Girl On the Edge

by CD Reiss

  “Yeah, I know you fail to see it. He is me. I am him.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “You should see him. He’s losing his emotions. They’re draining out of him and into me.”

  “But I thought you were the same.”

  “We’re both half a person. But this half?” He tented his fingers on his chest. “This half is the human half.”

  I put the toothbrush down and crossed my arms. “We have to get out of this house.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t think you’ve been completely forthcoming about what happened here. With your parents.”

  He looked confused.

  “Your father,” I said. “You said you hid from him in the bottle room, but the lock’s on the outside.”

  “It was always that way.”

  I couldn’t tell if he was lying or if he believed what he wanted. What I knew for sure was that if I wanted the painful facts, the bathroom in the middle of a fight was the wrong place and time to get them. “I think coming back to this house broke you apart, and if we don’t leave, it’s going to break us apart too.”

  “I don’t want that.”

  “I don’t either. But it’s happening.” I gathered my things from the vanity. “We never had a honeymoon. We had a few good weeks in a war zone. I fell in love with you in the middle of a crisis. I committed to you, and I take that seriously. But I didn’t marry half a man.” Pushing past him, I went back into the bedroom, where I picked my clothes off the bed.

  “We should take a vacation,” he said. “Let’s see what happens outside the routine.”

  “No.”

  “Why not? I read this article about sky diving in the Grand Canyon—”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” I stood with an armful of clothes.

  “What?”

  “I’m terrified of heights, and so are you, by the way.”

  “I am not.”

  Was this his way of getting back at Caden? Setting up a nice relaxing vacation doing the one thing that would freak out his other half?

  “I’m too busy for a vacation right now.” I brushed past him.

  “He’s coming back,” he said from behind me. I turned before I walked out. “I can’t hold him anymore. We’ve negotiated a sort of truce. An uncomfortable cease-fire, I guess. He’ll be back.”

  Caden’s body leaned against the doorframe. Captain St. John didn’t lean. He stood straight. Even near collapse after eight days in the combat hospital OR, he’d shouldered a confidence bordering on arrogance. I’d carried him through tragedy in Fallujah, but standing in his family home in Manhattan, he seemed weak and beaten. Still beautiful. Still perfect. But altered, like the same sentence spoken in a different language.

  “I’m sleeping in the guest room.”

  “I love you,” he said.

  I saw it for what it was. Manipulation. He wanted to tie me tightly to him with his words. He wanted to use my response to relieve his sense that I was untwisting the knot.

  There was no reason not to soothe him, but I wasn’t feeling predictable or pliable.

  “Yeah. I hear you.”

  Without another word, I crossed the hall into the guest room.

  * * *

  I didn’t sleep. I kept staring at the blinking red dots of the clock, wondering what the fuck I was doing.

  Myth number one about therapists was that we were any better at managing our personal lives than our patients. I had tons of words and advice. I could listen to people for hours. I could hear underlying motivations and detect falsehoods even when the patient believed them. I could see a situation from all sides unless I was one of the sides.

  Detaching myself from the situation, I could deconstruct the factors driving Caden’s affliction.

  An abusive father…

  …who had lived in the house he now occupied….

  …after a traumatic stint in the military…

  …exacerbated by an experimental therapy…

  …and a new wife.

  Did the last two help or hurt?

  And where did his father end and his mother begin?

  And was I making it worse?

  I couldn’t complete a thought without a stab in my chest where I missed the egotistical jerk who’d shocked me with his vulnerability. That surprise was the location of his split.

  The light in the room went from blue to gray as the sun lightened the sky.

  There was an insistent double rap at the door. I turned around, but before I could grant permission, it opened.

  Caden stood in the frame, bare-chested, feet set apart, his shape crossing the corners of the rectangle. “Why are you in here?”

  I bolted upright at the sound of his voice. “Caden?”

  He entered with an erection growing in the morning light. “Did we fight?”

  He didn’t remember. Whatever happened with Damon was hidden from Caden while he was in the bag. The correct therapy for a dissociative disorder was transparency between personalities, but this wasn’t a normal break.

  “I had a cough, and I didn’t want to wake you.”

  He stood at the edge of the bed, pressing his right thumb into his left palm as if massaging it. “You looked beautiful last night,” he stated matter-of-factly, slipping the sheet off me. “I can’t believe I didn’t come home and destroy you.”

  “It’s early. We have a few hours.”

  He looked my body over, as if deciding where to fuck me first. Leaning on the bed with one hand, he used the other to pull off my underpants. I closed my legs so they came off easily, and he opened them.

  Oh, Lord.

  He was here—inside this not-Damon half Caden.

  This wasn’t safe, but I wanted it so badly I could taste the sweet sting of danger.

  Lifting my shirt over my breasts, he ran his fingers over my hard nipples, then along the silver scar over my heart.

  “Don’t come until I tell you to.”

  He went to the bathroom. I straightened myself on the bed. He came out with a hot washcloth. He folded it twice and placed it between my legs. The rough, warm cloth felt good against me.

