Page 114 of I Will Mend You

I don’t hear what he says next. Before I know it, I’ve already slashed him across the face with my blade.

“Gaslight me again, and I’ll slice off your balls.”

He screams louder than I ever did, and the blood pouring down his face doesn’t give me a measure of satisfaction. Not while he still draws breath.

Leaning against the wall with his knees pulled into his chest, he closes his eyes and shudders. He shrinks into the corner, pressing himself into the concrete as if it would swallow him up.

“What do you want to know?” he rasps.

“Tell me how a man goes from being a film major to making snuff movies.”

Proctor whimpers, and his sniveling fills the small room. Through halting breaths, he tells the story of a scholarship student who fell in with the wrong crowd.

His university roommate invited him to watch videos he rented from X-Cite Media. When he was invited to become amember, he allowed Clyde to use his computer to access more content.

They saw how other members uploaded videos of their exploits, and his friend persuaded Proctor to mount a multi-camera set-up in their dorm room to film him with a drugged student. When Proctor edited the video and uploaded it to the site, the roommate received praise for its cinematography.

“Delta himself reached out and discovered my background. He asked if I wanted to be a runner for one of his movies,” Clyde sputters through tears.

I stare down at the pathetic man, incredulous. “How did you dispose of that first girl?”

“We didn’t kill her,” he replies, his voice tightening with offense. “She woke up confused and left.”

“So, you don’t murder innocent women,” I say, my voice flat.

“That’s right.” He stares up at me, his eyes shining with a sickening sincerity. “I’m a nice guy. I’ve never laid a hand on a woman in my life.”

Never laid a hand on a woman.

What a nice, upstanding guy.

Something in my psyche snaps, and I laugh. Laugh to the edge of my sanity. Laugh so hard that I double over and tears spring to the corners of my eyes. I’ve never heard anything so flagrantly delusional, so utterly unhinged.

Xero steps forward and takes hold of my shoulder, but I shrug him off. This is between me and Proctor.

Proctor stares up, trembling, perhaps now grasping the explosive impact of his words.

I flash my teeth. “You witness the degradation of helpless women, you capture it on film. You dehumanize them. But because you don’t stick them with the knife, that makes you a nice guy?”

His face freezes in a rictus of terror.

My laughter subsides, replaced by bitter contempt. “No, you just enable the rapists and killers.”

When his gaze flicks to Xero’s, I rush at him with the knife. “Don’t look to him for help. He’s not your fucking bro.”

Screaming, he twists around, hiding his face in his hands. His vital organs now face the wall, and all I have left is the expanse of his back.

“How many?” I yell over his cries.

“What?”

“How many movies did you work on?”

“Just two.”

“Don’t lie to me.” I punctuate the word with a slash of my blade, making slices across his shoulders. Blood pours down his back in thick rivulets.

“Five,” he screams.

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