Chapter 16 | Caleb
Caleb
I had been overjoyed when one of my closest friends had returned to town and looked to be staying for a while, but it seemed that there was a sad reason as to why she came back home, one that I had only guessed until now. I was hoping what she was about to tell me was not what I had imagined.
Rage pulsed through my veins at the thought of someone possibly hurting her. I was trying to stay calm so I could focus if she wanted to talk.
She had taken my hand, and it felt like she was holding on for dear life. Like if she didn’t hold it tight, something bad may happen. When Duke saw her take my hand, he moved his head away but stayed right next to us, almost like he thought Dad’s got this.
“My ex, Ethan, and I met in my final year of college. We were both studying at a cafe and went to sit at the only table available. We ended up sharing it and chatting with each other while working on our assignments. We saw each other there a few more times, and each time agreed to share a table while doing homework. Eventually...” She had a death grip on my hand and her wine glass.
“...he asked me out and we went on a date. He seemed kind, charming, I thought...”
She took a sip of wine and cleared her throat. “Fast forward—” She paused again, took a shaky breath, and looked at me for a moment. “Sorry I’m taking forever,” she said in a tiny voice.
“It’s okay, Sunshine. You take as long as you need. I’m not going anywhere.”
She took a deep, shaky breath, and continued.
“We moved in together after a bit. I don't remember how long we'd been dating, but it was a little over a year after we'd met. Everything seemed okay and normal for the first year of us living together. Things were good for the most part. We would disagree on things, but nothing major. Just normal disagreements couples have. But then something changed in him. He had been getting a bit ‘nit-picky’ at things I would do, but then it got worse.”
Her voice broke as she said those last words, and it broke my heart to hear it.
She stopped talking for a couple minutes and hadn't looked at me either.
I, however, hadn't stopped watching her.
She shivered despite the fire still being warm enough, and her hand felt so cold.
I knew the shaking was probably mostly due to what she was telling me, but with my free hand, I grabbed a blanket from the corner of the truck.
“Rae, you don't have to tell me anything if you don't want to, or if you're not ready to,” I reassured her as I wrapped the blanket around her. I picked the other one up and placed it over her lap.
She shook her head and wiped a tear off her cheek. “Thanks for the blanket, but no, I need to tell someone, and I trust you.”
My chest tightened at those three words “I trust you” considering it sounded like she had no one she could trust right now. I offered my hand again, and she held it just as tight as before.
“He changed. He became angry at times for no reason. He would talk sternly to me, as if I was a child, and eventually he started to yell when he was angry. He would occasionally call me stupid.” She let out a huge breath.
“I was constantly told that my body was fat and that I needed to lose weight.
He really disliked my stomach, hips, and thighs. I know I'm curvy, but...I...”
She blinked back tears.
“Anyway...He also was aggressive when he'd touch me.
He—he would grab at my chest and be really rough with me instead of being gentle.
He liked to grab me on one side, using his other hand to do other things, or restrain me.
It wasn't just my chest he was rough with either. The things he did, they hurt.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, and she was just letting the tears fall now.
I winced when she said that. “No one deserves to be called stupid or anything of the sort, and I'm so sorry—” I ran my free hand over my face.
“I don't know why he would think grabbing at you or hurting you in any way was fun, or would make you feel in the mood, if that was even his intention. Those parts of you...All of you...You deserve to be treated gently, with love. You, your body, are also beautiful, and he was crazy for telling you otherwise.”
I could feel my blood boiling but had to stay calm or it might scare her off. I needed to know as much as possible about this guy, but if she saw my anger, she might shut down.
She whispered her thanks and then started to talk again but paused and said something like “sorry for ruining the evening” and she'd stop there.
I rubbed the back of her hand with my thumb.
“You are not ruining anything. Nothing at all. You can continue if you want, Sunshine,” I said with an encouraging tone, squeezing her hand a little.
Rae nodded and took a deep breath. “I had started to stand up for myself.
Trying to make him realize he was being a jerk.
One day, we were in the car and he'd been in a bad mood most of the day, so I asked him what the hell caused his bad mood.
He said he was just stressed about a project at work that he had been assigned.
He was frustrated that I'd gone out with a friend the night before instead of hanging out with him while he was stressed. My best friend out there had taken me out for my twenty-fifth birthday. Something that he had forgotten about.” She said those last words with a bitter tone, and I could hear the fight in her voice.
“When I told him I'd had that dinner with my friend planned for a while, he said I should have canceled it. I told him that would not be happening in the future and started to get out of the car.”
Her breath shuddered when she inhaled. She breathed a bit faster for a moment, and I covered the hand I was already holding with my free hand, her breathing settled.
“He...he reached up to my head and grabbed my hair right here.” She touched her roots.
“He pulled me back into the car. It happened so fast that I hadn't been able to get the door open much yet. I guess he realized what he was doing, so he let my head go, but I ended up hitting my head on the window of my door.” More tears fell and her voice cracked.
My mouth fell open. I was in shock that someone could treat her like that.
“Sorry. I know you didn’t ask for this.”
“Yes, I did. When I befriended you all those years ago, I signed up for the good and bad. When I told you the other day that I would be there for you, anytime, I meant it. Anytime about anything.”
She nodded and opened her mouth but then closed it immediately.
