He falls asleep in her bed, clutching her pillow tight to his chest. It's childlike and Norma can feel her heart twist in unholy directions as she watches him. She does this a lot-observes him while he sleeps-but something's different tonight. He's peaceful. Usually, he's restless, tossing, turning, pulling away from her and stealing the covers.
Tonight, all of him sleeps and Norma doesn't know why that thought hurts her so fucking much.
She walks to the edge of the bed and reaches out to him. Her hand skims down his side, halts in a position that's dangerously low. For a fleeting second, she thinks about grabbing him between his legs, but her whole body rebels. Shame turns her stomach.
"Norman."
He's so small under her hands. "Norman." She shakes him and finally, his eyelids flutter.
"Mother?" His blue eyes are bleary, unseeing. Confused or maybe just over it, he back pedals away from her touch and slams into the headboard.
Pain crawls across her face.
He'll wake up one day and he'll see it. He'll see it and he'll hate you for it.
See what, though? What deep dark abandoned crevice within her had Dylan been privy to? Was it what Norman was seeing now?
Cold, creeping fear latches onto her spine. "Norman. What's wrong?" A little girl desperate for anyone's affection.
He's still trapped in last vestiges of a dream. "Mother. Don't. Please." His head turns toward her, but his eyes don't clear. "Mother."
It's morbid curiosity that keeps her from rousing him completely. What had Dylan seen?
Norman's head thrashes against the headboard.
She takes his hand. His skin is clammy.
"Norman, hey, come on. Wake up."
"Mother?" He returns to her slowly, like waking death.
She smears on a broken smile. Strength all but abandons her. "Hey, sweetie." It's been a decade since she's called him that. She doesn't remember why she stopped.
He laces his fingers through hers, digs his blunt nails into the back of her hand.
"You're here."
"Of course I am."
"They said you wouldn't come back."
"Who did?"
He's distant, lost in a far off place that isn't the here and now. Norma's body goes cold. "Dylan and Daddy."
Daddy? He'd never called Sam daddy. Not once. It was always 'Dad.' She keeps touching him, runs her fingertips through his hair. Sweat clings to his temples.
"Norman, it's okay. I'm right here. I'm not leaving." His eyes shut tight. He shakes his head in a way that suggests he's fighting off another presence in his mind. When his eyes open, he's himself again.
"Hey." His voice is thick.
She gives him a tight smile. "Hi."
He takes in her appearance. She's exhausted and confused. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine."
He crawls on his knees to her, and then swings his legs over the side of the bed. She's crouched down before him, looking up into unsure eyes. His thumb brushes her bottom lip. He can almost feel the foreign presence staining her.
The very first morning after isn't as awkward as it probably should've been. He pads out into the kitchen in only his pajama bottoms, marveling at the new house and its creaky floorboards. She's standing at the stove wearing the maroon button down shirt she'd rid him of the night before and nothing else. His shirt was long on her, stopping at the midway point of her thighs. He stares. It was a sight that stirred feelings inside him that he couldn't even begin to pick apart.
He strides to her, high on memories of her beneath him. Within a span of a second, her hips are under his hands and his chin rests on her shoulder. His eyes cast downward into the opening of her shirt; she'd only done up the three buttons on the very bottom, which created a wide v that exposed the valley between her breasts. The shirt smelled like his cologne, some wintry fragrance she'd picked out for him.
"I think that's mine." He teases as he nuzzles into her neck. Her skin smelled like sex.
She looks down at herself, touches the tip of the collar. "Huh. I think you're right."
"It looks better on you." He doesn't know when flirting became so easy for him. It was her. She gave him confidence. Every time her body reacted to his last night, she'd boosted him up a little higher.
"I like it. It's like having you wrapped around me." Norman presses himself even closer, pelvis to her ass. He doesn't know what they've done. He doesn't know what's going to happen tomorrow or next week or a year from now. He doesn't know if she'll still want him like this, but for now, he'll relish it, because fuck, she feels good.
Her fingertips tick along his forearm. Suddenly, breakfast didn't seem so important. She twists in his arms. Looks him up and down. Bare chested, smirking, and insatiable, hands skating over her ass and the back of her thighs. They kiss and he balls the material of that shirt in his fists. Gets lost in her on impact.
Her lower back collides with the counter and he falls into her, kissing her deeper. Her hand dips into his pants, her fingertips teasing the inside of his thigh. He separates from her out of necessity for breath or bearing or something.
"God." His forehead drops to her shoulder, his warm breath cascading across her skin. She trails soft kisses down his neck and wraps her hand around him. A strangled groan leaves him as he bites down on her neck. It hurts.
"Asshole." He lets lose a chuckle against her skin and her hand stops moving.
His eyes shoot up. Lust has made them dark. "But I'm all yours." Her wrist peeks out over the waistband of his pants and he rubs his fingertips over it, urging her on. "Keep going."
She does. "Yeah. All mine." Certain and poised and power hungry like all the greatest rulers who ever lived. He couldn't blame her for sounding so sure; she did have quite the hold on him right now.
Her hand speeds up and she watches pleasure fall over his face. His eyelids flutter closed and his lips part and his Adam's apple stutters up and down.
All mine.
She leans up so she can whisper in his ear. "Let go, Norman. Let go for me."
He does.
That memory lingers on the edges of his mind now, as he passes his thumb over her lips. Someone else's hands. Someone else's mouth. And this time, she'd wanted it. Someone else. He closes his eyes and finds it hard to feel anything but agony.
