Giving It Up

by Amber Lin

  “You know him?” I choked on the words.

  “I know him,” she confirmed, her face grim. “I’ve gotta run.”

  “What? Now?”

  “Yup.” She plopped a fussing Bailey into my arms and vanished out the back door as quickly as she’d appeared.

  Well, shit.

  But I gave myself a tacit pat on the back for keeping that swear to myself. Slow as mud, but I was learning.

  * * * *

  I would tell Colin about the cops, I decided. After dinner. It didn’t take a domestic goddess to realize a man was more amenable on a full stomach. Plus, spazzing out as soon as he got home just reeked of insecurity. However accurate that might have been, I wanted to show him I could deal with this. No problem. Detectives questioning me before snack time? Easy.

  So when Colin came through the back door, I just called over my shoulder. “Hey, you. How was your day?” I dropped a spoonful of cookie dough onto the sheet. Look at me, so domestic.

  “Not great,” he answered.

  I froze, but the lump of dough slid from the spoon and landed on the tray with a plop. Colin was like Shelly. A faker. He said great when he meant fine, and fine when he meant total suckage. Not great was practically a cry for help.

  I turned around. He looked like…Colin. Sturdy, steady. Dependable. Or maybe it’s just that I had depended on him so much that I wanted him to be that way for me.

  I walked over to him and reached up to cup his jaw. “What’s wrong?”

  “Where’s Bailey?”

  “Napping.” I smiled. Physical comfort, I could give.

  “We need to talk.”

  My smile fell. So much talking today and none of it good.

  “Is there something you didn’t tell me about Jacob?” he asked.

  Alarm bells clanged. There was a lot I hadn’t told him about Jacob, actually, but I had a feeling I knew exactly which thing he was talking about. The question was, how could he know? “Like what?”

  “How long did you and Jacob date?”

  Shit. He knew. But how? And perhaps more importantly, how the hell could I get around this? I tried to collect my thoughts, my lies. Lying about this felt more natural than not, but I wasn’t prepared for this direct questioning out of the blue. I wasn’t prepared for all this fucking security to shatter. It was too soon. I’d had just a taste, and it was too fucking soon.

  “Colin,” I tried. “Has something happened?”

  “Answer the question.”

  I felt panic rise in my chest, and I tamped it down. “I’m not going to answer the question until you tell me what is going on. Something had to have happened. You’re acting weird.”

  “I spoke to Jacob today.”

  “You did what?” Jesus Christ. Colin and Jacob together. This was a cluster fuck of the first order. Fuck, fuck, fuck. “Why would you do that? What did he say?”

  “We had to find out if he was going to pursue this.”

  I tensed. “What did he say?”

  “He said he was sorry.” He paused. “He acted like I was going to hurt him before I even threatened him. Why would he think that, Allie?”

  The room blurred. “Because…you’re a mean son of a bitch?” I hoped repeating his own words back to him would distract him. At least enough so I could breathe again. Actually the whole not breathing thing was good. Kind of dimmed the panic of the whole Colin and Jacob thing when I thought I might pass out.

  “I don’t think that’s why,” he said, so far away.

  “I don’t…” My voice faded, and so did I. I wasn’t sure how I’d finish that thought anyway. I don’t know why Jacob does anything. I don’t want to think about that. Don’t make me tell you. Don’t hurt me.

  I was nothing good or special. I had never deserved this knight-in-shining-armor treatment. I knew it, and now Colin would too. I felt his touch on my arms, warm and sure. The next thing I knew, I was sitting down on the couch with Colin beside me.

  The stillness in the room belied the way my world was crashing down around me. I hadn’t wanted this moment to come, but it had. Of course it had.

  The sound of my breathing roared in my ears. Colin’s warmth seeped into my skin, but not deep enough. I wasn’t stalling. I was bracing myself.

  “If I tell you,” I said, “you have to promise me something. You can’t hurt him.”

  “Fuck no,” Colin said.

  “I’m serious. I can’t…I can’t deal with that too. You have to promise. And you can’t ask anyone else to hurt him either. Swear it to me.”

