A/N: Hey guys, thank you so much to everyone who read, reviewed, faved and followed this fic so far – I truly appreciate it. :D
This ended up being quite a complicated chapter to write and I don't know if I've exactly nailed all the concepts I wanted to. There are more chapters to come, so hopefully I'll be able to smooth them out as we go along.
So, I'll be curious to know what you make of this chapter. I hope you'll enjoy... :D
Chapter TWO
"I must get my soul back from you; I am killing my flesh without it."
~Sylvia Plath~
The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
Dexter lay on his side, watching Debra sleep. A glance at the clock on the bedside table behind her telling him it was nearing four o'clock in the morning. He'd slept for a few hours but Debra turning over in her sleep had woken him. For an instant he hadn't known who was the warm body beside him in bed but when he'd opened his eyes Debra's head was lying facing him now, face relaxed in sleep. Her hand was resting on Dexter's pillow, palm up. The flickering of her radial pulse against her pale skin the tell tale sign of life in an otherwise unmoving figure.
She's so still. Deb is never still. She's always moving, a frenetic energy reverberating out from every fibre of her being. When I was a kid I remember capturing fireflies in a jar. Trapped, the tiny glowing lights hurled themselves against the glass in a desperate and frenzied attempt to be free. I'd kept that jar in my room, watching over the coming days as the light slowly left their little bodies, leaving only a dried out shell to drop to the floor of their prison, every bit of their energy spent for my entertainment. Their glowing light had intrigued me as a child and I didn't care that my fascination with them would ultimately cost them their lives.
His eyes drifted over Debra's face, knowing each line and curve so well, better than his own in fact. It had always been easier to look at her face rather than his own. At least, it used to be, before the pain he'd caused her had been etched so deeply into her eyes.
Was Debra another firefly I've trapped inside the glass prison of her feelings for me? Am I watching her throw herself against that invisible cage again and again, draining the life force from her own body simply because I don't want to be alone in the dark? Debra is a flicker of light in my darkness but maybe all I am to her is certain death.
Dexter closed his eyes at the painful thought. He opened his eyes again to see a strand of hair had fallen across Debra's face. Without thinking Dexter lifted a hand to gently move the length of softness back behind her ear. Debra's eyes flickered open at his touch. Dexter froze, his fingers grazing her ear. They stared at one another, the silence stretching out between them. Dexter slowly withdrew his hand, eyes never leaving hers.
Why isn't she talking? What does she want me to say? What could I possibly say to her to make anything better between us?
"I've missed you." His voice, raspy from lack of use, sounded too loud in the silence.
Debra didn't answer for a long moment, stretching out Dexter's nerve until she finally did speak. "I've missed you too."
Dexter couldn't hide his surprise, or his hopefulness. "You did?"
"I didn't want to." Debra's green eyes were solemn as they held his unrelentingly.
"I'm sorry." Dexter didn't know why he was apologising but it felt like he should. "How-" he cleared his throat nervously, "how are you?"
"Fucked up." Debra didn't hesitate with her answer but there was no particular force behind her words, not like there usually would have been. Gone was the usual passion from her declarations. Her continuing stillness was unnerving.
My firefly's light is diming. Her light is going out and it's my fault.
"You?"
Dexter swallowed; mouth suddenly dry. "The same."
Her eyes swept his face. "Yeah, but no one could ever know with you."
"You know," he answered swiftly. "You know everything about me."
And it's killing you, eating you from the inside out.
Debra looked away briefly. "I don't want to stay at Vogel's anymore."
Dexter frowned, wondering why. "Did something happen?"
Her gaze was capturing his again, impossible to read. "Dad killed himself, didn't he?"
Dexter's eyes went wide in surprise at the sudden change in conversation.
"I saw the tapes, the last session before he died," Debra continued on, her voice strangely lifeless. "He said he didn't know if he could live with what he and Vogel had created." Her eyes never left his. "Our father killed himself because of you, didn't he?"
Dexter was scared. The fight or flight response coursing through his body, not knowing what his answer to her question would cause to happen next. "Yes," he said hoarsely.
No emotion registered on Debra's face and that was more frightening than anything to Dexter. The silence stretched out between them yet again, setting Dexter's teeth on edge.
"What am I meant to do with that information?" she asked him at last, voice dull and lifeless.
Dexter moved his shoulders a little. "Hate me?" he offered up helplessly.
Debra gave a dry, humourless laugh. "Fuck, Dexter, what do you think I've been trying to do for the last six months?"
"Get yourself killed," replied Dexter seriously.
