Veiled Moon Shadow

Emma

Emma POV

I’m dreaming about the most amazing smells, all of my favorite smells. I have always wanted to ask why they smell so good, what colognes are they wearing that they always smell like hot, fresh baked goods, the forest, rain at night, the beach, a campfire mixed with the smells of pine and s'mores. I don't know what they do to smell that good, but hmmm.

I wonder if I can find candles that smell like that because I would always sleep well. Though candles would be a fire risk, how can I get those scents without adding the risk of burning down the house. If my family hates having me at home now, I can only imagine how far they would send me if I accidentally burnt down the house.

What is it about those four that always makes me so relaxed? I have had crushes on them for as long as I can remember, but while my heart and insides seem to do flips every time I see them, they also relax me like no one else. Being around them is like those videos they show during Shark Week about tonic immobility, just put me near them and it is like rubbing the belly of a lizard or getting a shark upside down and I become overwhelmed and just go into the deepest sleep.

My dream was nice until I heard the door to my room open, followed by the scent of my sister, Claire. Everyone around here has such distinct scents, not as much as my brothers’ four best friends, but it does seem weird. It doesn't always smell like perfume or cologne scents either, maybe it is whatever soaps they use. I don’t mention it to anyone anymore after everyone went crazy when I said I liked how the guys smelled, apparently that was unacceptable. I was still partially asleep until she closed the door, and then I heard her trying to walk out of the house quietly. Dad must have tried to force her to babysit me again. I don’t know why it is okay for me to be on my own away from here when they treat me like a little kid when I am back home.

I have never understood my family, when they are around me they are overprotective and act like I am the most precious thing in the world, and become extremely overprotective. But, then they have no difficulties in sending me away most of the year and don't seem to care what I do if I am not here. It is only behind the gates of the Veiled Moon neighborhood that they seem to care. I wonder if my overprotective family would truly care if they knew how much trouble I had gotten myself into away from home. Part of me doubted that I would see the light of day until my eighteenth birthday, and maybe not even then. While the other part of me wonders if I would simply be told to be more careful, or maybe they wouldn't even care.

It started about nine months ago, on my fifteenth birthday. I was working with one of my advisors, who also happened to be the professor that I had a crush on when he heard my roommate wish me a happy birthday. “Oh, happy birthday Emma, how old are you today”, he asked with happiness in his voice. “Fifteen, it’s my fifteenth birthday today”, I said with a sense of embarrassment since I was the youngest on campus and crushing hard on the guy. “Seriously, how are you only fifteen?”, he asked and looked a little troubled by hearing this. I blushed as I answered, “I skipped a few grades, I could have skipped more, but I like being with my friends and my family doesn’t seem interested in me going home since they have had me in boarding school since I was five”. I blushed deeply when he said “But, you look much older than fifteen. I was going to ask you out, but… fifteen.” He blew out a breath as he ran his hand through his beautiful hair, it was thick, dark, wavy, and always looked windblown. I shyly looked up at him through my lashes “There are only three years difference between fifteen and eighteen. And it wasn’t that many years ago that it was common for fifteen-year-olds to marry. I am graduating from college soon.”

I didn’t mention that I was also going to be graduating from high school at the same time. Part of me knew that I shouldn’t encourage him, but part of me wanted the college dating experience and liked the idea of dating an older guy. However, if this hadn’t been the dumbest idea in my life, I would have been thinking that I was talking to a man, not an older guy. An older guy would be no more than three or four years older than me, and even that would be pushing the limits in the opinion of the law. And my family, particularly my father seemed to be of this opinion as well since they were so strict with Claire, and my family weren’t the only ones that took my father's opinion as law. I don't know why so much weight is assigned to what my father, and my oldest brother, think, but you would think they were royalty with the way everyone treats them. The rest of the family are treated similarly, but people almost seem fearful of my father and brother.

My voice hitched as I asked, “how old are you”? I was only briefly taken aback when he answered. After all, he was not much older than my brothers and sister, and there was a greater age difference between my parents, “I’m twenty-five, ten years older than you, Emma”. “My father is fifteen years older than my mother; ten years is not that great of a difference.” “Lots of celebrities have huge age differences between themselves and their spouses,” I answered, stupidly hoping to convince him that it wasn’t wrong. He pressed my hands into his, making my heartbeat more quickly, “That may be true Emma, but how many of them were only fifteen when they entered into those relationships?” I looked into those beautiful blue eyes and said, “Some of them probably were, “I know at least one of them was only fifteen years old when their relationship began, and they had a ten year age difference”. “I’d like to take you out for your birthday Emma, but we can’t have more than a student and teacher relationship. It would be inappropriate.”

“Thank you for dinner, Mr. Prescott. I had a lovely time, and it was nice to do something for my birthday, it rarely happens since I so seldom see my family.” I backed against the car door, if my outsides reflected how I felt inside I would probably be levitating and struggling to be on the ground. I looked up at him as he gently lifted my chin, “Emma, please, outside of class call me Jackson, or Jack, or this won’t work.” It felt like my insides were going to melt and my belly did a flip as he leaned down and kissed me gently on the lips, then he reached behind me, lifting me onto the hood of his car as we kissed more passionately, and I felt my breath leaving my body. My body wanted to do so much more, and I could feel that he struggled to pull away. It was only the first time that we had done anything more than what was necessary for my academic career, and though part of my brain knew this was a bad decision, my body was fighting me. I wanted to be irresponsible and do something stupid for the first time in my life.

For several weeks afterward, we went on like this, the passion between us getting increasingly more difficult to dismiss. Part of the passion was driven by how wrong this was, for both of us. I don’t know what finally made me come to my senses, but when Jack reached the point where passionate kisses and some groping were no longer enough for him and he tried to push me to have s*x with him I knew that this had to end. I tore myself away from his hands as he tried to lift my dress and tried to calm myself as I forced myself to tell him “Jack, Jack, no. We need to stop. We shouldn’t have done this. I’m not ready for this.”.

I broke into tears as he became more aggressive and began yelling at me while forcefully pulling my head back “You wanted this, you pushed me to go out with you when I told you that you were too young. You can’t stop this now.” Now fully sobbing “No, please, Jackson. Stop. Don’t do this”. I felt him tear my dress as one of his hands began to tear at my panties, “please, Jackson, no.” I managed to free one of my hands and slapped him hard across the face and bit his hand as he placed it over my mouth to silence my screams. My reward for the bite was a hard punch to my face that left me feeling dazed.