He always was a monster. I was just too blind to see it. Too stupid. Too pathetic.
My vision’s gone black and my entire body is shivering, shaking, soaking in sweat, my legs drawn up to my stomach. The knuckles on my hands are white from how hard my interlocked fingers are pressing down on my legs.
“I’m here,” says a faraway voice. “I’m here for you, Piper.”
I close my eyes, wishing it were Quill speaking, even though the futile hope breaks my heart again. It’s not Quill. I know it’s not Quill. It’ll never be Quill again. And even when it was Quill, it wasn’t him but a fucking liar speaking those words.
All things must end, and if I’d ever doubted it, it was beaten into every part of me three years ago. I guess it goes for the good things as well as the shitty ones. Although the panic attack feels like it’s going to last forever while I’m in the throes of it, it ebbs at last. The oppressed, panicky sensation that’s gripped me fades and I take in little spurts of air.
“You alright?” murmurs Josh. “What was that all about? Did you know them?”
I blink at him from behind the round, fogged-up horn-rimmed glasses he thinks are cool. A thousand things run through my head, a thousand possible explanations, but the words that pourout of my mouth before my mind has even had time to catch up are, “Yes. They raped me.”
19
Piper
Present Day
There’s a long pause as Josh stares at me. He seems to be searching for the right thing to say. Meanwhile, I’m lost in my painful memories.
Three years of being away from the nightmarish town of Astley had helped me to get back to that cheerful, sunshiny Piper of my childhood. Eleven year old Piper who welcomed bullies with a grin. Eleven year old Piper who naively believed everything was okay, as long as her silent protector was around.
Leaving for college was a breath of fresh air. Memories of Quill never left me, but the more recent ones faded, allowing me to enjoy the old ones.
I actually made friends. Two girls who didn’t seem to care that I was poor or wore thick round glasses. I went out and partied, and studied, and got good grades. I was going to get away from Astley permanently. I was majoring in English, and even though my new friends told me that was a bullshit degree, I had big dreams of being an author, and teaching on the side.
Now, all of that’s in the past tense. Because my parents are dead, I’m stuck in Astley once more, and my bully is back in my life.
That bully is also a rapist and a murderer, and he killed my parents. I just fucking know he did.
He’s capable of anything. He told them to rape me, after all. Didn’t he?
Bitter tears blind my eyes. I once believed it was impossible toforget that night. But I guess nothing’s impossible, since it had all but disappeared from my mind.
It’s crazy how powerful minds are.
When the rape happened, it happened to Pissed-off Piper. I watched from a far-off place before thankfully passing out. It didn’t happen to me. It happened toher.
And I leftherin Astley when I went to college. When I thought about that night, I thought about it as you might think about some bad thing happening to an acquaintance. It didn’t touch me. I didn’t let it.
Maybe that’s why I dreaded coming back so much. Maybe some part of me knew that the memory of that night would come rushing back the minute I stepped foot in Astley.
Only it didn’t. I guess that’s what murders do to you. You lock eyes with the dead, unseeing ones of your father, and suddenly, nothing else exists. Nothing but the need to know answers, because if I’m not hunting for them, then Dad’s corpse begins, slowly but surely, to turn from a vague nightmare to a horrible reality in my mind.
Yes, the mind really is a powerful organ. It feels like it’s been doing somersaults to prevent me from dealing with all the things I can’t stand to deal with.
It thinks it’s protecting me, but it’s drowning me instead.
Because the second I laid eyes on Dane and Liam again, I realized I wasn’t ready.
I wasn’t ready for the memories to come flooding back.
Now, I sit on the ground, my head leaning against the chair, my skin coated with sweat, and I can’t even fucking get a word out. It’s all I can do to remember how to breathe.
“Come on,” says Josh suddenly. “We have to get out of here.”
My mind is blank as he grabs my hand and yanks me up. He clicks on the elevator button and scans the visitor’s badge, and I follow him numbly inside. Then we leave the building hurriedly,ignoring the receptionist’s voice.
