by Vera Hollins
“Yes,” I rasped. I wanted more. I wanted him to move his hand up a bit. Just a tiny little bit. I was too lost in the sensation to be shocked by my visceral reaction.
Attuned to my needs, he moved his hand an inch higher, where it lingered for a few hard beats, before it drifted down and settled on my knee. I bit my tongue, disappointed.
I looked at the starry sky. “Since you’re opening up and all, tell me one thing, the million-dollar question—why do you bully?”
He took a long time to reply. He sighed heavily. “It’s a combination of too many things.”
“Such as?”
“Lack of control. Anxiety. Feeling lost. Feeling angry at the whole world for being so shitty. Yadda yadda yadda. I had to grow up so fast and be responsible about everything, without ever being able to slow down and just . . . relax. Find myself. I guess I just needed a way to let it all out.”
“So, basically, you’re punishing other people because your life sucks?” I asked in a harsher tone than I’d intended.
He drew away to look at me. “Are you going to tear into me because of that again? I know I was wrong.”
“I won’t. It’s just—I hate that. You lash out at others because your life is unfair, but what you’re doing is also not fair. I mean, look at Eli. He was bullied for being a quadriplegic. Isn’t that enough of a slap of cruel reality for you?”
He leaned back down on my shoulder. “I know, and I just told you I knew I was wrong. I regret being that asshole who didn’t give a shit about others, who was too lost in his own problems to care about someone else’s problems. And I’m not bullying anyone anymore.”
“Now, that’s what I don’t get. I’m seeing this new version of you, and it looks almost too good to be true. Why? What changed?”
He started moving his hand again. A shiver of pleasure slid down my spine. “I think you know.”
I closed my eyes. “Let me guess—me?” I said this as a joke, but he didn’t reply at all. Emotions clogged my chest.
“At one point, I stopped to think about who I actually was, like really think, and I realized I didn’t know myself. I was too messed up. And, yes, it’s even more fucked up that I did the same thing I wanted my own brother protected from. That’s when the shame kicked in, and I decided I wanted to be a better person.” His hand slowly made random shapes on my thigh as he talked. “I look at you, and I see . . .”
“What?”
“Another reason for me to do better. Another reason for me to be ashamed of everything I’ve done. So, before I give you more reasons to puke, does this satisfy your curiosity?”
My eyes returned to the starry sky, my pulse growing erratic. I only said, “Mm-hmm,” too stunned by his honesty to say anything else.
“Since I’m opening up, it’s only fair you do, too. So, I’ll ask you the same.” His voice was unusually deep. “Have you ever fallen in love?”
I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. I didn’t want to share anything from my past, but it was only fair since he’d shared his.
Black consumed the edges of my world as the memories of the past gathered in a kaleidoscope and unfolded behind my eyelids.
“I thought I had. Once. But that wasn’t love. Just a stupid teenage infatuation.”
He stopped moving his hand. “Was it with the guy who—you know.”
I flexed my hand, fighting against the demons. If I focused too hard, I would feel it all over again, and it was a road I’d crossed too many times. Each time I crashed.
I’d never admitted it out loud, but even after all those sessions with a therapist, I felt ashamed of myself. I’d constructed a constant reminder in my head not to believe that voice of shame that fed me when I was too vulnerable. Not to believe that it was my fault. Not to believe that there was something wrong with me and not him. Each time, I put shackles on those destructive feelings, but the emotional scars remained. Their phantom pain returned from time to time, reminding me they were there and never disappearing.
“Yes,” I replied. “Which makes the night it happened even harder to forget.”
He squeezed my thigh, but I didn’t think he was aware of it. “Do you want to talk about it?” he asked, his voice suggesting he was having a hard time controlling his anger.
“No.”
“Okay.” He let out a shuddering breath. He started drawing circles again, this time even more slowly, and it was . . . soothing. Liberating. There was something liberating about a touch that wasn’t bringing fear. I felt freed and alive again. Not burning with anger or feeling empty. Not dying inside. Alive.
