The images flashed through his mind, as clear as if they only happened yesterday. So many different images, different memories...and along with those memories, the pain that came with them at the time. It had all begun when he was only three years old, with the death of his mother. He had been the one to find her, lying on the floor. Confused and scared, he had sat beside her for hours, crying, trying to wake her up and saying the simple word "Momma" over and over, to no avail. Six months later, the abuse started when his brother, Percy, beat him senseless for looking in one of the drawers in Papa's desk. Both Papa and Percy had been verbally abusing the child for six months, but he didn't pay much attention to it until it turned physical. Papa refrained from beating him until he was nearly six. That's when Papa decided Percy was right: the little boy made a good punching bag. Papa took it one step further though, and rather than use his fists all the time, he took to beating his younger son with an iron poker from the fireplace. When the boy was nine, things got worse. Papa and Percy started tying the boy up and raping him after beating him. After years of abuse he was unable to fight back; he was completely at their mercy and they took great pleasure in hurting him in any way possible. As he grew up, he started trying to fight back, and they enlisted the help of three fellow assassins, men who always stayed anonymous to the boy by wearing masks. The five of them made an almost daily ritual of beating him, tying him to a bed and taking turns brutally raping him. Their treatment of him left him emotionally and physically scarred and mentally unstable. To outsiders he seemed to be clinically psychotic. Deep down, however, he was a scared, hurt little boy who didn't know how to react to everyday feelings and things the same way everyone else did. As all the memories from his youth haunted his dreams, he did the only thing he could do, and began to cry...
Shelby had stayed right by Questa's side that night, knowing that if she moved, he'd wake up, and she had felt he needed to get some rest. But it wasn't long after she fell asleep that she found herself being woken up by him. She opened her eyes and turned her head to look at him beside her. He was still sleeping, but he was crying and struggling against some invisible enemy in his mind.
Knowing this had to be dealt with quickly, Shelby pulled herself up and switched on the light beside the bed, flooding the room with a soft glow. Questa must have felt the movements, she noticed, because he suddenly jerked awake, still crying, eyes wide with fear, heart pounding, breath coming in raspy, ragged gasps. Shelby reached over to touch his pale face but not surprisingly he pulled away, still unaware of his surroundings.
"Questa..." Shelby said softly, her voice breaking through his frightened mind. "Shhh....it's okay...it's only me. I'm not going to hurt you, you know that."
"Dey..." Questa stammered. He got no further.
"They're dead, Questa. I killed them for you, so they can't come back and hurt you ever again." Shelby soothed.
Questa nodded slightly. Shelby took a chance and reached to him again. This time he didn't pull away, but rather leaned into her hand when she rested it on his tear-wet cheek. He cherished the softness of her touch, and took a couple of slow, deep breaths to calm down. The tactic worked and when he looked at her he was more relaxed and steady.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Shelby asked.
A blink and a shrug was all she got in reply. He knew it would be best if they did talk about it, but the dreams were still so fresh in his mind he wasn't sure if he would be able to get through it.
"You know...you'll probably keep having the dreams if you don't face them and bring it all to light. Dreams are funny like that. They don't seem to be nearly as bad in the light." Shelby encouraged, taking her hand away and giving him a brief hug before settling back to talk.
"Je sais, but dese are diff'rent, chere. Dey ain' like normal dreams or anythin'...dey're memories dat I'll never be able to get rid of, b'cause dey're part of who I am. Dey made me de way I am." Questa explained with a shaky sigh. "I can' help it."
"But maybe talking about them will help ease the pain of it a little...I hate to see you like this." Shelby pressed.
"You really care 'bout me, don' you..."
Shelby laughed lightly. "Of course I do! I love you with all my heart and then some...if I didn't, do you think I would have done everything I've done in the past year and a half? More than anything I just want you to be okay."
"I want to be okay too, chere, but you do realize dat it might not happen, right?"
"Yes, I realize that, Questa. And you know something? Even if it never fully happens, I'll still love you, no matter what. I promised you when I came back that I'd never leave you again unless you asked me to, and I will stand by that promise for as long as I live, even if you never get better." It was a vow Shelby made honestly and seriously, and she meant every word of it from start to finish.
"What'd I ever do in a past life to d'serve to have you in dis one?" Questa half-joked.
"I don't think it was anything you did, or anything I did." Shelby mused thoughfully. "Wouldn't it make more sense to say that fate, driven by your mother's desire to help you even though she's been dead for years, brought us together because we're right for each other?"
Questa thought about that for a few minutes, but didn't reply on it. Instead he said, "I miss Momma..."
"Her death really impacted on your life hard, didn't it?"
"Oui. She was more'n jus' my mother, y'know? She was de one standin' in deir way...makin' sure dey didn' lay a hand on me. When she died, I lost more'n my mother, I lost my protection." Questa explained. "I was jus' a little kid, dey were s'posed to take care of me, but dey didn'."
"Yeah...I remember you telling me something about that when we first met."
"But somehow, she stayed wit' me. Whenever t'ings were at deir worst when I was growin' up...especially after de sexual abuse started...she kept me alive. It was only her voice in my mind, it wasn' like she was really dere stoppin' dem, but I could close my eyes an' picture her an' talk to her in my head an' take my focus off de pain. Dat's why I never died...I prob'ly should have, a long time 'go, but her memory an' my imagination kept me from dyin'. It wasn' my time. I remember hearin' Theoren comment dat it was a miracle dey never killed me but it wasn' really a miracle, it was prob'ly my will to survive kickin' in an' helpin' me."
"Even so..." Shelby commented. "I used to think my father was hard on me...but then I look at you and talk to you and I see how lucky I really was. They were a hundred times worse, I'm sorry to say.
