by Reid, Penny
“Oh my God!” A shock of two conflicting emotional states—one completely expected and logical, and one dark and secret and troubling—had me turning away from her and reaching for my bathrobe: repugnance and fascination, revulsion and curiosity, disgust and temptation.
She grabbed the terry cloth before I could and tossed it in the pool. “There. It’s gone. Stop trying to cover up. Now give me one good reason why you two shouldn’t take advantage of this fortress of solitude for the next few days.”
My temper was lost along with the bathrobe and undammed feelings surged forth, coating my voice in viscous emotion. “Because he’s in a position of authority over me. He could tell my parents lies about me—about Lisa not behaving, or seeing Tyler—if he wanted, and it would be my word against his. He could try to blackmail me into physical intimacy, if I don’t do what he wants. So, no. He absolutely shouldn’t be flirting with me!”
By the end of my tirade, Gabby was staring at me with wide-eyed confusion, but it quickly morphed into narrowed-eyed suspicion.
“Mona,” she whispered.
“You mean Lisa.”
“Mona,” she whispered more insistently, her eyes moving between mine. “Did something happen to you? Did someone . . . did they do something?”
“No,” I said, unable to hold her gaze. “I mean, no. Not really.”
“What do you mean, ‘Not really’?”
“I mean, nothing happened.”
She bent and moved her face in front of mine, forcing me to look at her. “But someone tried to make something happen? While you were in college?”
I shrugged, waving my hands around. “No. It wasn’t like that. I overreacted.”
“About what?”
“Does it matter? If nothing actually happened?”
“I don’t know, why don’t you tell me what didn’t happen?” She squinted until her eyes were nearly closed.
“It’s not a big deal.” Again, I glanced at the back door. Shouldn’t he be back by now?
“Then it shouldn’t be a big deal telling me what happened, or what didn’t happen.”
“I—” Now I felt silly. It wasn’t a big deal. Every girl or woman I knew had gone through something similar, where she misinterpreted an innocuous situation, let her imagination get the better of her. If it happened to all women, then it wasn’t a big deal, right? “It’s stupid.”
“I love stupid. Stupid is my favorite. Go on. And hurry, before the hottie gets back.”
I vacillated, feeling inexplicably out of breath. I didn’t want to tell her. “Fine. I’ll tell you what happened if you tell me about Lisa being naked with Abram.”
“Deal. Tell me.”
Oh. Okay. Damn. I hadn’t expected her to agree.
“You’re going to be disappointed.”
“Tell me.”
I rolled my eyes at myself. “Fine. There was this postgrad TA. And he used to, you know, get touchy with undergrads. Give back massages or hug us from behind. I didn’t like it, so I avoided him. Really, no big deal.”
“That’s it? How old were you?”
“That’s not it. I was fifteen.”
“Hmm. So what happened?”
“He . . .” Why are you telling Gabby, of all people? Why was I telling anyone? It was no big deal. No big deal.
“Mona.”
“He cornered me—once—when I was alone in the chem lab. Made me feel uncomfortable.” Stop talking.
“What did he do?”
“He—” my eyes lost focus as they drifted over her shoulder “—came up behind me and put his hand over my mouth. I didn’t hear him come in, so I freaked out. I thought . . .” I shook my head at myself. “See? Stupid.”
I didn’t want to talk about this. My heart was galloping at the memory. Just like then, I couldn’t seem to get my pulse under control. So stupid.
“And then?”
“I was kicking and elbowing him, because I didn’t know it was a joke,” I said, my voice growing quieter, more robotic. “But he was bigger than me, it didn’t even faze him. When he let me go, he laughed. He said, ‘You should see your face.’ And then, when I finally calmed down, he acted like he wasn’t going to let me leave again, and I got scared. Again.”
Gabby, frowning, nodded slowly, apparently absorbing every detail. “What did he do next?”
This is Gabby. You don’t trust her. STOP TALKING!
