MADMAN'S HAVEN

37

"So you're not angry with me?"

Brandon carefully rocked our bodies back and forth where we sat in his bed, still messed up and stained from the earlier bloody chaos.

"I'm just mad you put yourself through that horrible procedure,"

I closed my eyes along with a heavy breath as I remembered the pain from when the sharp tool scraped the life out of me.

"You know I hate it when you hurt yourself,"

Brandon's caring words got me out of the traumatizing flashback from yesterday, and I turned my face to place a kiss on his neck.

"I know," I said, and remained in silence since I didn't want to further explain myself about the difficult and illegal choice of action.

"Why do you do that?" He asked as he grabbed my arm to look at the little bruised-up area in the bend.

"Same reason as you," I replied shortly, and looked at his destroyed arms covered in scars and scabs.

"Somebody murdered your whole family too?" Again he spoke, this time to bring shame over me. I felt humiliated, of course I had no reason good enough to self-medicate if I compared myself to Brandon. This was exactly why I shouldn't talk to him about myself or what I had been through. He was still my patient.

"No,"

Once again I decided to answer shortly. I didn't want to have this conversation even if I wanted him to get to know me.

"Then what?"

I lifted my head off his shoulder, and sat up instead to face him while talking.

"I became an addict during my education. My mother died when I was young and I've struggled a lot with it. I only did morphine once, then I was stuck,"

I didn't want to go into detail since I could never know what to expect from Brandon, yet it felt a bit too personal to speak about such things as my addiction and mother's passing, even if I was enough distanced from it now.

"You've been battling as well," Brandon quietly said, with no other change in his face.

I was glad about his response, not making a big deal out of it.

"Not anymore, I'm glad," I replied in confident denial while smiling at him. Even if I wasn't using very heavily right now, it had been too short of time to call myself sober at all.

"Well... I bet you wouldn't be working here if you were a total junkie, or are you just very good at hiding it?" His humiliating words knotted my stomach, but I chose not to get offended since I knew he didn't mean to insult me, he just asked the question out of genuine curiosity, without any sense of boundaries or filter.

"Actually I got sober after two months in rehab. For four years I was completely clean..." I further explained while looking away from him as I got so filled with shame.

"Then I relapsed, after..."

"After what I did," Brandon filled in, and I realized that I crossed the line of leaving the details out. Now he could figure out on his own that he was the reason behind my backslide.

I chose not to answer, since he already did it for me. Brandon sighed loudly, and once again placed his hand over his mouth.

"Fucking Christ!" The frustration rumbled even through his mumbling, and I had to prepare to change roles again since I knew this could turn out ugly if he was sentimental enough.

"Brandon it's okay," I stated calmly, placing a hand upon his shoulder.

He looked up at me with glaring eyes filled with the same black colour I'd witnessed so many times before. He already switched, and the chaos inside was already ongoing.