by Shey Stahl
My door opened, Evie was standing there in one of my old shirts, then found her way back to my bed where I was waiting for her.
Evie’s tears were relentless, and she cried longer than I wanted her to. Sometimes she would stop, only to pick up with more force in what could only be described as hysteria. I had no clue what to do but hold her. I was at a loss, but I held her tightly hoping that offered her something.
Every tear that slid down her cheek was like a serrated knife stabbing me in the heart. It was more than I could stand to see her in this type of pain because of him. When she finally fell asleep, her tears didn’t stop. She tossed and turned, murmuring my name repeatedly in an agonized voice. The guilt was killing her, and in turn, it was killing me.
I watched her all night, tossing, turning and crying. The nights spent in Iraq were easy compared to the weight of this night. Even the night the torture finally ended and Matt was killed was less agonizing than this. My own pain, I could handle. Hers, I could not.
The sun finally rose, and Evie had quit crying by the time she awoke, though I knew it would be temporary. When the disorientation from sleep wore off, she would remember what had happened last night.
“Hey,” she crooked and then cleared her throat, her gaze on mine.
“Hey.”
I stared at her intently. She seemed better, but I couldn’t be sure.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, knowing what my next question was going to be.
I grabbed her face in my hands, forcing her to look at me. Her eye was swollen shut; blood still caked her lips and throat. I gently ran the tip of my thumb over her lips, anger raging inside me again. People like Shane deserved what happened to Matt. Not Matt, and certainly not Evie.
She looked at me intently, tears filling her eyes again. I quickly pulled her to my chest again. I had to make her see that no matter what I wasn’t going anywhere.
Again, not now, not ever.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t…” she paused. “I’m just sorry. I thought if I didn’t fight him, it wouldn’t be as bad.”
“He could have killed you.”
It hurt that she felt that she needed to apologize. None of this was her fault but it didn’t stop me from being annoyed that she felt she couldn’t tell anyone. Actually, it pissed me off.
I sighed knowing me getting angry wouldn’t help, if anything, it would make this worse for her. “It should be me apologizing.”
More could have been said. I could have taken that moment to tell her everything but I couldn’t. The words were on the tip of my tongue.
It frustrated me to no end that I couldn’t just tell her.
Much like her, I wasn’t ready to face that yet.
The day passed slowly, we spent most of our time in my room, just laying there watching television when she wanted to take another shower. I let her, since I had my own bathroom and I knew she’d be safe here.
It wasn’t ten minutes later and I could hear her in there, her soft cries coming from inside and immediately opened the door. I couldn’t let her be alone.
I didn’t care that she was naked in there.
“Evie, what is…” my breath caught when I focused on the scene before me. Evie was lying on the shower floor curled up in a ball, crying profusely, trembling from the now cold water.
I immediately opened the shower door and climbed in, fully clothed and pulled her cold delicate body in my arms. “Shhh, shhh, it’s okay. I’m here for you” I soothed rocking her back and forth.
Evie clung to me as though I was her lifeline to breathe and frantically grabbing anywhere she could to get closer to me. Her arms wrapped tightly around my neck.
“Grayson,” she clung to me tighter. “Make it go away, make the memories go away.” Evie begged through chattering teeth.
The problem was, I couldn’t. I couldn’t even make my own memories go away so helping her deal with the hell she’d been put through at the hands of Shane wasn’t something I could make go away.
A searing pain tore through my chest and my lungs seized up. Could Evie understand what I went through? How hard it all was, how every night the only thing that kept me alive in that hellhole was picturing her face. I had been blocking the memory of the past for so long, but the full reality of it all finally hit me.
I remembered when I was over there, enduring pain, torture, my body sustaining, injury after injury as I continued to lose the fighting battle with myself and with them. I would endure this pain, this new crippling feeling as long as she was safe and alive.
Evie didn’t need to hear how they ripped off his nails or how they burned me with steel rods over and over again.
I unconsciously rubbed one of the scars on my arm. Evie noticed and quickly grabbed my arm, gently touching the scars. I gave her a small smile as tears began to stream down her cheeks.
I wanted to tell her about all the physical torture we had to endure, the pain, the murders and rapes, the innocent children killed around us but I couldn’t—she didn’t need to hear those things, no one should. It was bad enough the memories were so deeply etched in my brain.
The problem was, those memories were nothing compared to the ones of Evie that I was now having, of the things I imagined Shane had been doing to her.
It was more than I could take.
I managed to get her out of the shower and on my bed wrapped in blankets with just her head peeking out.
That’s when I apologized. I had to.
“I’m so sorry I left you. I thought…I thought I was doing the right thing. The night I left...” I paused and looked her directly in the eyes, searching for forgiveness I guess and finding it, though I didn’t deserve it. “I wanted to tell you I loved you. I always have, but I wasn’t ready to admit to you that my feelings for you were much more than just a friend. When I found you that night, I saw you sitting on the dock with Chris and for the first time in a while, you looked genuinely happy with him. I didn’t want to upset you so I left. I always felt like you were pushing guys away because you thought it would hurt me…as your friend you never gave anyone a chance, you were always more concerned about my feelings than finding your own happiness.”
