by Somer Canon
“No pain no gain,” Grenadine said behind me. “Isn’t that the saying? It’s true. Just suffer through this, little human, and you’ll have what you want from me.”
Terry got up from his recliner, jerking me up to my own feet in the process. I struggled, trying to pry his hands open and striking out at his body, trying to land a hit even though I couldn’t see anything from the way my head was angled. I was being dragged down a narrow hallway, fighting the whole way.
“Terry, let me go! What are you doing? Stop this! Stop! Let me go!” I was saying over and over again. He did not listen. He kept dragging me away by my hair. I heard a door open and was dragged through a doorway and then thrown by my hair onto a bed.
I landed face-first and spun around to look at Terry and get away, but he was on top of me before I could begin to scurry. He punched me in the jaw, sending me back onto the bed, seeing black and red spots blur my vision. I stayed back and stunned until he started ripping at my clothes, trying to strip me.
Something in my brain, something primal and made of fear, started beating on the inside of my skull. I closed my eyes as tightly as I could and started screaming as loud as I could, shredding my throat. I struck out and landed as many hits as I could, but he would not stop tearing at my clothes, cutting the soft skin of my body as seams shredded and sunk in. I hit him in the face, I scratched and slapped and tried to dig my thumbs into his eyes. He shrugged off my attempts at self-defense. He was so much bigger and stronger than me. His heavy weight on my legs kept me from being able to kick.
He hit my jaw again, making me black out for a few seconds. When I came to, my pants were off, my breasts were exposed, and he was standing over me, sliding his boxer briefs down his hips. I was groggy, and my head felt like someone had dropped an anvil on it, but I started scooting away from him in a panic. He reached out easily and grabbed my ankle, dragging me back towards him. I fought him by clenching my legs together, but it didn’t last long. He wrenched them open and placed his body between them in an infuriatingly easy way.
I was screaming and pleading with him, trying to scoot away from him but he just pinned me down and barreled into me. I screamed in pain, feeling myself tear and bruise from the inside. I continued to fight, but then the biting started.
As he pounded me relentlessly, he held onto my neck with one hand, a thumb over the front of my throat as if reminding me that a simple squeeze was all that he needed to shut me up. He lowered his head down to my shoulder and bit. He bit hard. I screamed louder and harder, but I could feel my voice giving. Blood was starting to make the back of my throat get gooey and clogged. I was coughing when he bit my breast. I was screaming when he bit my neck.
The police were beating on the door when I was able to comprehend anything other than the pain. Terry got off of me and I noticed that he had my blood all over his face, like he had rubbed his face in it, and there was blood on his softening penis. I rolled onto my side, curling into a ball, my back to my rapist. I was shaking uncontrollably, and my breath was coming out in harsh, painful wheezes.
“Mister Knight! This is the police! Open the door and come out with your hands above your head!” I heard the police command from outside. We must have been close to the front door but seeing as I popped into the living room via crazy fairy, I couldn’t know.
“She’s got to be next!” Terry screamed. “She found out and was going to write about it! She has to be next!”
I stayed curled up in a ball, feeling pain in places I’d never felt such agony, my eyes closed and running water freely.
“Come out, now!” the police commanded.
“I have a gun! I’ll end it all!” Terry screamed back. “She knew too much! She got too close!”
The sound of Terry’s front door crashing inward made me jump, but I kept my eyes closed. I heard Terry slam his bedroom door shut as I heard many feet thumping down the hallway towards us.
“Mister Knight! Open the door and come out with your hands above your head!” the police commanded.
“Terry! Open the goddamn door and surrender! What in the hell are you doing in there, boy?” another voice screamed.
“No!” Terry screamed.
“OPEN THE DOOR! LAST WARNING!” the second voice screamed again.
“She has to die!” Terry screamed.
A moment later, I heard a loud crashing, splintering sound and many thumps and shouts as the police burst into the bedroom and tackled Terry to the floor. I took a moment to slowly open my weary eyes. If I’d had a voice left, I would have squealed at Grenadine’s face inches from mine. She was kneeling beside the bed, staring at me, her black eyes regarding me coolly.
