Kathy With A K's Song

31 | Tourist Trap

"Make yourself free, a man said that to me. Now my heart is like an open door." - Tourist Trap

-

The car ride to Sophia's house was deathly silent.

Seth had stayed behind at the school to finish explaining everything about what he had seen. Then of course as soon as Drake found out what had happened, he was in the principal's office too, spilling everything that he knew.

Luckily a crowd of four was too much for the room, so Sophia sat outside and didn't have to hear all of the gory details. And Drake made sure that the principal heard every single detail and didn't brush him away like he did Zach.

In the middle of the debrief, I had begun to feel lightheaded, so I left with Sophia so that she could take me back to her house to rest. Which now brings us to this incredibly awkward, tense, and trainwreck of a car ride.

"And you were going to tell me about Chris when?" Sophia spoke, residual hysteria seeping through, for the first time since this car ride.

I shrugged and turned towards the car window. There was never any timeline for Sophia finding out. In fact, the plan was to keep it as much of a secret as possible from everyone. Somehow that plan has just slowly devolved into the mess we have now.

"Never," I whispered quietly, and then I heard her scoff sarcastically.

"So you weren't going to tell me that I was in a relationship with an abusive asshole?" She asked, and a hot flash of fire immediately ran through my body.

"He never touched you." I shot back in a raised voice.

When she turned to look at me with a blank stare, I sighed quietly, upset with myself for raising my voice. "I made sure of that," I whispered, a lot quieter now.

A flash of regret spread across her face but just as soon as it came, it left and she turned her attention back to the road while I turned mine back to the window.

When we got to her house, Sophia left the car without a word to me and I sat there for a few moments, collecting myself before following her in.

My reasoning for keeping everything from Sophia was never well thought out, but I did it with good intentions. I always felt that if she didn't know, then she couldn't confront him, and then he couldn't hurt her just like he did to me. However, at the end of it all, it seems like she doesn't even care about the physical damage that was done to her. It's her heart that's hurt.

After I made it through the front door, Sophia gestured for me to wait in the kitchen so I sat at the table. I watched her go down the hallway, probably towards the bathroom for the first aid kit. Before she could come back, I pulled Seth's shirt that he had given me as a replacement for my bloody one away from my chest, and inspected the cut.

It wasn't too deep, and it only hurt to touch. The worst thing about it was probably going to be the sting when Sophia comes to clean it. What was worse was the throbbing on my cheek, which has most likely already began to bruise, but it's not like Chris hasn't done worse than slapping before.

In the grand scheme of things that Chris has done to me, today definitely isn't that high up on the list of most painful interactions. There was no way I was going to convince Sophia of that though, and even if I did, I don't think it'd really matter that much to her.

Soon enough, Sophia came back with her arms full of medical supplies. I attempted to help her by relieving her of some of the items, but she just turned away from me and set everything on a different part of the table. I frowned at her back but otherwise kept my mouth shut. I have to remember that she has every right to be upset, I just hope it doesn't last forever.