The Last Party by A. R. Torre

Author:A. R. Torre [Torre, A. R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Published: 2024-08-20T00:00:00+00:00

Sometimes it’s not the people who change. It’s the mask that falls off.

I repeated the line as I hurried along the wide hall, past the commissary and the library, to my block and then to my cell. Entering the narrow space, I retrieved my files of letters and carefully combed through the stacks.

For my regulars, I kept them grouped by sender, and I thumbed through the women until I got to the men. It was likely the brother, Mr. Anonymous. I pulled out his stack and started there, kneeling on the hard concrete floor and spreading out the pages.

The collection was thick, over fifty or sixty pages, and I forced myself to be careful not to rip anything.

How long ago had I heard that? At least a year, maybe a few.

I’d worn a mask for decades. One that only a couple of people had ever seen behind. Hell, I had adopted a new one once I got here, for survival more than anything.

I don’t understand how a man like you can look at himself in the mirror.

I flipped to the next letter, scanned it quickly, then the next. A dozen more letters passed.

She was the only pure thing in my life. What did she do to deserve this? How did you justify this in your mind?

Maybe it wasn’t from him. Maybe it had been from—my finger stopped mid-scroll on a paragraph of handwritten text.

I’ve been reading about narcissistic behavior and the differences between a narcissist and a sociopath. Both work very diligently to appear normal but hide their true nature behind a mask—their public persona. When they act outside of that public persona . . . say, killing a group of innocent children . . . it’s not a psychological break, it’s just an interruption of the play-acting . . . i.e., their mask slipping off. To say that another way . . .

Sometimes it’s not the people who change. It’s the mask that falls off.

That is so disturbing to me . . . the idea that the people in my life could be like you, and just . . .

I stopped, then reread it. Narcissistic behavior . . . That’s what Tim had said, right? It’s something they say about narcissists. It can also be applied to violent individuals.

Maybe it was a coincidence, or maybe this was the scratch that had been digging its way deeper and deeper into my brain with each visit from Dr. Valden.

I pinched my eyes closed, trying to piece together what I had told the pen pal versus what I had told the visitor. I’d always been careful to keep the different pieces of the truth in compartments, but I might have . . . maybe . . . shared too much between the two of them?

I hadn’t been the only one with a mask on. The brother had a wife and a kid. Tim had presented himself as single. Who was telling the truth? The brother had been in a long-term relationship . .

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