by SM Johnson
For one quick instant all my masks slipped away as I stared into his impossibly blue, impossibly beautiful eyes.
"I do," I said. "Too much."
Then I spun away, escaped to the bathroom in my room where I hid behind two closed doors, hoping to hide my hammering heart and shaking hands.
A few minutes passed before I heard myself being paged to group.
Damn.
I pulled myself together and willed my body to stop this anxiety thing, and headed to the group room.
Super Therapist had her 'concern' face on. "Everything okay?"
I nodded, slumped into my chair.
"It's okay to need a few minutes," she said. "From now on just let me know beforehand."
"I'm fine."
I was not fine. I snuck a look at Bree, but there was no way in hell I could look at Jamie.
"We're going to have a pre-test," Bright Therapist said brightly. "I need some help pulling gym mats out of the closet."
We all helped, in silence. I was wondering how many kinds of horrible this would lead to, and I'm sure Bree and Jamie were wondering the same. I continued to not look at Jamie until we were arranging the mats on the floor and he hip-checked me so hard I fell down.
For a second I saw black, humiliated rage filling my brain, my eyesight, but then I heard him snort and giggle. The snort was so ridiculously cute that it cleared my head, and I snarled back. "Brat."
"Yep," he answered, and everything was okay for a moment.
But only for a moment.
The next game was called Trust, and the rules were… close your eyes, fall backward, and let the rest of the group catch you.
Oh, no.
"Pre-test," Therapist Comfort repeated in her soft voice. "Which means it's okay if you can't trust the group yet. It's normal. Bree first. Stand on the edge of the mat, facing the wall. Close your eyes. When I say 'go' let yourself fall backward."
Bree's eyes were huge. "Do I have to go first?"
"Yes. You're the lightest. I'll show Jamie and Jeremiah a couple different ways to catch you. And I'll fall next, promise."
She was learning us, now volunteering to take her turn. I was pleased with myself for this.
When Bree was in position, we grouped behind her. Therapist Do Good Stuff mimed a two-person catch, with mine and Jamie's hands linked, feet braced into the mat.
With his fingers twined between mine I was sure we could catch the heavy-weight champion of the world. We could catch a plane like an aircraft carrier. We could save the whole fucking world.
Just his hands in mine made me feel invincible.
Bree was a trusting soul. She fell. We caught her. She laughed and said thanks.
Therapist Trust Me went next, and I guided Jamie and Bree into position, even though letting go of Jamie's hand felt like tearing my own fingers off.
I wasn't used to feeling like this, at all.
When it was Jamie's turn, I waved the ladies away. I would catch him all by myself, always. I vowed to never let him fall.
He flailed, his arms wind-milling just as he lost his balance, a sudden last minute fear. I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around his chest from behind, squeezing him tight as he regained his balance. He was almost a head shorter than me.
Somehow the vow made its way past my lips into his ear, as quiet as an exhale. "Never, never let you fall. Not ever."
Then I released him and stepped away.
I looked at the group and shook my head. "I can't."
"Try?" Bree pleaded. "We'll catch you, I promise."
So I stood with my back to them, inhaling, exhaling, closing my eyes, opening them.
"Go," Jamie murmured softly.
I tried. I did.
Unlike Jamie, though, I didn't wind-mill. The moment I felt my balance going, my knees buckled and I crashed onto the mat, leaning forward and catching myself with my hands.
I shook my head.
"Not today."
Chapter 22
Jeremiah talked for what seemed like forever, pausing his drawing endeavor for such long periods of time it seemed like he was far away, in a different place, being a different, not-angry Jeremiah. A softer, sweeter, safer Jeremiah.
A Jeremiah almost willing to have round edges, who didn't have to fight everything and everyone. Like for a while there was a possibility….
In the end, he said, "I lost him, do you see? I got my own clothing back, kept wearing the makeup, wore the sunglasses as much as allowed, and I whispered into that boy’s ear the things I wanted to do to him…
"And he squirmed and moaned and smiled that naughty little smile at me….
"And then we got sent back to the world.
"Corrie kept her promises, got me a job in addition to my job of delivering newspapers, so I could feed myself, or go to the laundromat if I had to. I was allowed to go back home.
"Somebody else answered the phone number Jamie gave me and said he didn’t live there anymore.
"And I decided the best way to fight the world was to stop fighting the world.
"I didn't call myself a victim.
"I called myself a pacifist.
"And somewhere not too long after that, you came in."
Chapter 23
"This part is done," Jeremiah announced, and tossed the pen into the air, sending it spinning toward the rafters, and catching it just before it struck his chest upon its return.
Pretty was inexplicably seized with anxiety.
She was used to him drawing on her. There was a routine, prediction. A semblance of safety, of nothing bad happening. Already? She found herself thinking. Are you sure?
"Shower?" She asked, feeling hopeful for some reason that the ink could now be washed off.
But Jeremiah shook his head. "No. I'll help you clean up, though, and then we'll celebrate."
He held her right hand, and slid his left arm around the small of her back, supporting her by holding her close.
