by K Larsen
“Here, let me help you,” Eve says from behind me. I yelp and fall sideways, landing on my hip. “Jesus, what . . .” she pauses when we make eye contact, “you’re crying.” She helps me stand and brings me into the house. In the living room she filters through the mail while I dry my eyes. Her gasp is all I need to begin crying again.
“I have to tell you something.”
She looks to me, her brown eyes terror stricken. “It isn’t the first time he’s made contact.”
“Tell me everything now, Nora.” I cringe at the last two words that leave her lips. Memories of stripping bare and posing for Holden rush my mind. Now, Nora.
“He called me at the hospital, and he left wildflowers on the porch here. And now the note.” I don’t want to give all my secrets away but I don’t see another alternative.
“What did he say when he called?” she barks at me.
“Only ever you,” I say. “It was our thing. It was . . . it was romantic. I felt special.”
“Jesus Christ! Why didn’t you tell anyone? We could have traced the call or someone could have lifted fingerprints from the flowers.” Eve drags her hands through her hair. Her face is tinged pink. She is angry. I should be angry. This is my life. My heart. Mine.
“Really?” I scoff. “Come on, Eve, this isn’t a movie. He didn’t stay on the line and fingerprints from flowers?”
Eve pulls her shoulders back, correcting her posture. “Okay, maybe that one was a stretch but . . . I don’t know why you’d keep all this a secret.”
“It seemed harmless. I told you he’d come for me. There are details on the house and with the Clarks. I don’t know,” I blurt out. “I’m telling you now.” And isn’t that good enough?
“He made Charlotte write your address.” Her voice is flat and dejected.
“I know,” I sob. “But that means she’s still alive and well enough to write.”
“It also means he’s been to this house, Nora. That he’s close.” Eve shivers. The hairs on her arms stand up. She tries to smooth them down.
I nod and wipe my eyes. “I know that.”
“We need to call Agent Brown and tell her. This note is evidence,” she says. She sets the letter and envelope on the coffee table, as if it is fragile. She kneels before me. “Are you okay?”
I shrug. “I don’t know anymore. I don’t know. I’m not right, Eve.” Her arms wrap around me and she holds me close to her chest. I want to be sure of something. Anything. But I am all mixed up. My feelings splatter together like a whisk in batter. I lean into Eve’s embrace.
“You’re fine. You’re getting there. Maybe after we talk to Brown, we should call an emergency session with Dr. Richardson.” She rubs my back.
In this moment, I don’t know how I would survive this without Eve. She has become more than I ever thought she could. She is, like Lotte, a part of my soul. She wipes at my tears and holds my face.
“We all cope differently. I fought him, you fell for him. But you’re safe now and you are strong, Nora. Just keep fighting. Keep fighting for your old self.”
I nod and thank her. She digs her cell from her back pocket and calls Agent Brown, followed by Aubry, for moral support and then Dr. Richardson. Eve reminds me of my mother. She does not think twice about doing all this for me when I am incapable.
Him
She checks her phone before she hurries to a checkout line as best she can with her soft cast. I hang back a few minutes before slipping into a line a few cashiers over. She tosses a couple of items onto the belt, pays for her groceries and tells the cashier to have a good day before picking up her plastic bag and leaving. I impatiently wait to pay for my bag of apples. Once I’m out of the grocery store, I drive to her house and wait for her to arrive home. Her skin doesn’t glow anymore. Her eyes are tinged with melancholy. Only ever you. I’ll come for you, soon, I think.
On the back side of a receipt, I log her activities.
Sunday
9am—Physical therapy
1015—leaves PT
1030—grocery store.
11am—home. Eve greets her at the door.
I have a dozen pieces of paper that look just like this. Lotte and I analyze them for any sort of routine. Any window of opportunity in her schedule. I breathe in the cold air from the cracked window of my rental car. I start the car and roll the window down a smidge more. From here, I can see into her kitchen window. Nora wrinkles her nose in distaste at something Eve says and I find the corners of my mouth pulling up.
