Split

Past

The next day Patricia had brought me my breakfast and told me that Dennis was going to be supervising me later that day. I felt a flutter of nerves at the mention of his name, but brushed it off when I thought that Patricia might notice.

"I hope you've been feeling better now that the big day has passed," she smiled, "we will let you know when the next girls will be brought here... I suppose we need to find you separate accommodation if they are going to be put in your room. Hmm," she took my hand in hers and I looked down at it uncomfortably, "I do hope that you bare us no ill will... and I hope Dennis hasn't given you any grief over the subject. He's been... well, it shook him up to say the least, and I hope he hasn't been talking to you about that."
I shook my head quickly to dismiss the probing she was trying to do and she let go of my hand, letting it drop to my side.
"Well then, I'd better be on my way. Busy day, I'll be making preparations for the next time the beast visits us," she opened the door and stepped out, leaning backwards to peer back at me, "Dennis will be by in a few hours. If he has anything to say, you'd better tell me, dear. I'll know if you're keeping secrets."

I shivered at her words and went to the bathroom to shower.

When Dennis eventually stepped through the door, he looked reluctant and looked away from me straight away.
I sat upright on the bed and cleared my throat, "how are you?"

"Yeah, I'm... I'm okay. What about you?"

I nodded, "about yesterday, I didn't mean to be so forward, I'm not sure what I was thinking. Are we okay?"

"Of course," he came over and sat next to me, "better than okay, I feel more comfortable around you now, I feel like I could talk to you about anything."

"I want to talk about the beast."

He grimaced, "not about that."

"But Patricia was saying that she's going to be bringing more girls here, she's going to do this all again and you'll be helping her."

"Patricia knows how I feel..."

"Have you told her you aren't going to help?"

"No, I told her I wasn't happy-"

"But it's not going to stop her doing it-"

"Look, this is out of my control, the beast has already come forward, we can't stop him now if we wanted to. He's here now and we just have to get on with it."

"But you're going to have to look after those girls until they die, until they're eaten, and then-"

"Just stop, I don't want to think about that right now, alright? Can we just have a normal conversation that doesn't involve what we're doing? I don't want to do it but if it means I get to have a little freedom then I'll do it."

I sighed, "you know how this is going to end... you know what it's like..."

"I know... but I don't have another choice."
I watched as he rested his chin in his palm, "there's no way I can win in this. I just need to cooperate until... those nights, and then let Patricia deal with it. At least then I don't have to go through all that again."

I could see where he was coming from, Patricia wouldn't let him into the light again if he refused to help her, he didn't have a choice. I took his hand but he barely acknowledged it, "I know there's no other options for you, and I get that... it's just hard for me to accept."

He nodded and straightening up, "I know, and please believe me when I say that I don't want to be doing this either..."

I rested my head on his shoulder, "I know. I'm not sure what else to suggest," he looked at me and I met his gaze, "I wish I had better ideas."

"I think you have great ideas," he kissed me on the forehead.

I slowly looked up at him and saw how troubled he looked, "I wish that this could be different. I wish it was just you, no Patricia, no Hedwig, no Kevin... just you. I think you'd be better off without them."

"No matter how they treat me, they're still my family. They're all I know. I wouldn't be without them... especially Kevin."

"Does he talk to you?"

"He used to... when we were kids. But when we got older I developed this... I mean... I started to do bad things, things I'm not proud of and... Kevin said that I couldn't be trusted anymore. I almost got him into trouble so... I got shut away. Then the others started to form like I had."

"Do you miss him?"

He pondered that for a moment, "yeah... I do. I was the first one, we spent a lot of time together before the others surfaced... sometimes I try and talk to him but he just won't listen anymore. I don't blame him."

"You were the first one?"

"Yeah," he was quiet for a moment, debating talking to me about it or not, "Kevin's mother used to hurt him when he did things she didn't like, which seemed to be everything, and then I was brought into the light. I kept him out of trouble, which is funny because it's like we've swapped places now..."

"Did she ever hurt you?"

"Yeah... she didn't understand that we were two different people, she thought Kevin was making it up and seemed to punish him more. In the end we just had to keep quiet and hope that she didn't find excuses to hurt us."

"That's awful."

He nodded, absorbed in his own thoughts, "but she's the reason I'm here..." he looked at me, "and I don't know whether that's a reason to be grateful or a reason to hate her more."

I looked into his solemn eyes, "I don't think you should be grateful, but you owe her your life. That's something, right?"

"I don't know anymore... maybe not so much."

"I'm glad you're here." I smiled sadly and he looked down.

"Thanks. At least someone is."
We sat in the dim room for a long time before he spoke again.