“Is that when you left?” I asked, hoping that had been the only thing that had happened. I also hoped that she was okay with me prying.
She sniffled and shook her head. “No. Sadly, it isn't. I went inside the house, thinking he would leave. He followed me, though, and said he wanted to apologize. I told him I needed space and he needed to go. He said—He said he would make it up to me, and he tried to kiss me.” She pulled her hand away when she said that, and my stomach felt like it was in my throat.
She was quiet and didn’t move for what felt like an eternity.
When she spoke, it was the worst thing I could have imagined.
“He...forced me to have sex with him. I told him I didn't want to. I told him to stop. He said he needed to make it up to me. He told me he was sorry.” Anger laced with hurt and fear coated her voice.
“Rae, are you saying he raped you?” I was trying to stay calm. She needed me to be calm.
She sniffled and shrugged, “I mean, we'd been intimate before, but I asked him to stop...”
“Honey...” I said as sweetly as I could as I offered my hand again.
She didn't pull away or flinch this time. Instead, she slid her hand into mine without hesitation. For a moment, we sat like that, silence stretching between us. I was about to continue talking when she shifted closer, pressing her thigh against mine. I froze. This move was so brave of her, considering what she just told me. I slowly and carefully lifted my arm and draped it around her shoulders, leaving the weight of it loose, ready to fall away if she moved—but she didn’t.
She leaned into me, resting her head on my shoulder.
We stayed like that for several minutes before I dared to speak again.
“Rae, he raped you. Regardless of what you'd done before, you told him to stop and he didn't.” I could tell she was processing the words I had just said. They were not easy to say, and I could only imagine how heavy it was to hear the reality of it.
“I was so stupid for not leaving right away. I should have run right after that. I tried a couple months later, but he caught me.” My chest hurt hearing her say that.
“Then I tried a few months after that, then again, after my twenty-sixth birthday. He had made me break off all friendships and I only got to call my parents when he was there so they wouldn’t be suspicious about anything. ”
My shirt was soaked from where her tears fell. I would gladly take the pain and fear she was feeling if I could.
A chill shook her entire body, and I saw that the fire had died down.
I hadn’t realized that it felt a bit chilly.
“Hold on just a minute.” I moved away from her body and immediately wanted to be back with her, but I also didn’t want her to be cold.
I quickly added a couple of logs to the fire, waited for the flames to come alive again, then hopped back up in the bed of the truck.
I knelt beside her before sitting back down in my spot, and I grabbed one of the flannels I had forgotten about.
Removing the blanket from her shoulders, I held the flannel open for her so she could slip her arms into it, then replaced the blanket over her shoulders.
“This okay?” I asked as I sat down in the space I had been in. I didn’t put my arm around her right away because I didn’t know if she would be ready for that again.
She looked at me for a few seconds. I felt like she was staring into my soul. The flames danced in her eyes as she stared at me, and I was so in awe of her beauty.
Rae looked down at my hand and picked it up, moving it so my arm was around her again, then leaned her head on my shoulder.
My heart felt like it would explode because of every emotion I was fighting off.
She had just been so vulnerable with me, reliving something traumatic, yet she initiated putting my arm around her shoulder.
We were quiet for a bit. Just her hip against mine, my arm around her, and her head resting on her shoulder. I didn’t know if she wanted to talk more, didn’t know what to say besides the fact that I was sorry she had to go through that.
She reached for my hand, and this time she laced her fingers in mine.
“I gave up for about a year and just lived with it.” Her voice sounded a bit stronger than it had before but it was still so quiet.
“I was hoping he would change, or something.
Every time I tried to leave, I did something different and he always caught me.
If I came home late from work, even if it wasn't my fault, I would get in trouble.
If I did not answer a text within a certain amount of time at work, he would appear at my work and make sure I was still there.
I was so afraid to go to anyone who could help, even law enforcement.
I tried once, and he made me seem like I was crazy.
He never left physical marks on me, so I could never prove anything.
It was mostly just emotional and mental pain he caused.
“He physically hurt me when he pulled my hair and occasionally when he wanted to be intimate.
You know...being aggressive like I said or occasionally he would smack me if I couldn't get in the mood or...finish...I was finally able to sneak a call in one day when I got home before him, and that night was when I ran.”
My brain was going a million miles a minute as I was trying to think of what to say. What do you say in a moment like this? I gently rubbed circles on her shoulder with my thumb.
The fire had died down again so there was only a soft glow illuminating our faces. “Rae. Sunshine. Look at me, please.” The glow of the flames was bright enough to see the look in her eyes. The fear. The pain. But I could also see how strong she was.
As she looked at me, a single tear rolled down her face. I moved to wipe it away and she flinched before I could touch her cheek. Dang it.
“Sorry, I...” Her eyes fell.
“Hey, I won't hurt you. I won't ever hurt you,” I said gently, getting choked up by my own tears as my palm touched her cheek and my thumb brushed away the tear. “You're safe here. You're safe with me. I am so sorry that happened to you. You deserve so much better than what he gave.”
She hesitated for a brief moment and then gave me a hug. I froze in surprise, my one arm still around her. I let her decide how long to hold on for. She pulled back quickly and then looked embarrassed. I gave her a smile to let her know she was okay and that I understood.
She leaned against my shoulder again, with my arm around her, and whispered, “Thank you.”