2019-07-19 - 25 or 6 to 4

Everything is wrong about where Alexander is, even the floor. It sways and bobs under his feet – not a lot, for the houseboat is a sturdy presence and well secured to the dock – but just enough. Enough to remind him that he’s walking on unstable ground.

As if Alexander ever needed that reminder.

The sleeper sofa isn’t the most comfortable place he’s ever tried to sleep, but it’s not the least, either. It could be made of the stacked mattresses from that old fairy tale, and it still wouldn’t matter. His nerves hum with the aftermath of the evening’s events, his hands starting to shake whenever he doesn’t exert effort to control them. Once the inevitable argument with Isabella over sleeping arrangements is won (he suspects he only won because she’s still half-starved and too exhausted to put up a proper fight) and she’s settled into her bed, he doesn’t bother to try.

He does try not to throw up. That seems rude. But the nausea twists in his stomach, and being in an unfamiliar place, with an unfamiliar mind nearby, his skin still tingling with unaccustomed contact, and the air tinged with the obsession that has taken root in her soul, it isn’t helping. He can’t relax here, can’t pull on his headphones and let the music try to drive out the worries and the fear until his body can drag his mind into something LIKE healthy sleep. Instead, he walks, shoeless and soft, in ever-changing patterns in the dark living space, and frets.

Dr. Faust. Isabella. Thorne. Isolde. Miss Winslow. Miss Whitehouse. His thoughts ping-pong back and forth between them all, and it’s all he can do to not stretch out his mind and see how many of them he can touch, just to reassure himself that they’re alive and sane. He doesn’t, because he’s already done too much; the shadows are deep and dark and he feels like something is gnawing at the edges of his essential self, reminding him of all the terrible things that can happen to friends.

Isabella was going to have bruises. Not many. He tried. He tried. But there were going to be some, and they were going to be because of him.

You’re doing God’s work, Alexander. The voice was so real, so close that he had to shove a fist into his mouth to keep from crying out. He stumbled in a circle, eyes wide, straining to make sense from shadows. He was alone. He was absolutely alone in the dark. But he could still hear it, warm and low against his ear. Reassuring. Strong. Without doubt or fear. He wanted to sink into it. He wanted to smash it into a million pieces.

And the voice didn’t care what he wanted, which was the most familiar thing of all. It continued. She required correction to regain the righteous path. You did your duty, that’s all. Thorne put her in your keeping. Dr. Glass agreed. They wouldn’t have done that if you were wrong.

Things that everyone agreed on were real. That was right, wasn’t it? Maybe. Maybe. But Thorn hadn’t seemed quite right, either, had he? Stressed. He was stressed. Because it was a fucking stressful time in Gray Harbor. There was nothing wrong about that. Nothing that required (correction) immediate attention. The only thing that really needed immediate attention was sleep. His sleep. He found himself stopped, staring at the bottle of pills that Dr. Glass had left in his care. They weren’t for him. And he couldn’t afford to take them. Not if he wanted to keep Isabella from giving him the slip.

He turned away from the bottle, forced himself to sit on the sofa pull out. The quietest brush of his mind on hers, just to make sure she was still asleep, while his hands continued to tremble and twist against one another, as if he could rub away the memory of her wrists straining against his grip. For the first time in many years, Alexander had the urge to pray.

He curled up on his side and recited crime statistics to himself, instead.