“Just like you, I have trust issues. I can’t trust guys. All I see is a threat and what could happen to me again, and I hate even thinking about guys touching me.”
He stilled his hand again. “So, you absolutely can’t stand my touches?”
“I am letting you touch me now, aren’t I?”
He let out a quiet chuckle, pulling away from my shoulder. “So, maybe you’re starting to trust me.”
I opened my eyes and met his gaze. It reflected hope, and I couldn’t help but feel we’d achieved something important here. One of the barriers was down.
Still, everything was new, which made it frightening by default.
I rolled my eyes exaggeratedly at him. “Stop being so sappy. It doesn’t suit you.”
He smiled and then—that cheeky bastard!—he scooted away and placed his head on my lap, using it as a pillow.
I choked on my saliva. “What are you—”
“Let me stay like this just for a while,” he said in a deep, raspy voice.
My hands hung in the air, and I was torn between pushing him away and letting him stay. I flexed and unflexed my hands, my chest tight with anxiety. If I’d been super aware of him before, I was ablaze with awareness now.
This was new for me. I wasn’t cuddly. I’d never wanted something like this. But instead of kicking him all the way to Mercury, I lowered my hands to my sides, making sure I wasn’t touching him, allowing him something I’d never allowed anyone before.
“Don’t you dare fall asleep on me.”
“Mm-hmm.” He snuggled against my thighs. “I just want to help you.”
“What?”
“I want you to get used to touching,” he replied drowsily.
At this, something pierced the thick armor that protected my heart. “So you’d get to fuck me?”
“So you’d let yourself live again.”
And that shut me up completely.
Let myself live again.
I’d been denying myself so many things, shielding myself with venom and hate, because it was the only way for me to survive, and I’d been fine with that . . . or so I’d thought. I’d thought I’d healed in my own way, but I’d just been patched up. Never healed.
Masen’s touches stirred that longing I’d left buried long ago. The touches reminded me that I was dead inside; I’d followed that self-imposed path of destruction and erected shields around myself that kept everyone else away. I was surviving, but I wasn’t living.
I glanced down at Masen, whose eyes were shut, and I finally allowed myself to imagine being with someone. Letting them come close to me. Letting them know all my vulnerabilities. Letting them give me love. Trusting them.
Something seemed to be pushing me and Masen closer and made us gravitate toward each other, and it was equal parts scary and thrilling. I just want to help you. I want you to get used to touching so you’d let yourself live again.
I allowed my eyes to glide over his face. I studied his lashes, which cast shadows upon his cheeks, the firm line of his jaw that was tempting me to touch it, and his pouty lips I’d tasted and to which I’d become addicted.
I took a shuddering breath. The tension between my legs drummed stronger, and I squirmed. He didn’t even stir, his breathing growing deeper.
“Barbie?” I whispered. There was no response. “Just great. Don’t tell me you decided to fall asleep on my lap.” He didn
’t move an inch, his breathing unchanged.
I continued studying the contours of his face. My fingertips itched to touch that smooth skin.
“You actually look like a nice person when you’re sleeping. Who would’ve thought?” More like an angel, with that halo of blond hair and a sculpted face made for the front covers of magazines. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that girls were writing poems about him.
I moved a strand of his hair from his forehead tentatively, feeling weird for initiating the contact. I waited a second, two . . . and then I grazed his cheek with the back of my hand.
I couldn’t see him as the same old asshole anymore. I could try as hard as I wanted, but I couldn’t. I hated everything he’d done in the past, but I couldn’t hate him. Not anymore. Over these past few days, the silly flame of my crush had turned into a blazing fire, and the more I got to know him, the more that hate seemed like something from another life.
Besides, he was changing, if his lack of whoring and bullying was anything to go by. I’d have still preferred that he’d spend at least the next twenty years repenting and cleansing his soul—by drinking bleach every day and night—but, still.
