Authors: Evelyn Rosado
We hug as I whimper into her arms. It feels good to cry. I cry not only about what just happened with Chase, but also about my mom, about the drugs, about Connor, about Aiden, about everything.
“I’m here for you okay,” she says choking on tears as well.
I nod, letting the tears flow onto her bare shoulders. Minutes pass as we continue to hold each other sobbing.
“Naked huh?” I say laughing through my tears breaking the silence.
She giggles. “All the time while you’re gone.”
The tears stop, but we chuckle until our eyes water.
***
“I just bubbled over,” I say on the couch as we sip hot cider and donuts that we got from the farmer’s market off campus. Tessa always knows how to cheer me up. “When I got the call from my aunt about mom, it was like my life flashed before me. It was the scariest thing ever.”
“Well I’m glad you’re alright. I was scared shitless about you.”
“I’ll be okay. Thanks for coming to the hospital.”
“You don’t have to thank me. Just promise me you’ll leave that stuff alone. It’s dangerous. I’m done with it myself.”
“That stuff changed me into another person.”
“Well I’m glad to have you back here. I thought I lost you. Who else can I binge watch crappy nineties sitcoms with every Sunday?” We laugh.
My smile quickly fades. I still haven’t told her about Chase. I just told her I was having a bad day. She smacks her palms onto her thighs and exhales deeply, from the look of her eyebrows pushing down, I can tell she’s about to lay something not so good sounding on me.
“What’s wrong?”
“I know it’s bad timing, but—” She bites her lip.
“But what?” I ask interrupting, putting my mug on the table and facing her. “Don’t sugarcoat it. Just tell me.”
She pulls out her phone, pushes a few buttons and hands it to me. It’s an Instagram post from that asshole Connor. My lips part and the cold feeling of that backseat comes back to me.
“He’s in the brother frat of the sorority I’m pledging.”
The sour feeling in my stomach slowly rises to my throat. I look at his profile avatar. That shit-eating grin, those fiendish blue eyes. The smugness. The entitlement. The attitude that he’s never been told no before by any girl, any professor, any coach. I hate it and I hate everything he stands for. I can’t stand to look at it. But I can’t turn away; I sit there, every muscle in my body is rigid.
“Do you know this Connor asshole? I know you don’t know him. He doesn’t seem like your type at all. I know it’s a fucking prank. These college boys have nothing else to do but play with their dicks and do stupid stuff,” she says, my eyes still stuck, appraising the screen.
It’s a photo of me on the lacrosse field playing against a small school across town. What he wrote makes me want to puke.
“Another conquest for me on behalf of the Theta Kai brotherhood. This fine piece of work with dark, curly hair and thick thighs is just as good in bed as she is on the field. She’s a real giver—in every sense of the word. Fellas, she comes across as a real prude, but trust me…a couple cans of beer and a few other unscrupulous things to fill her bloodstream, she’ll get going in no time. Get her tipsy and you won’t even have to get her back to the dorms, the backseat is just fine. Trust me.
If this wasn’t Tessa’s phone that I hold in my hands, I’d throw it against the wall. I can’t tell Tessa the truth about what really happened. With my mom and me just getting out of the hospital, this is just too much for me to bear. I already can’t keep myself under control from wanting to have a panic attack every five seconds, telling her and her not being able to keep a secret and go to the police—I’d explode. I can’t. I just can’t. But I have to tell somebody soon.
“What a fucking dirtbag. Like who does that shit?” she says taking the phone out of my hands. “Do you know this slimeball? I know it’s not true.”
Now or never Brynn. Do you want to be an adult or do you want to be a little girl and just let things pile up and bottle up thinking some adult is going to come in and save the day and rescue you, cape flapping in the wind. Daddy’s gone. Been gone. Mom can’t save you. You have to go at this alone like a big girl. That’s why I came to college, to become who I have the potential to truly be. Making my own decisions, taking life by the horns and facing it head on, whether good or bad. Rolling with the punches. I know I’ve been dealt a bad hand. I’ve seen more than the average girl. This is nothing. Be brave.
I smooth down my face, dragging my fingers and palms down from my forehead to my chin. I exhale from the deepest pit of my stomach. Don’t pull any punches Brynn.
