Scarred Roses

Chapter 11 part 2-flirting with the boundries

We kept silent as we walked back home. Though mum and dad were a little surprised to see Nick, walking in shirtless, it disappeared quickly enough when he showed them the stained shirt. Mum was glad to hear that I had the sense to use stain-remover, even though it was mostly down to luck that I had it in the first place. The shirt and vest-top that went with it was thrown into the washing machine, and after a brief trip to his room to put another shirt on, we started on dinner. The only sounds that could be heard were the quiet chewing of the cucumber salad, and the scraping of cutlery against the plates. Nick and I didn’t speak, Audrey glared sharply between the two of us; trying to decipher our silence, and my parents took advantage of the quiet for as long as they could. Once the plates were cleared, I hurried to help mum with the dishes before trying to distract myself with some evening television. I tried to make myself feel normal again, but nothing I did would erase the picture of me in his arms, being literally an inch away from kissing him. Kissing Nick! Just the thought was unfathomable. Making the boy from my past, the boy who gave me so many scars my first kiss? It was insane, it was Ludacris, it was…it was supposed to feel wrong. At least, that was what I kept telling myself.

Since it was a Friday, I initially had plans of watching the latest episodes of ‘Bob’s Burgers’ until I got tired. But as I went back down to the kitchen to get some popcorn, I found my path blocked by Audrey. She didn’t look angry, but she certainly wasn’t smiling either. It scared me when she did that; her mood could take a turn for the best or worst, depending on what you said to her.

“I remember you said you were going out with Thomas tomorrow morning,” I said, wondering if she was just here to remind me. “We can work on the dress Sunday, if you’ve got the time.”

“You know perfectly well that I’m not here about the dress,” She replied tightly. “Do you think I’m some sort of i***t? You might have mum and dad fooled, but you can’t lie to me.”

“What are you talking about?”

“What am I talking about?” She laughed; not the soft, sweet kind of giggle I was so accustomed to hearing from her, but a bitter, mocking sort of laugh. The kind she would give after hearing somebody, lie blatantly to her face. “He comes back here, half-naked, you’re nearly red as a tomato, and you both come back together. I know what it means, even if mum and dad don’t. So, how long has he been going at this? What did he make you do?”

“He hasn’t made me do anything!” I whispered, adamant that our parents wouldn’t hear. “It was just like we said. His biro broke, I used some of that stain-remover I bought to take care of it, and we went to Lilac Park for a little while to let it soak. What else could you think happened?”

“Hazel, use your imagination!” She barked, “Do you think I don’t know what go’s on between a boy and a girl, alone in a park? If this were any, other boy Hazel, I would try and be happy for you. But the scumbag who nearly tore our family apart?! How can you do it? How can you live with yourself?”

She made it sound as if I were…as if I were sleeping with him! How could she even think that? She knew what I’d been through, she’d seen it all happen. Me getting startled, if a passing stranger so much as glanced at me. Staring at an ordered drink for long minutes at a time, wondering if it could’ve been drugged somehow. Why all this? Why right now?

“I have done nothing!” I cried, thinking ‘to hell with them overhearing!’. “Nick has been nothing but a good friend to me, and I have no shame in admitting that. But if you thought for a second that I would question everything you’ve done to protect me, everything I’ve done to protect myself, then you’re dreaming.”

“So, he’s been a good friend, hmm?” She grabbed my elbow. Digging those blood-red, manicured nails into the softer flesh of my upturned forearm. “He makes your life hell for an entire year, then suddenly he’s a good friend? Next thing I know, you’ll be boasting about how Trevor’s such a close chum.”

“Audrey, stop! You’re hurting me.” I cried out, wincing as she dug even harder.

“Maybe a little pain will put some sense into you!” She snapped, “There’s nothing but heartbreak with him, can’t you see that? The only future you two could ever have would be decades of control and abuse. Don’t you know there’s a reason they call Stockholm syndrome bad? Sick? One way or another, she keeps on going back to him. Take a lesson from it, Hazel! No matter how many times he’ll apologize, he’s a monster and he’ll always be a monster.”

