by Grace Walton
“I’m finding alcohol dulls the memories,” he said with another devastating sad smile. “It keeps the Devil at bay, at least until I’m sober.”
“I don’t think that’s exactly how it works.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, I think maybe sobriety is the best call for you right now.”
He wiped a weary hand over his eyes. “But when I’m sober, I see them, Blackbird. I see them, but I can’t help them.” His words were painful and haunted.
“Who, Hollister? Who do you see?”
“I see all the little children, babies really. I see their poor mothers. I see their blood. And I see them fall into the pit like lifeless tattered dolls.” He lifted his head and shuddered. The movement wracked his whole body. “I hear their cries. I see the terrorists laughing at their pain and sorrow. And then… it gets worse,” he grated out.
Maggie was stunned. She couldn’t imagine where he’d been or what he’d been through. She’d seen the news that there’d been a huge upheaval in the Middle East about six months ago. At just the same time he’d disappeared. But she’d had no idea he might have been part of it.
“I’m so sorry, Hollister,” she said.
“It was my fault,” he said. I didn’t save them. I should have saved them. I always save them. Why didn’t I save them?” he asked. It was a rhetorical question because neither she nor he had any idea why such awful things happened to the weak and helpless.
“Tell me,” she offered.
She knew from her own experience that a burden shared was a burden lifted. It had worked with Fiona. That woman was completely changed by her new faith in the Lord and by, at last, confessing some of the things she’d done in the past that still plagued her.
Confession was more than just good for the soul. It was cleansing in a way that nothing else could be. And Maggie knew the best confessions were the ones she’d made to the Lord privately. Nothing could compare to His peace. But, in the meantime, she would have to do. Hollister wasn’t a believer, so there was no solace for him in prayer and confession to God.
“Tell me,” she urged once more.
He shook his head. “No.”
“If you can’t share what you went through how are you ever going to come to terms with it?”
He cocked his head in her direction. “Will you tell me your secrets?”
Maggie swallowed hard. They’d been here before. But now she was willing to tell him everything if he would respond in kind.
“You first,” he said.
She nodded and took a deep breath.
Chapter Ten
“I went out with Chase Brown,” she said. Then she nervously licked her lips as if even the words she was about to speak were bitter.
“I remember,” he coaxed.
She was ashamed to be glad he was still just a little bit tipsy. The coffee was doing its job. And he was a strong and stubborn man. His eyes no longer looked glazed. His hands were steady as they held the steaming mug. But, all in all, there was always the chance he’d not recall any details of this night. Or of what she was about to tell him.
“So…,” she looked casually over at Chase. He was as still as the dead. She hoped and prayed he would not die. Even he didn’t deserve that fate.
“So?” he repeated.
“Yes, well… you know I went out with him,” she nodded towards the sleeping man on the couch. “And I drank some beer. More than I ever should have because I didn’t have any experience with alcohol.”
“Yeah,” he nodded.
Some of what she was about to confess she’d already told him. She remembered that earlier sweet and tender time between them. It seemed like every time she let Hollister get close, she told him a little bit more about herself. A little bit more about her secrets. A little bit more about her very soul. But this time she felt she owed him the entire truth. After all, he’d agreed to tell her what had happened to him over the past six months. That had to be a heavy burden. So she steeled herself and she plunged ahead.
“Chase wanted to take me to a place. To, you know, do things. I didn’t know that’s what he had in mind, but I told him to take me home. I’d never have agreed to what he wanted. Even if I was sort of…”
“Drunk?”
She swallowed hard. But she nodded in agreement. “Yes, drunk. I don’t like to admit that because I’m a Christian. Even then, I was known as being pretty conservative. Tonight I learned that kind of behavior made me a target.”
“Oh?” he said. His face hardened.
“Yes, tonight in his truck Chase told me the jocks at school had an open bet to see who could be the first to… who could…”
“Have sex with you?” Again his voice was mild. But his eyes were flames of rage.
“Yes,” she admitted. She lifted her heavy hair and fanned at her cheeks. Suddenly the fire seemed to close. The air seemed too heavy. A wave of nausea rolled over her.
“And Chance decided he’d be the lucky one?”
“Yes, he confessed he planned our date with the idea to get me trashed. He was taking me to a deserted county road so that he could… he could.” She swallowed hard. Any minute she was going to lose the last meal she’d eaten. How humiliating would that be?
“Rape you?” His words were soft and very deadly.
Maggie shook her head. “It wouldn’t have been rape. I went out with him. It was my fault.”
“You knew he wanted to have you?”
She shook her head. “No, of course not. I thought we’d only kiss goodnight. And I was curious about what happens between men and women. I was the last girl in my class to…to…,”
“Remain a virgin?”
“Yes, and because of that it made me an outsider. All the other girls had serious boyfriends or didn’t care about how many guys they did that with. There was a lot of talk going on about me. That maybe something was wrong with me. Or that I was a snob and thought I was too good for any of the guys in school.”
“And you wanted to prove the gossip wrong.”