  He looked down, and I heard him swallow. I knew he wouldn’t want to. I thought maybe he’d refuse and just go beat Jacob up anyway, knowing that if I feared it, it would probably be deserved in his eyes.

  “Please.” I put my hand on his arm. “Please.”

  He looked up. “Okay. I promise.”

  Thank God.

  “I didn’t exactly tell you the truth.” What a way to start. God, I really deserved what was coming to me.

  I turned to face him and pulled my leg up underneath me. Might as well be comfortable for this. There would be few enough comforts left afterward.

  I told him everything. Or really I’m not sure what I told him, so lost was I in my story, my shame.

  * * * *

  Jacob and I were best friends. It wasn’t Shelly I called to chat about nothing for hours as I painted my nails or lay on my bed, but Jacob. And it wasn’t his buddies he confided in about the nights his father had drunk too much, but me.

  His father was away, had been for days, leaving Jacob without any way to contact him and no food. As usual. We hung out in his basement and ordered a pizza from the money my dad had left me. There was a movie playing on the TV, but neither of us were interested.

  “Allie,” he said. “I’ve got to get out of here.”

  “Okay. Let’s go,” I said.

  “No. I mean, out of here. This whole city. The fucking country, maybe.”

  It wasn’t the first time he’d expressed discontent. More than anyone, I knew what he risked, what he tolerated to stay in this shithole of a house, but there was an edge in his voice tonight. And that bottle of rum we’d jacked from his dad’s stash had run awfully low.

  “Where would you go?”

  “Anywhere,” he said. “Maybe I’ll join the army.”

  I snickered. “You wouldn’t last two seconds. You don’t follow orders well.”

  He laughed, a hollow sound. “You’re probably right.” He looked over at me. “Come with me. We’ll find someplace to go. Anywhere’s gotta be better than here.”

  I shifted on the couch. That was true enough for him, but not for me. I wasn’t sure I loved my dad, that guy who stopped in with his semi between long-distance routes every couple of months, but it was comfortable.

  “Come on,” he said. His eyes turned stormy. “Do you want me to stay here? You think I deserve this?”

  “What? No. Of course not.”

  “Are you sure?” he said in a singsong voice. “I might deserve it. Maybe I should tell you what he did, and then you can decide.”

  Selfishly I didn’t want to know. It was easier to pretend his dad was an ass. The ordinary kind. I didn’t want to see the remembered pain in the eyes of the boy I loved, not when I’d be helpless against it.

  “Stop it,” I said. “Just stop.”

  “Maybe I should show you,” he went on. There was a strange glint in his eye, and I couldn’t tell if he was teasing me or was angry with me. Maybe both. “Then you would have all the facts. What do you say?”

  “Please stop. I’m sorry.”

  That only made him angrier. “You’re sorry,” he spat. “I don’t want your fucking sorries.”

  He crawled over me on the sofa, and I shrank back into the thin cushions until the springs pushed into my back. I was afraid of him, afraid he’d yell at me, or afraid he’d say something mean. So when he tilted my head up and pinched my chin hard, I was more surprised than anything. />
  “What the hell are you doing?” I asked, pushing his hand away. But he still crouched over me.

  “First, he was drunk.” Jacob glanced at the empty bottle of alcohol. “Done that. Then he started yelling, you know, that I’d never be anything but a loser, that sort of thing.”

  A funny feeling tickled my nose. “Oh, Jacob. Fuck him.”

  “Yes,” he said. “That’s pretty much what happened.”

  And he smiled. Something had happened. The man-boy hovering above me wasn’t Jacob, my friend, the person I loved and trusted. He’d been replaced by an echo of his father, sick and sadistic.

  It wasn’t exactly the same, he said. Because I was a girl, it would hurt less. That’s what he told me anyway, but with my wrists in his hand and my body forced open, it hurt a whole hell of a lot. And then it was over, but the pain never stopped.

  * * * *

  My heart thudded, in that moment long past but never forgotten, and here in the present. Colin pulled me closer. I wouldn’t have thought I’d like to be touched right then, but it calmed me.

