Heather laughs as she replies, “I figured as much when you missed our celebratory mimosas this morning. What I can’t figure out is how it all ties into the big blob of strawberry jam you have on the front of your shirt. You hardly ever eat sweets. What’s up with that? I have to practically hogtie you to get you to try any of the pastries or cakes I make.”
I slump down in my seat. I don’t even know how to begin to explain to her all that’s happened in the last twenty-four hours. Heather and Kiera know about the rape in the general sense of the word. They know something bad happened to me and they know some days are better than others. They know I don’t usually date. Even though I consider them my best friends after Aidan, I haven’t told them all the horrific details of my ordeal. At first, I didn’t tell them because I was ashamed about what happened to me. After I worked through the shame with my rape counselor, I elected not to tell them because I didn’t want them living with the mental pictures and the psychic dirt that leaves behind. I did my best to encourage Heather and Kiera to take self-defense classes and have top-notch security without having to completely erode their sense of personal safety. To this day, I’m still not sure I’ve done enough to protect them. I guess I wanted to shelter then from it all. As hard as things are for me now, I’ve actually made real progress. It took me months to share my story publicly and far longer to take back my identity by calling my rapist by his name. I still wonder if I should have been more insistent and told my whole story in gory detail, not pulling any punches.
I weigh my options carefully. I know these women deserve my trust. I’m just afraid their perception of me will change once they know the whole story. I swallow hard and pivot in my seat so that I’m facing Heather as I speak, my voice heavy with trepidation, “I’m not really sure you’re going to want to hear my answer. It’s a long, complicated and really ugly.”
Heather swings her head around so fast that I’m afraid she’s going to crash her car. “What did that rat-bastard do to you? My family is Italian, they have connections you don’t want to know about,” she threatens.
“What did who do? AJ? Oh geez, no! He’d never hurt me. I’ve known him since I was about six and a half.” Even as I explain that to Heather, I realize the starkly simple truth of that statement. Aidan is many things. He is loud, funny, effervescent, irreverent, and sometimes totally inappropriate. Still, the one thing the Aidan could never be is intentionally cruel. Now, if I can only get my irrational, panicky side to remember that.
Heather looks confused as she inquires, “AJ? I thought his name was Aidan.”
I chuckle as I clarify, “Oh it is. But I sometimes call him AJ, and he sometimes calls me Gracie. It’s a thing from our childhood.”
Heather shakes her head in dismay. “What is it with you lovebirds and all these nicknames?” she teases.
I snicker as I reply, “Gee, I don’t know, Gidget, why don’t you ask the Cowboy, the next time you see him?”
Heather turns bright red as she insists, “For the record, I did not ask that oversize G.I. Joe to call me that. He came up with it all on his own. In fact, I told him to knock it off. The big old oaf refuses to address me by my name.” Her eyes are flashing with outrage.
I grin at her as I remark, “Uh huh...and the reason you call him Cowboy instead of Ty or Tyler is what exactly?”
Heather sticks her tongue out at me and declares, “Now you hush. We’re supposed to be discussing your love life, not mine. Now, where were we?”
“Heather, I’m serious. Are you sure you want to talk about this? It’s not going to be fun and it might change the way you think about me forever—” I start to caution again.
Heather holds up her hand to stop me from speaking. “This might be a good time to remind you that I only look like a ditzy blonde. Do you think Kiera and I have been your friends for as many years as we have without knowing that there’s some deep, ugly pain buried deep inside you? We figured you’d tell us when you felt the time was right.”
I swallow hard as I look out the front window, taking in the Oregon coastline as it goes flying by.
“Pain is pain,” Heather continues. Her words catch my attention. So, I turn my gaze toward her. “The precise details aren’t really our business unless you choose to tell us. Nothing you share with me is going to make me not be your friend, so you can just stop worrying about that right now. After all, once you’re in the Girlfriend Posse, you’re in for life.”
