C H A P T E R 17
C H A P T E R 17
SECRETS THAT LIE BENEATH
Puppet
“ N ow now Innocence . We were finally starting to get somewhere.” Ughhhhhh, I hate her! The back of my legs find the bed, stumbling until I sit facing the door waiting for her to barge in behind me.
“Go away.” She’s gripping the door with her boot wedged between the door and the frame. She holds it and I wait for her to follow me in but she doesn’t. Instead, there is a thirty second pause before she slowly lets go, her body slipping away out of sight as she shuts the door for me.
“Fine. Have it your way.” My confusion peeks. A minute ago she blew up at me? Now she is leaving me be? I don’t understand. Why won't she fight me? Why won’t she just snap and end me quickly like she’s meant to? There is anticipation between the walls and I wait for her heavy boots to fade away but I hear nothing. She hasn’t moved an inch.
“I know you're still standing there.” I was an idiot to think today would be any different. Even uncuffed I am still caged. I don’t understand why she is being so friendly? What does she think she is going to get out of this, she is nothing but a monster .
“I didn't mean to hurt you. Ok? ” Ok? She's attempting to make amends but the fury inside me doesn’t allow the empathy I hold to cling to the half-arsed sincerity just yet. I grip the sheets tightly, channelling my anger and the urge to scream through my fingers.
“You know. On second thought, just tie me back to the bed so I don't have to interact with you unless you can be arsed to check up on me.” She’s messing with my head, I hate her . I HATE HER . Just when I think there is something inside her other than evil we take ten steps back.
“I don’t expect you to understand me. I don't want you to understand. I know an apology isn't going to cut it but I'll say it anyway…it was never meant to be like this. You weren't meant to exist and I wasn't meant to be here much longer, alright? But plans change and there is shit I can't take back, you think I enjoy treating you this way? I don't. But I'm fucking trying here. OK?” A rock grazes the back of my throat as I swallow my guilt. Sitting on the conversation we just had. Part of me hates every inch of her for taking away the very thing she rebelled for, but in retrospect, if she hadn’t of stopped me that day, I would have easily let the voices in my head take over, I would have murdered her without a second thought, out of pain, out of revenge. If she had allowed me I would have ploughed that knife into her chest until I couldn't breathe.
I would have killed someone to try and ease the unbearable ache in my chest. She didn’t have to confide in me but she did. She lost someone important and her vengeance got the best of her. I glare at the door trying to find the words but I'm left empty. She doesn’t deserve my forgiveness, but she did deserve better too. I’m afraid to learn what went wrong in her life for her to become something she loathed. There is art in that, dark, potent art.
A few minutes pass by and we sit in each other’s silence before I make my way towards the door. Opening it slowly, I see her leaning against the bathroom door, her foot kicked back into the wood glaring at me like she knew I was going to come out eventually and that in itself frustrates me, I shouldn’t even be giving her the time of day but I fear my loneliness is getting the best of me. As much as I hate to admit it to myself, earliers conversation was the most normal I've felt in a long time. She listened; she saw me. No one has ever taken interest in my hobbies, let alone understood them.
“You're really shit at apologising...” I hold the door, rubbing my bare foot against the floor as I refuse to look at her but I know she’s rolling her eyes. God forbid she apologise for hurting someone’s feelings.“I'm bored.” I kick the door gently, leaning my forehead down the seam trying to break the awkward silence that is swallowing us both whole.
“I could put a movie on? Don't think you'd like any of them though.” Her brow tugs at me, peeping at me through the hoods of her eyes.
“Try me...” She underestimates me.
“Me and my mom liked horror.” I suck in my bottom lip, lost in thought as I think about all the horror movies that I love.
“You got Saw?” I can't see much of her expression underneath the paint but I can tell she is disturbed by my response and it makes me giddy inside.
“I'm sorry. Did you just say, Saw? Isn't that too gory for you?” I glare at her blankly. Considering the crap I have gone through in the last month; a gory movie should be a walk in the park.
“Thanks to you, gore is the least of my worries.” A bitter smile makes itself known, grinning at her with ill intent. That was meant to be mean, and I hope it hurts.
“Saw it is.” She lifts herself off the door, ready to walk towards the living room and I blurt out like word vomit.
