“You’re sure?” Vann asked. “Because that smug motherfucker rubbed me the wrong way.”
My lips twitched at his zeal. It had been six years after all. Six. I had survived the aftermath for six whole years. I wasn’t a victim anymore. I was a survivor. Even if the pain of what happened still threatened to suck out my soul and shatter it into a million unfixable pieces.
“It was a guy I didn’t know. I don’t even remember his name. I’m not sure I ever knew it to begin with.”
“What did you tell the cops then?”
I pressed my lips together, ashamed to admit the truth. And maybe this was what killed me the most—that at the end of the day I was a coward. I was a fucking coward that hadn’t even been able to stand up for myself.
These words had never left my mouth before. Not all of them. My therapist had heard broken, battered bits of the story, but never all at once. She had been the only person I’d been able to tell. And only because it had felt like life or death, only because the secret couldn’t stay trapped inside only me. I needed someone else to share the burden, to understand the depth of my pain.
“I didn’t,” I whispered, feeling like I would choke on the truth.
“What do you mean?”
“I didn’t tell the cops.”
His lips pressed into a straight line, his eyes filling with sorrow, frustration, and anger. So much anger.
The words came in a rush. Confessing my personal sin opened the floodgate and my secrets spilled from my soul. “I was drugged. I remember taking a cocktail from someone at Justin’s, but I don’t remember who. Someone had been passing them around. Mine was drugged. Or maybe they were all drugged. I’m not sure…” I turned my head, staring out the window at the city. I couldn’t look at Vann. I couldn’t bear his judgment. “I have memories of what happened, but they’re blurry. Foggy. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve made them up completely.” I took a steadying breath and let the words settle in the air. The truth, in all its messed-up-ness was like getting thrown off a bridge. The falling sensation rocked through me like a cannon.
“I can’t remember what he looked like,” I whispered. “I don’t have a name. Or a description. Or even clarity of what exactly happened that night.”
Vann ground his teeth together. I could feel his anger, his outrage. I felt sick, too afraid to ask if it was directed at me.
And then, as if I needed to prove myself to this man that had trusted me until now, the events of the night came tumbling out of me. “I used to be wild,” I told him. “A total mess. My dad was sick and then dying and then dead… It started in high school though. We were rich assholes with too much money and not enough parental supervision. I was at a party every weekend and nothing was off limits. Alcohol, sex, drugs… When my dad died, I just… I just lost the ability to care about consequences. He’d been absent my entire life. Even when I lived at his house, he wasn’t there. Even when he spent time with me, he was never there. Never truly present. I grew up being the thing he used to manipulate my mom. Or the party trick he would prance around social clubs with. I wasn’t his daughter. I was his weapon. By the time I got to high school and he could no longer use me anymore, I didn’t even know what my purpose was anymore. I mean, how fucked up is that? That’s when the drinking started. And then the drugs. And I was out of control. When he died… I don’t know, something snapped inside me. By the time I showed up to Justin’s party, I thought I didn’t care about anything. I thought nothing could make me feel again. Nothing could make me care. And then I accepted a drink I shouldn’t have. The memories are blurry at best. I woke up to hands all over me. They were rough… painful. I remember trying to swat them away, but I was so damn weak.” Tears leaked from my eyes again and I was surprised there was any moisture left in my body. My chest shuddered as I tried to breathe through the lancing pain across my rib cage. “He pulled off my clothes and I could not stop him. I was in and out of it, waking up in the worst of the pain. He would shove my face with his hand, shutting me up when I tried to make a protest. He smelled like too strong cologne and cheap beer.” I glanced at Vann, my voice breaking when I saw tears reflected in his eyes. “I woke up naked and sore and sick the next morning. Justin’s place was mostly empty. But I didn’t stick around to see if anyone was there or had seen anything. I fled. I ran away. And I never went back.”
“You didn’t tell anyone?”