I hadn’t even told Allyn about this, and I didn’t stop. I met her stare and finished the story calmly. “He chased me, grabbed me again and pinned me against the wall. When I started to cry, he laughed again and let me go, said I didn’t know how to take a joke, that I was easy to tease, like his little sister. And then he left, and it was over.”
“Did you report him? Tell anyone?”
Her question cracked the shell of outward calm I’d erected. I looked at her like she was nuts. “Tell them what? That I got scared like a little kid?” I whispered harshly, because I was upset. I hated that this still upset me.
“Nooo.” She drew the word out, but her eyes were tender, patient. “That he assaulted you. That he put his hands on you without your permission and frightened you. And when you told him to stop, he did it again.”
“Come on, Gabby. It was a joke.” Resurrecting cold reason to distance myself from the memory–nothing happened, no big deal, nothing happened—I took several deep breaths and my heart began to slow. The story was done, it was over, but for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why I’d said anything to begin with. Especially to Gabby.
“It was assault. You should have reported him.”
“And then what?” I asked, once again employing my calmest, most rational voice. “I was fifteen, and he was the son of someone important. No one would have believed me. There was only one logical path forward, and that was to forget about it.”
“Are you kidding? You were the perfect victim. Young girl genius, daughter of DJ Tang and Exotica, Mary Sue do-gooder, everyone would have believed you.”
“First, there is no such thing as a ‘perfect victim.’ No one is ever perfect enough when there’s no hard evidence of wrongdoing. Add to that, when the truth or identity of the alleged perpetrator—”
“’Alleged perpetrator?’ Can you hear yourself?”
“—is inconvenient, no one wants to listen, no one wants to know the truth, let alone do anything about it. Second, I might have been terrified, but nothing actually happened. They would have told me it was no big deal, because it was no big deal. I wasn’t hurt, I was just scared.” Inexplicably, despite my determined sensibleness, my eyes stung.
Gabby glared at me for several seconds. Whatever this expression was on her face, I’d never seen it before.
I was just about to speak, to reiterate how minor of an event it had been, when she said, “No. Not hurt, just scarred.”
I blinked against the hot sensation behind my eyes and labored to form a complete thought for a few moments before finally managing, “Pardon?”
She gently—but suddenly—encircled my wrist with her fingers and I winced, instinctively yanking it back without thought.
“See? Scarred.” Her smile was small and sad.
My face flushed anew, my tongue tasting like ash. “Just because I don’t like—”
“You didn’t think I noticed? You don’t think Lisa noticed? You’ve changed. Not answering Lisa’s letters from boarding school is one thing, but cutting her out completely?”
OH MY GOD! The letters. The damn letters!
“I had no control over the fact that her school didn’t allow emails or internet. And I answered her handwritten letters. I answered every single one of them, and yet she continues to point to them as a reason to be mean-spirited.”
I’d answered them as soon as I’d received them, which was months late. As an eleven-year-old, I’d begged my tutor to stop holding them, parsing them out as prizes for accomplishments. When that didn’t work, I’d asked my parents to intervene, but they agreed w
ith my tutor (which really meant they didn’t want to rock the boat). I’d even asked Leo for help and discovered his teacher was doing the same thing to him!
When would Lisa and Gabby get it through their brains that there’d been nothing I could have done?
“You responded months after she sent them. Months and months, Mona. She was sent away—because of you—and you were too busy to respond. And she’s never been mean to you, not as far as I know.”
“That’s so untrue! You know she can’t stand me.”
“False.”
“Oh yeah? What about that prank? With the university newspaper? Plus, as I’ve explained a hundred times, I didn’t get the letters—”
“Whatever, that prank was a joke. You’re just too busy thinking the worst of her to realize it.” She flicked away this fact with a wave of her hand. “The point is now. You don’t even like it when your twin sister hugs you. What happened changed you.”
“That’s preposterous.” I was sputtering again, “I-it-what happened didn’t change me. I’ve never liked. . . I just don’t like not knowing when- when- nothing—”
I didn’t get a chance to complete my thought or reiterate my objection because Abram chose that moment to exit the house, the sound of the door drawing my attention. I watched him, some forty feet away, as he descended the stairs dressed only in board shorts.
