Stolen Innocence

Chapter Two

Hoping out of the shower made me feel a little better. I sat down on my bed and grabbed my phone to check the time. My heart skipped a beat as I seen a heap of messages and missed calls from Colin. My hands were shaking, wondering what they were going to say.

I decided to ignore him for awhile, I wasn’t mentally ready to read them, or deal with him. So instead I decided to ring Ella, hoping she might cheer me up. I never had intentions to tell her what had happened, But as soon as she answered the phone, my emotions got the better of me andI broke down crying.

“Em, Emily? What’s wrong? What happened?” Her voice was cracking,I could tell she was worried.

I took a breath, and through my sobbing and the tears I managed to tell her what had happened. Ella couldn’t believe the way Colin had carried on, She was just as shocked as me.

“If I still lived there Emily, I would go straight around his house, and kick him straight in the balls! What a piece of s**t!” She exclaimed in shock,

I never kept anything from Ella, and I didn’t want to either. Friendships are built on trust and honesty, we always had a rule- no secretes and lies.

“How sweet of Ricky to looking after you and make sure you got home safe” Ella added, “I always thought he was hot!”

I laughed at her, but she was right, he was good looking. Talking to her made me feel better, it always did. No matter how s**t I felt she always had a way to make me laugh and smile. After awhile I decided to put Ella on loud speaker, and read the messages that Colin had sent. My stomach was nervously churning as I read them;

“I’m so sorry Emily, I don’t know what’s wrong with me, I think I need help.”

“I’m sorry I carried on like a complete i***t, I’m sorry I scared you”

“Please don’t ignore me Em”

“Emily, please reply. I said I’m sorry, please don’t be angry at me.”

I scoffed as I read them out to Ella. When I got to the last message, my heart skipped a beat as I read it;

“Please don’t leave me Emily. Without you there’s no point in me being here anymore. I may as well end it all. I don’t want to live without you. I won’t.”

Was he talking about suicide? I thought to myself. I felt a lump in my throat. I didn’t like what he done, I know he scared me, but I didn’t want him to hurt himself over it. I didn’t want him to do anything stupid, I couldn’t live with that on my conscious, I would feel like it was my fault if he took his own life, and I couldn’t bare that kind of guilt.

So I quickly replied:

“I need some time Cole. You scared the s**t out of me. I have never seen you like that before. I don’t know what I want to do anymore. Don’t do anything stupid please. I need time, I’ll talk to you at school”

I didn’t really know what else to reply, I was confused and I honestly didn’t know if wanted to be with him anymore. But I could say all that to him knowing that he wasn’t in a very good frame of mind; even though he caused all this. It just didn’t feel right.

“Oh well, now we both have shitty boyfriend stories to tell” Ella said, and I knew she was being sarcastic because she forced a fake laugh after she said it.

I know why she said it, Everything came back in the blink of an eye. I remembered what happened to Ella. She had dated a boy from our school, his name was Anthony Chapman, they were together for nearly two years. We called him Tony for short, mainly because it just sounded better. I honestly thought they were the perfect couple, and they seemed to be very much in love.

He was so sweet, and gentle and kind to Ella. He would hold doors open for her, and tell her he loved her every chance he got. They had even gone ‘all the way’ and Ella lost her virginity to him. She told me in details how romantic it was. There was a bath tub and rose petals and candles and everything. It was straight out of a cheesy chick flick movie, which Ella loved watching. I honestly pictured them being together forever, and having kids and getting married. The full fairy tale.

But all of that came to a crashing halt, after Tony decided to go to a ‘Paddock Party’. A Paddock party’s is held by the most popular girl at school, Michelle King. She is the hottest chick at school, blonde hair, blue eyes. She is gorgeous. Michelle held a party every chance she got, as soon as her parents were away she would throw a party and invite everyone.

Her parents owned a massive property with dams and a fresh creek running through it, everyone would show up with tents, sleeping bags and whatever else. They would party, drink alcohol, and music would play all night. It was always pretty rowdy, and in someways a lot of fun.

On this particular night Ella wasn’t feeling very well, so she didn’t want to go with Tony. He decided to go anyways and went with his friends. Till this very day we don’t even know what really happened that night, because Tony always claimed to have no recollection, he was blind drunk apparently, and he doesn’t remember anything. Ella reckons its just an excuse and he lied to cover his own guilt.

The next day everyone uploaded photos from the party, they were all over f*******:. In them was photo’s of Tony, he was half n***d with his arm around some girls neck, and his tongue down her throat. There was a fair few photos of him, and none of them were innocent ones, so he could deny it.

It really shattered Ella’s heart, she was a complete mess. She cried for days, then the days turned into weeks. She changed her number and never spoke to Tony again. I stayed with Ella to help her through it, even if we didn’t talk. I just wanted to be there for her, to make sure she knew she wasn’t alone, I was there for support. That’s what best friends do.

