Chasing Stars

by Siler, Mercedes

  “You okay?” he asks gently.

  I nod, tucking my arms underneath my body against him and clasping my bra closed, my head on his shoulder, breathing in the warm, clean man scent of his neck.

  He hugs me, closing his eyes. “My balls feel like they’re in a vice,” he whispers to himself.

  I whisper back, “You don’t have to be in pain waiting for me. You can take care of yourself.” I kiss his neck softly.

  “Trust me, I do. It’s better with you, though.” He moves his hands back to my butt, squeezing me, rocking me on him again and watching me look at him with love.

  My eyes close and I focus hard on the rocking, touching myself and letting my head fall back, riding him hard, trying to come again like before, tingling at every point of my body.

  It’s not working.

  It’s okay though. At least I know I can.

  I kiss him until he comes again, groaning into my mouth.

  “Let’s go before someone figures out what the fogged windows mean,” I whisper.

  I get dressed while he fixes his pants awkwardly, completely drained of intelligence and motor skills. I pull on my jacket and we go get coffee.

  I like that I can have coffee with the guy and have sex with him and neither one makes me want to vomit.

  We get our coffees and sit at a little table. The music is a little too loud so we’re crowding the table to hear each other. I can still see where my fingers were in his hair and his voice is deep but quiet as he asks me about friends from high school and if I talk to anyone besides Persephone. His eyes are puffy and soft, vulnerable. His hands are wrapped around his coffee cup.

  “Not really. You?”

  He shakes his head. “Just Taylor.”

  “How’s he doing?”

  He shrugs with a little side smile. “Apparently he likes Rihanna now.”

  I laugh a little. “There’s nothing wrong with that. She’s got some good songs.” I touch a spot of paint on his hand and he turns it over to touch me too. “How are things with school and work?”

  “My last day is Friday. I already took two of my finals.” He’s so soft and vulnerable in this quiet moment.

  There’s a lump in my throat and stupid tears in my eyes.

  We finish our coffees and talk about quiet silly things and he takes me back to the diner and walks me back to my car.

  We make out until my lips burn.

  His mouth brushes my ear, giving me warm liquid chills. “I don’t want to let you go. I want to stay with you. I love you.”

  I hold the back of his neck. I look into his eyes warmly, trying to see the truth. When he says things like that I raise my guard. I don’t want to be devastated when it all falls down on me. I want the happily ever after. I want him to not find someone else. I’m terrified I’m never going to get it. He’s going to change his mind. He’s going to find a normal girl.

  “Does it feel like just sex to you?” he asks.

  It doesn’t. “No. It feels like a lot of complication and a small breath of fresh air.”

  “I’m sorry about the complication.”

  I shake my head. “No, don’t be, it’s not you.”

  He sighs and looks around the parking lot, feeling the first drops of rain. He doesn’t want to leave. He pushes back from the car and fixes my jacket, zipping it for me. “You need to go home and go to bed before it starts raining again. I don’t want to be responsible for you dying in a wreck or sleeping in and not making it to work in the morning.” He frowns, looking like he wants to take me home with him.

  “How chivalrous of you, Ares,” I smile, showing all my teeth.

  He pinches my lips back together. “Too many teeth.”

  I roll my eyes. I kiss his lips and get in the car.

  I run from the car to my house through the rain and stumble in. I should take a shower but I can hear a man in my mother’s room and I want to climb into comfy clothes and bed, feeling Ares on me while I fall asleep.

  ✽✽✽

  Someone’s on top of me.

  At first I think it’s a nightmare or a memory, but now I know it’s real and I was asleep and now I’m awake. I start screaming but I can’t because the person is covering my mouth and I can barely breathe. I bite down as hard as I can, sinking teeth into flesh, and start kicking and hitting.

  “Ah, shit! She said you were wild but she didn’t say anything about biting,” he growls, trying to get at me under my blankets. “I’m glad I didn’t stick my dick in there first.”

