Today (Night)

Theo's hand scrabbled against the chain lock. His fingers left smears of blood against the door as he struggled to slide the clinking chain out of place. He did not throw a panicked glance over his shoulder because he knew better than to delay himself for even a second—better than to feed his demons. A drop of blood shook from the tip of the blade, clasped by one of his hands in a white-knuckled grip. Once he got the chain undone, he dropped his cuffed hands to flip the deadbolt and shoved the door open.

He spilled out into the muggy summer evening. The vacant cars still sat in place, undisturbed by his distress. To the side presided the glowing red vacancy sign. His heart rate spiked each time he stumbled over his feet or slipped in the smear of blood they left in his wake as he dashed down the length of the building.

Then he burst into the motel office, naked, bloody, and panicked. The man behind the desk dropped his feet from where they had been propped up and stood. His phone was already in his hand.

"Please," Theo babbled, walking forward, but before he could ask of anything, the man set his phone down with a clatter and yanked one of the desk drawers open to pull out a pistol. He aimed it straight at Theo.

"You just stay right there, now," he ordered.

Theo stared down the barrel with wide eyes and nodded, lifting his trembling bound hands and the bloody knife in surrender.

911. What is the location of your emergency?

The man rattled off an address. "I'm not sure what is going on. He's naked, handcuffed, and holding a bloody knife. But he hasn't attacked me and cooperated when I told him not to approach."

Can you get him to set down the knife?

"No," Theo shook his head miserably, the back of his neck tingling. But he still refused to look over his shoulder toward the door. "He's not...I didn't kill him. It's impossible to kill it. It always comes back. He's coming after me. I can't." He clutched the knife harder.

"He's refusing to set down the knife," the man said to the 911 operator in case he could not hear. "Sounds like maybe there is someone after him. Maybe he stabbed them in self-defense? He is naked and handcuffed."

Keep trying to talk him into setting down the knife, but otherwise, don't try to engage.

Then, the bell above the door jingled.

Theo cried out and stumbled from the door toward the little coffee bar with its neatly stacked cups and bowls of granola bars. He pressed back into the corner beside it, holding the knife in front of him as Colby advanced through the door.

"You!" the man behind the counter barked, "Stay right where you are. Don't take another step."

Colby completely ignored him, clutching his abdomen, where blood from several stabs saturated his clothes, making them black, heavy, and shiny. His eyes had a maniacal glint to them as he continued walking forward, hissing under his breath, "You bitch, I'm going to fucking kill you."

A sharp bang tore through the room, loud enough to hurt Theo's head and make his ears ring. He screamed, sliding down the wall as he watched blood spray out of Colby's leg. He saw a bullet entering a bloodied woman's head. He smelled searing metal and gunpowder as Ken leered at him. Colby crumpled to the ground with a yell, finally giving the man behind the counter his attention.

"Can't you see that this bitch stabbed me?" he shrieked, but the man spoke over him as he told the 911 operator what was happening.

"He appears unarmed, but he was walking toward the guy with the knife and threatening him. When I asked him to stop, he did not, so I shot him in the thigh. He also appears to be bleeding heavily from his side."

The voices of Colby's pained shouts and the man behind the counter conversing with the 911 operator faded into waves crashing against the beach. Theo huddled in the corner, hardly daring to blink and take his gaze off Colby. But he also remained crumpled on the ground, glaring down the barrel of the pistol which was now trained on him.

In the distance, Theo heard sirens. He looked down at the knife, clutched in his bloody hands between his thighs and chest as he curled up. It was only inches from his throat. He swallowed. His anger had seeped out of him. And now he only felt tired—too tired to hold the knife any longer or look at the blood all over him. He set it aside.

The last time the cops showed up, they did not like that he was holding a weapon. As their flashing blue lights and screaming sirens pierced the motel office, he shoved the knife away from himself, then hugged his arms around his legs and buried his face into his knees.

Long after they got him out of the room and sitting in the back of an ambulance, the lights were giving him a headache. The flashing blue and red and white still seemed to pierce through the thin skinof his eyelids even when he tried to shut them. The cops had put him in new handcuffs when they first came, just like the last time. However, this time, the cuffs were more quickly removed.

The motel manager was able to make a statement. It had taken Theo much longer to say anything useful to the police. As the paramedics helped him into thin clothes, he babbled on and on about the demon and how it had tried to take him away again, how it would try to kill him again.

"Who's Abel?" The police officer asked. Theo ignored his question and tried to look around his body, which stood between Theo's spot on a gurney and the back of the guarded ambulance where Colby was being hastily treated for his stab and gunshot wounds and loaded up to be transported to the hospital. There was one here in town close by, if Theo remembered correctly.

He kept thinking about his childhood.

"Sweetie," the paramedic, who was trying to connect a bunch of wires up to sticky patches all over Thoe's body, said softly. "Can you tell us who Abel is? You mentioned him a few times now?"

"He can give me back my shark," Theo said. "Please call him. He brought my shark back last time."

