The first day
Joe Cole woke up but he didn't open his eyes. His morning glory was pressed uncomfortably on the hard cold floor.
Cold floor? He thought to himself and blinked as he looked around him. The room was very white and very clean.
Joe climbed to his feet, wondering where he was and... what had happened to his clothes?!
He was just wearing his white cotton boxers.
He gazed around him as if awed by a cathedral or alien planet.
It was all so very surreal.
He felt something around his neck but he couldn't see what it was. He was relieved to notice that, whatever it was, it wasn't too tight.
He brought his hand up to feel what it was.
It seemed to be a metallic collar of some kind.
He looked at the bare mattress on a double bed but it didn't make any sense to him.
"Don't come anywhere near me!" A voice cried defiantly from a corner to his left.
Joe spun on his heels to face the speaker. For the first time he registered, really registered, what he was seeing.
There was a young woman sitting there, watching him with an angry, wary expression.
Joe put his hands up in an open way and retreated a few steps. He crouched down and looked at her. She was, perhaps, 23 and had short, boyishly short, brown hair. It suited her elfin face.
Joe looked down at the rest of her instinctively and realised that she was wearing only in her underwear too. He removed his gaze hastily.
He made eye contact and cleared his throat.
"My name is Joe Cole. Can you tell me yours?" He called over to her.
The young woman looked at him, sizing him up. She observed the 40 year-old's fit, lean and semi-naked body suspiciously.
"My name is Sister Mary Angelica." She gave him after a few minutes.
"You're a nurse?! Is this a hospital?" Joe ventured.
"I'm a nun ...and... I don't know where this is!" She replied, enunciating each word vehemently.
The two stared at each other for several minutes before Joe backed down. He cast his eyes down to the white tiled floor.
"Can I take a look at the thing around your neck? I can't see mine." He asked.
The Sister touched her hand to her neck then sniffed her consent and Joe approached her slowly, as so not to startle her.
He was kneeling right next to her now and she had turned her eyes to the wall, indignantly.
He touched the metal ring, flushing as he glanced down at her more-than-ample cleavage. He looked back up and drew closer to look at a seam in the bronze and the LED that flashed next to it.
"It's a bomb, isn't it?" The nun said, quietly.
"Yeah, I think so." Joe confirmed her fears.
"Can you get it off?" She croaked.
"Can you tell me what's the last thing you remember?" He soothed, answering her question by changing the subject.
"I stopped at the gas station on my way home to the convent...Oh, Holy Father, there was someone on the backseat!" The Sister recalled with horror.
"You mean the convent in Sixville Hill?" Joe searched for clarification.
"Yes. What about you?" Mary Angelica fired back, testing him out.
"I was home alone and I heard a noise. That's the last thing I remember." He replied.
"We've been abducted." Mary Angelica whispered, her voice wavering.
Joe couldn't deny it, it was so obviously true and they sat there in silence for what seemed like a long time. Both of them were lost in their thoughts and pondering the ramifications of this revelation.
"The Matchmaker....?" Joe thought aloud.
Mary Angelica jumped up and waved a furious, accusing finger at him.
"You do know something!" She shouted, half-pleased that her suspicions had proved righteous.
Joe looked up at her.
"It's just an urban legend. It's not true." He explained.
"Tell me what you know..." She cried, in a threatening tone.
Joe surrendered and shifted on the floor.
"I don't believe this stuff, okay? My son, Billy, is going through a..a...morbid phase, I guess and he told me about the Matchmaker. This guy, the Matchmaker, abducts people and if they don't do as he says he kills them." He expounded.
"What sort of things?" Mary Angelica gasped, horrified.
"Umm, sexual things." He winced. He took a deep breath. "Apparently one case was a father and daughter, another case involved two male homophobes, I think."
"Anything else?" Mary Angelica questioned.
"I don't remember...umm, a gay man and a frigid housewife...umm, there were others, I think. Billy, my son, liked one about a white racist AIDS patient and a black hygiene freak, but I'm pretty sure he made that one up himself... Hell, they're all made up!" He cried.
"Mr Cole, you can't deny the fact that we are here!" The nun protested earnestly.
He looked at her but was unable to contradict her.
"Maybe people are looking for us..."He said, hopefully.
"I was on my way back early from a hospice retreat. No one is expecting me back for a week!" Mary Angelica shouted.
Joe thought about how Simone, his wife who was staying with her parents, might call and discover he was missing.
He groaned as he remembered that their phone had gone out of order a couple of days ago.
