“Isis! So good of you to come. I heard your voice and was concerned, so I came out to check, and lo and behold, here you are! What a pleasant surprise.”
I set my expression, trying to make it unreadable.
“I want to talk to you. In private.”
“Of course you do.” He smirks. “Let’s go. My roommate’s out getting dinner.”
He leads me to his room, and shuts the door behind me.
“Don’t lock it,” I say, feigning a hint of terror in my voice. But he does anyway, double checks the lock, and smiles.
“Can’t have you running off now, can we? We have important things to discuss!”
Will claps his hands and sits on the bed, and motions for me to sit on his chair near his desk. And his computer. Bingo.
“So!” He says. “Should you start, or should I? Or will you just sit there struck dumb like you always do and let me walk all over you?”
“That would be nice for you, wouldn’t it?” I snarl. He makes an ‘oooh’ noise.
“So you’ve got some spark back in you, huh? And here I thought I’d gotten rid of it all. Such a shame.”
“You’re not worth the breath it would take to speak to you,” I say. “But I’m going to do it anyway, because this was something I should’ve said a long time ago to you.”
“Oh, let me guess! Is it one of your resounding ‘fuck you’s? I love those so much. I miss those, you know. Hearing them from a fat, nasty blob like you was truly entertaining.”
“Is that all you care about? ‘Entertaining’?”
He taps his chin thoughtfully, then nods. “Yes! Fun things are the only important things in the world. If you can’t have any fun with it, then it’s useless and should be discarded promptly. That’s only fair.”
Will gets up, circles me, then grabs my hand. I pull away, panic making my muscles strong, but he rips my fingers open and grabs the keylog from it.
“Well now, what’s this?” He laughs. The hope punches out of me in a single hard burst.
“It’s n-nothing,” I scrabble. “Just a piece of dirt –”
“It’s a keylog. Did you really think I didn’t know? I saw you and that disgusting creep walking around, kissing and making stupid f**king faces at each other, and I knew he was getting you in on this. He’s after me, and his f**king partner’s after me, and now you’re after me. But it won’t work, because –” He snaps the keylog in two, grin wide. “I’m just that much smarter than you.”
I stare at the fracture remnants of my hope as Will flops on the bed again and sighs.
“I could never be as entertaining as you though, piggy.”
“Is that all….is that all I was to you?” I choke. “Entertaining? Nothing about us – not one single time was because you liked me?”
“Oh, don’t get me wrong. I liked you very much.” He smiles. “I thought you knew that.”
“But you – you can’t like someone and call them names. You can’t like someone and –”
“Yesss?” He leads. “Go on. Say it.”
I take a breath, the deepest breath. I fill my lungs with strength, with Jack’s smell and memories of his laughter and his hands, of Diana and Yvette’s laugh, of Kayla’s teary smile. I look Will in the dark eyes and hold my gaze there.
“You can’t like someone and rape them.”
“But you can,” He protests. “It’s really too bad you thought about it as rape! I was trying to have sex with you! That’s how much I liked you!”
My instinct is to squeeze my eyes shut, to block out the memories, but I force myself to unblinkingly stare at him, through him.
“I told you to stop. I said it clearly many times.”
“It’s true. You did. But girls don’t really know how good it is, so they say stop. But they don’t really mean it. That’s why I got mad. That’s why I had to do it – because you kept saying stop. Because you were a stupid little girl who kept changing her mind and didn’t know what she wanted.”
His words turn to a hiss, his anger refreshing. This is the real him, the one he hides behind the boisterous laughter and genial good-boy front and fake grins.
“I wasn’t stupid,” I say slowly. “I just didn’t want you.”
He stands all at once, tall and exploding from the bed.
“You did.”
“No,” I smile. “I didn’t.”
Will has no control over himself. He just puts a silk screen over his ugly face and hopes people won’t look or pry too hard. But I’ve pried the hardest. I’ve stabbed him where it hurts, deep in his ego, and his handsome faces twists into an ugly mockery - a gargoyle, a vampire of old.
“You f**king bitch!” He slams his hands on his desk. The computer rattles. “You were a fat, f**king ugly bitch! You were lucky I even let you hang around! You were so f**king lucky I even wanted to touch your fat, stinking carcass! No one else did. No one else does. Not even that f**king pretty boy. He’s just f**king you because he pities you. He sees how pathetic and ugly you are, and he’s taking pity on your piggy ass!”
I sit still, transfixing my eyes on his face, not away from it. I always used to look away, too afraid that his face, his every finger, or his eyes would bring up memories. Will puts his red, furious face in mine, and it’s all I can do to not bolt up and dive through the open window away from him.
“I had you first!” He seethes. “He’s got my trash, my discarded meal, my f**king garbage! You’re nothing. You’re nothing without me. I got you friends, I got you popularity, I f**king taught you how to smoke and drink and steal and not be a pathetic f**king loser. You’re mine! You’re mine, and to anyone else you’re an empty, useless bitch. Fucking. Useless. Garbage.”
With his every word something deep inside me starts to come loose. It’s hardened and dark, like old amber on the skin of a tree, and it wiggles free bit by bit. Will laughs, an insane sound.
“You liked it. I know you f**king liked it, you whore.”
And with that the dark thing pops free, off the bark of my insides, and floats up and away, out of me, out of the top of my head, and I suddenly feel so light and exhausted.
Whatever Will used to be in my memories, whatever he’d done to me in the past, suddenly lets its grip on me go, and disappears into the air.
“You never loved me,” I say hoarsely. “And I hated it.”
“You hate me,” He grins, maniacal. “You’ll always hate me.”
“No.” I stand, and sigh. “I feel sorry for you.”
It happens so fast I lose my footing and fall – Will lunges for me and pins me to the ground with his knees. Fear streams down my back, my spine, my face, like the ice-cold claws of a dread monster made of razors.
“Get off!” I scream. “GET THE FUCK OFF ME!”
“You think you’re better than me?” He sneers, spittle landing in my eyes. He grabs my flailing wrists and pins them to the floor, too. “You think you’ve got the f**king right to feel sorry for me? I’ll show you sorry. I’ll make you more sorry than you ever wanted –”