Double Helix Ch. 06

Tears had sprung up in her eyes and her lower lip trembled as she pulled in a breath. Wendy was suddenly at my side, patting Tilly on the shoulder and whispering her own reassurance. "I know it's terrible," she said, "but you have to. You have to get it out."

Tilly gave a convulsive sob. "The men pushed me down. Two of them held me on each side with their hands and their knees, while the third man pulled off his pants. Jeff jumped up and started to protest, but the man with the gun smashed the grip hard into the top of his head and he collapsed with a scream. The two men held my legs open and the third one pushed into me. I must have closed my eyes because he slapped the side of my face and said, 'Look at me.' He stared into my eyes while he used my body. I could feel his pleasure building and my body responded in spite of my fear and revulsion. 'This bitch is getting wet,' he said, and he laughed at me."

Tilly was crying now, with great, gasping sobs. "I was. . . s-so ashamed," she stammered.

"Enough," I said. "You're too worked up. Just relax and let yourself cry. Let it out."

Wendy climbed up into the chair and put her arms around Tilly, hugging her close and letting her cry into her shoulder. I saw that Nissi and Stan had come closer, standing just behind me, lending their silent support. Tilly's sobs gradually slowed, and she went on without being prompted, still leaning into Wendy. "When he came inside me, the feel of him in my mind was enough to trigger my own orgasm. They all laughed at me and told me what a dirty whore I was. Before it had finished, the man had changed places with the one on my left and now he was inside me. I came again before he had finished, getting another round of laughter from all of them."

Tilly had stopped speaking and was taking quick, shallow breaths. She was hyperventilating. "Hey!" I said and stroked her hair to get her attention, "Tilly, hey! Focus, breathe. Slow, deep breaths." I breathed in and out deeply as an example.

Tilly followed my lead and her panting slowed. She closed her eyes as if suddenly exhausted. "I don't know if I can go on. I d-don't want to think ab-bout this."

"You have to, Tilly. Please."

She stayed like that, eyes closed, for probably close to a minute. When she began speaking, her voice was choked. "The man raping me finished and started to change places with the one on my right. But the man with the gun suddenly spoke up, 'No, my turn,' he said, and handed the gun to the one who had just gotten off me. 'This cunt is having too much fun.' I watched as he reached into his back pocket. He came out with a knife, and unfolded it, taking care to make sure I saw what it was. 'Oh, I've waited so long for this,' he said. I felt pleasure and desire bubble up in him." Tilly paused. Her face had gone suddenly ashen. "Oh, no," she gasped. She leaned over the chair arm, away from Wendy, and heaved. A splash of bile hit the floor and she coughed, heaved, and coughed again.

"I'll get it," Stan said, hurrying to the kitchen. He came back with a paper towel roll and began spreading sheets over the mess.

Tilly was alternately coughing and sobbing now. I wavered, on the verge of calling an end to it, reasoning that we might have already done enough. I waited though, and she slowly got herself under control. Her voice was hoarse as she went on. "He-he wasn't hard, not at first. Not until he started cutting me." She gently pushed Wendy away and traced a line with her finger done the center of her chest, across the bottom of one breast, diagonally over her pubic bone. "The pain and the fear was too much. I did the only thing I could think to do. I focused on him, that bundle of emotion and sensation that my mind constructed. I clung to his pleasure and tried to forget the pain in my body. It was a mistake. I lost what little control I had over my mind, and he took over. Every time he hurt me, I felt his pleasure surge and my mind and body responded by giving him more of what he wanted. He burned me with his cigarette." She touched a place on her shoulder and another on her stomach. "I cried. I pleaded with him to stop and it was all for him, all for his enjoyment. Even my body felt weak, because that's how he wanted me to be."

Tilly's eyes suddenly grew wide. "No, oh no. No!" She screamed the last word. "No, don't!"

"What happened, Tilly?"

"Eddie," she said, sobbing again now. "They forgot about him, but I saw him get up. NO!" She surged out of her chair. The fingers of one hand closed on my neck, choking off my breath. I felt her grip grow tighter, tighter, her fingernails biting painfully into my skin.

