Chapter 1

My fingernails click rapidly on the table, this needs to go fast. It’s taking too long. I shouldn’t have agreed to meet here. Why did I? To prove something? I’m not even sure. The cell phone which I hardly ever use sits in my bag next to me, and I feel it vibrate through my chair. Leaning down, I pick it up and see a message from Marina telling me she’s going to be late. Dropping my phone into my lap and collapsing back into my chair, I wonder if I should just get up and leave and forget about it all—probably not.

“Is this seat taken?” His voice sounds rich and sensual to my ears. My head shoots up from looking down at my cell, and a man that’s unlike any other stands in front of me. My eyes fling quickly around making sure he’s talking to me, and when I look back to him, he seems to be growing impatient. Marina is going to be exactly thirty-minutes late, if he wasn’t gone by then I could just move? Nodding my head, I watch as he takes the seat out and sits in front of me. I look away figuring he’s waiting on coffee, or maybe he’s waiting on someone, or maybe he just came from a function since he’s dressed the way he is. Looking back down at my cell, I debate telling her I don’t have time. She would know it’s a lie though. I’m starting to tap out my reply when the stranger’s voice breaks through.

“Are you waiting on someone?”

Looking up, I see his elbows are on the table and he’s leaning in, staring at me. I can’t look for long, his stare is too intense. His eyes are positioned on me and I have to look away without picking up the color. Are they violet? I’m not sure.

“Yes,” I answer him, the words leaving my mouth as I look down at his closed hands in the middle of the table. They’re strong, that much is obvious.

“Tell me something… why here?”

My eyes stay downcast as I contemplate his words. And if I should or shouldn’t answer him. I prefer not to speak to people in general. Having someone get too close scares me. Yet, here’s a stranger who I know I won’t see again, so instead, I humor that side of me.

“She prefers me to be social,” I scoff.

“You aren’t social?” he asks, his eyebrows lifted in an ‘I’m interested’ stare.

Looking up now so I can stare at him, I wonder if he does this a lot—talk to strangers. I’m sure most girls would love it, especially by the looks of him. He’s beyond good-looking, more so than any other man I’ve seen. He lifts his hand and smooths through his black hair, I want to touch it too.

“I don’t like people.” I say, distracting myself from my thoughts.

“Yet, here you sit, talking to me… a person.” He waves his hand at me and smirks. There’s something so serious about him, so intense, that you can’t stare at him for long. His eyes—

I pick up on the color now—they’re violet, with flecks of gray. They’re intense, which matches all of him. My eyes drop again, and l look down at my fingers that are still tapping on the table.

“I expect to never see you again.” Looking up, I watch for his reaction to my answer. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not someone who hides away from life—well, perhaps partially I do. I speak to people, mainly men when I want something. But even then I don’t need to talk much. Basically, my body does all the talking from then on out.

Except right at this moment, I know I can’t do that. No matter how stunning this man is, no matter how much I want this stranger. Because that’s all they ever are—strangers.

I have to sit here and wait for her. She’s had this booked for months. And even though it isn’t a social thing, even though we’re not friends, I do what she says because she’s always wanted what’s best for me.

“Never? You sound so sure.”

Nodding my head, he tips his.

“So if I wanted to see you again, you’d say no?”

I can’t speak because if I do I know I won’t say no. I would absolutely say yes. So, instead, I nod my head to tell him no simply by agreeing with him. Words aren’t safe right now.

“Interesting…” His fingers drum on the table in front of him.

A waiter comes around and asks for our order. I look to him expecting him to say he’s already ordered. So, when he asks for a coffee, I’m shocked. He orders mine as well, then the waitress looks back one more time before she walks away.

“You chose to sit here without ordering first?” I state the facts.

His eyebrow perks up. “I did. You interest me.”

I tuck a loose strand of hair that falls from my ponytail behind my ear as I look up, ready to answer him. “I’m far from interesting.”

“I beg to differ. I think there’s something… very intriguing… very interesting about you.” He’s leaning in again, and I can smell him more so now. All thoughts of my appointment leave my brain as I take him in again. It’s unfair for a man to have those long eyelashes fanning over those gorgeous colored eyes.

“I’m very boring. I work, I go home… that’s the extent of my life.”

He nods his head and sits up as the waitress places our drinks in front of us. He doesn’t thank or even look at her. He picks up his drink and places it to his lips then positions it back down on the table. Lifting his wrist, he looks at the time, which makes me remember I have Marina coming soon.

