Page 50 of When Sinners Fear
I just shake my head. The guilt rumbles in my stomach and makes me question my next bite. I drop the fork and settle on the wine. It’s not particularly good – it tangs at the back of my mouth.
Why is this so hard?
Knox doesn’t say anything more, but he does clear his plate. It’s the first thing that injects a little warmth into me, a shred of satisfaction. I shake my head, frustrated that I feel like a stranger inside my own mind.
“Are you feeling any better?” I ask. “Has the doctor mentioned skin grafts or your recovery period?”
“He’s talked to me about a lot of shit.” He reaches for his drink and downs it again. “I’ll heal. As will you.”
“Okay. I’ll get the dishes.” I stand and take our plates.
Upstairs, I look around at the generous bedroom that’s been given over to me. For how long I can’t say after what happened yesterday and my inability to leave, but I can also feel the unrest between me and Knox. He’s not completely at ease about my presence, and I’m not sure how I feel about that reaction. Disappointed and confused, I suppose, and I’m a little horrified by my actions and responses since coming back here. But then, is it fair to assume that nothing would have changed after what we’ve been through?
I sit on the edge of the bed and pull open the bedside table drawer and look at the small cup with the pill still inside. The morning-after pill. There’s no need for an explanation for why I was given it, but there’s a lot to unpack about my decision not to swallow the little thing.
I lick my lips and still taste the fruity tang of the wine Knox poured for me.
From a biological perspective, I know I could be pregnant. We had unprotected sex. On multiple occasions, so that’s increased the chance of the unthinkable happening. But, for once, my mind doesn’t want to rely on the surety of scientific fact, and I wonder if my upbringing has seeped into my decision. I know I don’t want a baby, and certainly not under these circumstances. So why can’t I just put the thought out of my mind?
Sighing, I stare at the pot. It’s an unlikely possibility. It was my first time, it was traumatic, and my body went through plenty of trauma. These pills are also less effective the longer you wait. Nobody has given me the exact time we were gone, but it’s more than five days – Mariana said something about that – there’s no counting on it working, anyway. So I shut the pot back in the drawer.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
KNOX
It’s been precisely four days of her being in my house.
And precisely twelve days of being so close to her I feel oddly widowed without her near.
None of that makes any reasonable sense to me, no matter how much I stare at my watch or try to navigate the absurdity. I should be back out there by now – doing what I do. But the thought of stepping foot outside these grounds, malicious intent or not, is proving fucking tiresome. Watching her move has become a fascination. Listening to her breathe is becoming an obsession. And waiting for her to speak, attitude or not, is fucking unnerving.
I’m even awake most of the night to check she’s not sleepwalking again or shrieking about nightmares she’s still enduring. And if not that, I’m waiting for the silent alarm to sound for security breaches, like it did when she went for a moonlight stroll. I watched her the entire time that night from the darkness of my room. I smoked, as she wandered aimlessly. There was no purpose to her steps, and she seemed as lost as I felt. She was free, though, or as free as my grounds provide. Reams of guilt constantly swelled inside me, as she moved. They caused intense reactions to form inside me, despite any intent from her to root them in.
Those reactions are still here now.
It’s all pissing on my ability to heal the way I should. She is.
At least the doc has been in and changed my bandages to waterproof ones now so I can shower. He didn’t say much about her. She’s healing fine, apparently.
Another slug of whiskey slides down my throat, and I stare at her uncovered legs as she flips pages of a book listlessly and sips red wine. She’s not interested in either. For a start, the wine’s too acidic for a beginner, and secondly, she’s reading poetry. Keats, to be exact. Whilst Keats, with its romanticism and delight, is possibly more her style than the Marquis De Sade collection she picked up earlier, she’d be better concentrating on De Sade if she’s to stay here much longer. I will not be curtailed because of whatever she is becoming to me. And I will not hide.
I look back at my laptop and upload everything I need from there into my new phone.
“Why are you still here?” I ask, almost petulantly.
She doesn’t look up from her pages. “It’s easier here.”
“How is being here, with me, easier?”
Her finger hovers on the edge of the page, and she takes a long gulp of the wine. “I don’t feel guilt around you. I don’t have to think about that. I can concentrate on me. But I suppose you’re right. I should go.”
“Guilt? What do you have to feel guilty about?”
The book shuts quietly in her lap, and she stands to walk out to the deck. I wait for an answer, but she’s gone into the gardens before she bothers. I follow without much thought, still riddled with pain and still annoyed with that. I thought I’d feel better by now – stronger. I don’t.
By the time I catch up with her, she’s crouched down and looking at some yellow flowers down by the stream. “Peyton. There is nothing you should be feeling guilty about.”
“My mother’s dying. I should be with her.”