Page 74 of Black
“Nuh-uh,” he said in an exhalation of air, “You said I could touch you as much as I wanted.”
“Whatever.” I yawned and placed a hand under my ear, waiting for sleep to take me away.
?∞?
Gabriel
I must have fallen asleep after my nightmare, because the next thing I remember is waking up with Cia fighting to get away from me. Even in the dark I could tell her eyes were wide with fear and my first thought was that I had somehow hurt her. “Don’t touch me, Dennis,” she whined.
“Dennis? Who is Dennis?”
“I don’t want to. Leave me alone.”
From the way Cia was looking at me, she had either gone mad or was somehow still sleeping. She kept calling me Dennis and accusing me of abusing her for at least two or three minutes until I finally had enough and went to shake her. That only made her scream, but at least it made her come to her senses.
“Stop shaking me, G.”
I did.
“Who is Dennis?” I demanded.
“Who?” she said confusedly. “I only know one Dennis.”
“And who is he?”
She hesitated.
“Cia,” I said in a deep no-bullshit-voice. “Who is Dennis?”
She answered in a whisper, “My mother’s boyfriend,”
My heart was already racing, but now bile rose in my throat too. “What did he do to you?”
“Nothing,” she said and looked away.
My voice softened. “Don’t lie to me, precious. You thought I was him and just begged me not to touch you. Did he…” I swallowed hard. “Did he molest you?”
Cia started crying but when I tried to touch her, she pulled away.
“Talk to me, sweetie, tell me what happened.”
“I can’t,” she said in a broken voice that fucking tore my heart out.
“You can tell me anything, sweetie, you know I’m here for you, I’m not him, and I’ll never judge or hurt you,” I begged and avoided touching her.
She was still crying and curled herself up in a fetal position, facing away from me. If she didn’t want me to touch her, I didn’t have any other choice than to lie down behind her and whisper once again that I was here for her and that I would listen.
“My mom met Dennis in a bar,” Cia started, in a voice so low that I had to listen carefully. “He was different from all of her other no-good boyfriends: younger than her and always dressed in nice clothes. The fact that I never saw him hit her was a big change too. My mom was so proud of him, because he worked in an office, had some money and a car. I remember being happy that my mom had met Dennis. She was nicer when he was around and he would occasionally buy me a slush ice or give me a lift to and from school. I was thirteen when they started dating and he was the first of her boyfriends to insist I called him Daddy.” Cia stopped talking and I waited.
“At first I didn’t want to call him Daddy, but my mom got furious and said I had to. She told me he loved kids and wanted to be the father I never had. It was lovely at first: his interest in me and how he always included me in everything they did… until…”
“Until what?” I swallowed hard.
“Until it started getting weird. He would ask me if I had gotten my period and if I needed a bra now that I was beginning to get breasts. There were times when he would accidentally touch me; and one time when my mom needed to go somewhere, he insisted on babysitting me, which was strange since I’ve been left home alone for as long as I can remember.
“The first time I remember being scared was that night when we were alone. He asked me if I had ever kissed a boy and suggested I could use him for practice.”
“Did you?”
