Promiscuous

by Isobel Irons

  But Grant can’t seem to stop counting the reasons why he can’t do what ‘normal’ guys his age are doing. Why he shouldn’t want the things he wants. Why he doesn’t deserve to be called ‘perfect.’ On top of his parents’ expectations, Grant is getting tired of carrying a lifelong secret, one he’s betting that future employers, work colleagues and fellow students won’t understand. Let alone the girl he’s falling for, who thinks he’s too good for her, even though she couldn’t be more wrong.

  Because the perfect student, the perfect son, the guy ‘most likely to succeed’…is about to crash and burn.

  Click HERE to read a sample chapter of OBSESSIVE.

  OBSESSIVE

  The Issues Series: Book Two

  By Isobel Irons

  PART I: PERFECT

  Tash likes to call me Mr. Perfect.

  She thinks it’s funny, watching me blush when she says it. She has no idea I’m blushing because I’m embarrassed, because every time she calls me perfect, I count the letters. P-E-R-F-E-C-T. Seven letters. The number of days in the week. Seven is the first integer reciprocal with infinitely repeating sexagesimal representation. And then, because I’m a guy, I think of sex.

  S-E-X. Three letters. Three is a prime number. If I step into an elevator with three people in it, something bad will happen. Like the elevator might malfunction and plummet to the bottom of the shaft. Three: the number of months Tash and I have been ‘together.’ But we still haven’t had sex.

  And it’s not because Tash thinks she’s not good enough for me, or because she’s upset about her best friend Margot being shipped off to ‘Reverse Fat Camp’ this summer. It’s not even because she thinks my mom hates her ‘sassy, trailer trash guts.’

  No, it’s because of me. It’s 100% my fault. Because every time she calls me Mr. Perfect, it’s a lie. I’m not perfect. I’m a walking malfunction. And more than anything, I’m scared. All the time. I’m scared to let Tash find out just how perfect I’m not, because then something bad will happen.

  CHAPTER ONE

  JUNE

  I’ve always hated summer.

  The irregular schedule and lack of structure makes me feel adrift, like that movie Tash made me watch last week about astronauts who get detached from their shuttle and float off into space.

  Ninety-one minutes of terrified flailing in an airless abyss, and a brand new nightmare to keep me awake through the boredom. At least Castaway had that volleyball for comic relief. But then, nobody really watches Castaway to watch it, do they? I might not be a player like my friend Matt, but even I know what a ‘makeout movie’ is.

  Now that I think about it, that might be why Tash wanted to watch the space movie in the first place. And I, total malfunction of a human being that I am, spent the entire movie wondering about space survival, instead of making out with the funniest, hottest and most down-to-earth girl on earth.

  It’s no wonder I’m sitting in therapy right now, instead of getting a tan at the lake with friends I haven’t seen since graduation two weeks ago, or doing any other normal, summery teenage things.

  Because I am abnormal. Dysfunctional, on a basic cellular level. Broken.

  “Have you been keeping up with your journal?” Jeanne, my therapist, stares at me patiently over the thick rims of her bright blue glasses. I get the feeling she’s been doing that for a while, just staring at me and waiting for me to say something. As usual, I’ve been getting lost in my headspace, drifting off into gray matter, oblivious to my actual surroundings.

  “Yeah,” I nod. “Not as much as I did during school, though.”

  She smiles. “That’s right, I completely forgot! Wow, this year has flown by. How does it feel to be a graduate?”

  How does it feel? I clear my throat. It feels like my space shuttle just blew up, and I’m drifting around, wondering when my oxygen supply is going to run out.

  “Good,” I tell her. “It’s uh, it’s good to be done with high school.”

  Jeanne cocks her head, eyeing me speculatively. “Just good?”

  I squirm in my seat, careful not to touch the bare skin of my forearms to the leather armrests, which countless crazy people have undoubtedly come into contact with in the recent past. Another reason to hate summer: people think it’s weird when you wear long-sleeved shirts, and gloves are unheard of in June, unless you’re working outside. What else does she want me to say? It’s not like this is a new thing, me being taciturn. She’s basically a spy for my dad, to make sure I’m taking my meds, because of our deal. Because weekly therapy and meds are ‘necessary evils,’ in his words. We both know it. So why does she insist on pretending she cares about what I’m thinking?

