Demons [Eddie Brock] Venom

14. Nothing

Rory stirred.

Rose petals lead to the bedroom; it is corny, but Rory doesn't voice the fact that it will be a mess to clean up. Instead, she lets him lead through the hallways of his massive condo, so large she swears she might get lost in it. And then sooner than she hopes, the bedroom is there, the rooms filled with roses. She fights the urge to wrinkle her nose; she doesn't need jewelry and roses, she wants fattening take-out and a crappy movie playing on the tv.

She rolled onto her side, eyes flickering back and forth underneath her lids.

She sits on the edge of the massive clawfoot tub, her favourite thing in the entire condo. Her hand sways in the water as it fills the perfectly clean porcelain. The water ripples as she runs her fingers through it, then she slips off her robe and hangs it on the hook. At her own place she would have stripped out of her regular clothes and tossed them over the floor, cleaning them up the next day. But not here. She slips into the tub and lets the steaming hot water scald her. It burns every inch of her flesh, but she doesn't feel it. Her long hair -the way he likes it- hangs over the edge of the tub until she submerges underneath. She stares at the pristine ceiling from under the rippling waters until her vision too ripples.

Rory's breath increased.

She lays on her side, clutching the sheet over her sweat-slicked frame. Like a layer of grime coats her, she wants to peel her flesh off, start anew. He gets up and walks to the washroom, disappearing for a moment and giving her room to breathe. She dares not get up, but reaches out from the blankets and grabs her pajamas, sliding them back on under the covers. When he comes back to bed he mutters something about it, but does nothing more.

Rory's arm slings over the edge of the bed, touching the ground.

"Aurora, I'm going away for the weekend. But don't worry, I'll check in on you and make sure you're okay. The house keeper did inform me that she found you unconscious in the bathtub; the heat knocked you out. I'm worried about you."

"You don't need to worry about me," she says, but her words don't come out as convincing as they used to. She has nothing left, no energy to expend to false smiles and lies.

"I wish that were true, Aurora, why do you feel the need to lie?"

"I'm just going through a hard time," she replies.

"I'll send Doctor Patel in to speak with you, I can't have it public that you are on medications, but if you need them I will make sure you are on them."

She does not want meds. "Alright."

"That's my girl," he says, then reminds her that there will be someone outside the door and another at the bottom of the building, a chauffer

She stands in the doorway of her art room, the one she was given when she moved in -or when she was moved in. The paints sit neatly in the corner, tidy and untouched. Paint brushes that have never touched paint are on their sides, pristine and still soft. She hears the door close and know he is gone. Slowly, she walks into the room and grabs a cup of water that she would have used to rinse her brushes. It's filled with dust.

She clutches it in her hand, then throws it against her last painting; she doesn't know when she painted it, it's foreign to her, another person painted it. The painting explodes with colours as the water hits it, making it bleed into the floor below it. She studies the black and blue that seep into the beautiful hardwood floors. How it is a mirror, how it mocks her and laughs at her.

She collapses onto the ground and with a heavy sob, she lets it out.

She lets it all out until she is nothing more than a heap on the floor, curled in on herself. How long has she let herself slip away? Her own self, disappeared through the pores of her flesh, allowing an empty space to be filled with a toxic. A poison. It seeps into her, it caresses her and taunts her all at once, telling her she is nothing, that she will never be anything. That if she walks out that door she will have nothing, no one.

"Oh dear," the housekeeper says, starting Rory yet she does not flinch or dare move.

How long has she been like this? How many minutes or hours has she been curled up on the floor, letting the smell of old paint and dusty water remind her that she has become nothing. Only when the house keeper touches her back does she move from her place there, where she belongs, groveling.

"Let's get this cleaned up before he comes home," the housekeeper says, the kindness in her voice the only thing that makes her get to her feet.

"Is this what I have become?"

"Sometimes we are forced into roles we do not fit into, sometimes it is impossible to break from them. But do not give up now, Aurora."

She gets her to her feet, helping her along towards the chair. Aurora sits, her lip no longer trembles, and tears no longer fall, she doesn't have anything left in her now. After watching the housekeeper begin cleaning up, she joins in. Grabs a cloth and begins to sop up the mess, the mess she made, the mess she got herself into, the mess that she is.

She decides she likes the name Rory, her father used to call her that.

Rory woke on her back, hands clutching the sheets of a strange bed. Eddie's bed. Releasing a deep breath, she stared at the speckled, water stained ceiling and waits until a smile appears. It crawled its way on there, that strange part of herself she once forgot about. Quietly she got out of the bed and her bare feet pattered along the warped floor. From the light of the city she finds it nearly impossible to tell what time it is, but the clock on the stove informed her it was nearly six AM. As she clambered out onto the balcony, she sat down on the freezing cold metal ledge, watching as the city began to wake up.

"I will become what I want to become," she told herself. 

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So good news, I plotted this story to completion, I just need to write it! More good news, I found the list of names for dedications! 

Bad news, tomorrows update might be later in the day, I'm busy all day today, tonight, and tomorrow morning.