Ever After

by Heather McBride

  Capturing Eternity

  © 2010 by Heather McBride.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publishers, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a newspaper, magazine, or journal.

  First printing Infinite Dragon

  Capturing Eternity

  All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Chapter 1

  How it All Began

  In every person to some degree, there is a pull to please or to be accepted by the ones we love or by the ones we hope love us. The drive, depending on the relationship, may be very strong or very weak; each person is different of course.

  I had been living my life to this exact day, this exact second, to please my father; it was all I thought about. The thoughts that filled my head always were what my actions would mean to my father. He and my grandmother were my world growing up. What they thought of me, was everything.

  My mother died two months after I was born. I was named after her (Corrine). My dad says I look just like her, and that makes me happy. I have long blond waist-length wavy hair with reddish highlights in it. I have a picture of my mom on my nightstand. She was five feet tall, just like I am now. We could have been twins people always tell me.

  I think because she was gone, I had gotten the twisted idea that it was my job in life to make my father happy. I felt continual pressure to excel at everything I did. I always hoped it would be what he wanted. This as you might imagine was exhausting, but to see him smile was worth it to me.

  I gained a stepmother five years after my mother’s death or got one dumped on me if you want me to be real about the whole mess. Her name is Sara. I do not think of her as a mother. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t think that either. The woman is cold and as maternal as a dog turd. I know that’s not a very poetic description, but it is what it is.

  My job, she told me many times, is to keep our family name clean and marry into a family as wealthy as ours or even more so. I guess I shouldn’t have expected my dad to grieve for my mother his whole life. I just I hoped he would pick a more motherly woman. I guess I thought my father had better taste in women, but sadly, I was wrong.

  My father’s name is John Andrew Whitmore he is listed as number four on the top ten most successful businessmen in the United States. So for him to have married a gold-digging hag, well, I guess I should have seen that one coming. My dad’s success in his work automatically pushes us all into a social circle based on wealth, power, and achievements. I had grown up in this world. It was what I knew it was all I knew. I could have never guessed it might just be the reason I nearly died just a few short months ago.

  I was head cheerleader all four years of high school. I headed up charity groups for the underprivileged in our city, and I played volleyball and soccer. All four years we made state finals in both sports. I was on track in my perfect life if you want to call it that. I was on the perfect track, my parents expected me to be on. I had no idea what I ever wanted to do; it was always all about what they wanted and what our social group expected me to be doing. It was like autopilot for over teenage over achievers.

  High school graduation came just last year. I was at the top of my class. That of course would have been the only thing acceptable to my dad and Sara. I studied my butt off to make valedictorian, so much, so I began to get migraine headaches from sitting at my computer for so many hours. Dad beamed with joy at my gradation, so it made me happy despite the horrible headaches.

  I was accepted into Harvard University with no trouble. I as usual was expected to join the top sorority at the start of my freshman year. I did just that. I joined Delta Kappa, one of the oldest and most popular houses on campus. I socialized with the other children of the “best” families in our social circle at school. Life was easy, even boring sometimes.

  I was naturally expected to date one of the most promising guys in our social circle too, according to Sara. I did that (against my better judgment) his name was Todd Downs. Todd was captain of the football team of course and head of his fraternity house. He came from one of the wealthiest East Coast families (his father is a senator). My parents were pleased with my choice. Todd is whom they would have expected me to date, but he was also the reason I wanted to end my life just a few short months ago.

  Since I dated Todd I have been isolated, reduced to my cell phone or e-mail to keep in touch with my friends, for about six months or so now. I’m at the tail end of my freshman year at college, even though I don’t actually take classes on campus right now. I have been completing my last semester courses via correspondence. I have been doing this because I have been sick and basically terrified of life in the real world.

  Thanks to my illness (which I will explain) and being paranoid, I have missed all the parties, dances and just about anything, a freshman girl at college can get into. I am an only child to my father and stepmother Sara, so you can say I am the main focus of them both. Let me tell you, this has been sheer hell for me especially right now. I am under a microscope 24/7 and it is draining. It doesn’t matter since nowadays everything is draining to me.

  I close my eyes as Kate, as my private home nurse comes into my room. I smell her perfume, the kind they sell at the dollar stores. It stings my nose and fills my overly warm bedroom. I know it is crazy to have a home nurse, but that’s what happens when your dad has too much money and you’re an only child…ah lucky me (not). Thankfully, this is her last day caring for me and I can have some shred of my privacy back.

  I like Kate she is kind and funny. Her short hair is a golden color, and spirals up in a hundred different directions. She has come to be a good friend in the past few months, and she never complains when I’m moody. I hate to see her go, but if I am ever going to get back to some kind of normal life, she cannot be here.

  “Up up, Corrine!” She chirps her English accent thick and happy.

  I groan, pulling my satin pink bedspread up over my head. “No,” I mumble trying to ignore her.

