CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
"Have you ever been in love, Violet?" Aaron asked.
Richard paused in mid-scrub on the small shower area. It was a Tuesday. Something Richard reminded me this morning when I got in. My days ran together. It had been almost a week or more since I'd seen Aaron, since I'd left his room while he writhed on the floor after shocking himself.
"Love?" I repeated. My gaze jumped to the word in his skin, unbidden. My fingers itched to reach for it, in spite of everything that had happened. I'd spent all week licking my wounds, trying to lift my bruised ego and feelings out of the gutter. It took awhile, but it wasn't until this morning that I finally resolved myself to the fact that I shouldn't be embarrassed. He was my patient and I had a job to do, regardless of anything else.
"Yes. Love." He watched me, his gaze perceptive as always, and yet unreadable. The urge to look away danced beneath my skin, but I fought the feeling, maintaining eye contact.
Don't let him see how much he hurt you, Adeline.
"I don't know." I took a moment to consider his question, an opportunity to ponder anything but what happened last week. My ex, Anthony, popped into my head. His brown eyes empty, absent of their warmth. Warmth that had been gone for a long time. He'd been sleeping with one of our friends, a waitress from the restaurant on the corner of Peppermint Street - my favorite restaurant. They served tiny little fortune cookie sandwiches that were cream-filled and delicious. We had only gone there on special occasions, like birthdays and our anniversary. She'd even been our waitress the last time we'd gone only a few months before our break up. Apparently, it had been going on for months. He'd been pushing me away for ages. But it turned out, I was the kind of person to hold on to a bad thing, even after it was more than over. Even Anthony was tired of waiting for me to take a hint - to let him go.
"You're an adult. You should know." Irritation laced Aaron's voice. He sat in his chair, chained. I hadn't watched him all week on the surveillance camera. I hadn't had the courage to walk into that room.
"It's a complicated question," I said.
"Hardly."
I tilted my head, listening to his hum. He seemed frustrated, irritated.
Join the club, asshole.
"Define love." I stood with my back against the wall by the door. I wouldn't sit. The distance was good.
"Can such a thing be defined?" he asked.
"It's a word, Aaron. All words can be defined." I added, smirking.
"I suppose so." He cut his eyes at Richard who had gone back to cleaning. "But what is the difference between love and sex?"
The word sex on his lips sent my mind back to last week with Aaron's body on top of mine.
"I'm going to be inside you, Violet. Over and over and over until there's nothing left of either of us. Until your skin bleeds and you're nothing with me or without me. Until you're everything."
Heat bloomed in my cheeks, across my chest.
Way to go, Adeline. Way to not let him affect you.
"You tell me. Is there a difference between love and sex?" My gaze was glued to him, remembering the way he touched me. Images of him on the surveillance camera resurfaced in my mind. The way he touched himself. Relentless. Uncompromising. And yet his lips had been soft when they touched mine, pliant, giving. I chewed the inside of my lip.
"Love is a feeling, an emotion, a knowing." His fingers tapped faster than normal. "Sex is the opposite. It's uncertainty. A bodily function. It can be given and taken."
"And love can't be given and taken?" I asked.
He raised his eyebrows. "Perhaps, but love takes longer to be given and to be taken."
"There are emotions tied to sex though, are there not?" I asked.
"For some." His eyes seemed to burrow into mine, like he was trying to tell me something.
"This is pretty deep," Richard said, standing. He chuckled.
"You don't think it's a serious subject, sex and love?" Aaron asked, still looking at me.
Richard looked at me and rolled his eyes, giving me an easy smile. It was his signature smile – one he gave me everyday. I'd had him over two more times this week, though not necessarily because I invited him. He had just shown up on my doorstep, once with cookies and the other time with, strangely enough, a cold pizza. Being with Richard was easy, simple, uncomplicated. It was nice to have a friend. Richard was kind, normal, unobtrusive, the only uncomplicated aspect of my life at this point.
"Shower's all clean and Ryan replaced the sheets. Should be good until next week, bud," Richard said, ignoring Aaron's previous question. He winked at me and picked up the bottle of bleach off the floor, heading out the door.
