by Trudy Stiles
It’s only ever been Noelle.
I’m in love with a dead girl.
Noelle
Past
Age 17
I LISTEN FOR THE GARAGE door to close and wait a few extra minutes. My father and Tonya just left for a long weekend in New York City. Then they have front row seats to the Macy’s Fourth of July fireworks on Monday night. So they booked a suite at the Plaza for the weekend. A trip that I respectfully declined. Tonya was as relieved as I was. She hates me, and the feeling is more than mutual. She really did some damage to me yesterday when she wrestled me to the ground, punching and kicking my side. A large bruise is now visible on my outer thigh, and I’ve been covering it up.
For the first time in a while, I was almost able to overpower her, but then she reminded me of something she could expose that would destroy my family forever. That’s when I relented, allowing her, once again, to take control and finish the beating. Over the years, she’s learned to avoid my face so my injuries aren’t as visible, but it doesn’t matter. I can feel the pain for days, and sometimes weeks, after she unleashes her fury on me.
And my father still has no idea. I can see pain in his eyes every single day he’s with her. He is being tortured in his own way, underneath her thumb, I’m sure. For him, I take the abuse. For him, I’d die. Even though he’s unaware of what she’s been doing to me since I was younger. The hell she and her family could unleash on ours is staggering, so I continue to endure her blind rage as best as I can.
Before they left, my father pulled me into his office to remind me of how I should behave while alone for the next four nights. I plan to relax, maybe play some ball with Heath, and explore every corner of our house, trying to find the ‘evidence’ that Tonya says she has. I need to destroy it, before it can destroy us. His eyes were sad and hollow when he kissed me goodbye. The words “I’m sorry” escaping his lips more than once. If he only knew what else I’ve endured because of Tonya’s rage, he would break to pieces. I hugged him tight, told him I loved him, and watched them leave together. Tonya’s glare over her shoulder as they walked out the door sent chills up my spine, the bruises and muscle aches still sore from yesterday.
Once I’m sure they are gone, I slip on my flip-flops and the baseball hat I’ve been wearing since I was a little girl, and jog out the back door. The sun has just set and flashes of light streak across my backyard, indicating that the fireflies are out in full force.
“Hey,” I call out to Heath who’s already lounging in one of the chairs out by our Wiffle ball field. He’s set up a small table with snacks and what looks like a pitcher of lemonade. “I hope you didn’t start our game without me.”
He stands up from his seat as I leap into his open arms. When he wraps his hands around my waist, I stiffen as a dull ache radiates throughout my ribs.
“You okay?” he asks, concern on his face.
“Yeah, you know me. Super klutz,” I lie for what seems to be the thousandth time since I’ve known him.
“What did you do this time?” he asks, nuzzling into my neck. “You smell good.” He presses his lips lightly against my throat, and I giggle.
“Oh, you know. Ever since I got that new bed, I’ve been walking into the footboard, it juts out so far into my room. See?” I push away from him and tug up the side of my shorts, showing him the giant bruise caused by Tonya’s spiked heel. “Walked right into it, like a dumb-ass.”
“Jesus, Noelle. That looks awful.” His eyes find mine, and he grabs my hand. I can tell he wants to press further, but he should know by now that I won’t answer any more of his questions. He’s grilled me in the past about my relationship with my father. With Tonya. He’s even come right and asked me if I’ve gotten “smacked around” by either of them. I’m always able to deflect his probing questions, but I know he’s not going to continue to let this go. I can go months without receiving a beating from Tonya, and actually the past year, I can only count three times that she really did some visible damage to me, present injuries included. Not that I consider myself lucky, but I’ve learned ways to avoid triggering her insane rage.
Heath’s face hardens. “You know I don’t believe you, right? I’ve never believed any of the crazy stories you’ve told me about your injuries. If you don’t tell me the truth, I’m going to tell my father and–”
“No!” I shout, grabbing his hands. “You can’t say anything. Promise me. Please. Swear to me you’ll keep your mouth shut.” He can’t tell anyone what he thinks is happening to me. It will destroy everything. My father would be lost to me forever.