I flinched.
“Good. Lord. That man is gorgeous.” Gabby’s breathless exclamation felt like sand in my bathing suit. My eyes still stinging, I frowned at the back of her head for a beat before glancing again at Abram.
Perhaps it was the recounting of my no-big-deal story just moments ago and the strange emotional toll that had taken, but as my attention moved over Abram, all I experienced was an aloof observing of a fact.
Objectively, I could admit that Abram was, his body was, breathtaking. Big, wide shoulders—linebacker shoulders, but still lean—on a tall frame, defined stomach, narrow hips. He wasn’t just strong, he was exceptionally formed. He was perfect proportions and elegant lines and exquisite angles.
He was gorgeous. However, my accompanying thought was, so what? Abram was gorgeous, so what? The sky was blue, so what? I have no idea why my damn eyes are still stinging, so what?
And then he looked up. Met my gaze. A whisper of a smile curved his lips and I experienced an odd sort of tunnel vision as he approached. His warm brown eyes didn’t stray from mine though his smile waned, and the focus, the concentrated intensity of interest obvious in his stare seemed to increase the closer he came.
Suddenly, he was there. Standing in front of me.
“Hey,” he said softly, those warm eyes of his moving over my face, a concerned-looking wrinkle appearing between his eyebrows. “Are you okay?”
Am I okay?
“Of course,” I said automatically, feeling oddly flustered by the question.
The wrinkle between his eyebrows deepened and he shifted closer, confusion and urgency behind his gaze. “Are you- have you been crying?”
7
Motion Equations for Constant Acceleration
It was 2:47 AM. I couldn’t sleep. Maybe I didn’t get enough exercise . . .
I hadn’t gone swimming, and I had only myself to blame. More specifically, my wonky emotions were to blame. Or maybe it was Gabby’s fault and her potent power of suggestion. Whatever it was, I was paying the price now.
Instead of getting control of myself like a sane person, Abram’s intensely gentle concern for my well-being freaked me out and drove me away from the pool. I’d made some lame, hurried excuse about needing to wash the bathrobe, fished it out of the water, and sprint-walked to the house. Then, feeling like a fool, I brought the robe upstairs to the bathroom, tossed it in the tub—planning to wring it out and dry it later—and ran into Lisa’s room.
Any plans I’d had of going swimming or cooling off were forgotten, which was fine. After recounting my stupid, ridiculous story to Gabby, I’d no longer felt hot anyway. I’d felt nothing.
I’d wanted to go to my own room but didn’t. That wouldn’t have been prudent. Changing back into day clothes, I searched my sister’s room for something to do, something—anything—that might occupy my mind and time. After a short hunt, I discovered one of our old violins in the back of her closet along with a pile of early workbooks and advanced sheet music.
I took it all out, attempted to tune the instrument, reacquainted myself with how to hold the bow, where to place my fingers on the bridge, and began playing. I started with “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” I played it ten times and then flipped the page of the Suzuki Method, Book One to the second piece, “Old MacDonald.”
I’d just made it to page eighteen when I thought I detected someone approaching, reverberating footsteps on the stairs, on the landing, coming closer. Closing my eyes, I replayed the song from the previous page—which I had memorized at this point—and silently chanted in time to the music, Please go away, please go away, please go away.
Whether it was Abram or Gabby, I would never know. Whoever it was, they left after two stanzas, continuing upward to the third floor. So, probably Abram.
I played and I played until my neck ached, and my wrist cramped, and my fingertips stung, and I suspected the violin had given me hickeys on my neck. And then I played some more. When my arm started to spasm, I put the violin back in its case, but didn’t place it back in the closet. I left it out for tomorrow.
That had been hours ago and I’d only left Lisa’s room to sneak into the bathroom twice. I spent the rest of my evening going through her record, cassette tape, and CD collections. Despite living in the digital age, my sister still collected hardcopy forms of music.
