Taming Lucas

Chapter 20

"Matt its not like that." I look him in his eyes.

"What did Claire do to you?" His voice sounding so angry, I flinch. "Did she hurt you?"

I close my eyes, biting my lower lip in between my teeth. "Yes." I answer silently. I open my eyes slowly to see Matt's reaction, his pupils dilate in anger, biting his teeth.

"What? Ems why am only knowing this now?! When- I mean how is-" Matt clenches his fists, biting his teeth so hard that I can see his muscles flex on his neck.

"Matt please calm down." I put my hands on his chest, I can feel that he's breathing heavily.

"How do you expect me to calm down when you didn't even tell me this before!" Matt yells. I just hope dad doesn't hear him from his room.

I flinch at his words, stepping back a little. Matt sees my reaction and tries to calm down a little by breathing slower. "Ems I'm sorry I didn't mean to yell at you."

I take a seat on my bed, drying my tears with my hands. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you." I look down at my hands, wet from my tears.

Matt sighs, and sits down next to me. "Why didn't you tell me Ems? No, why couldn't you tell me? I thought I was your friend." He sounds so hurt, I feel even more guilty.

"Hey you're my best friend okay? You're the only person in my life that is constant." I assure him.

"Then why? Why didn't you tell me? I could have helped you Ems. After all these years, she had made you feel miserable and I didn't even notice." He shakes his head.

"Matt this is not your fault. I didn't want you to know because I knew you'd react this way. I need you to stay strong for me." I tell him.

"I'm so sorry Ems. I couldn't even protect you." He puts his head on his hands, bending down. "Tell me everything she ever did to you. Wait does your father know?"

"Yes I told him but he didn't believe me. He thinks his Claire is so perfect! He never listens to me anymore." I say, the tears coming back again.

"What? How can he not believe you? You're his daughter for heaven's sake! I'll go talk to him." Matt starts to get up from the bed but I stop him.

"No, Matt. He won't believe you either. That witch must've told dad I hit her before I left." I scoff. "So dad thinks I'm making this up to cover myself."

"Why would she tell him that?" Matt asks.

"When I packed my bags to leave for New York, Claire came home drunk. When she saw me with my bags, she started to pull me by my arms. So I pushed her away from me to get loose from her grip, she must have hit the floor. But I didn't mean to hurt her, Matt. I wanted to, but I didn't do it on purpose." I defend myself.

"So this was the reason why you wanted to leave so bad huh? I can't believe she would do that to you. When did this start?" Matt looks calculative, as if he's actually calculating when I was being abused.

"After Dad married her, she would be really sweet to me. I actually thought she was a nice person. I mean I was just a kid, so sometimes I would talk to her about mom, you know about how mom would do things a certain way, about how mom do these little things for me. I always talked about mom because I was scared that my memories of mom would disappear if I didn't talk about her. It was silly but can you blame me, I was only ten at the time. She would listen to me every time, until dad left for a business trip. When I talked about mom in front of her, she would get really mad like she would just flip out. The first time she got mad, I just thought she was a having a bad day. And then the next morning when I mentioned mom again, she shouted at me saying I talk about her too much! She took dad's belt from his room and whipped me, warning me to stop talking about mom." My tears fall down my cheeks. This is the first time I'm talking about what happened. "That was the start, I think. After that even if I don't mention mom, she would just lash out at me for no reason." I sniff, fighting back the tears. "Then she started drinking, it got worse with time. Which means she gets to hurt me even more." I continue to tell him.