“This is a great favor I’m paying you, Christina. I’ve made it look like that wet rag of yours has been a very, very bad boy and he’s going to get blamed for things he didn’t do, all so you can get that much-desired acclaim. The word of a survivor is much more savory to the public than the word of a hungry, ambitious reporter.” She reached out a hand and stroked my cheek gently.
“Now all you have to do,” she whispered to me. “Is ask yourself how much you want it.”
Then she was gone. Someone touched my bare shoulder and I jerked away from the hand and fell off of the bed.
“She’s alive!” I heard a man shout. “She needs medical attention and a blanket! Get an ambulance out here now!”
Many “yessirs!” followed and someone knelt down beside me and covered me with the comforter off of Terry’s bed. I stayed curled up on the floor, not wanting to look at anybody. I couldn’t bear being seen and not having to look at the people looking at me let me keep at least that part of me numb while the rest of me was screaming in pain.
“Ma’am? Ma’am, an ambulance is coming. We’ll get you taken care of. You’re safe now.” A hand reached out again and patted my shoulder. I shuddered and jerked away, trying to wheeze a demand that I not be touched.
I felt the man’s presence kneeling beside me, not letting me be alone, as some scuffles continued. I heard authoritative stomps coming towards the room a moment before I heard a new voice.
“Is this the victim?” a man asked softly.
“Yes sir,” the man kneeling behind me said quietly.
“Got a name?” the bossy voice asked.
There was no vocal response. I assume the man kneeling by me just shook his head.
“Let me know where they take her,” the bossy voice said before stomping out.
“JESUS CHRIST, HEY GET OUT HERE!” I heard someone scream from just outside of the window that was above where I was curled up.
“What is it?” I heard the bossy voice ask.
“There’s blood everywhere in here, Todd! It’s his fucking murder shed!” the first voice said.
I wondered what they were talking about.
I was cold and in so much pain I couldn’t think on one subject for very long. I was surrounded by noise and movement, but all I could be at the time was a ball of pain and fear. My jaw hurt. My shoulder and breast and neck felt like they were missing chunks of flesh, but I was too scared to reach up and find out. My thighs and tender intimate places were throbbing and aching in a way that no amount of curling up or wriggling would take away. I wanted Anais. I wanted someone to call Anais.
I turned as best as I could to see the man kneeling by me. He was looking at me, alerted by my movement. He was about my age, early 30s. He reached a hand out to still me, but thankfully stopped short of actually touching me.
“You just stay still now, ma’am,” he said to me. “That ambulance will be here very soon.”
“Can you call my roommate?” I tried to say. It came out as a harsh whisper and I was reminded of my shredded throat. I tried to hold back the cough that came from my attempt to talk, but it came anyhow, and my entire body lit up with fresh pain and agony with the spasm. When the cough subsided, I was gasping in pain and I could hear the poor cop behind me fidgeting, trying to decide how to help me without touching me.
/> “I’m sorry, I can’t hear what you’re saying,” he said to me quietly. “You just stay still. I think that ambulance is here. But I’ll stay here with you, don’t you worry.”
I closed my eyes against the wall of tears building up over them and the warm spill of new salty water was almost comforting. It was the only warmth in my life then. I hoped that I would remember the kindness of the man kneeling behind me.
The paramedics came in a clamor of rattles and stomps, asking the cop in the room with me to step away so that they could get to me. A hand fell on my shoulder and I began shaking uncontrollably at the hand, trying to get it off of me.
“Alright, hold on, we need to get her on the stretcher,” a soft female voice said.
“Ma’am, if you can move, we need you to stretch out and get on this stretcher for us,” a man’s voice said.
“She’s really traumatized,” I heard the cop say.
“Okay, alright,” the female voice said. “Eric, help me lift her.”
Hands were all over me. I couldn’t get them off. They were touching places on me that hurt. They were touching places Terry had pulled and pounded and slammed and bitten. I was crying as they maneuvered my body to lie flat on my back on a cool, hard stretcher. I kept my eyes shut tightly as hands adjusted Terry’s comforter around my body to maintain modesty. I was tucked in like a scared child after a nightmare about the thing under the bed. I wished it were that easy. I was living a nightmare about the thing in the pond.