“Connor…tried to rape me a few weeks ago.” I say flat, monotone, looking right into Tessa’s hazel eyes. Straight up, no chaser.
She cups her hands over her mouth and nose, eyes bulging.
“Brynn, oh my God. She grabs my hand as tears flood the back of her eyes. She pulls me to her and hugs me tightly. “Brynn I don’t know what to say. Are you okay?” She pulls away quickly, tears, hanging from each side of her chin. “Please tell me you’re okay.”
I remain calm. No tears, no trembling fingers, no running to snort something up my nose or swallow a pill to shield myself from the truth. “I’m fine. He didn’t rape me.”
“What happened? Why didn’t you tell me? You can’t hide shit like this from me. That fucking asshole attacked you?” She stands up pacing around the living area. “Oh my God. Did you go to the police?”
I shake my head. “I didn’t tell you because we weren’t really speaking at the time.”
“That’s not a good enough reason.” She sits back down next to me. “You really think I’d be that much of an bitch to not care about if you’d been assaulted? I’m your friend.”
“I know that now. I just wanted it to be over. I didn’t go to the police because I have a lot of bad experiences with them. I don’t really…trust them, if that makes any sense. I just wanted to keep this to myself.”
“I can kinda understand. But you could’ve at least told me.” She sighs trying to process what she just heard. “I know it’s a very personal thing. There are people you can talk to though. When did this happen?”
“A few weeks ago. At the Theta party. We met and I got a little too wasted and left the party with him. We went to his car so he could smoke. We started kissing and he wanted to go further. I didn’t. And then he attacked me. I fought him off as much as I could. And then this stranger saw me struggling with Connor and beat him up.”
“A stranger. Seriously?”
“He literally came out of nowhere and saved my life.”
“He saved your life? Who was he? Did you know him?”
“I didn’t know him. He just appeared out of nowhere. Right place, right time, I guess.”
“What happened after that? Did he take you to the hospital?”
“He tried, but I just refused. He dropped me off at the dorms.”
“Where is he? Do you still talk to him?”
“Remember the boy from the nightclub that I danced with?”
“The hottie with the all ink?”
I nod.
“Him? Are you kidding me? The same boy from the hospital, right?”
“We’ve been kinda seeing each other. Well, we
were
seeing each other.”
“So, he’s saved your life twice?”
“I was over his apartment the night of my…overdose.” It’s still painful to even say that word. “And the night after the Theta party. So, yeah, twice.” Chase truly might be my guardian angel and I treated him like shit earlier, not willing to hear any explanation.
She looks back at her phone. “We have to do something. We just can’t let him keep saying stuff like this. He’s a jerk. I never liked him the day I met him. Just rubbed me the wrong way.”
“This’ll just blow over. It always does.” I grab her hand. “Please don’t tell anyone about this, okay? I’m trying to handle this my own way.”
She sighs and looks away. “I hear things about him.”
“What do you mean…things?”
“Well, I can’t prove it but I think you’re not the only girl he’s…attacked. There are whispers about him among a few of the sorority sisters about another girl, but I don’t know if it’s just rumors or really the truth. After this, I know he really did it. I just don’t know with whom.”
“As hard as this has gotten for me, I just want this to blow over. It’ll blow over soon.”
“I respect your decision Brynn. I really think you should at least talk to someone about it, other than me. If you don’t want to go to the cops, I understand, but bottling it up is gonna kill you.”
“Maybe you’re right.”
I need to do something. I thought of that women’s group that I passed by not too long ago. They hold meetings in the study area in my dorm. Maybe stopping by and just introducing myself next time may be a step in the right direction.
Chapter 4
The entire morning I debate whether to go to my Psych class. I’ve already missed like two weeks’ worth of class, what’s another day? Ugh. Another day means another step closer to flunking out. I’m already never going back to my Art History class after the situation with Aiden; so that’s a failing grade chalked up in the books. I have to make sure the rest of my grades are good. But I can’t bear to face Chase after yesterday—even if I may have overreacted. And that’s a huge ‘may’. Would he say something to me and pretend like nothing ever happened? He’s a player, I know it. Who just has random girls show up at their door? Coach Thompson asked him to mentor her? Yeah right.
