Chapter Ten
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I took in a deep breath and slowly opened my eyes to stare at the ceiling. After the happenings of the late morning, Marshal and I both lost any appetite. Mental and emotional exhaustion pulled, making both of us agree that a noontime nap would be wise to keep our minds sharp and clear on what our mission was really about. So, we decided to walk around the town itself in those few hours before dinner.
I stretched, but my left hip pressed against something. I looked over and blinked.
Marshal lay beside me, on his back as I was, with his hands behind his head. He looked over and smiled slightly. "Hey."
I pushed myself into a sitting position and sent him a sidelong glance as I wiped the sleep from my eyes and likely the creases from my face.
"Dinner's in an hour," he said quietly. "You should make use of the shower."
I looked sharply at my watch. I had slept clear through the afternoon. I focused a scowl on Marshal. "Why didn't you wake me?"
He looked away and sat up, swinging his legs over his side of the bed. "You looked tired. What are vacations for if you can't sleep in the middle of the day?" He stood and made his way to his dresser. "Besides, you're too cute when you're sleeping. I couldn't do it."
I pressed my lips together and slid off the bed to make my way to the bathroom. 'Too cute'? I scoffed and shut the door with a slight slam. I turned and cranked up the hot water. We aren't really on vacation! I pressed my lips together as I roughly stripped out of my clothes. I threw them aside and stepped into the steaming shower.
Marshal knew the trip around town was essential to giving us the opportunity to touch-base with the locals regarding 'happenings' here, as well as 'things-to-see'. I wanted to be there to pose my own questions. Him allowing me to sleep had stolen that opportunity. I swore.
tap-tap-tap "Ahndra?"
I frowned and began roughly scrubbing shampoo into my hair. "What."
click clack--door open--click clunk--door shut
I heard the slight creak as Marshal leaned against the counter. "Ahndra, we can walk around after dinner."
I knew that, but that wasn't the point.
"You were tired," he went on carefully. "I was tired. You haven't been sleeping well. This is my first weekend off in months. I figured we could use the rest."
'We could use.' I wiped the shampoo and water from my eyes and stared at the wall ahead of me. "You didn't. . .?"
"Walk around? Of course not. You want to talk to the people here as much as I do." There sounded another creak as he adjusted his position. "I took a nap same as you. Felt damn good."
I turned and dipped my face under the water. Yes it had. No dreams. Nothing. Just sleep.
Marshal tapped at the shower door. "Okay?"
I turned again and rested my palms against the wall as the water from the shower pelted my back, warily accepting the answer with a carefully voiced "Okay."
creak "So do you want to go tomorrow before breakfast? Or after dinner?"
I closed my eyes and pressed my palms harder against the wall. I wanted to go this evening, so I could find the clues that would solve the mystery and let me leave before tonight--I punched the wall. "After breakfast," I said through clenched teeth.
Marshal didn't move. He didn't speak. He didn't stop watching me through the shower door. I could feel it. The study. The reasoning. The piecing together of the puzzle he mentioned before. A challenge. A mystery. I slowly opened my eyes. This would be one mystery he wouldn't solve. Who could imagine a life like mine?
Marshal stepped slightly closer to the shower door, and I cringed back toward the opposite wall, my eyes focusing on the muted shadow of his form. He backed away, and I heard his deep breath.
"I'll call down to the restaurant and make sure they have a table." His steps toward the door--click clack of the door opening--a pause--click clunk of the door closing again. I released a heavy breath as I turned, pressing my back against the cool wall. I rested my head back and closed my eyes, balling my hands into fists.
'I'm gonna hold you, Ana.'
My eyes snapped open and I grabbed up the body sponge. I scrubbed and scrubbed, but I could still feel it. The other burning. The slight, continued tingle. The barest hint of warmth. The new memory. I choked and stared at my arms. The scars that told of beatings and pain, but all they remembered was a slight, non-invasive touch. I didn't know how to ignore it. Daddy's. . . forgetting that was simple self-preservation. This--I scrubbed at the arm until it glowed red. My body wanted more of that touch. I could feel the hunger for it roar, building up just as the rage had done.
I threw the sponge with a choked ". . .no."