  “I said no, but he didn’t listen. It…happened anyway.”

  “He raped you,” Colin said in a flat tone.

  “No,” I said. “It wasn’t like that. We were friends.”

  Colin just looked at me.

  Tears blurred his image. “We were best friends. I…loved him.”

  Colin’s arm tightened around me.

  “Why didn’t he stop?” I whispered. It wasn’t a rhetorical question. I’d been searching for that answer, desperate to understand, ever since it’d happened. Maybe Colin would know.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  I understood why Jacob got so angry when I’d asked that. I didn’t want to hear that. It wasn’t an answer to the question. What did “I’m sorry” really mean, anyway? I’m sorry this happened to you, but I’m glad it wasn’t me. I’m sorry you’re broken, but life goes on. It wasn’t anything good or anything helpful; it was just pity. Fucking pity.

  I took a deep breath. “After that, he drove me home. I just sat there. I didn’t know what to say. I should have screamed or cried or something, but I couldn’t. Why couldn’t I cry then, but I can’t stop crying now? He was my friend, but I hate him. So much. You don’t understand how much I hate him.”

  “I think I do,” Colin said. He was squeezing me almost to the point where I couldn’t breathe. I doubted he even realized it, but I wanted more. There’s a certain magic to being held. No one could hurt me there.

  “I heard he left town right after that. I didn’t see him again.” Not until a week ago, when he showed up at my apartment.

  “Why didn’t you call the cops?” Colin asked. His voice was even, without the judging lilt I’d expected, but I didn’t want to talk about that. There was enough bitterness in the room to choke on without adding more.

  I shook my head and tried to blot the tears out of my eyes. “It wasn’t really…”

  “Rape? Yes. It was.”

  “I know,” I whispered. “I know, but I just… It’s better if I don’t think about it like that. I know I never should have gone out with him or let him kiss me. I should have fought harder. I should have—”

  “No.” I winced at his raised voice, and he lowered it. “God, is that what you think?”

  “I don’t know. I’m sorry.” Christ, now I was doing it. “I just…I don’t want him to know Bailey. I know that fathers”—I practically choked on the word—“have rights and that Bailey deserves a father, but he isn’t…he’s not…” My voice broke, and I bit into my lip hard to stem the tears. I also clutched Colin’s hand a little too hard, but I couldn’t seem to let go.

  “I don’t want him near Bailey.” I was babbling. “I can’t be near him, either, but it’s not just for me. He doesn’t care about her. He doesn’t even know her. What if he takes her away from me?”

  “No. He’s not getting anywhere near you or Bailey.”

  Colin held me while the threat of tears passed. The rhythm of our breathing synced, as if to steady us both.

  The quietude was interrupted by the ringing of Colin’s cell phone. Without releasing me, he reached into his pocket.

  “Yeah,” he said quietly.

  The faint buzz of another person speaking.

  “I can’t come now,” he said.

  More buzzing, slightly louder this time.

  “I’ll talk to you later.” He hung up.

  “If you need to go…” I said. Hell, my problems had stewed for this long. It was hardly an emergency.

  “It’s fine,” he said, stroking my hair.

  “There’s something else I have to tell you,” I said into his shirt. “Earlier today, some cops came by. Detectives, I mean. They were asking about you.”

  His grip tightened to just this side of bruising before subsiding. “What did they say?”

  They said I wasn’t safe. Bailey wasn’t safe here. “Nothing.”

  “Don’t talk to them again.”

  I should have bristled at the command, but I really had no desire to ever talk to them again. And I was drained. “Okay.”

  Bailey’s soft cry crackled from the baby monitor. Up from her nap, and life goes on. I pulled away. Colin clung to me for a beat and then released me.

  In that sort of dulled state that comes from falling apart, I retrieved Bailey from her bed and set her up with a bowl of watermelon chunks in the kitchen as I finished baking the cookies. Dinner was a quiet affair. Neither Colin nor I had any words left. Bailey seemed to take her cue from him, peppering the silence with subdued grunts and eating little. I regaled Bailey with outrageous stories, slapstick versions of her favorite books complete with silly voices, through dinner. I put her to bed early, which of course only made her stay up extra late, tossing restlessly in her bed until sleep overcame her.

