Don't Feel Guilty

Chapter Three

Freedom wasn't really freedom to me anymore. 

For an independent girl at just 19 years old, I was really naive to how dependent I was on Eli. 

I was a full-time honors student at Suffolk University in Boston, had an internship, worked for the college paper and had a work-study job where my entire minimum-wage paycheck was late up by Boston rent and some groceries. Otherwise, I depended on Eli for everything. 

He drove me everywhere I needed to be. 

He made good money and paid for groceries and for me to eat. 

He paid for my commuter rail and T tickets every month. 

When I we went out, it was card that was being used. 

When I was short on rent, or bill payments, he was letting me "borrow" money. 

But he never actually asked for the money back. And he never really complained about it. It was the one thing that he didn't throw in my face. And I needed to eat. I needed rent money. And I needed to get to class. In some ways, and on some days, I felt like I needed him.

It was fucked up. And I even thought it then, how it wasn't right that someone like me, who has most of her wherewithal, would allow someone to abuse, practically swallow her up and spit her out, so that she could pay the rent and feel like someone liked her sometimes.

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It was 1:45 p.m. and I knew that I had two more hours bore Eli would be getting out of work, get through traffic and get home. I made up for my lack of sleep throughout the day by crashing on Eli's queen bed. And now I was just getting out of the shower to pull myself together. 

It was Friday, which means that Eli would come home and be in a good mood. Not because it was the last day of the work week, because he always worked on Saturdays, but because Fridays meant that him and his two friends, who were brothers that lived across the street their entire lives, would go in on an 8 ball. 

I blew dried and loosely curled my hair, which is naturally dark brown that I dyed blonde. I never expected to look like a Kate Upton with a butt, but I had to say, that I pulled it off. Everyone loved blond on me -- expect for Eli. Naturally. 

I put on a too-short black skirt, Black tights and a low-cut long sleeve white top that had two strings that zig-zagged through holes at the neckline. 

It was likely too sexy of an outfit to wear when you're just hanging out at someone's house with two people that you were always with every Friday. But I knew more people were coming. More of the brother's -- Brady and Ben -- friends were coming. And if some man was giving me more attention then Eli was less likely to be an asshole to me. 

I was just walking down the stairs, finished getting ready when the front door unlocked and opened. I looked at the time on the stove and thought, it's too early for him to be out of work. 

I walked through the kitchen and through the living room when I saw the only person in Lynn that I liked and Eli's best friend's older brother. 

He was 6 foot 3 inches with a good smile but a former oxy addiction and alcoholic tendencies.

He always said he didn't care to meet girls when his brother Ben, or Eli, would nag him over talking to a girl. 

But I knew what occupied Eli's mind. 

"You're a little later than I expected today," I said, as I motioned him to follow me down the stairs.