I broke away, wincing as the nails caught hold of my skin and tore at it as I retracted my arm from her grip. How could she say that?! Speak so horribly after everything this family has gone through? I might’ve been a burden when I was a child, I might’ve been the reason my mother had to break off such a beloved friendship, but I never did any of it on purpose! I never asked to exist. I had to go somewhere, to clear my head…the attic! Yes, the attic would do. It was cold and dusty up there, so Audrey couldn’t get to me. And there was the bay-window, Grandma’s old, salmon-coloured sofa…I could’ve slept there, if I really wanted to. But that would need to be decided later. For now, I needed to be alone.

Walking as fast as my feet would take me, I hiked my way up that narrow stair-case that led me to the airy attic. It was cool in here; as I should’ve expected. It wasn’t insulated like the rest of the house, and if I were looking for a warm place to sit in, the basement would’ve been a better choice. But it was quiet up here. Quiet and desolate enough to pace and mutter self-soothing things to myself. Anger wasn’t an emotion I was accustomed to, but I could stifle it easily enough. It was anger, sadness and disbelief, however, that was hard for me to contain. Especially when all three were aimed towards the most unlikely person: Audrey. Audrey was my sister; the golden-sister, the sister who cast an eternal shadow over me as others would bask in her glow. I never minded falling one step behind her; accepting that as long as she was the same, loving, gentle girl I knew straight from birth, I would always be glad to be second-best. Now she had turned on me. Because of one, stupid innuendo, she had lashed out and condemned me for my friendship with Nick. But despite, or because of the fact that she had even hurt me physically, as well as emotionally, that wasn’t the thing that troubled me the most. I think…I think it was because in some ways, she was right. I was feeling something different towards Nick, and as much as I tried to lie to myself, the truth was right there, staring me in the face. He held me in his arms, he danced with me, told me more-or-less that he wanted to go with me to the masquerade, and came so close to kissing me that I had nearly let him. Nearly. I think I deserved some credit at least, for pulling away when I did.

The unvarnished wood beneath my bare-feet felt cold and dirty, and the icy air made goosepimples on my arms and calves, nevertheless, I was calming down. The unaffected silence and the faint scent of rose-powder-grandma’s favourite, was soothing me. The anger towards my sister was lessoning, albeit, very slowly. Now I would just have to sneak back down to the hot-water cupboard to get some blankets. I know it was silly and cowardly, but I didn’t want to sleep in my bedroom tonight. I wanted to be somewhere nobody could find me. I wanted to…to fall asleep in a row-boat, wrapped in a thick blanket, with only the soft sounds of lapping water as my lullaby. I wanted to lie, face-up in a meadow. The thick, lush grass soft beneath my back, and the wind, soothing my abraded arm. I wanted those silly, surreal kind-of fantasies. Just like Winnie the Pooh. But reality was never too far away, and eager to pull me back to earth, where I belonged.

“Hazel?” Nick stood, his silhouette standing out through the streams of light that came in through the open doorway. Dressed in his normal bed-time attire, wearing a worrisome frown of his face. How did he know that I would be here? “Are you alright?”

We met each other half way. Me, shivering in my cotton-thin nightgown, and him, even barer than I was, still radiating natural warmth. He knew I was upset. I didn’t know how, but I think he sensed it, even before it occurred to him to visit the attic.

“If I told you I was, would you believe me?”

He reached out; his fingertips making the slightest of caresses against the roundness of my cheek. Why did his touch seem so considerate, when my sister’s felt so rough?

“Not for a moment,”

For a while, we just stood there. Minutes had gone by, maybe hours for all I knew, of him comforting me as I had comforted him just two weeks ago. Only, it wasn’t a close embrace. It wasn’t physical affection that I needed, right this minute, but an unspoken understanding. It was okay for me, not to be fine, and he knew that. He was far from perfect, much to other people’s disbelief, and sometimes, times like these, we were both fed up with trying. He’d already let me see him with his guard down, so now it was my turn to let him see me.

“What did she do?” He’d finally asked me, motioning towards the deep-red scratches on my arm. Partially small droplets of blood that were beginning to dry, partially the dark flakes from her nail-polish.

