Chapter 21 #2
Sam doesn’t acknowledge her. She’s watching me, giving me time to catch up. She continues, “You haven’t had the ceremony yet because Carrson’s dad is supposed to be there, to oversee it, but he’s away. Somewhere in the Middle East, dealing with God knows what.”
She looks at her own unmarked palm and shakes her head. “My mother says every man she knows has three scars on the left.”
I rub a hand over my face, secretly appalled by how these women talk about this so casually, like this is how the world works. Like it’s not clearly a system designed to keep women under the men’s boots.
“This is all so Handmaids Tale,” I mutter to myself.
“What’s that?” Sam asks, frowning.
“It’s a book,” I say. “A dystopian one. Women are used only for their bodies and their ability to have children. They made it into a TV show, too,” I say, knowing the sisters won’t have seen it.
There are no TVs here, no movies, no video games, hardly any books. Even though they have phones and computers, they don’t use them for entertainment, only for school.
When I asked Carrson about it, he recited, “Those things rot the mind. The mind and body are temples, never to be polluted.”
I almost laughed when he said it. I thought he was kidding, but then I realized he believes that, or at least he acted like he did, which made me wonder what else he believed in.
I glance at Sam, an idea sparking. “I’ll get you a copy of the book. You might like it.”
It hits me then, an obvious connection I somehow never put together before. I smack my forehead. “The names. Oh my god, that’s why all the guys have names that end in son. It really is like in The Handmaid’s Tale. Ofglen. Offred. They’re named of someone. So Carrson means son of Carr, right?”
The women all look at me like I just asked if water is wet.
“Of course,” says Sam flatly, like it’s common knowledge. “When they are sons, they’re named after their father, but once they have a child of their own, they lose the son ending. So Carrson’s father is just called Carr. Once Carrson has his own baby, he’ll become Carr.”
“What about grandfathers?” I ask, “Wouldn’t that make two men walking around named Carr?”
Abbie shakes her head and explains, “If they become a grandfather, the word Senior is added. So it would be Carr Senior. Carrson’s granddad is dead, though.
” She leans closer, her voice dropping to a whisper.
“Some people say Carrson’s dad killed him.
Apparently, his grandfather was even worse than Carr.
The things he did to Carrson’s dad are legendary and not in a good way. ”
Something cold unfurls in my stomach.
This isn’t just a naming system. It’s a lineage. A legacy. A cycle of abuse.
A boy is born, raised in isolation by his father, shaped by violence and control.
He bonds women—not out of love, but out of tradition and strategy.
He chooses one to be the Mother of future daughters, while he goes on to have his own son.
Once that son is born, he sheds his name like a snake sheds its skin and becomes the next patriarch in a long, blood-soaked line.
Over and over again. Generation after generation.
And the women?
They don’t get names full of legacy. Not really. They get roles. Purposes. To be used.
I thought Carrson was the top of the food chain.
Turns out, he’s just another link in the chain itself, and I’m bonded to him, the heir to this twisted dynasty.
The realization makes me ill. Part of me wants to believe he’s different.
Wants to believe that the boy who listens when I talk and teaches me to stand on my own feet isn’t just biding his time until he becomes the next Carr, the next leader.
This is all so confusing. I don’t know what to think, and I’m starting to wonder if Carrson doesn’t know either.
“So Carrson’s grandfather was…” I choose my words carefully, not wanting to misstep and lose what little ground I’ve gained with these women. I need the answers they hold. “…harsh with Carrson’s dad.” I swallow, then continue, worried I’m walking into a landmine. “Carrson has scars on his back…”
Even Sam drops her gaze at that. “All the brothers have them. The way the Fathers raise the Sons…,” she trails off. “It’s not gentle or kind.”
“Carrson has it the worst, though,” Cicley says quietly. “It’s like his father hates him.”
“Jackson’s not far behind,” Abbie adds. “We’ve all seen his scars.”
Samantha frowns. “What does it say, that the boys who were beaten the most are the ones who rise the highest?”
Silence follows, heavy. Each of us caught in our own dismal thoughts.
Finally, Cicley breaks it. “Being a Daughter isn’t easy. Our mothers expect obedience, success, but at least they don’t usually beat us.”
Abbie shoots Cicley a sharp look. “The Fathers have to be like that. They’re raising the Sons to inherit the earth.
” She lifts the necklace she wears every day, a symbol like a cross but with bars of equal length instead of the traditional longer vertical.
It’s the same symbol branded into Carrson’s shoulder, Samantha’s chest. It dangles between her fingers, “It’s ordained by God himself. ”
Slowly and deliberately, she touches her forehead, her chest, her left shoulder, then her right. Her voice is low, solemn, reverent. “In the name of the Father, the Mother, the Son, and the Daughter.”
