Chapter 33 #2
The times that my cousin would come into my room at night while I was sleeping. Thinking that I wasn’t aware. Eventually he stopped caring if I was asleep at all.
Part of me believes that he wanted me to know what he was doing. I shudder thinking about the things he did that I wasn’t aware of.
He enjoyed the fact that I knew. Every touch that made my skin crawl. The way his voice would make my stomach churn.
It started innocently enough, finding ways to “wrestle” so when the family walked in, nothing would be out of place. I was six. I didn’t know any better.
As I got older, he progressed to touching me, kissing me in places that I didn’t want to be kissed. He would force me to hold his dick while he touched me, kissed me. And then he started getting overconfident, knowing that I wasn’t going to say anything.
When he realized he could get away with whatever he wanted, he started jerking himself off in front of me, making me watch as he came all over my skin.
Before leaving me to lay in his filth, he would always ask the same question. “Was it good for you my Little Flower?”
At first, I wouldn’t say anything. I would just lay still, silently begging him to just leave already. After a few moments of silence, he would leave. Until that wasn’t good enough for him.
Eventually he wanted more. So, he took it. But if I didn’t pretend to like it, that’s when his darker side would come out and he wasn’t so nice. That’s when the first hit happened.
I was thirteen.
Started with just a slap across the face. Not hard enough to leave a mark, because if he left a mark, then the parents would know. And if the parents found out, he wouldn’t be able to rape me anymore.
The next time I didn’t say anything, I got a black eye. I was staying at my aunt's house, and she told my parents I fell and hit my face on the corner of the porch. It always bothered me how they never seemed to know what was going on.
I feel like you would have to be pretty dense to not at least suspect something. But no. At times, I felt like they were purposefully turning the other cheek.
They always insisted that we go over and visit.
Even when I would protest as hard as I could, they’d still make me go. I even tried acting out, getting in trouble at school, hanging out with the wrong crowd. But it only made it worse.
They said they couldn’t trust me to be alone and not get into shit. Whatever. I gave up trying to understand when it became clear that they just didn’t care.
Then things just got worse, and I gave up altogether. Multiple times I wanted to just disappear forever.
When I stayed at my aunt’s house the summer I was sixteen, my cousin decided that I was good enough to share. That night, my aunt and uncle had left to go to the movies, leaving me alone with him.
I already knew he was going to take advantage of them being gone.
Mentally preparing myself for him to do whatever it is he wanted to. I tried to leave, go to the neighbors to hang out. Or to the park down the street. Anything that would give me an excuse to get out of the house.
But as soon as I had my shoes on and was throwing my jacket over my shoulders, he stopped me. Grabbing my arm, he pulled me into the living room and sat me down on the couch. Told me to sit there and look pretty.
He took out his phone and began typing a message to someone. Something about the way his demeanor changed when the reply came through, sent the hair on the back of my neck standing straight up.
My stomach was in knots, and my hands were trembling and clammy. My heart pounding violently against my rib cage, threatening to break free. At least some part of me would be free.
I felt like I was suffocating. All I wanted to do was escape. Run away.
But I knew that if I tried, he would do worse than just slap me. It turned out that I was right.
Enzo grabbed my wrist and yanked me off the couch. He dragged me to his bedroom at the end of the hall, shoving me through the door, laughing as I stumbled over my feet.
The door shuts behind him, the click of the latch echoing in my ear. Reminding me that I am trapped in this room with a monster. A sick and twisted shell of a man.
“We are going to have a little fun tonight, my Little Flower.” His arms snake around my midsection from behind and his hot breath fans across my neck.
On the outside, I do nothing. But on the inside, I’m screaming.
“You are going to take your clothes off and then go sit on the bed.” My body moves on autopilot, starting with my shirt and then my pants. I turn around to go sit on the bed like he told me to, but he grabs the top of my arm before I could move.
He hands me a piece of silk fabric. “Put this blindfold on when you’re on the bed. And take your fucking underwear off. You know the rules.” He releases my arm with a shove, allowing me to go and sit on the bed.
I hated that bed.
Once I sat down, I tied the blindfold around my eyes. Instant darkness envelops me. The only thing I am left to rely on was my sense of hearing and smell.
