Chapter 29

Tabby and Collie were there. They gave us an appraising look as we came up from the basement, Lana having been crying, but looking more happy than upset, my pep-talk having boosted her mood.

“Hi,” I said lightly. “What’s up?”

“I wanted to apologize again for dinner,” Tabby said and I could tell she wasn’t going to let it go.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ve already forgiven the slap,” I told her. “Unless you mean the apology for more than that?”

She nodded. “I should have asked you why you were taking more classes,” she admitted.

I nodded. We were on the same page there. “Let me put it in perspective,” I said and offered everyone drinks. “I swore to all of you, but you in particular that I wouldn’t kill myself. That I needed to be here for you. I wouldn’t abandon you by taking my own life. If I’d immersed myself in courses to the point that it damaged me, carved out my sense of self to make room for what’s on page 805, then that’s no less a suicide than nestling a shotgun under my chin.”

“That promise was made to people who promised you the same devotion,” she reminded me. “We didn’t live up to our end.”

“So you’re worried that I’ll take that as justification to nullify the contract and renege on my promise to you?”

She looked down, but nodded.

“Well, what’s it to you anyway?” I asked irritably. “Every time you and I have been in a room, you seem hell-bent on misjudging me and pissing me off. You’ve developed a habit of jumping to conclusions and deciding I’m out of line about something. What’s going on? Am I missing something or are we just going to continue like this, with you accusing me of something and me having to defend myself?”

“Matt,” Lana said, putting a hand on my arm. She was worried about where this was going.

I frowned at her and she fell silent. “Look, I don’t want to fight, but it seems to be all we ever do now. I hate that. I just don’t know what I did to earn that assumption that I’ve done something wrong from you. I’d love to be able to be close to both of you again, even if we never return to being lovers again, but I see you about once a week and there’s a fight each time.”

She sighed and I could tell there was more wrong than I knew. “I want to help, Tabby, I really do. Just tell me what we need to do to put things in a better place.”

“Stop being so nice!” she blurted, surprising us all. “No one is this nice! Do something! Be selfish! Hit someone.”

Things started falling into place in my head. Collie looked like she wished she could still be next door enjoying a second piece of cake with Patty and Dan. Lana just looked confused. “Are you volunteering?” I asked calmly.

She stared at me in shock at that. “Yes. No! I ... What?”

“You’re looking for the villain behind the facade? Your uncle was one of those good men that do everything for everyone and asks for nothing in return. You’re seeing me give out forgiveness like Mardi Gras beads and you’re suspicious. You wonder what I’m hiding. Part of you knows I’m not hiding anything, but you still worry that I’m holding back something malignant.”

She looked surprised, but nodded. “Yeah. I don’t think I can trust you until you do something human.”

“Oh that’s rich!” I snorted. “You can’t trust me until I do something untrustworthy. The last time you THOUGHT I’d done something untrustworthy, you broke my heart, cut me out of your life and made a full-time job out of lying to me about your circumstances. It’ll all be better if I ACTUALLY do something awful?”

She laughed a little at that. “It does sound stupid when you say it like that,” she admitted.

“You want to see behind the curtain? Fine. I’m planning three murders and I intend to fund as many as 60 abortions starting tomorrow. Are we all happy now that we can go back to thinking Matt’s a monster?”

She reacted as if I’d slapped her. “That’s not why I was anxious about it!” she said, upset by the direction this was going. “It’s just all too good to be true. You’re being good to everyone even the ones that have done something wrong to you.”

“What murders?” Collie asked, more interested in that.

“The three people that started this whole mess. They’ve destroyed a lot of lives besides ours.”

“And the abortions?” she wanted to know.

I told them about the rapes in very vague terms and told them that I’d help the girls pay for the procedure if that was what they wanted.

“So even the awful things that you point out that you’re planning are for the benefit of others,” she said, looking at Tabby. “I told you, you were being silly. He’s better than you give him credit for.” She was calm as she said it, using a tone that said she’d tried to convince Tabby of this before.

“Honestly, I don’t even consider them awful,” I said. “It’s the best I can do though. The three people on my list are responsible for ruining so many lives that I can personally point to that I would have no problem with any of their deaths. And I can hardly demand that any of those girls carry a rapist’s baby to term. They were traumatized enough when they were violated. Making that violation spread out for the length of a pregnancy and then endure childbirth is more than I can justify putting them through.”

