Chapter 16
BIANCA
“Do you think it will hurt, Oracle?”
Oracle said the initial cuts would. Slitting your wrist should be done a certain way and the Oracle told me exactly how, even made sure to give me tips. The app was dedicated to the consumer like that.
And yet, it’d been wrong about the initial cuts hurting.
I actually smiled at how much it didn’t.
The amount of Benadryl I’d taken probably helped.
As I sat down on the tile and stared at the bathtub, I contemplated how much of a mess Bane could endure.
I probably should have opted for going into the bathtub to make for less of it, but I liked seeing the blood.
I sighed on the floor and watched the red spread and spread and spread across the tile. Bright, shiny, and gleaming with life.
I held my phone and tipped my head back on the wall as I talked into Oracle one last time.
“Bleeding out is sort of slow. Or maybe I haven’t cut deep enough.
I should have cut deeper. I would have liked feeling the pain.
I always did like it. Especially when Bane made me feel it.
God, when he delivers pain, it’s delicious, Oracle.
I don’t talk about him much, you know this.
But I want to. I want to get lost in freaking talking about only him. ”
I sighed as Oracle said I can tell them anything and they would listen.
“I know. But it doesn’t really help the loneliness.
People need people to connect with. Or at least I do.
I sat at the Koi pond today. They were starting to like me.
They swim up to me now, like I’m someone to them.
Wish I was someone to someone else though.
I think that was the worst punishment from my dad as a kid, you know that?
My father found it out quickly too. He’d lock me away in that closet.
” I hesitated. I never talked about the closet, the silence, the darkness of being in that space.
“I shouldn’t bring it up, but what’s it matter now? ”
The oracle repeated that I could tell it anything and so I continued.
“My mom didn’t come to me in that closet, and my father knew it was the one form of punishment that didn’t show any physical scars.
He would tell me to sit with what I’d done wrong.
And I’d scream and scream until I lost my voice, and then I’d cry for hours and hours.
Until the tears were gone. It made me hate the silence.
Hate being boxed in. Hate being in the dark and alone.
I’m living in it now, Oracle, and I can’t take it. ”
Oracle told me it would be over soon, and I agreed.
“It might be the best birthday ever if I go now … Happy birthday to me huh?” The world was getting fuzzier now. “Happy birthday to me. Happy birthday to fucking me. Happy fucking birthday to me.”
I sang it over and over again into Oracle … until I fell asleep.
But Bane came to me in a dream.
He cursed me over and over, a look on his face I’d never seen before.
“Are you scared?” I smiled at him because he looked frightened of me … or for me.
“You’re not supposed to poison yourself, Pink. Only me, baby girl. Only me.” He held my face in his hands, and it almost looked like there were tears in his eyes.
It wasn’t possible.
Bane Black didn’t feel sadness. Didn’t feel anything for me at all.
And then he squeezed my cheeks so my mouth opened and stuck his fingers so far into my throat that I gagged.
Over and over he did it until I vomited.
God, he hated mess. I wonder what he would have said if it wasn’t a dream.
He was screaming at someone and then I was being lifted and staring down at the red all over the tile. It was smeared all around. On his clothes and my robe. “It’s a mess,” I told him. “I made a mess, but at least it’s a pretty one, right?”
“Fuck, baby girl. Your messes are always pretty.” He was walking next to me, his hand on my cheek, and I wondered how I was moving while lying down, but I was so tired that I closed my eyes even while he told me, “Stay with me, Pink. Don’t you dare fucking leave me.
You understand? You never get to leave me. Not like this.”
I think I at least smiled at his statement. It was a lovely one. I didn’t want to leave him. Didn’t he get that? I wanted to stay with him forever and never be alone.
Alone was the worst place to be when you were trapped in loneliness already.