“Do you really want my consent?”
“It’s preferable, but not required. I’ve got this, and that’s all I need to have you saying ‘yes’ to me every chance you’ve got. So if need be, pretend.”
“Pretend to give you consent?”
“Yes, say it’s what you want. It’ll be easier to give in than it is to resist.”
I closed my eyes to gather myself. I needed to be grounded, because everything felt like it was falling apart. I tried to form the words, but it wasn’t entirely easy. With a deep breath—inhale, exhale—I said the words he demanded I spit out for him.
“Yes, it’s what I want.” I refused to tremble as he took me in his arms.
I watched him sign the paper, and he let me leave after that. I quickly went to the nearest trashcan, and I threw up. The stress wasn’t good on me at all.
***
I didn’t go to school for days. Professor Long still called me every minute and every hour that was spent without him. He still dragged me with guilt to his house and made me sleep with him, which I always ended up regretting. He beat me every time, because it turned him on. Seeing me in pain gave him pleasure. One night I was so broken I had to stay the night with him. Sleeping next to him was torture, especially when I could clearly see his wife’s house shoes on the floor by the end table. I knew he was lying about his wife. When he found I knew, he gave me her jewelry. I wondered if she’d ever notice it missing. I couldn’t go on like this, and so I told Lia. At least, I planned on it. I had to stop by Ben’s first, because he had requested an audience with me. He was treating me like royalty, and I was honestly still pissed off at him. I didn’t want to see him, but I had to. He said it was important, so I had to get through this somehow.
“Ben, I’m here!” I shouted once I got into the house. I turned into the main entryway and immediately closed my eyes. Splinter had caught me by surprise, mainly because he was naked.
“Jesus, Splinter! Put some clothes on!”
“Oh god, did you—”
“Yes I did.”
“Okay, I’m going!” Splinter ran upstairs, and I began to question my sanity.
“BENJAMIN!”
I was determined to find him, but the anger in my voice seemed to call out to him in a way that my normal, calm voice didn’t. He appeared instantly and looked worried.
“Why is Splinter running around naked? Am I hallucinating?”
“Well, did you take something before coming over?”
I shoved him and let my anger take over. “No! You’ve got to be kidding me! Tell me why I’m here and why on Earth Splinter was naked!”
“I’ll explain later. Please follow me.” He took me into his office where he told me to sit down, and with much anticipation growing between the two of us he threw a magazine onto the desktop in a furious attempt to show me what was on the front. The words, The Morrison Study were bold and hard to go unnoticed.
“What is this?” I asked, and he sighed.
“Do you know a student named Lia?”
“That is totally—”
“Just yes or no, please.”
“Yeah, I have a friend named Lia.”
Ben laughed. “Get comfortable and read up. Because she isn’t much of a friend if you ask me.”
I couldn’t get comfortable with the feeling of anxiety churning in my stomach, but I went on to read what had been written. It was a psychological study of me, my life, and my mind. I trembled with anger. The only thing that made sense was tearing apart the evidence. But I knew there was more. It was a local magazine. After a little inspection, I became even more furious than before.
“She goes to fucking Dartmouth,” I said with disdain.
“Yes, she does.”
“She used me for her senior project. She used me like…”
“Like a piece of meat?” I began to cry. It had been a while since I had cried in front of Ben.
“Do you want to sue?”
“I want to get away. I want to run.”
“You can’t run away from this. This is our life. There are shitty people who you think you can trust and then you find out you can’t. It happens to everyone. But for us, it’s more public. We need to deal with it.”
“No, you need to deal with it. I never asked for this. I only asked for you to call me your sister! I didn’t sign up to become a public spectacle!” I got up and left without even asking why Splinter was here. At that moment I didn’t really care why. When I saw him as I was leaving, he was fully clothed and he had his hair up in its normal man bun. I couldn’t remember if it was like that before or not.
“You look like you need to let off some steam.”
“Yeah, sure, Splinter.”
“Really? Nearly two years pass and this is the way we act?”
