by Traci Finlay
“Oh, Chrissy nothing,” he spits. “Chrissy was an empty shell. She had a terrible personality, and you were her only friend.”
“Chrissy was the best person I’ve ever met. And you liked her, Ian. You pursued her.”
He gives me a dirty look. “Chrissy was hot. And she was an animal in the sack.” He catches my fist as it surges toward his abdomen. “Don’t,” he warns.
“You slept with Chrissy?” I choke through clenched teeth.
Ian giggles like a schoolboy. “Hell, yeah. Best I ever had. She was down for whatever. Complete opposite of Dana. You always thought Chrissy and Dana were alike, but they weren’t at all. Dana was a disgusting pig. She wouldn’t give it up for anything.”
“Why did you date her then?”
“So I could break up with her and cut off your little womance. She drove me nuts. I couldn’t stand the sight of her. Like I could really rape her! She couldn’t get me up if she had a paper bag over her head. She’s lucky Dad was already in prison, or I would’ve had him off her, too.”
“What did you say to him?” I whisper through grinding sobs, my fists festering in my lap. “What could you possibly say to a person to convince them to take someone’s life?”
Ian reaches over and drags the backs of his fingers down my cheekbone. “You’d be surprised at what people will do when you make them think they’re in charge. When you give them choices. Let that be a lesson to you. Manipulation 101. Don’t forget it.”
“What were his choices?” I whisper.
Ian smirks. “Option A, to kill Chrissy. And if he refused Option A, he was left with Option B—I go up to the house and kill you. His daughter. So Tim Stahl isn’t really in prison, he’s in his own little heaven. Because he saved the life of his daughter—the love of his twisted life. I’m sure he tells himself that before he goes to sleep every night, but after his ass raping.”
My hands are over my mouth, I’m gonna throw up. Nope, my mind’s rejecting this information. That can’t be real. “Are you really going to kill me, Ian?”
He places his hand thoughtfully on his mouth. “I don’t know, Chuck. Of all the people I hate, you’re the one I tolerate the most. You’re my favorite person ever. I don’t know if I could really go through with killing you. Because then what?”
“Why were you trying to kill me in the first place?”
He punches the steering wheel, and I flinch. “Because look at you! You’re a twenty-four-year-old loser! Your life was going nowhere until I took the reins and led it, and I ran you right into the ground. I was your boss at McBain, and I was your boss at home. I manipulated you down to a pulp, and there was nothing left of you. And now look! A couple death threats, and look at you, Charlotte. You’ve gained a lot more experience and lived a hell of a lot more than you ever have. Even got yourself a little boyfriend,” he says, clipped, and glances at me.
I bite my lip and look straight ahead.
“Did he fuck you?”
“No, he didn’t.”
“Are you lying?”
“I’m not lying.”
“Look at me.” He grabs my chin and turns my head to him, staring into my eyes. “You had an orgasm today.” Then he shoves my face away, and I start laughing.
“You can’t tell that by looking into my eyes, you dumb asshole.”
“Then tell me you didn’t, and I’ll believe you.”
“I don’t have to tell you anything.”
“And that’s how I get you to confess. See what I did there? I don’t trick you into telling me about your orgasm, no. I made it so you can’t deny having one. A back-door confession. You denied sex from the start, but not orgasms. How’d he do it? Did he eat you out?”
“Shut up, Ian!”
He chuckles. “It’s okay. He has a broken nose and no car now. I think that’s punishment enough for putting his hands on my sister.”
“I don’t know what you think is going to happen when we get home, but I won’t be your little muse anymore. You’re a sick bastard.”
“But aren’t we all?” Ian says loudly, throwing his hands up gallantly and letting the car drift into another lane. “I’m more honest than you are, Charles. I’ll be honest with you right now. I have no conscience. I don’t remember if I ever did. Sometimes, I wish I had one. But only because it would make me feel more human. That way I could get into your minds easier, empathize with how a normal mind works. You’ve no idea how much of your time is spent worrying about other people and your feelings and their feelings, you barely have time to do something for yourself. Imagine having your whole brain working toward one common goal: to gain control over people. Not having to worry about hurting their stupid feelings or making them angry. You just don’t care.” He speaks like he’s a salesman for a sociopathic mentality—like he is trying to talk me into being one.