Relationships are love, mixed with fear, pleasure does not come without pain. Nothing can break the bond we have. She crept into my heart. We are one. Bonded in blood, in lust, in circumstance. I cannot say for certain when I felt the connection start but now, it is so thick and strong, that nothing can sever it now. I saw the new pink marks on her skin when she reached for something high. She shouldn’t be doing that. The art is my job. But in a sick way, it proves she needs me. She misses what we had. What I gave her. She craves it. And when I get her back, I will give her everything.
Lotte
He barges into the room and throws down another paper. This must make at least eleven now. Every day he watches Nora. He writes down what she does, then, if I’m good, he plugs in the TV so we can watch shows together, while we go over her daily routines. I’m excited now. He can’t get close to her without me. I reminded him of that. I will definitely be part of the plan. And if she sees me, she will do whatever it takes to help me. I am going to get away from him. I know that much. So I play along and look for ways and clues into getting me near Nora once again.
If I come up with a good idea, Holden writes it down and brings me a treat from the store. I really like peanut butter cups. In the evenings, if he is home, we watch silly tv shows together. Sometimes, he wants to comb my hair and braid it like we used to. Sometimes, he asks me to read the book Nora wrote for me. Some days, he is ornery and complains about all the noise. It is loud here. The mountain was full of sounds but they are not peaceful like here. One night, there was loud banging all night long from the room next to us. Terrible grunting sounds came through the wall. Holden stood in front of the bathroom mirror and made tiny slices along his torso, while chanting only ever you to himself. I stayed awake all night to be sure he wouldn’t try to cut me. It is something he needs to do. He calls it art. Once, he told me his mother told him to make art. That when he drew a picture, she told him that wasn’t real art, that it had to come from the soul and touch someone else. She cut him with a blade. I cried silently when he told me. My parents never did anything mean like that. But I think Holden is messed up because of what his mom did. And Laura was, too. She tried to be normal. She watched me and Eve, tried to copy us. But she was like him through and through. She wasn’t right. She begged Holden to keep us. And I bet she begged him to keep the others, too.
I curl up in a tight ball when Holden wakes in the morning. I don’t want him to see me. The morning after cutting, he is always grumpy.
Dr. Richardson
Normally, I wouldn’t drive two hours to a client’s house, but I am skirting a thin line with Nora. I know I’ve become emotionally invested in her case and I also know that is bad.
It becomes a liability—developing feelings for a patient. It clouds judgment. I am supposed to be objective in order to help my patients, but one call from Eve saying Nora needed to see me as quickly as possible and I’m in my car driving to her, instead of scheduling an appointment for tomorrow.
When I pull up to her house, I am awe struck. I knew her parents left her their home but I had pictured it small and meager. The house is quaint, but well kept. A storybook stone cottage, with a covered front porch. I park on the street and flip my visor down to examine myself in the mirror before going in.
I ring the bell and wait. It’s cold today and my breath leaves cloudy residue in the air. The door swings open and Eve’s face greets me.
“Hi, Eve.”
“Hey. Come on in.” I fol
low Eve’s lead. The living room has two arm chairs and a soft yellow couch. The walls are pale blue and covered in pictures of Nora and her parents from childhood and framed book pages.
“Hello, Nora.”
She sighs and gives me a weak smile. “Hi.”
I gesture to the arm chair nearest her. “May I?” Nora nods and I make myself comfortable. I pull my notebook and pen from my bag and say, “What is the emergency?”
Her eyes wander the room and her shoulders slump. “I’ve kept things from you and I need to tell you.”
“Okay,” I say.
She inhales deeply before meeting my eyes. “Holden has . . . reached out to me.”
“Reached out, how? When?” I am surprised by this turn of events.
“He called me at the hospital once. He left flowers on my porch and today I received a note in the mail from him.”
“This is information I am obligated to pass on to Agent Brown, Nora.”
“I already spoke with her.”
“Good. That is good. Why did you keep this to yourself?”
She plays with the neckline of her shirt. “At first, because I didn’t trust anyone. I was happy to hear his voice. I . . . I miss him.”