"Officer, I don't think he's in any condition to answer questions. He needs to be transported soon. It's already been a few hours at least since he received the wound in his hand, by my guess." the paramedic said gently but firmly. Her voice was like the firm, gentle touch of the male nurse who had told Theo he was raped when he gave him the rape kit a couple of nights. He was probably going to need another one of those. He laughed, and the officer lowered his little notepad and nodded.

"My shark..." Theo whispered in despair. Abel couldn't bring it back. The man had ripped it apart. It had died before ever reaching the water. A well of deep despair like nothing Theo had ever felt surged within him and made him tremble. His throat felt swollen, and his eyeballs melty. He was certain if he looked down, he would find a gaping hole instead of his chest, from which all of his organs—his heart and lungs and guts—would be spilling. His insides hurt that bad. But his chest was whole.

He had never felt more like a stuffed animal with its stuffing ripped out, left limp and torn for people to trod on.

"I don't even know why you are trying with him," the other officer, who had his brightly tattooed arms crossed in front of his chest, said. He hasn't even been able to tell you his name."

"Teddy," Theo spat out, throat closing around a guttural sob. "My name is Teddy."

One of the cops nodded to the other, "So it is his birth certificate and stuff in the box."

Theo hugged himself. "Please call Abel. I'll tell you his number."

Then he rattled off the number.

When they tried to load the gurney in the back of the ambulance and take him away, he threw a fit. Abel was on his way now, which meant he could not leave. He hopped right out of the back of the ambulance and tried to flee, but one of the officers caught him around the waist and carried him back.

"Abel is on his way to meet you at the hospital, not here."

So, Theo laid back down in the ambulance and felt it rumble beneath him as he stared at the ceiling and thought about how maybe it was the same one his mom or his dad had died in it when they were being rushed to the hospital after their accident.

His mind was a mess.

But for the first time, he felt he understood what was happening. He had never been able to figure out what had been so terrifying about the shadows. Every diagnosis and treatment seemed to fall through. Then, everyone thought he grew out of it, only to be swept right back in as soon as he met Ken. And now he knew it was his dad. The memories that he had repressed were what peered out at him from the shadows, always accompanying him and never allowing him to feel safe.

He closed his eyes and put his unstabbed hand over them as tears leaked hotly down his temples and soaked into his hair.

The hospital was a blur. It almost felt like he'd returned to the day before. The only difference was that they had to fix his hand, too. He could not believe that his last rape kit had been only forty-eight hours ago. A lifetime of violations, and suddenly, he had a label and two records, and he was not sure how to feel about that. That made him chuckle as they were processing him through it. They looked at him with sympathy, but he did not want it.

Then Abel showed up, holding the shark, who had been wrapped up in what looked like an ace bandage. Abel looked simultaneously furious and terrified, clutching that little, bandaged stuffed animal. Theo was crushed by relief, affection, and grief. Tears started streaming down his cheeks, and he held his arms out in a silent plea, words failing him.

"Jesus, Teddy." Abel surged forward, collapsing onto the edge of the bed to wrap his arms around Theo's torso and drag him into a firm hug. Theo clung to his neck and sobbed. Once he soaked Abel's shoulder and had grown numb to the soothing circles Abel's hands were making on his back, he pulled away and sniffed.

"M-my..." he broke off as Abel sat back and showed him the shark. A bit of thread was hanging from it beneath the bandage, and a piece of stuffing was puffed out from one end. His lip wobbled.

"He tore all the stuffing out," Theo whispered, cautiously touching the bandage with his good fingers.

"I know, baby. I tried to put it all back in." Abel's voice shook as he poked the exposed stuffing under the bandage. Theo's eyes shot to his face and found it was also streaked with tears. He tried to reach out with his other hand but hissed when the movement pulled on the wound. Abel's lips thinned, and he picked up the bandaged hand to cradle it in his own beside the shark. "And he hurt you too."

"They are going to have to do surgery on my hand," Theo said sadly, repeating what the doctors had told him. "Some of the bones are broken, and several of the nerves are severed. They said they would try their best, but I probably won't be able to use my ring or middle finger anymore. And the most incredible thing happened when they brought me into the hospital, Abel!" Theo was not sure why he was rambling on about this, except he knew that Abel would want to know, and it was easier to talk about than stuffing. "They had to put someone else's blood in me."

Apparently, he had bled out quite a bit in the back of the man's car and on the hotel bed.

Abel looked between both of his eyes, then turned his face to the side. He pulled one of his hands away from Theo's to press it over his eyes as he blew out a shaky exhale, one that Theo was surprised could escape past his tightly clenched jaw. When he opened his eyes again, he trained them on the ceiling, and Theo saw they were wobbling with tears.

"It's okay." Theo lifted his good hand, this time to cup Abel's wet cheek and turn his face back again. "You can cry, too. I know..." he furrowed his brow and tried to fill his voice with more conviction, "I know you are always so strong for me. It's okay. I'm okay."

