Images are flashing behind my eyes. The boxing ring felt like we were friends. Siblings no, but it felt like friends. The texts have never been anything more than that, if I was lucky. I'm nearly gagging. My hands are shaking. How did I miss it?
"Did he punish you, sexually?"
My eyes betray me and answer her question.
She nods, "He has a thing with that. He was punishing you as Emalyn, for dying and making him a failure."
I wish I were the one who died.
She sighs and continues, "Not to mention how you feel about him. He saved you. You will never see the man, only the hero. You will forgive him his flaws too easily. I imagined that was what you were feeling. Not true lust. I honestly didn’t think you were capable of true lust. This is progress for you, even if it's twisted and bizarre. Considering the dirty house and all." I'm up and walking to the elevator.
"You need to stay away from him until I can help him." She calls after me.
I feel sick and dirty. My fingers tap the button in a disturbing panic. My fingertip goes numb.
The elevator opens. I step in and fight the tears. I run across the parking lot, away from the SUV. Stuart doesn’t see me. His head is down. I run hard and fast. My boots are killing my feet, but I run until I can't. Then I pull out my cell phone and call him. I'm frozen and pacing on the sidewalk.
"Yes." He is cold.
"You think of me as your sister? You've fucked me, imagining I'm your sister?"
"What? What are you talking about?"
"Doctor Bradley, she told me that you think of me as the sister who died. You've replaced me in your heart as your sister and you love me like that. You protect me like that." I'm huffing and puffing and blowing steam in an angry circle.
"You told Dr. Bradley about us? What we did at my house?" His vice is still cold.
"ANSWER ME, FOR FUCK'S SAKE! DID YOU FUCK ME AND THINK ABOUT YOUR SISTER?"
My ear is pressed into the phone but I know he's gone. He's hung up on me, again. My tears are blocking my throat up. I'm wheezing and pacing. My heart is broken in a thousand pieces. I crouch onto the ground and sit on my heels.
"Sarah?" I look up. Stuart is pulled over on the side of the road. I laugh. I laugh hard and psychotically.
He's parked illegally and running across the street. He grabs my arm and lifts me.
"What happened?" He looks concerned, but I just laugh.
He takes my cell from my gripped hand and dials.
"Meet me at the place I always park. She's upset." He hangs up.
I laugh harder. He's called Eli. Eli who has made me dirty and yet somehow broken my heart in it all.
Stuart helps me across the street and into the SUV. He drives fast. He pulls up in front of the dorms. Michelle is there. She looks worried.
Stuart opens the door for me but I get out on my own. "I'm fine." I say.
Michelle looks at Stuart with daggers but he shakes his head, "I don’t know."
"They just keep fucking with me. They won't let it go." I turn and grab Stuart's coat, "Thank you for everything. Don’t be offended if I don’t want a ride or to see you. Please."
He shakes his head, "I get it."
Michelle puts a hand out for me. I look at it. I shake my head, "I can walk alone." I hug myself and trek across the road and the snow-covered grass.
My dorm is a haven. It's the only place I feel safe, with or without Shell. I curl into my bed and turn on the TV. Shell comes into the room, watching me.
"I'm fine." I say and turn on the Xbox.
"You're clearly not fine. Spill." She sits in the way of the TV. I stare past her. I can't let her see inside of me. I can't let her see what's in there and what I have allowed to happen. What sick fetish filth I have let overcome me.
My jaw trembles slightly. I know she can see me. She is the only one.
"He doesn’t love me." I whisper.
"It's more than that?"
"He really sees me as his sister."
She pauses and takes it in, "What do you mean?"
I can't pull the words back. I've let them out. I'm panicking about the fact she's processing them and I hate the things I have allowed. The things she will see any second when she puts it altogether. She will see me for the weak girl I am. But in the end I need someone. Someone I can process it with.
"Sarah, what do you mean?" She presses me.
I keep my eyes covered and continue, "He wanted me to be his sister, like he sees me as her. When he saved me it was like he saved her. But when he punished me, he was really punishing her. I am her." My head is twitching.
In my peripheral I see her face. It's filled with the disgust I knew it would be. "Sick bastard," she whispers.
I close my eyes but feel her weight on the bed. She wraps around me and kisses my forehead, "Forget him, withdraw from school and stop taking his money. This isn’t worth it. You were better off with the lonely."