“She…she thought we were sleeping together.” I confessed, “She thought that I was sneaking around, behind everybody’s backs, throwing away every, little thing I’d learnt to protect myself. Everything they did to protect me! This person, the sister who’s known me my entire life, thought that I would do this to everybody I was supposed to care about. She’d forgotten all of it! The nightmares I had, almost every night after, the shock from anybody who tried to even shake my hand, being so, damned scared to even pick up a drink in case somebody spiked it- “

I stopped, mid-rant, to breath. Forcing the short, shallow panting into longer, deeper, controlled drags of breath. I couldn’t lose myself again, not like every, other time…

“Do you know what she said? If you, the boy who tormented me was such a good friend to me now, then soon enough, Trevor will be too. I know what she meant; I know exactly what she meant. I go looking for it, don’t I? I go looking for men who’ll hurt me because, deep down, I like it. Pain is attention to people like me, and I’ll fling myself at any sort of man to have it.”

He dared to pull me close this time. As if curling his arms around me could somehow draw all the pain and abuse against my self-worth from me, into him. It was a nice thought, and if this was his intention, it was sweet of him to try. But I knew for certain that being held doesn’t make it go away. Physical affection can ease some pain but have no effect on the others.

“I hate that she hurt you,” He murmured, bowing into my neck. “You know that I don’t like her, but she’s always loved you. That, I could respect. But hearing you say those things about yourself, and knowing that she made you think them, there’s nothing I can excuse about that.”

Instead of pulling back, like I did before, I gave in to what I really wanted to do. Putting my arms under his arms and around his shoulders, I allowed myself to sink into his hug. I let my head rest against his naked chest; the mild smell of imperial-leather soap, clinging to his skin. There was something oddly-pleasant about that smell; mum used to buy it for us when we were much younger, at a time where I still liked watching Fairy Follies and Audrey and I were still young enough to take baths together. I heard someone say once that familiar smells, sounds or sights could bring about a sense of comforting familiarity. Imagine that; Nick Koster, having such an effect on me.

“I know what we’ll do,” He declared suddenly. “Move those chairs over to that sofa; but put space between them. Enough to fit the two of us.”

“What are we doing?”

“We’re going to build a fort,” he said, plastering a smile onto his face. “I’ll go get as many pillows and blankets I can find.”

This boy must’ve been, insane-and I liked it.

While he padded quietly downstairs to fetch the pillows and blankets, I set about organizing an outer-structure for our fort. In the middle, lay an old, single mattress (Since everybody in the house had outgrown them), on one side, the sofa, and the other, two, old-fashioned dining-chairs. It would be scarcely big enough for the two of us, but what was the fun in having a big fort? Secret-forts were meant to be small, cozy and warm. Just as this one would be, once we’d finished.

In less than five minutes, Nick had returned. His arms full of an assortment of bedding and shelter for our fort. We used two sheets-one to cover the mattress, and the other to act as our roof. The two, thick blankets would be our source of warmth, and pillows were just carelessly thrown about, to make it all the more comfy. For a short minute we stood, looking proudly upon our handiwork before we crawled, on hands and knees, into the cozy cave. Like kids, I thought-but not the kids we used to be. Strangers, children who were just looking for some solace.

“This shall be our house.” He said, flopping onto his back. “I will be husband, and you will be wife. And after a hard, long day of earning our daily bread, I’ll come home to your delicious chicken, and a glass of customary-gin.”

“I will serve you these things and say ‘husband, what troubles you so?”

“I will eat my food first, and then over some evening television, I’ll confess to you that I don’t know if we can live in this perfect, little world of ours forever.”

“I will listen to you, then after you’re finished, I’ll just smile and say there’s nothing to worry about. No world is ever, truly perfect; as strange as it may seem. There are always going to be bad people in them, but they never matter. The people who matter the most are the ones who make your world worth living in.”

Grabbing my hand tight, he pulled me down onto the mattress with him. Tucking the blankets snugly around us, and his arms around me. I’d never lain with a boy before. Not even this kind, where we were just huddling together. Nose-to-nose, eyes locked onto one another’s. I was still feeling a little sad, but not as sad as I was before, thanks to Nick. This little hideaway we’d made for ourselves was warm, safe and, secure-but I knew we would have to leave it tomorrow. Mum and dad couldn’t know about this, and if he we stayed here for more than a night, they would get suspicious. And there was Audrey. If she’d ever found out about this, it would prove every suspicion she had of me. That I was sick and deluded.