My ears strained to hear every sound so I could try and anticipate his next move. The air felt colder against my sensitive skin. My breath, shaky and uneven.
He had me naked and exposed waiting for him.
His cheap cologne invades my nostrils. The same scent that smacked you in the face every time you walked by those clothing stores in the mall. I still can’t go into a mall without wanting to vomit.
Suddenly, his door opened and I heard his footsteps retreat. Tilting my head, I hear the front door open and close. For a fleeting moment, I thought, maybe somehow, I lucked out and my aunt and uncle came home early.
I was frozen in place on the bed. Not knowing what was going to happen. After what felt like ten minutes go by, I begin to stand and take my blindfold off.
I must not have heard him walking back, because the next thing I knew, a force pushed against my shoulders, and I was shoved back onto the bed. Then I felt the sting of his hand across my face.
“I didn’t say you could get up.” My cheek burns where he slapped me.
I’m rubbing my face when I hear a second set of footsteps coming from down the hallway.
My breath stops.
Each thud and squeak of the sneakers down the hall made my heart pound. They stopped at the entrance of the door and that's when the stench hit me.
It smelled like sweaty old gym socks. I fight to hold back a gag.
“I brought you a gift, Little Flower.” He runs his finger down my cheek and I flinch. “I promise you’ll love it.”
The cheap cologne in front of me fades and is replaced by the sweaty unknown man.
A rough, calloused hand runs up my arm and across my collar bone.
“You weren’t lying Enzo. She is a beauty.
” His slimy voice caresses my ears, and a shudder runs through my body when I feel his knuckles brush the underside of my breast.
“She tastes just as good as she looks too. Go ahead, have a taste.” I heard my cousin from the corner of the room. Realization slammed into me, and panic flooded my body.
“No! Please…” My pleas were worthless.
Gym Socks pushes me to the bed, spreading my legs open. The musty odor of the sheets surrounds me, and rough strands of the wool blanket scratch my skin. His knees push mine aside as far as they can go, the darkness from the blindfold becomes suffocating.
Something inside me snapped and woke up when I realized that I was about to be raped by a man I didn’t know. Somehow, I gathered enough fight in me to kick my legs and pushed away from him with my feet.
He grabbed my feet and pulled me back down. I tried twisting out from his grasp, clawing at his face, but he crawled on top of me and sat on my hips. “You didn’t tell me she was a fighter. Get the fuck over here and hold her down.”
I hear Enzo’s footsteps before I feel his hands grab my wrist and hold down my arms. Try as I might, I could not pull them free. Fear takes over and I scream. Hoping and praying that someone, anyone, would hear me.
My screams are muffled with a rough, meaty hand, before a bitter taste of dirty sock washes over my tongue. The cotton rubbing against my teeth as the article of clothes is shoved in my mouth.
Twisting and bucking my hips. Doing everything I could to break free from underneath the two of them. My efforts did nothing but piss them off and the next thing I knew, pain exploded on the side of my face from the impact of a fist.
“Hold still you little bitch.” The sound of a zipper makes me freeze. And when I feel him at my entrance, I try one last time to break free. I managed to knee him in the back before I’m struck again, this time knocking me out.
When I woke up the next morning, I was in my own bed and my pussy was sore. It was never just my cousin after that. He always had Gym Socks join and they would take turns fucking my pussy.
I guess I should be thankful that’s all they did.
Savannah’s screams rip me out of the past and bring me back to the present. Blood is dripping from her hand and onto the floor. When I look closer, I realize that she is missing her pinky on her right hand.
“I warned you. Every time you smart off, I’m taking a finger.” Isaac is wiping the blade of his knife on jeans. I was so distracted, I haven’t heard a word either of them has said for the past fifteen minutes.
“Fuck you!” Savannah pants and sits up in the chair. She looks horrible.
“How about I just cut off both of your hands and save us both the trouble? It’s the least you deserve after putting them on Serena.” He taps her forehead with the flat edge of his knife.
“I should have just shot her that night on the bike.” She nods in my direction. “But watching her bleeding and leaving her to rot in her car was so much more satisfying.”
My spine straightens. “You were the one on the bike that night?” All this time I suspected that it was Tyler coming back. I never knew him to ride, but he was hiding an entire life from me. So, it wouldn’t be totally unheard of.