  He’s too heavy for me to push him off and I’m furious at the whole stupid thing, somebody attacking me in my damn bed when I’m sleeping.

  If I make it out of this alive, I’m never coming home again.

  I hate this place.

  I knew I wasn’t safe.

  I can feel him rubbing himself on my thighs and undies, trying to fight his way in and jerking off on me in the process, tearing at my clothes with his free hand.

  I scratch at his face and keep hitting. I will not let this guy ruin anything Ares made beautiful.

  I reach out and grab my lamp and hit him in the head.

  “What the fuck!” he yells, grabbing his head.

  I jump out of bed. I grab my keys with my pepper spray and my phone. I open my phone and shine it at him. “Get the fuck out of my house!” I scream at him. He comes toward me and I spray him in the eyes, screaming.

  And he takes off.

  He pushes his way past my mother in the hallway and she turns away as if she was watching the whole time.

  I sit on the edge of my bed and scream.

  I’m shaking.

  I get up and go after her. “You did this!” I shove her into the wall.

  She stays there, smug look on her face. She looks through her eyelashes and shows me the knife in her hand. “Be careful, devotchka.”

  “You promised me you would leave me alone!” I scream at her.

  “I do what I have to do to keep a roof over your head. You think this is all free? I worked hard for this. I did a lot of things I didn’t want to do to give you and your little bastard a home.”

  I shake my head, taking a step back. “You’re psychotic.”

  “If I’m psychotic, what does that make you? My blood flows through your veins.”

  “When I came back to live with you, when I came back because you said you needed me and I had to run away to come back to this house, I said I would only come back home if you left me and Dexter alone. You promised me.”

  “You never came back for me. You came back for him. You should be grateful I’ve let you live here, contributing nothing, for as long as I have.” She points the knife at me, taking a step forward. “This is the way it is. And I would hate for anything to happen to your precious little boy because you wouldn’t hold up your end of the bargain. Right, Little Mouse?”

  I push past her.

  I get to my car and I start the damn thing on the second try and peel out of the driveway, sobbing with shame and humiliation and so much anger. I cover my mouth with my shaky hand to keep from screaming.

  I call Persephone on the way to her house, holding my shirt together as I drive.

  Persephone is not answering her phone.

  I can’t call Ares.

  I pull over and cover my face with my shaky hands. I can’t even cry. I’m so fucking mad I can’t even breathe.

  I have a key to their house but I don’t want to show up like this. And what if Persephone isn’t home?

  But I have nowhere else to go and I have to be safe. I want to live.

  I start my car back up and drive on autopilot. I park next to Ares’ car and sneak to the house, unlocking the door as quiet as I can. I lock the door behind me and tiptoe to Persephone’s room. Her TV is on but she isn’t in there. I change my shirt and look at my cheek in the mirror. It’s swollen and red but not bruised. There’s a scratch across it. People are going to ask questions.

  Ares is going to ask questions.

&nbs
p; How is he going to react?

  I sit on the edge of Persephone’s bed, staring at the infomercials on TV, trying to blank out my stupid life. Infomercial after infomercial, my throat burning with all the things I don’t want to feel.

  The door opens quietly and my heart jumps in terror.

  It’s Natalie. She’s in her pajamas, her long braid over one shoulder.

  I pull myself out of my fog and blink at her.

  “Oh my God!” she exclaims, holding her heart. She didn’t see me at first and now she’s looking me over. “I thought you were Persephone and then you weren’t. I came in to turn the TV off. Are you okay?” She stands, frowning at me.

  I rub my face.

  Her jaw tightens. “What happened?” Her voice is chilly and murderous.

  I shake my head, trying to rouse myself. “No big deal, a misunderstanding.”

  “Between who and who?”

  I shake my head again. My throat burns. “Please, I don’t want it to be a big thing. I just came here because I had nowhere else to go that was safe.”

  “Tell me what happened and I’ll decide if it’s a big thing,” she says, hands on hips, jaw clenched.

