Objects In Motion by Kristen Mae

Author:Kristen Mae [Mae, Kristen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780997541854
Publisher: Tritone Literary Publishers

* * *

In the very early morning, when the streets outside were still dark and quiet, I awoke to a scratching sound. No … gagging. Choking. Hazel, thrashing, clawing at the air, kicking at the covers, her whole body tense with fight. I pushed myself to sitting. A seizure? No, she was moaning too, whimpering something unintelligible—a nightmare.

I shook her, and she slapped at me, still whimpering. She’s awake. Is she awake? No. Her eyes were open, but she was not seeing.

“Hazel,” I said, afraid now as her terror filled the room, seeping into my pores the same way her desire had done.

“Hazel!” I shouted it this time, grabbed her shoulders, and again her arms came lashing out, catching me in the face with the heel of her hand before her eyes focused at last. “Hazel!” I said again. “It’s just a dream!”

Her arms dropped to the bed, and she stared at me with wide, troubled eyes as reality returned. I held her, dropped my head to her chest where I could feel the furious pounding of her heart. “It’s just a dream, you’re okay. You’re okay, you’re okay,” I whispered, but I was shaking, hollowed out by her terror, made porous and insubstantial. Was this how she felt all the time?

“Please cover me,” she sobbed, reaching for the blanket she’d kicked to the foot of the bed. I pulled it up around us, cocooning us.

“Tell me.”

“It was here … I dreamed it was here. It was around my throat.”

“It?” A chill crawled up my spine.

“I couldn’t see it … it was”—she paused a moment to take a shuddering breath—“on top of me. It was coiling around my neck, and I was trying to yell for help, but it was squeezing me, and it was on top of me, it was … it was trying to rape me and I couldn’t fight…” She cried soundlessly, shaking against me while I stroked her hair.

“I get it. He’s always there, even though you can’t see him. It’s like … like he’s left an imprint of fear on you, and you feel trapped and suffocated by him, like he’s taken away your very voice. I get it.”

I laid a hand on her cheek, went to kiss her, but she jerked backward with a sharp intake of breath. “Please don’t. Please … don’t fix me.” Tears glistened on her face.

“What?” My heart stuttered to a stop in my chest.

“You like me because I’m broken. You think you can fix me.”

Make her into your little project…

So it was me. I’d looked at her like a chipped music box that only needed a bit of glue to be as good as perfect, and she’d sensed it. “Is that what you think? Because of what I said last night?” My insides suddenly seemed made of lead. “Is that why you’ve been so distant all day?”

She didn’t answer.

She was right, though. I had wanted to fix her. And I’d hurt her by saying what I meant, by being honest about how I felt.

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