Raising a Psychopath

TWENTY SECOND

Roman was on his knees about seven feet away from me. His hands were doing something. I didn't want to look, but I knew that my curiosity would soon outdo my reluctance.
I took a few steps forward, and I watched my nephew tie what looked like wires on Bart. He wasn't binding him to something, or confining his hands and feet together. He was working very tight knots on the upper parts of all his limbs. On the tops of his arms and his inner thighs. The color on Bart's hands started to turn to a deep purple, and I realized what he was doing.

Roman stood, eyes briefly glancing at me before making his way to the kitchen and coming back with a knife. He ran his finger on the sharp end of it, inspecting its effectiveness.

"I thought you said..." I started, and was surprised by how weak my own voice sounded.
Roman's dangerous pale blue gaze faced me as he knelt on the ground by Bart, waiting for me to finish my sentence.

With a clearing of my throat, I attempted to ask again. "When you said the story about the family friend who took you to ice cream every weekend. I thought -"
"Bart was the family friend," Roman interrupted, playing with the large blade in his hand. "He did, once upon a time, take me for this shitty fucking cookie ice cream every hour in the weekend, but when he found out what Avery was doing with me..." he trailed off, his gaze falling blankly.
The teen seemed preoccupied.
Thoughts.
Emotions.
What he was doing.
He rested his elbows on his knees, his eyes not daring to land on me, lest my stare plants hesitation in him. His mask was beginning to crumble, and he didn't want to look into my eyes and let me in.

"When Barty found out my dad was selling my body for money, the ice-cream visits started to last more than an hour."
Roman stood again as my throat swelled in disgust. Even this young man's happiest memory was short-lived.

I swallowed back the swelling, but before I could collect myself in time to say anything, he leaned in closer to Bart, steadying the knife on his arm. "Wreck It Ralph here won't fit into the fridge. I need to cut him up, but I don't want him to loose blood, that's why I tied him."
I didn't understand why Roman was offering me an explanation for what he was doing. With the last murders, I've had to figure it out for myself.
It only took a short minute for it to dawn on me - he wanted me to leave.

I couldn't move though. I didn't know why, but my limbs froze.
I wanted to say something.
Anything.
To stop this.
Though it was too late to let Bart off the hook now, I still wanted to somehow stop it.

"Go to your office."
The order made me pour my focus back on my nephew, who started to slowly plunge the knife into unconscious Bart's arm.
I quickly looked away.
"Roman, I-"
"Your office, Ally!" He yelled as the blade drew blood, eyes down on the surgical-like procedure. "Now!"

I shut my office door, slamming my back against it and sliding down, elbows on my knees, fingers tugging my hair.
I couldn't even quite put a finger on all of my thoughts. Everything just tsunamied over me in an abundance of incomprehensible and inharmonious emotions.

Roman had four rapists in total.
One hadn't paid - Jonny.
Three did - Francis, Bart, and Mystery Man.
That Mystery Man was also the first rapist. The one who caused all of this. The one Roman wanted to bestow a greater revenge on.
The name kept pounding in my head.

Greg.
It was Greg.
It had to be Greg.
Who else but Greg?

No.
It can't be Greg.
It shouldn't be Greg.
It must be someone else.

Fuck.

I opened my office door.
"Don't walk down. Do not go down and see what's happening," I told myself when my legs lead me to the stairs.
Thankfully, I changed my course.
I needed to do something. I had to keep myself occupied.
With that thought in my head, I ended up in Roman's room.