Page 11 of Captive Vows
With nowhere else to go, I grabbed my phone and called Amy. She was a friend who’d want to help me out, but it wasn’t like she could be my hero. Her apartment was too small. Her sister—who’d just had a baby—was sleeping on her couch. There was no room for me to come over.
I didn’t have a long list of friends to rely on. With all my waking hours spent cleaning for my dad and working at the store, I only had the free time to dance, not socialize and have friends.
“Hello?” Amy answered.
“Hey, um.” I cleared my throat, hating how croaky my voice was from the fear and running I’d done. “Long story short, I, uh, need a place to stay tonight.”
“What?” She peppered me with questions about what was wrong. I wanted to avoid admitting I’d almost gotten raped in my home. And I didn’t wish to rehash any details for her at the moment now. The less I allowed myself to think about what just happened—or didn’t happen—the better my odds were of not freaking out.
“It’s a long story,” I said, hedging an actual answer again, “but could you open the studio?”
It was the only other location where I could feel safe. I’d be safer there than at home.
“The dance studio?” she asked incredulously.
“Yeah. You don’t have room for me at your place. I don’t have enough money for a hotel room. And I can’t go back home.”
“Why? What happened?”
I shook my head as I walked, knowing she couldn’t see my gesture. “Please, Amy. Can you unlock it? Just for the night.” I didn’t know what I’d change before tomorrow night would come,but I could buy myself time for tonight. I had to figure something out. This couldn’t be my future, dammit.
“All right. You know where the spare key is for it.” She sighed. “I’ll text you the one-time guest security code when I get it. But you owe me answers later. You hear me?”
“Yeah, Sure.”
Yeah, right.
I didn’t feel like telling the only semi-friend I had that I’d almost been raped. I was used to being the poor girl. The outcast. The loser no one wanted to be near because I was supposed to be inferior. But to admit that I’d almost been raped? That was more humiliating than how I’d struck out flirting with Oliver.
Amy was true to her word. She texted me the code to get into the dance studio.
The second I was in the place that I considered my second home, I sighed and scanned the empty space. I didn’t dwell on how I’d failed to hit on Oliver. I didn’t let myself relive the flashback of Tony trying to rape me, either.
Here, I was safe. I was free.
All night long, I compartmentalized my trauma of the night in the only way I knew how to pull through this. I danced.
And danced.
And danced some more.
Losing myself to the beat of the music and seeking the comfort of the steps and choreography that I knew by heart, I stayed at the studio all night.
The bench near the restrooms would serve as a cot. The locks and security system wouldn’t fail me.
But come tomorrow, I’d need to prepare myself for another day of disappointments, namely, my dad.
What’s new with that, though?
He always let me down, and I bet that he would try to neglect me for the rest of his life.
Because no man is good.
None of them.
I closed my eyes and snuggled into the warmth of my hoodie, taking that morose thought to heart as I slowly drifted to sleep on the tiny bench.
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