“I was pushing them away because I only wanted you,” she interjected, her eyes on mine.
“Don’t you see though…I didn’t want you to just settle for me because you thought we should be together. I left because I wanted to give you a chance to fall in love and really give someone else a try. What if I’m not that guy?”
“I didn’t though,” she whispered pulling her knees to her chest. “I didn’t move on. I can’t move on from you.”
“What do you mean?” I asked in confusion.
“The night you left…I broke up with Chris,” her eyes met mine. “Grayson, I was ready to tell you how I felt as well. I never dated again until Shane…” her voice was almost a whisper.
I shook my head at the irony of it and let out an agonized chuckle. It’s amazing to me how you can mistake shit so badly at the time, but when the situation is in front of you, it makes perfect sense.
I used to think to myself that no one could take from you what you don’t give them. I guess that could be true, to a certain extent. And then I lost Grayson.
And met Shane.
Shane took what I didn’t give him and he ripped it to fucking shreds right before my eyes.
We all have emotional scars. Everyone pretty much knows this too. There’s scars you can’t see, but ones you feel. They say you have to rip off a bandage and let it heal naturally, with time but what they don’t tell you is the level of pain you have to endure when you take that bandage off.
You gotta give into the pain of the exposure and then sting, and let time heal it.
But how do you do that when the cut is buried deep inside?
Sometime Tuesday morning, I woke up to Grayson lying practically on top of me with something poking me in the leg and his hand was on my left boob.
It was kind of nice. And for
a moment, I left it there. Enjoying it.
It wasn’t the first time Grayson’s hands ended up on my boobs, or the first time he was lying on top of me come morning.
When we were about sixteen it seemed that every morning we woke up he was on top of me and hand one hand on my boob. After I brought it to his attention that he did that, he just laughed and said it was like his baby blanket when we were kids, he couldn’t sleep without them.
I tried to laugh quietly to myself at the memory but it must have woken him up, he quickly moved to the side, turning away from me, noticing he had a problem.
“Someone is happy this morning,” I teased. I couldn’t help myself as I giggled. It felt good to laugh a little after the emotional drain of the last two days.
“Tease,” Grayson grumbled dragging himself off the bed and going into the bathroom. I laughed at his expression of both horror that he was sporting morning wood in front of me and frustration that he wanted to act on it. It definitely wasn’t the first time I’d seen his erection.
I looked over at my phone to see if I had any messages, nothing. I never had reception in Grayson’s room though.
Hmmm…this could be a good thing. Maybe Shane finally got the point…maybe.
I knew better than that though.
I looked up quickly when I realized that Grayson’s bedroom door was opening. He came back in and sat back down on the bed pulling a shirt over his head.
“So…” I said laughing again, running my eyes down his body, referring to his morning wood I felt.
“Stop doing that,” he said leaning into my shoulder as he sat beside me on the bed, stretching his legs out.
“Hey, I wasn’t the one who got up and walked away,” I stated simply, adding a shrug to my shoulders.
He turned to face me, his eyes burning. “You’re telling me I should have acted on it?” he asked, his voice a little more southern than I’ve heard recently, running his hand down the side of my neck until his hand reached my collarbone with his eyes following the motion, his fingers dancing along my bare skin causing me to shiver.
He certainly hadn’t lost his touch with me.
“I guess you’ll never know. You left,” I said simply getting off the bed, pulling on a pair of his shorts.
He groaned following me downstairs. “I’ll never live it down. Ever.”
Once we made it downstairs everyone was gathered in the breakfast nook at his parent’s house. Ever since I could remember, his parent’s house had been the local hangout for us. It hadn’t changed.
I glanced over at Ethan and Frankie as we walked toward the table to see Ethan licking syrup off Frankie’s arm. Wearing her light pink scrubs, she appeared to have just gotten off work.
“Morning sunshine,” Josh said, stuffing his mouth with pancakes.
Julia slapped the back of his head for talking with his mouth full. At least someone could keep him in line.
She wasn’t his mother, but she never hesitated to keep him in check. Josh needed that.
Grayson shook his head and grabbed some coffee off the counter, handing me a cup as well, then took a seat next to me.
“How’s the hands there, Grayson?” Josh asked looking at his hands as we sat down at the table beside him.
Even days later, they were red and slightly swollen. Looking at his hands up close, I noticed he had the same scars on his hands and forearms as he did on his back, new deep purple scars. Realizing I was looking at them, he pulled his hands under the table, looking away from me. I wondered where all those scars came from. They almost looked similar to burns.
Though he hadn’t come out and said it, I knew something horrible happened to Grayson in Iraq.
Just like he hadn’t asked about the things Shane had done to me. There was just some things we didn’t talk about, and might never discuss.
“Try to stay out of trouble today.” Wyatt teased ruffling Grayson hair and he walked past toward the back door.