"Norman." Blue reappears. She's transfixed by the pain, the heartache that stares back at her. She's going to lose him. It gnaws at her heart. He'll leave her, like Dylan did.
He's going to wake up one day and he'll see it. He'll see it and he'll hate you for it.
And he had. He saw it. The shame she felt for being with him like this. The fear that somebody would find out about them. The paranoia. Love didn't matter. Love is a disease, not a cure.
"I'm sorry." She says and she means it.
She leans up and buries her face in the hollow of his throat. His instinct is to push her away, but his arms circle her, pulling her as close as possible. His lips graze her forehead. He holds her for a long time, but the flurry of black emotions doesn't dissipate.
He wanders through town after school. His stomach's in knots and he can't go home. Home wasn't a safe place anymore. His phone is a lead weight in his pocket. He removes it, turning it in his hand. There's one person he can call; one person he actually feels like calling. One person who made him feel a little less out of his mind.
The numbers blur together on the keypad, but somehow he manages. It rings four times before there's an answer on the other end.
"Hello?"
He breathes out. "Hey, it's Norman. Do you think you could meet me somewhere?"
Silence. Then,
"Norman…" Sounding just like his mother.
A shiver passes through him. "Please. Anywhere you want. Please."
"…Okay. There's a coffee shop on Lexington that's open all night."
There's a smile in his voice when he responds. "Thank you."
She finally shows up at midnight. He's nursing a warm mug between his hands and sipping periodically. He didn't have that much cash on him, only what was left over from his lunch money. He watches her close, trying to find a hint of trepidation in her posture. To his surprise, it isn't there to find. She orders at the counter and her eyes shift over to him once and twice and three times while she pays. He's visibly worn down and it causes her discomfort.
She's wearing a beige winter coat and a navy blue scarf and her dark hair is falling in perfect ringlets over her ears and her neck. His eyes don't leave her for a moment. Something about that makes her warm. She settles into the seat across from him with a small smile.
"How are you?" It's a frozen Friday night. Rain taps on the store front window, ice cold and begging to be let in. Inside, it's only them, the lone patrons, looking for something, anything that'll get them through. He got one call from his mother an hour ago. He wouldn't get anymore; his phone was off, permanently darkened for the rest of the night.
"I'm okay, I guess. I just didn't want to be alone. And you said the other day at school that I could call you if I ever…"
Miss Watson holds up a hand to stop him. "It's fine, Norman. I know what I said and I meant it. What's wrong?"
"I just needed someone. And I can't call my brother." He takes a long sip of his coffee. It hits his stomach in the form of a scalding brick. "Or Bradley." He shakes his head. His eyes fall away from hers.
Concern gathers up inside her. "Hey. Hey, look at me." He does. Stricken blue confronts her head on. "What's going on?"
"Have you ever…" He rubs his fingers over his lips. They've been cracked by the winter wind. "Have you ever been in love?"
The question sends her reeling backwards. This boy was seventeen. What the hell could he possibly know about love?
"Yes."
He says his next words to his mug. "It's awful, isn't it? It makes you feel invincible and then it tears you down."
His voice carries heartache and bitterness. If she didn't know better, she'd say she was talking to a thirty year old man. The worst part is, she knows exactly what he means.
"It does." She agrees. Her battered soul reaches out towards him, desperate for connection.
"She's in love with me, too. She said she was. She meant it. I know she did. She's just scared."
Miss Watson doesn't ask him to clarify. She just allows him to let it out into the world. His hopelessness was tangible, growing thick in the air between them. It makes her ache. For a moment, she stays suspended, drowning in her past mistakes. Who knew she'd find a kindred spirit in someone half her age?
"She's with someone else." He looks up at her. His face is the definition of defeat. "And there's nothing I can do." The image tortures him. That cop with his hands on her, peeling her dress from her body. Norman wants to tear the entire world down.
"I'm sorry, Norman. Really, I am."
They talk for two hours about everything and nothing. The coffee shop starts to feel too small for her. The longer she stays with him, the harder she seems to fall. There's something about this boy. He's intelligent and he's wise and he's damaged. It's written all over him, like words in a book. Something has hurt him or more likely, everything has hurt him. The past, the present and probably the future.
She feels the need to take that damage away from him. To rip it from his skin and his bones. It's intense and immediate and she can't make it stop. She wants to help him. Longs to.
So, against her better judgment, she invites him back to her place. She spends most of the drive glancing over at him, watching passing headlights throw white light across his face. He's haunted and broken, but that just makes him all the more alluring.
She feels like she's losing her grip on sanity.
He follows her to her front door, engrossed by the sway of her hips and the depth of her understanding. She was there for him the way she promised she would be and he's grateful. The door swings open and he quickly shuts it behind him. Before she can get too far, he grabs her wrist and spins her around. She startles as his lips crash into hers. There's a plea hidden in his kiss. She can taste it on his tongue. She doesn't push him away (doesn't even think to); she pulls him close and feels heat pool in her belly when he moans his approval.
He's haunted and he's broken and she wants him so bad she can't even fight it. He's longing for something and she needs him to find it in her.
A couple of fishermen discover it at dawn. A severed hand caught in their net. Romero knows it belonged to Keith. He doesn't even have to go to the crime scene. He does anyway and he isn't the least bit surprised to identify that ugly antique wristwatch Keith had been so fond of. And, here it was, pulled up from the bottom of a lake still intact on a severed wrist, the only remaining piece of a man he'd once called a friend.
Romero seethes. Somebody would go down for this and he had a pretty good feeling who it would be.
