Little Do We Know(80)

I reached the restrooms and pulled hard on the door, hoping it was unlocked, but it wasn’t. Luke caught up to me.

I folded my arms across my chest. “I am not going to talk to you about this.”

“You’re going to ignore the whole thing and pretend it never happened?”

“Yes.” I leaned against the lockers. “It’s what I’ve been doing for months. Until tonight, it’s worked perfectly fine.”

“Emory…” Luke wouldn’t let up. “Tell me what happened.”

“You know what happened!” I yelled.

“I know Hannah’s version. I want to hear yours.”

I stared at him. I was only three blocks from home. I could take off running and be there before he could get in his car and catch up to me. If I wanted it to, this whole conversation, this whole night, could end right now. But I didn’t want to run away. I wanted to tell him. I needed someone other than Hannah to hear me say it. I pressed my back against the cold metal locker bank.

“I don’t know where to start,” I whispered.

The ground felt like it was wavering under my feet. I tried to steady my breathing like I did onstage when I got nervous, but I couldn’t stop my chin from trembling.

Luke rested one hip against the lockers, facing me. “Start with something easy. What day of the week was it?” he asked.

He got that from Hannah. That was how she always got me to tell her my secrets.

“It was a Sunday morning.” I heard the words come out of my mouth, but it didn’t sound like my voice. I closed my eyes and pictured my bedroom. Opening the door. Stepping into the hallway.

“The football game was blaring.” I twisted my dress around my finger for something to do with my hands. “I walked into the kitchen and went straight for the coffeepot. D-bag was standing at the stove making breakfast, and I asked him where my mom was. He told me she just left for the gym. He said he would have gone with her, but he had more important things to do…and then he pointed at the TV with the spatula.”

I sucked in a breath, but my chest felt so tight, like it had shrunk and there was no longer enough room for air.

“There was a pile of mail on the kitchen table. Charlotte and I had both applied to Tisch for early acceptance. She had just received her early acceptance letter, so I’d been checking the mail every day, hoping to get one, too. I picked up the stack and started thumbing through it. And…and…” I stammered. “I didn’t hear him come up behind me.”

The memory made me squeeze my eyelids tighter.

I remembered the way he put his palms on the kitchen table on either side of my hips and pressed his chest against my back.

“He leaned into me and I felt his breath on the back of my neck. He kissed me here.” I pointed to a spot behind my right ear. “And then he slid his hands over my chest and said, ‘You shouldn’t walk around wearing stuff like this. You know I can’t control myself….I can’t be responsible for what I’ll do to you.’”

I looked up at Luke. “He said I walked around like that on purpose, just to tease him.” I shook my head. “I started to tell him that was total bullshit, but I didn’t.” I forced out a breath. “I didn’t say anything.”

Luke looked furious. I’d never seen him so angry.

“He had me trapped against the kitchen table. I couldn’t move. Or, I don’t know, maybe I could have moved. I’ve played it over in my head a million times, but…I…I didn’t move. I didn’t even try to move.”

Luke took my hands in his. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” he said.

I shook my head because it wasn’t true. I should have moved that day. It was the easiest thing in the world to do, and instead I’d stood there, frozen. I’d always pictured myself as someone who’d throw elbows and punches and knees, but I hadn’t. I’d stood there.

“I didn’t get it,” I continued. “I was wearing a tank top and sport shorts. It was what I’d slept in. You’d been there the night before. You snuck out my window, and when you left, I changed into something I probably picked up off the floor before I crawled into bed. My shirt was probably kind of sheer…I honestly didn’t think about it.” I felt a tear slide down my cheek, and then another one followed. I brushed them away quickly. “He was my mom’s boyfriend. He was going to be my stepdad. I liked him. I was happy for them.”

Luke kissed my forehead and it made me feel safe. Safe enough to keep talking.

“David was still behind me with his hands on the table, and I could feel him pressed against me. It’s funny…I remember staring at his watch, like I needed to focus on something while I figured out what to do,” I continued. “But then he lifted his hands away, and the watch suddenly disappeared, and I was so relieved, because I thought that was the end of it. But before I could move, he wrapped his arm around my waist and pulled me into him. I stepped backward and lost my balance, and sort of fell into him, and I guess he thought I’d meant to do it because—” My voice was shaking so hard, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to finish the sentence. “He started kissing my neck, and I felt his hand on my stomach, pulling me into him again, and I felt his fingers between my legs and—”

“Stop.” Luke squeezed his eyes shut, like he could stop the progression of events that way.