I moved to follow Richard, exhaling a deep breath.
"Stay, Violet. I need to speak with you." A chill ran down my spine. There was something in Aaron's voice that both excited and scared me at the same time.
I waited until the door closed behind Richard before meeting Aaron's gaze.
"You didn't answer my question," Aaron stated.
"What was your question?"
His face turned hostile. "You're thinking about him."
"Who?"
"You tell me."
I glanced at the door. "Who? Richard?"
"Richard." He said the name as if it had some sort of secret meaning. "Who is he to you?" Aaron's gaze flickered all over my form.
"What? He works here." The words were a gasp from my lips.
"Of course he does." He flexed his fist, squeezing it repeatedly, while the other hand tapped so quickly, the typical rhythm was almost completely lost in the haste. "Of course he fucking does!" The words were a shout absorbed into the soundless white walls around us. An extreme outburst, different from the typical Aaron I knew.
"Richard is my friend, Aaron. Not that it's any of your business." I crossed my arms over my chest.
"Is that where you've been all week? Is that why you haven't been in to see me?"
I narrowed my gaze. "Again, that's none of your business."
"He's nothing compared to me!" The words were a shout, threatening to pin me against the wall. "You're mine, Violet."
I watched as he seethed. His gaze was everywhere. No escape. And just like that, my body flushed, my skin prickled. My body, the ultimate betrayer.
I moved and approached the table, my legs seeming to have a mind of their own.
"Is that so?" I asked.
"Don't even act like you don't know." His gaze frantic, panicked. He pulled against his electronic chains, restless.
"Like I don't know?" I gave a harsh laugh. "Seems I recall the last time we saw each other you were claiming the exact opposite." I had promised myself I wouldn't bring it up. I had planned to pretend like last week hadn't happened – that it hadn't affected me.
I fingered the remote in my pocket, remembering his hands on me, how they felt, warm, hard, soft, punishing, forgiving all at once. I could push one button and he would be free of them. Free to touch me. Free to do whatever he wanted. Then I remembered what he chose last time.
"Why would it matter if he wants me?"
"You're mine." He spoke more quietly now. "He can't have you, Violet, because you're mine."
"Am I?" I toyed with him.
"I have something of yours," he said.
I blinked. "What do you—"
"In my pocket."
"Your pock—"
"Yes."
"What is it?"
"Let my hands free and I'll show you."
I frowned at him. "Not a chance." Bitterness swam through me. "I haven't forgotten what you chose last time you had the opportunity."
"What I chose, Violet?"
I narrowed my gaze. "Yes, what you chose."
He chuckled seeming almost normal for a moment. "I had no choice."
I raised my eyebrows. "That sounds strange from someone who just a week ago, sitting in that very chair, told me that there is always choice, most people are just too dumb to realize it."
"With you, Violet, for the first time in my life," he paused, his gaze flickering over my face like he was trying to commit every inch to memory, "there is no choice."
"What does that even mean?" I hated the hope in my voice.
"Just let me show you." His voice dropped an octave. "Free my hands."
I pulled the remote out of the pocket in my coat.
"I can't."
His fingers tapped his song. I could hear the melody in my head. "You can, Violet. Please."
I pushed the button, releasing his hands. His feet were still bound.
I shouldn't have.
It was against basic protocol, I knew that now better than anyone. During this past week I'd found an extremely dusty manual at the bottom of one of my desk drawers. All patients were to have their electronic chains completely hooked into the table whenever a staff member was present. There was no excuse. No valid reason they could be unhooked in anyone's presence but their own. As it turned out, there was another option that hooked the inmate into the wall if maintenance had to be done on the table. There was absolutely no reason for a patient to be unhooked – under no circumstance. Even in the event of a serious disaster, the patients in Ward Z were to be left behind. Death, the manual said, was to be their fate – better death than their freedom. The words had sent a shiver down my spine when I read them, though I couldn't imagine leaving any of them behind, especially Aaron.