Where my shelves were stuffed with books, hers were stuffed with music, vintage devices used to play the music, and fashion magazines. She owned an old boombox with a double cassette player, an AM/FM radio, and a CD player; a Sony Walkman; a record player; and several sets of quality Bose headphones. I’d listened to various and sundry music until late, lying on the carpet, my feet in the air or against the wall.
Then, at 1:00 AM, I’d gone to the bathroom to wash my face. There, on the counter, I found a note from Gabby folded under a brown plastic bottle with a pink label.
Hey you,
I’m leaving dry shampoo here, use it. I’ll check on you tomorrow.
Love, Gabs
PS Sorry if I upset you
She’d also wrung out and hung up the bathrobe.
Numbly setting her note to the side and promptly pushing it from my mind, I washed my face, braided my hair, and changed into a pair of pink tank top and boy-short PJs. I then tried to go to sleep.
Maybe I can’t sleep because I’m hungry? This was a distinct possibility, given the fact that I’d eaten only a granola bar yesterday.
My stomach rumbled, long and loud, and I pressed my hand against it. Grunting into the darkness, I tossed off the covers and stood from Lisa’s bed. Food on my mind, I slipped out of the room and down the stairs. The kitchen was dark, but instead of flipping on a light—which might’ve alerted Abram as to my whereabouts . . . which he probably didn’t care about so long as “Lisa wasn’t doing anything crazy”—I crept on quiet feet to the fridge and opened it.
Momentarily dazzled by the bright light within, it took several seconds of squinting and blinking before the scant contents became visible. I frowned. In addition to the pizza box, two suspicious-looking containers of Chinese takeout, and various condiments, I found: shredded cheddar/jack cheese blend, a zucchini, a half a pint of mushrooms, and hot salsa. Opening the hot salsa, I smelled it, and then I dipped my pinkie inside and tasted it while examining the lid. It looked, smelled, and tasted fine.
Placing my finds on the island counter, I shut the fridge. The sudden extinguishing of the bright light meant that the kitchen was now pitch black. Shrugging off my lack of sight, I extended my arms and blindly felt my way over to the pantry until my hands connected with the torso of a person.<
br />
A person.
A PERSON!
I jumped back on instinct, my leg hitting one of the stools at the island counter and sending it crashing to the ground. My heart in my throat, I screamed, turned, and darted forward, but my feet tangled with the felled stool and I pitched, bracing myself for a gravitational collision with unseen wooden bars and a granite stool top.
But then strong arms caught me, deftly spinning and lifting me into the air. Cold dread rushed through my body, tensing every muscle. I couldn’t think. I didn’t think. Instinctively, my legs and fists pumped, fighting against my captor. Rocks in my throat as I readied another scream, a hand covered my mouth just as I belted it out.
“Whoa! Calm down. It’s me.” Abram’s voice at my ear soothed, his bulky arm a tight band around my torso, my back to his front, my feet not touching the ground. “Calm down. Shhh. Calm down.”
Hot breath teased my hair and neck, and I stilled, relief at discovering it was Abram didn’t quite chase away the viral panic still attached to my hemoglobin, coursing through my veins. I shook. I was shaking. And I was gasping through my nose, greedy for air.
Perhaps he heard or felt my strained breathing because his arm loosened, lowering my feet to the ground, and his hand covering my mouth slid away. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine,” I said, not sounding convincing. Truth was, I felt like throwing up. “Can you, uh, let me go?”
His arms immediately fell away and I stupidly rushed forward, once more crashing into the stool.
I heard Abram mutter a curse under his breath just as he caught me again, lifting me off the ground again, and saving me—again—from another gravitational collision. This time he turned us away from the stool and carried me across the room.
I didn’t fight him this time. In fact, I relaxed into him. Wired and exhausted, but mostly embarrassed, I allowed myself to be transported without protest. We left the kitchen and I was finally able to see dim outlines of furniture and walls, courtesy of the streetlamp illumination spilling through the windows of the living room.