“What the fuck is going on?”
“You need to stop asking. Please, I’m begging you. Please just trust me.” Tears spill down my cheeks, and he pulls me against him again.
“I can’t keep that promise anymore, Noelle. I can’t keep seeing you like this and not do anything.” As his arms tighten around me, his warm breath tickles the side of my neck.
My body stiffens as I say the words I know I’m going to regret. “If you say anything to anyone, you’ll never see me again.”
“What?”
He releases me and leans back so he can look into my eyes. “Exactly what I just said. You need to trust me or this is over.”
Heath and I officially became a couple when he asked me to junior prom last year. Although he likes to remind me that he fell in love with me the first time I hit a home run off of him when we were kids. For him, it’s been that simple. Stolen kisses in my closet. Holding hands when we walk through the woods together. Our almost nightly talks, through my open window. He’s given so much of himself to me over the years and I’ve only given him what I want him to see, hiding the secrets of my abuse at the hands of Tonya.
“You can’t mean that.” He looks distraught, scared.
My eyes lock on his, and I’m determined to make him believe me. “I’ve got everything under control. But, I swear, if you say anything to anyone about what you suspect is going on with me, I’m gone. For good.”
He shakes his head, breaking eye contact with me to look down at the ground. “I trust you, Noelle, but I can’t keep quiet after seeing you beat up so bad. I’ve seen it too many times. I don’t believe your stories anymore and haven’t for a very long time.”
My eyes widen. “You haven’t told anyone, have you? Your mother? Your father?” Fuck. If he hasn’t believed me, it’s possible his father is already involved and that would be the worst possible scenario. I can’t have the District Attorney snooping around my family business.
“No, but if you don’t come clean to me, I’m going to talk to my parents.”
I start shaking, sobs taking over. “Please. I’m begging you,” I cry. “Please let me handle this.”
I’m in his arms once again, he’s saying my name over and over into my shoulder. “Don’t make me regret this,” he begs. “I won’t say anything, for now. But please don’t do anything stupid. If you need help, please come to me.”
Relief floods my chest, and I exhale into his ear. “I promise. If I need you, or your father, I won’t hesitate to ask for help.”
We hold each other in silence for several minutes before he pulls away, his lips find mine and he kisses me tenderly. Sweetly.
We often joke about our first kiss on my fourteenth birthday. A kiss that wasn’t really even a kiss, but two pairs of lips stuck together. Every once in a while, he’ll plant one of those ‘sticky kisses’ on my mouth, causing us to laugh hysterically. Remembering the innocence of my youth makes me sad, especially the times before Tonya’s rage and beatings began. I was so young. So innocent. In love with life and clueless to the pain that my father endured with her. Still endures. I wish I could turn the clock back and relive some of those times, before I had the weight of my father’s world on my shoulders.
His mouth leaves mine as he kisses me softly along my jaw line and down the side of my neck. “I love you so much,” he whispers against my skin. “So fucking much. I would die if something were
to ever happen to you. Please don’t let it, okay?” He finds the sensitive skin at the base of my neck, his tongue tracing my vein.
“I promise,” I moan into the warm July air. “I love you.”
He groans into my neck, pulling me tight against his shorts. “Did you bring your firefly house out?” I can’t believe he’s thinking about catching fireflies when I’m about to suggest we go back to my house.
“What?”
“We need to catch fireflies. Now,” he growls, and I know if I push him, there will be a point of no return. We’ve been talking about making love since our senior formal. But I’ve been reluctant recently because I don’t want him to see me fully exposed, too many new bruises to explain.
“It’s in the pool house,” I point out, nibbling on his ear lobe. “But I thought we’d go back to my house. I have it all to myself.”
I’m ready. I want to be with him. Tonight. I have it all planned out, and the lights in my room will remain off. I even unplugged the lamp next to my bed in case he tries to turn it on. I want to give myself to him, but he can’t lay eyes on my bruised naked body. Ever.