“On one condition…” It comes out without thinking and I don’t really know what I’m asking. It could be dangerous, and I know it shouldn’t matter but if she’s trying as much as she says then I deserve to know.
“Do I have a choice?” She halts and turns to face me, waiting patiently for my response knowing very well she doesn’t.
“You tell me your name.” I know she doesn’t want to tell me, but if she wants us to be ‘friends’ then we need to be on a first name basis. She somehow knows mine. It’s only fair.
“Big D.” I hold back a smile, trying not to laugh as a gaspy huff leaves her mouth.
“Very funny…”
“Just call me Hays.”
Play - ‘Get You The Moon - Kina, Snow’
“Done.” She continues her path and I follow quietly behind her. She rummages through her living room for the first movie and sticks it in the video player. Watching her acting so normal is unsettling, unnatural to the monster I know. We sit there all day going through the franchise barely uttering a word, just trying to enjoy normality as Shep sits as a barrier between us. A day without violence, a day without blood, only through a TV screen where it isn’t real, the only place it should be. She watches unphased while I pretend that certain scenes still don’t make me heave as I replay today in my head on loop, barely paying any attention to the screen, analysing everything she told me. She shared so much in the little words that she spoke. I have been unable to think about anything else but one thing stood out to me and I finally cut the silence.
“What did you mean earlier? When you said about not being here much longer?” My knees are tucked under my chest, nuzzled into the sofa she has been sleeping on, God knows what has been on this couch, it looks older than this house.
“Do you think you’re the only person who wants the easy way out?” She doesn’t move, still fixated on the screen as I burn a hole into the side of her head with my eyes.
“Why haven't you?” I don't understand, if she didn’t want to be here, why is she still hanging on and why is she stringing me along with her when we both want the same thing?
“Plans change.” She crosses her arms, sinking into the sofa with her legs spread, finding her new comfy spot and by her change of tone, that change of plan is sat in this room.
“You mean me?...” My thumb threads through my fingers, guilty for being the reason she is still breathing but for some reason, part of me feels slightly honoured. There have been multiple times since my arrival things could have gone horrifically different but they haven’t, not even with her other plans interrupted by me.
“Something like that.” She doesn’t agree, but I know I am right. She’s drummed it into me that I interrupted her plans, that I was not wanted. But if I am so unwanted then why am I still untouched. Why am I still here?
“Do you still want to?...” Even through her painted smile, I can see hurt all over her face. Not even a fake one can hide your emotions for long, a mask is a temporary fix.
“Yes.” She replies sharply without hesitation and my throat closes. I'm trying to understand her but it's encrypted messages, a small part of me aches for her and I hate that she is pinching at my empathy like a vulture. I suppose I am dead. I died that day along with them and I don't think I've been the same since, I don't think I ever will be and that terrifies me, learning this new version of me that has to face life alone. Truly I've spent my entire life living in the clouds. She is right, I chase a world that doesn't exist, I dream of the impossible just to get through life and no one's ever said it like that before. I became a writer to escape my daily life and fall in love with a world beyond this. And she's shown me how ugly it can really be without harming me,
Physically harming me.
“I'm sorry.” I whisper under the screams coming from the TV hoping she doesn't hear me but she does.
“Say sorry again and I'll wash your mouth out Puppet .” My eyes bulge slightly as I crawl into the corner of the sofa cuddling my legs like a puppy being told off. I can feel my eyes getting heavy, resting my face against the back of my hand as I continue watching the movie.
She said I shouldn't have existed? What does that mean? Did she not do her research before she raided my house? Maybe they don't do that but I was under the impression there is a personal vendetta here that I'm missing.
“Was my Dad part of this?” I see her knuckles clench and she ignores my question like the plague as she gets up off the sofa, walking towards the dining room table for my insulin before handing it to me.
“You should get some sleep,” my heart drops. Her silence confirms my question without words and I bite my tongue, frustrated that she won't be honest with me. “I will be out tomorrow, not sure when I'll be back.” She sits back on the sofa next to me, slightly closer and I gently pull my legs away, afraid to touch her.
“Work?” I ask, knowing the answer beyond that simple and harmless question.
“Work.” She replies calmly and glances at me. I shudder knowing what that actually means, but for today, life is normal and it's like she's playing along with me so I can forget.