Page 34 of The Flesh Remembers
Marian startled, her hands snapping back as though burned. She turned, guilt flashing across her face, but it quickly gave way to something more complicated.
“He spoke to me,” Marian said, her voice low and trembling. “He said my name.”
Eleanor’s stomach twisted. “You shouldn’t be alone with him. He’s…unstable.”
Marian let out a short, bitter laugh, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. “Unstable? You think I don’t know that? You think I don’t feel it every time I’m near him, the pull, the hunger, the… wrongness of it all?”
Eleanor frowned, stepping closer. “Then why?”
“Why am I here?” Marian interrupted, her voice rising. She turned to face Eleanor fully, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. “Why do I keep returning to him, even though every instinct tells me to run?” She laughed again, a shaky, broken sound. “Because I can’t help it. None of us can, can we? He’s not just a man anymore. He’s something… other. Something that draws you in, even when you know it’ll destroy you.”
Eleanor froze, her blood pounding loudly in her ears. “Marian, you’re not making sense.”
Marian shook her head, tears spilling down her cheeks. “I wish I weren’t. I wish I could look at him and see only a patient. But I don’t.” She took a shaky step closer to James, her hands reaching towards his chest again. “I see him, Eleanor. I see the man he was. I see the man he could be if we succeed. And I…” Her voice broke. “I don’t know what I feel anymore.” Marian’s skin flushed, and a fine sheen of sweat covered her face and chest. She opened the neck of her dress as if desperate to remove the tight restriction of her clothing.
Eleanor’s throat tightened. She wanted to pull Marian away, to shake her out of whatever trance had taken hold, but she hesitated. She knew all too well the allure of James’s presence, how he seemed to occupy some liminal space between life and death, love and obsession. She knew as well that this place and what they were doing here were affecting all of them. They were all becoming something other than what they had been in the past.
“What do you feel?” Eleanor asked softly, though she wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer.
Marian's gaze flicked to James. “I feel… guilt. For wanting him. For seeing him as more than a patient, more than your… your lover.” She let out a shaky breath, her hands trembling as she pulled them away from James. “But I also feel drawn to him. To the power he represents. To the possibility that he could love me, too. I don’t understand these feelings, Eleanor. I don’t want to feel this way. Truly. But I can’t stop myself.”
Eleanor’s heart ached with a mix of pity and anger. “Marian, he’s not capable of that right now. He’s barely holding onto what’s left of himself.”
Marian turned to her, her eyes blazing. “And whose fault is that? You’re the one who’s been feeding him, sacrificing everything for him. You’ve made him into this… this thing that none of us can look away from.”
“That’s not fair,” Eleanor said, her voice rising.
“Isn’t it?” Marian shot back. She gestured to James, her voice trembling with frustration. “You think I don’t see it? The way he looks at you. The way you look at him. He’s consuming you, Eleanor. And maybe that’s what he needs to return fully, but it’s destroying you in the process. And the rest of us… We’re just collateral damage.”
Eleanor opened her mouth to respond, but the words died in her throat. She couldn’t deny that James had become an obsession, not just for her but for everyone in the clinic.
Marian turned back to James, her fingers brushing against his chest. He stirred slightly, his pale eyes flicking to hers with an almost predatory gleam. “I just want to understand,” she whispered, her voice barely audible. “I want to know what it feels like to be seen by him. To be… wanted by him.”
Eleanor’s stomach turned as she watched Marian lean closer, her lips brushing against James’s collarbone. The intimacy of the gesture sent a surge of jealousy and revulsion coursing through her veins.
“Stop this,” Eleanor retorted, “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
Marian ignored her, her kisses trailing along James’s chest. Her hands moved with reverence, tracing the lines of his decayed body as though he were a holy relic. James let out a low, guttural sound, his hand twitching before resting on her shoulder.
The room seemed to freeze as James moved. His fingers curled weakly into Marian’s hair, and his gaze locked onto hers with an intensity that made Eleanor’s breath catch.
“Eleanor,” he rasped, his voice low and fractured. “Why… are you fighting her?”
Eleanor’s chest tightened. “James, she doesn’t understand. She”
“She feels it,” James interrupted, his voice thick with something Eleanor couldn’t quite place. “The pull. The need.”
Marian released a shaky breath, her tears mingling with the flush on her cheeks. “I do,” she whispered. “I feel it. I can’t stop feeling it.”
Eleanor stepped forward, her fists clenched tightly at her sides. “This isn’t real, Marian. It’s the rituals, the machines, the… the madness of this place. It’s not him.”
Marian turned to her, her face a mask of anguish. “Then why does it feel so real?”
James’s grip tightened on Marian’s shoulder, and he let out a low, guttural growl. “Because it is,” he said, his voice dark and commanding. “It’s more real than anything else.”
Eleanor felt her resolve crack as James’s dark gaze shifted to her. In that moment, she realized she wasn’t just fighting for him, she was fighting for herself, and for everyone else who had fallen under his spell.
James grabbed a handful of Marian’s hair and forced her head back, exposing the soft white flesh of her neck. Marian let out a soft whimper at the act, though Eleanor could not tell if it was in submission or fear. Perhaps it was both.