  I hear my cell phone ringing again for the tenth time. I slide a hand out from the sheets to grab the damn annoying thing off my nightstand…I groan again. “It’s my wicked stepmother.” Kate laughs softly at me, clearly agreeing. I drop the phone into my pink sheets like a hot potato. I have no desire to talk to that wicked woman so early.

  “She won’t stop calling, ya know,” Kate warns. I know Kate is right. I roll my eyes as the phone goes silent. “She’s trying to remind you Doctor Mott is coming over in an hour for your check-up.” Kate smiles, watching me for a reaction.

  “Nobody makes house calls anymore Kate. It’s crazy, that’s so one hundred years ago.” I groan, wishing I could hide away from the world in my bed. I was so sick of doctors and medicine.

  Kate ignores me, laying out a fresh towel for my shower, and motioning her head to the bathroom. I can hear the shower water already running in the bathroom. Kate knew I would be dragging my feet, so she already turned it on. The home phone on my cluttered dresser, covered by my Garfield pajamas, rings.

  “Please tell her I’m in the shower.” I beg as I cringe with each ring.

  “Go on, get in the shower. I will handle her!” Kate waves me out of the room and heads to my dresser to dig out my phone. My room is less than clean these days. Kate try’s to “tidy up” for me as she says, but I never let her. Sara treats like a housemaid already, and I just won’t do that. Kate is a single mom, with three kids, she usually looks worn out already when she gets here at 7 am, and that’s without picking up my junk.

  I give her a quick hug as I head for
the shower. I know Doctor Mott and he is never late. I quickly wash my hair. I know why he is so diligent in my care. My parents recently funded the new cancer center at our local hospital (go figure)! The good doctor doesn’t want to tick off my dad in anyway which means he’s seen me more than he probably has seen any of his other patients this year.

  I quickly dry off. Looking in the mirror, I can see I’ve lost weight but I still look good… I think or I hope. I grab the brush to untangle my long hair. Sara bugs me to death to get it cut; it’s only to my waist. She thinks it is too long and like a hippie’s. I could care less what she thinks she looks like a plastic Barbie doll… so she shouldn’t talk. I will take my “hippie look” any day over her “fake” look.

  I am told I look just like my mother and I think of that all the time. I keep a picture of her on my dresser. My grandma (I call her Grammy and sometimes Gram) gave it to me when I was five years old. I often look into the mirror and wonder if she sees me. Honestly, I hope she can’t right now. I’m not too fond of the girl looking back at me so I can’t imagine she would be either.

  I am lucky that Gram still lives with us. She’s always been here for me. I would be majorly lost without her. I know Sara hates that we are so close, that’s probably because Gram doesn’t like Sara. The day they met Gram told me Sara told her she had already picked out a boarding school for me. Gram said she nearly smacked her in the face at the suggestion of sending me away after she married my father.

  I try to forget that thought and quickly slip on my yellow flowered sundress. I don’t look in the mirror again. I know I’m pail and look to skinny in it (Sara told me that last week), no need to verify that fact. I head down to the kitchen to grab something to eat before my check-up. I don’t feel hungry, but if I don’t eat, I will get shaky. I hope this is the last check up for a while. I got rid of the home nurse, now I needed to stop seeing doctors. I have had to go to so many I cannot stand it anymore.

  I head downstairs to the kitchen. Sara calls it her gourmet kitchen, for someone who cannot boil water its ridiculous. She spent a year designing it, and over thirty thousand dollars of my dad’s money building it. The stupidest thing about it is the only one who cooks in this house is our chef, Cam Parsons. He started cooking for us after Sara fired the last chef for using non-organic eggs.

  That’s the thing around here it’s all about organics. Sara swears food chemicals are poisoning us all. I hide most of my junk food so she can’t find it. Kate and Gram have been so sweet to bring me Twinkies, donuts and other various sweet things Sara has deemed poisonous. I would starve to death if I didn’t have my food stash. Hey, a girl has to have her chocolate!

  I manage to get the last donut and pour a glass of organic milk. I start thinking about what my stepmom says about chemicals in our food killing us. I go out with Todd to a party, and get mono and get attacked; milk with hormones is the least of my worries. Death by Twinkies on most days sounds really good to me…sadly.

  I take what’s left of my breakfast to the media room and flip on my dad’s pride and joy, his giant flat-screen plasma TV. The room is his “man cave” as Sara calls it. The furniture is all black leather, and the windows have remote control shades, for optimum viewing of the TV. and computer screens. My pictures hang next to the ones of dad and Sara; creepily she looks like my sister and not my stepmother. The TV is on CNN naturally and of course, I channel surf to MTV.

  I try to watch the videos and quit thinking of ways to torture Todd for destroying my life and making me sick. I to this very day cannot forget what he did to me. I close my eyes as I feel the panic slipping into my mind, as it always does when I think too much. Thinking has been my downfall. If I could stop, I might forget the sheer terror I felt that cold fall night in the back yard of the Delta Kappa Phi house.

