Jake

17. "Y-You Have To Help Me..."

She walked down the sidewalk, kicking pebbles with the toe of my shoe and thinking about everything that had happened. She was getting really angry. Yeah, new start, alright. New start of stupid. Of course, the guy just had to pick me. He couldn't pick any of the other 20 something kids in the class. He just had to pick me. Now, I'm gonna be humiliated in probably the worst way possible for the next four years. Thanks a lot.

She was about five minutes away from home when someone grabbed her arm and pulled her into an alley. She looked around and saw Joe and his group, which was a lot larger than his group in middle school. Miranda stood next to him. She thought, Ugh, great, just great.

He looked at her in a way that would usually scare her, but today, she just wasn't in the mood.

He said, "You know, I just cannot believe that after all this time, we still haven't got our message through your thick, little skull." She stared at him, rage building up inside her.

She started going off on him. "Oh, just cut the crap, Joe. Hurry up and get one of your little minions here to beat me up so I can go home."

He said, "Hm. Baby's all grown up, huh? Well, what makes you think I wouldn't to something to you myself?"

She said, "Because you don't want to get your hands dirty. So you round up all these douchebags and call them your friends. Then you go around making them pound every kid you see. Everyone in the school's afraid of you and you always get your way. How long have you done this, Joe? A few years? Your whole life? Do you have any siblings?"

He stared at her for a few seconds and said, "I'm not gonna answer that."

She ignored him and said, "I bet you pushed them around since you were little. You slapped them and hit them and your bitch mother didn't do anything. She figured you were just playing with them. But now you're this...thing. The son of a whore."

He just stared at her until he slapped her hard enough that her head turned almost all the way to the left. She ignored the slight sting and looked him straight in the eyes.

"Wow. I've done worse to myself."

His jaw started clenching and his hands were turning into fists.

She said, "Just do it. You know you want to. Hit me. It's all you really want, isn't it? Just beat the living shit out of me for no reason." She stayed staring at him for at least a minute.

He looked at his whole group and said, "Block sight and turn around." They did as he said, blocking the opening of the alley, and also blocking a lot of the light. He got closer to her and she could feel his breath as he spoke.

"You know, how you're treating me right now isn't bad. It's not bad at all. It's actually kind of...appealing." He grabbed her forearms and held her against the cold brick wall. She started panicking. She thought, What have I done?!

"What are you doing? Get off me!"

"Oh, don't worry, you'll love this. I'm gonna rock your world."

She sat on the ground in the dark alley with tears running down her face. She took out her phone, her hands still shaking and dialed Jake's home number. It rang once...twice...then someone picked up.

"Jake?"

Jake's mother said, "Sophia? I'm sorry. Jake's not here."

She whispered, "Damn it!" then said, "I'm sorry, Ms. Short. D-Do you know where I can find him?"

She replied, "Um, I think he was going to your house, but I'm not sure. You could try his cell phone."

"Okay. Thank you." She hung up and went into her contacts. I found Jake's number and clicked it, slowly lifting the phone to her ear, still crying a lot. It rang once, then cut off on the second ring.

Jake said, "Sophia? Where are you? I went to your house, but no one's there."

She sniffled and said, "Jake?"

"What's wrong?"

"Y-You have to help me..."

"Why?! What happened?! Where are you?!"

I said, "Just, please come. I'm in an alley, somewhere by my school. I'm not sure where. I'm pretty sure I'm like five minutes away..."

He said, "I'm coming right now!"

The call cut off and she pulled her knees up to her chin. Tears kept streaming down her face as she sat and waited. A few minutes later, she heard fast footsteps coming towards the alley. She slowly looked up to see Jake running towards her.

He said, "Sophia! Are you okay?"

He came close to her and she said, "I need you to take me to the hospital."

"Why? What happened?!"

She started crying more as she said, "Joe. He-He raped me..."