Close Your Eyes by J.A. Konrath

Author:J.A. Konrath [Konrath, J.A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

LYON

SAME TIME…

Kelli Lyons set down her phone and undressed. Naked, she climbed onto Duncan’s bed and squatted.

She clutched Duncan’s pillow against her chest, sniffing it hard, remembering his scent from that car ride he gave her.

It seems so long ago now.

Why doesn’t he know we’re meant to be together?

Why is he dating that stupid whore, Katie, and not me?

Doesn’t he know I’m perfect for him?

Doesn’t he see how much I love him?

She removed the pillowcase, intending to keep it for her hope chest. Lyon had been collecting little things that Duncan had owned, or merely touched, as a placeholder until she had him.

After folding it up, she pissed on his blankets, moving her butt to get wider coverage, soaking his blankets and mattress and emptying her full bladder. When Lyon finished she climbed off the bed and put on her jeans, socks, and boots. Bare chested, she stared at herself in the oversized mirror on Duncan’s dresser.

Years ago she considered getting tattoos, but Mother would have never allowed it. She got away with the facial piercings because she was able to take them out when she was home. Mother lost her eyeglasses in the horde years ago, misplaced among all the thrift store crap and garbage she lived with, floor-to-ceiling. But she would have noticed full sleeve artwork, or a back tattoo.

So Lyon went another route to modify her body.

She lifted her arms, admiring the network of scars crisscrossing her torso. Seventy-seven X-marks, each several inches long, covering her breasts, stomach, shoulders, arms. She had more on her thighs and legs.

Everywhere she could reach on the body with a razor blade, Lyon marked with an X.

She fished a blade out of her front pocket and returned to Duncan’s bed. Raising her left arm and flexing her bicep, Lyon cut a deep X underneath her elbow.

Hello, X number seventy-eight.

X marks the spot.

She held her arm over Duncan’s bed, letting her blood drip down and mix with the piss.

It hurt. But it’s a good kind of hurt.

The kind of hurt I can control.

Lyon understood, from a young age, that life was pain. Mother, who was all kinds of crazy, hurt Lyon in hundreds of ways.

But Mother could never break her.

Because, from a young age, Lyon learned the secret.

Nothing in the world can hurt me more than I hurt myself.

At first, she restricted the cutting to her buttocks. Even as a kid, there was ample fat there so she could go deep without permanent injury. Also, it was hidden from everyone. But Lyon was reminded of her mastery over misery every time she sat down.

As she got older, and Mother’s eyesight got worse, Lyon began marking more of her skin canvas.

Pain can be beautiful, if you embrace it.

The blood eventually stopped, as it always did, and Lyon went to the bathroom and washed her arm. She put her Plasmatics T-shirt back on, then went to her phone to check her trackers.

All four of them pinged locations.

The one in Duncan’s car was stationary, the car parked out back next to his friends’ cars.

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