“Fireflies first,” he says, taking my lips gently once again. “It’s our Fourth of July weekend tradition.” He’s all about traditions and I love it. He has no idea how much these small little gestures help me preserve that innocence that I’m desperately trying to cling to.
“Okay.”
We walk, hand in hand, to my pool house and open the door. The small closet in the sitting room holds pool toys and outdoor equipment. I open it up and see the firefly house that my father gave to me on my eighth birthday. The sides are made of a black mesh material, the top looks like the roof of what I imagine a fairy’s house would look like. When I caught fireflies when I was younger, my father would tell me that if I left them in the firefly house overnight, the light from the moon would turn them into fairies and then they would fly out. They would live in my backyard, always watching me, always protecting me. I eventually realized that he opened the house, letting the fireflies escape, but I clung to this wonderful memory for as long as I could. Until the rage of Tonya started chipping away at my innocence and trust.
I love that Heath wants to give that all back to me, little by little. When first I told him about fireflies and fairies, he made me promise that he could help me catch them every year. And here we are, five years into our newest tradition, running through my backyard, capturing firefly after firefly, giggling like the young kids we used to be.
“I’M USED TO CLIMBING through your window,” Heath mumbles against my neck. We’re standing in the hallway, the back door closed and locked behind us.
“Tonight’s special. I didn’t want you to have to crawl through the grass,” I smile as he spins me around to claim my lips. His tongue softly parts them, gently meeting mine.
I pull away a little, walking him through the back of the house and down the hallway that leads to my room.
He closes the door behind us, locking that as well. I’m not worried at all that anyone is going to surprise us. My father texted me two hours ago saying they were just finishing dinner in the city and were meeting friends of Tonya’s for cocktails and a cruise around Manhattan. Then they’ll be nestled away in their hotel, and I won’t see them again until Tuesday afternoon.
My bare feet sink into my plush carpet, and I feel every single thread between my toes, my senses heightened. Heath flicks the light switch, but nothing happens.
“My lamp broke,” I lie. He quickly dismisses it and pulls his shirt over his head. Moonlight streaming through my window accentuates his well-defined chest and abs. I look at the blinds and consider closing them, so my room is pitch dark, but I see the firefly house hanging from the metal pole that’s stuck in the ground just outside my window, and I change my mind. It’s meant to hold bird feeders, but my father repurposed it, and we hang my firefly house from it instead. Heath and I caught about a dozen between us and they are dancing in their temporary cage.
Heath sees me staring at the fireflies. “Don’t worry, I’ll set them free when I leave.” He closes the distance between us and pulls me against his bare chest.
“Set them free? Then they won’t become fairies,” I joke.
His eyes brighten, and he reaches out, gently sweeping my cheeks into his hands. His mouth covers mine as a soft moan escapes my lips.
“I love you so much,” he tells me for the tenth time tonight. “I want to give you everything. And take away the pain you’re hiding from the world. From me.”
I can’t cry. I won’t cry. He’s given me so much already, and I can’t let him shoulder my pain. I’ll become a burden.
“Make love to me,” I whisper against his lips. “Please.”
“I thought we’re waiting until we’re both eighteen?” Our birthdays are just days away. His is on the tenth and mine is on the fourteenth.
“I don’t want to wait. Tonight is perfect.” And it is perfect. We won’t have this opportunity to have this kind of privacy again.
His hands leave my face, and he reaches down, slowly pulling my tank top over my head, exposing my lace bra. He drops the shirt to the floor, and it lands on my feet. “Are you sure?” he asks, holding my gaze.
“I’ve never been more sure in my life,” I respond, kissing him deeply.
He reaches around behind me to unclasp my bra, that, too, falling to the floor. He unbuttons his cargo shorts, and quickly removes them and his boxer briefs so all that remains between us are my shorts and panties. His body is no stranger to mine. We’ve explored each other as much as we could over the past year and a half. Desire swelling. Need building. We’ve waited as long as we could. Tonight we will complete the bond that we’ve been longing for.
