Page 32 of Cuts Like an Angel: Part 2

Chapter Seventeen

William

“Fuck.” William was down on his knees almost, in the bathroom, retching till his throat burned and there was nothing left to bring up. The bile stung his throat, making his eyes water. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” It had been a mistake to bring Rosie here. A god damn big fucking mistake.

“William?” Rosie knocked on the door. “William, it’s me. Are you okay?”

No … no … he wasn’t okay he was very far off the fucking map of okay. Shit, he was in another town, another planet. “Give me a minute,” he called, washing his face at the sink and patting it dry with a piece of paper towel.

When he came out, Rosie was standing outside the door, hands clasped together in front of her and that look on her face. The one he knew she would have. The one anyone would have if they knew the truth.

“Did she tell you?” William had always feared she would tell people. She had promised him many times that she would. That if he ever got with any little whore, she’d tell them how much he liked it and what he had asked her to do. She always made that promise to him, and he had never brought anyone to meet her. Not that he had ever cared enough about anyone for them to see her. She was his secret, his dark and dirty fucking secret.

“She squeezed my arm,” Maria cried, followed by a series of pain filled shrieks that echoed along the corridor. “Get my William in here. Call the police.”

“I didn’t ...” Rosie began shaking her head. “I wouldn’t.”

“I know.” He knew alright. How she did this. Made the marks on her own body and then blamed whoever. That’s why he never believed her when she said the carers hurt her. It was her control, her way to make sure William didn’t leave.

“I want my William,” she hollered so damn fucking loud.

He felt himself mentally retreating, going to that safe spot in his head where Josh waited. When he was a child, it had been Phillip. Not someone in him, but someone with him. Phillip, who no one else could see but him. Who would come with him every time he was summoned? Who would hold his hand and give him the strength not to cry every time he was beaten? He was his saviour as a child.

Phillip had been gone a long time now, though. No longer comforting, but he could have Josh. He could pull Josh up from inside and go to her and deal with this.

Rosie caught William’s hand as he went to go back to the room. “I have to,” he said, seeing the concern on her face. “Meet me at the car.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“No. It’s better alone. It’s always better alone.” He didn’t kiss Rosie as he left her standing there. He didn’t even give her any reassurance that it would all be okay, because maybe it wouldn’t now. His mother had been right about everything else, why not this? Who’d want you when they know, William? Who will stay when I tell them about you?”

No one. That was the truth of it. No one would stay and no one would want him.

“I’m here,” he said loud enough to be heard over her racket his heart almost paused as he stepped into her room. Two nurses were trying to calm her, one trying to look at her arm.

“And your little bitch?”

“She’s gone,” William said.

“Do you see what she did to me?” Maria lifted her arm to show him, waving it like a mad woman. Her lips pulled back in a sneer as she showed him exactly what his sweet Rosie had done to his mother. “You pick her over me and she does this?”

“No.”

Maria will have done it to herself. He stood coldly at the end of her bed, not falling for it like he used to. Her tears … fucking crocodile tears designed to pull at him in just the right way. Her face twisted, her eyes glistened and William stiffened his back. Here it came.

She sobbed into her hand, shaking with the fake sorrow racking her frail body. “My son doesn’t love me,” she said in a tiny voice. “He hates me. I have this stupid illness and he hates me for it.”

One of the nurses met William’s gaze and he could see the confusion in it. “William loves you, Mrs Carter.”

“No. He hates me.” She raised her tear streaked face so she could see him. “Don’t you? You hate me?”

It was like everyone in the room was paused, and she was sitting there, daring him to admit he hated her. Daring him to say it in front of them all.

“I don’t hate you,” he said, trying to force emotion into his words.

Maria snatched her arm away from the nurse. “Let my William do it,” she said. “He can fix it. I don’t want you touching me.”

“Mrs …”

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