Questa shook his head. "Don' be sorry, Shel. You were lucky, but he still hurt you. T'ink if dere'd been more of dem...or if Stephen helped him even...how much worse it would have been. I admire your strength in gettin' past what you endured."
"And to think, I admire you, for your own strength and will, Questa." Shelby laughed. Seeing he was about to protest, she continued. "Oh don't even bother, I know you think you're not strong, but it took a lot of strength to survive all those years of abuse the way you did. You're stronger than you give yourself credit for."
"Maybe..." Questa admitted sheepishly. "Don' feel like it sometimes t'ough. Sure as hell didn' feel like it when I was a kid. Do you know what it feels like to get cracked rather hard across de head wit' an' iron poker?" He asked suddenly.
Shelby blinked. She had heard him mention that poker before, but had not realized his father had actually hit him in the head with it. "No..." She replied, her voice a small whisper of horror.
"I made Gris-Gris melt all de iron pokers an' stuff down to nothin' once I grew up." Questa said frankly. "If I see one, I freeze. I can' help it. It's jus' one of dose instinctual reactions of mine. But to answer my own question, it hurts. A lot. I get migraines b'cause of it. I can' t'ink de way normal people do b'cause of it. I've tried, but I can'. I've heard people say I'm a psychopathic lunatic...dey get dat impression jus' by lookin' at me. An' it's b'cause of dose iron pokers. An' de chair legs, an' de whips an'...all dat stuff."
"That's what the dreams are about, isn't it. You're remembering them doing all these things to you. Your subconscious mind isn't letting you forget, even though you know they're dead and can't do anything to you anymore." Shelby stated.
"Oui. I can' turn de memories off, sometimes, y'know? I want to, but I can'." Tears welled up in Questa's dark blue eyes. "An' it might not be so bad, but de pain dat comes wit' dem...de physical pain...is always dere too. Part of de dreams're 'bout de physical stuff, like de iron poker. Part of dem are 'bout de emotional stuff, which I've always been able to take easier dan de rest of it. An' part of dem are 'bout de sexual stuff, which is actually worse dan de rest put together..."
The tears spilled over and instinctively, Shelby pulled him into her arms, cuddling him like a child. He leaned against her, sobbing quietly at the memories. Shelby just hugged him and rocked back and forth with him, letting him cry and get it out of his system for the time being. After several moments, he looked up at her with water-logged eyes.
"I'm sorry..."
"Whatever for, Questa? This is all part of the healing process...I certainly don't mind having a tear-soaked shirt if it means you feel a little tiny bit better afterwards." Shelby said, leaning down and kissing him lightly on the forehead. "Besides, it's enlightening to me, too. I'm starting to realize why you have such a fear of getting close to people, myself included. And I can't say I blame you."
"You're too good for me...I don' d'serve you..." Questa stammered shakily.
"Nonsense!" Shelby exclaimed. "I don't want to hear you saying things like that, because they're not true."
"Dis whole t'ing scares me sometimes, Shelby..." Questa admitted, sitting up and facing her squarely. "I'm scared of losin' you, scared of how I feel, scared of...everythin'."
"Well," Shelby assured him. "You're not going to lose me. We've been over that. And as for being scared of how you feel...it's normal, believe it or not. You love me, right?"
Questa nodded. "Oui."
"Being in love, especially being in love for the first time, is a very scary thing. I'm kind of scared too. But I believe in us and I believe in our love, so I know in my heart it will be okay. We just have to take our time, take things as they come, not rush any of it, enjoy ourselves and focus on healing." Shelby told him. "Everything will come when it's supposed to and not sooner. That much I've figured out already. Now...are you feeling better now?"
Questa thought about it and then nodded again. The dreams and the memories that provoked the dreams, were fading and the pain that accompanied them was fading as well. There was nowhere in the world Questa felt safer and more secure than with Shelby. That scared him too, but he trusted her and if she believed it was right, then who was he to argue? No dream in the world could hurt him for long if Shelby was around. He smiled at the thought.
Shelby noticed the smile and smiled herself. It was nice to see him even a little bit more at ease. "Having a nice thought?"
"Oui. I jus' realized dat de dreams don' hurt for long if you're here." Questa replied. "You make me t'ink dat t'ings ain' so bad. No one else can do dat. I've never known anybody quite like you b'fore. Would you do me a favor...no, actually...would you do me two favors?"
"Of course." Shelby laughed. "As long as they're doable favors, that is."
"De first is...stay here wit' me tonight...jus' hold me...maybe de dreams won' come back tonight if you're here. Like a dreamcatcher or somethin'."
"That one is definitely doable. What's the second one?" Shelby asked.
"Uhm..." A light flush gave Questa's pale cheeks some color, if only temporary. He wanted to kiss her again, like he had done the day she returned, but he was nervous, embarrassed and uncertain. "Can I...uh...can we..." He found he couldn't get the words out, and stopped.
Shelby raised her eyebrows. She had figured out what he wanted from just those few words and before either of them had time to say another word, she leaned over and brushed her lips against his in a gentle kiss that sent shivers through his body.
"I'm not a mind-reader, but it was kind of obvious." She laughed when the kiss was over. "And besides, that stuff is part of the healing process too, as long as we don't rush it and do things we're not ready for. The last thing we need to do is rush into things and end up hurting one or both of us all over again. Okay?"
"Oui." Questa smiled and snuggled down into the comforter again, waiting for Shelby to follow suit. It was late at night and both were very tired. They curled up together, Shelby careful to wrap an arm around him protectively before they both drifted back off to sleep.
The last thought that went through Questa's mind before he lost the battle with sleep was a relieved, happy one. 'I'm glad dere's no rush to do anythin', b'cause I ain' ready...but man kissin' her feels good...why did nobody ever tell me it was like dat...?'