Tortured Whispers

by Danielle James

  This company was different though. I didn’t feel like I was drowning around him. “Brook, I’m glad you came to eat with us. Now we’re spending quality family time together. That’s exactly why I moved back out here. I was too far away in New York,” Caesar frowned, shaking his head.

  My uncle didn’t look much like my father at all. Cease was tall. Really fucking tall. I always thought my father was the tallest man I’d ever seen at six-foot-four, but turns out his little brother had him beat. I was tall too but Cease was a tree amongst shrubs.

  Dark stubble covered his chiseled jaw and chin and his eyelashes were thick and black framing eyes that were soft brown like cashmere. He had a head full of thick, dark hair that was combed and styled perfectly. Unlike Dad, Cease didn’t have a strand of gray on his head. He could have been a hair model for whatever kind of shit guys put in their hair.

  Brooklyn, stop staring at your goddamn uncle.

  I jerked my eyes away from him and looked down at my plate of food. He stole a glance at me and smiled a little nudging my knee under the table and winking. “Yeah, now you’re close and you can annoy me in person,” Dad grumbled but there was a smile beneath the rough exterior.

  “I’m glad you’re hew,” I said quietly. I almost thought nobody heard me but Cease gave my knee a quick squeeze under the table that sent my heart into the roof of my mouth. Dad looked at me with pride shining in his eyes.

  “Well, if Brooklyn likes you then you get the seal of approval. You’re welcome here anytime, Cease,” Dad chuckled. It was good to see him smile. The entire dinner was good. It was a step in the right direction that I needed.

  I got to see what it felt like to breathe normally. To finally walk above water. I actually laughed. I hadn’t laughed in so long I forgot what my laugh even sounded like. It was light and shockingly loud.

  When Cease made a joke about how we should take all the instructions and warnings off mundane, everyday things and let natural selection take place, I snorted. I laughed. It made me warm all over. I guess that’s what real happiness felt like and not just the happiness I got from eating Aunt Erica’s banana bread.

  “Okay guys, I gotta turn in. I have to be awake at three in the morning for work at four. Lovely life I lead.” Dad pushed away from the table and leaned down to kiss the top of my head. “Good night, sweetheart. You mind helping your uncle with the dishes?”

  “No, I don’t mind. I’ll help. Night, Dad.” I stood and hugged him tightly, catching him off guard. I caught myself off guard too. I guess neither of us was used to me being…happy.

  “I love you, Brooklyn,” he said.

  “I love you too,” I grinned.

  “See you tomorrow, Cease.” He headed down the hall to his room and suddenly everything was silent and ten degrees too warm. If I didn’t have to hide my scars all the time, I would have taken off the stupid long sleeve active shirt I had on.

  Since I had to wear long sleeves in the summer, I picked the lightweight material gym bunnies used when they wanted to look wintertime cute. I just wanted to hide my cutting scars.

  “Are you comfortable telling me about your speech apraxia, Brook?” Caesar’s voice curled around me and held on tight, yanking me out of the recesses of my murky mind.

  “I don’t know…” I shrugged, hugging myself.

  “I’ve met loads of kids who have it. From what I can hear, yours is pretty moderate. I won’t push though,” he smiled at me and I wanted to tell him my entire life story. He probably already knew but still…

  He was comfortable.

  I’d never felt comfortable with anyone. Not even my speech therapist made me as comfortable as standing in the kitchen with my uncle did. I locked on to his brown eyes and tugged on my sleeve with my lips.

  “I hate talking. I don’t know when I’ll say a word wight or not.” I fisted my hands at my side and ignored the prickling on the back of my neck. Why was I so fucking incapable of speaking properly?

  “You say ninety percent of your words perfectly, Brook. Do you realize that?” He offered me a smile warmer than any day in June.

  “Doesn’t feel like that,” I muttered. “I’m a fuck up.” I chewed a vigorously on my sleeve while I stared at my feet. Caesar’s thick, black brows furrowed as he regarded me. He shook his head and pulled my sleeve away from my mouth. I missed the comfort of it.

