Chapter 3:
Both Tate and Violet woke when the first rays of the sun shone through their windows, though both under very different circumstances.
Violet was in her bed and, as soon as she opened her eyes, felt the anticipation of some discovery or other she was to make in the book.
Tate found himself lying on the concrete floor of the basement, face and hair coated in his dried blood. There was a red mark on the wall where his head had collided with it and the sight of this blotch seemed to remind him of all the pain that sleep took away from him for a few hours.
His longing to be with Violet and knowledge that he himself was what was standing between them came crashing over him all at once. The irony of his situation made the sting all the more bitter.
Tate knew that he should think that what he did was wrong. He really did, but at the same time he found himself feeling sorry about what he had done, not because his deeds seemed wrong to him, but because he regretted that they had parted him and Violet.
He was still lying on the floor, the blood from a wound that had healed as soon as it was made still caking his face, when Nora found him.
She came around the corner wringing her hands in despair and occasionally sighing in remembrance of her lost child. It seemed that she herself had grown tired of her own incessant wailing.
As soon as she laid eyes on Tate, Nora knelt down by his side. Her precious gown was draped over the dusty ground. She held his head in one hand and caressed his cheek with the other, all the while muttering.
Her feelings towards him were almost motherly, as Tate made her think of what her own dear son might have looked like. She delicately ignored the fact that he was a homicidal rapist. All that mattered to her was that his facial features; his hair and eye colour were just like those of her son. This served as a canvas onto which she could project all the sweetness she wanted to remember her baby for.
Because of this, the sight of Tate deeply affected her and, before long, tears were dripping down onto him.
"Oh, my dear boy-"
A sob interrupted her speech. Nora took her hand from Tate's cheek to cover her mouth with it.
She tried to speak through her fingers, but could only babble. It took some time before she was composed enough to properly talk again.
"Your poor head. Why must that golden hair of yours be tainted with blood? Oh, Tate! Tate, tell me- will you leave me too?"
Another sob stopped her. Tears were freely flowing down her cheeks and onto his. Tate grabbed her waist and hid his face in Nora's stomach.
This seemed to confirm to her that his wound was fatal. Tate, however, only wanted to be held by someone and he found this someone in Nora, who had always been like a second mother to him.
The sound of Nora's wailing filled the small room in the basement, where they were. It brought Tate back to reality and he pushed himself away from her.
"Don't worry, Nora. I'm fine. Ghost wounds heal quickly, remember?"
She choked on another cry of despair.
"But; but Tate! Your head-"
This word made Nora wail again. Tate sat up and pushed hair away from his temples.
"Everything's fine, see? Get up now or you'll ruin your dress."
Nora didn't budge, not quite believing his words. Tate sighed and added a little more affectionately:
"Please, Nora. I'm fine and I'm not going anywhere, don't worry."
He held his hand in her direction to help her up. As they stood facing each other, Tate looming over Nora, her wide eyes showed him that she still worried.
This time Tate caressed her cheek, then turned to leave. He couldn't be with her anymore. Her caring only made his actual mother's deficiencies even clearer and she made him think about Constance, which is something he tried to avoid, if it was possible.
Before he knew what he was doing, Tate had left the basement and was standing in the corridor leading from the front door to the main staircase.
Tate knew why he was there and didn't, all at the same time. Lately, the thought of speaking to DR. Harmon had crept into his mind more and more often. He knew he had to, but wasn't quite sure how to and was afraid of being rejected again, as he had been before.
At the same time he also knew that DR. Harmon was the best way to get closer to Violet. Perhaps they could even resume therapy, if that was necessary for Violet to let him in again.
Tate knew exactly where to find DR. Harmon. He always spent the mornings in the living room. There the sun shone through the windows and the small stained-glass panels in them, casting colours over the wooden floor.
All Ben really did there was just sit and watch the wandering lights on the floor.
None of them in the house really had any occupation to pass the time with. Time itself had become an unknown concept to them; a distant memory from the past when it was known to pass and ultimately lead to something. In the house it had stopped in its tracks, and with it also the inhabitants' wish for it to pass.
He found DR. Harmon where he had expected to. There was an armchair in the living room that was positioned so it was facing the window looking out to the back garden. In it was Dr. Harmon, his arms slung over the armrests and unfocused eyes fixed on the ground beyond his feet.