I blink in shock as I process the passion in her voice. I guess I’ve been so busy monitoring what everyone else’s needs. It failed to occur to me that someone might be doing the same for me.
“It’s just that you and Kiera both have a bunch of family drama and I don’t want to pile anything else on,” I confess cringing at the words even as they leave my mouth.
Heather studies the highway for a while then glances back at me, the pain clearly evident in her eyes as she asks, “Do you really believe Kiera and I think our problems are more important than yours?”
“No!” I protest, “It’s not like that at all. I was just trying to protect you guys from my nightmare. You don’t need to know the garbage that goes on in my head! Trust me; I’m just trying to protect your happy.”
Heather sighs and shakes her head in disbelief. “Oh honey, I really wish you hadn’t tried so hard to be tough. I know a lot more about what you’re going through than you think I do,” she responds.
My stomach clinches with fear at her words, “Oh God, not you too—” I whisper in horror.
Heather places her hand lightly on my arm as she replies, “No, I didn’t mean to scare you. It feels almost as devastating though. It happened to my sister after somebody slipped her a roofie at a party during her first week of college. She’s never been the same.”
Even though I’m well aware that in America someone is sexually assaulted every two seconds, I still flinch at the idea of someone attacking Madison. I’ve only met her a couple of times, but I would’ve never guessed that the cool and sophisticated journalist is a part of the same unwilling survivors club as me.
“Heather, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. Still, she seems to be doing well—” I start to say, but quickly change my mind. I know better than to say crap like that. People can put on sorts of fronts which have nothing to do with reality. I’m uncharacteristically at a loss for words.
She interrupts me, her hands gesturing wildly in frustration, “That’s just it!” she exclaims. “I can’t tell how she’s doing... We don’t talk about real things any more. It’s all surface talk. I don’t know how she really feels about anything. I’m so worried about her.”
I reach up and squeeze her hand as I carefully formulate my comments. It feels so strange to be talking about all of this. I haven’t spoken out loud about it since I was in my support group a few years ago and now I’ve had three conversations on three days. “Well, I can’t speak for Madison, but I have many more days that seem normal than days which aren’t,” I respond, in an effort to cheer her up. Heather is usually unfailingly cheerful and optimistic, so to see her so distressed is disconcerting.
Heather arches an eyebrow at me. “Let’s just say for arguments sake, I believe you. What kind of day are you having today?”
I glance out the car window and start chewing on my thumbnail as I try to evade the answer, “Umm—”
“No, wait,” Heather interrupts “I can tell it’s not a good day. You’re usually so calm you make a yoga instructor look like they need to take Ritalin, but today you’re so antsy, you can barely stand to ride in this car and you probably trashed the manicure we just got yesterday. I can tell that things are not right in your world. You might as well tell me what’s going on.”
“Okay,” I acquiesce, “but you need to understand that I have a lot of stuff going on before my rape even occurred. So, my reaction was really extreme and Madison is probably coping much better than I ever did.”
Heather nods and replies, “Oh, I know everybody’s st
ory is different.”
I give Heather a wry grin as I quip, “Well, unfortunately, my life story reads like a badly written soap opera script. My parents had a really epic love story. It was the kind that really good movies are written about. But then, my dad was labeled as a dissident by the Chinese government and killed right before I turned six. I remember being so angry that he missed my birthday party. After he died, my mom forgot how to live.”
“Unfortunately, it took her body eight years to catch up with her brain. My only salvation during that time was my dancing. I was a competitive a dancer.”
Heather shoots me a confused look, as she asks, “Dancing, not art?”
I shrug. It’s weird bringing these two parts of my life together. To me, they’re intertwined. However, Heather and Kiera didn’t know about the dancing and Aidan didn’t know about the art. So, I guess I really am two very broken halves of a whole. “I didn’t start the art stuff until I stopped dancing. It’s like I have a very bright line which divides my life into before and after.”
