Not for you (FIN)

Author's note:

Here's another small warning.

Even if this story is rated NC-17, the following chapter is *not* for the faint at heart. You dislike drama, blood, gore and pain? I suggest you stop reading right now and continue reading with the next chapter as soon as I've posted it.




I noticed something else. While Dom was reluctant, pale at the beginning of the discussion; he was more and more actively participating, his face glowing. It came to a point where he was leading the discussion, asking questions instead of being asked, mostly by Vince. He's taking the lead again, I smiled to myself. That's good, I thought, very-

"What are you smiling at?" Dom said, distracting me from my thoughts.

"Huh?"

"You're smiling all the time, what are you smiling at?"

"I'm just enjoying that you all are finally talking to each other."

"Isn't there something you would like to say, too?" Dom asked, head cocked, taking a sip from his Corona bottle.

"Uhm - I wasn't involved in your little accident..."

"No, but as you brought up the psychologist, I think there are one or two things that you should discuss with one, too." Vince gave me that kind of stare which seemed to be able to look at the bottom of my soul.

"Like what?" I tried, hoping he would drop the subject. But he didn't.

"Like... this..." He said, trying to touch my face, from which I automatically flinched back.

"I don't think this is a subject for Racewars." I said, feeling anger boiling up.

"Fuck Racewars! It's just me and you and some friends at a cozy table. Tell us." Dom still looked at me.

"I don't really think that your friends want to hear this."

"Oh, if it's just about me, I'd love to. Besides, after spending a full day with you inside that scaring little car and just having laid out the last five years of my life before you, I guess I'm a friend of yours, too." Said Vince, looking at me as expecting as Dom and totally ignoring my hateful stare.

"Well, you properly introduced yourself to me and from what I heard, that's unusual; so I'm your friend as well." Leon said, smiling, drinking beer.

"Count me in! I almost fried my cooling system for this strange little habit of yours. Besides, I kissed you, so I'm your friend too. Plus, you owe me for smoking my car." Laughed Brian.

"I didn't smoke your car, so sure as hell I don't owe you anything!" I protested.

"Funny, just a few hours ago you insisted you did." Smiled Dom.

" Speak. Just start telling, until you reach the end of the story. It can't be that bad, you know?" Leon said.

"Oh, I do know, and it's even worse than just 'bad'." I said quietly, looking at my shoes under the table.

"Still not at the Olympic games." Warned Dom, seeing what I was looking at.

"Come on, we talked, now it's your turn." Vince tried to encourage me, rubbing my arm. "Why don't you like being touched?"

"Oh, in fact, I don't just 'not like' being touched. I can't stand it. At least and especially not in my face."

"Not even by, well, you know, people you know well, like me?" Dom said.

"No. If someone doesn't like to be touched, it means by no one and nothing. I can't even wear caps with a strap running under my chin because that touches my cheeks. I hate the pressure."

"I thought you'd trust me." He sounded disappointed.

"Well, yeah, I sort of... trust you, but still I don't like being touched."

"Then by all means finally tell us how it came to this." Now Vince gave me that stare.

Dom and Vince were sitting at either side of me, each their hands on my arms. Before me was the table, and behind that table were Leon and Brian. I felt a little trapped.

"Boys... this is not funny. It's serious. And it's not nice."

They stared at me, I stared back at each of them. Just when I was about to draw a breath to tell about the whole thing, I felt that I was choking on that same breath. My stomach was cramping, and I knew why; but that knowledge didn't exactly help with the pain, so I leaned forward and pressed my hands on it.

"What's up, what's wrong now?" Dom's voice showed real concern, and I felt his body heat when he leaned towards me. Just the thing I don't need now, I thought.

"Stomach cramping. Always happens when I think of this..." I squeezed my eyes shut, seeing the vision of a hand that touched me long ago, with a metallic glitter on it. Instantly, I started scratching my upper arm.

"Look at me. You look at me!" He shouted at me, one finger on my chin, forcing me to look upwards into his eyes. "It's alright. You're here with me and the others. No one will hurt you."