Her lips twisted. "Like father, like daughter, I guess. Dad was just better at it. I'm too chicken shit to make a proper job of it."
"Or maybe you're stronger than you give yourself credit for."
Debra pressed her lips together so hard that all the blood left them. When she spoke again, there was finally a glimpse of her old energy behind her words. "How the fuck am I meant to live with something Harry couldn't?" Her face tightened. "You're asking too much of me, Dexter."
"I know," said Dexter simply.
"If you know that, then why are you doing it?" she asked, the anger building in her voice.
"Because I need you in my life."
"You need what I can do for you," she countered. "You don't need Deb the person. You've got that Dark Passenger on board for company."
"I was wrong about the Dark Passenger," Dexter confessed. "For the longest time I thought he was separate to me, some outside force which inhabited my body and compelled me to do these terrible things but the truth is it's all me." His face clouded over. "There is no Dark Passenger, Deb, there's just me."
There it was, the bitter and unflinching truth laid out in front of my sister. I couldn't blame it on some twisted entity compelling me to do what I do. There was no more compartmentalising, all of the things I'd done belonged to me, Dexter Morgan, and no one else. Was there anyway Deb could accept that I was just as much a serial killer as I was her brother?
Deb closed her eyes, a dry laugh escaping her lips.
I didn't expect that.
"What's so funny?" he asked cautiously.
Debra opened her eyes and looked him squarely in the eye. "Irony and the way it sucks ass."
Dexter's brows knitted together. "What do you mean?"
"I mean you finding out you don't have a Dark Passenger while I find out I do."
"Deb," he said, voice low and urgent, "you don't have a Dark Passenger. You're not a murder. Just because you've killed doesn't make you a killer."
We're not the same. I need Debra to understand that.
Debra shook her head as it lay on the pillow. "It's you, dumbass," she said simply, "you're my Dark Passenger."
The breath left Dexter's body in a painful rush, her words impacting him more than Deb could have known.
Debra was unwavering in her revelations. "You're my compulsion, Dexter, the thing I can't quit. You overtake me so completely at times that I'm no longer Debra, I'm Dexter's Deb and she's capable of just about goddamn anything." Her voice wavered. "Do you know how fucking frightening that is to realise, Dex?"
I was struggling to know what to say. The idea of a Dark Passenger had always brought me solace, being able to place the responsibility of my actions on his shoulders and leave myself blameless. He was a welcome part of my life. For Deb he was a terrifying intruder, one she had no way to protect herself against.
"And you know what the scariest thing is?"
"What?" Dexter croaked. His heart was pounding, eyes on her face, trying to prepare himself for what Debra was going to say next.
"I don't want to be free of him." Debra's tone was sober but unwavering. "I spent six months trying to pretend you didn't exist, Dexter, that you weren't curled up inside of me, with me no matter how far away I went, no matter how drunk or stoned I got, my Dark Passenger was always there. I hated myself for letting him in, for giving him that kind of control over me." Her expression was haunted. "My weakness caused LaGuerta's death."
"I caused LaGuerta's death," said Dexter tightly, "not you. It was all my fault, Debra, you know that and you should hate me for it, not yourself."
Debra gave a sad smile. "You know when I first found out the truth about you, Dex, when you first told me about your Dark Passenger, I couldn't understand why you didn't want to be free of him. It was so fucked up to me how you didn't even seem to want to fight him, when he made you do all those horrible things."
"I told you, Deb, I don't believe in him anymore," said Dexter unhappily. "It's all me."
"And you're alright about that?"
"At first it frightened me but then there was this sense of-" he moved his shoulders restlessly, trying to find the right word, "-liberation, I guess. Like I could see myself as a whole person for the first time, not just as a shell being occupied by these different personas."
"We're so different, you and me," replied Debra unevenly. "We're the complete fucking opposite in every way. I always thought I was a whole person, responsible for my own actions but this last year, covering up your crimes, protecting you, going against everything I believed about myself, I realised at some point it wasn't just me in my head anymore."
"I'm sorry," said Dexter sadly. "I never wanted that for you. Harry and I, we both worked so hard to keep you out of my world, to keep you free of all of this."
"If you'd wanted me to be safe from your world then you would have left, long ago," she pointed out.
She's right. I should have left her life. Then Deb might have had a chance at a real one, not the nightmare I've forced upon her. I'd always sworn to protect her but the truth was I refused to keep Deb safe from the biggest danger in her life – me.
"I know," he confessed raggedly.
Debra's expression was intent. "And you know what I would have done if you did that?"