  Fuckin’ a. I wish I had somewhere else to go because I love them all so much and I don’t want to pull them into this. I don’t know how to react to a real mother who is worried about me. But I know she won’t back down. “I didn’t lock my door and some guy came in thinking I would enjoy his company.”

  “Did you call the police?”

  I shake my head. “It was a misunderstanding. My mom told him it was okay.”

  Her eyes get big. “But he hurt you. You have bruises. You need to file a police report. At least it will be on record if he attacks someone else or your mother tries to get Dexter back.”

  “I can’t.” If only she knew.

  “What do you mean you can’t? You have to report it! You don’t want to be responsible for him attacking someone else or your mother doing this to Dexter.”

  “I don’t care about anyone else! This is my life. I’m not going to report it!” I yell, finding myself crying and not remembering when it started. I am shaking and nauseated. I don’t want to faint again but I can feel it. I’m so angry and hurt I can’t even see straight. I love her and I want her to hold me and tell me it’ll be okay but she’s not, she’s attacking me and I want to hit her.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Ares

  I shouldn’t have let her go.

  I woke up to the commotion next door and jumped out of bed. When I saw it was Nikki and not Persephone I leaned against the wall out of sight and listened.

  I should have told everyone about us already so I could protect her.

  I come around the corner. My mother has been a battered woman. She sees all battered women as herself and she gets so angry. She gets angry at herself for letting it happen, especially since it hurt me. She isn’t speaking gently to her like she should; she’s yelling at her like she’d yell at Persephone, and Nikki isn’t Persephone and she’s not taking it well. I’ve never seen her look so broken and cornered.

  “Yes you are!”

  “Leave her alone,” I speak firmly to my mother and she looks at me as I come into the room. “You’re making her cry,” I tell her quietly. “Give her a break. She’s not you.” I’m still in my pajamas and my face still burns from not enough sleep and the rude awakening, and Nikki is looking the same. But I see her mouth is bruised and my skin prickles with barely contained rage.

  My mother looks at me like she’s seeing me for the first time. She takes me in, her eyes blazing. The room is dark except for the glow and flicker of infomercials on the TV.

  She regains her composure and looks back at Nikki. “Why wouldn’t you report this? Who are you trying to protect? It’s your responsibility!”

  Nikki’s lips tremble. She’s panicked. “It’s not the first time it’s happened, and it doesn’t matter anyway. How am I going to prove to anyone I didn’t want it when I can’t say I don’t have sex? I had consensual sex before I went home! They’re going to take samples and I’m going to have to sit in a room and be interrogated. How humiliating will it be to have two guys’ DNA on me at once?” She looks at my mom, eyes sharp and eyebrows together. “My mom will say she knows nothing about it and I’ve propositioned her boyfriends for sex before. The guy will say he understood I was consensual and when he found out I wasn’t, he took off. Trust me, I know.” She looks at my mom, her eyebrows wrinkled. “I don’t want to deal with it. I’d rather just never go back.” She shakes her head in disbelief. “If I wanted a big mess I would have let him rape me and go to the hospital to report it!” she sobs.

  My mom gapes at her, like she wants to shake her.

  “Eetsa, leave her alone!” I tell her sharply.

  “This is the way it is!” Nikki cries. “I have to get Dexter to adulthood!” She lowers herself to the edge of the bed, holding her stomach as she doubles over to hold herself, clenching her fists and digging her nails into her palms.

  “This is ridiculous! You won’t last nine more years! You’ll end up dead, pregnant or crazy!” my mother yells.

  I go to Nikki to hold her and she hits me and struggles to get away like a wounded animal.

  “It’s not much of a life you’re living!” my mother cries.

  Nikki goes weak like she’s been socked in the stomach and just looks at her.

  “This is no life. This is a slow and painful death.” My mother shakes her head, disappointed in her.

