AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Zach holds me tight as sobs wrack my body. He says nothing but simply rubs my back, squeezing my neck every so often, and I am so thankful for his silence.
“After a lot of persuasion, Mom and Dad agreed. We all gathered and dressed up at a classmate’s house whose parents were out of town.” I close my eyes remembering my reflection in the tall mirror.
I wanted to grow up so fast. Why?
I take a deep breath. The rich smell of Zach’s cologne bringing me back from that mirror to the present.
“The club was nothing special, but it was the most hip place for us teen girls. We went to the dance floor, and I had never danced like that. I often joined my parents as a third partner, twirling around them to Ella’s soft voice. But this noise, these beats were all new to me. They were beating in sync with my thumping heart. After spending a long time on the dance floor, we all got tired and went back to our table. I was about to get something to drink for myself when a guy approached me.”
My voice trembles as an ache develops in the back of my throat. Zach’s hand on my back stills and I can feel him going rock solid next to me as I continue. “He told me that he was watching us dance and I stood out among all my friends. I never had that kind of attention from anyone before. My friends were looking at us,at me, with an expression of awe. I was not the girl living in the shadows, but for the first time, I was under the spotlight. He asked me if he could buy me a drink.”
A sob tears through me at my own idiocy and Zach’s grip on my shoulders tighten. “Hope,” he whispers in a pained voice.
“Please. Just…don’t say anything, I won’t be able to continue.”
He agrees by placing a small kiss on my head.
“I had no idea about drugs or any such thing. Nobody taught us that stuff in school, possibly because I was living in such a safe town.” I swallow the shame, the humiliation of all those years.
“When I woke up the next morning, it took me a moment to realize I was not in my room. I was lying naked in a seedy hotel room bed. My tongue was heavy, I was aching everywhere from head to toe. I had bruises on my body, there was blood…”
Zach crushes me against him, muffling my words in his chest as if he cannot bear to hear more. My tears soak his shirt, but he doesn’t seem to care.
“I…was so scared.” My hands fisting his shirt tremble. “I didn’t know what to do. The room had a dirty bathroom where I puked over and over. It was horrible, Zach. So horrible.” Incessant tears continue to blur my vision.
“When I could finally stand, I looked in the mirror. I had bruises all over my body. I showered in that dingy shower and scraped my skin to get rid of the marks, the stench, the pain. I couldn’t stop my tears. I cried for my parents, I cried at my stupidity. I found my clothes dirty and scattered in the room. I didn’t want to put them back on.” I hide my face behind my hands. “I didn’t know what to do, to take them with me or throw them away. I was still a child.”
Like so many other times in my life, I wonder why did this happen to me?
“I found some money on the nightstand. It was a hundred dollars and you wouldn’t believe how relieved I was to see that money because at that time, I had no clue where I was or how I would get home. I was so lost.”
I glance up at my husband who is holding on to my every word with a pained expression on his face.
“I took that money. I kept it. Even though I wasn’t aware at that moment what it symbolized, I sold myself for a hundred dollars. I accepted the payment for fucking me like a whore.”
“Shh...shh…” he coos, but I just want to end this nightmare.
“After getting dressed, I cleaned the room. I didn’t know about the proper conduct on leaving the room after you were drugged and raped, so I cleaned it. I still remember feeling pain in my body every time I moved to clear the beer bottles, the cigarette butts. After a few hours, I finally gathered the courage to escape that shithole. It was a bad place in a bad neighborhood. The lobby reeked of filth.” I shiver just from the memories of that place and Zach pulls me closer to his chest.
“I tried to ask the guy sitting at the makeshift reception desk, but he wouldn’t tell me anything. It was really a place where you can get a room without any questions as long as you have the money. Walking on the streets, I realized that I was in the neighboring town. I bought the ticket for the next bus and spent the whole evening hiding in my room. I didn’t know at that moment what was exactly happening to me. They tell you in sex-ed classes about sex, but they don’t tell you anything more. I was hurting overall. I was so scared. I didn’t tell anyone.”
“Hope.” The agony in his low voice forces me to look at him. Zach’s stormy gray eyes are glazed with tears. He presses a kiss to my forehead as tears continue to roll down my cheeks.
“I changed after that night. I started being silent and withdrawn. My parents tried to cheer me up for a few days, but nothing worked until, in a final attempt to lighten my mood, Dad got me an application for a baking school in Paris.”
An ache develops in the center of my heart, spreading throughout as I remember the white envelope with a blue cupcake on the left.
“It was way out of our means, but Dad was adamant on it, even agreeing to take out a mortgage on the house if needed. A feeling of hopefulness hit me after such a long time. We celebrated that night like we used to. My parents danced, I sang, and we cooked. I started believing that all would be okay and that night would soon be a forgotten history. I had Paris to look forward to. But my happiness was short-lived. A few days after I had sent in my application, I started getting morning sickness. I thought it was some bad food or the flu. I didn’t realize that I was missing my periods. But my mother made the connection and got me a pregnancy test. My life, my parents’ life, was never the same from the moment I walked out of my bathroom holding the pink pregnancy strip.
“My parents asked me numerous times about the guy, but I said nothing. What could I tell them?” I crush my eyes with the heel of my palms, remembering how this crushed my parents. "The atmosphere of our house changed, my parents became quieter and the traditions became rare. There was less music, less dancing, less happiness…until there was none. I did that to them. I took away their happiness.” I hiccup and clutch my hands close to my chest, hoping it will lessen the pain, the guilt that has been sitting there for so long.
“A week later, I received the acceptance letter from Paris and that night I cried so much because in that moment I realized how my life would never be the same.
“A few days later, Dad told me that he had sent a letter to the school asking if I could defer the admission for a year. He promised that they would help me raise the child. Can you believe it?” My fingers press on the back of my hand, my nails digging into my skin. “I told them nothing, they owed me nothing, but still they were willing to support me. For a moment I feltmaybemy life wasn’t destroyed just yet, maybe all would work out. I started helping Dad in the kitchen again and we tried to get into our normal routine. But one day, when I was in the sixth month of my pregnancy, we got a call from the restaurant. My dad had a heart attack at work.” Zach’s hands running over my forearms came to a halt. “He died on the way to the hospital.”
The feeling of emptiness hits me like it did that day years ago.
“My stupid brain thought everything was okay and normal at home. I didn’t realize how stressed my parents were. I was already showing, people were asking all sorts of questions, and my parents paid for my mistakes. My mother couldn’t take the loss of my father and started fading, eating less and less until she stopped all together. I had to put her in the hospital so she could be fed by IV. All of a sudden, I was a six-months-pregnant teenager with so many responsibilities.”
I don’t tell him how scared I was all those nights alone in my house, crying to God to send my dad back, begging for a second chance to fix my mistakes.
“Once Ray was born, I took him to see Mom. Until then, I didn’t really have a name for him, I was just calling him baby. But Mom held him and whisperedRaymond. That was my father’s name.” I swallow the huge bundle of emotions balled against my throat.
“We both cried for the first time for Dad, and I told her I needed her. I told her I couldn’t do this alone. Thankfully, she started eating and a few weeks later I brought her home. However, it was not the same without Dad. His memories were everywhere. One of my dad’s friends helped me find a job at the bakery and we moved to St. Peppers, making it our new home.”