“I did,” she said. “It was stupid because after the assault the gossip just escalated. Once the cellphone images were made public, I was considered a tramp because they all said I’d posed for them. And then Chase’s folks began saying that I’d teased their poor son. That I’d trapped him and was now going to send him to jail because I wouldn’t tell the truth about what really happened that night.”
“So now we get to the real issue,” he said. “What did happen that night, Blackbird?”
She looked down at the hands clenched together in her lap. “He tried to rape me. He tore my clothes and took pictures of me naked. He put his hands all over me… all over me,” she said. “I fought back. I screamed. He began hitting me. He took out a pocketknife and he cut me. There are scars Hollister, lots of them. When I take my clothes off to bathe, I’m always reminded of what he did to me. I’ll carry the ugly scars with me the rest of my life. I was bleeding heavily from all the slashes and I had sustained some broken bones by that point. I was just about to pass out when he pinned me under him. I knew he was going to violate me. And I knew there was nothing I could do to stop him. He was grunting and pushing against me. I screamed and screamed. I was still screaming when the flashlight poured through the truck window. A sheriff’s deputy had stopped to investigate the truck when he heard my screams. He called EMT’s and arrested Chase. Thank goodness he testified at the trial or I doubt Chase would have been sentenced. It would have been my word against his, and the false testimony of every jock on the football team. I learned later they had a pact to defend the one who finally slept with me. They were going to say it was a group consensual thing that turned into rough play. They were prepared to hurt each other so that it would look like I’d been an active participant.”
“So you weren’t physically raped? He never breached your body?”
“No,” she said. “But what he did to me changed me. I’m not normal. I’m different.”
“Diffe
rent?”
“Yes, I’ve spent the last few years being afraid. I’ve been cold inside and numb.”
“Is it anxiety?”
“That and depression too, but mainly I’ve just been petrified of letting a man get close to me.”
“Until Dan?” he asked the problematic question.
Of course he’d believe she’d worked through all her issues with intimacy. He’d have no way of knowing the relationship between Maggie and her fiancé was almost platonic. He’d never guess she suffered from horrible physical reactions any time a man showed any interest in her. But agreeing to marry Dan was not the reason she’d begun to overcome her phobia.
“No, Dan has been wonderful, but he’s not the reason I’m beginning to heal,” she said. Maggie was trying to turn the conversation in a more positive direction.
“I would think being engaged to marry would force you to confront your fears about the physical aspects of commitment.”
“Yes, I have been thinking about that a lot lately,” she agreed.
Maggie had been almost frantic with worry at the prospect of sleeping with Dan once they married. That was the truth. She had no desire for intimacy or for him. But she couldn’t very well say that to Hollister. He, like everyone in town, thought she and Dan were in love. The most warmth she could summon up for the young pastor was their shared devotion to ministry. Was she doing them both a tragic disservice?
“You don’t love him,” Hollister answered her unspoken question.
“What?” she gasped. “Of course I…” and there she quit speaking. For to finish that sentence would be to lie.
“You what?” he asked pleasantly.
Maggie was beginning to think he was not at all incapacitated by whatever alcohol he’d had earlier. His words were back to sounding crisp and English. His eyes were clear and direct. She couldn’t deceive herself by saying he was drunk and therefore would never remember this conversation.
“I care for him,” she answered.
“Yeah, he seems like a nice enough fellow, if a little boring. But you don’t love him.”
“How could you know that?” she demanded.
“Does he make you shiver with desire?”
“No.”
“Do you ache for the taste of his mouth on yours?”
“Uhh… no.”
“Do you dream scandalous things about the both of you?”
She blushed. “Of course I don’t.”
“Then you don’t love him.”
“You can’t just sit there and say such things. I know who I love and who I don’t.”
“You love me,” Hollister said as if he was announcing that the snow was falling outside. It was a given. It was a proven, observable fact.
“What?” she sputtered. “Don’t be ludicrous.”
“You’ve loved me since you were fifteen. Maybe even before then. But that’s the year I noticed.”
“You are out of your mind. Or maybe you’re drunker than I thought.”
Everything he said was true, of course. But that was one secret she refused to confess. It was not a sin to love someone. And as long as she didn’t act on the emotion, no one would ever know of her doomed dreams. He wouldn’t be hurt. She wouldn’t be humiliated. It was good for everybody. And, as far as Maggie was concerned, as long as she didn’t outright lie about how she felt about him, she was not doing anything wrong.
He shrugged his broad shoulders. A half smile turned one side of his mouth up. He looked devastatingly attractive, she thought. Like some kind of dark fallen angel. Why did he have to be so very appealing, she asked herself for the millionth time?
“I may be a little inebriated. That’s true. But even a sotted blind man could see you love me.”
“I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to, Blackbird. It shows in the rosy glow of your face whenever I’m around. And the way that little dainty pulse hammers in your throat when I stand close to you. Your pupils dilate. Your hands get shaky. You become breathless. It’s all so unintentional. That’s what makes it so sexy.” He chuckled. “I always have to get away from you as fast as I can so you don’t notice you affect me the same way.”
