Falling Apart

Chapter 20

Hours of watching the fan spread dancing shadows across the ceiling and listening to Katherine small breaths eventually led to morning. She made it through the night without any nightmares, only a few times her eyes screwed shut and she shook her head, whimpering. I pulled her close to me and whispered promises in her ear until she could believe me, and sleep took over.

If we lived a normal life, I'd buy her a coffee and meet her halfway to her first class. We'd be able to talk about what to do for the day and we could stress about the upcoming projects in history, but those aren't the problems we're given. Instead of a normal college life, Katherine gets to worry about a sociopathic kidnapper who raped her. The thoughts of what he did to her make my blood boil. I know where he is, the police don't. Katherine doesn't even know where he is, but he's close enough to harm her again.

I'd easily tell the police where he's staying, but what Ian holds over me is stopping me from that. If Katherine, or anyone, knew of my past, I'd be thought of as bad as him. Ian and I go back a while, unfortunately, and he had promised me that one day people will know of what I've done. After what he did to Katherine, I thought that he wouldn't still hold it over me but now it's even worse.

If she were to ever find out, it wouldn't just be bad for me. She'd have no one to cry to anymore. Her aunt doesn't even know of what happened to her and Jenna hasn't been seen since the night we found Katherine.

"Good morning." I try to smile as I see her shifting in her sleep. I leave the chair from across the room and join her side.

"Are you still going to make me go to therapy?" she groans and I can't help but laugh.

"I think it's needed." I assure her and she pulls the sheets over her face. "Have you heard from Jenna in a while?"

She brings the sheets back down and her face moves to confusion. "No, actually. Not since the morning after, you know."

"That's what I thought. Oh well, she's probably just had a lot on her plate." I assume. It still doesn't make sense that her best friend hasn't made an ounce of contact with her in the past two weeks. "I called the nearest psychologist office I could find on my phone. I made an appointment with Ms. Clark for us at 2:00 this afternoon. Is that alright?"

"Sure." she sits up but focuses her eyes to the floor. "I'll get ready for today. I think I'm going to go to classes today, then we'll go." she walks to the bathroom and half an hour later she returns, glowing with a smile I haven't seen in weeks.

"Katherine, shit, you look..." I lose my words as I watch her pour cereal into a bowl.

"Thank you, I think." she smiles again. "I haven't worn makeup in a while and I decided I should get dressed up for once." her hand runs over her skirt and she takes a bite of the breakfast.

"Are you ready? How do you feel?"

"I guess so. My head is killing me, though."

"A side effect from drinking last night, I suppose." I grab her hand. "You scared me last night, Kath."

"I don't want to think about last night. I can barely remember it actually. Today is a new day and things will just have to get better." she straightens her back, tucks her hair into a tail on her head and we leave the building.

Katherine's POV

After a few hours of working on an assignment for English, David picks me up from the parking lot and takes us to lunch before going to the counselor. We settle on Little Mama's and end up getting the infamous burgers. An hour later, we're on the way to Mr. Clark's.

"Any news from Jenna?" David asks as we climb out of the car and step into the small building.

"Nope. I'll text her." I send a small message to Jenna as we sit in the waiting room. I tell her to call me later and that things are beginning to look okay.