Author: Cassia Leo

‘For me? You mean . . . the song you’re going to record in L.A., you wrote that for me?’

‘Yeah, take one guess at the title of the song.’

She pulls her head back and looks me in the eyes. ‘Muffin stumps?’

He laughs briefly then fixes me with an intense glare. ‘Come with me. I’ve been working on this song for three years and no one has ever heard me sing it. I want you to hear it first.’

‘Me and a roomful of strangers. Just play it for me here, pleeeeeease.’

‘It will sound so much better at Wally’s. Besides, I’m beginning to think I should probably perform it for a crowd at least once before I play it for Kane.’

‘You think so?’ she replies sarcastically. I lightly dig my fingers into her ribs to tickle her and she yelps. ‘Don’t tickle me!’

‘Why?’ I chuckle.

Her body goes rigid and I can sense something has shifted. I quickly remove my hands from her sides and she scoots away from me. Her hands tremble as she crosses her arms over her chest.

‘I’m not going to tickle you,’ I assure her, but she’s not looking at me anymore. She’s somewhere else. ‘Mikki?’

‘I have to take a shower.’

‘Okay, do you want me to order you something to eat?’

‘No, just leave. I have to take a shower then I’m going to sleep.’

I sigh as I rise from the bed. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m sorry.’

‘Go, please.’

I close her bedroom door softly and I listen for a bit before I make my way back to the kitchen to grab a beer out of the refrigerator. Taking a seat on one of the stools at the breakfast bar, I sip the beer slowly as I try not to think about what could have made Mikki react that way. She hasn’t told me everything those pieces of shit did to her that night, and I’m not sure I even want to know. Any more details might send me on a revenge rampage.

I head back to her bedroom door to listen. The sound of the shower running puts me at ease, but it’s quickly followed by another sound. I can’t decide if it’s sobbing or whimpering; either way, I have to check on her or I’ll never forgive myself if I find out she’s hurt herself.

When I open the bedroom door, the bathroom door is wide open and, along with her cries, thick clouds of steam are billowing out into the bedroom.

Chapter 27: MIKKI – January 4th

I ball up my fists and try to grit my teeth against the pain, but I can’t suppress my cries. They come out like high-pitched gasps as the stinging hot water hits my chest, sanitizing me. Washing away the thoughts I just had.

The shower curtain is yanked open and I scream as the water is suddenly ice cold. I turn to escape the shower and I land in Crush’s arms.

‘Don’t touch me!’

‘Fucking shit! Look at your chest. You have to get under the cold water, now!’ He forces me to turn around so my back is against his chest and the icy water blasts the front of my legs. ‘I won’t look at you, just please get under the cold water.’ He lets go of me and pulls the shower curtain closed. ‘Get under the water or I’m calling an ambulance.’

I gasp as I step forward into the cold water. ‘Ow,’ I whimper, as the pressure and coolness of the water against my chest stings and soothes me at once. ‘I’m sorry,’ I say, sinking down onto the floor of the bathtub.

‘Are you in pain?’ he calls from the other side of the shower curtain, his voice so close and comforting.

‘Yes.’

*****

After ten minutes under the cold water, Crush sticks his hand through a crack in the shower curtain to turn the water off and give me a towel. I yank the curtain open, holding my breath as he looks me in the eye. He quickly unfolds the towel and holds it up for me. I step out of the bath and he wraps the towel around my shoulders. I wrap my arms around his waist as I lay my cheek against his solid shoulder. He’s so warm.

‘Do you want to tell me what that was about?’ he asks, lifting my hair out from underneath the towel.

‘I don’t think you want to know.’

It’s the only part of the attack that I didn’t write down the night before the detectives came to my house. It’s the only part of the attack I wish I could completely forget.

‘Anything you want to talk about, I want to know. Even if you don’t want to talk about it, I still want to know. I just want to know why you’re hurting. Even if I can’t make the hurting stop.’ He reaches for another towel and drapes it over my damp hair as he tilts my head back to look me in the eyes. ‘How’s your chest?’

‘Okay.’

He pulls the towel tight around my shoulders to cover me up, then he kisses my cheek. ‘I’ll be right outside the door.’

As much as I’d like to keep this part of the attack a secret for the rest of my life, I know there’s no way I’ll be able to do that if I want Crush to understand what just happened. Shame is the worst emotion we can carry inside of us; and I’ve been a nuclear reactor for shame for more than three years. Because it wasn’t enough for them to violate me. The one with the Red Sox cap wasn’t happy until I was completely humiliated.

I come out of the bathroom wearing the bathrobe I’ve been ignoring up until today. True to his word, Crush is standing just outside the door. He steps aside so I can get past him. The black box is gone and the comforter is pulled nice and smooth, as if nothing happened.

I sit on the edge of the bed, staring at my clasped hands in my lap. ‘They only took the pillowcase off my head once,’ I begin, as he sits next to me. ‘The one in the Red Sox cap wanted to see my face. But . . . that wasn’t enough. He wanted me to . . . to smile, like I was enjoying it.’

‘You don’t have to talk about it if it’s too much.’

‘No, I need you to hear this.’

‘Okay.’

