Page 5 of Dollhouse

I sniff away the only tear that falls, noting that even my sorrow feels shallow. I have no control. I’m stuck, never going home. My husband is someone I never truly knew, and my parents sold me to him like an animal.

Everything has been a lie, and I’ve been surrounded by wolves the entire time.

It’s too much. “I’m tired. Please leave me alone,” I say, turning to my side, the slice of pain through my ankle making me flinch.

I stare at the wall until I can’t take his silence anymore and close my eyes. There’s a creak of the floorboards and then I feel the blankets pulled up to my chin.

I barely manage not to reach out for him, especially when his hair tickles my face as he leans forward to kiss my forehead.

When he retreats, shutting the door behind him, I exhale a shaky breath, and then let myself slowly sink into a pool of nothing. I don’t cry, or think, or feel sorry for myself. I stare at nothing, feel nothing. And it’s a relief to let the numbness spread.

FOUR

A soft scraping sound rousesme from fitful sleep and a dull pain throbs deep in my head. I have no idea how much time has passed but the burn of exhaustion still stings my eyes.

It really feels like I could sleep for years and still lack any desire to crawl out of this bed.

Shifting just enough to peek at the floor, I see Bo on the carpet, lying on his stomach with his puzzle board in front of him, one piece in his hand as he scans for its home in the patchwork outline.

Molly lies at his side, tail twitching until she sees me stir. A running leap vaults her onto the bed where she bumps her head against my cheek and curls up on my pillow, her purring rumbling along my neck. My arms feel too heavy to scratch her ears the way she likes.

“She lives,” Bo muses, tilting his head. His eyes are too sharp, too aware. They always have been when it comes to me. “How are you feeling?”

I simply blink at him, taking register of my body. Noting where there’s still a dull pain, and remembering thisuncomfortable boot on my foot. Beyond that, all I want is to sink into the mattress and never emerge.

Hollow. I feel hollow.

“Tired,” I say instead. “You?”

He hits me with that overcautious look again, but must decide to let me get away with my lie. “Okay. The new house is beautiful.” He tries his puzzle piece in a new place, then chews his lip when it doesn’t fit. “I met Jesse’s dad, who is…wild. He’s wild. Noah’s parents are here too,” he adds, when I don’t say anything. “They seem nice-ish.”

“Nice-ish?”

“Yeah, his mom is sweet, but his dad might take a minute to warm up to us.”

I ponder that, weighing my curiosity with my dread of moving. “Where’s Noah?”

“Locked himself in the computer room. Only comes out to smoke or grab more coffee.”

Part of me had expected him to be passed out in the corner, waiting for me to wake up so he could keep bullying me into not being mad anymore. He’s relentless. It’s his nature to want me to bend to his will, and he’s not here?

I should feel relieved that he’s kept his distance like I asked, but I don’t. Somehow it just makes this emptiness inside me expand.

The clock ticks several silent minutes away on the wall with me watching him fit several pieces into the puzzle before the dampness of my pillow registers. Is that from me? Reaching up, I touch my fingertip to my cheek, then pull back my hand and watch as I crush the tears between my fingers.

How strange? I don’t feel sad right now. I feelnothingso deeply that I didn't even feel these tears crawling down my face.

“Em,” Bo’s concerned voice cuts through my musings. He’s on his feet and at my side, brushing my hair from my forehead before I can tell him I’m fine. “Honey, what’s wrong?”

He shifts me toward the middle of the bed and climbs in next to me, his strong arm pulling me close again so that we’re face to face on the pillow, his thumb slowly brushing along my cheekbone. “Can you talk to me?”

I close my eyes, focusing on the warmth of his body, and force my tired brain to think.

What's wrong?

Noah did not betray me, and that should make me feel better. Less angry. Every single thing points right back to Eric and Bundy.Everything. There’s just thisviolationfrom someone inside Mercy stealing the footage from the cabin and sending it out to strangers. What’s the motive? Unless Noah's keeping more secrets, I can’t imagine why someone would even risk themselves to do it.

But beyond that, there’s this unshakable shame that I know I shouldn’t feel, and yet it burns in my stomach anyway. I’ve tried to shed that preoccupation with the purity that was forced on me my entire life, but it’s still a voice in the back of my head. A brainwashing that refuses to break down.