I stopped moving my hand, aware only now I’d been stroking his hair, when it dawned on me.
He’d had too much to drink, so I couldn’t let him drive. I wouldn’t be able to sleep if I did.
He would have to spend the night here.
I grimaced at him. “Well played, Barbie. Well played.”
The bonfire was the only source of light in the dark woods, its flames licking up into the cloudy sky. It would be kind of spooky if not for the dance music blasting out of someone’s car speakers and the drunk fools around me who were acting like ten-year-olds. It was Halloween, so some folks were dressed as ghosts and vampires. We even had werewolves, who kept howling into the night, acting like they came straight out of the Twilight movies.
It was funny, but I could hardly care about their antics when I had him sitting next to me. I knew this was going to be the night I lost my virginity to him. I wanted it. I was ready for it. I was.
The stench of beer on his breath was almost revolting when he leaned in to plant a kiss on my mouth; the can in his hand was tilted as though it was seconds away from falling to the ground. He was drunk, his lips more and more explorative on their way to my neck. His friends didn’t even try to conceal their staring, which was paired with cheeky smiles. I almost grabbed my untouched can of beer from the ground and threw it at them for being so nosy.
His lips reached a very sensitive place on my neck, and I shivered, forgetting about our audience. This was what I wanted. My body wanted it.
So, when he took my hand and led me far, far away from the bonfire, I didn’t protest. I didn’t even question him.
“This way. We don’t want anyone to interrupt us,” he said.
If I’d been drunk, I wouldn’t have noticed how far we were going, minutes and minutes passing by. But I was sober, and the surrounding darkness didn’t sit well with me. The further we went, the colder I felt.
I rubbed my upper arm. “Let’s do it here.” I tugged at his hand to stop him, but he kept moving.
“Just a little further, sugarpie. I want to make you scream, and you don’t want the others to hear you.”
His words were supposed to turn me on. But they didn’t. Something about them rubbed me the wrong way.
“They’re pretty far away, and the music is too loud.”
“I’m not taking any chances,” he said.
“Then I’ll try to keep quiet. Or bite my fist, whatever those porn actresses do.”
He raised his eyebrow at me, a dangerous smirk tugging at his lips. “Already watching porn, sugarpie?”
“Nope, but I suppose you do. I wouldn’t want to disappoint you.”
He chuckled, but somehow, I didn’t detect any humor in it. There was something different about him tonight. I didn’t even finish that thought before he pressed me against a tree and kissed me roughly, his tongue and saliva attacking me before I even had time to take a breath.
Hey, we’re not in a wrestling ring, I wanted to say, but I let him do his thing, focusing on his hands that were now all over me. It was nice, so I should just relax and go with the flow . . . This was what I wanted. I was ready.
But something felt off. His hands were too rough, and his pressure on me was too hard. His urgent moves felt aggressive, not passionate, and I started doubting my decision to have sex with him tonight. I bit my lip, tilting my head to the side when he buried his head into my neck. His kisses should turn me on. I should be enjoying this.
My stomach churned. This didn’t feel right.
“Just wait for a sec.” I pushed against his massive chest, but he didn’t budge. “I said wait.”
I pushed against him again, but he only pressed harder into me, grabbing my hands and pulling them behind my back. “You’ve been teasing me the whole night with that skirt,” he said and bit into my neck. I cried out in pain, my desire completely gone.
“Okay, I know it’s Halloween, but you don’t actually have to act like a vampire. You’re freaking me out. Stop.”
His chuckle sounded merciless, sending shivers straight down my spine. “Don’t pretend like you don’t want this. You were ready to give me your pussy the moment you saw me.”
Disgust and fear crawled all over my skin. He left a series of painful bites across my neck; his hands held my wrists too tightly for me to do anything.
I twisted in an attempt to set myself free. “I don’t want to do this anymore, so stop!”