  If my dad gets his way, I’m staring down the barrel of ten more years of school, followed by residency, then 80 hours or more a week of surgeries, scrubbing in and cutting people open. I nod again.

  “Really good.”

  Short answers are the key to getting through the next 37 minutes unscathed. Short answers are safe, even if they tend to piss off people who like to read a lot of emotions into your response. They call it sharing, but it’s more like oversharing. Like opening up a vein and just letting the thoughts pour out until everyone is uncomfortable. Verbal diarrhea—it’s a perfectly disgusting phrase to describe how awkward a situation can become when people share too much, too easily.

  “Are you enjoying summer break so far?”

  Thirty-five minutes left now. “Sure. What little is left of it.”

  I smile, to soften the truth I never meant to say out loud. Tash must be rubbing off on me. Jeanne looks confused for a split-second, but then she consults her notes and remembers, smiling when she’s back in control of the conversation.

  “That’s right, your dad said you’d been accepted to the summer anatomy program at Duke. You must be so excited.”

  I keep my face blank, but a muscle twitches in my jaw, as my anxiety level jumps from a four to a five. Jeanne is a spy, so I’ll tell her what she—and by extension, my dad—wants to hear.

  “Yeah, super excited. It’s a really great opportunity.”

  Jeanne’s expression says she wants more. “Are you nervous at all?”

  “Nervous?” I blink, and silently start counting. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven….

  An unbidden slide show of disturbing images flashes through my head. Dead bodies. Cold skin. Metal slicing through flesh. My palms are starting to sweat, and I want to put my hands in my pockets, for safe keeping. But I’m sitting down, so instead I rest them on my knees. I’m always hyper-aware of where my hands are. It’s one of my ‘tendencies,’ as Dad likes to call them. So much nicer sounding than ‘obsessions,’ or ‘compulsions.’ Or, as Jeanne calls them, ‘rituals.’ Like I’m addicted to sacrificing wildlife for pagan mating rites, or something. Not just washing my hands or counting.

  “Just excited.”

  When I was a kid, we went on this father-son hunting trip, my dad and me. When we were building a fire by the lake, this fisherman cut his hand open with a knife. My dad had an emergency kit with him, so he sutured the guy’s hand, right there by the lake. He made me hold the flashlight for him, so he could see what he was doing. I can still remember watching the skin pull away from the fisherman’s hand, tugged from the flesh with every stitch—flesh I could clearly see, exposed. F-L-E-S-H. Five letters.

  I was five or six at the time, I think. I can’t really remember. Man, I hate that word, flesh.

  “Grant?”

  Jeanne is looking at me expectantly again, waiting for another short answer to another question I zoned out and missed.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “I asked if you’ve had any more attacks since the last time we talked.”

  Of course I have. But I’m not telling her that. First of all, because she doesn’t really care. She’s only being paid to ask these questions. My 50 minute ‘sharing’ session is almost up, and unlike my dad, Jeanne gets paid no matter what. Even if she doesn’t ‘fix’ m
e. Even if I walk out of here every time every bit as broken as I was when I walked in, she gets paid.

  Maybe I should become a psychiatrist, instead of a surgeon. Wouldn’t that be ironic?

  But then hey, no flesh to deal with. Bonus, as Tash would say.

  I still haven’t answered Jeanne’s question, but she’s got to be getting used to that by now. We’ve been doing this one-sided dance for almost eleven months. Forty-four 50 minute sessions of pointless Q&A, 19 prescription refills—including two changes in medication and dosage, because of negative side-effects—and if I’d been keeping track, which I now realize I should have been, probably about 2,000,000 shrugs on my part, followed by the word ‘good,’ or ‘fine.’

  I shrug again, number 2,000,001.

  “No, it’s been a while since I’ve had any attacks.”

  “That’s great, Grant.” Jeanne smiles again, her face encouraging, like she believes my lie and is proud of me. Or maybe she’s just happy that the hour is up, like I am. “I guess the medication is working, then.”

  I don’t answer. If by ‘working,’ she means that the pills keep me from feeling normal human emotions, like fear, or pain, or happiness, or lust…then yeah, I guess they are.