  I have spent hours in therapy, being analyzed by shrinks. They try to help me quit having nightmares and severe panic attacks, but they never end. All the doctors look at me with their wire-rimmed glasses perched on the ends of their noses and examine me. They all ask the same questions; I should know I have seen five different shrinks. I think wearing wire-rimmed glasses is like a requirement in the psychology field, at least around here. They must hand them out when they get their degrees.

  I now take three antidepressants a day. They are for the continuous suicidal thoughts that haunt me like ghosts on a mission to see me self-destruct. My parents and Grandma watch me as if I am a time bomb ready to explode at any given moment. I cannot find one thing about my old self in me now. I don’t like who I have become. It’s like the real me got lost somewhere that horrible night and she doesn’t seem to have any plans to return. I think the “real” me died the night Todd attacked me.

  I can remember it like it was yesterday. All of the girls from my sorority house had been invited to a party at the football players frat house Delta Kappa Phi. It was the usual “keg” party of course. I didn’t drink but I went anyway. My friends and Todd begged me to go. I didn’t see the harm in it at that time, big mistake on my part. Beth and Kara, my two best friends, had come up to my room before the party.

  We all got ready together it was sort of a ritual of ours since middle school. We were having a great time trying on clothes and talking, just typical girl stuff. Todd had been bugging me to go over to the party with him. I told him I was walking over with Beth and Kara, and for some reason that made him really mad. I had been watching him lately; his temper was bad all the time. I told Beth I thought he was getting into drugs and she agreed. Kara’s boyfriend David had told her the football coaches were watching him for possible steroid use.

  The party was in full swing when we got there, music blaring, kids were running everywhere, it was totally wild. Todd was really pushy all night; he wouldn’t let me out of his sight. I remembered telling Beth he was getting to be a pain in the butt, when I snuck off to the bathroom and ran into her in the hallway. Todd was also trying really hard to get me to drink which I refused. I’d asked him to get me a Coke after telling him I did not want a beer for like the hundredth time.

  I was in shock when he took off finally to find me a Coke without nagging me to have a beer again. I remember how sweet the Coke tasted, much more so than it should, but I was so thirsty I didn’t think about it much. I sat down on the steps going upstairs as my head started spinning. I felt like I was going to throw up. Todd pulled me to my feet; he swore I needed fresh air.

  I could hardly hold my head up as he took me outside. I remember how cool the night air was, it gave me chills. I tried to take a deep breath so I wouldn’t throw up but my stomach just churned. I wanted to curl up somewhere and sleep or maybe even die, since I felt so bad. I wanted to call Beth and tell her I needed to leave but I had left my cell phone in my purse somewhere inside the frat house.

  Todd told me I needed to sit down and by chance, (not) he had a blanket outside behind the gazebo, far from the party. I felt too sick to see he had this planned out. I stumbled as he led me to the back yard. My hearing was getting muffled and I wondered if I had food poisoning, I was close on that thought I found out later. Todd seemed way too helpful as we finally reached the blanket.

  The words he spoke were etched into my mind from that night, and they filled my head as a flash back hit me full force. I curled up on the couch and buried my head, as Todd’s voice filled my mind.

  “Let’s sit for a while till you feel better and I’ll take care of you.” He said to me. I felt a little better until he started trying to kiss me and when I said I was too sick he said that was too bad

  “I need to go home!” I remembered clearly telling him as my stomach flipped over. He only laughed at me.

  “You look so hot tonight.” He purred in my ear and I scooted away. He was pushing me to the ground in that next second and I knew right then. I was in major trouble.

  “I’m sick, Todd. I need to go home now please.” I kept telling him this over and over. He grabbed my arms as I tried to push him away from me. I f
elt a rush of panic now.

  “No… babe. It’s okay, it will wear off soon it’s not lethal it’s just to loosen you up a little..you know have some fun. They…they told me that. I’ve used it before anyway…with…well never mind.” He stared at me and he looked a little scared for a few brief seconds.

  I didn’t understand what he meant by that. I knew he had done something to me already and it was something bad. I was trying to get through to him that I was sick, but he just didn’t get it. The look in his eyes terrified me. This was not the Todd I knew; this man was crazy. I felt his fingers dig into my arms suddenly as he pushed me down. He slapped me hard across the face without warning. I started crying and the next thing I remember he grabbed me by the hair and slammed my head onto the ground.

  I felt pain rip across my head as I fought to stay conscious. I came too quickly, fearing what he might do. I knew I had to get up. I made myself keep my eyes open fighting the darkness trying not to pass out. I could feel Todd pinning me down. My arms seemed to fell heavier and heavier and my legs were like lead weights. Everything was spinning when I looked up, as if I was a child at play on a merry go round. This was no child’s game now, Todd Downs was determined to hurt or maybe even kill me.