The Strange Good Girl

Chapter Twelve: The Body Count Begins

"I'm going to need stitches." Lisa examined her face in the bathroom mirror. She walked past Jason and turned on the light in the closet. She pulled a plastic tub down from one of the shelves and poured its contents out onto the bed. Jason watched with his head tilted to one side as she searched through what looked like a bunch of medical supplies. She grabbed a few things and went into the bathroom setting them on the counter.

He stood in the doorway to the bathroom and watched as the girl screamed in pain after pouring a clear liquid over the gash on her face. She was still shirtless, and her skin looked paler than normal. Was it from the cold? Had she lost too much blood? He had never had to worry about things like that, but he was different from everyone else. According to him and Mother he couldn't die, and so he didn't. The girl opened up a syringe and filled it with a different white liquid from a small glass vial.

He grabbed her hard by the wrist before the needle made contact with her skin. "Hey! What are you doing? It's just morphine." He didn't know what morphine was but he'd seen some teenagers in the woods using drugs with needles before. "Let go of me." She said firmly.

Jason, let her go. What she's doing isn't bad. It's good medicine. Listen to Mother. He slowly released her one finger at a time and watched as she emptied the syringe into her cut. She capped the needle and threw it into the trash.

She returned to the bed and sat for a moment to wait for the morphine to take effect. Her eyelid began to droop and she let it shut. The numbness felt good after the sting from the rubbing alcohol. She searched for the stitches kit on the bed, she was thankful her Mom always kept extra medical supplies around the house. There was no way she was going to trust the hospital in town to fix her up. Luckily she spent a lot of time working as a nursing assistant during the summers at the hospital with her Mom after she graduated from high school.

He watched her return to the bathroom with a small bag in hand. She washed her hands in the clear liquid and took out a needle and thick black thread. She looped the thread through the needle and her hand began to shake. She took the needle in her other hand and it began to shake as well. She put her hands on the counter to steady herself. She turned and looked at him.

"I can't do it. You have to do it. I can't keep my hands steady and only having one good eye isn't making this any easier." His eye narrowed at her. "Please?" She grabbed him by the arm and dragged him further into the bathroom.

He'd given himself stitches before, but this was different. "You can't hurt me, half my face is numb from the morphine." She pressed her skin just outside the cut. "See. No pain. Let me see your hands." He held his hands out to her and she put them over the sink pouring the clear liquid over his hands. The smell of it stung his nostrils. She placed the needle in his hand.

"I assume you know what stitches are, right?" He nodded. "Ok good. I'm going to make this easier for you." She put a few thin adhesive strips down the cut. "There." She sat on the edge of the counter and leaned against the mirror. He slowly came at her with the needle. Taking a deep breath he started at the bottom of the cut, slowly threading the curved needle though her skin. Once he got the first two done he wasn't as slow threading the needle through.

With her good eye Lisa watched him, all his attention was on what he was doing. She let her eye wander over his body. Since his jacket was off she noticed how muscular his arms were along with the rest of his body. His shirt was still soaked from the rain and clung to his stomach. She could see a few scars through the holes in his shirt. She refrained from reaching out and touching them afraid of startling him while he worked on her face.

Jason was taking in deep breaths, extremely nervous afraid he'd make too sudden of a movement and hurt the girl, but she just sat completely still. He was almost done and as he readied the needle with thread for the next one the girl held her eye open moving her eye lid out of the way.