Walk of Shame

by ANDREA SMITH

  “Now you need to quit fighting me, Peyton,” he says, his voice thick and husky. “Guess you aren’t so high and mighty right now, are you? Prancing around here showing off your tits and ass, and acting like you’re so fucking superior to me and Ma the way you do…”

  I squirm against him, trying to speak but it sounds like a pitiful moan against his calloused hand.

  “You need a lesson about what men really want, girl. You think your brains are going to be enough to take you out of this place? Huh? You think you’re so smart that you won’t be stuck here peddling bagels just like your old man does?”

  I’m shaking my head furiously back and forth, gasping for air. He lowers his hand just a bit so that I can breathe a bit easier through my nose. And I take in the air and the stench of him. I feel my nose scrunch up in disgust. Phil sees it too and gives a sneer. “Yeah, you think you’re too damn good for a guy like me, don’t you?”

  I’m frozen in fear, as he presses against me, pinning me now against the wall with his body, as his free arm now moves down my side to my hip. He presses a knee into my groin, as his hand roughly shoves my pajama shorts down, taking my underwear with them.

  Oh God!

  I struggle against him, trying to bring my knee up but it’s no use. He’s big and he’s strong and he’s determined as hell to do whatever it is he’s planning to do.

  I squeeze my eyes shut not wanting to look at his demonic face.

  “Relax, maybe you’ll learn to enjoy it.”

  His hand plies between my legs. The knee he has pinned against my right hip, moves to spread my thighs a bit to allow his fingers more access to my vagina. It hurts and I feel the tears of pain and fury welling up in my eyes, but I will not let them fall because no matter what, he won’t know that he’s won.

  I feel a finger slip inside of me, and then another. It’s rough, it’s demeaning, and I thrash my head from side to side, squeezing my eyes shut even tighter.

  “Like that, huh?” he whispers, and he pulls his fingers out of me and then slams them in again and again. “This is what will get you out of this shithole, girl. Your pussy will get you farther in this world than your brains ever will. Your looks, your body, and knowing how to please a man are what really matters. And if you don’t believe that, then you’re a stupid bitch,” he sneers, his fingers quickening.

  I’m raw. I’m in pain, and it crosses my mind that he just may have more in store for me.

  “How do you think Ma snagged your old man, huh? Do you think it was her brains he was interested in?” he laughs bitterly. “Don’t be a stupid bitch. You hear them going at it at night, don’t you? Sure you do. Cause I hear them from my room. Your daddy loves fucking Ma, and if he didn’t, she wouldn’t have shit to her name.”

  I finally feel his fingers leave me and he presses his hard-on against my pelvis. “Feel that? See what you did to me, baby? That’s the power you have. That’s the power all women have. It’s pussy power baby. And pussy power will get you where you want to be.”

  He pulls back from me, but his hand is still clamped over my mouth. He takes my hand and places it on the bulging expanse of his denim-clad crotch. “Feel that, baby? If you breathe a fucking word of any of this to anyone, your gonna find that shoved into that tight pussy of yours, I promise. And I won’t be anywhere near as gentle when I take you with my cock as what I’ve been with my fingers. So, are you clear on that?”

  I whimper against his hand. A tear escapes, and then another.

  “Answer me by shaking your head if you understand what I just said,” he says roughly.

  I shake my head up and down.

  “So, you know what the consequences are going to if you breathe a word of this to anyone, right?”

  Again, I share my head ‘yes.’

  “Okay then,” he says, finally pulling his hand from my face.

  I slump against the wall, quickly pulling up my pants. He grabs the bottle of beer that he’d brought down with him when he’d snuck up on me earlier.

  “Don’t you ever doubt one fucking word of what I just said to you,” he warns, pointing his finger at me and jabbing it in the air for emphasis. “I don’t think you’d enjoy my unleashing my cock on your tight little virgin cunt.”