  “You’re no more of a fuck up than the rest of the world. You know what that means, right?” He asked, holding on to a glimmer of something that made his eyes shine.

  “What?” I asked, curiously.

  “If everyone is a fuck up, then it means you’re just normal. Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re perfect, Brook.” He took a step closer to me and brushed the messy hair out of my face.

  I’d been called a lot of things but perfect wasn’t one of them.

  “No, I’m not,” I said harshly. My own voice sounded foreign to me being so…loud.

  “Well, what makes you so un-perfect? Because all I see standing here is a girl that has a lot of thoughts to let out. I don’t see a fuck up. I don’t see someone who has to hide.” He folded his muscular arms over his chest and I noticed how ripped my uncle was. Shit. He must have never skipped the gym.

  What if he thought I worked out too because of the shirt I was wearing? Stupid shirt choice, Brooklyn. I only wore it because it had thumb holes and it was long sleeved.

  “I have plenty to hide,” I said, much quieter than the last time I spoke. Caesar didn’t flinch away from me because I was starting to fold in on myself. He didn’t frown at the way I spoke or my funny accent. He stood there, listening for me to speak.

  I was used to my dad getting frustrated because I wouldn’t give him the answer he wanted right away and leaving me to my thoughts. Caesar didn’t do that. He waited patiently.

  That’s what he was paid to do though, right? He was a psychologist. He got paid to listen to fucked up people like me.

  “Like what?” He asked, closing the dishwasher. His long fingers pushed a couple of buttons that made the dishwasher panel light up then he leaned against the counter and eyed me.

  He wanted to know what I had to hide.

  Every cut scar on the underside of my forearm burned with shame. It was searing and I almost cried out from how uncomfortable it made me. My hand flew up to my mouth and I tugged the dampened bottom of my sleeve in between my lips.

  Caesar swatted my hand away with a frustrated frown. “I’m annoying you too. I should probably go to my room,” I choked down the prickly feeling taking over my throat and stepped back. I didn’t know what the feeling was. I couldn’t tell if it was fear or something else.

  I did know that I hated the thought of frustrating Caesar. Before he could speak, I darted out of the kitchen and down the hall to my room. I pushed the door closed and it clicked softly behind me.

  Rogue tears, hot and salty, stormed down my cheeks. I just wanted to be normal. My soul ached with the desire to fit in. I know Caesar said everyone was fucked up, not just me but I’d give anything to be fucked up like a normal person.

  At least they could speak without sounding ridiculous.

  Thinking about how difficult it was for me to have a conversation made my stomach hurt. My head felt fuzzy too. Like…water was trickling back in.

  I forgot that being around my uncle made me feel clear-headed. I forgot that quickly. Feeling like a normal person was such a deep craving, that I forgot I didn’t have the luxury of feeling normal all the time.

  The thought of having a head free of water had my heart racing to go back into the kitchen with Cease. My feet wouldn’t move though. Blissful thoughts of standing in the light he radiated made my skin buzz.

  I gritted my teeth together and went into the bathroom to start my shower. My showers only lasted ten minutes and I usually had to blast music to get through it. Although I hated being in the water, taking a shower was better than taking a bath. Being in a tub full of water reminded me of drowning and I ha
ted it.

  I washed my hair, scrubbed my face and looked down at my arms. Scars littered my olive skin, stretching up to the bend of my arm. I wonder what my uncle would say if he saw them.

  I ran my fingers over the newest cuts and my stomach lurched.

  Stupid Brooklyn.

  So fucking stupid.

  I destroyed my arms. They were marked up and ugly. I wanted to stop cutting so I didn’t cause any more damage but I couldn’t help myself. I went into a trance when I cut and couldn’t stop digging into my skin with razors.

  Not every cut was deep. Some of them were only scratches that drew blood. I hated them all though.

  I rushed through the rest of my shower and hurried out. When I was done, I sat on the bed with my towel tied around my body and tried to stop the water from taking over me. Thoughts of how annoyed Cease was with me wreaked havoc in my mind. He hated me. He thought I was stupid.