I stopped and looked at him as I mindlessly wiped the tears off my face. “I’m sorry, I’m not in the friendliest of moods right now, Splinter.”
“Oh, don’t be. I wanted to tell you I had an idea of how to change the headlines for you.”
“Oh yeah? Well tell me, because I can’t seem to trust anyone but you.”
“Let’s go out and get some tattoos. Let’s publicize it, make a big deal out of it. People love us, and we get to choose how they see us. If people see you are out doing something aside from focusing on that shitty stuff and having breakdowns, they’ll see a better side of you.”
“And this will help me how?”
“It’ll help because you won’t need to defend yourself. Other people will see that shit isn’t true without you lifting a finger. They’ll know you. It’ll only be by secondhand, but it’ll be worth something.”
I smiled and held out my hand. “Okay, let’s go make the news go crazy about us, Splintass.”
“You know, people still love calling me that.”
“Only I can call you that.”
“Why?”
“Because I started it.” Silence filled the rooms, and he laughed.
“I’m so glad we’re past the high school bullshit. Aren’t you?”
“To be honest, Splinter, high school never ended. We just let go of the people who didn’t grow up. We got old.”
“Don’t say that. We’re not that old.”
“You are. Crosley told me you repeated your senior year his sophomore year. How many times did you have to repeat your senior year until they let you graduate with us?”
He sighed and motioned me toward his car. When we were buckled in, he pulled off to find a good tattoo shop. “I was a low-income student. I couldn’t pay off all of my debts that come around senior year. I opted for work-study within the school, and I had to keep at it until I worked enough hours to pay off the debt. I happened to earn enough by the time you were a senior. So I graduated with you.”
“They seriously kept you from graduating because of the debt?”
“Yep.”
“Assholes.”
“No kidding.”
I leaned across and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Are you going to tell me how old you are?”
“Nah. But I’ll let you get a tattoo with me.”
Laughing, we went into the tattoo shop we had picked out, and the rest of the day didn’t seem so bad after that. When I went home I went to Instagram to see how well the photos were being taken by our ‘fan base’. When I saw all the feedback, I was happier than a clam. I was so ecstatic that when I saw another text from Professor Long, I ignored it. However, I didn’t ignore Lia.
“Hey, what’s up?” she asked when I called her.
“I hope you know you messed with the wrong person.”
“Yeah, about that…”
“Don’t bother explaining the reasons behind your pathetic study to me. I am not your friend. If you were studying me, that makes me your patient, not your friend.”
“Bea, please let me—”
“No, let me explain. Whatever you think you know about me is bullshit. Your paper is shit. You are a piece of shit and I couldn’t care less w
hat happens to you. I’m going to lose your number, and you better lose mine. Because if you don’t, I’m gonna sue you.”
I hung up the phone, and for once I felt power in my heart and soul. It was riveting and exciting. Then when I saw the texts from David, I was a heaping mess all over again. I had no one to tell, no one to confide in. And for all I knew, my efforts were meaningless. He could easily turn over those photos without a second thought. First I was walking on eggshells with Ben and now I was walking on very thin, slippery ice with David. I didn’t know what he was completely capable of. But after tonight, I would find out.
***
I wasn’t the kind of person to beg for mercy. However, I was willing to try anything to keep myself from reaching the point of no return.
“Please David, I can’t anymore.” I was pleading with every ounce of energy I had left.
“I’m sure you can do a little more tonight, Bea.” His hand wrapped around my neck, which was covered in hickeys, and I tried my best not to let my emotions show on my face. I let him bend me over again, and take me with all the energy and vigor he had. It wasn’t what I wanted. It was far from what I had bargained for. When he was done and he had gone to clean up, I took his phone and grabbed my clothes. This was my out. I needed to destroy the evidence. I couldn’t allow him to do this to me. I needed to be free. I had watched him for days unlock his phone, and I figured out the six-digit code after one try. My memory had been working overtime to make sure I could access his phone. When I was in, I went in and reset his phone to factory settings and changed the password. Six-digits required. 3-8-2-5-8-2. F-U-C-K-U-B. I took my exit and I prayed that we would never run into each other again.