  He leaves and I slump to the concrete floor, my silent tears falling onto my legs. There aren’t enough showers to ever make me feel clean again.

  “Peyton? Are you down there?” my father calls from the top of the basement stairs. I wipe my eyes, not realizing that tears have fallen at the memory of that horrible evening in this very place.

  “Yeah, Pop. I’ll be right up,” I call out. “Give me a minute.”

  “Take your time, honey. Supper won’t be ready for an hour or so. Louise is on her way home. I just closed up shop.”

  I hurry up the steps and switch off the light as I step into the kitchen, shutting the door to the cellar behind me. My father is taking a beer from the fridge, and as he pulls the tab to open it, he gives me a smile.

  “Did you have a good day?”

  “I went to the cemetery. I went to Mom’s grave.”

  He arches a brow as he takes a swig of his Budweiser. “You did? What prompted that?”

  “The secrets that I’ve been hiding behind,” I reply, my eyes locked with his. “We have to talk, Pop. Just me and you. And we need to do it now.”

  Chapter 35

  Weston was just starting to outline the basics for his final term paper in Early American Lit when someone tapped on his bedroom door.

  “It’s open!” he yelled.

  “Hey dude, I just got back in. How was your Thanksgiving?” Drake asked, as he sprawled out on Weston’s bed. He propped his hands behind his head, and when Weston looked over, he scowled at the shit-eating grin Drake was wearing.

  Drake was Weston’s least favorite frat brother and, for the most part, he avoided him as much as possible. He gave the label ‘Fuck Off’ a whole new meaning, and basically, Drake stayed on his nerves.

  “It was fine,” Weston replied, turning back to his work, “How was yours?”

  “Oh, the usual, you know. But then I didn’t invite a special person to come home and have Thanksgiving with me and the family,” he chided. “So, did your family enjoy the joke?”

  “What the fuck are you talking about, Drake?” Weston asked, clearly perturbed.

  “Well, fuck. I’ve been curious as hell about how your family enjoyed meeting your fugly tutor. Penny, right? I mean, did you pull the joke off or not?”

  Weston slammed his pen down, and rose from his chair. He stretched out his arms, clasping his hands together and cracked his knuckles. “Who the hell said anything about my inviting Penny—and yes, her name is Penny—to Thanksgiving as a joke?”

  Drake shrugged, “Well, we pretty much figured that was the whole reason you did it. You know, something to distract your old man so he’d stay off your nuts – make him think you’d lost your mind?” he finished, laughing. “Shit, it’s like I told that hot chick at Big Daddy’s the night you were there. You know, you just missed her by minutes?”

  “Missed who?” Weston interrupted impatiently. A jolt of impatience rushed through him and he was so close to telling Drake to just get the fuck out of his face and out of his room.

  “That chick that works there with the amazing rack. Peyton? Yeah---Eva’s roomie.”

  “Okay, so what about her?” Weston pressed tersely.

  “I was starting to tell you,” he said with a smile. “She came on duty just after you left. I went to the bar to get us another pitcher. Well, it was just so funny because Alex and I were still busting a gut over your plans for Thanksgiving, so I was telling Peyton about it being a joke and all…” Drake stopped talking when he saw the dark look that came over Weston’s face. It was unfamiliar. His expression had changed in a flash – Drake knew that Weston had a quicksilver temper, but this was the first time he’d been on the other end of it.

  Before Drake had a second to dige
st the fact that Weston was pissed, he felt himself being lifted off the bed, and slammed against the wall with a loud thud.

  “What the..?”

  “You’re a fucking asshole!” Weston said, slamming his fist into Drake’s gut. He doubled over with a whoosh of expelled air from his lungs, and staggered backward when Weston’s fist once again met its mark ramming into his jaw.

  Drake tried to push him off, but he was no match for Weston’s adrenaline-induced strength.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Drake yelled. “What’s your fucking problem, man?!?”