I couldn't--I wouldn't let someone do what my father had. I had taken my body back, and I wouldn't let it be used again. Ever. I pushed the shower door roughly open and stepped out to grab up a white towel. Yet even that kept bringing back the memory within the shower and throughout the night, and on the ship, and in the field. . . proving there was something different. Proving that what my father did wasn't the only--I shook the thought out of my head and rubbed harder with the towel, almost frantic. It only began to draw out the more painful images--
I tossed the towel aside with a strangled "Damn it."
But if I had to choose--Why? Why must I choose either? Why must I have it? I don't need it. I don't want it! I slammed my fists onto the counter.
Yet Marshal's touch had finally burned away that of my father, and my sanity craved more. I knew it wouldn't give me peace until I had it, but the thought of--I shivered and lowered my head. Everything was different. It wasn't fair. I wanted. . . . I slightly shook my head. I didn't know what I wanted. Not now. Not since Seifer had done that first damned push.
I beat my fists against the counter again.
tap-tap "Ahndra? You okay?"
I turned away and grabbed for my shorts and shirt. My stomach felt as if it slithered to my feet and then rose to lodge itself in my throat. Leave me alone. . . please! "Fine." I didn't even convince myself.
silence "You need me to grab you some clothes to change into for dinner?"
I rubbed at my forehead, noticing my shaking fingers with a flare of temper. 'Get me my beer, Ahndra!' 'If you don't get your ass in there and get me my din--' "Yes."
I heard the dressers opening and closing out in the main room as I dressed into my panties and bra. Then I sat on the toilet and covered my face with my hands.
tap-tap "Ahndra?"
I looked up. ". . .what." And I could barely hear my own voice.
click-clack The door opened slightly and an arm and hand appeared holding a pair of black slacks and a long-sleeved sweater of dark blue. I stood and made my way over to the hand to take the clothes. Marshal then drew back his arm and closed the door. I stared at the clothes and then raised my gaze to that section of the door where I knew he would stand. Why didn't he ever--
"If you want something else, just let me know."
'Tough shit! You're going to deal with it, you ungrateful--'
My hand fisted around the clothes. Something else. Something else? What I wanted I didn't want to want. Just leave me alone! But what would that do? When I enrolled at Garden, everyone had left me alone, yet the nightmares still came. The rage kept burning. The hate. The cold. These past few days had been the first. . . .
I stared down at the clothes in my hand, still hearing Marshal's slight breathing outside the door. My insides tightened, and I forced myself to turn away. My brain pounded. My eye throbbed. I didn't know if it was dread or panic or something I hadn't had since my mom died. How could I remember that far back? I didn't even have images of her.
I slightly shook my head and pushed all the pounding and questions away, tossing my clothes onto the counter with a choked sound. I grabbed up the slacks just as there was another tap. My insides tightened so hard and fast that I nearly doubled over.
"Ana?" and he almost whispered. "Are you sure you're okay?"
I roughl
y stepped into the slacks, ignoring the something that burned in my eyes and strangled my throat. 'This what you want?' I cringed as the soft warmth began to warp. The soft touch began to feel harder. Rougher. My throat tightened so quickly that I choked again. I fought it back as I grabbed my sweater and yanked it over my head, pushing my arms through the sleeves so hard it burned. 'I'll sex you up!' Weight--I tried to push it away as I leaned my hands against the counter. 'Don't fight me, you little bitch!' I choked and crumpled at the remembered intense pain--
The door opened slowly--"Ahndra!"
And Marshal stepped in to kneel beside me, but he didn't touch me. No one ever touched me--I covered my face with my hands, trying to hold it back: the nausea, the tears, the rage. ". . . damn it," I hissed. The gropes, the clumsy and drunken invasions--I shivered violently and reached out to grab Marshal's shirt, eyes wide. His expression showed calm seriousness. I choked out "I don't want it!" I shook him, hard. " I never did!"
Marshal slightly nodded, and then his silver eyes colored to charcoal. "What can I do?"
Panic and self-preservation flared as I shook him again. "I don't know!" My head and eye continued to throb. I squeezed my eyes shut tight and held my head in my hands. "Stop! STOP!" It had been five years. Five years of ignoring hell while smelling its sulfur. Five years of scrubbing my skin raw while still feeling those damned fingers. Five years of--
'Get over here, Ahndra--'
". . .make it stop," I choked.