  He kissed me, and I wrapped my legs around him. We had so much to talk about. Leaving the house. This other person he’d been. The changes between them. But not yet. Not while he was pushing inside me, fucking me all over again. Not while the hot, rough cloth was wedged between us.

  He went slowly, grinding deep.

  “Caden,” I whispered.

  “No coming. Not until I say.”

  “Yes, okay.”

  Slowly, gently, he fucked me to maximize the friction of the cloth.

  “I’m close,” I gasped.

  “Not yet.”

  “Okay, but…”

  “Hold it.”

  His strokes got faster. I was going to burst open. I needed to.

  “Take the washcloth away, please,” I begged.

  He came inside me with a satisfied grunt. I was so close, but he was pushing too shallow now, and when I shoved my hips against him, he jerked away. He got up on his knees, dick still hard and slick.

  “Caden. What—?”

  “Hold it until tonight, Major.”

  “This is bullshit.”

  “You wanted to try control.”

  I lay there with my mouth agape and my T-shirt pulled over my breasts. He smiled as if my frustration was entertaining.

  * * *

  My sour mood when he got downstairs was probably exacerbated by the ten pounds of unreleased orgasm I was holding between my legs. I got him a cup out of habit, but when I heard him behind me, I wanted to shove it up his ass.

  “I don’t know what you two share with each other,” I said, not looking around.

  “Us two?”

  Still Caden, but in the quiet kitchen, with only my annoyance to interpret his tone, he wasn’t Caden either. I looked at him, dissecting the pieces. Was this a third?

  No. But the primary person was changing somehow.

/>   Annoyance turned to fear, and fear turned into exhaustion.

  “I want to get out of this house,” I said.

  “Why?” He acted as if I’d lost my mind, as if he hadn’t heard the request before. He and Damon weren’t communicating the nitty-gritty.

  Now I had to say everything twice. I’d probably have to describe what I wanted twice, argue twice, explain twice.

  “Forget it.”

  I went to leave, but he grabbed my arm. “I’m not going to forget it.”

  “You should. And you should start by letting me go.”

  “No.”

  I jerked my arm away. “You can’t just waltz in here and start demanding my time, my attention. You can’t do what you did this morning. I’m not a fuck doll.”

  “If you think this morning was me treating you like an inanimate object, you have no idea what that means.” He was calm, too calm, in the face of my simmering heat. That alone took me back a step. “If you were a toy, I wouldn’t bother with your pleasure. You wouldn’t have the option to say stop.”

  He talked about rape like a sniper talking about bullets. Everyday instruments of death.

  “This morning’s game?” he continued. “It was designed to push you.” He sipped his coffee black, without blowing on it. “I found your limit. You still haven’t recognized it.”

  He threw back a big swallow of coffee. I knew it was scalding. He shouldn’t have been able to do more than blow and sip.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “What’s your name?”

  I recognized his smile. The right side stretched first, and the left caught up. I recognized the little nod of assent, as if he and I got the same joke.

  “Caden Kevin St. John. Captain. First Medical Brigade. 065-43-0987.”

  “You’re not the man I married.”

  “You didn’t marry a man.”

  “What?” The alarm in my head came out as a whisper.

  He stood over me, close enough for our clothes to touch. I didn’t step away. I wouldn’t show fear.

  “You married the army. Your plan was to consummate it by making a family with another soldier, but instead, you chose me. Admit it. You miss your husband.”

  I got his point, but all I heard was the content of the last sentence. “I do,” I said with a quivering chin. “I miss him so much.”

  He brushed away my tears. “I don’t like it when you’re sad.”

  I pushed his hand away and wiped my own tears. He didn’t like it when I was sad? Jesus. Caden was a passionate and protective man. Caden wouldn’t see my sadness as one of many menu options.

  “I watched my mother give up control to the military,” I said. “I watched her get dragged all over the country because Daddy had to be somewhere. And when he deployed, I watched her sit there crying because no matter how you sliced it, he’d betrayed her. Every time. He betrayed her for the army every damn time. So, I decided I wasn’t marrying a man who would betray me. I would beat him to it, whoever he was, by enlisting. I was taking the mistress first. But… look at this. Look at us. The army broke you and handed me the pieces.”

  He laughed. “I’m not broken.”

  I crossed my arms. He was so cocky. So sure that between us, he was the healthy one. He was intolerable like this, and all I wanted was to take him down a notch. Cut him at the knees.

  I should have thought about it as a therapist, not a wife, but like I said, I was sour.

  “Where were you yesterday?” I asked.

  “Reserve duty.” He said it without the disdain Damon had. That was my Caden. Finishing what he started was to be done without complaint.

  “How much of it do you remember?”

  “Everything.” He sat back down and took his coffee as if he’d won the argument and could move on with his day. “I trained medics in an emergency trach. Came home American Airlines flight 45 into JFK. Plane was three minutes early. I came home, changed. Met you for dinner with the Mt. Sinai board. Had a few hours’ sleep. I fucked you. Anything else?”

  “Before this morning, when was the last time you fucked me?”

  “You doing an intake?”

  “What day of the week is it?” I snapped an amber bottle from the corner of the counter and placed it in front of him with the label facing away.