Looking down to check my cell, I see a text message from Marina, and when I look back up, he’s gone. A twenty-dollar note is on the table and the sexy stranger has vanished. I take a sip of my coffee and I’m surprised when it’s exactly what I like. Just as I’m about to get up and leave, Marina sits down in the exact same place he was sitting. She’s out of breath and her chest is heaving heavily. Marina is young, maybe a few years older than me, and is gorgeous. I often wonder why she chooses to do what she does, but I never question her.

“I’m so sorry…” she trails off, her breathing labored as she tries to catch her breath. She grabs a notepad, pulls it out and starts to write.

Sitting back in my chair, I prepare for her questions that I know will come.

“Tell me, Milanka, how have you been since I saw you six months ago?”

It always starts this way. She’s always polite and never straight to the point. I think it’s the reason I started treatment with her in the first place. She feels safe, from all the evil.

“Nothing out of the ordinary…”

Apart from the stranger. A stranger so delicious I’m sure he’s made of chocolate, I think to myself. Where did he go?

“No episodes as of late?”

I shake my head in answer.

“That’s good, I’m so glad to hear that.”

I nod my head once and listen to the rest of her questions. Hopefully, it will be another long period of time before I have to see her again. I try to forget about my disability, to place it away in a box, away from my brain so I don’t focus on it. It doesn’t affect my everyday life at all, it just has to be maintained in a way.

My worst and the most serious episode was when I was eighteen. It was the first time I met Marina who then started acting as my therapist. She goes above and beyond for me, and that’s why I don’t mind waiting when she tells me she’s going to be late. I’ve yet to tell her about my extracurricular activities. I’m too ashamed to talk about them, but I am living a normal life to the best of my ability.

But then the past plays tricks on me and holds me in its vice grip.

I always try to pinpoint that moment. That precise time when everything changed.

Was it the night I lost my virginity?

Or was it the first time I let a man treat me less than my worth?

I don’t know, but I do know my mother has a lot to do with it. It’s always them, isn’t it? They shape us into the person we are today, and she did that without any thought of me whatsoever. I’ve never once seen a motherly side to her, never once felt her love.

Then it was the same with the man who stole my firsts—he took it all based on lies and hidden faces.

It shapes you into what you become.

To what you will be.

Then once you’re shaped into that person, no one can help you, because you are well and truly fucked, just as I am right now.

Sixteen Years Old

Another day that dragged, and one I thought would never end. School was, as it always was for me, a nightmare within a nightmare. Today though, I had a boy show me interest. A boy that was the most popular in school. I wasn’t sure what to do with that interest, so I walked away.

Heading down the dirt road toward my trailer after being all day at school, I flinched, as the shoes I was wearing are too small and hurt my toes. I tried not to complain, it got me nowhere. Sometimes I thought, perhaps I should become a thief, that would be more helpful than the person who was supposed to care for me.

A car was parked out front of the trailer—an old and expensive red Corvette. Well, anything that drove was expensive to me. We’d never had a car because we didn’t have the money to run one, let alone purchase one. Being used to her men always being over, I knew I needed to move fast—get in, change, steal a pair of her shoes to get out of my uncomfortable ones, and get the hell out.

The first step I took up onto the old beat-up trailer creaked loudly, under my old hole-ridden shoes. I winced at the noise hoping they wouldn’t hear me. Pacing my next step a little slower, I turned the doorknob, releasing and opening the door. It was never locked because there was nothing to steal. Hearing sounds as soon as I opened the door, I contemplated just dropping my bag and leaving. That was until I looked down at my raggedy shoes and knew I had to change them because I wouldn’t get far otherwise, the pain being too much to handle.

Taking another step inside the trailer, I was hit with the pungent smell straight away—smoke and alcohol dulled my senses. Covering my nose and mouth with my hand, I kicked off my shoes and moved some of my mother’s discarded clothes on the floor trying to find the flip flops I knew she had lying around. Not seeing them anywhere, I got on my hands and knees to look under the dirty old brown couch, hoping she’d kicked them off and left them there. I was not going anywhere near that bedroom of hers to find them.

Sliding my hand underneath, I could feel one and I silently cheered when my hand clasped on pulling the flip flops free. I stood, and the minute I did I regretted walking in and looking for them, I regretted even stepping in here knowing she had company. He was standing with a bottle of whiskey in his hand, and his eyes were roaming me up and down like I was his next meal. I’d seen him before around town, though never knew who he was, or even cared enough to notice much other than he was the father to one of the girls my age at school. His shirt was off revealing his hairy chest, and his pants were undone. I dared not look down, but I clung to those stupid flip flops like they were my lifeline.