"I'm gonna hold you, Ahndra."
And Daddy's voice from the past collided with Marshal's from the present and disappeared. The arms surrounded. Again that blessed and torturous shiver and tingle. The burning away. "Go to hell," I whispered. "Leave me alone. Go to hell." My hands moved to once again clutch at Marshal's shirt. "You bastard--" and my voice choked on the word. "No more. Please. No more. No more."
It needed to go. The nightmares. The voices. The images. All of it. Each day it grew harder to do my job. Keeping distant. Keeping cold and angry. My hands clenched tighter as the throb in my head grew to a sharp pain. Dizziness. Heat burning the images, warping the voices, twisting my insides.
Then there was a soft stroke on my hair. . . and again. . . soothing the throbbing and easing the pain. Making so many things disappear. I slowly opened my eyes to stare at a rust spot on the silver pipe under the sink counter. Blinking slowly. Breathing slower. More relaxed than I had ever been. Warmth. Safety. Had I ever felt that? But that must be what this was. No lurking cringes or flinches. No wariness. No twists of the stomach.
Again, Marshal didn't ask anything. Didn't push anything.
So I did. I pushed back and lifted my gaze to meet his. He still looked serious. His silver eyes charcoal. They looked into both of mine--and then reached up to brush the hair from my scarred face, gently touching the scar near my eye as he did. Then he smiled. I don't understand why someone like him would smile at someone like me. But he did.
"Why don't you ask?" I didn't understand why he wouldn't ask 'What happened to you?' Didn't he want to know?
"Ana. . . .” Marshal looked down at my hand and gently took it in his. “I won't ask. I'm not saying I don't want to. I just won't."
"Why?"
He lifted his eyes to meet mine. "Because it hurts."
I blinked and then lowered my gaze. Yes. Yes, it did. Each time I thought of it the agony came.
"I'll listen if you want to talk," he added quietly, "but I won't ask. Not this time."
I lifted my eyes to meet his. Calm seriousness. Charcoal silver. Those eyes had watched a sister live and die in my torture. I lowered my gaze. I couldn't watch those eyes for very long. Those eyes saw me as easily as Seifer did.
Marshal leaned a little closer and whispered, "It's all right," as he gently enfolded me in his arms. "The bastard can't hurt you anymore."
My entire body relaxed against his warmth, trembling. I felt like I was eight years old all over again. Terrified. Alone. But then Marshal adjusted those arms around me. Not invading. Just being. Like Seifer, but not. Different. Good. So damn good.
But everything good always came to an end.
The memories would be back. The images would burn my scarred eye. The touch. The invasion--No! I want something else. Something else! I lifted a frantic expression to meet that silver gaze, but I didn't know how to ask. I didn't know what to ask.
I choked, and Marshal seemed to cringe a bit with the sound. Then he reached out and lightly stroked my cheek with his fingers again. Never before had I been touched the way Marshal touched me. The way he smiled at me. The way he said my name--I pushed myself hard against him, my lips against his. But it was the same. The revulsion came with the touch, and then my father's breath on my face--I choked back a sob and pulled away. Marshal followed, continuing the kiss, but softer. Gentler. Chasing away the breath and the face as his gentle hold on my arms kept me slightly back.
Terror flared to that 'something else', but I didn't understand it. I just wanted a different nightmare. A different face in the dream. A softer touch. . . . My arms surrounded Marshal as my mouth remembered and then learned and returned the gentle touch. The soft intensity of movement. He drew me a little closer, lowering me back onto the cold bathroom floor with his arms surrounding yet again.
"Ahndra. . . ." And the name was caressed against my lips. "Ana, I’m sorry. . . ."
But to my vanishing terror the statement didn’t fit, and I didn't care. All I could focus on was the warmth of him and the different weight pressing against me and chasing away the weight of my father. That was it. Nothing more. I didn’t know what to feel next. I didn’t know what to think about anything that happened before or what would happen after--
Thoughts scattered and my body responded as Marshal’s lips moved slowly across my cheek. Each touch lasted a mere instant in length, as if he fought within himself. Fought against what he did. But I needed it. I needed a different ending to the nightmare.
