Kisscut

She told Mark, "Greg was never like that. I knew that. I knew that in my mind." She squeezed Mark's hand. "I knew it somewhere, and I didn't care. I just wanted to be with him. I wanted to feel him."

She put her hand to her mouth, but there was no turning back now. "Then, the drugs would wear off," she said, feeling like she was describing something that had happened to someone else. "And I would start to feel things. I would start to realize what was going on, who I really was." She swallowed hard. "What I had done with him." Lena felt her stomach turn in disgust. "The noises I had made," she whispered, remembering them now, how she had talked back to him, how she had pleaded with him the way she would plead with a lover.

Her hand dropped to her chest, and she could feel her heart pounding. "And then I would cry," she said, tears streaming down her face. "I would cry, because I was so disgusted with myself, and then I would cry because I felt so alone." She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "I would cry because I didn't want to be alone, didn't want to know what had happened."

"And when he came to me…" she whispered. "When he came back into the room, and I wasn't alone anymore…"

Lena had to stop, because she was going to hyperventilate if she did not get her breathing under control. She looked at Mark's hand, rubbing her fingers across the tattoo.

Mark's confession came back to Lena in a flood, and she could hear now what she could not let herself hear in that trailer. He had talked about the crime against him like a lover recalling a particularly passionate moment. As Lena played his words in her head over and over again, she finally knew why he had branded himself with the tattoo. She knew the guilt Mark carried around with him like an anvil tied to his heart. Part of him would always be his mother's son. Part of him would always be back in that trailer, listening to a CD, when his mother came into his room and raped him. Part of him would always remember how good it felt, if only for the moment, to be inside of her, to fuck her. No matter where he went or what he did, Mark would carry that brand inside of him. The tattoo only made it so that other people could see. The tattoo was Mark's way of telling people that he did not belong to them, that he would always belong to his mother. What she had done had marked him inside the way no needle and ink could ever mark his skin.

For the rest of his life, maybe even right now, trapped in his body as he was, Mark would carry with him the knowledge that he had enjoyed it. Just for that moment in time, he had been his mother's favorite, he had experienced what he thought of as love for maybe the first time in his life. In her sick, twisted way, Grace Patterson had made her son feel wanted, and he had loved her back for it, even as he had hated her for doing something so wrong.

The room was silent but for the machines and the blood pounding in Lena 's ears. She heard a high-pitched whining noise, but knew it was only in her head. She wanted to stand up, to let go of Mark, to leave him in this bed to die because he would do that with or without her.

Still, she had come this far. There was no one stopping her, no one questioning the insanity of her revelations. There was just Lena in the room, and if Mark was there, if he was really there with her, hearing what she was saying, then he was probably the only other person in the world who could understand what she was saying.

"I was so lonely when he left me there," Lena began, her voice a hoarse whisper as she made herself go back to that horrible place. She clenched her teeth, not sure she could go on. It was this part that killed her every time, the reason she would never go into therapy or tell anyone what had really happened in that room four months ago.

"When he came back-back into the room-and I wasn't alone anymore…" Lena stopped, choking on a sob. She could not say this. She could not make herself admit this to anyone, not even Mark, not even this lifeless shell who wasn't even Mark anymore. She was not strong enough. She could not overcome this.

"Shit," Lena cried, trying to keep herself from breaking down. Her body shook, and soon she was wracked with sobbing. If Mark could still feel things, he would be able to feel her hands shaking, sense the fear that held her body like a steel trap. He would understand the pain that touched her deep inside the way no one ever would be able to again. No pills would take this away. Even a bullet passing through her brain would not push out the knowledge, and Lena knew that even if she did manage to do it, to pull that trigger or take all of those pills, her last thoughts would still be of him.

"No," Lena said, shaking her head violently side to side. "No, no, no," she insisted, thinking about what Nan had said, knowing what Sibyl would say if she were here.

"Be strong," Lena said, speaking for Sibyl. "Be stronger than this."

Lena thought of Hank, too, sitting on the floor in her bathroom, weeping openly, just as she wept now.

"When he came back into the room with me," Lena began, forcing herself to speak, pushing herself to say his name. "When he came back to me," she repeated, "part of me was relieved." She stopped, knowing that was still not right. She could tell Mark this, because Mark understood. He knew what it was like to be so empty that you took whatever people gave you. She knew the loneliness of being locked in a pitch-black room with nothing to do but wait. She knew that there came a point when your mind told you everything was wrong, but your body betrayed you anyway, reaching out for whatever comfort was offered.

She swallowed, starting again. "When he came back into the room," she began, "part of me was… happy."

Chapter Twenty-Two

Sara sat on the floor across from Lacey Patterson in the back room of the children's clinic. Just a few days ago, Lacey had come here seeking help. Now she was back, having gone through unspeakable things, and all Sara could do was wait for the girl to talk.

"Dottie just left you at Wayne 's house?" Sara asked.

"Yeah," Lacey said, looking down at her shoes. She had asked to sit on the floor for some reason, and Sara had obliged, wanting to make the girl as comfortable as possible. She did not want Sara close, and so they had decided Sara would sit a foot away with her back against the closed door. Lacey sat in the middle of the room.

Lacey said, "The pills made me sleepy."

"And you don't remember anything that went on until you woke up in the hospital?"

She nodded, then started to bite her fingernails. Time passed, and the little girl was down to the cuticle on her thumb, and working on her pinky finger when Sara reached out and stopped her.

"You'll hurt yourself," Sara said, then realized from Lacey's expression how silly the warning was.

Lacey chewed at her cuticle, asking, "Is Mark going to be okay?"

"I don't know, sweetie."

Lacey teared up, but she did not cry. "I didn't mean to hurt him," she said.

"How did you hurt him?"

"He was coming after me again, and I just grabbed the knife."

"You're the one who cut him?"

She nodded, chewing another nail. "They were at Dot-tie's, taking things out of the house and painting. I was hiding, but Mark found me. I kicked him in the head with my foot." She took her fingers out of her mouth. "Mark didn't want me to come here to see you. I wanted to say goodbye, and then I was so scared I got sick. I'm sorry."

"That's okay," Sara assured her. "So you came here and then Mark showed up? And then you ran and Dottie picked you up in the black car?"

Lacey nodded, but she still would not say who had been driving the car. She asked, "You don't think that's why he tried to kill himself, do you? Because I hit him?"