I could hear yelling, but it sounded far away. My feet kicked at empty air. There was shouting, hands grasping. The world jumped, slamming painfully into my forehead. I screamed, but all that came out was a gurgling sound. I rolled onto my side, gasping and coughing. Something crashed nearby. Gradually, I became aware of voices shouting. ". . . her arm. Get her arm. We need to get her down." Wendy's voice.

I flopped to my back and could see them now, all three of them hanging onto Tilly a few feet away, restraining her. A vase on a side table had fallen and shattered on the ground. Tilly stared at me, naked hatred in her eyes. "You. . .you fucker! You killed him!"

"Tilly!" I croaked. "It's me!"

She fought to free herself from the collective grasp of Stan, Nissi and Wendy for a few more seconds, but my words must have begun to sink in. "Norm?" She stopped fighting and let the others wrestle her down to the couch. Stan had one arm and Nissi had the other. Wendy let go, releasing her grip on Tilly's legs.

I lifted myself to hands and knees. "What happened?" I asked, my voice a painful rasp."Tell us what happened then."

Tilly stared past me. The rage had left her voice, leaving nothing. She spoke with no inflection at all. "Eddie, he knocked the gun away. It flew across the room. Eddie was fighting him. The man that was raping me, though, he turned and stabbed Eddie, right in the middle of his back." Her hands clenched. "Something snapped inside me. Only one of the men was holding me then, and I grabbed his arm and threw him against the wall. I went after the twisted one first, the one that had stabbed Eddie." Her fists unclenched and she looked down at her hands. Tears were running down her cheeks again, but her voice was steady. "I grabbed him by the throat and I squeezed and things crunched and burst and there was blood and he--he just died. There was a table next to me, so I grabbed one of the legs and ripped it free. The man I threw off was coming back at me, so I hit him with the table leg. I hit him in the face and he went down and didn't get back up. The other two were trying to find the gun. I started hitting them, over and over. I hit them until they both stopped moving. I killed them." She stared at me. "I killed them all."

I stood there in shock, staring back at Tilly. "That's it, isn't it?" I said. "That's what's really wrong with you. It's not the rape. It's those men you killed. That's the trauma."

"Four lives," she said. "I ended four lives." She screamed then and thrashed against Nissi's and Stan's hold on her. "I killed them!"

"Good," Wendy said, and though her voice was quiet, Tilly stopped moving to listen. "I'm glad you did it."

"No," Tilly said. "That was murder. I killed them. I deserve to die."

"It was self-defense," I said, finally getting to my feet. I touched my neck tenderly. There would be bruises there, but there seemed to be no serious damage. "You did it to save lives."

"You don't understand," Tilly cried. "I did it because I was enraged. I wanted to see them dead. I'm a killer."

"Why should it matter that you were angry?" I asked. "You, Jeff and Peter came out alive. You would never have done that to them if those men hadn't attacked you first."

Tilly slumped on the sofa, all fight gone out of her. Carefully, Nissi, then Stan, let go of her. "It's not your fault," I said, and I flashed to the memory of that time in the greenhouse, when Tilly had said those same words to me.

Tilly closed her eyes and shuddered. "What happened shouldn't have been possible. I'm supposed to make people happy."

"That doesn't mean you can't fight back when you are attacked," Nissi said. "The men you killed were evil, and I don't say that lightly."

"So tired," Tilly said, and her eyes closed. She was asleep in moments, limbs splayed haphazardly across the sofa.

"I'll stay with her," I said. "It's okay. I think the worst is past."

Nissi, Stan and Wendy reluctantly left me. Over an hour had passed since we had started. I sat and watched Tilly for a minute. Her chest rose and fell slowly and rhythmically. She looked to be at peace, and I hoped it was a good sign. I picked up the phone and called Sasha. "We're finished," I said.

"Okay, Norm. We'll be out for a few hours more. How is she doing?"

"She's asleep," I said, looking over at Tilly again. "I'm not sure yet if she's going to be better, but she was amazing." The hoarseness in my voice had nothing to do with my injured throat. "I'll have to tell you about it all later."

We said our good byes and I hung up the phone. I reclined the chair and rubbed at my face, still coming down from the stress and excitement of the encounter. Slowly, by degrees, I relaxed.

