Page 69 of Caged
Sunday night, after Kieren drove me to DG and waited for me outside in his car while I facilitated the weekly chapter meeting, neither of us spoke to each other. I stayed in his room, compliant, and finished my classwork due on Monday, alone. He said he had to oversee Sigma’s weekly fraternity meeting and then preside over some hazing bullshit of the newly admitted brothers. He stumbled in around one a.m., drunk and smelling like weed.
When I was bored last week, I went through his medicine cabinet for answers, but it only resulted in more questions. Namely, the only medication present was a bottle of prescription-strength pain pills for his ongoing TMJ issue after a high school car accident rearranged his jaw structure. I’ve gone through his medicine cabinet before, when he first brought me to his house in Connecticut our freshman year, and I remember seeing several other medications for the treatment of anxiety and mood stabilizers.
I know Kieren has a lot on his plate, not to mention all that happened last summer with his father, and I wish he would consider therapy. I’ve mentioned it before, but my suggestion clearly triggered him. Apparently, I’m the one who needs therapy to work through my daddy abandonment issues and the tumultuous relationship I’ve always had with my mom. Frankly, I don’t disagree. I know I need a fuck ton of therapy, but therapy is expensive and unfortunately for me, cost prohibitive.
Monday morning of this week, while I was getting ready in Kieren’s en suite bathroom wearing nothing but a towel, he woke up, stalked into the bathroom to pee, took one long, rakish look at me, then ravaged my body with a raw desire I hadn’t felt since he returned at the top of the year. No chains, no nipple clamps,no e-stimulator machine like he normally enjoys using, just fucking and kissing on his bed until our lips were swollen and our need satiated. I missed my first two classes that day, and it took every modicum of strength I had left to leave his bedroom. If Harrison weren’t my designated chauffeur, I probably would have skipped the entire day of lectures.
But when I got back to Sigma Monday evening, the earlier version of Kieren had vanished. He was cold and distant, hardly acknowledging my presence, gone again for hours. What I don’t understand is which version of Kieren is the real him. Just when I think we’ve settled into a way of being with each other, things shift. This hardened version of him is the one I remember from our freshman year. Back then, I chalked it up to exhaustion and anger from the Sigma pledge process, but I’m not sure that conclusion holds. Sophomore year, I watched him lose himself, and when the alcohol wasn’t enough, and the cocaine and ketamine weren’t enough, he let the demons that plague his mind win.
I walked away at the end of my sophomore year. But these oscillating versions of Kieren, a detached, power-hungry monster one minute and possessive, love-starved boy the next, have stripped me to the bone. I worry the former version of Kieren is most aligned with his true self, and that the fleeting moments of insatiable desire and doting concern are nothing more than performative. Maybe Kieren isn’t the only one who battles addiction issues, because somewhere along the way, I’ve become the addicted princess who willingly cohabitates with the devil, trapped in a castle of my own volition.
I know this, and yet I’m still here.
Why?
Why am I still here?
I’m living with my boyfriend, and yet why do I feel so empty and alone?
Why can’t I find it within myself to leave him?
I have a phone, a car, and friends, even if my friends are currently living on the other side of the Atlantic.
Tears break free under my closed eyelids. I force every muscle in my face to tense, to freeze, as I collapse in silence. Only when I’ve held my breath to the point of fainting do I succumb and suck in a ragged breath.
“Are you okay?” Harrison asks in that lifeless, monotone voice of his that makes me want to throat punch him. I almost forgot he was here, which is stupid because he’s always fucking here.
No Harrison, I’m not fucking okay.
But I don’t say that because I know where his loyalties lie, so instead I say, “I’m getting my period.” I don’t explain further. There’s no need, because what more does a simple man require than the thought of a bleeding vagina to get him to shut the fuck up.
“I just need twenty minutes,” I say as I slam the car door. Honestly, I don’t know how much time I need, but I also don’t give a fuck.
I wipe the tears of my impending nervous breakdown away and march up the stairs of Delta Gamma. The padlock flashes with acceptance, and I swing open the front door only to be blasted by a panic-inducing ruckus of fifty-plus female voices talking simultaneously.
I stick to the perimeter of the large dining room. Every few steps, one of the members will look up from her conversation and offer me a friendly smile or wave. The mask I don as sororitypresident feels heavier with each wear, because underneath the mask, I’m cracking. Unravelling. Crumbling into a pile of ash.
Ten paces in front of me, I spot her.
“Hey Kasey,” I say, bending down to tap her on the shoulder. She startles slightly at my touch, and I feel guilty for interrupting what seemed like a juicy gossip session. “Could I talk to you for a minute? It’ll just take a second.”
“Oh, sure.”
She gives me a wary half-smile and pushes her chair back to stand. I motion with my index finger that we should head to a different room for this conversation and make my way to a quiet nook in the foyer.
“How are you doing?” I ask, turning to face her.
Kasey’s eyes meet mine and then quickly look away. “Fine, you know. Excited for spring break.”
Her clipped answers give me pause, and I can sense she’s deeply uncomfortable in my presence. It’s… heartbreaking. I’m supposed to be a confidant, a mentor, a mother figure to these young women, especially to Kasey, who is my Grand-Little. I was supposed to be a friendly face, accessible and caring, before Kieren gave me a different face, one that I didn’t ask for and quite frankly, no longer want.
But apparently, this new face is permanent, and the reason why I’ve hardly been at my sorority this semester. I’ve cancelled just as many chapter meetings as I’ve held. I’ve let emails from sorority headquarters about our finances go unanswered. I’ve not even done the bare minimum, and it’s painfully obvious to everyone. I have not been the leader I had hoped to be when I took this position. I knew it was a thankless role, but I’d intended to show up and try.
I push my failures as sorority president aside and compartmentalize them for a later date. “The other night,” Ibegin, “you said someone had been running their mouth about… you know.”
I don’t want to say the words ‘Sigma Little Sisters’ out loud, and I wonder if my extreme paranoia is out of fear, or if I’ve just been brainwashed by Kieren.
“Was the name of that someone Rory? The same Rory who is missing?”