Why must I be so stupid?

“You look so much like her,” he slurred taking a step toward me. I immediately took a step back, hoping he didn’t move too much. He was almost at the door where I needed to make my escape, and I knew he would block my way from making that escape easily. My eyes skimmed the floor and up the wall to the exit, his eyes watched me too closely. “I see what you’re thinking, little one,” he teased, stepping the way I was hoping he wouldn’t, and effectively blocked my way out.

“I was just leaving,” I said to him, hoping he’d let me go. He put the bottle to his lips and sucked hard, almost finishing the contents. Then he took another step, so he was closer to me—too close. His free hand reached up and I knew he was coming for me. My eyes searched behind him, hoping my mother would come out, but I knew she wouldn’t. She’d be passed out or drinking herself into oblivion until she was out cold and not caring that she left a man in our home with her teenage daughter.

“I think you could be so much more fun than your mother.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand as he stepped forward again, this time there was nowhere for me to go. He was now in my personal space and blocking my path stopping me from escaping.

I remembered closing my eyes thinking, this is the moment that my life will change. I will get on this train forcefully, afraid I’ll never get off.

Then my world came crashing down.

His hand came up.

It touched me where no other had been before. He grasped my breast and squeezed hard pinching my nipple. No one had ever touched me there. I had hardly ever seen my own body as I kept it covered.

It came out of nowhere.

The scream that ripped through me as he dropped the bottle and used both hands.

It was a scream of pain.

Scream of torture.

Screams of my lost childhood…

He pushed me up against the wall to shut me up. I was frightened and stood stock still.

I did the only thing I’d seen done on television, I lifted my leg and hoped wherever it landed would hurt. He dropped his hands and cursed so loudly that I wanted to cover my ears.

At that precise moment, I should have run, as far away as I could. Yet, I was surprised at what I’d done, and that caused me to be stuck in that moment, unable to move, giving him enough time to recover and stand up straight. The look on his face was something that would be branded into my mind for the rest of my life. His fists came down heavily onto my face, and he hit me so hard he knocked me to the floor.

After that, he left, and whenever I came home to see his car parked at the shithole I called home, I would not enter. Instead, I’d flee into the woods and sit there, no matter the weather, no matter how much my toes hurt from the cold, because I would never let anyone make me feel that way again.

Present

Some things have such an impact on your life that you don’t come to realize it until years later.

Some things shape you to be the person you are, the way you think you should be treated. All these things shaped me into the person I am today.

I don’t wish for anything anymore.

Let’s face it, all wishes go unanswered and unheard.

Now, I try to see people without their masks, even when I know they all wear them. They all hide, I know this. Even the most beautiful ones conceal their true identities.

My mother wasn’t all to blame, there were other factors in my life that brought me to where I am today. I wish I could blame it all on her, but she was only a fraction of the problem.

Stepping into the shower, I don’t recognize my own hands. My usually long nails are now cut short. I thought my episodes had passed, I thought I was normal.

But what is normal? I’m yet to still meet someone that is normal.

My fingers are covered in blood, my hair is matted with it. I don’t know about my clothes because all I was wearing is a hospital gown, before I stepped into the shower, one I have no recognition of putting on. This hasn’t happened to me for a while, and I’m afraid of what it means—my last clear thoughts being that I needed to grab milk after my meet-up with Marina.

Did I even get the milk?

I don’t even know.

Scrubbing my body until it’s raw and I notice no more blood circling and running down the drain, I step out, feeling sore like I’ve run a marathon. My arms are bruised and my hands are aching. It’s happened again, yet I don’t know why. I don’t want to tell Marina because I know what happens when I do. Instead, I hope like crazy it doesn’t happen again.

Walking into my room, I pull out the one box that represents my past—pictures and gifts I keep lay in the bottom of it. My moments in time.

A single picture of my mother from when I was a baby. She looks beautiful, shockingly so, and I wonder where it all went wrong for her? I wonder who my father is? She never gave me answers to that question. My mother told me I wasn’t entitled to them, let alone any of her time. As I glance over the photograph, I notice her hair matches mine—dark and slightly curly. Our eyes, though, they don’t match. Hers are always hollow and lonely, mine are filled with—one day, perhaps, there will be a chance of hope, normalcy.

I do take one thing from her, though.

The sex.