“Why would I ever want that?” I ask.
“Power,” he answers majestically. “You can’t think for yourself, Chuck. Everything you’ve ever done has been filtered through me. You eat me up. In fact, you’re letting me manipulate you right now, and you know it. You’re confusing my openness with vulnerability, and you think you’re bonding with me.”
“No, I don’t. Not anymore.”
Lights flash in the rearview mirror, and I look behind us. “Are those cops?”
“That’s what it looks like,” he says, causing the odometer to break past a hundred.
“Slow down! They’re pulling you over for speeding!”
Ian laughs. “You think ten cops are pulling over one person in the rain, just to give him a speeding ticket?” He grabs my hand and kisses it. “This is why I can’t kill you just yet, Little Spider.”
I jerk my hand away. “What did you do?”
He cracks up laughing. “What do you mean?”
“Ian? Why are there a million cop cars gaining on us and you’re going … almost a hundred and twenty?”
“Well, there are a couple different reasons. I’ll give you one. One is because we stole your carpet-munching boyfriend’s car. But there’s another reason, and I want to see if you can guess. I’ll give you a clue. Think back on any strange or ironic things that may have happened today, something that totally benefitted me and completely fucked you.”
I jar my head because I’ve no idea what he’s done, and then I know, and I gasp. “Oh, my god. The other runners. What did you do to those three people who were supposed to run the race with us?”
He grins, and I can’t believe I’m sitting helplessly in a car with him. I’m claustrophobic. “What did you do?” I shriek at the top of my lungs.
“Listen, Charles. Nothing was going to interfere with our reunion. And what fun we had today! This will be a trip we’ll talk about until the day you die.”
“Ian, tell me what you did to those people. Did you kill them?”
He shakes a finger at me. “See, you’re doing it wrong already. You have to get me to deny it. Ask me a different question first, one that accuses me of doing something worse than killing people.” He cracks up at himself, because even this lunatic knows there’s nothing worse than killing people. “You still have a long way to go.”
“Did. You. Kill. Those. People.”
In one smooth motion, his right hand leaves the wheel and swings into my lower lip, slicing it open against my teeth.
I yelp, my hands go to my face. He’s never hit me before. And here it is. A watershed to new levels of abuse—a rite of passage for graduating from mental and emotional abuse. This is what I have to look forward to now when we get home. I look at him as blood streams over my taste buds.
“Why are you doing this to me?” My hands are cupped under my mouth, catching the blood leaking from my lip.
Ian looks at me incredulously, his hands back on the wheel like nothing ever happened. “Seriously? Charlotte, nothing’s changed. I’ve been doing this to you your whole life. What do you think Burken was about? It wasn’t just to screw over Tim. I had full reign over you
with one stupid phrase. You let me hunt you. You loved being my prey.”
“So why chase me if you didn’t care about me?”
“To prepare us for this day. I seasoned you for years for this very moment. I had you eating out of my hands, running at the utterance of a few simple phrases. And even after Tim went to jail and we stopped playing. ‘Don’t be friends with her. Go to college here. Work here, become this.’ And it worked, didn’t it? I have you right where I want you. I won. Again.”
Fuck! I’m dripping blood everywhere, and Ian opens Jack’s console and hands me a tissue like some generous nut bag. I snatch it from him, and blood quickly saturates it.
“What happens if we go home and I’m too seasoned?” I ask.
“Then you’ll start this wonderful job I’ve gifted you, have a life finally, try to gain a little independence, and I’ll get to sharpen my manipulative skills, won’t I, tiny sister?”
“What if I don’t want to go home?”
“Then a bloody lip will be the least of your concerns,” he answers.