  I put on a white Back to the Future t-shirt that used to belong to my dad, then I rubbed lavender and honey oil into my skin and rubbed coconut oil on my scars. I stared at the fresh, angry red cuts on my arm. They were jagged and not as clean as the ones I’d made with my razor.

  Sometimes, it felt like I couldn’t even cut myself the right way. Water rapidly filled my head making my chest constrict. I needed to breathe.

  **

  Caesar…

  Once I heard the shower in Brook’s room cut off, I waited a few moments before I knocked on her door. I saw the way she looked before she bolted away from me and out of the kitchen. She was embarrassed and god knows what kind of conclusions she’d jumped to in her head.

  My fist hovered over her bedroom door, prepared to knock but I knew she wouldn’t answer. Against my better judgment, I knocked twice then walked in before she could lock me out. Brooklyn needed to open up more but I wasn’t trying to shrink her as my brother would say, so I was using tactics that I would never use on one of my patients.

  She wasn’t one of my patients though.

  When I walked in her room, the smell of lavender and honey filled my nose. I took a moment to inhale before my eyes found her. She looked up at me, and tears danced in her beautiful eyes. Worlds of sadness swam inside of her. She looked like she was drowning.

  Fuck.

  My heart thumped relentlessly, bleeding empathy for her. It trickled into my chest and destroyed my logic. I reached my hand out to her and she grabbed on. When she did, I pulled her against my body and wrapped my arms around her. A shaky breath came rushing out of her lungs. Cough after cough shook her slender frame.

  “Brook, look at me,” I tipped her head back and smoothed her damp hair away from her face. “Are you okay? I want the truth. Don’t give me some bullshit, auto pilot answer. You looked scared to death before I came in here.” I was breaking all sorts of rules. If she were my patient I would never talk to her that way.

  “I am,” she said, blinking away tears from impossibly thick lashes.

  “You are what?”

  “Scawed to death,” she stammered. “Maybe I’m just scawed of death.” Her throat dipped and she clutched me like I was her life preserver, pulling her from the deepest sea.

  “What’s trying to kill you?” I asked, my lips brushing the top of her hair. It smelled like fruit. Some kind of berries.

  I wished she could see how insanely normal she was. She was a young woman, getting ready for bed with wet hair, a clean face, and the day’s events on her mind. She needed someone to tell her that. She needed a friend to pull her out of the endless sea in her mind.

  “Evewything. You hate me. Daddy is fwustwated. So am I,” her words were shrouded in whispers. I found myself cupping her face and making her look at me, not down at her feet.

  “Brooklyn, I don’t hate you. I could never hate you. You’re a part of me. I know I haven’t been around but I’m here now and I’m not going anywhere. I need you to believe me.” My voice was urgent, begging her to not only hear my words but to feel them.

  “Y-You don’t hate me?” It sounded as if she couldn’t fathom someone not being annoyed with her or not hating her. What the fuck was going on in that head of hers?

  Speech apraxia may have made her words come out imperfectly but her anxiety and depression were worse than the apraxia could ever be. We sat on her bed and it groaned under my weight. “No. I think what you saw on my face when we were in the kitchen was frustration. Not with you but the fact that your father didn’t get you help. I want to help and I think I got pissed that I didn’t have more time with you. More time to help you open up. If I’d been in your life before now, you would have already trusted me, Brook.

  Now, I’m like a stranger. That’s why I told you not to call me Uncle Caesar. I know you have trouble with pronouncing your R sounds but I haven’t been much of an uncle to you. I figured maybe I can be the friend you need. Not Uncle Caesar. Not Dr. Powers. Just…Cease.” I bared my soul to her in ways I’d never planned. It was a small sliver but the blatant honesty was so raw it startled me.

  Brooklyn looked up at me. Her eyes were more green than hazel at that moment. They looked like orbs of jade with golden specks.

  “I’d like that a lot. I don’t have any fwends.” Her brows crashed together and she shook her head.

  “It’s okay, Brook. Keep talking. You’ve been through speech therapy. You know that the best way to overcome it is to keep talking. You can only correct it if you hear yourself,” I explained. She gave me an earnest nod like she’d heard all of that shit before but it was still true.