Digging my fingernails into the palm of my hand, I force myself to remember it. ‘He . . . kept asking me to smile, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t stop crying. So he started tickling me and I couldn’t help it, I laughed a little and that got him excited. He started kissing me on the mouth. I thought of trying to bite his tongue, but they had my hands tied. I couldn’t fight them off. Then he started moving down, kissing my neck and . . . and my chest, and . . . He wouldn’t stop. He refused to stop until I . . . I let go. So I did. I’m so disgusting.’

I double over as my stomach cramps up, then I bury my face in my trembling hands as I weep for everything I lost that night. Everything they took. Everything I gave in exchange for my life. A life I don’t even want anymore.

‘I’ve never had . . . consensual sex,’ I say, my voice muffled by my hands. ‘I never did what they said I did when all those rumors spread in ninth grade. I never even got close to having sex after they . . . they raped me.’ I can hardly breathe now. I’ve never said those three words aloud. ‘I don’t know if I ever will because they ruined that. They ruined me.’

‘They didn’t ruin you.’ His voice is thick with emotion and it makes my stomach ache. ‘You’re beautiful, inside and out. And those . . . those fucking animals are the ones who are ruined. I wish I had killed them all.’

‘Don’t say that.’

‘It’s the way I feel.’

I take a few deep breaths before I sit up and tuck my damp hair behind my ears. ‘I’ll understand if you don’t want to sing that song for me anymore.’

‘What? You think what you just told me changes the way I feel about you?’

I shrug. ‘That’s the way it’s always been. No guy wants to be with a girl who doesn’t fuck.’

He hangs his head and takes a beat before he looks up at me and responds. ‘Mikki, I fell in love with a girl I knew three years ago for all of twenty minutes. A girl who wasn’t even conscious. Either I’m one sick bastard or I don’t really care about whether or not you’re the kind of girl who doesn’t fuck.’ He reaches for my face so I’m looking at him. ‘Look at me. I knew when I saw that tattoo on your chest – the bunny – that you got that tattoo because I had saved your life the day we met on Twitter. And I hate that you had to go through what you went through for us to meet again in that parking lot, but I knew from the moment I carried your limp body into my car that that was it. I knew that fate would never stop bringing us together. No other girl could ever – will ever – compare to the only girl who’s meant for me. Do you understand that?’

I nod, unable to speak, and he nods in return.

‘Good,’ he replies, brushing the tears from my cheeks. ‘Now, will you go to Wally’s with me so I can make an idiot out of myself in front of you?’

I nod again. ‘As long as you don’t make fun of me when I cry. No one has ever written a song for me.’

‘Well, you’d better get used to it cause I just started writing another one called “Muffin Stumps” that’s sure to be a hit.’

I smile at him, though the tears have started again. ‘Fuck muffin tops.’

Chapter 28: CRUSH – January 4th

‘You should get dressed,’ I say, planting one more kiss on her temple just to feel the softness of her skin. ‘I’m going to order some food and threaten the concierge with bodily harm if he can’t get Pretty in Pink on our TV.’

‘God, you’re so mean,’ she says with a smile as I rise from the bed.

Once she’s dressed in her pajama bottoms and a T-shirt, she comes out of the bedroom holding a hairbrush. She’s got a sly grin on her face.

‘The movie is paused and ready to watch whenever you’re ready,’ I say as she holds the brush out to me. ‘What’s this?’

‘Can you brush the back of my hair? My sister usually does it when it gets like this.’

I chuckle as I take the brush from her hand and she sits on a stool at the breakfast bar. ‘Is it going to hurt?’

‘Probably, but it’s even worse when I try to do it myself. I get frustrated and make a mess out of it.’ She closes her eyes and draws in a deep breath, preparing herself. ‘I know it’s because my hair is so damaged from the dye, but I don’t care.’ I bring the brush to the crown of her head and she immediately protests. ‘No! Start from the bottom and work your way up . . . please.’

‘Whatever you say, your majesty.’

I brush the bottom wisps of her damp, black hair, which are hardly tangled at all. But by the time I reach the middle, my heart is racing and I’m practically sweating just imagining how much pain I’m inflicting on her.

‘Are you sure you’re okay?’ I ask for the twentieth time.

‘Yes! I’m fine.’

When I’m done, my arm is aching and my stomach is in knots, but she just smiles and thanks me as she heads off to put the brush away. The food arrives shortly after that and Mikki and I sit on the sofa eating the pizza I ordered while watching Pretty in Pink.

‘Blane has crazy eyes,’ she mumbles through a mouthful of pizza. ‘I don’t believe a word he says. Andie should have ended up with Duckie. He really loved her. And he didn’t have that psychopathic glare.’

‘Yeah, but this wasn’t Hughes’s best film,’ I say, pausing the movie. ‘The Breakfast Club was his best, and Molly Ringwald ends up with the right guy in that film, right?’

She turns to me with an incredulous look on her face. ‘They all go their separate ways at the end of The Breakfast Club. She doesn’t end up with anybody.’

‘Exactly. Bender was an asshole and the other guys were pussies. She ended up with the right guy.’

She shakes her head as she sets her slice of pizza down on her plate on the coffee table. ‘Most guys think Bender is the cool guy in the movie.’