Memories That Still Haunt Us

Chapter Twenty-Nine:

Beck's nose is sunburnt. I should have applied more sunscreen but was too preoccupied by Ellis. We spent most of the day in the pool until our fingers and hands were shriveled and the sun was beginning to set.

We had dinner together like a family at the dinner table, and Ellis and I cooked together in the kitchen, laughing and bumping into one another as we prepared the dish. Sneaking touches and kisses as we did so as Beck watched another Harry Potter film in the living room. We prepared garlic chicken and rice.

After dinner, Ellis put Beck to sleep while I cleaned up the kitchen mess downstairs, loading the dishes in the washer and wiping down the counters. I can't erase the smile on my face as I bask in how magical today has been.

When Ellis comes back down, I notice his olive skin has grown darker from being out in the sun all day. His cheeks under his eyes a light shade of red. I wipe my wet hands on a dish towel as he leans his hip against the counter. "Today was nice." He states and I nod in agreement, moving closer to him.

I realize everything we do is always downstairs. The kisses and touching are reserved for the bottom of the stairs, whereas his room is still his room. The upstairs feels off-limits. It's still his room; it's still the bed he and his wife share. I'm the secret kept downstairs, where I belong. Am I still the same whore I was in eighth grade? Maybe nothing's changed at all.

I want Ellis to think I'm pretty. I want him to think I'm smart and mature. That I'm more than this. That I can be wife material too. All the men in the past never viewed me as anything more than the slut they brought to hotel rooms or slept with in parking lots. I was disposable. In the moment, I was sexy and young and everything their wives weren't anymore. But in the morning, they couldn't wait to get rid of me. They were repulsed by me and wanted to go back home to their wives, who were cooking breakfast in the kitchen, awaiting their arrival. They'd go back to their lives, and I'd go back to being the sad, lonely teenager tossed aside.

But I don't think I could ever say no to Ellis. If he wants me to be his secret, I will. If he wants to fuck me in motels while his wife is home, I will.

Ellis grabs my hand, pulling me into him, and we haven't rinsed off since the pool, so he still smells like chlorine and sunscreen and the summer sun. I imagine telling him my life story. Starting from the beginning and all the ugly details in between that have led me here. I imagine telling him of all the disgusting men I've fucked and how awful it has been. The rapes might not have been recognized as rapes at the time, but looking back, they clearly were. The awful treatment of men towards me my whole life and how I didn't mind because at least someone thought I was pretty and at least someone was showing me an ounce of love, even if it hurt in every imaginable sense. Life isn't pretty, and neither are men. They all have the ability to rape within them. It's just waiting to come out, and so many of them do, in one sense or another. Whether it's by pressuring girls, grooming them, beating them, or forcing them to do something they don't want to do. All the ways women are raped by men in our lifetimes. In the workplace, on the streets, in marriages.

Yet we continue to smile at them because we fear what they will do if we don't. We continue to laugh even when we don't find them funny. We continue to sit quietly and look pretty as they insult us and make us feel small. Not wanting us to take up too much room. Not wanting us to have too much power.

I'll tell him about what happened when I was fourteen. I'll tell him about my addiction to sex and men that followed afterwards. Will he be disgusted? Will he want me as far from Beck as possible? I think he might. Beck is his main priority, and why would he want a sex addict like myself to be around his son?

He likes this version of me. The young, sexy, aloof version that lives to please him and has no backstory. He likes the version that cleans his home and cares for his son and kisses him like my life orbits around him and his world. He likes me to be waiting for him in his home, looking sexy, and ready for whatever he wants.

His hands move to my waist, and I sway slightly. I give him my smile. I want to believe Ellis is kinder than the rest. That he's not like other men. But then again, he's cheating on his wife with me, the nanny, while she's away during the week, and I think that might make him like most men. There might not be any kind men out there. "You seem like the type of girl who knows exactly how to get what she wants." Ellis then tells me.

"I am." I lie because I've never gotten anything I wanted. I've got versions, portions, slivers. I've gotten the exact opposite. I know how men operate. I know how to make them want to fuck me. I don't know how to make them treat me right or how to make them not hurt me. But he doesn't know that, and I have Ellis in a portion. He's just a sliver of mine. The rest of him is Millie's, and I'm not sure if I'll ever get more from him than this sliver. I want to be Millie. I want to be his wife, to come home to him, and to prepare him dinner.

Ellis smiles slightly, reaching up and tucking my hair behind my right ear, then slides that same hand along the side of my jaw to the side of my neck, and I envision him gripping my throat and squeezing. Choking me until I'm clawing at his arms, pleading with my eyes to let me go, just before I die at his feet. I already have a premonition that the way I'll die is at the hands of a man. I've known this for a long time. "I want you," I say. "Right now." I make sure to clarify that I only want him right now. I don't want to give him the satisfaction that I want him forever. That the want is fleeting. I'm still the aloof me that wants to desperately have sex with him in every position and on every surface in this house.

His eyes look back and forth between mine, and I can tell he's struggling. He wants to tell me no. He wants to be a better man, but he will cave. They always do. They aren't fooling anyone. Ellis shakes his head lightly and exhales a heavy breath. He's taking too long to make up his mind, so I take the initiative and mold my lips onto his, my fingers reaching for the button of his swim trunks, popping them open swiftly. His body is stiff; he's not sure yet if this is a good idea. I go ahead anyway as I pull down the zipper, then his pants.

His hands grip the edge of the countertop for balance as I free him from the swim trunks and marvel at his size. I never thought for a second that he'd be anything but large. You can always tell when a man has a big dick. They don't flaunt it like the small-dick men do. They know they're big, and they don't have to flash it to the world. Small-dick guys have to make up for it with big talk and lies.

I'm so excited. I've been waiting for the day that we'd get to this point. When I'd have him in my mouth and get to look up at him with adorning eyes as he grabs my hair and moves my head with such a force it makes my eyes tear up. I want to make him feel good. I want to be the best he's ever had. I want to be better than his wife. For him to forget about her altogether. Forget her existence.

I lick him and swirl my tongue and do all the moves I've learned over the years that men enjoy. I think about the first time I gave head. I was so scared that my body was shaking, and I tried telling him no—not verbally but through my actions. My eyes had tears in them. My body was stiff, unmoving. Yet he forced my head down anyway and shoved himself so deep inside my throat that I imagined my intestines were waving hello to his tip. I gagged and fought to not throw up all over him. Tears streamed down my face, and I tried pulling away, but he shushed me, told me how well I was doing, and gripped my hair tighter, forcing my head up and down with such an aggressive force that I was scared he would rip my hair out or shatter my jaw. I was fourteen and in love, and I thought he was in love with me.

I never once said no to him. Even though I always wanted to. In a sense, he had to have known I never wanted to. I was always so immature, uncomfortable. It was clear that I wanted to be elsewhere. I wanted to be outside in the fresh air for recess instead of in the classroom. I wanted to be eating lunch with everyone else. I wanted to join afterschool activities or ride my bike around the neighborhood after school instead of being taken to his house and placed in whatever odd position he wanted me in.

Ellis is so much gentler. So much more loving, I almost start crying. He doesn't hurt me in any way or make me feel forced. He doesn't shove my head down. Instead, he says my name seductively like I'm a goddess and releases soft moans until he finishes in my mouth, and I've never felt more loved by someone before.