I was given a lovely shot of something in the back of that ambulance that made my body feel warm and heavy, but there was no more pain. The two paramedics, a round pink woman with kind brown eyes and an older scruffy man fussed over me, looking at my face and talking quietly to each other. They asked me my name and I whispered it as best as I could to the kind looking woman. She was writing on one of those scary metal clipboards that always make me think of morgues.
With my mind clouded by that blessed shot, I wasn’t quite sure, but it seemed that my ambulance ride was strangely lengthy. Terry must have lived far out in the sticks.
I asked for Anais, hoping that the kind woman was writing that down on her morgue clipboard.
“Please call Ana,” I said. “I want her here with me. Call Ana. Ana will know how to make this better. Call Ana.”
I was vaguely aware of being awakened by movement. There was darkness above me and then blindingly bright lights. People kept trying to ask me questions, but the shot was so amazing, and I was so relaxed that I couldn’t be bothered to really even focus on what exactly was being said to me. I was warm, and it felt safe to be warm after being so cold and in so much pain while waiting to be taken out of Terry’s house. I wanted to lie in quiet while enjoying being warm. I wanted everybody to be quiet. I wanted Anais to sit with me and tell me to remember to breathe. I wanted a Zebra Cake to fill my mouth with sweetness and send a wave of comfort and happiness over me. I didn’t want to wake up and think about Terry’s dead eyes staring into me as he beat and raped me.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I was allowed that first night and half of the next day to languish in a drugged-out sleep. When I woke up, Anais was in the room with me, pushing buttons on the television remote in agitation. My movements alerted her to my wakefulness and she came to me and hugged me fiercely, her tears warming the side of my face. I grunted, her beautiful hug causing me quite a lot of pain. I hoped she didn’t hear it.
“Girl, I always said that your luck was shit,” she said, pulling away and looking at my face. She saw something that made her cringe and she turned away, pulling something out of her oversized bag. It was a box of Sunny Cakes, a Nummy Nellie treat. It was like presenting a glass of water to a person fresh out of a ten-mile hike in the Sahara.
I was so grateful that Anais was there that I burst into tears at the sight of that box of treats. She dropped the box onto the bed beside me and wrapped her arms around me again, holding me tight. This time I ignored the pain. I breathed in the smell of her spicy perfume and relished her warmth as she held me, protecting me.
After we had both calmed down a bit, Anais offered to call my mom. I really didn’t want my mom there freaking out over me, but there was no getting around it. She could see all about the mess on the news and it wouldn’t be fair for her to hear about her daughter being attacked from a news anchor.
The next bit of business was having the rape kit done. I was humiliated at being taken to a cold examination room without Anais, alone with a doctor and a nurse. They explained every step of the process to me and asked if it was alright if they continue at every turn. If I was uncomfortable with something, it wasn’t done. I was thankful for their tact, but I still had to submit to a vaginal swab, a mouth swab, and having stuff scraped from under my fingernails. They combed my pubic area for pubic hairs not belonging to me, photographed me inside and out, and asked a lot of uncomfortable questions. It took nearly three hours and I was grateful when they handed me a slip of paper with the number to my rape kit on it. I was sore all over again and wishing that I could have another one of those shots that reminded me of what it felt like to be warm and safe.
That evening, Sgt. Todd Blaniar himself came to my bedside to talk to me. It hurt to sit up in bed too much. The parts of me that were typically beneath me in a seated position had taken a hell of a beating and lying back was most comfortable physically, but it was uncomfortable talking to a strange man in that position.
“Hello, Sergeant,” I croaked when he’d introduced himself in a stiff and formal manner. “We talked on the phone once and you told me to treat everybody with respect, remember?”
“Yes, Ms. Cunningham. I remember you,” he answered. He looked like he hadn’t slept in a decade and the sweat stains around the collar of his shirt and the stink of stale coffee wafting off of him told me that I was almost correct in that assumption.