“Then why mention them at all?” Tabby asked.

“Because they’re the exact things that convinced you I was a monster when I did them to Miranda and Tricia,” I told her evenly. “I’m trying to be forgiving to everyone and let go of a lot of what happened to me, but it’s not easy for me. So if knowing that I have that going on makes you more satisfied you can point out what’s wrong with me, then great.”

“You’re still mad at us, aren’t you?” Collie asked reluctantly. Tabby looked at her and then at me, watching my reaction closely.

“Shouldn’t I be?” I asked. “Let’s put aside that I poured the worst thing I’d ever done out to Tabby and it didn’t occur to her that I would have told her about Tricia when I broke down if it had been true. Let’s put aside that you pledged your submission to me absolutely and wouldn’t even talk to me. Lana and Beck were your sisters. YOUNGER sisters. They looked to you to help guide them. You told me that you were worried things were gonna break down into high school backbiting and I swore to you that if we communicated, that we’d avoid that. You didn’t talk to me and you didn’t talk to them.”

I was fuming. I was sick of people giving me shit for things I didn’t do. “You believed the worst about me and then when you found out it was a lie, all four of you brought back the objects you used to destroy me on the day you walked out on me and asked me to make your guilt go away. Have you done ANYTHING to earn that?!!? Lana and Beck both made those lists I asked for. They both worked to make things better and once we talked it all out and got it all out on the table, we burned those lists and declared them fulfilled. I haven’t even heard that you wrote them out and I told you I didn’t need to see those lists, but I expected you to tell me you’d done them and talk to me about how you felt. Instead, the only emotions you seem to express to me are anger and disappointment. The very next time I saw you after you tried to get me to touch those collars again, you’d believed another lie and came to attack me for it. Tonight, you found out something new and attacked me for it.”

I’d avoided yelling, but I couldn’t keep the anger out of my voice. It made me spitting mad to think of the two of them coming here and attacking me for their guilt. “Tabby, maybe you’d feel better if I took you downstairs and beat you black and blue with a cane.” I could see her bow her head meekly. It was exactly what she’d been looking for. “That’s not what I’m going to do though. Too many people have treated you like garbage. As much as you want to see the worst of me, I refuse to be counted alongside your mother or your uncle or Miranda. If you’re looking to see what Bad Matt has in store, you need to earn it. That’s one lesson, you should have taken from Beck. That’s not a side of myself I give away. When she saw that part of me, she knew she had all my love in that moment. The only exception to that rule will be when I lay hands on the people responsible for all this misery. They’ll see a version even Beck doesn’t suspect exists.”

“Okay,” Collie said meekly. “What do we need to do to earn a way back?” she asked.

“Try!” I growled. “When someone tells you something awful about me, ask if it’s something I’d do. Better yet, tell me what’s going on! Do you know how fucking delirious with joy I would have been if you’d told me what was going on when this all started? Treat me like I matter and show up once in a while when you DON’T have a bone to pick with me. Lana and Beck have done everything they could to show me that they wanted to repair our friendship even if I never take them back as lovers. They wrote out those lists and started working on how they could fix things. I don’t know what’s going on with either of you. I don’t know if you made those lists or if you sat down and thought about how to get back on track or even what you’re doing to get by. I had to ask Patty and Dan and found out they’ve been making sure you have enough money to pay for rent and bills, but you haven’t told me shit. I had to find out from Patty that’s she’s passing money along. I don’t know if it’s enough or if you’re struggling or if you had to take up jobs again.”

They both looked ashamed that it had taken them this long to talk it out. “We didn’t think you wanted to see us after everything that happened,” Collie admitted. “Things have been pretty rocky between us.”

I put my head down and rested it on my arms as I leaned on the table. I took a couple of deep breaths and raised it again. “Yeah, things are pretty rocky right now. There’s two ways of solving that. Put in the work to clean up the rocks or abandon the land and move on to greener pastures. Two months ago, you TOLD me that you’d moved on. I’m done assigning blame for that and I understand that you want a path back home, but that path is not a straight, clear line. There’s a lot of debris to pick up before it’s open. Fortunately you don’t have to do it alone. I helped Lana and Beck find their way back. I can do the same for you.” I paused and thought about what they really wanted. “If your vision includes following that path back to being lovers, you also need to talk to Emma. She controls that aspect of my life.”

“It’s not your decision?” Collie said, surprised.

