Chapter One-Hundred and Three
John turned on the shower, pulling his shirt over his head and dropping his pants and boxers around his ankles. He picked out one of the washcloths that Mary had stitched his name into, before stepping into the steaming water of the shower. He rubbed the bar of soap that belonged to him over the cloth, working up a good lather before he started to scrub his body clear of Jessica's touch. He rubbed until his skin was pink, only stopping after the water turned ice cold. He stomped his foot on the floor of the tub, hoping that someone had simply turned the dishwasher on or something and diverted the hot water.
"Johnathan Kurtis! Get out of the shower! You used all the water!" Mary shouted, knocking on the bathroom door to get him out. "It's bath night for Amelia and now we have to wait until it heats up again."
John shut the water off, grabbing his towel and wrapping it around his hips. He opened the door, stepping out into the hall and walking past Mary on his way to his room. He could feel her eyes on him; knowing that she'd never seen as many of his scars as she could see now. He stopped in his path, turning to walk back to her. He lifted her hand to the scar on his side, trying to tell her that he was okay and he only hurt every now and then.
She brushed her fingers over the scar, wondering how deep it had been. It was obviously old, maybe from when he was in his early teens, but it was still purple and had something about it that made it look almost fresh. "How old?" She asked, praying that he told her he'd been older than she thought.
He flashed five fingers twice and followed the ten with a two, making a total of twelve.
Her heart ached with the thought of a twelve-year-old child having this wound inflicted on him. "How deep was it?"
John held up his finger, placing the index finger of his other hand on top as he measured out how far he thought it would have been. He shrugged, trying to tell her it was an estimate and that he didn't remember a lot after he'd been cut. He nodded toward his room, hoping to be able to tell her more with his notebook.
She followed him to his bedroom, watching as he picked up his notebook and wrote what had happened.
"That was the first time I almost overdosed, the blood was coming out so fast and so much that I thought I was bleeding out. So, I popped a bunch of oxy and laid down to die in peace. Next thing I knew, Dom was on top of me forcing me to throw up as Sid heated up a knife with his lighter. They cauterized it and that's why it's still that funky color, they had to burn me to stop the blood. Then we took a couple needles from my Mom's heroin jar and made an old-fashioned blood transfusion set up, and hooked Dominic up to me for about twenty minutes until I started to get my color back."
Mary read his writing, noticing that about halfway through his hands had started to shake. "Sweetheart…" She took one of the blankets at the foot of his bed and wrapped it around his shoulders, happy that he kept the weighted one in his room.
"Why didn't you tell someone sooner?" She asked, brushing a hand through his soaking wet hair like she'd seen Clarissa do when he was upset and trying to go into his own world of nothing but music and Claire. "We could have helped you."
John shook his head, jotting down his answer. "No one would have taken me… I was worse then, than I am now, believe it or not."
She kissed his temple, noticing the scent of the hair dye still clinging to his hair. "But you were still a child in need." She smiled, forgetting the placement of her hand and its proximity to his neck. "No one should have to go through what you did." She jumped as he jerked away from her, shocked at the sudden movement and how quickly he reacted. "What's wrong?" She asked, noticing the fear in his eyes. "John?" She stopped when he pushed his back against the wall and held his hand toward her, knowing that he needed to be left alone for a while. "Clarissa has something to share at dinner, I'm not sure what though. Come down when you're ready." She left John's room, happy that he at least felt safe in there. She closed his door, listening to the silence waiting for John to either explode in a fit, or start to cry. No one ever knew which he would choose, and that was the worst part of his temper, sometimes he chose neither and disappeared for a couple days until he'd had enough of being without Claire and decided to come back. She was amazed that he always knew how to get home, even if he'd never been in the city before. It was like he had a compass built in to his mind. She furrowed her brow as after five minutes no sound came from his room, and she cracked it open to see him in nothing but his boxers with his pen and poetry and song book in his hand. She smiled, happy that he'd found another way to relax and vent his emotions. "Good boy, Johnny." She whispered, shutting his door all the way as she started down stairs.