“You have to be careful with people who think they deserve pain,” I say softly, still stroking the hair away from Isolde’s face, still looking into her aquamarine eyes. “Because sometimes they don’t think they deserve for the pain to stop. Sometimes it feels too good to want to stop. Sometimes it feels so awful that even wanting to stop feels like proof that they’re the weak and miserable creatures they thought they were. Sometimes they might think they deserve pain so unequivocally that they begin wanting to hurt themselves rather than having someone else do it.