“We’ll have to take this all down tomorrow morning,” he said aloud, voicing my basic thought. “But for tonight, it’s all ours.”

“So, what do you think we should do first?”

“Let’s tell each other stories,” He suggested, “I’ll tell you one first. This one’s about the boy who got sent to boarding school after an innocent prank went horribly wrong.”

“Do tell, but you must start with ‘once upon a time’…”

“Alright then,” He chuckled, “Once upon a time, there lived an obscenely stupid, fifteen-year-old boy and his two friends, Andrew and Oliver. Two weeks prior to the terrible and awful prank, the boy and Oliver were at his house, sitting inside his brother’s Mazda, daydreaming about when they too would drive it and pick up hot girls, when Oliver asked if the boy wanted to go and see something amazing. The boy merely thought it was the pile of hustler magazines he kept, stowed under his bed, and laughed at his suggestion. He didn’t know at the time that when Oliver said to him ‘in the flesh’ he meant it quite literally.

“We looked mature for our age, but not really mature enough to get into a strip club without I.D. Lucky for us, Oliver had figured out a way in. Women didn’t really visit the club at all, let alone use the customers bathroom. But there was a bathroom there, nonetheless, and with a perfectly stable beer-crate out back, and an open window, it was our ticket in. Once we were inside, we kept our hoods on the entire time; even when we found some tables at the back, where no one would see us. And we were only there for an hour, but at the time I thought it must’ve been the best hour of my life. After we snuck back out, unseen by anybody, I told Oliver that we were practically sitting on a goldmine. If we could successfully smuggle other guys in, and make money off of it, we’d be filthy rich by the time summer. And for the amount of time we got away with it, we were getting more and more confident. Too confident, as it turns out.”

“What happened?”

“Well Hazel, we thought that with all our experience, we just might get away with smuggling half our class in on end-of-term day. We told them all to meet us at the half-way point; bring jackets and/or hoodies, and the twenty-quid admission fee. And then, one by one, we’d gotten them all inside. We hadn’t anticipated that night, to see one of our teachers there-let alone three. It turns out, we weren’t the only ones trying to cut loose and have some fun. My P.E teacher was bragging, very loudly, about his quickie with the Textiles teacher in the changing rooms a few weeks before, my chemistry teacher was downing what looked to be his fourth jug of beer, and the deputy principal was in the middle of generously tipping one of the waitresses. The moment I saw them, I thought ‘s**t! How are we going to get out of here?’, and then I took Oliver aside and discretely pointed out our predicament. His thoughts were pretty much the same as mine.

“It took some convincing to pry their drinks from them and con them into leaving. But somehow, we’d managed to get most of them to the ladies bathroom. Little did we know at the time, the P.E teacher wasn’t actually at the table when Oliver and I finally left. Nope. After getting the other boys through the window and safely out, onto the street, who should walk out of the toilet cubicle with one of the strippers, but Mr. Mackley? Fly undone, and lipstick all over his face. And the rest…well, suffice to say that when my parents arrived, they were far from pleased. I was fifteen, they said, and at an age where I should be setting an example for my younger sister, and those who clearly looked up to me. Never mind when Eric took grandad’s old Cadillac for a spin and nearly got to towed; he was just going through a faze. The only faze I could ever go through was a permanent one.”

The memory made him sad, but it also made him happy too. Thinking back on easier times with his friends, just being a reckless teenager. Laughing at his own mistakes and seeing the few amounts of good that came out of them.

“Well then, you told me a story, so I think it’s only fair that I tell you mine.” It was going to be difficult. Only a fool could try to promise me that it wouldn’t. “It’s about a foolish, naïve girl and a glass of fruit-punch that changed everything.”

“You don’t have to tell me this- “

“Yes, I do.” I sighed, lifting my gaze back up into his eyes. “If you really want to know me, then you ought to know all of me. Even this part.

“When I was fourteen and Audrey was seventeen, she took me to a party. It wasn’t her idea or anything; in fact, she was at a phase in her life where any mention of me in her social life was a complete embarrassment to her. You know, the typical older-sibling thing.”

“I know what you mean,” And I knew he did.