I nod and make note.
“And then, when the flowers were here, I knew he was close. He is close. I feel it. And for Lotte, I don’t want to scare him away. But again, also because it is personal. It feels private—his contact.”
“Private?” I ask.
“No, not private, intimate. Amatory. Meant just for me.”
“How did that make you feel?”
“Desired. Validated. Scared.”
“Scared?”
“Yes. You’ve all been beating it into my head that he is dangerous. And reaching out to me in the ways he has, makes me feel like this is more of a game than love.” Nora frowns. It is obvious she does not like the idea of being played.
“How do you feel right now?”
Her eyes lock on mine in an intense way.
“I am certain the time is drawing near. I am warring with my feelings over him. He is becoming more bold and I feel a sense of foreboding. Because of that, I have this urge.” Her words tumble quickly from her mouth.
“What urge?”
“To finish telling you what happened. I have an overwhelming need to finish my story.”
Nora is spiraling. I need to ground her somehow.
“Nora, you have plenty of time to tell me everything that happened. It isn’t a story, though. It is reality. Your reality. Your past.”
She nods rapidly. “Yes, yes. But I want you to understand. To know. Just in case.”
“In case, what?”
“In case I don’t make it.”
“You are protected. You know that, right?”
“I’m not saying I fear for my life. I . . . never mind, can I please tell you more?”
It occurs to me that Nora is insinuating that perhaps, if given the chance, she would go with Holden. She is not fearful that he will hurt her, she is fearful that she will willingly return to him.
“Go head,” I say.
Him
Sometimes, it feels wrong staring into her unassuming gaze and basking in her smile, while knowing I chose her, the way a man might choose a pair of shoes. I saw. I researched. I chose. I saw her last week at the therapist’s office. Her hair clipped away from her face at the sides. Nora’s hair smelled like strawberries; she smelled better than any woman I’d had before. I could breathe her in forever. I wonder if it still smells that way.
I wait across the street in the park. I can see in the therapist’s window from here. Sitting here watching, feels like abuse. I’m not touching her. I’m not hearing her voice. But you don’t always get what you want and this will have to suffice. For now.
I am throbbing with the unfulfilled craving. I wonder if she can feel me watching. If she can feel my presence. Does she still ache to be cut, the way I throb to cut her? Does she desire the feel of my fingertips, my lips on her skin, the way I long to feel her beneath me? Fresh rain begins to fall like blood from a fresh wound. I wonder if I am like my mother.
There is always something to be worried about when it comes to Ma. She doesn’t have a trigger. Everything, anything, is one. Pa said she wasn’t stable. They fought bad one night. So bad, that Pa left with Liam. We haven’t seen them since. Ma didn’t seem to care. But she did. I know she did because the abuse got worse. Sometimes I think about how lucky Liam is. Sometimes I wonder why Pa only took him. The middle child. The one spared from most of Ma’s tantrums because of me. Why not save me? I remember Ma when I was little. Before Liam and Laura, and I remember her with light in her eyes and dirty hands. Always carving, creating, sculpting.
Then Liam was born, I was nine and two kids were harder than one. When Laura came, Ma had no need or want for her at all. Pa tried to protect us, but it became harder and harder. When he left us, when he took Liam, it became unbearable. Laura was only two. I was eighteen. I couldn’t just leave her alone with Ma. Someone had to stay and protect her. Liam would be twenty-one now. I wonder if he remembers us. If he had a normal childhood, in a neighborhood, at a school. Does he know Ma tried to carve Laura? That I had to drag her down to the river and kill her, so our sister would be untainted and safe?
Nora
Down on the banks of the wild river. I bow my head. I know he is watching, my clever devil. I wait, while he lurks. I strip my dress off slowly. One shoulder at a time. It slips down my arms, off my body, pooling around my feet. Leaves rustle and I know he is on the move for a better look. I keep my back to the woods. He likes to see his artwork. I step from my dress toward the water. I am lucky, because the day was so hot, the water will be warm still. I stop at the water’s edge, wiggle my toes in the clear water. The last of the day’s sun hits my back. I chance a look over my shoulder. I see him step from the tree line, a smirk on his face. I walk knee deep into the water.
