"What do you remember about your exorcism, Trine?" The priest says. Rei glares at him, but Misha continues studying me. His expression never wavers, his hands splayed on the comforter under him.
He’s sitting cross-legged on the bed, the fabric of his jeans hugging his legs, the cotton on his sleeves straining against his well-defined muscles.
"Why?" I ask, my mouth dry. "How’s this going to help Tom?"
"Before we’re able to perform an exorcism, we need the subject’s consent," Luke replies, looking into my eyes. He looks strange without his collar, like a part of him is missing. But then, he doesn’t really look like a priest. He only looks like a man who plays a priest on TV. "The truth is, Tom himself doesn’t seem to believe he’s possessed, and that makes it tricky to obtain consent."
I watch him, my eyes narrowing. "Okay…"
"The kid is mostly humoring his mother," Rei says when I trail off. "She seems to think an exorcism is going to provide a cure-all solution, and we can’t start the process if he doesn’t at least admit there’s a chance he’s possessed."
I shake my head, trying to reconcile the words that have just come out of his mouth with the man I’ve started to get to know. I waive him off, deciding that it’s probably best if I come back to this later. "Okay, but if he’s just humoring his mother, then you can surely get him to humor his mother by saying he’s possessed, and he wants an exorcism?"
Luke laughs under his breath, but the other two don’t. They just watch me intently, neither one of them saying a word. Luke stands up and walks over to the sofa, sitting down noisily next to me.
He’s not nearly as graceful as Rei, and he doesn’t seem to take nearly as much space as Misha, but fuck, if he isn’t nice to look at. And as he sinks into the sofa next to me, I can’t help but smile, even though I know I probably shouldn’t.
His presence is steadying; quiet and strong in a way that the other two aren’t, and under that easy smile I can detect something that feels like genuine kindness. I don’t know him that well, but just the way his lips curl up in a smile, a dimple appearing on his right cheek—yeah, I want to confess everything to this man. The problem, of course, is that I want him to confess everything to me too.
And I don’t think that’s how being a priest works.
"That’s not how it works," he says, his knees pointed toward me. "We have to believe that the consent is at least somewhat informed."
"And from a clinical standpoint," Rei says. "If he doesn’t believe that it’ll work, then it likely won’t."
"There’s a clinical standpoint to this?" I ask, shaking my head.
Rei shrugs. "I mean, I wouldn’t be here if there wasn’t."
"And that’s why we need you," Misha says. "Because we need you to tell us what worked for you."
I close my eyes, my breath shaky when I speak. "I don’t remember what worked for me," I say. "I don’t remember meeting you at all. Just waking up bound to the bed, surrounded by people I didn’t know."
I can see Luke and Rei share a look between us, but Misha continues to stare at me, a muscle working in his jaw.
"I’m sorry," I say, though I don’t know if I am. It just feels like the right thing to say. "I wish I could help more."
"You can," Misha says. "You can help us convince him."