He took both my wrists in one hand and groped my breast with the other, grinding against me. I struggled for air, overwhelmed by nausea and panic. This was not happening to me.
“Get off me! I don’t want this! Get off me!”
He chuckled. The bastard chuckled. “Don’t pretend with me. I know you want me.” His voice was as cold as this feeling that was rapidly spreading through me. I was trapped. I couldn’t set myself free.
“Stop! No!”
I screamed from the bottom of my lungs, but he quickly silenced me when he clamped his mouth over mine and raised my skirt. I couldn’t even bite him. I thrashed and kicked, beside myself with terror as he lowered his jeans. I was powerless. I couldn’t do anything. Nothing.
In my mind, I pleaded for him to stop. Again and again. And again.
But he didn’t.
He carried on taking away my innocence.
He carried on destroying my soul.
He ruined me.
Until I couldn’t even remember who I was before.
I snapped my eyes open, gasping and covered in a thick layer of sweat. I turned on the bedside lamp and jumped out of bed, taking large gulps of air. Panic gripped my throat, my chest, my whole body, and I wanted to scream my heart out.
I stumbled to my punching bag and grabbed it, digging my fingers into the leather.
“It’s in the past. In the past, in the past, in the past.” I hit the bag with the side of my fist, letting out a barely audible whimper. “It’s all in the past. I won’t get hurt again. I won’t.”
I steadied the bag and hit it again, forcing the poison out of me. I fed on the physical pain that came immediately.
How could I think even for a second of letting Masen get close to me? How could I think this time I would come out of it without new scars? I’d trusted once, and my whole life had been turned upside down. This time it could completely break me. Masen would break me, and he wouldn’t even have to break a sweat to achieve it.
I couldn’t drop my guard. I couldn’t be like normal people, because I was too broken. I was ruined.
I punched harder, chasing the high that was never enough. I’d let him get too close, allowing myself to forget that true horrors loomed right behind my back, and the moment I was careless . . .
I hurled my anger at the punching bag, hitting it again and again and again.
I wished Steven were
here. He would make stupid jokes, and I would roll my eyes at him, but it would be easier to get rid of the demons of the past with him by my side. I would be able to forget how lonely and scared I was.
Had he felt lonely, too? Had he embraced drugs because everything else was out of reach? Had he started changing because I’d started changing, too? Why had this happened to us? Why?
I punched harder, each punch delivered with anguish as part of a never-ending fight.
All this time, I hadn’t felt whole. I’d felt this burning need for—what? Clarity? Caring arms that would embrace me? A loving mouth that would tell me the world wasn’t a minefield and I didn’t have to watch my back constantly? Peace?
I was becoming more restless with each punch, spiraling deeper into the pain.
What was happening to me? I’d had a clear vision—survive on my own. Now, just because of some guy, I couldn’t get rid of this thought that maybe I didn’t have to survive on my own. I could survive with someone . . . We could survive together.
It was pathetic. Pathetic. Pathetic. Pathetic.
And now, he was sleeping in the room next to mine. He’d infiltrated my world skillfully, affecting me in more ways than one, until I’d almost been ready to give in.
“Pathetic,” I hissed. “So pathetic.”
The pain in my knuckles turned into a dull drumming, but I swung my fist again, right before a knock coming on my door stopped me.
“Satan? Open the door.”
His sleepy voice only further ignited my anger. I’d actually wanted him close to me. I’d almost let him ruin me again.
I marched over to the door and flung it wide open, fighting against the sudden need to shove him away and out of my life.
“You can’t sleep, huh? Pretty sure folks on the other side of town could hear you punching,” he said with a half-smile before he noticed what I was wearing. I’d donned a short sleeping top and shorts that clung to my skin, leaving little to the imagination. I hadn’t shaved my legs, and just remembering this and wishing I’d had doubled my anger.
“What the fuck do you want?” I snarled at him, and he snapped his eyes up to meet mine, frowning.