“Anyway, you met Aidan at the wedding last night,” I continue. “He was the little brother of my dance partner. But, he was so much more to me back then. He doesn’t know this, but some days he was the only reason I bothered to get out of bed when the sadness of my dad’s death threatened to overtake me. None of the grown ups in my life ever wanted to talk about Daniel Isamu. People seemed to think if they stopped talking about him, I’d suddenly forget he ever existed. It doesn’t work that way. I was a daddy’s little girl. Nothing was going to change that.”
Heather nods as she comments, “People tried to do the same thing when my cousin died.”
“Aidan didn’t care what people thought was ‘appropriate’ for me to talk about. We spoke about everything and nothing. He just let me talk, laugh and cry. He tried so hard to make sure most of it was laughter. I used to try to match his level of intensity. I soon realized it was an exercise in futility. So, I just went with it. He became my personal entertainer and I, his biggest fan,” I explain, finding comfort in the memory. “When I got back from dance camp, Aidan was gone without a word. I didn’t see him again until last night.”
Heather gasps and her eyes tear up. “That’s so sad. You must have been devastated. Did you ever figure out what happened? Why did he leave? Did you ever try to find him? How did he react when he saw you?” she starts to ambush me with questions.
Suddenly, a peculiar expression crosses her face. “Oh... wait! Now I understand what happened when he screwed up the wedding march at Kiera’s wedding! That’s the moment he recognized you. How romantic is that?” she exclaims excitedly. “So, what’s the problem? It’s clear from the way he treated you at the reception that he still cares about you. The man was ready to slay dragons if anyone so much as touched you. He was so worried when you passed out. I thought he was going to call the ambulance. It was all Jeff could do to convince him that he was a trained EMT and that you were fine. I thought that Jeff was going to have to produce his credentials on the spot.”
“Oh man,” I let out a sigh of frustration before I haltingly continue my explanation, “if you thought I was weird before, this is going to take it to a whole other level.” I start to pick at the bottom of my sweatshirt.
Heather clicks her tongue at me as she chides me, “You do realize that we’re driving down the coast in a vintage cherry red Bel Air and I’m dressed like Rosie the Riveter, right? It’s not as if you’re cornering the market on being odd. So, stop worrying what I’m going to think and just tell me.”
I take a deep breath and decide to tell the unvarnished truth. “So, you know how Aidan picked me up and held me last night?”
Heather shrugs and nods.
“Well, aside from a few martial art competitions, that’s the first time I’ve been touched by a guy since I was sixteen. I was raped when I was fourteen. I went through a stage where I thought if I had enough ‘normal’ sex, I could somehow undo what had happened to me and erase the past. When it didn’t work, I just stopped letting people into my personal space.”
“My mom died right after I was raped. People who hadn’t been around during the eight years that it took her to die suddenly pretended to care. It literally made me sick. At first, I was so angry. I stopped hugging people. Then, I stopped shaking their hands. After a while, it got difficult to look them in the eye. It wasn’t long before it became a struggle for me to even leave the house. Since I had been taking care of myself for so long, it wasn’t difficult for me to prove to the court that I had the right to be emancipated.”
Tears are gathering at the corners of Heather’s eyes and she starts to make a comment. But, I shake my head to stop her. I need to finish before I lose my nerve.
Taking a deep breath, I continue my sad monologue, “Eventually, I had to earn a living. So, I joined the carnival circuit. Initially, they played on my exotic looks and used me as a fortuneteller. I was never very comfortable in that role. My mom was part Native American and as you know, I have certain sensitivities when it comes to people’s emotions. I felt like playing a psychic was taking advantage of those gifts. So, I worked hard on my artistic skills and became a face painter so that people could pay me for something legitimate.”
Heather chuckles as she responds, “I’ve seen your spooky self in action. I can understand how you would feel that way. Your ability to read people is definitely a God-given talent. The rest of it sucks though. But, what does all of that have to with that Aidan guy. He doesn’t seem like he’d be the type of guy to care.”