I shook my head, loose strands of hair getting caught on my wet cheeks. “I didn’t know what to say. I was too ashamed to tell Ezra. I should have gone to the police, I realize that now. But I was twenty-one and terrified. I had no hard evidence. I had no memory of what the guy looked like. I had nothing. Plus, at the time, I was afraid that if they called in character witnesses, they would find out that drugs were… I wasn’t like this upstanding citizen, okay? And the thought of them using a rape kit on me…” I hiccupped through another sob, wishing I could shrug off the shame that had followed me since that day. “I would do things over if I could. I would do anything to go back to that morning after and make different decisions.”
“Dillon…”
“I did finally get tested for disease and pregnancy though. About a month later. I couldn’t stomach the idea of having to live with something venereal forever. And I was worried about a baby.”
My heart hammered at those awful memories. The thing about being violated was that it didn’t end after the act was over. The actual act, the actual rape, had been the quickest part. It was the rest that would follow me around for my entire life. It was the pain and sorrow, the grief, the shame and embarrassment, the stupid guilt that shouldn’t even be mine. It was the tests that happened later. The continued exposure as I tried to make sure my body had survived in ways my soul hadn’t. And for those women that were brave enough to tell law enforcement… they had more tests and testimony, they had court cases and lawyers and opportunity after opportunity to relive their horror. The rapist walked away free as a fucking bird, while we had to suffer it over and over and over.
“I’m clean,” I quickly added. “And there was no pregnancy caused by it.” The words tasted like ash in my mouth, but I still managed to spit them out. “In those ways, I got lucky, I guess.”
Vann moved so quickly I barely caught my breath before he was kneeling in front of me, his hands tentatively on my knees, his eyes dark and intense. “Not lucky. Nothing about that is lucky.” His fingertips dug into my knees and I found that I didn’t want to push him away now that the story was out in the open, no longer hiding inside only me. “Dillon, I am sorry that happened to you. It’s not okay. Nothing about it is okay. I am wrecked that you had to survive that violence.”
I shook my head, tears falling freely. “I feel like a coward for never telling anyone. He could still be out there. He could still be doing that to other women.”
He lunged forward, wrapping me up in his arms, cradling me against him. “You’re not a coward,” he whispered against my temple. “You’re the bravest woman I have ever known.”
“Vann…”
“Stop,” he ordered, his gravelly voice sounding as though it had been dragged over hot coals. “I refuse to let you blame yourself for any part of that night. That should never have happened to you. You should never have been put in a position where you would have to question your decisions every damn day. That fucking asshole should never have touched you. That’s what should have happened. He’s the goddamn coward. Not you.” He pulled back, cradling my face as gently as humanly possible with both hands. “I have never met anyone more beautiful than you, Dillon Baptiste. I have never met anyone as kind or as giving or as funny. You are everything that is beautiful and lovely. Everything that is sweet. You are the opposite of all that happened. And if I ever find out who it was, I promise, we will make him pay. I promise, he will suffer like you have. He fucking dared to hurt something I love so much, I would be happy to put him away forever.”
My wounded heart tripped over his words, finding more pieces of itself at the same time it grew in my dormant chest. “Love?”
He seemed to realize what he’d said and that it had been the first time that word had been whispered between us. It only took him a moment to nod with conviction. “Yes, love. I love you, Dillon. I’ve been falling slowly for you since you walked into the Bianca kitchen when you wanted to turn down the job. I had never seen anyone as beautiful and confused and frustrated as you. I nearly dropped the stack of plates I was holding that night. Since then it’s been a downward spiral into wholeness. I love you. I want to keep loving you.”
I threw my arms around his neck and pressed my heart against his chest, needing the comfort of his solid body. “I love you too,” I cried, fresh tears wetting my lashes. “I didn’t know I’d be able to feel this way. Not after what had happened. And not after confessing it. I didn’t even know if I was… loveable. Or if I had the ability to love back. I thought I would be empty forever. Forever broken. And yet you’ve made me feel like a can be whole again. Complete. Anything but empty. I love you, Vann Delane. I hope I always do.”
He held me like that for a long time. Our hearts beating against each other, our arms wrapped securely around one another.
He held me until I stopped crying. He held me until I could smile again. He held me until I was brave enough to face the world again.
