Page 17 of The Reaper

He looked at her but didn’t say anything. They both felt the distance between them now, suddenly, and how it had contrasted with the earlier visit yesterday, the possibility of intimacy, this felt heated but angrier than before. He was angry, he’d got her riled up, too.

“The combination of the brain trauma and the medication is likely to make you a little paranoid, that’s understandable-” she said, aware of her heated tone.

“Paranoid? You think I’ve lost my mind?” he countered.

“I just think you aren’t in a rational place right now to judge what you think is real and what is going on inside your brain right now.”

“You do think I’ve lost my mind,” he snapped tersely.

“You’ve said yourself, you can’t tell what’s a dream and what’s reality,” she countered.

“I know I’m not dreaming this. I feel it. Like I feel things for you, like I know there is something between us, I feel something is going on, someone is trying to kill me here…”

Hannah gulped. He was beginning to remember. He hadn’t been truthful with the neurologist. Something had switched. He wasn’t his usual self. Or the Jack she had come to know over the last week, at least. She hated herself for being so naive, for falling too hard into the lie she had constructed. She could see it on his face, she could hear it in his voice. Jack was beginning to remember.

“Look, I’m not going to argue with you about this-” Hannah began, trying to deflect.

“Argue?” he snarled. “Is that what we’re doing? Did we used to argue a lot? What would we argue about, who did the washing up? Who took out the bins? Friends that we didn’t like? What would we argue about Hannah?” His tone was harsh.

She was taken aback at his temper, but she wasn’t going to back down to him. He wanted heat, she could match him there. She tossed her hair over her shoulder and crossed her arms over her chest. “Jack, I’m not talking about our arguments-”

“And how would we resolve our arguments?” he ground out, looking angry, murderously angry. “What would you do when you got angry with me, Hannah? Shout? Stomp your foot and have a tantrum? Cry? Did you tie me up and beat me? What would I have done to you? I could bend you over the sofa, pound into you, a hard and angry fuck. Is that how we would resolve it?”

Hannah stood up and rolled her eyes, she was angry that he was angry. She was angry that he kept pushing at this. She didn’t want the lie to end. She wasn’t ready.

“Did we do anything, other than fuck, Hannah?” he suddenly said, bluntly. He turned his head fully now, his tone harsher than she expected.

“Not really, no,” she snapped back, she was getting tired now. Frustrated. Stretched too thin for this.

He swore under his breath. “I’m cross at myself. You deserve better. I’m cross with you, too, in honesty,” he said. “Why didn’t you demand more from me?”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re a smart, young, attractive woman, you’re an absolute catch Hannah, and I treated you like a whore-”

“It wasn’t like that-”

“Well, it sounds a lot like it. We didn’t walk, we barely talked, not about each other, not about anything meaningful, we didn’t go out anywhere, we didn’t live together, fuck… but when I touch you…” He shivered.

“We were lovers-”

“That’s just a nicer way of saying it Hannah, we met up, we fucked, I left. That sounds like that's about it. Why didn’t I wantmore? If I couldn’t be there for you, as a proper partner, you know, a loving boyfriend, willing to commit to making a go of it, why did you let me treat you that way?”

“Hey now, are you considering that you could have it all the wrong way round? Why didn’t I want more? Why didn’t I want to make a go of it, ask you to stay... because I could have. It’s not just you, I could have done more.”

“I just don’t get it, it doesn’t feel… like me,” he finished quietly. “Was it enough for you?” he asked.

She hesitated. How could she even begin to explain, to vocalise. No, she thought, it wasn’t enough for me. Because it wasn’t anything for me. Because there wasn’t a me and you before.

“I don’t think it's enough for me anymore,” he finished.

Her eyes flashed furiously now, too. She was meeting him, toe to toe. “Jack, I’m not talking about this with you, rehashing what could have happened and all the questions you want answers to, not in this state you’re in, I might as well go-”

“Are you running away from an argument? Maybe we avoided arguments because you would always disappear, is that what would happen?”

She shook her head once. “No, I’m not afraid of a fight Jack, I just don’t want to do this here, now-”

He interrupted her. “And what if I want to do this here, now, what if I am so angry, you’re angry, that we simply have to have it out here and now, Hannah?”

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