“When I asked her to marry me, she asked for control of the Sorority. I didn’t expect one to continue, but she’s serious about it.”

They nodded at that and asked what they could do to help out.

“Just be better friends to me,” I said. “That would be a good way to start.”

“I really AM sorry I’m such a bitch to you all the time,” Tabby said. “I still talk to Dr. Spencer. She helps me as much as she can, but she can’t tell me anything about you, so I don’t know how bad it is for you.”

“Things are improving, but you should know that I still suffer from stress-induced depression, feelings of persecution, paranoia, anxiety attacks, probably a martyr complex. I’ll have to discuss that with her to see what she thinks. The list goes on. A lot of days in September and October I only got through because I had the study. I didn’t have much else. That’s changed me a lot.”

“How did it change you?” she asked

“You already know, Tabby,” I told her gently. “How did it change you when you realized that the people around you were turning their backs on you after it all came out about your uncle?”

“It can’t be THAT bad, Matt,” she said, pleadingly. She wanted desperately to believe that I hadn’t felt that abandoned.

I shrugged. “You four walked out on me and despite me begging for a reason, you all shut me out. My mother assumed that I was at fault, my sister sided against me, I had no one at school. I don’t know if you were around for it or not, but Mom and Lilly still went next door for meals. Dinner for me was quite often a sandwich while I listened to the clock over the fridge tick. I was virtually alone. All I had to lean back on were Dr. Spencer, Dr. Saddler and Emma. Now Carl is dying. The number of people that got me through those days is going to drop to two in the next few months. Maybe that’s not so bad compared to how your family treated you. I only know that they don’t care about you now.”

She shook her head. “No, I guess it’s about the same,” she admitted. “I really fucked up. I should have known better.”

“You should, but what’s worse is that you didn’t learn from it and kept coming back to anger every time you heard something new about me,” I reminded her. “Learn from it now. If you can’t trust that I’ll tell you the truth when you ask, then we’re gonna keep losing ground. Make a promise to yourself to do better.”

She nodded. “I will,” she said meekly. “I want to make this better,” she promised me.

I nodded and got up to give her and Collie hugs.

“One thing that I’ve wondered about the past couple of months,” I said when we were all seated again. “Collie, how have you been getting along without a Master? When Miranda died, you didn’t handle it very well, but this time, you’ve managed just fine from what I’ve seen.”

She blushed and shrugged. “I, uh, never really stopped thinking of you like my Master,” she admitted. “I didn’t want ... I mean, everyone just decided...” she shook her head and I nodded.

“You had to choose between me and your sisters,” I said. “You felt like you could keep your devotion to me best by keeping your devotion to them since that was important to me.”

She nodded, gratefully. “I didn’t want to lie to you,” she swore adamantly, “but if I didn’t, you’d have figured out why I was doing it and I would have come back if you’d asked. I promised Tabby I wouldn’t leave her though.”

I nodded. I guess that made some degree of sense. They dragged her along, swore her to silence and cut me off from what support I might have had. “I understand,” I said quietly. “It worked out, I suppose.” I was sick of finding out new things that people had done to hurt me. I didn’t think it was ever going to end though. I had years of school ahead of me, the study, a responsibility to Victoria after Carl left us, the girls at school that had made me their rock. I suddenly needed support after this conversation. “Thank you for telling me,” I said woodenly and I hoped that they would take that as a dismissal.

“Come on,” Lana said, getting to her feet and gathering them up. “I think you guys should leave him to think about what’s happened and try to talk again another day.”

They got up and left while I stared at the table surface in front of me, my eyes tracing the grain of the wood as I concentrated on breathing. I heard the front door close and sighed, thankful to be alone again. I looked up when I heard footsteps and realized I wasn’t alone yet. Lana returned to the table and sat down across from me.

“That really bothered you, huh?” she said softly. “What was worse? Finding out Tabby was trying to goad you or finding out Collie didn’t want to leave?”

“All of it,” I told her softly. “It’s all the same mess.” I got out of the chair and did the only thing I could actually think to do. I went downstairs to my room to start my workout for the evening. I could tell Lana had followed me, but I didn’t care at this point. I hopped up to grab the pull-up bar I’d put in here right after they’d left and started working at it furiously, like I was angry at my shoulders for what had been said upstairs. I knew I was in much better shape than I’d been this summer and Hanna had promised to turn me into a god over the winter.