***
“Meet me somewhere?” I begged Splinter. I couldn’t hide my crying.
“Yeah, I’ll be there.”
We agreed to meet at the state line. I parked my car and waited for him to arrive.
“What happened?” he asked when he approached. He quickly came to me, and I clung to him like a lifesaver.
“I’m free,” was all I could say before I broke down into uncontrollable sobs and became incapable of holding myself up. I hadn’t realized the extent of my pain until just then.
“Okay, shh it’s okay.” He lifted me up, and cradled me in his arms. “You’ll be okay. I’m here.”
We sat like that for a while then he offered to drive me to get coffee. When we sat down and the espresso calmed my nerves, I poured out every bit of information I could to him.
“Come back to Hanover with me,” Splinter said. “Stay with Ben and me.”
“No, I can’t do that.”
“Of course you can do that. He’s your brother. You think he’ll kick you to the curb once he—”
“He won’t find out about this because this never happened.”
“Bea, I appreciate you opening up to me but—”
“If I find out you told anyone I’ll never make the mistake of opening up to you again.”
“Don’t do this, Bea. You need help, or so you told me.”
“And I’m taking care of it. I needed to vent.”
“So you used me to keep your deadly secret? Do you really think I want to keep this from your brother?”
“I don’t expect you to lie for me. I expect you to avoid bringing it up. It’s over and it’s done. Isn’t that enough for you?” I asked, exasperated by the conversation at hand.
“Will you be okay?” he asked as he spun the spoon in his coffee cup.
“When am I not okay?”
He didn’t answer. “I’ll drive you back to your car. You seem okay to drive.”
“I am. Promise.” He looked up at me wearily, and I smiled at him.
“I’ll be fine. I can take care of myself.”
“I don’t doubt that.”
We left the coffee shop after that, and we never talked about Professor Long again.
CHAPTER SIX
With everything that had happened, I almost spaced out about Halloween. It came so quickly I realized last minute I had forgotten about a costume. Thankfully, my brother picked one out for me. We were headed to New York for a big industry Halloween party. I straightened my hair and put on the 1920’s flapper dress and sequined feather headpiece, along with the fishnets and pointed stilettos. This would be my first industry event where I’d walk the red carpet and where I’d be in front of cameras. Needless to say, I was nervous as hell. Before we left, I did some pre-game partying at the club I worked at. It was my day off, but I was happy to help out, especially in costume. More tips for me!
When Splinter came in dressed in his lumberjack costume I freaked out when I saw him coming toward me not only with a bloody axe, but carrying the head of an evil teddy bear.
“What the hell is that?” I asked him, pointing at the teddy bear head.
“It’s my costume.”
“You’re an angry lumberjack that killed a poor possessed teddy bear? How are we even friends?” I said completely deadpan.
“Oh geez, Bea. I didn’t kill it. I am it. I’m the possessed teddy bear.”
“In a lumberjack costume?”
“Technically I’m a psychotic murdering teddy bear. But you know, I don’t follow rules.”
“Sure you don’t. I’ve got to serve these tables.”
“You need to get out of here. Ben is waiting.”
“Fine, let’s go.”
I walked out with him arm in arm, and as I left I saw Professor Long entering the club. Hoping he didn’t see me, I pretended that I hadn’t even batted an eyelash in his direction. I suppose he heard I was working the crowd tonight, but now that I was leaving I hoped he wouldn’t find a reason to drive from Connecticut to New York to try and cause a scene. Because that’s something Crosley would do, and he was a lot like Crosley was. Only, this time he didn’t have spies to act out his dirty plots for him. I turned back to look at him for only a moment, and I couldn’t tell if he was looking at me, or if he was looking for me in the unfamiliar garb I was wearing. I was almost unrecognizable; I hoped he couldn’t tell it was me, because if he saw me leaving with Splinter, I knew I’d have hell to pay. Things weren’t as easy as obliterating his phone and keeping away from him. It was much more complex than that. Even I couldn’t understand the complicated nature of trying to hide from someone who wanted to find me so desperately. If anything, I had tonight, and that was enough for once.