However, it should have been enough to keep me from releasing Aaron's hands. Hell, last week should have been enough to keep me from doing it. I had always followed the rules – until Aaron Whitman. These past couple of months I had discarded my diligence, for carelessness. Even as I pressed the button on my remote, a squishy matte under my fingertip, I knew it was wrong. I knew I was smashing the rules from the large shards I'd created into tiny microscopic pieces.
Unbidden, exhilaration flooded my veins.
I watched as he moved his hands, running one through his dark hair. The other snaked into his pocket as he hummed.
Is there actually something in there?
He came back with a ring.
My ring.
I glanced down at my hand. I didn't wear much jewelry. The tiny little butterfly ring, a gift from my father when I was a child, was the only ring I always wore. It only fit on my on my pinky now.
"How did you—" But I knew – last week, his hands had been all over me— "How did I not notice?" I shook my head and glanced down at my bare finger. "I would have noticed."
"Would you?" He held it between us. "And yet I've had it this whole time."
I stepped forward, leaving the remote on the other end of the table. "I want it back. Why did you take it?"
"Because you're mine. Isn't that already obvious?"
Confusion seemed barrage me with its bullets. "I don't believe it is." My eyes lasered in on the tiny butterfly. The wings were made of opal, they glittered their pearl color under the stale lights. My father had given me the ring just a few weeks before my friend Maria had been run over. He worked at a pawn shop and someone brought it in.
"I had to wait to make sure they wouldn't come back for it. But when I saw it, I knew it was perfect for you, little Line." His hands had been so large, dwarfing mine as he slipped the ring on my middle finger. Kind hands. The hands of a father who loved me. The hands of an imperfect soul who couldn't shake his drinking habit. The hands of a man who drove home drunk at four in the afternoon and ran over his daughter's best friend.
"It should have been you."
"I don't belong to anyone." I heard my voice speak the words to Aaron. I sounded sure, strong, but my insides were a mess. They begged me to give myself to Aaron, again. I wanted to fall into Aaron and all that he was. He was more than electronic chains and a uniform. More than the simple, white walls of Z15.
And the monster let them scream.
The words jumped out at me. Loopy, soft, dark words in his skin. "Are you the monster?" I stood in front of him now. Close. He held the ring between us.
"What do you think?" he asked.
"I asked you first."
"We are all monsters, Violet, in our own twisted and fucked up ways."
"Why put it on your skin, then?" I touched the word monster, letting my fingers linger. It felt different than Love with the capital L. Smoother, deeper.
"Because unlike the rest of the world, I've accepted my monster. Have you accepted yours?"
"I'm not a monster," I said. His skin was warm. I'd been dying to touch him. I'd tried to squash the feeling all week, pretending I didn't want to touch him or have anything to do with him.
Lies. All lies.
He slipped my ring back on my pinky and something inside me swooned. "Yes, you are a monster."
"How so?"
"No one ends up here, without being one of the worst monsters there is, Violet. Haven't you recognized that yet?"
"I'm not a patient," I told him, but I wasn't really focused on what he was saying anymore. I watched his hands. Big hands. They touched my forearms. Tingles ran up my spine. The silver bracelets that connected to his chains hung limp against his wrists.
Freedom.
A sigh left my lips.
"It doesn't matter, Violet. Patient, or doctor, anyone down here is a special sort of monster that can't be found anywhere else."
"What?" But I could hardly process his words. My mind lost in his touch, my body, a bundle of nerve-endings on overdrive.
My gaze landed on his pulse point on his wrist. Love with a capital L, and I was reminded of what he asked me earlier. "Have you ever been in love, Aaron?"
His fingertips tapped against my forearms. His twitchy gaze on mine. His lips full, there, just before me. The lips that had ravished mine just a week ago, though right now it seemed like a million years had passed. I wanted to be reminded of his taste. I needed to feel him again.
"Yes." His answer was curt, simple. As if he wasn't affected by what we were doing, as if his body wasn't on fire like mine.
Hate bloomed inside me. It cut at my insides like a hot knife, slipping through, destroying everything in its path.
How does he do this to me and then feel nothing in return?
He said you were his, Adeline. He feels something.