And that’s my promise of a dystopian future. Ian has no limits with what he’s willing to do to me. I’ll never get married because he won’t let me. I’ll never make deep friendships because he’s guaranteed to ruin them all. He’ll push and push until I have no freedom, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Because he always finds me. And he will kill in the process.
I toss the tissue to the floor, ignoring the blood flow, and turn to him. “I’m not going home, Ian.”
He glances at me. “It sure looks like you are.”
I shake my head. “No. Those cops behind us? They’re going to get you. You’re not invincible. You’ve done too many stupid things these last few weeks, trying to get to me. Looks pretty desperate to me, actually. You had a little trouble finding me, didn’t you? You needed to break some laws, kill some folks, because desperate times call for desperate measures, don’t they, E?”
I wait for him to hit me again, but he tightens his grip on the steering wheel. “You think this is the first time I broke the law? You’re stupider than I thought. Tools, Charlotte. Tim was the tool I used to kill Chrissy, and who’s in jail? Your boyfriend had a gun pointed at my head, and how’d that go for him? I now have his car. You’re my tool, and you’ll be my tool with the cops, too, if they ever get a hold of me.” He looks at their lights in the rearview mirror.
I start to giggle. “You’re scared. Your other sins were carefully thought out, thoroughly planned. These ones were spur of the moment because you were desperate. You didn’t think them through too well, did you? I know this because you’re running from them. Trust me, Ian. I’ve done a lot of running from people in my life. I’ll give you a little advice—round three is always the scariest.” I lean closer to him and whisper, “Round three is where you lose.”
I’m glad he punches me in the eye, because now his hand is off the steering wheel. I grab it and pull. If I’m going to die today, it’s going to be at the hands of myself, and not a man.
The car screeches as it 360’s into the next lane, and Ian swears at me and grabs it with both hands to pull the other way, but I’m locked onto it and I’m not letting go. It hits a puddle and starts hydroplaning, and both Ian and I abandon the steering wheel as we’re thrown backward, and the car continues skidding into lane after lane at a hundred twenty miles an hour. Ian swears again, and by the time the car has made it to the edge of the highway, we’re staring straight into the oncoming blue lights. I scream as the car tumbles over the edge and down a ravine, and I shut my eyes and grit my teeth as it continues flipping over and over, because I’m wearing my seatbelt. Unlike others in this vehicle.
Ian plunges into me on every roll, crashing into the ceiling, into his window, and back into me. I lose count of how many flips we complete when Ian’s arm swings into my head, knocking me into the window. I hear the glass bust and reach up to feel warm blood trickling from my eyebrow when the car makes another revolution, and Ian’s back plows into me this time.
The coup de grace comes when the car slams into a tree and lands on the driver’s side. I dangle from my seatbelt, hearing nothing but the air ripping in and out of my lungs as my eyes dart in a crazed triangle from the black rain pounding my window, to a cockeyed view of the road through the windshield, and down to Ian’s crumpled, bloody body piled lifeless against his door.
I didn’t die.
But Ian…
I’m screaming now, because I’m a murderer just like he is.
“Ian!” I unbuckle my seatbelt and topple into him, moving to the backseat to jerk on his arm. “Ian! Answer me!” I reach overhead to roll down the passenger window. The rain soaks the inside of Jack’s car as I erect myself and stick my head outside. The cop cars have roared to a stop, and they jump from their cars, running toward me with their guns aimed and screaming instructions to put my hands up.
I jerk my arms in the air as blood gushes into my eye, leaving me lightheaded and causing my arms to sway. “My brother! He needs help! He’s not moving!” I shout until the cops lower their guns and cautiously step toward me. One of them replaces his gun with a radio transmitter, demanding emergency assistance while another one asks harshly what my name is.
“Charlotte,” I whimper, squinting as the bright lights from the vehicles twist onto my face, my hands shaking above my head.
The first cop to approach draws his eyes to my injured brow. “You’re bleeding, miss. Are you okay?”
I nod as he reaches to help me out of the car. “Are you alone?” he asks.
“Did you not hear me? I said my brother’s in here, and he’s hurt.”