I stared at him with wide open eyes, my mind was blank. All I could feel was the pain of wounds that had long healed, and all I could see was something I had only seen once in my life, and that was long gone, too. What I didn't notice was that I was just about to scratch the skin from my upper arms, already leaving bloody streaks on the skin.

The image of what I had seen faded, and I could see Dom again. He still stared at me, a long, probing stare, then brought his hand into my view. Carefully, slowly, he stretched out his index finger and caught a tear that was rolling down my cheek, not touching the skin beneath it.

"Noticed those lines on your face." He said, just still loud enough for the others to hear; pointing at my cheek with the three faint, barely noticeable scars, then used his hand to stop me from scratching.

"Noticed those lines in many other places on your body when I washed you after you fainted. Some are so small that they almost blend with the skin, others are better noticeable; but they're definitely all over your body except on your back. Whenever you're nervous, you start scratching them, preferably the ones on your upper arms which are most prominent, which tells me that they have already been scratched when they weren't scars yet. Never seen anything likely before."

I still stared at him and finally stopped to scratch my arm. "They're that noticeable?"

"Only if you wear no sleeves, and only if you really look close. I doubt that you let many people come into a range at which they would actually notice them."

I breathed out. "That's good, because usually I don't want people to notice them."

"What are they?"

"They are - well, they're cuts, actually." The hand that was so long gone was so close to cut my face again.

"An accident?" asked Brian, almost crawling over the table to catch our quiet conversations.

"Not really." I so didn't want to tell this.

"Listen - you, I and the others here will probably spend some more time together. I'd like to know into which pit you've fallen to come out as screwed up as you are. Want to help you or at least understand this; hell, you helped us to get together at this table, it's the least thing I can do. And I have no idea how to do that if you don't tell us." Dom said, his face so close to my shoulder that I had thought he'd lean on it, but I felt no pressure.

I stared at him for minutes, hours, it seemed; he said nothing more but just stared back at me. The others did the same.

"Just someone who wasn't really happy about something I did." I finally said.

"Well, see, I'm also not always really happy what our Fearless Leader does, but I still don't cut him or something." Vince said, a frown etched to his face. "Care to tell us more? No, that wasn't enough, just to avoid that question."

I took a deep breath. Now or never, I thought.

"Alright, I'll have a try. Just don't you wonder about the way I'm telling you this because there is no way I could tell it in first person without freaking out. And just so you're prepared, this is gonna be ugly."

They all nodded, and I just stared at the table when I started telling, carefully avoiding any emotional aspect in what I told just not to be sucked into this again.

"Well, there was this girl who didn't want to be with her boyfriend any more, so she told him it was over. The guy didn't take that too well, so one night, when she came home, he and his two brothers dragged the girl into a car, broke into a parking lot and tied her to one of the columns that held up the deck."

And how cold the concrete felt on my back...

"While she was sure they had raping in mind, they were up to something else. The guy stood before the girl, telling her that if he couldn't have her, he would thoroughly spoil her from being touched by anyone else in the future. Plus, he'd make her look ugly so that no one would want to touch her any more."

The hand came up, and I remembered being irritated by a flash of light that seemed to be mirrored from somewhere in his palm...


I swallowed, closed my eyes, took a break, then continued speaking with my eyes closed.

"He touched her, with his flat hand, just very lightly, it seemed, on her cheek..."

I opened my eyes, brought my hand to Dom's face and let it hover over it in a stroke, just far enough from his face that I wouldn't touch him. Then I dropped my hand again, as I had demonstrated what I wanted to demonstrate.

"...and at first she felt nothing, but then something warm ran over her face while he was just standing in front of her, grinning like a madman."

...and his eyes were those of a madman...

Shit. I was so close, so close to being there again, something that hadn't occurred for quite some years and which I was not happy about. I took another deep breath before I could continue to speak again.

