Frowning, I spoke up. “I think she’s going to pop if we don’t,” I said, shuffling to sit up, swiping the sleep from my eyes.
“Unlike you lot, I had no idea this long journey was ahead of me before I drank a large cup of coffee and a strawberry smoothie,” Margaret chided, crossing her arms and huffing back into the seat.
“Shit,” Connor replied. “Fine. Hang on.”
As Connor found a place for us to pull over — an overly bright gas station with garish green colors and bold adverts — Margaret’s hand grabbed mine, squeezing like she was trying to tell me something. “Come with me, please,” she whispered. I nodded. Weird. There was no chance she’d be going in alone anyway. I’d have to be her chaperone, regardless.
Theo came with us into the station as Connor put unnecessary gas in the car to remain inconspicuous, and he stood outside the bathroom while Margaret and I slipped inside.
The second the door shut, she whirled on me. “Let’s get out of here,” she said with frantic urgency, her eyes darting around. “We can escape through this window.”
“What?” I asked in surprise. “No.”
She tugged on me, moving about like a frantic little bee, her nose scrunching up at the dirty counters, the pungent scent of a long since washed public bathroom. “Come on, Violet, we need to get away while we can. They’re bad men.” I watched her debate whether to touch the grimy counter, looking between it and the window above.
“And go where?” I asked. “Back to myhusband?”
“Yes!” Margaret said, her cheeks turning red. “He misses you. Needs you. Everyone is worried, Violet. Theo has…”
“Theo saved me, Mag. He saved us both. We aren’t going back.”
Margaret’s face fell. “You believe it too? That Rafael and his church are evil? That’s what father told us, that you’d fallen victim to our brother’s beliefs, that we were wrong, evil. But no, it’s just not true. Women are revered in the church. Adored.”
I laughed, loud and uncontrolled, but she carried on. It was the most ridiculous thing I’d ever heard.
“Everything the men do to our bodies brings us closer to salvation,” she spoke like she was under a spell, like she was giving a sermon. Like she wasn’t here in the room with me anymore. Her eyes went glassy. “It’s for us, for our own good. We have the vessels they need; we’re precio—”
I shook her, gripped her shoulders, and gave her a firm shake to bring her back down to earth. She was nuts. Maybe more than me.
“Do you want me to tell you the things he did to me?” I asked, my voice harsh. “I don’t want you discovering them firsthand like I had to.” She was pissing me off now. And not pissing. It had all been a ruse to get us out of earshot of the men. Should have been obvious. “You’re a baby, Margaret. You don’t know the real world.”
“And you do?” she scoffed, not wrong. “You’re less than two years older than me.”
Crikey, I felt older than eighteen. I felt like I’d lived a dozen lives in Rafe’s torture. It hit me like a truck. I had old bones now, a weary heart. And I only wanted to rest. I shrugged. She wasn’t wrong. But eighteen seemed off, insidious somehow. So much life left to live for someone so damaged.
“The indoctrination took much better on you,” I told her softly, leaning against the grotty wall. Theo would be getting restless soon, most likely pacing outside the door right now. “You had best do your business; we’ve gotta go.”
Margaret didn’t budge, crossing her arms over her chest and shaking her head. “You’ve got it backwards. You had it so good, married to the leader? What an honor.”
“Do you even know what the church does?” I asked, my voice strained. “Because I don’t. Not really. Based on my experience, all they are is a front for beating up women. I never saw anything to revere, never any sign that living this life was bringing me closer to divinity or whatever the fuck you’re spouting. All it brought me was pain. And you’re too bloody stupid to want different.”
At that, I turned and yanked open the door. Her yell to stop died in her throat. Theo’s bewildered face was right there, hand raised to knock. “She’s trying to escape,” I stated, then marched past him, leaving him to deal with that nonsense.
She was so, so wrong. So brainwashed. But she had made me realize something. Two things. She hadn’t had a Theo to show her any kindness, I’d been just as cold with her as she had been with me. We’d never really been sisterly towards each other. All by parental design.
And secondly. I needed to understand everything. I was done. Done not knowing what that bastard church was about. The mystery of it was growing old. Boring.
I thought it didn’t matter. I thought it was all about survival, getting out and getting healed. But I don’t think I’d ever truly heal until I knew what it was all for.
What Rafael was aiming for. Where was the divinity in my torture?
Twenty
Violet
Therestofourdrive only grew more tense with every mile we traveled. Only Connor occasionally commenting on something outside the car, or muttering a curse at another driver, broke the silence. I wasn’t sure where we were going, and didn’t want to ask for fear of Margaret kicking off. Things were… fraught. Awkward. I only wanted to reach over the seat and touch Theo, in any way I could. Would settle for my hand on his shoulder. He grounded me, and sitting next to miserable Margaret wasn’t helping.
Theo had to drag a spitting mad Margaret back to the car, her heels digging in, her eyes manic, and the gas station clerk paid off to ignore what was happening. She’d tried to leave, thought it was something I would want too. Hours into her rescue and she wanted back in with that dirty place.