A cold shiver slides down my spine. Something about the way she says it, ritualistic, practiced, like she repeats it every day, makes my skin itch.
On the other end of the table, Sam rolls her eyes. “Don’t mind Abbie. She’s very religious.”
“That’s, uh…not a religion I’m familiar with,” I say, trying to keep my voice light, even though it feels like I’ve just stepped into an ocean with no bottom, murky, dark, full of things I don’t understand.
Carrson’s been shielding me, I realize. Deliberately keeping certain truths tucked out of sight. Now I’m wondering, has he been hiding them from me or also from himself? Does he believe in all this? Does he think this is normal? How indoctrinated, exactly, is he?
“I was wondering about Carrson,” I say, careful to keep my tone neutral. Gentle. Like I’m not prying too hard. “Has he always been…into this? Like the rest of you?”
Sam answers immediately. “Of course. His dad is the High Father. Carrson’s bred to take his place.” A glint flickers to life in her eyes, sharp, knowing, and cruel. “You should’ve seen him back in the day. Carrson used to fuck anything on two legs.”
“What?” There’s a roaring in my ears, like blood rushing too fast.
I want her to stop.
I need her to keep going.
Sam’s gaze sharpens. She’s studying me, measuring every twitch of muscle, every emotion in my eyes. I try to keep my face blank, but it’s harder than it should be, especially when she adds, “He was notorious for going to the brothels. Taking two, sometimes three, women at once. Everyone knew it.”
My stomach twists, but I keep my voice even. “Brothels?” The word tastes sour in my mouth.
Sam doesn’t miss a beat. “What, you didn’t know?
The Fathers run them. Whorehouses. Strip clubs.
It’s not like they hide it.” She shrugs like it’s no big deal.
Her tone is smug. She’s pleased to know something I don’t.
“The main ones are in the city, over in Ashport, about an hour from here. That ritual I just told you about, when the Sons turn fifteen and cut their palms, it’s an initiation into manhood.
We don’t know all the details, but it ends with the boys being taken to the prostitutes. That’s how they lose their V-cards.”
I feel nauseous, but Sam’s not finished.
“Carrson didn’t stop there,” she goes on, her voice dropping into something darker, almost gleeful. “He used to bring town girls to parties. Do them in front of everyone. We all saw it.”
I look to Cicley, sure Sam is exaggerating, but Cicley is blushing, unable to meet my eyes.
She gives a faint nod, and my stomach sinks.
I shouldn’t care about what Carrson used to do.
Hell, I shouldn’t care about what he does now, but somehow I do, and this story makes me want to throw up.
I feel sick. Embarrassed. Angry. Jealous?
Abbie must sense my distress. “Don’t worry, Laurel,” she rushes in with reassurance.
“He doesn’t do any of that now. About a year ago, that all stopped.
Now he won’t go to the whorehouses when the other guys do.
At first, they gave him a ton of shit about it.
He had to fight even more than usual, but that’s died down.
With you two bonded, well, people are more accepting.
Everyone figures he’s getting what he needs from, uh…
” She fidgets, turns pink, then whispers, “From you.”
Oh. That’s right. As his Bonded, everyone assumes I’m Carrson’s personal sex toy. That we’re going at it every single night, something that couldn’t be farther from the truth. I still sleep naked next to him, but he’s never touched me.
Not once.
Not that I want him to, right? Do I? God. I don’t know, because sometimes when I’m drifting off to sleep, when the line that separates fantasy from reality thins, becomes blurred, I think about it. How it would be between us.
Sometimes I picture violence.
Sometimes tenderness.
Sometimes I imagine him dragging the truth out of me with his mouth, his hands, his body, until I stop pretending I don’t want any of it.
The fantasy always ends the same way.
With my heart racing against his, a drumbeat of desire.
With the shame of wanting what I shouldn’t.
I tell myself I can’t have him.
But then I catch the way he looks at me, like he’s one wrong breath away from breaking, and I wonder if we’re both just waiting for the moment we give in. If all this pressure building between us is going to explode into something intimate and irreversible.
Or maybe I’m imagining it, the way he looks at me when he thinks I don’t notice.
Maybe I’m making it all up, building stories out of tension and silence.
I don’t know. It’s like standing in the middle of a room where all the walls are mirrors.
I can’t find the real reflection. Everything I thought I knew about Carrson, about this world, about myself, is shifting under my feet so rapidly I can’t keep up.
I open my mouth, to say what, I don’t know, but the words die as Michaelson bursts into the room, loud and breathless.
Sam shoots up from her chair, her arms crossed. She’s furious and full of authority. “Excuse me! What do you think you’re doing in here? You didn’t ask permis—”
He cuts her off, shouting, “Come on, everyone! Party time! Ashford House, now!”