by Robin Leaf
“My mom was a twin, and she grew up in twin hell. She thought we were identical at first and didn’t find out we weren’t until we were about three. The doctor thought we might be an actual set of polar twins. It’s where the egg splits and is fertilized by two different sperm. It’s super rare, so it’s really not ever been proven. In fact, in all the research I’ve done, I’ve never found proof that polar twins are a real thing. I think the doctor was just covering since he told my mom we were identical from the start. But mom tells everyone that’s what we are.” She sneered before adding, “And Em does have different hair and eye color, and she is a little taller than I am. I try not to be bitter about that last part.”
“You shouldn’t,” I admitted. “You win, since you have the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.”
She smirked and poked her finger in my chest. “Was that a line, Slaughter?”
“Nope.” I grabbed her hand, brought it up to graze her knuckles with my lips, and gave her my full on sexy smile. “That was the God’s honest truth.”
This time, there was no mistaking it. I made her blush.
***
The group decided to go shoot a few rounds of pool at the two empty pool tables in the back of the bar. Etta and I joined them. Watching her bend over the pool table about drove me insane, but talking to her was as easy as breathing. We laughed a lot, too, which only made me want her more. As the evening progressed, I noticed she became more comfortable with me, but her frequent touches on my arms and brushes of any part of her body against mine set me on fire.
Five teams meant one couple had to sit out per round. It was finally our turn to sit out, so we moved to one of those high standing bar tables in the corner. As we talked, she moved closer to me. I was conscious of our every movement. My right hand was casually on her waist and her left thigh pushed into my right. Our heads mere inches apart, I reached up with my left hand and moved that piece of hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear. I trailed my fingertips down her cheek to her chin.
“You know,” I whispered in her ear, “I really wanted to be your random kiss.”
She looked up at me through her lashes and licked her lips; it made me hard. “I know.” She took a step back and smiled. “But hold that thought. I need to go to the restroom.”
I nodded. “I’ll walk with you. I really don’t like you going back there alone.”
She laughed and patted my arm. “Thanks, Mr. Flintstone, but I think I can handle going to the bathroom all by myself.” She walked away, and although I enjoyed the view, I felt her absence immediately. This was ridiculous.
I walked over to the pool tables to watch the game. Emily came to stand beside me.
“Things are going well, I see,” she gloated.
“Yeah. I really like your sister.”
“I can tell she likes you, too.” She smiled at me over her shoulder as she walked back to take her turn.
Minutes passed. No Etta. I started to get a little annoyed that she was taking so long. What the hell was she doing? Did she bolt on me? Was she really not interested?
Then I remembered.
The fuck nugget.
I quickly scanned the bar and saw the table where he sat earlier. All his friends were there. No Franklin.
My heart surged to my throat.
Without thinking, I practically ran to the restroom, bumping into several people on the way. In this horribly designed bar, the restroom was nestled in a twisting hallway on the other side of the building from the pool tables. After I hit the first turn, what I heard almost made me explode.
“No,” Etta sobbed.
“See, you little tease,” Franklin growled, slurring every syllable. “When you kissed me like you did earlier, you weren’t telling me no.” I heard something slam against a wall, something ripped, and she cried out. “You say you won’t give me a blow job, so I’ll just take another kiss and see if you change your mind. And then you’ll give me what I want.”
When I rounded the next turn, what I saw froze me momentarily because I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. His enormous body pressed hers against the wall. One of his hands clamped down on both of hers and held them above her head. Her legs were pinned to the wall by his thicker thighs. She was utterly helpless. I started moving, but it felt like I was in slow motion. Her panicked whimpers became louder each step I took.
I saw her head jerk back. The fucker yanked her hair.
I. Saw. Red.
That really got me moving. I lunged at him, grabbed him by the back of the head and the back of the shirt, pulled him off her, and used my momentum to slam him against the wall.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Franklin?” I asked, my calm voice belying my fury.
“Taking what she offered. No girl kisses like that and dresses like that if she’s not interested in giving it away.”
I turned him around and pulled back and punched him in the stomach. He doubled over, barely able to catch his breath. I had never been in a fight before. Hell, I’d never even raised my fist to my brother, but I kept hitting him, loving the feel of my fist slamming into him and relishing the noises of his anguished pain every time I connected with any part of his body. I pulled back to punch him again in the face, but I felt Etta’s hand pulling on my arm.
“No, Nathaniel.” I turned to look at her, still pinning Franklin against the wall. Her shirt and bra were torn open and she was trying frantically to keep herself covered. “He isn’t… Please, I just want to get out of here.”
I let go of Franklin and ripped my hoodie over my head. I turned my head away from her and wrapped the sleeves over her shoulders. “Put this on.” I turned back to Franklin and bent over his body which had slid down the wall. “No woman asks to get raped,” I said to him through clenched teeth. He looked up at me with surprised eyes, blood trickling from his nose and mouth. “That’s what you were about to do, weren’t you?”
