languidly before them, he paused right by Julian.

Amethyst stopped breathing, too panicked to say anything at all as they all stared wide-eyed at what was occurring before them. The thief reached down with his finger and stroked the baby’s jaw, gently, much to her surprise, and she almost cringed when Julian laughed up at him, grabbing his finger playfully before he pulled it away. She expected at any second for him to slam his fist against the small head of the fragile infant.

But she somehow knew she shouldn’t worry. He was only doing this to scare them. It was working, yes. But she wouldn’t be fooled.

“What a sweet little baby,” he quipped. “Now, girls; you have any money in your wallets? If you do, I want it now.”

Her mom was quick to move for the closet where she kept her bag, but the first thief quickly grabbed her arm. She yelped. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“I’m going to get you my money,” she snapped at him through clenched teeth. Amethyst could see she was struggling not to spit in his face. He slowly let her arm go, but he followed closely behind, and they all watched as she opened the closet across from the den door and reached inside. She was holding three fifties when she stiffly stepped away from the closet. The man smiled evilly and reached out, snatching it from her trembling hands. “Good girl.”

In no time, he was turning towards Amethyst who still stood there rigidly. “Your turn,” he barked haughtily. He waited with one eyebrow arched, looking in her direction.

“M-my bag is upstairs,” she managed to say.

“That’s not a problem,” the thief said, lilting his head to the side, as if they were discussing casual business and he was trying to keep his patience in check. “Lead me,” he smirked as he pointed to the stairs. To his partner in crime he simply said, “Watch them.”

She gave her parents a wary gaze before reluctantly walking to the stairs. Her heart was pulsing in her ears, but that didn’t cover up the sound of the loud stomps following close behind her. At the stop of the stairs, hidden from view, she felt the thief put his big hand across her lower back, almost as if he was leading her instead, or as if they had just finished a dance together. She froze right in her tracks as she eyed the gun he held in his other hand, out of the corner of her eye. His hand remained in this suggestive position, and when he realized she wasn’t moving, he leaned forward to whisper in her ear. She felt his hot breath against her neck, causing her to let out a small unintentional gasp.

“I won’t hurt you. Now show me where it is.”

She swallowed hard and continued walking forward, despite the fact that she didn’t believe him. She didn’t realize she had been holding her breath until they had reached her bedroom door and his hand was sliding from her back. She was breathing fast now, and she rushed inside her room, wanting to get this over with so they could go away and leave them all alone.

She found her small crossbody bag hanging on her doorknob and quickly zipped it open, rummaging inside like a mad woman until she was holding her wallet between her clammy hands. She reached in and pulled out what little money she kept in there.

“I don’t have much,” she whispered shakily. He quickly took it from her, and, seeing the disappointment on her face, a smirk arose.

“It’ll add up.” He gave her the evilest grin she had ever seen, be it in movies or real life. The comment paired with his mischievous expression made her knees go weak, and she felt the sudden urge to collapse. But she wanted more to go to her parents and hold them, maybe never let go.

She scurried to the door, ready to run downstairs, when she suddenly felt his big hand envelop her shoulder and pull her back against his hard chest. The shock and fear she felt clouded any sound from escaping. A big greedy hand snaked down to her chest and groped around through her shirt. She gasped in surprise, too stunned to move away from his violating touch.

“I’m not done with you,” the thief whispered menacingly. With a flick of her long brown hair, he was clutching her arm and dragging her out the door. She heaved a breath, still shaking, and quickly followed behind him, trying not to trip on her own feet. Once they descended, she saw the Ronnie thief had not moved from his post, and her mom was silently crying.

Amethyst hurried to step near her brother, now with the knowledge that something else was coming her way. Julian was whimpering now at seeing his own mom cry, and she knelt down, trying to shush him, just now remembering how she had never gotten the bottle to him.