Chapter 16: The Glitch

••~~CORIAN~~••

Shawny’s space isn’t a regular therapist’s office. It’s like a devil’s cave.

Dark matte walls. Dim lighting. Velvet couches. Diffuser steam curling in the air. There’s incense burning somewhere, sandalwood and cinnamon, and a playlist humming low in the background, something moody and beat-heavy.

She calls it The Hub.

It’s where I come to reset. Where she pulls me apart and puts me back together.

Today, I’m stretched on her lay-back chair, eyes closed, jaw clenched, her soft fingers rubbing slow circles into my temple.

I’m quiet. Not just because I’m tired—but because I’m thinking too damn much.

“What’s the problem, Corian? There’s so much tension,” she murmured.

She knows when I’m holding something in. Always has.

And right now?

“I’m glitching.” I blurted.

“Mr. Van Halen doesn’t glitch…. Ever.” she returned immediately.

True. Never. Not once.

But right now….. this moment…. I am.

“I think something’s messing with my complex,” I muttered out of frustration. “I am…. Code switching,”

She paused.

“The Van Halen complex has never cracked. Not once.”

Exactly.

And now it’s glitching non-stop.

I rub my eyes. The truth stuck in my throat.

Maddison Summers.

“Please don’t tell me this has something to do with that plain doll I saw at your house earlier.”

I groaned, hating her for calling her that.

“Don’t call her that, Shawny.”

Shawny took her hands off me. I felt the change instantly.

Even I’m surprised I said it out loud. But it’s true. That girl is anything but plain.

Something about Maddison fucks with me. Deep. Like... uncomfortably deep.

“You’re actually tense… because of her?”

“No.” I lie.

Yes.

Baby girl consumes my thoughts so much I can’t think of anything else but ruining her in my mirror room. And once she’s ruined, I only want to ruin her again.

She’s crawling under my skin. Living rent-free in my mind.

And I don’t like it.

“She’s just a contract. Just for the month. You know how I get when something’s mine.”

Shawny laughed, but I can almost hear anger? jealousy? “You’ve never said it like that before. Never called anyone ‘yours.’”

And that’s exactly the fucking problem.

I get mad possessive just thinking about her.

“She’s definitely messing with my complex, I need to fix it.” I admit, sitting upright.

That made her pause.

Shawny’s not your regular therapist, her methods are anything but conventional.

But yeah, she helped me.

I tell her everything.

All my darkness. My pain. My rage.

My childhood. My ex-wife. My spoilt son.

Alicia.

Shawny knows it all. She doesn’t run from it. She fuels it.

She’s not just my therapist.

She’s my accomplice.

She found me at my worst and told me it was okay to stay dark.

She helped me create my armor.

She calls it…. The Corian Complex.

And I have come to love it very much.

“So that’s why you called me…...”

I heard disappointment in her voice.

“That’s why I always call you, Shawny. To set me straight.”

Shawny gets me. It’s that simple.

She understands my demon and she allows him to shine.

She’s not terrified of him. She doesn’t judge. She embraces him.

“You need to be in control,” she told me once.

“That’s how you stay sane.”

But now… Maddison is poking holes in my control like it’s soft butter.

First I let her cry into my chest, holding her as she folded into my arms, despite how my blue balls twisted painfully from her bold behind grazing it the entire night.

“She made me breakfast,” I said through gritted teeth. “Wearing my shirt. Her grandma’s recipe, she said.”

I hate how soft that made me.

I hate how fucking good it tasted.

I hate how it made me remember the last time I had breakfast made for me.

Mom. I was five and fucking innocent.

Shawny Scoffed. “What? You hate being doted on, Corian.”

“That’s a fact, still I sat there and ate the damn thing. Didn’t even mean to fuck her right after,” I added,

Shawny raised her brows.

“But I did. In the mirror room. Twice now. And somehow, she makes it feel like I’m the one being ruined.”

I tried to play it cool but if she hadn’t signed that contract, I might have lost my mind.

She frustrates me. I took that frustration out on her in the mirror room.

Shawny leaned back, arms crossed.

Long legs propped up, eyes poking at me, doing her psycho magic.

“You’ve let her in. That’s what’s wrong.”

“No. Hell no. It’s been, what...three days? That’s not enough time to catch….” I paused biting the last word out. “feelings.”

I stood, raked a hand through my hair. “Shit. I am incapable of catching anything. Heck, she could even be a nut job,”

“How so?”

“There’s this scar across her wrist…. She says it’s nothing but….” I ground my teeth, different thoughts ramming my head.

“Damn… then let her go,” Shawny snapped,

Every muscle in me went rigid, like my body itself rejected that idea. “Not doing that. Yet,”

Her lips pressed tight, like she was holding something back. Before she let it slip. “Well… did you fuck her like you fucked me?”

My jaw locked. “Shawny….. don’t.”

“I’m just saying. If it’s just sex, you wouldn’t be glitching.”

Yes.

I am terribly glitching.

I ordered her a mountain of art supplies like some lovesick teenager trying to impress his crush.

Told myself it was just to keep her busy.

But nah…. I went full simp.

Had to look away, leaving the house just to not grab her again.

One glance and I’m ready to teach her another lesson.

Shawny got up, her hips swaying like temptation dressed in confidence.

Fingers trail along my jaw.

“I can help you reset. Like before.”

“No.”

“Corian….”

I caught her hands. Holding firm.

“We’re not doing that anymore. You’re my therapist. This is professional.”

She stared at me like I just stabbed her.

“I want to go to your mirror room, Corian. I want you to dominate me. Just once more. I miss you.”

I shook my head.

Shawny might help in her twisted therapy-sex hybrid way, but she’s too hooked on me.

And if we go there again, I guarantee everything turns into a scorned ex drama.

As if I didn’t already have one ex to deal with.

And right now?

Only one woman’s got me feral….

Maddison Summers.

The only one I wanna pin down and wreck, body and mind.

“No.”

She huffed, pulling back, all breathy and bratty.

“Fine.”

Silence.

I slumped into the couch, still tensed, trying not to picture Maddison.

Probably painting right now.

Maybe curled up with dinner and that stubborn pout.

Shit.

Glitching.

Full-blown malfunction.

Shawny circled behind me.

“Then let’s talk about your father.”

My whole body tensed at the mention of Colby Van-Halen, my sick twisted father.

“It’s his birthday today. You sending him a card?”

I almost blocked that out of my mind until right now.

Thanks Shawny.

“To a felon? In a federal prison?” I scoffed.

“It’s been ten years. Don’t you want to see him?”

“Don’t you wanna fly a plane?” I shot back, smirking.

She rolled her eyes, unamused.

“Alright. But if you could see him… what would you say?”

I stared into the distance.

“Thank you. Because without him, I wouldn’t be this Corian Van Halen. He made me great.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“Your father beat you with sticks and wires. Broke you down, bled you out. He traumatized you, Corian and you still respect him?.”

I grinned, dark and deadly, flash of his belt cracking my skin, me collapsing to the floor.

“I turned out great. Dark and dangerous. I love being this man.”

She leaned close, whispering.

“Then don’t let her change you. Don’t let this Maddison chick fuck up the Van Halen Complex we built together.”

My phone buzzed.

I tapped my earpiece.

“Ausley.”

The next words from him sent me into full blown fury.

Shawny’s eyes widened.

“What happened? Where are you going?”

I’m already up. Already storming to the door.

“To teach her a fucking lesson.”

And I swear the devil in me?

Wide. Fucking. Awake.

Maddison Summers…

What the hell have you done now, Tiger?