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As soon as we pull into the empty parking lot at the Ravencrest Park, my heart begins to race. It looks different than the last time I was here—more run-down.
The gazebo made out of wood has graffiti covering the chipped, white paint. The metal slide I hid under that night is rusted out with a few steps missing on the ladder. There’s an overflowing trash can with litter lying around it. It’s a far cry from the lively place I imagined it was when I first stepped foot in it. But now, seeing it like this, it’s a place I never want to enter again, and certainly not in the dead of night.
Thankfully, there is still daylight and I have backup this time; otherwise, I’m not sure I’d be able to do this.
Wilder turns the engine off, and the sound of his keys dangling together startles me. It’s as if Winton is here somehow. Like his eyes are boring into me and setting my nerves on edge.
“You okay?” Wilder asks, likely unsure why I look like I’m on the verge of a meltdown. I take a deep breath and try to convince myself that my anxiety is over the lack of control I had that night and not because of fear. I have control now. I can walk away and get in the car where Wilder will take me home the second I want to.
Wilder knows a small bit of what happened that night, but he doesn’t know the extent of everything I endured. He doesn’t know I still wake up struggling to breathe. He doesn’t know that any time I kneel down I have flashbacks to the moment I was pushed to my knees.
“I’m okay,” I tell him as my shaky hand reaches for the door handle. “Ready?”
He nods, swinging his door open to step out, while I take a little longer to get out of the car. As soon as my right foot hits the cracked pavement in the parking lot, apprehension stops me from moving my other foot out.
It’s silly to feel like this. No harm came from those guys. Sure, they touched me and ripped my clothes and were about to do unthinkable things to me, but they didn’t. I survived it. I walked away—or ran, rather. Nothing has touched me since that night, except a slew of terrible memories—and Rome—but I’m okay.
“You sure you wanna do this?” Wilder asks, now at the door I’m desperately trying to force myself to climb out of. “There are other ways.”
“No,” I say, swinging my other foot out. “I’m fine. I need to do this.”
This isn’t just for Rome; this is for me, too. I haven’t gone to therapy for my PTSD, but I have done a lot of research. One of the best ways for a victim to claim back control of being sexually assaulted is revisiting the place of the crime. Some choose to vandalize it, to mark it up so it feels as ugly as they do on the inside. Others will clean it up, even memorialize it as the place where they survived.
But not me. I plan to use this trip as a way to make sure Winton is taken down and never able to hurt another person again.
I stand up and close the door, forcing myself to walk into the park. Wilder is at my side, so I know nothing bad is going to happen. I was warned once about stepping onto Bulldog territory, and I thought I learned my lesson. But coming back here is crucial.
“Anything look familiar?” Wilder asks as my eyes scope out the scenery.
“It’s a lot different in the daylight.” I glance around, trying to replay the scene in my head. “That night I was here, I only had the light on my phone and the dim lampposts to illuminate everything.”
“Yeah.” He scoffs, kicking up dirt. “This place is a shithole.”
“What are the residents of Ravencrest like?” I ask, genuinely curious if they’re all jerks like the ones I had a run-in with.
“Some are all right.” Wilder shrugs as he leans against some of the dirty playground equipment, only to stand back up straight and dust himself off.
“But most aren’t too fond of us Willow Creek residents because we’re more financially stable. Willow Creek has all the appeal Ravencrest doesn’t. I don’t want to say they’re poor, but our towns are night and day in comparison. Not to mention, we’re sports rivals. So that only adds to the tension.”
“Are they any good?” I ask, curious if money gets the better players or not.
“They do have one hell of a team, I’ll give them that.”
Looking around, I can see what he means about the lack of appeal. Even the area surrounding the park looks dead and unloved. There’s a house in the distance that’s missing pieces of siding. The one beside it has a screen door hanging from the hinges and three rusted-out cars in the driveway, one with the hood up.
As I approach the slide where I hid, I already feel like I’m entering a new stage of healing. I crouch down, just like I did that night, and close my eyes, knowing I look crazy, but also aware that this is what I need to do.
I see it all so clearly. Like a movie replaying in my mind. I graze my arm, remembering the way it felt when Winton wrapped his fingers around me.
Drawing in a bumpy breath, I fast-forward to Rome’s voice when he told them to let me go.
I try to picture him in my head, that black hoodie and his familiar blue eyes, but all I can focus on is the sound of Winton’s threatening voice saying if I tell anyone, I’ll live to regret it.
Chills dance down my spine as the words repeat over and over in my head. Because now I have told someone.
If Winton finds out, assuming he hasn’t already, he could very well follow through with his threat. I look around, those eyes on me feeling even more intense now that I’m out in the open. I can feel my chest rising and falling rapidly, but I am no longer aware enough to stop it.
My body trembles until I feel the soft touch of Wilder’s hand on my back. “You’re safe,” he assures me. My fear escalates when I realize that bringing Wilder here could put him in danger.
