“Babe,” a voice says. It’s Shawn, of course, not Claudia, sitting on the couch next to her, his hand resting against her cheek.

She makes her mouth move. “I’m sorry,” she says.

He looks down at her legs, at the intricate spirals etched into her pale skin, with a mixture of fascination and worry. It feels like he is looking right into her, at a part of her that no one was ever meant to see. “Oh, Katriina,” he says. He begins to trace the lines that she has carved there, still raw and glistening, the dried blood flaking away underneath his fingers. She can’t tell from his face what he is thinking. Is he disgusted with her? Is he angry? Or is he laughing at her on the inside? What a stupid thing for her to do, how immature, how desperate. Does he think I’m ugly now?

The pain of his touch is nearly intolerable, his finger leaving a trail like a white-hot flame on her skin. But then there is also an unexpected pleasure, the touch of her husband’s hand, the warm, rough edges of it, the delicacy with which he makes contact with her broken skin. It is like electricity running through her body, stunning her slightly, making her skin vibrate, her muscles twinge. The sensation is almost too much for her to handle. She wants to say something, to make him stop, but she doesn’t want him to stop, and the whole thing is making her head spin – why is he here, why is this happening, why can’t she figure out how to get back to who she was? Then Shawn’s hand is gone and he is kissing her, gently, the way a mother might kiss her child’s skinned knee, his lips moving along the same path as his fingers. She closes her eyes and her breath grows shallow as he makes his way across her mangled shin and up the side of her calf, the top of her kneecap, the delicate skin on the inside of her thigh.