A touch on my forehead stirred me out of sleep. A moment later, a pair of lips touched mine in a gentle kiss. I gave a low moan of appreciation deep in my throat, forgetting for the moment where I was and what had happened. I opened my eyes to ssee a fan of short brown hair framing Tilly's earnest face. She leaned over the side of the chair above me, her eyes closed. Inhaling sharply, I broke the kiss, pulling back from her. "Well," I said with a halfhearted chuckle, "that was a little unexpected."

Tilly reached out a hand, as if to stroke my cheek, but stopped and let it fall to the arm of the chair. Her eyes shone. "It worked, Norm," she said, and laughed. "I woke up just now and the pain is just gone, like it was all a bad dream." She breathed in deep. "I feel alive again. I feel whole."

Tears stung my eyes at the joy in her words. I felt buoyed, overflowing with happiness and relief from all the fear and worry. "I'm so glad," I said, my voice breaking.

Tilly moved back so that I could sit up in the chair. "You were right," she said. "What happened, the things I did were so terrible that I blocked them out of my mind. I couldn't come to grips with it, but I punished myself by reliving the pain I had felt at that awful man's hands every waking moment. I see now that I had to do what I did. I had to stop those men. Their deaths were not my fault."

I stood and put my hand on her shoulder. She didn't flinch away or wilt under my touch. "Why don't we go down and see the others?"

To say that she was like a different person would be a vast understatement. "Hello, everyone," Tilly said, moving lightly on the balls of her feet as she alighted at the bottom of the stairs, instead of plodding and shuffling. There was a collective outburst of amazement as everyone rushed over to meet her.

She lifted Wendy up into her arms in a fierce hug, swinging her around. "Thank you, thank you so much for taking care of me," she said. "You have nothing to be ashamed of. You did all you could for me. You helped me to hang on for all those months. I wouldn't have made it without your kindness."

Wendy was crying when she put her down.

"Nock," she said, taking his hand. "Your blood saved my life, and I didn't thank you properly before." She stretched up on tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek. "Thank you. If you should ever need the favor returned, you know who your donor match is. The pain you caused me before came from ignorance, not from ill intent. I want you to let go of the guilt you still feel and we can start fresh. Please?"

"Yeah, I can do that, Tilly," he said. He stepped back and turned away, swiping at his eyes quickly.

She had words with the others as well, never more than a sentence or two, but in each case, the person came away with a smile or a few happy tears. Watching her work on everyone was amazing. She delved right into their hearts, exposing their worst fears and nullifying them with what seemed like barely a thought.

She saved Stansy for last, taking a seat with her at the table and asking her how her dialogue with her son was going. She listened attentively while the other woman poured out her soul with only a little bit of prompting. When Stansy had finished, she was sobbing. Tilly hugged her close and began to speak in low tones, reassuring her that she hadn't abandoned her son, that he would see that in time. Tilly told her what Chris must be feeling and counseled her to affirm those feelings first. It made my own efforts to advise her seem clumsy by comparison. Stansy sniffled through her tears, but was smiling and laughing by the time Tilly had finished. She went right for the computer to type up the email that she hadn't been able to bring herself to write before.

Tilly slipped away to her room, but came back a moment later with a change of clothes in her hands. "I'm taking a shower," she said at my questioning look. "I haven't been taking very good care of myself." She said that with a touch of chagrin.

I sat at the table, reading Stansy's book, while everyone else watched television. The Dreadnought had just suffered a strike from a German dive bomber, and the crew was bravely fighting to keep the burning ship afloat and operational.

Tilly emerged from the bathroom after about an hour, dressed in a green blouse and skirt that hung off her skinny frame, but she had done her hair and applied subtle makeup. The effect on her appearance was dramatic. Her large, expressive eyes were framed by long, dark lashes. A touch of color on her lips and in her cheeks made her skin seem to glow. Her hair, always limp or frizzy, had been meticulously combed out and styled to frame her cute, delicate features.

"You look ready to go out for a night on the town," I said.

"I feel different," she said. "I wanted to look the way I feel. You're not a girl, but I think you understand anyway."

I laughed. "Yes, I think I do."

Tilly joined the others in front of the TV, slipping into new habits as if the old Tilly had never existed. I was in a daze, still trying to make myself believe the changes in her personality. There was something a little bittersweet in seeing her move on, knowing that she didn't need me anymore. But I knew that I wouldn't have wanted it any differently.