I drop my hands to the seam of my shorts and start to push them down over my hips. “Wait, let me,” he whispers, his mouth leaving mine. His kisses pass over my neck and shoulders, then he pauses to tease my nipples with his tongue. He spends time caressing my breasts, his fingertips barely touching my nipples as they harden.
“Ah,” I moan into the dark room. “Heath.”
“Shh,” he says against my breast, warm breath softening the buds that his tongue continues to tease.
He pushes me back toward my bed and kneels in front of me, slowly inching my shorts and panties off together. His lips move down across my belly, finding my hip. He scrapes his teeth gently across the bone as he pushes my clothes down to my ankles. I’m afraid to make a move to step out of them, in fear of losing the contact his mouth has with my skin. As if he’s reading my mind, his hands travel slowly down my legs, reaching my ankles. He gently lifts one and then the other, pushing my discarded shorts and panties to the side. His lips and tongue trace a line down my thigh, over the massive bruise that Tonya inflicted. My breath hitches as he passes over that area.
“Are you okay?” Concern fills his voice.
I nod vigorously. I’m more than okay.
He suddenly lifts me off my feet, hands tucked under my naked ass. He holds me against him with one arm as he pulls back the soft comforter, placing me on the bed. His hands trace every curve of my body. Despite the bruises on my ribs and on my thigh, his touch feels wonderful. Soothing. Amazing.
He eases on top of me, resting his elbows on either side of my head, hands caressing my face, lips kissing away the tears that I didn’t even know were rolling down my cheeks. “I love you more than life, Noelle. You have to know that. You have to believe it.”
“I do,” I pant as his mouth covers mine again.
His length presses against my opening and he pauses, his body stiffening. “Should I grab a condom?” We’ve talked about our first time, and we decided we wouldn’t use a condom. I’ve been on the pill for almost a year, and I have no fear of getting pregnant. I take it at the same time every single day. We’re careful. We’re both clean. We’ve never been with anyone else.
“No. I want to feel you. All of you.” His eyes darken, and he kisses me urg
ently, tongue sweeping in, taking mine.
One hand leaves the side of my face and he touches me softly between my legs, sending tingles through every nerve. He knows how to bring me to that place, he’s had lots of practice with his fingers and tongue. And he sweeps over my bundle of nerves one more time, sending me right over the edge. He swallows my cries with his mouth, his tongue swirling in time with his fingers. I raise my hips to his hand as he draws the last of my release by pressing his thumb down, applying the slightest amount of pressure, elongating my orgasm. I begin to tremble, signaling that he can stop. I can’t take the contact any longer. “God,” I moan. “That was–”
“Not finished,” he interrupts me, a smile dancing on his lips. “I want you now.”
“Yes,” I pant, kissing him softly.
His fingers move away from where they were and move lower. He dips them into my opening, curling two in, hitting just the right spot. I relax under his touch and move my hips along with his thrusting fingers. “Are you ready?” he asks, slowing his pace.
I nod vigorously. I’ve been ready.
He withdraws his fingers, and I feel his tip at my opening. We’ve gotten this far before, him pressing slightly into me. Just the tip, never more. Now I want it all, and before he can push forward, I thrust my hips up, taking an inch more, then two, adjusting to him. Slowly. So slowly.
I hold my breath. I can feel myself tightening around him. “Relax,” he whispers. “Breathe.”
And I do. I inhale deeply, relaxing my shoulders. On my second inhale, he pushes several more inches in, almost filling me. His eyes open wide, and he looks scared.
“Are you okay? Did that hurt?”
I feel a slight burning and pulling, but nothing excruciating. Nothing what I imagined.
“No,” I say. “It feels–wonderful.”
Relief floods his face and he moves slightly, adjusting himself over me. He pushes in deeper, until he’s fully inside and doesn’t move.