  Weston came at him again, this time grabbing him by the back of the neck with one hand, and opening the door to his room with the other. He shoved Drake out into the hallway, where he landed in a heap at Marcus’s feet.

  “What the hell is going on?” Marcus shouted, looking between the two of them.

  Weston was still livid, and his grey eyes were nearly black with fury. “That motherfucker,” he said, pointing down at Drake, “needs to stay out of my business and outta my fucking face!”

  “Fuck you, Matthews!” Drake shot back, feeling a bit braver since Marcus had arrived on the scene. He knew Marcus would break them apart.

  “Hey you two…” Marcus started.

  “No! I mean it, Marcus. Either that son of a bitch moves outta here, or I am!” Weston stepped back into his room and slammed the door behind him.

  From inside his room he could hear Marcus in the hallway. “What the fuck did you do this time, Drake?”

  “Me?” Drake replied. The rest of the conversation faded as they apparently went downstairs.

  Weston was still livid. So, that was the source of the rumor Penny mentioned at his grandparents place last week. That pretty much sealed the deal: Penny and Peyton. One in the same. But why? The bigger question, was he the last one to this party?

  Eva had to know.

  If Eva knew, that meant that Marcus knew. And if Marcus didn’t know, then that meant that Eva was every bit as duplicitous as Peyton or Penny---whatever the hell her real name happened to be!

  He forced himself to calm down. He needed to slow the boil, and think this whole thing through logically, if that was even possible. What the hell was her game?

  And the big question: Why? What was her motivation?

  Weston sat on the edge of his bed and buried his face in his hands, letting his fingers massage away the tension that had surfaced by his showdown with Drake. Despite the fact that Drake was a major douchebag, the information he provided had served to solve the puzzle. There was no doubt about it now. He had fucked a witch that happened to be a deceptive bitch. How appropriate her attire had been at the party.

  He scoffed at his own ignorance. What a fucking fool she had made of him. And for what? Her personal pleasure and satisfaction? How fucked up was that?

  Majorly fucked up.

  He reclined back on his bed and forced himself to disengage the facts from the suppositions.

  Fact: Penny and Peyton were one in the same.

  Fact: Peyton turned him on in a major way.

  Fact: He and Penny had formed a fledgling, platonic friendship.

  Fact: Marcus would never be a part of a scheme like this.

  Fact: Peyton had dissed him.

  Fact: Penny had duped him.

  Fact: Paybacks are a bitch.

  He launched himself off of his bed and returned to his desk. He was starting on his term paper tonight. And he was pretty damn sure he was going to get an “A.”

  Chapter 36

  I haven’t seen Weston in more than a week even though I’ve been back at our apartment in Bainbridge and worked two shifts at Big Daddy’s. It’s odd that since our little heart to heart that afternoon in Plymouth how much things have changed in the way I regard him. I kind of miss seeing him as Penny. And I know that I was the misguided one in all of this.

  I have no choice but to own it. Learn from it and be a better woman because of it. I know that my perceptions, my biases, and my assertions have been twisted.

  And how I know this?

  I had my talk with Dad, I told him everything. I got it off my chest. I needed to know how he would react to it. It had been pretty emotional. He hadn’t doubted a thing I told him. He had hugged me to him so tightly I thought I’d break in half. He had cried, and he had apologized over and over again through his tears. He had asked me to forgive him.

  “For what?” I had asked.

  “For being such a miserable excuse for a father that you didn’t believe could, and would have protected you from that sick bastard.”

  What he didn’t do was chastise me for not coming to him. He took ownership of everything, but that’s not what I needed. I didn’t clue him in to make him feel bad. I told him because I needed him to set me straight about life.

  About men.

  About women.

  I needed to know from his perspective what he had loved about my mother versus the way he loved Louise.

  I couldn’t help it. Despite Phil’s crazy rant while he violated me, his words had damaged me more than his fingers ever could. The words he had said about a female’s worth, and linking it to my father’s relationship with his own mother.