“That’s our guy.” He grabs his radio transmitter and says the hostage is safe while another one lowers me to the ground, and I look around for a hostage but don’t see one, although I’m really glad that hostage is safe. I try steadying myself, but I lose my balance and stumble, reaching for an officer before hitting the ground.
“Easy,” he says as he places his hands on my shoulders and guides me to a police vehicle. “Sit in the car, Charlotte. Don’t get up.” He lowers me into the backseat and squats down to my level, piercing my pupils with a twiggy flashlight. “Do you have any identification?”
“Um … no.”
“Can you tell me what day it is?”
I blink at him and shield my eyes from the galaxy he’s shooting point-blank into my eyeballs. “Yeah. It’s late. La—later.” He frowns, but I don’t care. It is late and later, relatively speaking, and I bet he wasn’t expecting a philosopher.
The horizon glows with sirens and planetariums of flashing lights. Neon fire trucks stampede us, spilling uniform upon uniform as paramedics rush to me and to the car in an attempt to pull Ian out. The thunder and lightning are relentless.
Succumbing to the shock, I sit crisscross-applesauce and do everything they tell me to, and when one cop apologetically pulls me from the car and asks me to put my hands behind by back for precautionary purposes, I nod and let them cuff me.
I wonder violently if anyone’s refilled the salt shakers at Oliver’s as they clean and bandage my head and check my vitals, and didn’t Jack’s mom die from the lightning? Or was it puppies? But then the word resuscitate gongs in my ears, and I jerk my head to see them pulling Ian’s body from the car. Enough is enough, and just as I’m surrendering to the blackout, I hear Jack’s voice telling an officer that I am Charlotte Stahl and that he has my purse, and to please take off the handcuffs because I’m only a victim.
See, that’s where Jack’s wrong. I just killed my brother.
This hospital is a nightmare, and not because the blanket smells like onions. I can’t sleep. My body demands it, but my mind won’t let me. The accident, it keeps replaying. And not like a dream or memory, but like I’m reliving it—my mind and body experiencing it again for the first time.
Over. And over. And over.
The nurses fight with the doctors over how to sedate me. The mean ones want to d
o it to get me to shut up; the decent ones say not for a girl with a concussion, and I finally yell for them to stop fighting.
We’re not fighting, they say. Close your eyes, they say.
My right eye is bandaged because of the stitches on my forehead. Being blind in one eye is no joke, especially when the cut on my head feels like it’s giving birth to another head with another cut. My wrist is broken, but why the heck is there a cast on my leg?
There are too many tubes in my nose, and I don’t want them there. I don’t need them, I can breathe on my own but no one listens to me and everyone is going overboard and I think they’re trying to heal me to death.
I ask about Ian, and no one answers. I ask if he’s dead and people just say HIPAA, and that’s cute, but I’d like a yes or a no. Then I close my eyes and try to rest but I see myself killing him all over again, and I’m not like him. I can’t just kill people and be okay with it. Ian is bad, and I am good—except I’m bad now, because I killed my brother. Or did I? I don’t know because HIPAA.
The cops always come right after I have an episode. The nurses have just calmed me down and brought me pudding, then I have to listen to them fight with the cops about whether I’m in any condition to answer questions, and the cops always win (nurses like to fight a lot). I try to tell them I killed Ian, and no one believes me. Then the cops mope over to the nurses and apologize and say they were right, I’m in no condition to be questioned. The nurses actually high-fived once, and I’m beginning to think they aren’t nurses at all, but a ruthless gang.
A middle-aged little cop comes to visit one day. She’s dressed as a civilian and tells me her name is Amy Adams. No kidding. Obviously not the Amy Adams, but I snort a giggle and tell her that’s a great cop name. She asks me to tell her everything, and I do. She, of course, wants me to slow down once we get to the accident, and I tell her I turned the steering wheel, and she asks if I was driving.
“No.”
“You weren’t driving, but you reached across and jerked on the steering wheel?”
“That’s right.”