She liked it. She was well used to him now.
He stood her in front of the mirror and said, "Look! Just look at you."
The sight of herself was shocking. Her skin was more black than white, the complicated lines forming symbols from her head to her toes – hundreds of symbols. Some might have been Zodiac signs, but most of them were meaningless. Or at least, meaningless to Pretty. She'd lost some of the clinging twenty pounds she'd been annoyed about for the past several years.
"Beautiful, yes?" Jeremiah asked, his face as close to gleeful as Pretty had ever seen.
Was it? In the sense of art, yes, she kind of thought it was. In the sense of what happened to the body that belonged to her, it was horrifying.
When he decided she'd looked long enough, he tied her hands behind her back, gently, with a silky smooth white rope and an odd sort of pressure in his touch.
"I want to take care of you," he said, running the water and holding a washcloth under the stream. It was almost an explanation, almost an apology. Pretty accepted it as both, and stood still under his hands, hardly even blushing as his fingers pressed soapy foam into her intimate places, then chased it away with the washcloth.
Her body accepted his hands, his ministrations with grace and willingness.
He'd always been good at making her feel his world.
"We're going to walk to the house," he told her, and led her toward the door. She hadn't been through that door since he brought her here.
"How long?" she asked. Meaning... how long until this was done, whatever that means. How much longer would they have together? How much time was left?
He seemed to understand the question all its forms. His hand tightened around her upper arm. "I don't know. As long as we want. Not long enough for the ink to fade. I need that – it's the only path that matters."
Pretty shook her head. She knew better than to ask about the lines. He wasn't going to tell her until he was good and ready. "And how long since the day we got here?"
"Long enough," he said. "We're o
n track."
She didn't even know what that meant. On track for what? Somehow she knew that was as taboo a topic as the ink. And oddly enough, ever since the days of silence she found it easier not to bother him with questions.
The house was... well.
It was Dark.
Surprise, right? Black leather couch. Blood red carpet. A huge black tapestry with a white anarchy symbol on top of a pink triangle filled the living room wall.
He sat her on the couch, and she perched on the edge, hands still tied behind her with the silken ties that held but didn't hurt.
There were symbols painted on the walls, many of which she thought might be similar to those on her skin. He patted her cheeks and forehead, then disappeared into another room, briefly, and returned with a small plate. He fed her bits of cheese and summer sausage from his fingers, alternating with bits for himself. It was the first thing he'd fed her aside from warm cereal in… god knew how many days. A week? Two? There was no sense of time, here.
The food made her smile. The room did, too, the way it suited him.
In fact, she couldn't stop smiling, almost laughed, because despite everything, or because of everything, there was sheer happiness in this moment.
His hand lifted toward her mouth, paused, and it seemed like he almost shivered, and then he said, "You light up the whole room."
When his fingertip brushed across her lips, Pretty shivered, too.
The fact that she didn't have any desire to be anywhere but right here, right now, chilled her, and a wave of guilt came out of nowhere. Was she a bad person? There was a space of seconds when he'd been in the other room, when she could have run for the door, turned so she could fumble at the doorknob with her tied hands, could have... distressed, upset, angered – HURT – him. She didn't want to do any of those things. Especially that last one.
And so she waited.
And she ate the food from his fingertips.
Life's really good moments are few. She let herself be happy and content in this one.
Chapter 24
She.
She's smiling, laughing.
I don't know how she can smile, why she isn't wailing in dread for the next thing.
"You light up the room," I tell her, and it's not a lie, isn't supposed to be a sappy compliment. The words fall out without my thinking about them.
I tell her things I don't mean to. I'd done it back then, too.
She's… bright shiny. She never hid that she loved me beneath a sharp exterior, or sarcasm, or any other shell of self-protection. She was all soft underbelly, all the time.
She still is.
Back then I'd told her about the three people.
Now I've told her, in detail, about Corrie, and even Jamie. I guess I can't tell about Corrie without telling about Jamie.
But not what happened to him.
I can't tell her that. Not yet.
"Come on," I say, and pull her, gently, to her feet. "We have to enjoy what we can before the next part, because it's gonna be hard."
She.
She doesn't have any sense of time, and I'm proud of myself for that.
"Can you tell me?" she wants to know. "What's going to happen?"
I shake my head. The magick won't work if I talk about it. If I warn her. The magick needs her naked, honest response.
I'm no longer driving what happens, which is strange, but tells me we really are making magick, that a force larger than myself has taken over.
I had planned more rules, more punishment… a lot more spanking and flogging and humiliation. I thought it would take more to break her down than it did.
She…
Well. I don't have to break her, don't have to force her to be receptive. She's become my co-conspirator already.
I bring her into my bedroom now, and her eyes are huge, looking at and probing into my most private space. I try not to think about it, but I see her gaze pass over my alter, see her recognize the glyphs on the wall that match some of the lines on her skin.
She is… wide-eyed wonder.
Posters of the Sex Pistols and MM. Crow feather. Several dried and painted beetles. Mardi-gras styled masks and beads. Skulls and bones.