Abel's expression broke. His eyes closed, sending a fresh wave of tears down his cheeks, and his lips turned down as he let out a wet breath. Even given permission, he did not sob, clenching his teeth together and making his jaw tick. Though he tried to sniff the emotion back, his voice broke anyway as he spoke. "I was so..." he dropped his head to rest it on Theo's shoulder. "I was so scared. I heard you screaming. I saw him put you in that car. My god, Theo, I thought..."

He could not speak anymore. Theo patted the top of his head and placed a kiss on it, then wrapped an arm around his trembling shoulders and held him for a while.

Eventually, he sat back up and seemed to shake all the teary emotions away, setting his jaw and meeting Theo's eyes. "I saw your shark, and I thought...well, I'm just glad you are okay."

"I'm okay," Theo assured him. Better than usual, actually. All things considered. Even with the pain medications, he felt more lucid than he had in a long time. That, in combination with the fact that they were already getting emotional, made him decide he might as well tell Abel everything. Just in case he forgot again. It would be nice for someone else to know.

"My Dad was the first to rip out my stuffing," he murmured.

Abel's brows pinched together.

Maybe he wasn't as lucid as he thought. Maybe these drugs were a little strong.

But then, as always, Abel understood, and his expression cleared, only to be immediately darkened by horror.

"Theo..." he swallowed, "do you mean..."

He could not finish his sentence. Theo sighed and picked up the shark to hold it as he spoke. "He used to come into my room in the middle of the night and..."

By the time he finished recounting his recovered memory, which turned into a recounting of all the therapists and the most honest recounting of his miserable time with Ken that he had ever given Abel, they were both laying back against the hospital pillows. Abel held him tucked against his side, one arm curled protectively around his shoulder and his other hand lightly holding the wrist of Theo's injured hand where it rested on his chest. Theo's other hand lay tucked between them, clutching his shark.

Theo did not feel any better after telling him. He just felt a little stick to his stomach, still stunned. Simply being afraid of the demons had been easier. All his life, he had been terrified to be alone, and now he knew it was because his father abandoned him to those demons. And he was confused. Because he knew his father also created those demons.

He wondered what the therapists would have said if he had been able to tell them where the demons came from. If they would have believed that they were real then.

"You know," Abel said after several minutes of lying there and breathing against each other. If it were anyone else, Theo might brace for judgment or, even worse, that sickly-sweet gentle voice people used when they thought he was too crazy or fragile to talk to like an adult. Not that Theo knew if he was one. Maybe he was still stuck in his six-year-old bedroom and had never really left. But, with Abel, he did not have to worry. He never treated him like a six-year-old, or an escaped zoo animal, or a broken toy. Instead, he said, "Your Aunt still owns your mother's beach bungalow."

Theo did know that, but Abel did not know he knew. He lifted his chin to peer up at him but swallowed down the confession that he'd been eavesdropping. Sometimes, it was nice to know something that other people did not. It made him feel like his own person, so he kept that secret to himself and made a questioning noise.

"I'm not sure exactly what she is going to do with it, but I know how much you love the beach," Abel brushed a lock of hair back from Theo's forehead, "so I was thinking about buying it from her. And, maybe, then we could live there together?"

Theo frowned up at him. "But you live in the city? Would you want to move down to the beach?"

"The beach has got plenty of bars and nightlife where I can find a job," Abel assured him. "I think it would be good for...us to get out of the city. I never really liked it anyway."

"But, it's..." Theo pursed his lips to hold back the torrent of nervous words released by a pang of anxiety in his chest. He took a deep breath. "It's not just like a house down by the beach. It has its own private beach. It's not like my mom bought it; she inherited it from her grandparents, who bought it back when it was affordable. It's...not affordable now."

One thing Theo did know about was the price of that bungalow because he'd always dreamed of buying it or something similar. And sometimes, when he would let himself lean into that dream, he'd look at the realtor listings. They only ever made him want to cry, though.

Abel smiled down at him. His eyes were as puffy and red as Theo's felt, and there were still tear stains on his cheeks. But the desperation that had escaped his usual façade was already bricked back up behind determination. He was not one to wallow when he could do something instead. He was the type to march right into a bathroom and pull a man off a guy who was crying out protests instead of just ignoring what should have been none of his business.

"I'm sure your aunt will give me a fair price," he said. "And I've got a decent amount of money saved up for buying that bar someday, but I'd rather spend it on a place to live with you."

Theo was not going to let himself cry again. He squeezed his eyes shut and let out a shuddery breath. "Really?"

"Really, really."

This would obviously require far more discussion, and Theo was not sure if he was even okay with Abel spending his savings like that. But right now, he just wanted to bask in the possibility that his dream might come true—that he might live at the beach and not be alone.

He turned his face to the side and kissed the only part of Abel he could reach—his chest.

Then there was a gentle knock on the door, and the doctor popped his head in. He wanted to talk to Theo about his options for surgeries on his hand. The whole time, Abel held him and helped him understand what the doctor was saying if he became confused. After the doctor left to schedule everything, he held him as Theo drifted off to sleep, lulled by the pain medications and emotional exhaustion.