Together Ella and I done some f*******: stalking, it didn’t take long to find the girl that Tony was making out with. Her name is ‘Abby King’ and from what we could find, she hooked up with random guys regularly. The biggest shock was that we found out she was actually Michelle’s cousin! So Ella and I both went to confronted Michelle, hoping that Abby was still at her house. Ella was going to unleash her anger if Abby was there.

It didn’t take much for Michelle to spill the beans on everything about Abby. Apparently she has had a troubled life, which has now made her a troubled teenager and a bad s**t. Michelles parents were trying to help her get her life on track. But it didn’t work out, Abby kept causing problems, and was stealing from Michelle’s family. So they kicked her out and sent her back with her mess of a mother.

Michelle told us that Abby spent her weekends sleeping with different boys. Abby like to get them extremely drunk first. She wore the fake nail, fake lashes, and all the rest of it. Abby thought she was gorgeous, but the boys only wanted one thing; s*x.

Even though Abby was her family member, Michelle felt bad for Ella and was ashamed Abby had done such a thing. Michelle said that Abby’s mum is a horrible alcoholic, and she would get drunk everyday of her pregnancy, and still drinks daily now. Her mum has several children to different men, and she would treat them all like s**t. Her Mum sounded like a horrible person, and Abby must have had a terrible childhood. Michelle said Abbys dad was dead, he committed suicide while her mum was pregnant. I

Hearing everything Michelle was saying, I kind of felt sad for Abby. No child should be raised like that, how terrible. It was no excuse for what she had done, but she obviously had lived a rough life, and it seems like she was causing her own destruction. It made me cherish my upbringing, I felt very loved and lucky to have my parent.

I suddenly felt a grip around my waist that brung me back down to reality. I had been lost in my thoughts standing at my locker.

“Morning Em, I’m so sorry about the other day. Can we just pretend it never happened?” Colin said pulling me backwards and wrapping his arms around me.

I jumped at the feel of his touch after the way he chaired on in his room the other day. I had every intention of remaining angry with him, and I had rehearsed so much in my head that I was going to say to his face; But feeling his touch and hearing his sincerity in his voice kind of made me not as mad as I was.

I spun around and looked up at him right in his eyes,

“You scared me Cole, and I never want to feel like that again. I haven’t been able to sleep because of what happened. I don’t like fighting with you, and I didn’t like the way you carried on.”

He moved my hair away from my face,

“I never meant to scare you Emily, I think it was just my hormones or something, I don’t know. Maybe it because you make me go crazy” He chucked trying to make it a joke.

“You have to slow it down a bit Cole, I’m not ready to take it all the way yet. I know you really want too, but I’m not ready. In order for anything between us to work, you need to understand that first.” I explained

“I know your not ready, even though its been like seven months” He said rolling his eyes, “But I shouldn’t be pushing you” He sighed,

“I know its been awhile Cole, but it my body, and my choice. You need to remember that.” I said firmly,

“I know” He groaned rolling his eyes a little, I chose to ignore him

“How about we spend some time together on the weekend?” Cole asked excitedly,

“Really?” I asked, curious.

“Michelles having a paddock party, I think it would good for us to go, we can hang out together and have some fun, and talk.” He suggested,

“A paddock party?” I couldn’t help how unenthusiastic I sounded “I don’t know Cole, You’ve been trying to get to go to one of those for months.” I said sounding uninterested.

Suddenly Cole said bluntly,

“I’m trying to fix my f**k ups Emily. For once in our relationship can you please try and have a little fun? It would be nice if you could make an effort for a change. Don’t you get over doing the same boring things?”

I stared at him a little stunned and shocked. Was I really that boring? Did Cole really think I wasn’t fun? What if our issues are my fault because I haven’t been contributing to the relationship like I should. I mean, I see a lot of couples go to the ‘Paddock Party” they post photos up and they all look so happy.

Maybe Cole was right, and I did need to try more ways, different ways to make this relationship work. I just didn’t understand the big deal in drinking, and after what happen to Ella and Tony I didn’t want to go to one of them party’s.

I knew our relationship wasn’t in the best place at the moment, and maybe I was somewhat to blame for it breaking down. I mean, obviously Cole felt like it was partly my fault, he made that clear. He knew I wasn’t ready for s*x, so maybe if I go to a stupid Paddock Party with him, he might back off about s*x for a little bit. So I decided,

“Fine, Ill go with you” I hesitantly agreed

“But I don’t want to drink any alcohol, and you have to promise not to ditch me, and leave me by myself.” I added

“Deal” Cole replied smiling,

“It’s going to be a weekend you’ll remember forever.” He smirked before saying

“I’m off to class” he pecked me on the forehead and walked away.