Tate entered the room not bothering to be quiet. He knew DR. Harmon wouldn't notice him either way. It was only after he actually stood right behind him and started speaking, that Harmon even realised he was in the room.
"Look, doctor. I've been thinking quite a lot lately. About myself, about everything that's happened. It all seems so different to me now, you know? Now that I see the consequences, I guess. And I was wondering, because I felt a change in myself and I think it only really started with my therapy-"
Tate groaned and wiped his face with a hand. Now that he was speaking to DR. Harmon words failed him. The purpose of the conversation became blurry to him. He wasn't even quite sure of it anymore. Did he want to resume therapy? Beg him to make Violet forget his deeds?
Every second he spent standing in that room, behind a man he wasn't quite sure was even listening to him, made it clearer that DR. Harmon wasn't his way back to Violet; or sanity, for that matter. He had long given up on that, partly because he thought the man couldn't bring back something that had never existed, partly because he didn't see what good it would do him, now that he was dead.
DR. Harmon was listening, though, and started talking without moving his gaze from the dancing lights.
"What do you want Tate?"
The sound startled the addressed, who was hiding his eyes behind a hand he now pulled away from his face.
"I don't really know. It's just that you helped me. You really did, doctor; and I guessed that, well… I guessed that maybe you could make me even better. My brain, I mean."
"I did nothing for you, Tate. And I'm not your doctor; or anyone's for that matter. All my work- I believed it too, for a while. But we can't help people in that way. Even if I could, I wouldn't help you."
Tate could feel heat balling up in his chest at Harmon's speech, but was determined to ignore it. This man was his best bet.
"Look, doctor-"
"No, Tate. I can see you are remorseful. But I can also see that this is for the wrong reasons. You don't regret your deeds."
"But I do! Honestly, I do."
"No, Tate. You regret their consequences. That is something different."
The sigh Tate uttered at this sentence sounded more like a growl.
"I think I needed the consequences, doctor, to see that what I did was wrong. To truly see, I mean."
"Don't call me doctor."
For the first time during the whole conversation Harmon turned back to face Tate. He saw a person full of cracks, where broken pieces had carelessly been put back together.
"You see nothing, Tate, but your self-pity. I have said it before: I can't treat you anymore. The things you did to me- to my family. Wasn't it enough for you to kill us all? To condemn us to a fate far worse than death: That of being trapped forever, not truly belonging to either the realm of the living or that of the dead? No, Tate, you show no remorse and do you know why? You can't feel remorse."
Ben turned back around, thereby dismissing Tate from the room. Tate's head was bowed in a submissive position. His eyes, however, showed no trace of that feeling. He was failing to concentrate on suppressing what was a part of him, which was almost larger than he himself was. The bad had always outweighed the good in him and the dark the light.
He walked up to DR Harmon's chair and put his hands on the back of it. His head was still bowed and it was in this position that he spoke again. Tate was trying to keep his voice low, yet to add enough force to it to show he wouldn't leave. All his efforts were in vain, however. His voice was a harsh, shaky whisper that sounded like hissing:
"You must help me. I need you, don't you understand?", his voice was continually swelling with emotion, "This isn't just about me-"
"What are you going to do, Tate? You have already killed me. There is nothing left to take from me anymore. You can hurt me, but you are hurting yourself more. Whatever you do against me, goes against you as well. We all have reasons for deserving to be stuck here; everything happens for a reason, you know?"
Tate's fingers itched to move. He placed his hands around Ben Harmon's neck. He, however, merely scuffed.
"Well, do it. It makes no difference. At the end of the day, we'll be just as dead as we are now, and I suspect you even more so than me."
Tate didn't want to hear DR Harmon speak anymore. He knew he was right, and this infuriated Tate.
His head still bowed, his breathing slow and heavy, Tate jerked his hands to one side, revelling in the snap of bone he felt under his fingers. DR Harmon' s head fell limply to one side, but before Tate had left the room, He again sat erect in his chair, tracing the light and shadows on the floor with his eyes.
A/N: I realise it's been an awfully long time since I#Ve last updated and I'm terribly sorry about that. My laptop broke when I got home from my holiday and I haven't really been able to write. Sorry again! :)