“He probably isn’t,” I reluctantly admit. “The problem is with me. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to handle a relationship. The sad thing is, up until yesterday. I wasn’t even sure I wanted one. Sure, seeing, Kiera and Jeff fall in love has been hard because I know that I’ll probably never have that in my life. Being around Mindy and Becca has convinced me that I really want to be a mom even if I can’t have a guy around. I’m not sure how I’m going to make all that work yet. I’m still figuring it out.”
Heather glances over at me with an incredulous look on her face as she inquires, “So, let me get this straight—you like this guy and he obviously likes you, but you’re not going to give the relationship a chance. Why?”
“Why should he have to deal with all my emotional baggage?” I shoot back, in frustration. “I couldn’t even make it through a simple breakfast this morning!”
“I understand where you’re coming from Tara. Still, shouldn’t that be Aidan’s choice?”
“But you don’t know all the stuff he’s been through—” I argue.
“Do I need to?” Heather asks, confused.
“Heather, as a child he got sick and went deaf!” I explain, emphatically.
“Seriously? He’s a deaf piano player?” she confirms. “How cool is that! So? You’re a sign language interpreter. What’s the problem? It seems like fate to me. Aren’t you always preaching that we can’t fight our ultimate destiny?”
“The problem is that his life is already complicated enough without adding my issues to the top of his pile,” I insist, feeling agitated.
“Well, it seems to me that anyone who’s been through all that and can still be the phenomenal musician he is, would have the emotional integrity to deal with whatever life throws at you guys. Are you sure you’re not throwing this one back a little too soon?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know!” I respond in rapid succession.
Heather chortles. “Well, that’s about as clear as a set of aviator glasses at a mudboggin’ contest,” she remarks.
I look at her helplessly and throw my hands up in the air. “Heather, I don’t know what to do. This isn’t just any guy. This is Aidan. Then again, I don’t know if he’s the same guy I knew as a kid. What if he’s completely changed?”
“What if he hasn’t?” Heather asks softly.
“What if he hasn’t...?” I repeat to myself. My hands start to shake.
“Honey, what do you
want to do?” Heather asks after a minute.
I sit up straight in my seat and grab her hand for support as I answer, my voice steady and forceful, “I want to take my life back from Warren Jones. I want to be a typical, average and boring woman. I want to go to lunch with Aidan O’Brien. I want to try again. I’m not ready to give up.”
Heather examines me from top to bottom and smirks as she replies, “Well, many people consider me quite gifted in the cosmetics department, but even I could never make you typical, average or boring. You’ll have to settle for stunning.”
“Oh shut up!” I retort. “Are you going to help me get ready for my date, or not? I haven’t done this in more than a decade. I need all the help I can get.”
“Don’t worry, the Girlfriend Posse has got you covered,” she answers.
Kiera studies my outfit carefully. “What did Aidan’s text message say again?”
“He was very cryptic. His instructions were: “Rest well. Dress in layers. Comfortable shoes. Extra socks. Come hungry. Bring imagination and camera. Be ready at 6:30 AM. The road to happiness can be long and windy.
PS: Thanks for spending the day with me.
—AO”
I recite the text message back to her verbatim. I’ve parsed it out countless times trying to find some hidden meaning.
Kiera’s eyebrows go flying toward her hairline as she asks in surprise, “Extra socks? He doesn’t have some weird foot fetish, does he?”
I giggle in response to her outlandish suggestion, “No!” I exclaim, “at least not that I know of. Maybe we’re going roller-skating. I always wanted to do that as a kid, but my coaches thought it was too dangerous.”
“Well, at any rate, take lots of pictures for us. Now that Jeff and I have the girls, we might not get very many mystery dates. We have to live vicariously through yours,” Kiera teases.
I nod, but feel compelled to voice a different sentiment, “I don’t know Kiera, I might be too nervous to take any pictures.” I dry the palms of my hands on my jeans. “Are you guys sure these look okay?” I ask as I look in the mirror and try to examine my backside to see if they’re too tight.
So the Heart Can Dance (A Hidden Beauty Novel Book 2) Page 9
