Page 158 of Drown Like Heaven
The drizzling rain blurred the line between the sea and the sky, fog veiling the horizon, the smoke-blue sky. I tucked my hand back into my pocket, the shark tooth held safe in my fist as I took shaky inhales of air, thick with mist.
It was unsettling to know that my secret lived in the brain of another person now. Mila knew that I’d been assaulted by my older brother, but I never went into detail about it with her—I didn’t go into detail with Mason, either. I had no idea how to say any of it aloud.
He fucked me and I kinda liked it, but I mostly didn’t, but I still begged him to do it, still begged him not to leave me, even while he made me wish I was dead. Do victims beg for it? Do victims orgasm?
I kicked my boot in the sand, an angry sob punching out of my chest. Mila had helped me get to the one free therapy session Blackpine offered all their students, but an hour wasn’t nearly enough time to fix me. The therapist said things likeit wasn’t your fault, andit’s just your body responding, andif sex was the only way he let you be close to him, it makes sense that you found yourself wanting it.
But I still felt dirty. Tainted by it.
Anthony lived in California now, and I hadn’t seen him in person in a while. I wondered if he ever thought about what he’d done to me. Probably not. He had a fiancée now, and I bet she didn’t know what he used to do to me. She probably didn’t even know I existed. I’d never met her, only seen her through social media.
I walked back up the beach towards the rocks, then grabbed a handful of pebbles and chucked them into the ocean as hard as I could. They landed in a group of little splashes, disappearing instantly below the waves, bruised with shadow. The sound of their impact was muffled, quieted under the rain and the swells of surf.
I picked up more pebbles, threw them again.
Again.
It did nothing to make me feel better.
I hated,hatedthinking about the summer when everything changed. Between middle school and high school. When my kind brother became someone terrible.
When he took my trust and used it against me.
My phone buzzed in my pocket and I figured it would be Mason texting me, but I didn’t want to see what he’d said. I wasrunning from him, scared of what he knew—in more than one way. Now, he knew about all the terrible, disgusting things that consumed my thoughts in the dark. My secret and my fantasy, the two forever linked.
I didn’t think of Anthony when I thought of my fantasy now, but he was the root cause of it, which made me feel weird and sick. Remembering myself in high school fantasizing about death, contemplating suicide, but ultimately deciding it would better ifhedid it…
I stared out at the waves, tinted charcoal and green, the cloud-smeared light filtering down on their frothy edges. I thought of Mason holding me below that surface, thought of how dark and cold it was down there, how alive I’d felt. How much I’d hated him when I took that first breath afterwards.
A dark-winged bird swooped past me in a shadowy blur, startling me for a second. I turned my head to watch it ascend, then settle in one of the salt-brushed trees rooted on top of the cliffs. The tree was growing crooked, leaning over towards the ocean a little, its branches sparse enough to see through.
I squeezed my fist in my pocket, the shark tooth poking my palm.
When I gazed at the ocean for a long time, its vastness swallowed me. It made me feel better, in a way, to see all that endless unknown. It grounded me.
I couldn’t keep watching it forever, though, because I had another lab today. In an hour, I’d have to see Dr. Killshaw—Micah—for the first time since having sex with him in his truck. Nerves made me stomach twist up while memories made my face warm.
There you go. Just like that.
How I was supposed to actually get any work done on today’s lab with Micah in close proximity was a mystery. Unless he never showed up to check on us, in which case I’d likely just bedistracted by his absence. I needed to know how he felt about what we’d done—would he want to pull away now? Would he be cold and cruel and distant again? Or would he let me keep clinging to the closeness that was growing between us?
I prayed for the third option, because I had no idea what I’d do if he dismissed me again. He was too far inside my brain to get out now, not without fucking wrecking me. Hopefully he meant all the things he’d said to me in the dark in his truck, all the murmured promises he’d pressed against my skin with his lips. His hands, mapping my body, holding me steady.
My journal was officially out of pages, now that I’d spent so much time writing about Micah and the fact that I’d fucked my professor. That and a mini-spiral over telling Mason about Anthony. I would need to get another blank notebook soon.
I wiped my fingers over my cheeks, brushing away the traces of my tears mixing with the rain as I went towards the rocks. It was still raining as I climbed, but my rain coat had done a good job keeping me mostly dry. My jeans were a bit damp, but the water didn’t sink through my boots so my feet were still warm and dry.
Once at the top, I grabbed one of the wooden posts holding up the rope railing, staring over at the way the land curved out into the sea, the trees stationed up high there. I liked how the forest lined the ocean in that way, liked the cliffs and gloominess. Eventually, I turned and walked to the bus stop, grateful for the covered bench while I waited for the bus to arrive.
I slipped my phone out of my pocket, surprised to see it was actually Eric who’d texted me instead of Mason. He was asking if I had time to pick up a shift later today. I told him I had lab, but was available after that, then put my phone back into my pocket.
The bus rolled up after a few minutes, brakes hissing, rain streaming down the flat sides in rivulets. I climbed on and satin a seat next to the windows, as usual, watching droplets race across the glass, joining up with other droplets on their paths.
By the time I was actually in the Unit Ops lab at the continuous stirred tank reactor station with my group, my clothes were almost fully dry. The only part of me that was still a little damp was my hair—the pieces around my face that’d been sticking out of my hooded raincoat. They were drying a bit curlier than the rest of my hair, but the frizz was manageable.
Quinn smiled when she saw me, her hard hat on and her eyes bright through her safety glasses. There was a natural friendliness between us since we were both girls in engineering, and needed to stick together.
“Hey,” she greeted. “How have you been?”