Marshal’s lips paused at my ear, his breathing different and yet the same. "I didn’t mean this to happen. Not like this."
But I didn't care, and my body roared for more while my mind pleaded for protection from something I didn't want to face. All I could do was turn to him for that protection. For the different face. The different ending.
". . .please," I whispered. And I hadn't ever asked for anything.
Marshal's lips tickled my cheek and the scarring around my eye before again caressing my lips. Deeper. A little harder and then softer. . . he drew me closer, his lips pulling away and then returning. Touching and then retreating. My eyelids fluttered as I tried to breathe through the rampaging emotions and the need and the thirst for more.
Marshal's lips caressed themselves across my face and down the skin of my neck, his rough breathing awakening something in me I hadn't known to look for. One of his hands cautiously moved beneath my sweater, stroking the skin of my stomach to my back while caressing and touching me as I had never been touched: tenderly, awakening a mind-numbing emotion that proved I lived.
His weight adjusted itself against me and my body responded, urging itself closer as my arms tightened around him, hands clutching the back of his shirt. I could sense my sanity drowning in the waves of terror and pleasure, but everything was different. Brighter. More intense. My entire body trembled with the roar, wanting even more and not knowing how different it would be. Terrified of the sameness and yet addicted to the desire to want it--
'This what you want!'
I gasped and pulled back, my eyes snapping open as the voice burned through my mind. I could feel Marshal's entire body tense against me as he watched my expression.
He withdrew his hand from my skin very slowly. "Ana?" he asked.
I shivered at the caress and sounded a slight choke as I closed my eyes. Marshal gently stroked my hair from my face--My eyes snapped open again. He still watched me. Intensely gauging my reactions as he continued to hold me close. Tenderly touching my cheek and my hair.
Emotion tightened my throat, collecting in my stomach and flaring outward. This is what I want! You bastard! This is how it was supposed to be! Not drunken gropes and painful invasions from an animal!
"I want a different ending," I whispered, holding Marshal's charcoal gaze. "A different face in my nightmares."
Marshal drew my body closer, his lips caressing my cheek and the scar as he whispered my name, and I liked how he said my name. Soft. Like he smiled. Like he touched me. Like a caress.
". . .for the wrong reason."
I tensed and my eyes flashed open as my hands clutched his shirt. "What."
Marshal lifted his head and lightly kissed my scarred eye before momentarily meeting my gaze. "Ahndra. Hyne, you're a gorgeous woman." He caressed my cheeks and then my lips with his fingers. Finally, he held my gaze. His expression looked pained. "Ahndra, I'd be doing it for the wrong reason."
I stared at him in shock, the emotions sliding away to a pit of cold at the rejection. I never asked for anything since escaping the horror of my previous life. Now, the one time--I could feel my face harden as my body tensed within his arms.
I pushed at him, hard. "Let go of me."
He did, but he held my hands once I'd moved to sit against the far wall. "Ahndra, please," he said carefully, gently, "please listen."
Words. More words. Words. Words. I yanked my hands from his grasp and punched him hard in the face. My face set and stony. Insides cold, yet remembering the spark. Marshal turned his head back to meet my gaze, and I could still see everything in those silver eyes. Things I could read. Things I couldn't read. Things I didn't want to read. I looked away, swallowing back the tightness in my throat.
"Ahndra. . . ." He slightly shook his head. "Ana, I'm sorry. I'm not doing this to hurt you. I just, I. . . ." Marshal stretched his hands out toward me. "I can't do it for that reason. You deserve better, and I have too much respect for you not--"
"Get out."
Marshal released a deep breath as he stood. He stared down at me. "An--"
"OUT."
Marshal watched me a moment more before turning and opening the bathroom door. He rubbed at the back of his neck and muttered under his breath as he pulled the door closed. I flinched and wrapped my arms tightly around myself.
'I'd be doing it for the wrong reason.' Those words rang in my head and wouldn't be ignored. The wrong reason? The entire nightmare had been for 'the wrong reason'! I covered my face with my hands. I choked on something, but I didn't cry. I didn't know how. I had forgotten how to feel misery and tears a long time ago.