"She could see his hand, between his fingers, he held three razor blades, stroking her again over the other cheek. Guy continued that stroking all over the girl's body, cutting her clothes and skin, and she already thought it was not really going to become a future problem, as the deep, yet fine cuts of razors usually heal fast even if they burn for the moment..."

I felt a tear running down my cheek.

"Then, as her body was burning all over with the little cut marks, one of the brothers went back to the car and brought a can. She had no idea what that was; later in the hospital they'd tell her it had probably been salt water with dirt in it, like from a beach; and a high concentration of Hirudin; that's the stuff leeches produce to keep wounds from closing. They splashed the content of that can all over her. Then they just left, leaving her tied to the column."

When I had finished that sentence, I was shaking all over and unconsciously started to scratch my upper arm, staring at the table before me again. It's over, I thought, it's been over for years and you've just told it. They are not here, no one will harm you.

"I think I screamed for hours. I so hoped to fall unconscious. But I didn't. The pain was everywhere, all over my body, and it wouldn't just go away. I still screamed when the parking lot opened hours later, cars with people streaming in to see me in shredded clothes and screaming and crying, covered with my own blood and sweat.

I was told later that I managed to scream even louder when they brought me to the hospital each time someone was trying to touch me. They had to tie me to my bed to tend my wounds because I freaked each time anyone came near me. That's how this happened, that's why. There you are, happy now?"

I took some more minutes staring at the table, just feeling sick again. Then I turned my head to look at the others. Brian, arms crossed, looked around with an almost painful expression on his face; Vince gave the trailer next to me a blank stare while still rubbing my arm and Leon looked past the trailers into the desert, expression unreadable.

Dom held his face buried deep into his free hand, the elbow propped on his knee, the other hand still on my arm. Then, finally, when he found that I wasn't telling anything more, he slowly removed his hands from me and his face. His mouth was twitching as if he had just been cut with something.

"That's what was done to you?" Vince said, now looking at me, still rubbing my arm.

I slowly nodded. "If you have any doubts - I still have pictures from that day taken in the hospital."

"Oh, I don't doubt it, but I doubt I want to see pictures. When did this happen?"

"Sixteen years ago. I was twenty. I'll never forget that day."

That's something I believe." He said, looking down at the floor.

Leon jumped up and ran behind one of the trailers. I heard choking and spitting sounds just the split of a second later; then, after what seemed endless minutes, he came back, leaning hesitating to the trailer next to me, staring at the floor.

"Was that the guy who called you this morning?" Dom asked with a sour expression on his face.

"No, that was someone I got to know during my stay in the hospital, Michael, who was there after suffering severe burns from a fire in his car. We had a relationship some years later, but now we're - well - friends, sort of; but he's very worried for my well being. He's not exactly happy that I went to the US search for you and, in fact, found you, because he's scared that you, after that accident years ago, might get me into trouble.

But he was the first person I ever trusted again after this happened. He and his friends - my friends - helped me to become a half way acceptable member of the human society again. They taught me not to run screaming if someone, just like you now, Vince, just touches my arm or shakes my hand. Took them years to do that. My face is a different issue, though, as the hands or whatever is touching me comes so close to where I can actually see it." I looked at Dom.

"You're disgusted." I said. It wasn't a question, and I wasn't looking at him any more either.

"No, I'm just feeling a bit sick."

"I told you I didn't want to talk about it. Now, if you're disgusted by me, just turn and walk."

His brow creased, he looked at me. "Disgusted? By what?"

"Well, I heard that the idea that the idea of a woman on a live butchering exhibit isn't exactly charming."

He just shook his head slowly, his eyes never leaving mine. I thought he would say something, but he didn't.

"What?" I finally asked.

"I just hope," he said, "that you made those guys sorry for what they did. If they're lucky, they're still in jail."

I snorted. "You think after what they did to me I even just dared to think about telling the police or anyone else who it was? No, those three are still out there somewhere in Germany, which was another reason for me to turn my back on that country."

He still stared at me. "They better stay there and pray I never get there. I would personally and happily dismember each of them in a slow and torturous way."