Flecks and patches of startling color amid the shades of gray, the blacks on black.
Having her in this space renders me naked somehow, and when her eyes click to mine, I hold hers and let go, let her see how much the predator in me loves having her here. I hadn't been this kind of predator when she'd known me, when she'd first become important to me.
"Untie my hands," she says. "Please."
"Why?" I ask. "What are you going to do?"
"I want to peel your clothes off you. I want to touch you, guide my fingertips across your skin. I want to love you. And I want you to let me in, the way you never could before."
Somehow – the way she says it, maybe, reeks of the scent of losing power. But does it matter just yet? Will it hurt anything?
These were things I'd smelled on her when we first met, things too foreign to understand. I would later decide that somehow in that kiss in the woods we'd traded spit or blood and this bond developed as a result.
Ridiculous, I know.
But something.
It didn't feel like an accident, then or now.
Before making it a conscious decision, I untie her wrists and rub her cold hands.
There is no plan. I don't know if we're going to have sex, but I can't discount the possibility. It won't be against her will, though. This I know for sure, because we have no room now for bad magick.
She peels away my layers of clothing, pressing her fingers against my collar bone, squeezing it, resting her knuckles in the hollow there. She lets her fingers travel up my throat, pause at my Adam's apple, tracing it gently, then sliding up to outline my lips.
She puts her arms around me, one sliding around my waist, the other stretched up and over my shoulder, her hand resting on my back. I have to roll my shoulders forward and make myself shorter to accommodate this.
She squeezes, pressing our bodies together, chest to chest. It's a careful, gentle hug for the first few seconds, but when I don't pull away her arms tighten more, so fierce it feels like she'll never let me go.
And for the first time, I let her hug me, hold me, and lean into her embrace rather than fight to get away.
After what feels like an entire school year of lunch periods and chocolate, she steps away and stares into my eyes, completely without guile. She gives me silence and I give her the same, and she stares into me for long, long minutes.
I wonder what she sees.
She's so innocent. No. I know better. She's so much light, that it looks like innocence.
No one stares into my eyes for more than a second or two. No one but Corrie. Jamie. Sunshine.
The Three.
That's all.
The third of Three will end me.
Chapter 25
He let her make love to him.
She knew it was wrong, considering the rest of her life, but in the here and now it wasn't wrong, it was perfect, and absolutely what had to happen next.
Afterward he spooned himself around her.
"Corrie kept working with me, kept track of me, right up until I met you. And then she basically said she'd taught me everything she could, and the rest was for me to figure out.
"And then there you were, so shining and light and innocent and helpless. And, unfathomably, you liked me, liked my Dark, tilted your head that tiny bit and listened, really listened, as if what I had to say meant something to you."
"You changed everything for me. No one had ever been that honest. No one ever taught me to think for myself. What you gave me, those moments, that ability to look beyond the surface, has been priceless to me."
"And yet… you didn't go Dark."
She shook her head. "I adore the Dark, revel in it, love to be near it. But no, I'm too... me, I guess... to go all the way Dark. Surely you see this?"
His eyes – oh. They had sudden color now, black as night, but only for an instant. He shook his head. "I can make you Dark. It's what I'm supposed to do, why you're here."
She shook her head, not understanding.
His next words were a frustrated rush. "I can't leave you helpless, undefended. I can't. Don't you understand that? I have to help you find your magick so you can protect yourself when I'm gone."
"Jeremiah," Pretty said. "You've been gone for years, and I've been okay."
He shook his head, violently. "No. You don't see. I've not been as gone as you think. I've been protecting you, all along. Every day. Every year."
"Tomorrow will be hard," he said, as he wrapped each of her wrists in coils of that silky white rope again. She watched this binding and wondered how many hundreds of times he'd done this. He hardly seemed to even pay attention as he knotted the ends smartly, one wrist to the other, until her hands were secured in front of her belly. He then twined the rope around her waist, snug but not tight, wound between her wrists, securing her hands to her waist so she could neither raise nor lower them.
"Tonight will be ceremonial, important. You might be scared or revolted, but it can't be helped. It's part of all of this, and it's... just what comes next."
He brought her into the kitchen and spent an hour dyeing her hair the lightest blonde ever. When it was dry, it was almost white. Then he led her into a black and white bathroom. She recognized an enema kit waiting in the sink, and sucked in a breath. "Jeremiah." She stopped. Words failed. This… too much, too intimate. Too controlling.
"It's not kinky," he said, then amended himself. "Well, yeah, it is. But that's not the purpose."
"What is, then? Embarrass and humiliate me?"
He shook his head. "I… don't know if I can explain it. It's a feeling, and you'll come to understand why, tomorrow." He shrugged. "That's the best I can do right now. It's not a choice. Does that help?"
She shook her head. No, it didn't help at all.
He shrugged again. "Then I'm sorry, but it's very simple. Don't worry about anything, just do as I say. It's like... a submission thing." He pressed her down to her knees as he spoke, and folded her upper body over her thighs until her breasts and shoulders touched the floor, then guided her head until her cheek rested against cold tile.