***
Ben’s arm wrapped around my waist as we stood in front a crowd of flashing cameras on the New York red carpet. I followed suit, and eventually we were able to enter the party, where there were more cameras. I saw people with video cameras who were recording other people holding microphones. I was praying that they wouldn’t interview me.
Inside the party, they were playing “Gasoline” by Halsey, and I was surprised they weren’t playing an Eden Sank song now that Ben had made his arrival. I didn’t know if any of the other boys would be here, but I figured I’d soon find out.
As the night went on, I met plenty of industry professionals, none of whom said anything about what had hit the tabloids recently. Everything was going smoothly, and I was thankful. I took pictures with Splinter on our phones and with the event photographers, and I was having a blast. I hadn’t had this much fun in a long time, and I swore I had forgotten what it was like to have fun without a single worry in my head. Little did I know, I had a lot to worry about. Once this party was over, all the worry would start to seep in and intoxicate my body all over again.
When the night was over and I was escorted back to my apartment, I found myself drunk on nothing but pure bliss. I had danced and laughed and rejoiced tonight. It was the best party I had ever been to.
I walked into my darkened apartment, and I could sense that something was off. Roscoe hadn’t greeted me at the door.
“Roscoe?” I heard him barking, and it sounded muffled. I waded through the darkness, feeling for the light switch, when someone grabbed me from behind and cover
ed my mouth before I could scream.
“Shhh, it’s only me. You went out without telling me. You even tried to erase my phone in a petty attempt to hide. Too bad I’m a professor with access to student records.” He threw me down on the floor near the coffee table. I landed with a loud thud, the darkness in the apartment doing nothing to alleviate the shock overcoming me. I needed to get away, but I couldn’t remember how to navigate my own apartment. Everything was dark and confusing and my mind couldn’t keep up.
“Please—”
He began kicking me and hitting me repeatedly. I was crying so loudly I was surprised my neighbors didn’t say anything. Suddenly I heard a knock on the door, and Professor Long ripped me up from the floor, pulling my arm behind my back as he led me toward the door.
“Answer it and act as if I’m not here. If you don’t, I’ll break your pretty little arm.”
I sucked up all my tears and opened the door to see the worst possible person to lie to: Splinter.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” I forced a smile and shook my head with a small laugh.
“Nothing’s wrong. I’m fine.”
“You look like you’ve been crying and your dress is messed up.”
“Oh this? It’s been a mess all night.”
“Bea, you’re lying. Why is it so—?”
Professor Long yanked on my arm, and I had to sway a certain way to keep my balance.
“Splinter, what do you need? I need to get to bed. Classes tomorrow. Start of midterms. The usual.”
He pursed his lips, as if he was questioning the validity of my statement. “Where’s Roscoe?”
“He’s in my bed asleep.”
“Really? ROSCOE! COME HERE, BOY!” Splinter forced himself into my apartment, and the ruckus we created woke people up and brought them into the hall.
Before I realized what was happening, Professor Long let go of my arm and rushed at Splinter, who started punching his assailant. I heard screaming. It took a moment to realize I was the one screaming. All I could do was stand there and cry, yell, and shout while some of the neighbors came and tried to break up the fight. Two older women came and worked to calm me down until the police and ambulance showed up. None of these people knew me, but that didn’t matter. They saw me in trouble and they helped. While my faith in humanity was pretty lacking, they made me see something better amidst all the chaos. When the police came and EMTs were treating to Splinter’s injuries, camera crews began to show up. So did my brother. He walked past them like they were invisible to him, rushed toward me, and wrapped me in a secure embrace.
Warning Signs (Broken Promises #2) Page 5