I’d had some quiet time that day to think about what had happened. I needed to get out of my own sphere of pain and misery and try to figure out exactly what the hell had gone on the night before. Grenadine had done something to Terry that made him go berserk and do those things to me. I truly did not believe that he would have been capable of doing what he did otherwise.
I was still foggy on a few points, but I had every intention of grilling the poor tired Sgt. Blaniar about it. What was the murder shed? Had Terry talked and confessed to anything? What did I find that he kept screaming about to the police? Had he snapped out of whatever Grenadine had done to him and was he sorry for what he had done to me? I needed to know. I also needed to be careful. I couldn’t talk about Grenadine at all, which meant that I was going to be lying through my teeth when giving my statement. Everybody already knew that Terry and I were having a fling, so hopefully nothing that I said was going to be too far-fetched.
“How are you feeling?” Sgt. Blaniar asked me.
“I’m pretty sore,” I answered honestly. “They’ve taken me off whatever major shots they were pumping into me and putting me on Percocet. My roommate is at the pharmacy now filling the ‘scrip.” She had also taken my sobbing mother with her which was a blessing. Anais always knew the best course of action. Always.
He sat down on a chair by my bed and pulled out a pad of paper and a pen from his front shirt pocket.
“I need you to tell me about last night. Start from the beginning and take your time,” he said.
I’d practiced this, so I didn’t pause or look like I was thinking too much.
“Well, Terry and I had a sort of fling going on while I was in town. It was supposed to be really casual, his idea, and it was nice until he started acting strange,” I said.
“Strange how?” Sgt. Blaniar asked.
“He started professing feelings of love for me and he wouldn’t leave me alone when I tried to break things off with him,” I answered.
“So how did you end up at his house last night?” he asked me.
“I was out to dinner at this steak house next to my ho
tel. It’s the Holiday Inn out there, do you know the one?” I asked. He nodded at me, scribbling in his notebook, so I continued.
“I was sitting at the bar having a beer and some food when he came in and sat next to me. This was uninvited, mind you. He wanted to tell me that he had had to use me as an alibi when questioned about the disappearance of Stephanie D’Agostino and that I needed to go along with it.”
“Was the alibi that he gave to the police not true?” he asked me.
“I brought him breakfast at his place of work that morning, but I had an interview with Bridget Maditz at McDonald’s at about mid-morning and I didn’t see him again until late that night when he came to my hotel room to tell me about Stephanie’s disappearance,” I answered honestly. I’d been slightly worried before things went to hell for me that Terry using me as an alibi might have been murky since I had only been with him in the early morning, but he was an honest man and surely he had a reputation as such. That would have been good cushioning in case there were gaps in his story. That, and he actually was innocent of anything happening to Stephanie.
“Alright, so back at the steak house, he tells you to go along and be his alibi, then what?” Sgt. Blaniar probed.
“I told him that I would go along with it,” I confessed. “But then I asked him to leave me alone and after a few more words, he left. About an hour later, I was walking back to my room when he drove up to me in his truck and asked me to go for a ride with him. I was tired of him bothering me, but he really did seem like a harmless man. He’d been gentle and kind, albeit a bit annoying and hard to get rid of. I agreed to take the ride so that I could try to convince him that I didn’t want to have any sort of real relationship with him and to leave me alone.”
“Mmhmm,” Sgt. Blaniar probed, still writing.
“He took me to his house and I sat down in his living room thinking he’d offer me a drink and we’d have a serious talk, maybe go to bed together one last time, then he’d take me back to my hotel. But that’s not what happened. He started pacing around the room, really agitated and he kept asking me what I knew about him that was making me want to break it off with him. I didn’t know what he was talking about, I just kept trying to convince him that I wasn’t on the market for anything other than a casual hook-up kind of relationship. I mean, I live six hours away in Reading, Pennsylvania. Seriously, a long-term relationship between two busy people is just stupid wishful thinking. But he kept asking me what I knew, what I had found out. I kept telling him I didn’t know, but he kept telling me that I was lying and that I knew too much. That’s when he attacked me,” I said. I was surprised at how easily the words came out of me.