I nod, "I know."
Shell looks off into space and mutters, "I'm going to go kill him now. So I'll be back and we can talk about this then."
I grip her and shake my head, "No. Don’t leave."
"I need him to bleed and suffer."
I shake my head, "I let him do it. I let him punish me like I was her." I've said too much.
Her fingers dig into my arms, "What? You mean the therapy thing? I told you that doctor was a quack. I knew it."
Tears seep through the squeezed lids. "It's so much worse than that. When we had sex, I let him spank me and be rough and punish me. I let him hurt me and be rough with me." My voice has become nothing but a shell of what it once was. I don’t have the bravery to talk to her aloud.
"He hurt you? Sexually?"
I suck my breath and nod, "I liked it. So much is wrong with me." I'm heaving and shaking.
She holds me, "Wait…so you… liked being dominated? Dude…everyone likes that."
I shake my head, "I liked being spanked and held down." I'm so ashamed but I'm grateful I can't see through the blinding tears.
She pulls me back sharply. My eyes jerk open. She's smiling and fighting a giggle, "Everyone likes that."
I can't speak anymore.
"I love being spanked. I don’t like to talk about it. I don’t ever want to discuss it again, but you need to see. Everyone likes it. Those smutty books sell because women wish their husbands had half the balls the men in those books do."
I stop. I think she's telling the truth, but I doubt its validity.
"You aren’t a freak." Humor is spreading across her face. "Women enjoy a paddling and a spanking and some biting. We all like safe games. The fantasy of the roughness without the actual crime of being forced. Women like that. I read those books and I wish I could meet a guy like that…a bad boy. A guy who spanks me and makes it rough. Common fantasy."
I swallow, it doesn’t lessen the pain.
"He is the bad boy. The player. The rough and tough sex-freak. The one we all want."
I frown. "I don’t see him that way."
She shakes her head, "No…you love him. You won't ever see any of his flaws. Love is blind and you fell in love with the fantasy."
I snort, "My fantasy is the normal I've always wanted. I don’t have the same fantasy as the rest of you. I don’t want a bad boy, I want a normal guy."
She stops gripping my arms and relaxes a bit, "There is no normal. I wish you could see that. You are normal. Normal is being screwed up, but being able to work with it and appear calm. My family had too many kids, I never got attention. Now I'm an attention-seeking whore. I get that. I probably have daddy issues, but I work with it. I have fun with it. Why not? Why not just embrace the inner freak. So, you like bondage and spankings. Jesus. At least you don’t like being peed on or having things shoved in your bum, 'cause seriously, Dr. Oz says those muscles can relax and stop holding the poop in."
I laugh at her serious face when she says poop.
She pulls me in and hugs me again, "Dude, I'm exhausted thinking about the year you've had. You left the orphanage. You came to school, got abducted, fell in love with two complete opposite boys and conquered the lonely. Now you've learned you got some freakiness in ya. Well, so what. It's not so bad." She sighs, "Can we just finish the year, screw Eli? Well not screw Eli, but forget him. He wants you to be his sister, then be that. Be his sister that hates him or could give a shit about him. That’s how I feel about my brothers. Pieces of shit. Done."
I nod against her, "Okay."
Her forehead rests against mine, "Are we still on for your birthday though? Cause we can bail. They'll get it."
I shake my head, "I need it."
"Okay. I'm in for whatever you are. What movie we watching tonight?"
"Amelie." I say. She sighs, she hates subtitles.
"I'll go get some chocolate. Lord knows I could use some." She stands up and looks at me, "You know there isn’t a single thing wrong with you. Not one. There isn’t anybody who deserves love and respect like you do." She leaves the room and I let her words be true. I push the power button on the phone to turn it off and leave it alone.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Class was boring. I take a deep breath of fresh air, walking down the path, grateful to be out in it. The snow is still falling but I don’t care.
"Does winter ever end here?"
I laugh at Shell and shake my head, "I know right." I glance at her and nudge her, "You sure you want to do this?" I ask.
She nods, "I guess so hey. Can't make you go alone and be the only skinny girl who sucks ass."
I laugh. We walk over to the bus stop. Stuart watches us. I can see the look in his eyes, but I don’t meet them. We climb on the bus. I see her watching him out the window. She misses him. "Just call him."