He looked at the others, who just nodded enthusiastically. "I think I also know some people who would be glad to participate."

I chuckled, a bit wondering how I could do that after remembering all those events again; but perhaps it was the relative safety between them. "I would pay to see that." I said.

"When you're rolling with us, you don't need to pay to see something like this done to someone who did that to you. And rolling with us you are now, if no one has any objections." The others shook their heads, and as if to demonstrate possession, Dom laid his hand on my arm.

"And if I had any objections...?" I said. "Not that I would, though; I just thought I had to ask..."

"You dare to question the Fearless Leader's decision?" Vince winked.

I smiled at him, then back at Dom. It was not a full smile, but yet, I smiled. "You're sweet," I finally said.

"Funny, this is the first time that I'm called 'sweet' for announcing to inflict pain and death on other people."

"I don't consider such...pieces of shit... to be 'people'. They just don't deserve it." Brian said, first looking at Dom, then at me. "Sorry."

"What are you sorry for? Me? I don't want to be pitied."

"No, I just thought you were just a little crazy. I remember I touched your face in your car this afternoon. That's what I'm sorry for, and I mean it." He looked at me, stretching out his hand. "Apology accepted?"

"It's OK, Brian. I accept." I smiled at him while I shook his hand, then looked back at the table not really knowing what to say.

"So you all know and understand now why I can't stand being touched?"

"Certainly." Leon said. "Anyone of you had a look at the clock? It's three in the morning."

"Yeah, I think it's time to hit the sack." Vince said, getting up. "I also think we all need some time to digest what we heard this evening."

"I'd rather forget about it, or I'll take the first plane to Germany and commit manslaughter." Brian grumbled, also getting up, walking to his trailer. "Night everyone!" And gone they were.

Dom and I remained sitting, his hand still on my arm, moving his thumb up and down on my skin. "Thank you." He said, smiling at me.

"What for, telling a story that would make everyone else flee?"

"No, just for telling it."

"Did I understand correctly that you want me in your team?"

"You did."

"And what about this 'the police is after me and you'll get in trouble' shit?"

"I figured you went through enough trouble that you can decide all by yourself if you want this or not. And you didn't object, so I guess you still want it."

"Hum," I said, not really knowing what to say, "and now? You don't want to go to sleep?"

"Oh, I'd love to, but..."

"But what?" I stared at him, exactly knowing what he wanted to ask, but I wanted to hear, not offer it this time.

"But..." he said, looking around, clearly avoiding me.

"But...?"

He stared at the floor, still rubbing his thumb over my arm.

"You can say it, come on." I encouraged him. "If you didn't learn tonight that all you have to do is speak, then, I'm afraid, all is lost."

"...trailer...?" It was just one word, whispered.

"Trailer what?" I asked. "Stop being childish, where has the Fearless Leader with the unquestionable decisions gone?"

He took a deep breath and looked at me, chewing his bottom lip.

"You want to know why I have difficulties asking?" He finally said.

"Not only that, I also want to hear what you want to ask."

"I don't want to make you feel... as if I had already decided. It seems that in the past other people's decisions about you were not so pleasant, and it's your trailer, anyway."

"Then ask, by all means!"

"M'kay. Slept quite well in your trailer last night, any chance that I could sleep there again?"

"You could, of course. When?" I said, trying to stare him down.

"Like, right now?"

"Would be perfect, because I'm tired, too."

"Then let's go." He got up in one fluid motion, grabbed me and carried me away. This happened far quicker than I could protest. Finally, some yards 'later', I found my voice again.

"And what's this about? Caveman dragging the slaughtered animal home? Feeding time? I'm not interested in..."

"No, it's more like the Fearless Leader carrying his tired friend back to her trailer. We are friends, right?"

"I'd love that."

"That's good, because I'd love that, too."

"As long as you don't think that..."

"Oh, don't worry, I don't."

"Good."

This ended the day which everyone would later refer to as 'The day the team was refounded'.