  Sexual Abuse Resources and References

  (Courtesy of www.RAINN.org)

  Child Abuse/Sexual Abuse

  · 1in6 (men sexually abused as children)

  · ChildAbuse.org

  · Childhelp USA

  · Child Pornography CyberTipline

  · Child Sexual Abuse Statistics, Research and Resources

  · Darkness to Light (child sexual assault)

  · Justice for Children

  · National Center for Missing and Exploited Children

  · Pandora's Box

  · Sidran Traumatic Stress Foundation

  · Stop it Now

  · War Zone Study Guide

  Domestic Violence

  · National Domestic Violence Hotline (1.800.799.SAFE)

  · National Coalition against Domestic Violence

  · National Network to End Domestic Violence

  Drugs and Rape

  · Drug Enforcement Administration

  · Medline Abstract on GHB(requires registration)

  · National Institute on Drug Abuse (National Institutes of Health)

  · Project GHB

  · Rape Treatment Center

  · Samantha Reid Foundation

  Federal Government

  · Bureau of Justice Statistics

  · Center for Disease Control

  · Office of Justice Programs

  · Office for Victims of Crime

  · Office on Violence Against Women

  Incest

  · Darkness to Light

  · The National Children's Alliance

  · Stop It Now

  International Resources

  · RAINN Links

  · International Directory of Services

  · Protection Project

  Legal & Legislative Information

  · Findlaw

  · Find your member of the House of Representatives

  · Find your Senator

  · Protection Project

  · US Congress

  · US Supreme Court

  Male Rape

  · 1in6 (men sexually abused as children)

  · Child Sexual Abuse Statistics, Research and Resources

  · Men's Voices Magazine

  Mental Health

  · Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

  · PTSD Alliance

  · Sidran Traumatic Stress Foundation

  · GoodTherapy.org

  Military Resources

  · Safe Helpline

  Other Sexual Assault Resources

  · Act for Kids

  · Cavnet (Communities Against Violence)

  · End Violence Against Women (Johns Hopkins)

  · Feminist.com

  · Girl Thrive

  · Learning Publications Inc.

  · National Alliance to End Sexual Violence

  · National Online Resource Center on Violence Against Women

  · National Organization for Victims Assistance

  · National Sexual Violence Resource Center

  · National Violence against Women Prevention Research Center

  · National Women's Health Information Center

  · Project Respect

  · Rape Treatment Center

  · www.911rape.org

  · Sexual Assault Training & Investigations

  Prevention Efforts

  · Campus Outreach Services

  · The Date Safe Project

  · Good Touch/Bad Touch

  · Men Can Stop Rape

  · Partnerships Against Violence Network

  · Security on Campus

  Professional Organizations

  · American Congress of OB/GYNs

  · American Prosecutors Research Institute

  · International Assoc. of Forensic Nurses

  · National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence

  · SANE/SART Info

  Sex Offenders

  · Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers

  · Center for Sex Offender Management

  · State Sex Offender Registry Websites

  · Stop it Now

  · U.S. Department of Justice: National Sex Offender Public Website

  Stalking

  Statistics

  · RAINN Stats page

  · Bureau of Justice Statistics (US Justice Dept)

  · FBI

  · College Rape Statistics (US Education Dept)

  · Federal Justice Statistics Resource Center

  · National Center for Health Statistics

  · Statistical Assessment Service

  Support for Victims of Sexual Assault & Incest

  · Faces of Survivors

  · Homesafe Rape Crisis Center Survivor Listserve

  · It Happened to Alexa Foundation

  · Office for Victims of Crime (US Justice Department)

  · Promote Truth Online Counseling

  · Soar (Speaking Out About Rape)

  · Victim Compensation Programs

  · Welcome to Barbados

  Other Links

  · American Social Health Association

  · Kristina Brooks Hope Center

  ###

  Table of Contents

  FORWARD (Please Read First)

  Part I: “Dirty”

  CHAPTER ONE

  Part II: “Nasty”

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Part III: “Slutty”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Part IV: “Bitch”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Part V: “Cautionary Tale”

  APPENDIX

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Contact Isobel Irons

  Sexual Abuse Resources and References

  click here

  HERE

 

 

 
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