Page 42 of Chase

She moves so she is now crouching on the ground in front of me, smiling gently and removing some of my tears with the pads of her thumbs.

“There she is,” she says with a strange look on her face. “I remember those eyes, Izzy. Bright and always in search of more.”

“Everything ok?” Theo’s low, gentle voice calls out to both of us. Frankie doesn’t take her eyes off me, but I jerk my head up if only to try and block out the feelings swirling around inside of my head.

“Fine,” I lie, smiling as I make to stand so I can step away from my aunt. “I’m gonna go to the bathroom so I’ll see you in there.”

Before he can answer me, I walk away and back to the house with racing strides. I burst through the front door and head straight for my room. I used to think my room was my safe space, away from my family, but even that was stolen away from me. When Theo left, there was nowhere to hide anymore.

This room isn’t even mine, it’s fake, like me, but at least untainted. I walk frantically inside of it, running everything that ails me through my mind. I pace around and around in circles until I feel dizzy and have to sit down on the bed. Only then do I calm myself enough to look out the window to where Frankie and Theo are talking, both sitting on the bench, both looking grave.

I try to imagine what they’re saying about me; are they second-guessing themselves to stick with me? Are they trying to imagine what happened when they left me behind? Or do they simply pity the girl who refuses to show her true self?

The sound of someone clapping from behind me breaks my gaze and I instantly turn my head to see who it is. My blood runs cold, freezing. The moment I take him in, it feels as if all the breath in my body has escaped to allow his poison to seep in…all over again.

“Well, well, well, you’ve managed to upstage yourself again, you little idiot,” my brother says in his usual bitter tone of voice. It sends shivers down my spine, but instead of cowering, I remember who I’ve built myself up to be. I square my shoulders and get to my feet so I can at least face him on more of an even footing, despite our height difference. I must not show fear. “Don’t bank on this lasting, Isobel.”

“Jealous, are we?” I smirk with fake confidence as I shove past him.

“Of a little whore like you? Don’t make me laugh, Isobel.”

He catches my wrist before I can clear his area of reach and leans in to whisper in my ear. His breath is hot with the smell of liquor, just like it used to be, which makes me want to vomit.

“What will lover boy think when he hears what a disgusting little slut you’ve been?”

“Perhaps you should look up the definition of ‘slut’ and ‘whore’, Ethan,” I tell him with conviction, “you might find you need to brush up on your vocabulary seeing as I’m neither of those things.”

At my rebuttal, he grabs me by the throat and pushes me up against the wall with one of his meaty hands. Unable to hide it any longer, I freeze in complete fear. He smiles with self-satisfaction over my reaction before looking down at my chest, which is now heaving in and out, struggling to get enough air with which to breathe. He sucks a breath in through his teeth before grinning like he so often has in my nightmares.

“Stop…looking…at…me…like…that,” I gasp between breaths, but he just laughs.

“You disgust me, Isobel,” he says with a sneer on his face, one that is ugly and threatening.

With his spare hand, he grips hold of my hair and wraps it around his wrist, pulling at my scalp so I wince with pain. He then covers my mouth with the hand that was holding my neck, allowing me to gasp for air. No sooner have I done so does he slam my head against the wall, stifling my cries the moment they come out into the open. He repeats this action two more times before the room around me begins to blur. I feel my eyes rolling back as unconsciousness threatens to take over, but I will not lose control with him here, I will not let myself become vulnerable around him. I know how dangerous he is, and I cannot let go of my senses, not yet. I fight the darkness as hard as I can, even though it would feel so good to just slip under the blanket of sleep.

Eventually, he releases me, and I fall to the floor in a heap of coughing and retching. The objects and furniture are still a blur; I cannot even see Ethan anymore. I get to my hands and knees and begin crawling in the direction of a long column of light, where I know the bathroom is. Once there, I lie flat against the cold, tiled floor until my normal vision returns. My bedroom door is slammed shut, signaling Ethan’s welcome departure, so I grasp hold of the shower tap and turn it to the coldest setting there is. I then crouch under the icy temperature of the water, shocking my system so I can wake from the darkness. After a while, it serves another purpose; a need to numb my body and my mind, so I close my eyes and let it consume me.

_____

Theo

Be patient.

Mom had said those words to me not ten minutes ago, but even now I’m trying to stop myself from running up to Izzy and demanding that she tell me what the hell happened to her. I want to help, I want to make whatever it is better, and I want to do it now.She’ll tell you when she’s ready,felt like a kick in the gut, even if I do understand that helping Iz means waiting for her to open up when she feels safe enough. Which is why I’m currently repeatingBe patientinside of my head like a kid getting ready to take an exam.

I’m focusing so hard on those words that I almost miss the sight of Ethan walking down the stairs, looking punchable as always. However, when my head finally makes sense of his having been upstairs, I immediately decide to go and check out what the creepy bastard’s been up to. At first, I decide to head for my office, assuming he’s been rummaging around for something.However, something unnerving tells me to head to Izzy’s room.

Cautiously, I walk toward where I see light seeping through the gap beneath her door. When I step inside, I find what looks like the crime scene of a robbery. Furniture has been overturned, and personal items are scattered across the floor, but it’s the sound of the shower running at full pelt that has me rushing to the bathroom. I find Izzy, fully clothed, crouching beneath the shower head, her skin mottled with a bluish tint, her limbs shivering, and her eyes staring into nothing. I put my hand under the water and curse; it’s freezing!

“Izzy,” I shout as though she’s passed out, which in a way she is, for she remains slumped at the bottom of the shower tray. It’s not until I turn off the tap that she comes to again, gasping and shaking even more vigorously. My instincts have me trying to wrap my arms around her, but it only causes her to start thrashing around and trying to fight me away.

“No, no…don’t touch me!” she cries as I desperately try to grab at her wrists so I can show her I’m safe, a friend. However, she only ends up screaming.

“Izzy, please, it’s me!”

I try and still her and make her look at me, but it takes some time for her to see I’m not whoever she thinks I am; that I’m not going to hurt her. When she finally looks into my eyes with realization, she shudders, then turns away in embarrassment. I lift her carefully out of the shower, noticing how much she’s shivering. Without words, I place her on the bed and strip down to my bare skin, wearing nothing but my boxers, and then huddle under the covers next to her so I can hold her close to me. I then rub her arms and her legs to cause a heated friction between me and her mottled skin.

She eventually stops shivering and her skin turns to more of an alabaster shade rather than icy blue. We lie still for a long while, with me holding her tight, reminding me of the two nights we had spent holding one another as teenagers. When I had fallen in love with her.

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