"Had a good life," offered up Dexter hopelessly.
"I would have followed you," she responded. "I would have hunted you down and asked what the fuck was going on, goddamn abandoning me like that, you piece of shit."
She would have too. I can just picture it – a furious Debra on my doorstep in some faraway state, swearing her head off at me for cutting her out of my life. She'd have told me to pull my head out of my ass and that I was stuck with her.
Debra lips curled up in a sad, resigned smile. "You see, there is no saving me, Dexter. I'm fucked, no matter what you do or don't do, I'm always going to self-destruct. It's who I am."
Dexter reached out a hand and laced it through the fingers of Debra's hand as it lay on the pillow between them. "Don't say that," he said painfully.
"It's true and no one has been able to handle that about me except for you, Dexter. You're the only one who hasn't left me, no matter how fucked up I got." Her chin quivered a little. "I fucking hate that you're a serial killer. A part of me understands but another part of me is shit scared I'm going to lose you because of it. I didn't know how to reconcile that part of you with the brother I'd known and loved all my life." She gave a derisive snort. "Fuck, I still don't, probably never will. All I know is that I need you in my life because as fucking horrible as it gets sometimes between us, to have nothing between us would be so much fucking worse."
Dexter's fingers tightened their grip on Debra's hand, momentarily overcome by a strong emotion Vogel had informed him he couldn't feel.
Debra wasn't like Hannah. Hannah accepted the killer in me effortlessly, because she was the same kind of person. Her acceptance of me had cost her nothing, it was easy for her to stay with me. But for Deb, it had sent her to Hell and back with only the promise of more to come. But she was here, fighting for what was between us, knowing there was going to be a huge cost to herself but choosing me anyway.
Harry hadn't known what he was getting when he'd picked up that blood soaked four year old all those years ago, he'd just been forced to manage the responsibility he'd unwittingly taken on as best he could. Rita had never known the real me to have a chance at accepting anything. Lumen needed what I offered and Hannah understood, so for those two it was easy to have me in their lives. Deb was the only one who saw me for who I really was and stayed, not because it was easy or convenient, but because whatever the cost to her, there was something she saw in me that made the ride worth the fall.
I'd always thought acceptance should come easily if it was true acceptance. Looking at Debra now, I realise how naive I was. Debra's is looking at me right now, telling me she has made a place in her life for me, knowing all that she does about me and that she's walking willingly into more pain because of it. That old saying about bravery isn't the absence of fear but the willingness to go on despite of it seemed to fit this perfectly. Acceptance wasn't the absence of doubt and fear, true acceptance was a way of finding your way through those things. That's how you knew it was real.
Debra's lips twisted in a self-depreciating smile. "I guess Vogel would call this co-dependence."
Dexter couldn't take his eyes off her as an unfamiliar feeling of triumph swept through his body. "Fuck Vogel," he said decisively.
The woman had been moving us around like pieces on a chessboard since I'd first met her. Before that even. Vogel had stuck the label of psychopath on me and declared me devoid of all emotion but if this feeling bubbling up inside of me wasn't happiness, then what was it? Who was she to tell me what my feelings were, when she'd manipulated me all of my life with a clinical detachment any psychopath would be pleased to call their own? I wasn't one of her subjects she could neatly stick in a box and write a label for. What Deb and I share wasn't so easy to define and dismiss.
Debra grinned, her first proper smile in what felt like forever. "Fuck but I love it when you talk dirty, Dex."
Dexter grinned back at her for her playfulness, feeling like a giant weight had been lifted from his shoulders. On impulse, something he almost never gave into, Dexter closed the small distance between them, pressing a hard kiss of relief and gratitude against Debra's lips. He'd caught her by surprise because Debra gave a little gasp of surprise and their kiss was inadvertently deepened as her lips parted. They'd kissed on the lips in the past, brief pecks of familiarity but Dexter had never had the taste of her in his mouth before. He lingered, surprised by her sweetness, not thinking about what he was doing. Debra broke the kiss and suddenly her warm breath was on his face as they lay there, almost nose to nose, staring at each other wide eyed.
Fuck, what am I doing? I need to tell Debra that was stupid and I'm sorry. I need to get out of here. To protect what we have between us.
The moment stretched out between them, no sound in the room except for their combined, uneven breathing. Neither one seemed capable of movement all of a sudden. Abruptly Dexter put a hand up and cupped the back of Debra's head, dragging her lips toward him so he could taste her once again, unable to hear the warnings his internal voice was trying to scream at him over the thundering of his heart...