  “I want you to be my fwrend.” I heard her trying to pronounce her R sounds and a little bit of pride blossomed inside of me.

  “I’d love to be. We have to trust each other though. That’s what friends do. You can’t keep thinking I’m annoyed or that I don’t like you. I have to be able to trust that you won’t push me away without reason. Can we agree on that?” I asked, my voice full to the brim with hope. Brook wasn’t the only person who needed that friendship. Evidently, I needed it to.

  “Yes,” she smiled a little and I rubbed the back of her hand with my thumb. Her skin was smooth under my touch.

  “Shake on it?” I asked, pulling my hand away. Timidly, she placed her hand in mine, extending her arm. A smile dimpled the corners of her mouth. I smiled when we shook on it then my eyes fell to her arm and my smile disintegrated. Scars littered her skin. Some of the older ones were silvery and the newer ones were bright pink. The newest hadn’t yet turned to scars.

  My breathing grew shallow and my heart cracked in my chest. Millions of tiny shards beat in tune with the rush of my blood. She was a cutter.

  Brooklyn noticed the moment that it happened and she yanked her hand away, diving beneath the blankets, pulling them up around her shoulders. A sob choked her throat and her entire body shook.

  “Hey, it’s okay,” I told her quietly. She wouldn’t move. She wouldn’t turn to look at me. I felt like I’d slammed against a wall that cut off access to her.

  “It’s not! I’m bwoken!” I tried to get her to look at me, I tugged on her shoulder but she wouldn’t budge. I tossed the comforter back and squeezed myself into her much-too-short bed.

  “Brook, please look at me,” I begged. She shook her head vehemently. “I can help you. Just let me in.” I pulled her close to me and found her hand with mine, examining her scars. She didn’t pull away and that was a good sign.

  “You’re hurting,” I said.

  “I’m weak,” she gritted out. “Weak and fucking stupid.”

  “No,” a growl rumbled in my chest, making her wince and press her back against my chest. I had to calm down so she’d relax but the entire situation was burning me up inside.

  How much shit about Brooklyn had Anthony kept to himself?

  “These scars show how strong you are, Brook.” I pulled my index and middle fingers down the length of her forearm and shook my head.

  It was like reading the most gut-wrenching story on a sheet of braille. Brookl
yn let out another sob. It split at the seams with sheer agony and shame. It rolled off of her in thick currents. I would have done anything to absorb it all for her.

  I’d never had such a deep need to protect and help someone before in my life. I knew I would kill anyone that tried to hurt my niece. I would bring so much pain down on them they would crumble. She was precious and she deserved happiness.

  I was going to make sure she got it.

  “You can’t help me. I’m beyond help,” she turned over and our eyes locked.

  “Nobody is beyond help. I’ve dedicated my entire life to proving that point. Let me in and I’ll help. I’ll be there for you the way I should have been all along.” Pangs of guilt nipped at my conscious.

  “I don’t let anyone in, Cease.” She said, studying my face then pulling her eyes back to mine. Brooklyn had grown into a beautiful young woman. I blinked a few times and knitted my brows together.

  “We’re family.” My statement hung in the air and I didn’t know why. I pushed my fingers through her hair. It had started to dry but it was still damp at her scalp.

  A chill raced through my chest and I pushed away the logical, moral part of me shouting inside of my head. I dropped my lips to her forehead and her breath stuttered. Her fists gripped my shirt like she needed me for her next breath.

  “Let me in, Brook,” I muttered against her forehead. Her bare legs were smooth and warm as they slid against mine.

  “Okay,” she whispered, tilting her head up. The tip of her button nose brushed against mine. Something crackled between us. It was tainted and dangerous.

  I pulled my hands away from her and swallowed, giving her a nod. “Get some sleep okay? I’ll see you in the morning, kiddo.”

  “Cease?” She called out as I forced myself from her bed.

  “Yeah, Brook?” I leaned against the doorway, able to think clearly once I was away from the smell of lavender and honey and the feeling of warm, soft legs against mine.