++++++++++++
"Are you a homosexual, Mr Cole?" Mary Angelica asked after a long silence. There was a strong hint of disgust in her voice.
"No, I'm married! I have a son, remember!" Joe replied, puzzled, as he showed her his wedding ring.
"Are you faithful to your wife?" She asked insistently.
" I haven't slept with another woman in 16 years!" He shouted angrily. "What kind of questions are these?!"
Mary Angelica looked at him as if he were stupid.
"Mr Cole, from what you said before it is quite obvious that there is a pattern in the way this Matchmaker chooses his victims. Each couple was unwilling to have sex with each other."
Joe nodded at her reasoning.
"In our case I have my vows and so do you. The question you have to ask yourself is: ' Are you so unwilling to cheat on your wife that you'd die to remain faithful?'" Mary Angelica asked.
Joe stood up, not liking the question, or maybe, not liking the answer.
"Maybe there's a way out of here!" He stated.
Mary Angelica surveyed the room.
"There are no doors." She said, resignedly.
"Well, he must have gotten us in here somehow!" Joe shouted, frustrated at her attitude. He began to tap at the white wooden panelling of the walls.
"Hmph, look!" The nun said, pointing upwards to the high ceiling.
Joe looked to where she was pointing. He walked over and gazed up.
"You think he lowered us down?" He asked as he realised there was a dark narrow chute above them.
"Can we climb it?" She asked hopefully, standing up and walking over to Joe.
Both of them gazed up, thoughtfully. Joe noticed that Mary Angelica had unconsciously pressed her right breast against his bare back as she attempted to get a better view up the shaft.
He gave a small cough and she leapt back as if burned, glaring at him.
"The ceiling's too high. Even with the bed, the chair and you on my shoulders we'd never reach it." Joe said, despondently.
"Well that's that then." Mary Angelica sighed and returned to her position on the floor.
Joe resumed tapping the walls diligently and inspecting the toilet and sink that lay in one corner.
In the middle of the last wall Joe found a small hole.
" Come look at this." He said over his shoulder.
Mary Angelica padded over to him as he put his finger into the opening.
There was a small click and the wooden panel swung open in his hands.
Behind the secret door lay a small alcove. Mary Angelica put a soft hand on Joe's broad shoulder and craned round him to get a better look.
"There are no doors in the there, either." She said and turned away.
"There's a clock in the wall and a little door too." He corrected her, as he slid it open. "There's food in here and a note!" He cried.
"How'd they get in there?" The Sister asked, intrigued again.
"It's a dumbwaiter system, I think." Joe said.
"Can we climb up the shaft?" Mary Angelica said hopefully.
"We wouldn't even get our shoulders through." Joe said, his hopes dashed.
"Would he poison the food, do you think?" The young woman asked fearfully.
"No, wouldn't fit the plan, would it?" Joe replied after a moment's consideration.
Mary Angelica darted forward and snatched an apple. She bit into it with a greedy crunch. "What's the note say?" She asked with her mouth full.
Joe quickly read it.
"He says that we'll only be here for four days if we do as he says. We have to fu...have sex once a day. If we don't he'll activate the collars and our heads will be blown off..." Joe said, grimacing.
"Dear Lord..." Muttered Mary Angelica.
"I can't rape you or he'll kill me and let you go; both of us have to consent basically..." Joe said.
"Were you going to rape me?!" Mary Angelica hissed.
Joe gave her a disgusted look.
"Of course not!" He cried.
"Does it say anything else?" She replied, after a moment to collect herself.
"Oh..." Joe said as he stopped reading and bent to the cavity. "He's given us a condom to use."
"How thoughtful of him!" She cried and burst into great wracking sobs.
Joe took her into his arms and after a moment she melted against him.
"How...can....he...do...this to us?" She wailed.
He held her in his strong arms until there were no more tears left to cry.
"I'm not strong enough." She whispered against his light brown chest hair.
"What do you mean?" Joe asked her as she pulled away and turned from him.
"I'm not a martyr.... I want to live.... and ...and," She stuttered, "if that means I have to have sex with you...I will..." She confessed, with effort.
Joe stood there, gaping.
"Oh, God...I mean...if you will...umm..." She continued, awkward and uncomfortable.
Joe shut his eyes and his head was pounding.
When he opened his eyes Mary Angelica was watching him.
"I...I would do anything to get back to Simone and Billy." He groaned, realising it was true.
"You mean it?" The nun asked.
"Yeah...I think Simone will understand...." He sighed.
++++++++++