  “I didn’t do it to myself!” she screams back, fighting against me. “He attacked me! She told him it was okay! I didn’t do it! I don’t want this!” She screams so hard, her body is racked with hyperventilating, blind panic and rage.

  I grab her up and half carry and half push her out of the house and into the dark, frigid fresh air. I push her along out across the yard down the trail leading to the river as she weeps.

  We sit in a heap at our spot. Her body is shaking all over and she can’t stop. She tries to cover her face with her hands to hide the ugly crying while I just sit next to her, fighting between loving concern and blinding rage.

  She finally gets control of herself.

  She looks out at the silhouetted trees and now crawls to the cold, black stream and pukes.

  She rinses her mouth and comes back to sit.

  “Did you get to see him?” I ask her, looking at the bruise on her mouth, consumed with stomach-clenching, ball-receding anger.

  Her eyes run over my face with worry. “I’m pretty sure it was the guy she was arranging gigs with at the coffee shop on Fourth Street.”

  “Do you want to hear what I think?” I ask, my voice softer than my heart. “I think the major thing is you want everything your mother has done to you recorded so they won’t let her take Dexter back.”

  She lets out a breath, looking back at the running water. “But it could be worse. She could get back at me by finding someone who likes little boys.” She covers her face, sobbing again.

  I bite the insides of my cheeks, trying to keep the murderous rage at bay. “So, what’s your plan? Deal until you actually get raped or she gets you killed and takes Dexter anyway?” I ask, still soft.

  “Why should I have to have a plan? This is not my fault.” She searches my face, at a loss.

  I sigh, also at a loss.

  I pull her to me, holding her in my arms. She closes her eyes and breathes until her body relaxes and warms to mine. “You okay?” I whisper.

  “It makes me angry I can’t feel safe at home.”

  “I shouldn’t have let you go last night. I didn’t want to.” I look up at the darkness and the canopy of trees and curse myself. “Vegas is still an option. Then we can tell everyone and you can stay with me and I can protect you.”

  “And have the base of our marriage be this?” she asks, disgusted.

  “I want to take care of you.” I hold her tight.

  “That’s nice.” She sm
iles.

  “You don’t believe me.”

  “I do.” She nods but her conviction is shallow. She doesn’t believe she’s care-worthy. She groans. “You guys put so much pressure on me!”

  I look out at the water, exhausted. “Okay. I’ll stop.”

  She looks away, shaking her head, crying again.

  “What’s the matter? I don’t get it.” I watch her cry. “What’s wrong? Where is the pressure coming from? What’s wrong with being taken care of?”

  “Because,” she whimpers, her eyes filled with tears and sorrow, her eyebrows angled sadly, “when all that caring and taking care of are gone, then what will I have? I’ll be back where I started. Or worse because I’ll know what I don’t have!”

  I get it.

  She puts on a happy face and hides what’s inside from everyone.

  “You can’t say it’s not true because you are leaving and I’m staying and you’ve said several times you might not come back. You say you want to marry me but you don’t really because why get married if you don’t want kids? You don’t want to have kids with me.” She pulls her shirt to cover her face and covers it with her hands.

  What?

  I grimace. “I thought you said you didn’t want kids.”

  “I don’t want kids because the only examples of good moms I have are your mom and TV shows and I don’t think that’s good enough. But if I wanted to have babies, I would probably want to go halves on them with you.” Her tearful voice is muffled under her shirt.

  I pull her hands away and pull her shirt, revealing her tormented expression.

  She pushes out a breath. “Don’t look at me,” she pouts.

  I take her face in my hands and turn her head so I can look into her beautiful brown eyes. “Given the choice of anyone in the whole world, I would choose you to go halves on a baby for sure.” I kiss her forehead and let her go, filled with all the possibilities of being a father and husband and all the things I’ve never let myself think because I’ve always been so mad and I get frustrated and want to hit things. I don’t think I’m ready. “But I am not ready.”

  She looks out at the stream, rubbing her fingers like she wants a cigarette but she doesn’t get one out. “Me neither.”