Page 82 of Drown Like Heaven
After a little while, I stopped crying. Eric came in to check on me once, and he seemed relieved to see my dry face. I ended up putting my shoes back on and working for a couple hours, mostly because it was really slow and I hardly had to interact with any customers. But it also felt nice to be helpful. I owed Eric all the effort I had to give.
?????
In my bed that night, I was haunted. Tossing and turning in mysheets, chest aching, eyes sore from crying, body exhausted from fighting.
Did you run away, too?
Chapter 21
Dakota
Two days. That was how long it’d been since Mason said a word to me. Two days of spiraling, obsessively replaying our last conversation in my head. We’d gone longer before, but after the state I’d left him in…It was bringing me back down to a place I never wanted to be again, dredging up every awful memory I’d made throughout almost all of my formative years.
Waiting for Mason reminded me of waiting for Anthony.
I hated it. Hated waiting for him. Hated how many years I’d lost to him.
He didn’t like when I had any emotions, and I knew that was because it made him nervous. He didn’t like when I was sad, or angry with him, or anything other than docile and accepting. Every time I got mad at him, he’d disappear.
It was my punishment.
“Don’t do that shit, Dakota. You know I’m not trying to hurt you.”
“But you are!”
“How? How am I hurting you? I’m nice to you. I’m gentle.”
He was right. And I didn’t know what to say to that, how to articulate just how deeply the pain he’d embedded in me was. How it scraped my lungs every time I breathed. How my hearthad to grow around the complex shape of that pain, and I was disfigured now because of him.
“You know how, Anthony.”
He wouldn’t answer me then. Not when I moved to stand in front of him, or when I put my hands on his shoulders, or when I kissed his neck, or when I grabbed his dick over his pants.
I stepped back, standing on flat feet. Hating myself and hating him.
“I’m eighteen in three weeks. Will that make you hate me? Will you still want me then?”
“I’m not a fucking pedophile,” he snapped.
“No? You’re not?”
“No.”
“Yes you are.” My hands were shaking. It didn’t matter what I said to him.
“I’m three years older than you. That’s nothing.” His lips were pressed tightly together, and I couldn’t tell if he believed what he was saying or not. I didn’t know how he’d justified this to himself for as long as he had. Maybe it got easier with time for him, in the same way it got harder with time for me.
“Closer to four years,” I reminded him.
“Who gives a fuck?”
“You took my virginity when I was fourteen.”
“Because you. Begged. Me. To.”
I wanted to get away from him so badly. I didn’t want to keep doing this with him. It made me feel so dirty, and not only physically. My soul was tainted by what he’d done to me.
But every time he left, all I could do was cry until he came back. It wasn’t like I had a choice, anyway. I was tied to him forever.