He shook his head. “I wasn’t…”
I kneeled on his bad knee until he winced in pain to shut him up. “Think again. She said no; you kept going. And you fucking ripped her shirt open.” He blinked his eyes and looked over her direction before looking back to me. “Ask yourself this… would you have stopped? Because it didn’t look like you were going to from where I was standing.” He wiped his mouth and looked down at his hands now streaked with blood. “Being drunk is no excuse. And the push she gave you earlier and the warning that it wouldn’t happen again? That was not her ‘giving it away.’ That was her telling you to go away because she’s not interested. I don’t care if a girl is standing naked in front of you. If she says no, that means you stop.” I pointed to the upper corner. “See that? Security cameras recorded this all.” His eyes widened. “How do you think it’s gonna look on that video?” I grabbed him by the shirt and dragged him to his feet. “If she decides, your ass will go down for a long time.” I turned and looked at her, and she shook her head slightly and closed her eyes. “Have your friends take you home, Franklin. Sleep this shit off.” I gripped his shirt tighter and led him down the hall. “No matter what she decides, I might still tell coach,” I whispered in his ear, forcefully pushing him away. Once he stumbled a few steps and rounded the corner, I turned back to Etta who was huddled next to the wall.
“Please tell me that fucker didn’t…”
She shook her head, and her face twisted into pain. She rubbed her chest and gasped before she said, “No.”
“Are you hurt?” I asked, moving closer to her, not sure if it was okay to touch her. The overwhelming need to take her in my arms and comfort her was hard to resist.
She shook her head again, but the wince she tried to conceal as she crossed her arms over her chest let me know she was lying.
“I’ll take you to your sister.”
I turned to walk, and she grabbed my arm. “No, I don’t want her to know.”
I ran my hands through my hair. “Okay. Then what do you want? I’ll do anything.”
/> She grabbed my arm desperately, never looking me in the eye. “Just get me out of here, Nathaniel. Please.”
“Okay.” I wrapped my arms around her and felt her tense. Quickly, I dropped my arms and led her down the hallway. “We at least need to tell your sister we’re leaving. Can you pull it together enough to face them?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
I stopped in front of her. “Etta.” I waited for her to look up at me. “Are you sure you’re not hurt?”
She looked down. “I’ll be fine.”
I stood there for a minute debating what to do. I tentatively grabbed her hand, thrilled that she let me, and led her back to our friends.
I don’t even remember what we said to everyone, or if we even said anything. She gathered her stuff. At that point, I didn’t care about stuff. I didn’t care about her sister or our friends. I didn’t care how Josh and David would get back to my apartment. I didn’t care about what anyone thought. All I could focus on was getting Etta out of that bar.
I tore out of the parking lot and drove, not really sure where to take her. She stared out the window, her arms wrapped protectively around herself. I really wanted to touch her, to comfort her, but I didn’t want my touches reminding her of his. I didn’t want her to be alone, but beyond that, I really didn’t know what to do.
“Wanna talk?” I asked, trying to keep her from shutting down.
She wiped her face and turned toward me. “No.” Looking down at her hands, she shook her head. “I’m okay.”
It was almost 2:00 a.m. Despite Houston’s size and major-city status, it doesn’t really offer many safe, non-partying options that early in the morning. I opted for the all-night diner not too far from where we were that was known for ice cream. When I parked and turned off the car, she looked at me.
“I didn’t think you wanted to go back to my place, and ice cream sounded good.”
She gave me a weak smile. “Seriously, you really brought me for ice cream?”
“I learned it from my mom. It’s the all-around comfort food, right? She had a different flavor for every problem.”
I got out of the car and rounded it to her side. I opened the door for her.
“What’s the flavor for this situation?” she asked, trying to make a joke.
“I’m not sure,” I smiled. “Since I don’t think I’ve ever been through this, I’ll let you decide. I figured you needed a distraction right now. It can’t hurt, right?”
She got out of the car and followed me inside.
We sat in a booth and ate ice cream and talked. Well, mostly I talked. I just wanted to take her mind off the last hour, get her out of her own head for a little while. I told her about Jacob and stories about our childhood. I told her about my upbringing, my parents and grandparents, vacations we took, and silly things about my past. She listened, asking questions periodically. She even laughed a few times. After a few hours, she sank into the wall beside her, brought her knees up to her chest and rested her chin on her knees.
“You look tired.” She nodded her head and yawned. “Where do you want me to take you?”
“Back to my dorm. I just need some sleep.”
“I don’t like the thought of you being alone right now,” I admitted.
“My roommate is there. She never goes anywhere.” The corners of her mouth turned up in an attempt to smile. “I’ll be fine.”
I looked down at my hands. “I wish you’d have let me hurt him more.”
“He wasn’t worth it.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “He was just… drunk.”
“Don’t do that. I meant it when I said that wasn’t an excuse.” I stared at her for a minute. “What are you going to do about him?”
She sighed and looked away from me. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “No one has ever made me feel so…” She closed her eyes again and took a deep breath. “I just want to forget.”
I knew that would be easier said than done.
We rode back to campus quietly. All the freshmen athletes and trainers lived in the same dorm, and since I lived in it last year, I drove straight there. I parked and watched her eyes fill with tears.
