Chapter 20 #2
Water poured from between his fingers, trickling down as he held his hand up, studying it.
I stayed silent. I didn’t dare interrupt him.
“She got on top of me while her friends giggled and kept me still. She struggled for a while since, you know, I wasn’t hard because of how much I’d drunk.
She still tried, Em. She tried for a long fucking time.
I was crying and screaming, and nobody helped me.
But her friends helped her. She succeeded eventually, but she said it sucked.
I mean, I wonder why, really.” He huffed, the sound echoing off the walls.
“She got what she wanted. Her friends got to watch and help.
I can still feel all their hands on me, trying to help position me so she could use me.
I can still hear them laughing and egging her on.
Right after, I threw up. All over myself.
But I was too drunk to move. Too stunned to even try.
“I started to choke and one of her friends said, ‘ew, he’s getting it all over my bed’ and turned me onto my side.
And then they left me there. The girl broke up with me after beating me up for a few more months and trying to get me to have sex with her again.
She told everyone I was a bad lay.” He looked back up at me.
“I don’t get under anyone, Em. I don’t drink.
I don’t go to parties. I started cutting myself.
I tried to kill myself, which obviously didn’t work because I’m still here.
Still suffering. But I don’t want what happened to me to happen to Star.
And I know the fucking signs of domestic abuse.
I know them very intimately. And I never noticed it with Elio. I’d missed it.”
Silence. I was stunned to fucking silence, barely even able to see Moon through the hazy, watery film that was slowly trickling down my cheeks. My Moon. My brat. “Did you tell anyone?”
“Fuck no. Never. You, her, and her friends are the only ones in the entire world who know.”
“So you’ve just been carrying this around? For fifteen years?” I tried to stay strong. I tried to sound strong, at least. But I was fucking losing it. Losing my goddamn mind over just how much hurt he’d gone through.
He shrugged as if it meant nothing. As if it was fine. As if his pain wasn’t worthy of being voiced. “What was going to change? I was the easy kid. Not the exceptional one. I was the funny clown at school. Not the liked one. She’d ruined me already. There was nothing left to save.”
“But you weren’t ruined, Moon. You were hurt. Can’t you see that?”
“Hurt? I was hurt? No, Em, I was fucking destroyed. I thought the world was one thing, and suddenly I knew exactly how deep the evil went in humanity. I was ashamed. I was scared. I was confused. By the time I figured out it was rape, two years had passed, and at that point, what else was there to do? Nothing. So I tried to be the best big brother I possibly could, and I couldn’t even do that. ”
I ran a hand over my hair, gripping the ends in disbelief. “Couldn’t be a good big brother? Moon, your siblings fucking love you. You have done nothing but be there for them. You have done nothing but be strong for them. You are allowed to not be strong for once in your life.”
He shook his head. “No, all I’ve done is fail.
Can’t you see that? I tried so hard to make sure the horrors of the fucking world didn’t corrupt any of them, and here we are.
Elio was abused, Crescent tried to kill himself, and Star won’t talk to me!
And, let’s not forget this part—I killed two people! ”
“In defense of your brother, whom you protected.”
“I killed Jude with my bare fucking hands and don’t regret a single second of it. I’d do it over and over and over again, but his face won’t leave my mind. I can’t stop thinking about it. I’ve let it get to me. That’s a failure in and of itself.”
I stood from the toilet and bent down by the tub, looking up at him. “Of course it’s gotten to you. If it didn’t, I’d be worried. And you know damn well how hard it is to spot well-hidden abuse, Moon. You’ve hidden it for fifteen years.”
“Not when you know what it looks like.”
“Especially when you know what it looks like.”
“I should’ve known. I should’ve been there.”
“Elio wouldn’t have let you be there. He didn’t let Crescent. He didn’t let your parents. He left to keep up the lie, Moon.”
“Red flag.”
I looked him straight in the eyes, never blinking, never averting my gaze. “It. Is. Not. Your. Fault.”
He just stared at me.
“Say it. It is not your fault.”
No response.
“Say it, brat. It is not your fault that the world is awful. It is not your responsibility to shoulder the weight of every bad person in the entire universe. It is not your job to police every person in someone’s life. And it is fucking normal to be fucked up about witnessing a fucked up thing.”
His nose twitched as a tear fell down his cheek. “How else was I going to conceptualize what I went through? I was confused. And scared. If I didn’t feel something else—if I didn’t put that energy into something else, I’d just keep trying to kill myself until I finally succeeded.”
“I know.”
“I was so angry, Em. So lost and angry because why? Why me?”
“I know.”
“I hadn’t done anything but open my heart to her. I existed, and I was punished.”
“No. No, you brought light into the world, and she was greedy enough to take it. None of this is on you. None of it.”
He sat up, looking down at me, the water sloshing around him. “Will it ever feel like it isn’t?”
Slowly, I reached my hand up, watching his reaction. He was watching me, too. Watching me as I placed my palm against his cheek and rose on my knees. I pressed our noses together, closing my eyes. “Yes, Moon. If you let me help you get help, then yes, one day, it’ll feel like that.”
“Promise?” He whispered.
“I promise.” I pressed my lips against his, tasting our mixed tears. They were salty, and so fucking sad. So sad. So heartbroken.
But Moon was alive. That meant we had a chance. A chance to hold each other’s hearts. For me to hold his until it wasn’t too heavy anymore. If I couldn’t scorch the goddamn earth itself for having someone so vile exist on the planet, I’d make damn sure Moon healed.
Starting with therapy and a whole lot of love.