“Mum and dad had picked up on it much too soon for her liking, so when she got one of the first invitations to the biggest party of the year, they had insisted she take me with her. It was funny, actually. She thought she’d been so honoured at receiving an invitation, and so clever when it took mum and dad a few days to figure it out. When they told her they knew, her first assumption was that I had gone crying to them. Me. And so, she told me as much when she stormed into my bedroom that night in a fit of rage.”

“A fit of rage?”

“You weren’t there,” I chuckled, “She was furious! She called a pathetic, clingy baby, and that she was sick of facing humiliation because of me. I didn’t cry, or yell back, I just calmly reminded her that if she hadn’t left her invitation on the kitchen counter, we wouldn’t be in this situation. I had no intention of going, I didn’t tell mum and dad about her intentions to go, and I certainly wasn’t looking forward to the prospect of dragging her home, drunk, and holding her hair back while she brought up whatever it was she would’ve eaten for dinner that night. That had at least, made her come to her senses. And so, after the steam stopped coming out of her ears, she sat down calmly and asked me if I wanted to go at all. I told her, for the hundredth time, that I hated high school parties. And besides, I had plans with Leo, Ingrid and the other’s that weekend, plans I wasn’t going to back out on. We made up and made plans to talk to our parents together. Only, it didn’t occur to either of us that they just might put their foot down on it.

“Audrey and I needed to spend more time together, according to mum. Because we travelled in different circles, belonged in different worlds, we’d forgotten just how much we needed one another. More specifically, I’d forgotten just how much I needed to be normal again. Not that anyone would ever say so out-loud. And they were worried that Audrey’s ‘phase’ just might spin out of control. You know my sister; you know she’s sociable, popular with just about everybody. This means that naturally, things like parties, dances and clubs were where she thrived the most. To mum and dad, this meant that she could get herself hurt if she wasn’t careful. Hurt, the way I was hurt. I was now the responsible sister to them, and therefore I needed to be there and make sure she wasn’t messed with in any way. I was more-or-less, the babysitter.

“On the night of the party, Audrey took me into her bedroom and transformed me into a creature I’d scarcely recognized. She’d lent me one of her old dresses; this small, white thing, probably cost half the material of one of my usual going-out dresses. I was fourteen, but she said I could’ve easily passed for seventeen. I did look alright, and I appreciated Audrey’s effort, but honestly? I hated it. I didn’t feel like me, wearing all that makeup. But I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, so I left it as it was. Not long after, her boyfriend came to pick us up, and before I knew it, we were there.

“You’ve probably never walked past Laura Devin’s house before, but it’s an impressive place-more like a mansion, really. Her parents own a small chain of vineyards, and the one in Derby just happens to be their main base. They were away on business that weekend, so the party was completely unsupervised. The entire population of Derby High’s seniors were there, a few juniors, and even some university students who were taking their semester breaks. I swear, it was just like one of Gatsby’s parties; wild, glamorous and beyond taming. And I was invited-by extension, of course. We went inside, I was told to leave my coat at the foyer, and Audrey told me to meet her back there by midnight. For now, I was left to my own devices.”

“What did you do?”

“You remember how I said I initially had plans with Ingrid and the others? Well, coincidentally, they had to bail too. And once I made it to the main living room, I soon found out why. Leo was there with his brother Victor, Ingrid with the twins, Cathy and Camille, Bridget with Olive and Flora and Marlon…well, they were there by extended, extended invitation. We were all there to play baby-sitter to our siblings, so I suppose the cancelling in our plans was like a blessing in disguise. We all knew someone at that party-each other! And since nobody else was stopping us, we decided to explore the house and have our own fun. We went to the second-floor sitting room to get cushions, the second-floor kitchen to get snacks, and back outside we all went in search of the maze.”

“The maze?”

“The estate is that incredible Nick; from their front garden, is this gigantic maze of rose bushes with this little, green-marble fountain in the centre. Once you get through the first half, you take the path on the far-right to the fountain, and it’ll eventually lead you to the guest-cottage. It was something out of a fairy-tale Nick; and to our delight, to the perfect getaway. There was no TV in there, or even a computer, but there were games, and sofas, and everything else we needed just to be comfortable. So we played board games, shared funny stories, we even played a little truth-or-dare. We were so invested in our fun, I’d almost missed the time. Five-to-twelve. Time to go. Only, when I stood up, I was feeling woozy. Ingrid offered to walk me through the maze, but I told her to stay put; I thought it was just some sort of headache. But the further I got into the maze, the woozier I became. I don’t know how I made it out, but as I later found out, the maze was the least of my worries.”