“Where’s the fun in that?” Grayson mocked with a sarcastic laugh, smiling at me.
We sat around talking that morning before Ethan headed to work. He was taking Grayson with him for the afternoon so he could interview for a position they had open. It made the idea of him staying feel real, and I loved that.
At some point I knew I needed to get out of their house for a little while. I couldn’t stay holed up in there forever, I knew that. I had a job too.
Life wouldn’t allow us to just escape reality, as shitty as that was because I would have been completely fine just living in Grayson’s bedroom forever. I think part of him would have been thrilled at the prospect.
I had two weeks off from my job to get everything sorted out and for my body to physically heal, thanks to Frankie and talking with my boss. I needed it because there was no way I could explain these bruises to all those customers.
Later that morning, Grayson let me go over to my house and shower only because Ethan was over there getting ready for work. I had a feeling I wouldn’t be alone for a while. I wasn’t upset by it. I was okay with it.
It was actually a reminder, a painful one that this wasn’t over. Shane wouldn’t let go that easy. He wanted control and power over what he thought was his. When that was taken, I knew he wouldn’t give up. To Shane, it had nothing to do with me. He didn’t love me. He wanted control over me and confused that with love. And now that he didn’t have either of those things, regardless of my mom, I knew it wasn’t over.
As I walked back over to my house I realized that I was about to do something I should have done months ago, something I should have done when I first met Shane. I don’t know why I was ever attracted to Shane. I guess maybe I thought that he reminded me of Grayson. In the beginning, he was sweet and always a gentleman, but that turned around real fast, now there wasn’t a shred of resemblance between the two of them.
My phone started to ring just as I opened our front door as I came into cell range, but in a moment of anger, I threw it at the wall, knowing exactly who it was. Surprisingly, it still rang. That thing could be bombed and it would still ring if Shane was calling.
After contemplating how to tell him to fuck off, I thought maybe a phone call might be the best idea, guess I should have thought about that before I chucked my phone. Just as I grabbed my broken cell phone off the ground, Ethan came strolling in.
“Hey, Evie,” he sat down beside me on the couch. “How are you feeling today?” he asked looking at my swollen face, shaking his head in disappointment.
“I guess okay. I know now what I should have done a long time ago.” I held my cell phone up, well what used to be my cell phone, now it was a few pieces that were more similar to a 3D jigsaw puzzle. Gently I tried to force the pieces together but they just fell apart.
“Don’t bother,” Ethan scorned. “Mom had a long talk with his dad last night and he knows to never come near you again. You shouldn’t have to explain yourself.”
I had no idea what to say but he was right, I shouldn’t have to explain myself to Shane. The fucker hit a woman for Christ sakes. Ethan and I both knew that was never okay.
“Mom quit too, she’s going to be working as a partner with Julia and her firm.” He laughed. “Mom’s excited about it, so is Julia. You should see them over there planning, it’s madness,” he added.
“What did she say?”
“Not much. She was hurt that you didn’t tell her. You two need to talk.”
I knew that. And we would, when I was ready.
In a way, it pissed me off that it was that fucking easy. Like this would have worked all along. And all along I didn’t think it would. Looking at it now, it made me angry that I have convinced myself my reasoning was rational. It wasn’t. For that, I paid a high price, a price I would being paying on forever.
“I wish you guys wouldn’t have got involved.”
“Evie, someone had to,” Ethan pointed out, interrupting me. “I know what he was doing to you emotionally, but I thought you were strong enough
to handle it yourself. I never thought he would actually hit you. When he did, that’s all it took for me to step in. I’m not losing my sister over something like this,” he paused and looked me directly in the eye, his eyes tightened and I understood the meaning. We almost lost our mother the exact same way. He was failing to realize that my reasoning here was that I didn’t want anything happening to my family. They meant the world to me. “He will pay for this Evie,” he hissed between his teeth.
“Ethan, please just let it go, for me?” I moaned, throwing the pieces of my phone on the coffee table in front of us. “We should let it go.”
“What if he comes after you?” he shook his head, “I’m sorry Evie but this is one thing you are not going to convince me on,” he got up and walked toward the door. “When the time comes, he’s going to pay for that shit.” Ethan paused before opening the door, turning around with a devilish smile gracing his lips. “I love you, Evie.”
“I love you too, Ethan.”
It would be a good feeling to think everything had worked out, easy, but it never could have. No, not my life. Like I said before, Shane wasn’t the type of guy to just let it go.
After I showered, I went back over to Grayson’s house just as he and Ethan left. He caught me, his arm around my shoulder walking me to the door.
“Please don’t leave without Frankie.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
I hoped he understood the bigger meaning there.
He did, and smiled with a wink.
As I stood in the living room of his house, I almost felt, relieved. I guess relieved would be a good word for my emotional state at the moment.
It had been so long since I felt so relaxed, three years to be exact. Without having to worry about pissing off Shane I was surprisingly…chipper.
I made my way up to Frankie’s room.
