Chapter 10
LOIS
This is worse than I ever imagined.
Connor has been droning on about football and Germany and god knows what else for the last three hours.
I’m about ready to set myself on fire if he doesn’t hurry up and finish his last beer of the night.
I told him I have to be home by 10:30pm, I don't but I needed a reason to get out of here asap.
The guy is hot, I won’t deny that, he’s got that ken doll vibe going on and I'm here for it.
Unfortunately the moment he opened his mouth I was ready to lace my running shoes and bolt for the door.
There’s only one way to describe how this date has gone…boring as fuck.
I did my part, I’ve been polite, nodding along to all of his stories about holidays with his parents and football training whilst I sip away at cocktail after cocktail.
I haven’t been able to get a word in all night, not that he’s even asked anything about me anyway.
Connor tips his beer glass to his lips and gulps hard.
“Better go then, if I'm going to have you home for 10:30.”
“Uh-huh,”
I nod, scraping my chair back and standing up as I throw my coat over my shoulders.
Connor leads me out of the pub, his hand skimming my lower back.
I try to slink away from his touch, feeling a little grossed out by him purely for the fact that he’s self obsessed and has an ego the size of Mount Everest.
I know I'm a hypocrite, a lot of people would say the same thing about Nick, massive ego and cocky as the day is long.
But I know even after one night with him, that he’s deeper than that, there’s a lot more there under the surface.
He’s all I’ve been able to think about all night, wishing it was him sat across from me chewing on a steak and making me laugh so hard my stomach hurts.
The wind whips my hair, the icy chill prickling against my skin and making me shiver.
Conner slings a heavy arm around my shoulders and I hold my breath, the heavy sweetness of alcohol on his breath is sending nauseous waves through my stomach.
“Hey, are you sure you don’t wanna come back to my dorm for a bit?”
He winks, drunken eyelids opening and closing too slowly.
“Erm, no, thanks, I need to get home.”
“Ah,”
he groans, removing his arm from around my neck.
“You’re no fun.”
I dart into his car, out of the biting air and cross my legs, rubbing my palms together, trapping any source of heat I can get. The winter is creeping in and I'm not buzzing about it to be honest.
Connor drives like someone who’s had too many pints of lager, which he has.
Normally I'm not reckless enough to get into a car with a man who’s clearly way over the legal limit, but tonight I'm just desperate to get home and the thought of getting on the tube this late at night alone is not a positive one.
So I sink down into Connor’s heated seats and close my eyes as he weaves his way through the brightly lit London streets, like a rollercoaster that may spin out of control at any moment.
All I can do is grip the seat and squeeze my eyes tightly closed.
Connor says nothing the whole drive, but even with closed eyes I can feel his occasional glances hovering over me.
He’s making me nervous.
My bare toes are tingling as they poke out the end of my high heeled shoes and when he finally rounds the bend and pulls into a spot outside my dorm building, the fight or flight in me has already kicked into overdrive and I don’t even know why.
His breath is laced with beer when he leans closer to me.
“Before you go, are you gonna give me a kiss?”
Fuck me, hes a sleezebag.
“No, sorry, I don’t kiss on the first date.”
I squeak, my throat drier than the Sahara desert. My hand is on the door handle, the beads of anxious sweat breaking the skin and trickling down the back of my neck even though it’s fucking freezing in here.
Connor’s icy hand slides up my bare thigh, my stomach tightening with panic.
“I don’t think you mean that, I know you want me, I can tell.”
He drawls. Drunk and delirious he edges closer, his fingers tickling the edge of my skirt. My heart is beating so fucking hard I can’t even hear what he says next. I have to decide now, do I punch him or try to run?
I yank the door handle and it opens behind me, thank fuck. I shove at Connor’s chest, creating space between us before I grab my bag and scramble out of the car like a terrified animal.
“Don’t fucking touch me!”
I cry, tears seeping out of my eyes and streaming down my face before I even know they’re on their way.
Connor simply scoffs and leans back into his chair, eyes narrowed like a snake.
“Jesus Christ, don’t be such a prude! Mitchell said you’d be easy, said you open your legs for anyone.”
His words make me feel instantly dirty, like a truck just drove through a swampy puddle and soaked me in stagnant rain water.
I should have known when Callie said Connor was a football player, of course he knows Mitchell.
It’s not enough that Mitchell took the one thing from me that I can never take back, but he also feels the need to tell his friends that they can get an easy fuck from me whenever they feel like it.
I feel disgusting.
I slam his car door closed, hearing a muffled, “Don’t be like that Taylor,”
yelled after me but I don’t turn back to look at him.
I dash into the safety of my building and bypass the lift, taking the stairs two at a time in a desperate attempt to get into my dorm as quickly as possible and lock the door behind me.
My thighs are burning when I reach the fourth floor and turn my key in the lock, running straight past Molly who sits, drowning in blankets on the couch.
I slam my bedroom door shut and throw my bag and jacket to the ground, curling up in a ball on my new neatly dressed bed.