  “Monday. Why?” He wasn’t agitated. He seemed more thrown off course and trying to correct.

  “Patient is male. Late thirties. One eighty and change. Symptoms include low-grade fever, persistent dry cough, chest pain. General fatigue.”

  “Blood tests?”

  “Mycoplasma.” I hoped I’d gotten it right. I was an MD but not a GP.

  “Okay. Walking pneumonia. I’m really curious what you’re trying to prove.”

  “What do you prescribe?”

  “Any allergies?”

  “None.”

  “Ten-day course of doxycycline. Preferably Vibramycin.”

  I’d piqued his curiosity, and I understood my risk. If he had a flawless memory of his time as Damon, he’d laugh at me. If he didn’t, his reaction could be anywhere between mild amusement and deadly rage.

  Worst course of action ever.

  I’d try to talk a patient out of it.

  Not recommended.

  Doctors make the worst patients.

  “Agreed,” I said as I turned the bottle until the information faced him.

  He picked it up, rolling it between his thumb and middle finger to read the label.

  I waited. He read it again. Checking the date, maybe.

  “I have a busy day,” I said. “You think about where your week went. Take a deep breath and tell me how you feel. You try to remember taking five of those and leaving the rest when you went to reserve duty. You, Caden St. John, MD, didn’t take a full course of Vibramycin because the pills are big and you didn’t like it. We’ll reconvene over dinner to talk about what’s broken.”

  He put his arm in my way when I tried to pass him.

  He wasn’t angry. He was something. But anger assumed some kind of passion. This version of Caden didn’t have passion. He had facts and realities, and this was the reaction he had when one of his realities was challenged.

  Driven, maybe. Compelled. Motivated to correct the incorrect.

  “Let me go.” My voice had been drained of hysteria, matching his emotionless state. The tone was the only nonimpulsive action of the morning.

  “Before this morning,” he said, not moving his arm, “when was the last time?”

  “Friday. I was on top.”

  The effort to muzzle his reaction was betrayed by a blue fire in his eyes.

  “You ate my pussy like a champ,” I continued. “Then you put your dick in me real slowly. You were gentle and sweet. We flipped. I straddled you and fucked you. You wanted me to come, but I couldn’t ask you to hurt me since it upsets you. So, I dug my fingernails into my palm until it bled. Then I cupped your balls while you came.”

  “You made that up.”

  “Did I?”

  “I have him under control.”

  I slid the bottle toward him. “Count the days.”

  “Greysen.” He stretched his leg out and leaned into me. Even sitting on the barstool, his posture was so straight he was close to my height. “You’re mine. Mine. I own your body. It’s the only thing I have that I care about.”

  “Nobody owns me.”

  “Since you retired your commission, I own you.” He stood, crowding me against the kitchen bar. “I own your orgasms, your pain, your pleasure, your hunger. I’ve put my fingers on your heart and felt it beat. It’s mine. I own this body. Every inch of it. Every bone. Every organ. Every drop of blood.”

  “I’m not a fuck doll.”

  “You mentioned that. And maybe I wasn’t clear. If you were a compliant object, you wouldn’t be worth owning. Only me. Not him. Don’t be confused, Greysen.”

  “He’s you,” I said.

  “He’s
not me. I won’t tolerate him inside you.”

  The ultimate betrayal is the self against the self.

  He was growling against my neck.

  Mine, mine, mine.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  CADEN

  The pleasure of making her submit to an orgasm after denying her one was matched only by the gratification of doing a complication-free quad.

  After the disconcerting discussion preceding her surrender, I was left with the knowledge that he was still there even if I couldn’t feel him. He’d stolen days from me. He’d stolen her body. Her pleasure. He’d steal everything if he could.

  That idea was insulting enough. He was weak. Emotional. His thinking was imprecise and fractured, yet he’d managed to overtake me, and this fact was the most galling.

  After the quad, I was listing his weaknesses in my mind, placing his inability to cut into a plastic doll at the top of the list, when I froze, bloody gloves over the bin.

  Days and days had been stolen from me. The man everyone knew as Caden had done things I couldn’t remember, and I’d just stood in an operating theater, over an open rib cage, as if I had a right to do a quadruple bypass.

  What if he engulfed me during surgery?

  What if I’d gotten information yesterday that I needed in the OR today?

  I dropped the gloves in the bin and let the lid close.

  What happened that I didn’t know about when he fucked her?

  * * *

  The shower in the doctors’ lounge had gone cold, but that would help the swelling. I unwrapped the towel from around my left fist and flexed my hand. Pain jolted me from the second knuckle down to the wrist. Strained palmar ligament. Grade one sprain.

  Did I need a grade two? I was under no illusions that Damon would be gone in a week, but I didn’t want to risk permanent damage. I turned off the shower, and the pressure sent a shot of pain up my arm.

  I hadn’t punched a tile wall impulsively. I’d done as much thinking about it as I’d needed to do. I didn’t want to kill anyone, but if I reported my decline in functioning, I might never be allowed in the OR again. A sprain would give me a chance to fix this before it ruined my life.

  The pain jolted my every move. Toweling off. Getting dressed. I wrapped it and closed the bandage with butterfly clips.