  And so I told him that, and I asked him that very thing. I even explained to him how Phil’s words had somehow seemed legitimate from a sixteen-year-old’s perspective. But he needed to know that it had stuck with me, so I told him. I even confided in him about Stuart, and about my thesis project that had blown up in my face.

  “Oh, sweetheart,” he said, pulling me close. “I don’t have all the answers that you’re looking for, but I can tell you this. I fell in love with your mother, but it wasn’t just one thing that caused me to do so. It was a whole bunch of things. I loved her sweetness, and her passion for life. I loved her ability to connect with people, and her business savvy with the shop. I never told you this, but I was this close to going bankrupt,” he said, showing a slim space between his thumb and index finger. “And I didn’t care. Your mother was the one who invigorated me with fresh marketing ideas, menu changes, and advertising in venues where it met my target customers. She was so talented. And she was beautiful. It was her inner beauty that made me fall madly in love with her. It surpassed everything else about her.”

  I had nodded. “What about Louise?”

  He had taken a moment to pick his words before he replied. “There’s no comparison between the love I have for your mother and how I feel about Louise. Maybe that sounds insensitive, but it’s the truth. Louise filled an emptiness that I had for years. I fell in love with Louise because of my loneliness and my need, I guess, to not be alone. I knew eventually you would be off to school, and then on to having a career and hopefully a marriage and family of your own.”

  “You mean you didn’t expect me to take over The Bagel Stop when you retired?”

  “Oh God no, honey,” he replied quickly. “I’ve always wanted you to follow your own dreams and carve out a life that is of your choosing. You’re blessed with your mother’s smarts and tenacity. Why would I ever want to stifle my most favorite person in the world?”

  I had hugged my dad then. I had never known any of this. “Pop, you know, I think maybe we should’ve talked more,” I said kissing his cheek.

  “Peyton, the important thing is that you go on with your life knowing that no one else, be it a man or a woman, has the right to validate your worth. It’s all with you. I’m so sorry that I failed to instill that in you.”

  “You did the best you could. I have no axe to grind with you at all. I can fix this, I just know it. I’m glad we’ve cleared the air about everything. I love you.”

  “I love you too, Peyton. More than anything. But I will tell you this, don’t you ever worry about having to set your eyes on Phil again. I will have a talk with Louise and will fill her in on what happened all those years ago, and I will tell her that he is never to step foot in this house again.”

  “Oh, no. You don’t
have to do that. I don’t want to put a wedge between you and Louise. It was a long time ago; a lifetime ago.”

  “You need to trust me, Peyton. You need to let me do the right thing here. You trump everyone else in my life. Louise needs to know that I won’t tolerate that son of a bitch coming around here ever again. I’d probably kill him. She has to know where I stand.”

  “Well…it’s your call.”

  “It is. Now what about you? Have we cleared the air enough that you feel you can put what happened behind you? I mean, honey, there’s no reason to feel embarrassed if you think some counseling might be in order. I realize it happened five years ago, but you’ve been carrying some baggage and, in a way, it’s affected your perspective on men. I don’t think it would hurt, Peyton.”

  I had looked at him, and I knew he really wanted me to be okay. “I promise. Once back at school, I’ll utilize a one of the student counselors.”

  “Promise?”

  “Pinky promise.”

  I had felt like a huge weight had been lifted when I left Cranston the following day. I knew my father was going to wait and have his discussion with Louise after I left, but I had no doubt he would take care of it.

  Butterflies flutter in my tummy when Weston comes into our study room just a few minutes late. I smile and he returns it.

  “How are things on the hockey team,” I ask. “Are you hanging in there?”

  “Yep. Everything’s good. Feel back to normal.”

  “Great. So, this is our last session. If you have your term paper ready, I’ll be happy to review it and give you feedback if I feel any changes or additions are necessary before you turn it into Lindquist.”

  “That’s the plan,” he replies, handing over a thick brown envelope with a metal clasp that is locked into place.