“Nora.” His voice is ragged. I stretch, then dive forward. I can hold my breath for a long time. My parents used to count while I sunk to the bottom of a pool or lake to see how long I stayed under. I push my arms outward and surge forward. Bubbles sneak out my nose and up to the surface. Light undulates through the water. I turn and tread water with my arms to keep myself under. A splash dissolves the light and clarity around me in violent ripples. Holden swims, fully clothed toward me, eyes closed, hands frantically pawing about. I push up and break the surface of the water as Holden does.
He stares at me, wild eyed. I cock my head at him, watching the way water drips from his beard and ears and eyebrows. I swim to him. His arms pull me to his body with force.
“I . . .” I wrap my arms around his neck. “I thought . . .”
“Shh.” I kiss his nose and wrap my legs around his waist beneath the water. His expression grows stormy.
“Were you trying to scare me?”
“No.” I wiggle my hips against him. I like the way the water moves between our bodies.
“You shouldn’t do things like that,” he says. He is serious now.
“Like what? Swimming underwater or this,” I ask and move my center against his erection. He groans and I smile.
“Both.”
I lay my head on his shoulder and nuzzle my nose against his neck. “I knew you were watching me.”
“You’re mine to watch.”
“But I knew you liked what you saw. And I like that you worried about me.”
Holden says nothing in return but he does kiss the side of my head. “We need to get back.”
“Just a few more minutes,” I say and kiss his shoulder. He wades us back to shore and sets me down. I pout.
“Pout any more and I will give you something to pout about.” I cast my eyes to the ground, while he fetches my dress. It is freeing being naked outdoors and knowing there is no one around to catch you. When he returns, he lifts my chin with one hand, so we are eye to eye. “I know what you want.” My body tremb
les. Holden drops the dress and quickly scoops me into his arms. “And I will give it to you, but my way.” He carries me to the tree line. Setting me on my feet, I stand still, unsure what to expect. He drops his water logged pants and whirls me around so I face a tree. A hand runs down my back, slowly, lazily, decadently. I shiver as goose bumps break out down my spine.
“Hold on.” His voice is tight. I brace myself against the tree. The first thrust makes my hands slip. I smack my face on the bark. I welp. He leans forward and wraps my arms around the trunk. When I’m secure, he resumes. His pace is brutal and delicious. I push my rear end out slightly to take more of him. To better the angle. His fingers bite at the flesh of my hips as he pulls and pushes with his thrusts. I don’t need to see him to know he is near his orgasm. His breath speeds up and little grunts sound. But he stops.
I turn my head over my shoulder for a glimpse at him. “Holden?”
One hand works its way from my hip, until warm fingers hit my center. The other hand cups a breast. I moan loudly. “Ride my hand, Nora.”
Holden never asks twice, so I do as I am told. My body finds its own rhythm in no time. I cry out at the first small tingle of pleasure. Holden pulls away. His hands are on my shoulders. I spin. He moves my palms to his shoulders. “Hang on,” are the only words he utters. So I do. He lifts me up by my bum and slams us into the tree for leverage. I scream out. Some of the new additions to my back have not quite healed yet and the bark opens the scabs. His hands spread my ass wide as he slides inside me. First slowly. His eyes watching his cock slide in and out. In and out. The rhythm is more passion than frenzy and soon we pant in unison.
“Do you like what you see?” he asks. I bite my lip and nod because I do. Watching it happen is erotic. I lean into the tree so that we have more room between us to see. He thrusts in, holds, does a circle with his hips that nearly sends me into a frantic gyration, then slowly pulls out. “You’re squeezing me, Nora. Come,” he says. When I look up at him, he is watching me. How long was he watching me watch his cock pump in and out of me. I blush. He kisses my neck. He is beauty and honesty in raw form. I clasp his shoulders, yanking myself away from the tree and to him.