Page 72 of Ethereally Tainted

“I told you yesterday that I know how it feels to feel like that. Your demons tell me the exact same thing my demons do, we are a calling to each other. They recognize the darkness in your heart because mine is the same. You may not want to admit it, but we are both monsters, deserving of a happy ending despite that.”

She shakes her head, tugging at her lips. “We are not monsters, we are just fallen angels, taken to hell. Ethereally tainted, right?” she mumbles, and a small smile graces my lips at those two words I told her the day before.

As I rise from the bed and approach her, I can’t help but observe her gradually stepping back until she finds herself against the wall behind her. I corner her, staring down at her with ferocity. I don’t know what it is about her that makes me want to confess every sin I’ve ever committed, but I know I’m balancing on the thinnest thread.

“I was blamed for killing my parents one year ago. It happened after a confrontation with my brother. They were really fucking shitty parents, always trying to ruin our childhoods despite abandoning us in different orphanages.” I take a deep breath, trying to control the emotions inside of me.

“I found them when I came home, murdered in a car with their throats slit and my brother holding the goddamn knife in his hands.”

The images rush into my mind, thickening my throat with emotions. That sight of them, that horrifying moment when I realized they were actually, truly fucking dead and there was no way to bring them back to life. Even though I hated them for the way they treated us for all of those years, I was still affected by their death in a way I didn’t want to be.

“I told him to give me the knife and run. He didn’t of course, but I wasn’t about to let my brother fuck up his life because of this, and I couldn’t blame him for killing them. And so he ran, without looking back, and I took the blame for it.”

I will never forget the moment when he ran away from me, at first screaming at me not to leave him, but later realizing it was the only way for him to survive. And I was already convicted of murder-attempt when I got into a fight at the orphanage, so it was the only way to save him. I will never forget that moment when the cops dragged me away from my parents’ corpses or the moment they arrested me for murdering them. Now I realize my brother’s hesitation to run away immediately was only an act, his intention all along was to make me believe him and then have me take the blame for the crime he committed.

“You are not a killer.” She pushes her hand against my chest, feeling my heartbeat beneath her palm.

“But that doesn’t mean I haven’t killed before and enjoyed it just because I felt relieved that I had survived. I’m not a good man, and never will be.”

It is true, I murdered people before finding my parents dead. Druggies who refused to leave me alone, criminals who ran in the same circles as I did on the streets. As far as I know, the cops were never informed because they don’t give a damn about dead criminals, but it appears that Emilio Ricci found out because of my traitorous brother. When that confession is made, I feel an intense rage that takes over my body, and I see the same burning emotion course through her body, too.

“At least you didn’t kill your parents. I fucking killed my mom. My own mother. The one who gave birth to me, the one who was supposed to protect me. I killed her. Be glad you didn’t kill your parents, even if you got blamed for it.”

“Fuck, I’m so sorry, little doll,” I tell her before embracing her in my arms.

She is so taken aback that words fail her, before eventually doing something I never saw coming. She hugs me back, holding me close to her body and giving me the comfort she wants to give me, the comfort she never got, but now does.

“I was taken to a meeting with Mr. Ricci the other day, and that’s why I was gone because I couldn’t handle my emotions. I found out that my brother ratted me out, telling on me for a crime I committed that he was partially involved in. Here I was, protecting him, and he abused that to his advantage.” I stutter out, needing to get it out of my chest.

It has been three days, and I have ignored every attempt she has made to speak to me because it was too painful to talk to anyone. Mr. Ricci knowingly did that to me, exposed that to me, out of pure malice. Every single day, Naya has been on my mind, and even jerking off to the thoughts of her hasn’t left my body satisfied. I need to stay away from her, but I can’t.

“What the fuck?” she exclaims, looking at me shocked.

“Yeah, I don’t want to talk more about it.”

She nods, understanding me as she stays in my embrace while hugging me.

I do not know how long we stand there, finding comfort in each other’s embraces as we let our pasts mend together into broken pieces. Sharing the most awful thing about my past and the monster living inside me, was a huge relief. And maybe, just maybe, I can move on from this. Maybe, if she is by my side, for we are one and the same.

Beautifully broken but broken all the same.

Chapter 27

Naya

I don’t know whatI expected when I stormed into Grey’s room, but it wasn’t this. It definitely wasn’t what I intended. His chest pressed against me, and this is the first time in over five months that he’s actually held me without pushing me up against a wall. Not that I mind that part, but this is somehow so comforting. Recalling the last hug I received from my grandparents filled with such love and warmth brings me to the point of tears. But I cannot cry, not more than I already have, and especially not in his arms.

I’m so aware of his body pressed against mine, of his chest, rising and falling as he breathes. What I’m most aware of is his scent, the one that always follows him and pleases my nostrils because it smells like him–something forest-like but still sweet.

I never want him to let go of me, but I also know he’s wrong. We may be monsters, and he may deserve a happy ending, but I certainly am not. Not after what I did.

After who I killed.

Whenever I think about it, it hurts, but it hurts more to know that while I feel ashamed for it, I also feel ashamed for enjoying it so much. I remember pushing a knife into the side of my mother’s body in the hotel room she had booked. I recall the fear and shock that filled her eyes when she saw I’d broken into her room. That was after she assumed Frederick Grimhill had already collected me after leaving me strapped to the fucking hospital bed. Now that is probably one of the moments where I felt the most at peace, and I am ashamed of that, but I don’t regret it. At least not as much as an average human would regret something so sinful.

At last, Grey releases me from his embrace and gazes into my eyes, causing a wave of butterflies to stir in my stomach. He takes a step back, leaving me with no choice but to move along with him as he pushes me toward the wall.

“Well, if this isn’t familiar.”

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