“Is there where…?”

“Trevor came into it.” I answered, “I’d seen him earlier at the party. Before we could leave the main house, he stopped us and offered us some punch. Alcohol-free, he claimed, with a fruity finish. We took some, and he even went as far as to pour me a cup himself. I tried to think he was being a gentleman, but there was something in his eyes. A sort-of leering look that made me want to squirm. I shrugged it off, I thought ‘he’s just some friend of Laura’s-I’ll probably never see him again’. To this day, I still laugh at myself. At how stupid I seemed, thinking that. He had every intention of making his prescience known to me; whether it was my choice or not.

“He seemed nice at first, asked me if I needed to sit down. Then before I could really say anything, he was carrying me-I think. Carrying, dragging-that part was always a little fuzzy. Everything else was almost crystal-clear. Him, putting me on the bed, going over to lock the door, and the things he said…I could unhear them. ‘I’ve been watching you, all night. Audrey Kazia’s pretty, little sister. She was always hot, but she was never shy about it. Everybody knew her, and what she liked to do. But you? You act like a wall-flower when you ought to be out there with the rest of them. Why hide from the men? From me? If it’s the same, old teasing technique; playing coy to get my attention, then it’s worked.’

“I felt his hand on my hair first; it didn’t feel bad, not yet. But then it started to travel. Down my neck, my shoulder, and then here- “Not entirely touching the breast, I traced an imaginary barrier over the curve. “As soon as I felt it, I tried to fight. But the wooziness, the headache…it was his friend who brought the roofies to the party-he just happened to acquire a few along the way. They weren’t strong though; one would’ve only made me a little dizzy. It was three he put in the punch. They didn’t knock me out, but they made me weak. Like…like I was physically drunk, but in my mind, I was stone-cold sober. I tried to push, I tried to kick and bite and scream, but it was useless. Have you ever felt like that? To be fighting so hard against something on the inside, and knowing you can’t do a thing to save yourself on the outside?”

He wanted to say he had, to give me some small feeling that I wasn’t completely alone in my experience. But I knew he couldn’t. Nobody I knew ever could.

“So, I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t fight, so I was forced to feel. His hands on my body, pulling at my dress, his mouth on my shoulder, and the stink of liquor on his breath. I was nearly naked, soon enough. He was…preparing himself, and I wanted nothing more than to cover myself and cry like a little baby. A boy I’d never met was going to take my virginity, without my permission, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I was in a body I could scarcely control, and so I thought that if this was going to happen to me, I would need to find a way to block him out. Close my eyes and wait until it was all over.

“The last person I expected to come rushing in was Audrey. Her boyfriend had forced the door open, and she looked like she was just about ready to kill a man. Her hair was a mess, her makeup no more, and she stumbled as she walked, but sheer drunkenness couldn’t hold her back. She grabbed him by the neck and with some sort of super-human strength, she just peeled him off me. Like those hero-stories of men, lifting whole cars off people to save their lives. Once he was on the ground, I thought she really was going to murder him. She kept kicking him with those painful-looking heels she wore, screaming things like ‘bastard, r****t, paedophile’, and I couldn’t even join her. It was Margaret Ottoman who helped me up. She gave me her jacket to wear and spoke to me calmly. She told me that I was alright now, and that I was going home. Home. Not in my life, had the prospect sounded more appealing to me. Now I wanted to go home, my own bed, curl up and hope this was just a big nightmare.

“The drive back had sobered Audrey a little, and I could gradually feel the roofies wearing off. When we got home, my parents were already asleep. Audrey and I snuck upstairs, into her room where she put me in one of her old nightgowns and told me I was sleeping in her bed. I was almost afraid to get in; I’d just been in a bed that wasn’t my own, with a guy, ready and willing to violate me. I didn’t want to get into another, straight away. But when Audrey put her arms around me, it did feel different. I always trusted Audrey to make me feel safe and secure, and I shouldn’t have doubted her. There were nightmares afterwards, but for that night, I slept like a baby.