  Colin was somewhere in the house but not in his room. Our room, I reminded myself. Exhausted, I stripped down to my underwear and collapsed on the bed.

  When I woke, it was dark in the room. Strong hands cradled me, and I cuddled up to a hard chest. I craved Colin for the reassurance that he was here, that he would stay. I trailed my hand down, but he caught it in his.

  “Not tonight.”

  “You don’t want me?”

  “Always, Allie, but…it’s not right. Later.” Even though he was right, I felt the sting of rejection. He pulled me close to him, holding my hand. I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep.

  I didn’t have nightmares about what had happened with Jacob, not even right after it happened. Or maybe I did, but I never remembered any of my dreams. So I wasn’t really prepared for when Colin started tossing around in the middle of the night.

  He jerked against the tangled sheets and mumbled, “No…leave her…”

  I’d done this. I shook his shoulder firmly to wake him.

  “Colin. It’s all right. Wake up. Everyone is fine.”

  He blinked up at me blearily. “Allie?”

  “Yeah, it’s me. You were dreaming.”

  “Won’t let him hurt you again.”

  “I know. I know. Shhh.”

  Then he crushed me to him with both arms and slipped right back to sleep. I wasn’t sure he had woken at all, even though he spoke to me. My arms were trapped by my sides, and my neck was tilted awkwardly, but I held myself still. This was the way he’d put me. I needed to be able to do this small thing for him, have my body be the way he wanted it. I just closed my eyes and tried to will comfort from my body into his.

  When I woke up again, it was still dark in the night that would never end. Colin thrust between my legs. He was inside me and over me and everywhere. It wasn’t fear or discomfort I felt, but relief. Gratitude that he was letting me do this for him. But he was muttering, “I’m sorry. Sorry.” I roused myself enough to mumble, “It’s okay,” and spread my legs wider, and he quieted. I understood why he was apologizing, though, because he didn’t even seem to have control of his own body. It was
like his hips were thrusting of their own accord, and the rest of his body just had to go along with it. Each thrust was deep and strong, and with an unsteady but deliberate rhythm. It felt like being claimed, like being marked, protected, and I could hardly describe how that felt different from regular sex, except that I knew it when I felt it.

  The irony is that I felt more owned, more controlled, than I ever had during the rough sex I’d craved with other men. He was telling me that I was his—that he couldn’t stop it and neither could I, so it was damned convenient that neither one of us wanted to. I don’t know how long he went on this way, but I could have taken him forever. My body was already relaxed and pliant from sleep, and I made no effort to change that.

  When he came, he groaned my name and then shuddered over me, clutching me to him. I didn’t try to push into him, or away, just yielded completely to whatever shape he gave me.

  * * * *

  The light of the morning teased me, shadows dancing from behind my closed eyelids. Still feeling the lethargy from the night, I opened my eyes to…orange. Orange fur.

  “Goddamn it.” I bolted up from the bed, away from the orange hairball curled up on the pillow next to me. I was still gaping at the cat when Colin walked in and stroked my ass. Only then did I realize I was completely naked in the middle of the bedroom while Colin had dressed.

  He fitted his body to mine, my back to his front, and nuzzled his face into my hair.

  I pointed at the intruder. “The cat. It’s yours?”

  Colin didn’t even look up before he murmured into the side of my neck. “Figured it was yours.”

  “So, wait. Did you let it in?”

  He nodded.

  I pulled away from Colin, and he groaned in protest. “Sorry,” I said. “But this cat is leaving.”

  I wrapped the sheet around me and picked up the cat, who’d now gone deadweight. His heft proclaimed that this was no starving kitty. “Absolutely, positively no cats allowed,” I said as I carried him down the stairs. Then I set him down outside the door and shut it with a satisfying click.

  My confessions weighed on me, but the important thing was that Colin was still here. He still wanted me, and that was enough. I’d make it enough. I’d make us a family if it fucking killed me.