Boys—forget them. They’re just headaches adding more confusion to the much bigger issues I need to focus on. I decide to swallow my pride and hoof it to class—late. The hallway is empty and I hear footsteps behind me, as I turn around, I see Chase walking towards me. His 35mm camera is dangling from his neck. His eyes lock onto mine and he gives me a slight nod, his eyes narrow and face tight. Wow. A head nod? That’s it? I only get simple head nod, like I’m one of his buddies that he sees at the weight room or chugs a pitcher of beer with. Like I’m a nobody. I deserve better. We had sex for god sakes. I’m so over him, it’s ridiculous.
I walk into class a few paces in front of him and proceed to go to the back row of seats. My attention is focused on him the entire time. Not on frontal lobes, Freud or serotonin that the professor lectures about, but on Chase Knight Alexander. And I hate myself for it.
Chase scribbles something in blue ink in his notebook for twenty minutes and then buries his face in his phone, typing away for dear life. I know he’s texting, but not to me? Why not me? Why ignore me? He saves my life not once, but twice and I can’t even get a text? Wow. After I fill every line in my notebook with the question ‘what happened to my life?’ over and over until the ink in my pen fades away, I prop up my chin by my palm and doze off. My phone buzzes, rattling me out of my daze. My body jolts slightly.
CHASE: can we talk?
There’s seven minutes left in class. Wow, now he decides to text me. I should just leave early and act like I have more important things to do than chat with someone who obviously doesn’t want to take me seriously. I throw my phone in my bag and then bite my nails.
“What’s bothering you?” says the boy with the LA Dodgers hat whispering. Same boy who woke me up after class before. His long dreadlocks stick out of the back of his hat and he’s wearing a tank top that says Born and Raised In Compton with black cargo shorts. His prickly peach fuzz smile full is facetious like he gets a kick out of me watching me fidget and fumble.
“Is it that obvious?” I say back into his ear, getting a whiff of his breath which smells like cinnamon.
“Hell yeah. Looks like you need a fix. It’s not healthy to have hella shit on your mind before the clock strikes noon.”
“Life of a freshman.”
“Tell me about it.” He tears off a chunk of pages from his spiral notebook and passes them to me. “You missed a lot of class. Here’s the notes.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it.”
I feel the phone buzz against my leg in my bag. I pull it out and it’s another text from Chase.
CHASE: Please?
He looks back, his face melancholy and sad.
ME: ok
ME: Where?
CHASE: Outside. In the courtyard. Next to the big bell.
***
Any other time of day in the courtyard it’s peaceful and beautiful. It’s wonderful to look at the ivy cascading down the walls of the academic buildings like waterfalls in the rainforest. The maroon colored brick that decorates the pavement never ceases to catch my attention as I walk by. The benches are quaint enough to enjoy a peach in silence or read a book of poetry by yourself. But that’s early in the morning or right after the sun sets. But not now. Not at noon. It’s pure madness. To be on the courtyard at this time of day scares me. It’s a battlefield on prime real estate. Fraternities and sororities hold court, bludgeoning new crosses with verbal insults and physical taunts. Social groups hand out leaflets in front of you give you dirty looks and snide comments if you don’t take one. One group chants black power, another yells mantras about gay marriage. All of it gives me a headache. Picket signs and candlelight vigils are too much for me at this time of day. It’s all a maze of organized confusion. Normally I throw on my earbuds and hop through the madness, but not today. I need to focus on what Chase has to tell me.
“That girl. It wasn’t what it looked like,” he says as we sit on brick benches next to a small group of girls doing yoga. Hoards of students whiz past us scurrying to their next class or study group. Clearly this is not the best place to discuss what happened.
“I’m not a player like you think I am,” he says. “I’ve been with a lot of girls before and but that’s in the past. It’s not who I am. I know it looked bad but Coach really wanted me to train her. That’s the truth.”
I fold my arms, understanding I’m hearing the truth, which is what I want, but unsure if it’s the
whole
truth. I put my sunglasses on, the entire scene darkens. The darkness—it seems better this way.
He sighs deeply; aware that I’m pensive and sensing I may be wasting my time here.