“Don’t.” I instructed quietly. She looked at me questioningly. “Don’t start thinking for a second that this was your fault.” I waited for her to answer, but she didn’t. “You did nothing wrong, Etta.” She nodded her head, but it was unconvincing. “Look, I know you said you want to forget, but it wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to talk to someone… maybe a professional, about this. And I still think you should turn him in.”
She nodded. “I’m so sorry, Nathaniel,” she whispered. She looked so broken and humiliated. My heart broke.
“You have nothing to be sorry for.”
She got out of the car. I hurried around to her side and stood in front of her. She wiped her face and gave me a teary half-smile. “That kiss should have been yours.” She walked toward the building. “It should have been yours.”
I followed her inside. At the stairs, she turned and grabbed my hand. “Thank you. You’ve been a perfect friend tonight.” She rose up on her toes and kissed my cheek quickly. “But right now, it’s all we can be.” She looked down and stepped away from me. “And that’s what I’m sorry for.” She turned and walked up the stairs, taking a broken piece of my heart with her.
Seven
May 6, nine years ago
Baseball kept me busy, but when I was alone, guilt ate at me, thinking about what I could have done differently that night to avoid Etta having to go through all this bullshit. If only I hadn’t taken my eyes off her when she came to kiss me. If only I had stood up for her right after he kissed her. If only I had walked her to the bathroom. If only…
Time was not making things better for me, but I hid my guilt from her. I watched over Etta carefully as much as possible, feeling it was my duty for allowing what happened that night. She was getting help from a therapist and seemed better, but the subtle changes to her personality still were there. I know I had only known her a very short time, but I could tell she struggled. The people who knew her, her friends and Jackson, said she was different. Since I didn’t know how she was before that night, I paid attention to how they talked about her when she wasn’t in the room. They all said she stopped touching people when she talked; plus, she wasn’t as talkative with those around her and slightly less friendly. She didn’t smile as easily. She was jumpy and a little skittish. She joked less. She just wasn’t her normal feisty self. She was still Etta, just less so.
They noticed that her appearance changed as well. She wore much baggier t-shirts and longer shorts. She wore even less makeup than she did before, often opting for none at all. Every day she wore her hair up, usually in a bun or a ponytail. And more noticeable, to me anyway, were her stormier eyes – more grey, less greenish-blue, and certainly less bright.
I hung out in the training room whenever I could, which was pretty much every day we weren’t on the road. It became my mission to make her laugh. She seemed to like having me around; at least if she didn’t like it, she didn’t say anything. Plus, I was fighting this muscle pull in my left shoulder that she was treating.
Our stretches of away games were brutal for me, but I’d call her as often as I could just to check on her. She said she appreciated me doing that. I was the only one who knew, besides her therapist – well, and Franklin – about that night. She said she was glad she had someone she didn’t have to pretend around because the pretending was exhausting. I got that.
Tomorrow, I was scheduled to leave again. Franklin’s knee was still bothering him, and coach said I would be starting both games this weekend.
No. I didn’t tell Coach about Franklin. Etta asked me not to. I tried to convince her that she shouldn’t allow him to get away with this, but she insisted I drop it.
“Nathaniel,” she insisted when I brought it up one day, “if we tell coach, you would get in trouble for being at the bar and for fighting.”
“I think
Coach would be understanding under the circumstances, Etta. And I can handle the consequences. I need you to be okay.”
“I’m okay, really. And anyway, it would be his word against mine, and I just want it to go away.”
But it wasn’t going away, especially since Franklin’s knee was still an issue.
Therefore, I paid attention to the locker room talk and how he seemed around the girls he dated; I didn’t hear of him forcing himself on anyone else. He seemed remorseful. But the thing that was his saving grace was mainly that he left her alone, only going to the training room when she wasn’t there. However, the glares he gave me almost made me want to ignore Etta’s request.
Early before our first classes, she told me to meet her in the training room. I sat on my usual table today in front of Etta. Ever her guinea pig, she wanted to try some new treatment on me for my muscle strain, so she had me sitting with my arm draped over her shoulder while she worked on me with some new liniment. I was shirtless, and she was just as beautiful as she ever was, so I had to fight hard to concentrate on something other than how good she smelled, or how soft her skin looked, or how she was close enough to feel her breath on my naked chest while touching my naked shoulder.
“So tonight,” Etta began as she rubbed the spot on my shoulder giving me trouble, “Beth wants to watch a DVD at her place. Wanna join us?”
I rolled my eyes. “I’ll bring the nail polish and ingredients for s’mores.” I clapped my hands and bounced like a little girl.
She smiled. It wasn’t a laugh, but hey, I’d take what I could get. She placed my arm back over her shoulder.
“So does that mean you’re coming?” she deadpanned.
Jackson walked into the room with his breakfast. He waved at me, said hi to Etta, and walked into his office.
“By the way, did you say anything to Jackson? He’s been weird around me lately, never leaving me alone in here. Did you say something to him about Franklin?” she asked, thumbing a particularly sore spot.