But it wasn't enough. I could tell. I knew. Whatever I felt was more – and now I knew why.
"Who is she?" I asked. My mind went into overdrive. I saw it then, for the first time, the image of him in my head - Aaron Whitman with another woman. She drew him against her body. She was thin in all the right places. Her hair beautiful and messy all at once. She consumed him. She was all he could think about, all he wanted. Someone else. Not me. Never me.
I'm never good enough.
"Tell me who she is." The words were like venom, they spewed from my lips while the images of him and her filled my mind and killed me from the inside.
Who am I?
But I know. I wasn't her. I could never be her.
"The one you love. That's who you got the tattoo for." It wasn't a question. Suddenly Love with a capital L became something else. It wasn't special, something innocent amongst the darkness in his skin. It became more sinister than all the other words in his flesh. It became everything he was. Nothing else mattered.
He loves someone else.
My inner self cackled. It hated me. It knew, all along. Why had I ignored it?
"I won't talk about her," he said. "She is a part of me. Not you, my one letter away." The bite of his nails in my forearms came as sharp, splintering relief. They dug into my flesh, jerking me toward him until our mouths clashed together, a clanging of teeth. I should have pushed him away. But instead I wanted him to feel my hurt.
How had he hurt me again, so quickly?
It had taken only moments for him to tear me down after I'd worked so hard to build myself up this last week. I tried to imagine Anthony, but he was a faded memory. A disappointment. Love. Had I had that with Anthony? I didn't know. I couldn't remember what it felt like. I could only remember his freckles. Light brown flecks against his cheeks. They were smooth against his skin, no different than the rest. I could remember the way they felt, unblemished, perfect, a part of him, but I couldn't remember if I'd felt love.
What is love?
I gripped Aaron's head with my hands, my fingers intertwined with his hair and pressed into the mottled skin of his scar. This kiss was different than the last. I wanted to tear him open. Rip him apart. He had a whole life before this place, before me. A life where he murdered. A life as a monster. It was funny because those things didn't matter so much to me. Not right now. All I could see was her. The faceless woman. The woman he loved.
I bit his lip, sinking my teeth into his flesh until I tasted copper. This was all I wanted. All I had fantasized about for the last two months. Our bodies together. Our mouths. Touching.
He groaned against me. A guttural sound. I let go of his lip. He lapped at me. His blood smearing against my mouth. I'd hurt him. Something inside me rejoiced. I wanted him to feel it, to absorb it, to remember. Me.
Not her.
Finders keepers.
Aaron was mine now. I wouldn't let her have him.
What are you thinking, Adeline? What are you doing?
But it was too late to question myself. The thoughts were empty, light, whispers of words that faded out until only Aaron was left. Our mouths. His blood. His hands pressing against my skin as I clung to him.
In those moments, nothing else existed, not yesterday, not tomorrow. Only Aaron. Only me. Together. Us.
Sometime later we pulled apart, and when I leaned back and looked at him, there was blood on his face. His blood. My blood? I didn't know. There was flesh under my nails. Blood dripped from his head where my fingers had dug in.
He pressed his hand against my cheek. Wet.
Am I crying?
But then I saw the red. It was on his fingertips. My blood. My arms were bleeding.
"You're so beautiful when you cry."
I blinked and felt them. The tears. Blood and tears. Both for Aaron Whitman.
He shook his head slowly. Our faces were inches away. "I never thought I'd find something that repulsed me so much, so fucking beautiful." He cocked his head. "How do you do that?"
"Do what?" The words were breathless, a whisper from my lips.
"How are you the cold and the warmth all at once?" He tapped his fingers against my cheek, they were sticky, with my blood. "It's impossible.
I rubbed mine likewise, but against the scar on his head. "Nothing is impossible."
His eyes lit up, a fire behind them I hadn't seen before. He smiled, his teeth reddened with his blood. He looked like the monster, the one who let them scream. I drank him in, craving that monster from inside my very bones.
I wanted to drown in him. In his blood. I wanted him to consume me, every part of me, until there was nothing left. Until I was empty, full.
Until I was found.