It's Just the Way We're Diseased

When I woke up in the morning my eye was pure purple but the swelling had decreased. I pulled out a make up box and covered the purple markings, though they stayed kind of pink. The story as to why my eye wouldn't quite open all the way: I was stung by a bee and I'm allergic to it. The medicine hasn't fixed it yet.

I walked out of the bathroom and ran into Jimmy.

"Hey, Lease." He grabbed my chin and looked at my make-up job. "That's still fucked looking."

"I know. It hurts to touch though so I gave up covering it completely." I sighed some and pulled my head from his grip. I looked up at my big brother. He was always so calm with us. Why? We're batshit crazy... Then again he is too. Maybe he didn't get the fucked up torture we did, but he had to see it. For a few years they made him participate in torturing us. I could see the silent guilt in his eyes. "I love you Jimmy. None of this is your fault." I looked away, ready to keep walking, but I was pulled into a hug. He wasn't much of a hugger but me and him just happened to be really close.

"I'm sorry. I couldn't stop them." He whispered it. He never cried, but he always sounded so close to over the edge. "Grace doesn't remember it. And it's a beautiful thing." I think one tear escaped for him. I smiled.

"I know." He felt guilty about what happened to us. I wonder what everyone sees when they look into my eyes... "We'll keep it that way. No more running. No more killing. It's going to be hard because we're all haunted and addicted. Matt need to break his need for power. Zacky and I are pretty well controlled. I just need to find a different outlet for my anger." I laughed some. He nodded, letting me go. "You've done great not setting things on fire or breaking shit. Syn can get over his necrophilia."

"And Johnny?"

"We still don't know what his problem is. He's so inverted. Weird little sociopath." I scowled.

"You're a sociopath, Lisa." Jimmy said it so blandly. I just smiled some.

"I feel remorse, Jimmy. I do." I nodded.

"For what happened to Grace and for not being able to protect her. But for killing people? You don't give it another thought." He rolled his eyes. I glared at him. Is that what's in my eyes?

"Go away." I commanded, yet I was the one to walk away. Matt was in the living room with Grace. "Matty!" I tried to sound so optimistic. But his face conveyed something totally different.

"I remember some stuff." She looked up at me. And didn't scream or freak out.

"Like what?" My heart skipped a beat. Then sounded really loud in my ears. Memories of our life flew past me. Both of us have identical scars down our chest from the times mommy and daddy's doctor friends helped them with their fucked up rituals without killing us. The way she has a burn scar on her left foot from daddy getting mad at her for trying to run away when we were 12 and he put her foot on a recently lit but put out fire in the fire place. The time we made a blood pact like on that movie about the witch sisters to always try to help each other. And how I was the only one to ever actually follow on that pact.

"We're twins." She said softly, smiling. "And Matt and I are lovers. Jimmy is our brother. We're all friends." She sounded so innocent. All my life it's been we look innocent, but never were. Even when we didn't do anything. "This picture?" She held a picture of her and I together, we each had a rose. Then she recited the story I made up to fit behind it. "We were out picking flowers when we found the only two roses in the field." At the time she told me it the most stupid thing she'd ever heard. "And we wanted to document the beautiful find. So we brought them home." She smiled. She thought the story I said we'd tell everyone was the truth. The truth was that those were roses from our mother's grave. We took them because she didn't deserve anything so delicate and gorgeous.

"You're right." My heart fluttered. I almost started crying. She believed the stories behind all of our fake pictures. "You're totally right." I laughed some.

"What's funny?" Matt demanded. He seemed angry about this.

"I'm happy. She remembered something. Something glorious." I laughed more and sat next to Grace. "What else?" I wanted her to recite my lies to me as her memories.

"Well this one?" She pointed to a picture of all of us. Then did exactly what I wanted her to. "We decided to get professional pictures done because it was when we first came together as our own little family and we wanted something to really symbolize how happy we all are to have each other." She smiled. "For when we moved in to our first house together."

"Right." Lies. That was the picture we had taken because it was before we went on the run. We always wanted to document things that made an impact on our lives, at the same time we needed stories so if someone asked we didn't sound crazy for taking a picture of every inner scar we have. "You keep looking and remembering." She had about four photo albums with her. None of them were from when we were way little. We started taking pictures and making lies when me and her were 16. She had the one that they started in and up. None from before that. The pictures of the open chest rituals. The pictures of our bleeding hands from being locked in our punishment. The pictures of mommy and daddy's happy faces the first time they shot my leg.

I got up and left them, taking in a deep breath. I found Syn and Zacky in the kitchen. "She's remembering." I smiled.

"That's good?" Syn asked confused.

"You know how we make up false stories behind our pictures?"

"Yes." He arched a brow.

"She remembers those lies. And she thinks they're the truth." I sat down and smiled more.

"That's great." They both laughed some. Johnny came in.

"Why are we laughing? Grace is fucking gone and you guys are celebrating?" He was pissed. Grace was his best friend.

"Cheer up Johnny. You can't brood around here anymore. She remembers the lies. All the sweet stories we made up behind our pictures. She's remembers those as memories she actually has. She doesn't remember our awful lives. None of that. Just the happy things." I closed my eyes, really to take on the day. Everything was good.

"What's the story behind your eye?" Zacky asked.

"Healing bee sting allergy." I shrugged.

"Nice." Syn said. I looked at him and frowned some. "What?"

"Can I talk to you?" I asked softly.

"Sure." We got up and left them in the kitchen, giving Johnny directions to tell Jimmy the great news, and we made our way to our room. "What's wrong?" He asked when we got in.

"When you look into my eyes... What do you see?" I glanced at him.

"You mean the emotions in your eyes?" He asked to clarify. I nodded. He sighed. "You mask it. Well. You usually can fake the happiness and move enough so no one sees the truth. But because I see you everyday, I can say with positivity that even if I only met you once, if you gave me the true you, all I'd see the the pain. The guilt. The sorrow. The anger. You can tell it's there if you look long enough. I've seen it in Jimmy's eyes too but it's not as prominent. He's not as hung onto the past as you are. But he also didn't go through the same things. To see it in his eyes, you have to know him. You don't have to know you to see your scars." He sat down next to me on the bed. I stared at the floor and frowned.

"I'm that broken?" My voice hitched. I sounded so pathetic.

"You're not broken, Lisa." He sighed.

"I can't be fixed." I could feel myself falling into my personal deep whole. I could feel myself losing the battle to stay with the present. I was a child again. In the dark closet that was my room. I was broken. So broken. Like the glass embedded into my hands.