Teachers Pet

38: Penny For Your Thoughts

        I felt disconnected from my surroundings. I was here and I wasn't. My mind wandered to a time when things made sense. When a bee flying towards me was the only thing that made me flinch. When a test I didn't study for was the only thing that made me panic. When the flu was the only thing that made me sick. When secrets didn't come with such a big price to pay. I wanted to disappear entirely and live in a time that I could no longer go back to. I'd never known what it was like to feel so trapped in my own body. My skin felt disgusting. No matter how many showers I took, no matter how hard I scrubbed I couldn't get Nolan's touch off of me. I'd scrubbed until my skin was red and numb. After my mother had been discharged from the hospital, she sat down with me in the kitchen and spent longer than necessary to ask me that horrid question. It was on everyone's mind, but no one could muster the strength to ask me. Still, even then my mother couldn't even say the word. Her lips had shaped themselves to say it, but that four-letter word had been stuck in her throat.

       "No," I'd told her. She cried with relief and hugged me. She thanked some higher power for this good news. I just sat there in my chair trying to hold myself together. No, Nolan didn't rape me. I was always in pain or made up legitimate excuses to not be alone with him. He touched under my breast once, his fingers grazed the lining of my bra. That had been as far as he'd gone. Never did things escalate further than that. He had promised me that when the time was right, he'd make sure I enjoyed myself. He'd purred those words in my ear one night as we lay on my couch. His warm breath making me wince as it brushed against my ear lobe. I had feigned a small laugh as tears spilled down my cheeks that night.

       No, Nolan didn't rape me. His soft caresses on my cheek after he'd kicked me against the stairs... the gentle kisses on my fresh bruises he'd left after beating me in my kitchen... his fingers rubbing circles on my back as I laid in pain on my sofa from him dragging me by my hair down my hallway... It had been enough to make me feel more than violated. My body never felt like it was my own. I didn't expect my mother to understand why I hadn't been happy like she had been to hear that I wasn't forced to have sex with Nolan. I would never tell her what he put me through. Just like I know she'd never tell me what Marcus had put her through. My mother had been a victim for twelve years and never said anything to anyone. She did so so that we could have a roof over our heads. Part of me blames myself for letting things get as bad as they had between her and Marcus. I could've spoken up sooner. I should have. I should have done a lot of things differently. The more I thought about it, the more I found myself to blame. Not just for Marcus tormenting my mother, but for everything else. I dragged Jillian into everything and made her keep her mouth shut about it. I used Nolan so that I could date my teacher, not caring about the repercussions. I let myself make so many careless choices, not caring about the damage they would cause.

       "You need to go now. I'm sorry, but no. Goodbye." The sound of the front door slamming was enough to snap me back to a reality I kept trying to escape. My mothers' voice was harsh and final. She'd never been so hostile like this before everything happened. After her discharge from the hospital, she was different. She didn't stay in bed like she was supposed to. I watched as she did laundry and made dinner at a slow pace. She was being careful, but she was also going on as if we both hadn't just gone through something traumatic. I waited for her to snap. I waited for the breakdown to come. I waited for the tears, but nothing happened. It was as if Marcus never existed to her. She never spoke of him or Nolan.

       "He's gone." I shook my head without looking at Jill. I continued to stare out of my bedroom window, resting my head against the cold glass. My knees were curled up to my chest as if holding myself together would stop me from falling apart. It would be so easy to do here on my window sill. My eyes focused on Jake as he walked back to his car across the street. As he opened the driver side door to get in, he stopped to look up to my window. A million emotions crossed his face. It was hard to know what he was feeling right now. This was his third attempt at trying to speak to my mother and me, but my mother would never allow it. He'd get a few words in right before she slammed the door in his face. Jake took out his phone and started typing. A few seconds later my phone vibrated in my hand. I looked at his message on my screen and felt a tear run down my cheek.