( he feels it. he hopes she feels how gingerly he touches his cheek, too — or not gingerly, but reverently, a humble bow of his tattooed knuckles across his jawline where nancy's purple bruise claims a patch of his skin. )
[ Disbelief blooms between them, not enough to mask the reverberation of knuckles at her jaw. (His jaw, not hers, even if it feels otherwise.) A frenetic rush of memory follows in its wake, a rush of impressions: the bite of a knife, a heavy weight driving into the dirt, gloved hands tightening in her hair. And blood, so much blood, all of it hers, or worse, Steve's. Quentin's. So many others— ]
for the dopamine, because it felt good, because i wanted to, because he's a dumb slut who deserved it. i could pump out a hundred other factory default responses just like that, but you ain't gonna know unless you already know.
did he tell you what we were to each other before i did it?
[ Here is the thing that can't be denied, because they are linked so closely. Because Nancy doesn't know how to hide, not when this cave has flayed her open and spilled her thoughts out for everyone to feel:
You ain't gonna know unless you already know and the great, yawning void that lives inside Nancy, all her curiosity made endless and all consuming as her monster crawls up across her skin, clicks over to narrow its focus onto him. Does she know? Maybe. Does she want to know? yes, yes, yes— ]
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( he feels it. he hopes she feels how gingerly he touches his cheek, too — or not gingerly, but reverently, a humble bow of his tattooed knuckles across his jawline where nancy's purple bruise claims a patch of his skin. )
i ain't gonna hurt you, wheeler.
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Why should I believe that?
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( though this place feels close enough to it. )
what do i get out of hurting you when you don't want it?
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Beneath it, a question forms. Curiosity mingling with disgust coloring this breath of a query: When would I ever want it?
It clings to the syllables of what she does lob back: ]
What did you get out of killing Quentin?
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[ The more they talk, the more the yawning void of him opens in her own head. A whisper in a language she doesn't know. A scream she does. ]
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did he tell you what we were to each other before i did it?
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You ain't gonna know unless you already know and the great, yawning void that lives inside Nancy, all her curiosity made endless and all consuming as her monster crawls up across her skin, clicks over to narrow its focus onto him. Does she know? Maybe. Does she want to know? yes, yes, yes— ]
We didn't talk about it.
You tell me.