The sheets are cold and crisp, the scent of lavender washing powder helping to steady the still flowing tears when I squeeze my eyelids closed.
I only get about thirty-seconds to let myself be swallowed by self pity though before the hurricane that is Molly Crawford hurtles into my bedroom.
“What the fuck Lo, what happened?”
She shrieks, eyes wide with worry as she hauls me up by the shoulders to sit next to her on my mattress.
I sniff hard and clear the wet trail from my cheek with the back of my hand.
“Nothing, I just—”
“No,”
Molly says, gripping my chin and forcing me to look at her, although she’s still a blur of blonde through my tears.
“Something happened, I know it did, now tell me.”
I want to tell her, really I do but the truth seems lodged in my throat.
I want Nick, I want his tattooed biceps to wrap around me, to bury my nose in his hard chest and to hear his whisper of reassurance in my ear.
Molly’s hand on my shoulder is comforting, but it’s not enough in this moment.
I feel dirty and used.
Even though Connor didn’t get the chance to do anything serious, he still touched me without my permission and now I just want to put myself in the bin.
“Can you,”
I sniff, a tear streaking down my face, “can you call Nick please?”
Molly glances over her shoulder, out of my open bedroom door.
“Yeah, sure.”
She says on a whisper, leaving a kiss on the crown of my head as she gets up and goes to find her phone.
I hear her make the call in the hallway, her voice is muffled and I can tell she’s trying to make sure Anais doesn’t overhear anything from inside her room.
I lay back against the mattress, staring up at the stick on stars that litter my ceiling.
I brought them here from home when I started at Redwood and moved them in here from my old dorm.
They remind me of being a tiny child, lying in bed whilst the hum of music and conversation continued without me downstairs.
Sean would often sneak into my room and lay with me until I fell asleep, he always knew I hated sleeping alone and unlike now, he actually used to quite like me.
“Ok,”
Molly reappears in the doorway, “I called him and he’s coming.”
“Thank you.”
She leans over me and plants a lingering kiss on my cheek.
“If you change your mind about talking to me before he gets here, I’ll be in the living room ok?”
I can only nod, turning onto my side and tucking my knees into my chest.
I need quiet and dark so I can think straight.
I don’t know how I let that happen tonight, why I put myself in a dangerous situation with someone I barely knew.
I’m disappointed in myself, but more than anything, I'm embarrassed.
Maybe it was my fault for allowing myself to be stuck in a car with Connor in the first place.
Did I give him the wrong impression? I don’t think I did.
But sometimes things go straight over my head and I don’t even realise what’s going on until I'm in an uncomfortable situation that I suddenly can’t get out of.
I don’t know if I fall asleep for a few minutes or if it’s been hours, but the thumping on the front door startles me awake.
Heavy, rapid footsteps head for my bedroom and the door flies open without a knock.
Nick’s face is pale, his brown eyes wide with worry.
“Hey, baby what happened?”
He lands on the bed beside me, pulling me effortlessly into his embrace.
I’m in a ball on his lap, like a baby being rocked to sleep and it’s the warmest feeling of comfort I’ve ever felt.
He gives me a few minutes to cry into his t-shirt, then he lifts my chin with his thumb and his anxious gaze meets mine.
“Tell me what happened,”
he coos, dropping a tiny kiss to my wet nose.
“Tell me Lois. Molly said you went out with Connor, he’s bad news. I wish you’d have told me before you went and I could have warned you about him. Now tell me what he did.”
I sit up straight, wriggling off his lap and sitting cross legged beside him, wiping a hand across my cheek to rid it off the moisture.
“He drove me home,”
sniff, sniff, “and then he…”
I don’t know how to say the words, don’t know how to get them to stop sticking in my throat. But Nick just waits, totally patient with me, stroking a finger down the side of my cheek as my lips part on a jagged breath.
I inhale deeply and evenly.
“He tried to force himself on me.”
The air immediately stiffens around us and Nick drops his hand from my face.
His body is ice cold, like a blizzard just blew in and froze him to the spot.
When I glance up, his eyes have clouded over, an anger blazing like a house fire behind his hard gaze.
He just stares at the wall for a moment, but when I continue to watch him, he breaks his stare with a slow blink.
He looks over at me, snapping out of his trance and getting to his feet hastily.
He rubs his palms on his jeans and them drops to his knees in front of where I sit on the bed.
His hands clasp my cheeks.
“I’m going to take care of it,”
He presses his forehead to mine and both of our eyes fall closed.
“Do you hear me? I’m going to take care of it, this wasn’t your fault ok?”
And before I have a chance to ask what he means, he whips out of my bedroom like a hurricane on a path of destruction.
I don’t know where he’s going, but I have an idea he’s heading towards Connor’s dorm and it’s not for a friendly visit.
All I can do is wait, so that’s what I do, sit on my bed, picking my nails and trying not to look at the time on my phone every four-seconds.