The Window

78 Hours After...

I unlocked the door to my apartment, rushed inside frenetically, and slammed it shut as if Tremblay were still chasing after me.

I dumped my purse on the couch, and sprinted to the bathroom as quick as my feet could carry me. I could still smell his mouldy breath and dried blood on myself, and I had to get rid of it.

I just had to.

I turned the knob of the shower as soon as I entered the bathroom. Luke warm water began to drip from the pores of the faucet at a controlled speed.

I took off whatever disheveled clothes I still had on and hoped for the water to wash the revolting odour away, while lathering some body wash onto my skin.

I waited for a minute or so, but I could still smell him.

I observed the water trickling down my body, and realised that it was far from transparent. I'd stopped menstruating several hours ago...

Since it appeared to be some form of genital or rectal bleeding, it could only mean one thing.

Tremblay was responsible for it...

I began to rub my arms, legs and the rest of my body in a frenzy, as if to erase all evidence of ever having been touched by that animal. Despite my unrelenting efforts, I couldn't seem to achieve this even in the slightest.

Bits and pieces of the incident came back to me every time I attempted to scrub myself.

I sank to the floor gradually once my frail legs grew weary of carrying my body weight. Slowly but surely, the acceptance of my situation began to set in on me.

My consent had been utterly violated.

He'd raped me.

No matter what I tried to do now, nothing could erase this indisputable fact.

And that's when the tears started flowing freely.

I could hear myself howling as my tears mixed with the jets of water crashing against my cheeks, almost camouflaging them as if they were never there in the first place.

*****

I looked at myself in the mirror and sighed at my reflection. I'd been crying on and off for nearly three hours at a stretch, and quite frankly I was growing tired of my own inability to control my emotions.

My lacrimal glands had taken quite a beating as well, for it refused to spout out any more fluid to leaven the pain in my chest.

I looked at the puffiness in my eyelids and the marks on my neck and realised that I needed a substantial amount of make-up to cover it all up, before work tomorrow.

Even though I wanted to crawl under my blanket and never see any semblance of daylight anytime soon, I knew I had a lot of explaining to do. My manager had called me a bunch of times because I'd missed not one, but three important meetings post lunch.

He was understandably angry, but I could only hope that he wouldn't fire me over this. I'd proved my mettle a number of times prior to this after all.

And of course, there was the matter of returning to the bar and clearing my tab to avoid arrest for theft...

I finally went up to the couch and sat down rather carefully, making sure to put as little pressure on my injury as possible.

I gulped as I finally puckered up the courage to open Tremblay's wallet that I'd snatched in the nick of time before fleeing the restroom.