Page 2 of Like A Moth To A Flame

They wouldn’t take it.

I wouldn’t let them.

I would fight. I’d fight with everything I had left in me, but how much did I have left to give?

Was it enough?

The seconds passed into minutes, and then time seemed to stand still. His shaking breath was the only thing that sounded around us, and I could hear it coming in faster, shaking bursts.

What was he planning?

I heard a grunt and then felt the unmistakable touch of hands pushing my thighs apart and pulling at the fabric of my shorts, and finally, I understood.

Horrifically, I understood.

I opened my mouth to scream, but all I managed was a sharp exhale of air and a groan of pain. He hadn’t bothered to unbutton my shorts, instead ripping them down and jolting me with an electrical bolt of pain through my hips.

“W-what are you—What are you doing?!”

It took more effort than it should have to get the words out, but by the time I did, he’d pulled off my shorts completely and tossed them across the room, judging by the sound.

I could feel his hot, unwanted touch on my exposed skin, and a shiver of revulsion coursed through me. I would have vomited if I had had anything to bring up.

“Stop! What are you doing?!”

Tears welled up in my eyes as I pleaded with him, my voice trembling.

But there was no empathy in his touch. I could feel it in the way his fingers pushed and probed, touching places another human hand had never touched before. I was at his mercy, a prisoner to his twisted desires.

He quickly removed the digits as he moved over me, and shortly after, something else took their place.

As the room fell into an eerie silence, the only sounds that filled the air were my gasping cries, his grunts, and the thumping of my heart.

I wished for death, but it didn’t come.

No matter how hard I begged, it never came.

“Please,” I whispered, my cheek scraping against the cold, unforgiving concrete as he continued to push against me. “I need h-help. Please…”

I looked up, my eyes searching through the darkness, and I saw the unthinkable—a sliver of light, and the warmth of my savior’s gaze.

1

You made it through your darkest days

Moth

The smell of burning rubber filled the air as my little red convertible skidded to a stop. I knew that stop sign was there and still almost flew past it. Overgrown corn stalks nearly covered it, and briefly, I wondered how many out-of-towners had missed it altogether.

The cornfields stretched for miles in every direction, waving golden seas that I longed to get lost in—if only I didn’t know better. Seeing them now, I missed the time when I was blissfully unaware of the horror stories about the many people who got lost in Kansas’ unbroken cornfields every year. It was a dangerous maze, but still, it called to me.

The sun beat down from a cloudless blue sky. I already knew by the time I got there, I’d be burnt to a crisp. I could already feel the sizzle and my skin tightening around my knuckles. My freckles only stood out when I tanned, which never happened, given that I rarely saw the world outside of the clinic back home. In the dead of winter, they werenon-existent.

After this weekend, I’d be straight-up Raggedy Anne.

The road ahead was a black river, flowing east to west. To the east, I could disappear into the unknown and leave this life behind. To the west, it was a crumbling compass that pointed to the town of Cottonwood Falls. I’d grown up there. My entire life was there. So why did I want so badly to never go back?

Except, I knew why, even if I didn’t want to admit it to myself. I knew why I hated the tiny town, and it’s not just because of the ‘good old boys’ and ‘everybody knows everybody’ cliche. My waking nightmare had happened there. My abduction had happened there. My innocence was lost to the knowledge that men were dangerous and they would hurt me. Their actions had caused me so much pain and damage, in so many ways, that even fourteen years later, I still hadn’t recovered.

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