“I know I wasn’t r***d; there are victims out there who’ve gone through much worse than I have, so why should it affect me? It affected me because I wasn’t strong enough. I wasn’t strong enough to stop it, I wasn’t strong enough to call for help; I couldn’t even speak to the police about it without someone to hold my hand. Did they ever tell you we got the police involved? As soon as Audrey made me spill the beans to them, dad was downright furious. He wanted to go to the station that very morning and have me give them a full report. Luckily, mum had calmed him down enough to see reason. They were good enough to wait until I was less jittery before we all went down together. Audrey and Thomas gave a witness statement, and they talked to Margaret too. My friends had confirmed that I didn’t seem like myself before I left them, and if that wasn’t enough for them to go off of, there’s this.”

For two years, I’d covered it with makeup-even when I went to bed. With just a little foundation, it was as if I could wipe away the only mark he ever gave me with just the stroke of a brush. But once the makeup came off, it all came flooding back. The jeering, the laughter, the ‘I bet she did it to herself!’ the echoed from Shantell Travers and all her vile, little friends. I blocked it out, ignored its’ mere existence because I didn’t want it to exist. I didn’t want another scar on my body when I already had plenty.

“I knew he hit me at some point; perhaps before all the touching, or perhaps during. It doesn’t matter. I thought the scar; my words and the witnesses just might be enough. But it couldn’t stop him lying, or those friends of his lying for him.”

“So that’s where his story came from,”

“He made up the story of a shy, little girl with a great, big crush making a pass at him when I was drunk. He said my coma-like state was just too much alcohol, and that he wasn’t going to say anything because he didn’t want me to get humiliated. After all, he was the handsome, clever, star-student who had his entire life ahead of him, and I was the sad, strange Kazia girl, acting as if I had something to hide. He was arrested, we all went to court, and he got off with a written warning and a restraining order. He was expelled, a few weeks shy of graduating, and his friends hated me. They saw me as this petty, attention-seeking liar, and to this day, they still do. His parents are even worse; they refuse to do business with mum and dad because they ‘enabled’ me, and when I see them in town from time-to-time, they just look straight through me. I ruined their son’s future, I dragged him through the mud, I made them look like monsters. Now he’s scraping through university on a student loan, working almost every minute of the day, and it’s all my fault.”

It was my story, in full. No filtered-out details, no exaggerations or straight-up lies. Before tonight, I guessed that Nick must’ve only heard two, simpler versions. Now that he knew the full truth, what on earth would he think of me?

“I…I wish that I could fix it. Us, meeting again, going to this new school. You were willing to give me a second chance, and I threw it back in your face. And then, when I met Trevor, I felt…justified in what I thought. What I was going through. But then hurting you and helping him hurt you too…I’m sorry I ever had anything to do with it. I’m sorry I keep letting you down.”

I didn’t mean to make him feel guilty; Trevor was another part of my life, separate from him. I thought he’d realized that by now. But in the end, I couldn’t deny that he got involved to hurt me, any more than he could.

“You’re not letting me down anymore,” I reached out, not very far for he was so close. Gently resting my palm against his cheek. “And I know you won’t let me down again.”

“How can you know that? After what I helped that…that monster do, how can you trust me?”

“Because you know what remorse is-he never has. On that day in court, he looked me straight in the eye as he told everybody there that he didn’t assault me. Could you ever be as stone-cold as he was? Could you ever just do something like that, and feel nothing for the person you hurt?"

“Not even before. I used to hurt you, and I regret that, but you’ve got to know that I would never do what he did. Making you go to court, speaking about it, lying straight to your face…I care about you.”

I knew he did; but actually hearing him say it? It made a difference. To hear from his own voice that he no longer hated me but cared for me was incredibly relieving. Because I cared for him too. Nick Koster and I were very different people, in looks and in personality, but we had a lot in common. We both knew how it felt to have the world against us, to scream and shout the truth, but feel powerless to really do anything. We both liked to watch the silly people who were so afraid to let life pass them by, that we laugh at the fact that they can’t realize that in rushing about, they’re letting all the little things slip through their fingers. And we both…we both wanted something we knew we could never really have.

“Goodnight Nick,” I yawned, eager just to snuggle back down into the pillows, and even his arms.

“Goodnight Hazel,” He parroted, nuzzling into my neck. “sweet dreams.”