“What?” The girl was stunned. Did he just admit what she thought he had? Surely not.
“I love you too. I told you that out in the snow just a little while ago. Did you think I’d say something like that and not remember?”
“This is not right. You’re drunk.”
“I may not be stone cold sober, but I know I love you. And I know you love me, for all the good it will do either of us.”
“Hollister, maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.”
“No it wasn’t. But we’ve gone too far now to stop. I’m glad he didn’t rape you. It may be the only thing that saves his worthless hide. But now that you’ve told me your terrible secret, which wasn’t so terrible by the by, I think it’s my turn.”
“I sent a man to prison,” she argued hotly. “I think that’s a pretty big deal.”
“He went to prison because he’s a stupid, rutting animal. You had nothing to do with that. And unfortunately, it seems as if he learned nothing from the experience. If he lives, I’ll make sure his recent behavior gets him sent right back to his cozy cell and his jail gang.”
“I could have spoken up. I could have told what I knew.”
“What did you know?” he snarled finally losing his temper. “What did you really know? That he got you drunk, beat you almost to death, and almost brutally raped you? That’s what I know. Any one of those transgressions was illegal. Any one of them would have gotten him jail time. You weren’t old enough to legally drink. He’s lucky he got out at all. And for your information, sexual assault is not limited to just penetration, Magnolia.”
“If I hadn’t drunk…”
“Maggie, if he bought the alcohol that makes him the one who was guilty, not you. Did you use bad judgement, maybe you did. But what you did was in direct response to what Brown forced on you.”
“No,” she began to dismiss his argument.
“Yes,” he said in a fierce voice that was implacable. “Yes, he was to blame. He set the whole thing in motion with the plan to seduce or rape you. How can you still keep on defending him?”
Maggie knew what Hollister said was true. Chase Brown did orchestrate the events of that night. He did intend to hurt her. He was absolutely prepared to rape her to win a bet, a stupid, heedless and incredibly reckless bet. And she had tried to keep him out of jail. She’d purposely not given much testimony about what had been done to her. She’d thought to spare his parents knowing exactly what a poor excuse for a man they’d raised. She’d not ever said anything. She’d hoped and prayed no one would even consider the possibility. That’s one of the reasons she’d refused the rape kit at the hospital. She’d thought there might be some evidence of his attack on her person. And she just wanted to forget it ever happened.
Seeing it from Hollister’s more objective perspective, she understood she was not to blame for what had been done to her. And she most certainly was not to blame for the fact that Chase Brown had spent time in jail. Now she was sorry she’d wasted so many years running from the truth. A peace like none she’d ever felt encompassed her like a soft, warm blanket. Her fears vanished.
She looked over at the man lying so still on the sofa. She felt nothing but pity for him. She wasn’t afraid of him any longer. It felt wonderful.
“You’re right,” she admitted to Hollister. “It wasn’t my fault.”
His curt nod told her he either was too angry to speak or he had nothing left to say. He looked so stoic and strong sprawled out in the old chair. Like an ancient Celtic warrior he looked invincible. But she knew he was not. Not if he was suffering with PTSD as Dan claimed.
“I’d like to hear about your last six months,” she said.
She was careful to keep her face unemotional. She leaned forward and latched her arms around her raised knees. She leaned against
the warm brick of the fireplace. It was apparent she was getting ready to listen to a long story.
“Yeah, about that,” he said realizing he was not so sure he could tell her much of anything about his experiences in the desert headquarters of the terrorist faction. Those nightmares were his and his alone. She had no need to hear the gritty details of his incarceration.
“You promised,” she said. “I just told you the most disgusting details about the most awful time in my life. You owe me.”
As leverage, her statement was irrefutable. She’d bared her complete soul to him. How could he do less? But could he share things with her that would haunt her forever? He couldn’t. It wasn’t in him to do that to Maggie. He was a protector above all.
“Fine,” he said with a nod of his dark head. “I’ll tell you.”
“Thank you,” Maggie said, her voice shining with absolute sincerity.
That only made the man feel more guilty. For the truth was, he had no intention of telling this precious, delicate woman anything but the barest of details about what had been done to him.
“I originally went to the Middle East to help rescue the remaining women and children from a burned out village. Their men and boys had all been executed. The females were being held captive in their village. Some were destined to become the wives of Islamic terrorist. Others were to be sold amongst the militias as sex slaves.”
She gasped. “I’ve heard about such awful things on the news. But I never knew it would affect someone I knew personally. Was that the first time you left? The time you were gone so long?”
Hollister slowly nodded. There was a solemnity to the gesture that spoke of suppressed pain and stoic endurance. “There’s much more going on in these areas than most people realize. It’s not just the big news stories. There’s so much suffering, starvation, and criminal activity. It seems it’s become easier and easier for folks who are uneducated and have no clue how civilized and advanced the rest of the world has become to take advantage of the displaced. The people I was trying to help escape are part of a very small religious sect that doesn’t fit into the region’s norm. They’ve always been discriminated against, but it was just recently they became full-on targets for violence and abuse.”