“Are you okay?” I ask as I get to my feet.
“Not now, Cara. Need a shower then to get some sleep,” he says without turning around to face me.
“Um, okay.” I whisper, staying where I am and looking down at the floor.
Deciding to give him space, I sit back down and curl into the corner again but I don’t pick my Kindle back up. Instead, I stare out into nothing as I try to figure out what’s going on with Nerd.
Any other day he’s sweet and nice to me. Even the days of my sessions, but afterward it’s as if he’s a complete stranger. One that doesn’t want anything to do with me. Like I’m tainting him by what I talk about in regard to my trauma.
My eyes grow heavier the longer I sit there and when I drift off it’s not the monsters that haunt me, it’s images of Nerd with other women. Women giving him something I don’t know how to. A mask of pleasure takes over his face as he touches them.
I’m jerked awake when I feel myself being lifted in the air.
“What? Nick, what are you doing?” I ask as I regain my bearings.
“Putting you to bed,” Nerd grumbles.
“I can walk,” I protest, placing my hands on his chest to push against him.
“Know you can, but it’s quicker if I just put you there.” Something about the way he states this sends a chill throughout my body.
“Nick,” I murmur.
“Shut it, Cara,” he mutters in return and I clamp my mouth shut.
He’s definitely in a mood.
Laying me on the bed, Nerd walks around to the other side and climbs in, sitting with his back to the headboard. I don’t move the entire time he does this. Only merely follow him with my eyes apprehensively.
When Nerd reaches for the remote and turns the TV on, I roll to my side facing away from him.
My mind shifts all over the place as tears spill down my cheeks. I knew I wasn’t good enough and now Nerd knows it. It’s why he distances himself from me after every session I have. He’s realizing that I’m a lost cause and not worth his time.
Closing my eyes, I silently cry myself back to sleep knowing come morning things with Nerd will end. Even if it tears me open to do it. He deserves so much more than me. A woman with experience rather than a nineteen-year-old who will be twenty in six months.
Sometime or another, I wake to arms wrapping around me and the filled with silence. Nerd must have decided he was done watching TV. I don’t say anything as he does this wanting to savor the last bit of time I have with him.
“Love you, babygirl.” He murmurs into my hair and I let out a shutter breath.
Minutes pass but it feels like hours when Nerd rolls me to face him. “Look at me, Cara,” he commands, the tone in his voice holding no room for argument. Opening my eyes, I lift my head, but I don’t look at him head on but rather over his shoulder. “Babygirl, eyes on me.”
Sucking in another breath, I hold it as I meet Nerd’s gaze.
“Why are you crying?” he asks softly. His eyes softened from the hard look he’d had before, he looks into mine.
Pulling my bottom lip in I bite it nervously as I shake my head.
“Can’t fix what’s going on if you don’t talk to me, Cara,” he murmurs gently.
You can’t fix what’s broke, I want to scream but I don’t. I already know it’s over between us and I’ll live knowing I wasn’t able to make him happy by giving him what he needs.
Sighing, Nerd lifts a hand to cup the side of my face. “Talk to me,” he demands.
“I’m too damaged to be enough for you,” I whisper, casting my eyes to his chest.
“Come again?” Nerd mutters, his body growing taut.
Closing my eyes, I repeat my words to him in the same whisper. “I’m too damaged to be enough for you.”
“Where do you come by that bullshit?” he asks, frustration vibrating off of him.
“Um.” How do I tell him this without causing him to become angry?
“Spit it out, Cara,” he mutters.
“You leave me,” I blurt.
Nerd jerks back some like I’d slapped him, “What?”
“You leave me,” I stammer nervously.
“I don’t understand what you mean by that. I leave you?”
“You do. After my sessions with Dr. Lanston. You leave for hours and come back sweaty and go straight to the shower without speaking to me. Then you go to bed. I know I’m not good enough for you and you have needs. I . . .”
“Stop right there,” Nerd snaps.
“Nick.”
“No. Don’t even say it.” I knew me bringing this up would upset him. “You think I’m cheating on you?” Nerd demands.
“I, um,” I murmur, but Nerd puts a finger over my mouth stopping me.
“You know what, don’t answer that. I’m not cheating on you. I’d never do that shit to you and it pisses me off to know you think I would do something like that to you, Cara,” he snarls, pulling away from me and standing at the side of the bed, hands on his hips.
“Then why do you leave me? When any of the other times, like with group, you’re always there.” I whisper while sitting up and pulling my knees into my chest protectively.
“When I leave you for a couple hours it’s to burn off the anger that I feel after sitting in those fucked up sessions of yours and listening to what those motherfuckers did to you. It’s bad enough the video is burned into my brain. I don’t need to hear my woman talk about it but I do it for you because I’m not going to let you fuckin’ go through this bullshit alone.”
Oh God.
I’m selfish. Completely so. I’d forgotten about the videos they made. But then again, I was the one they were raping so it’s not easy to remember everything other than what they were doing to you.
Tears well in my eyes.
“I’m sorry. You don’t have to come to anymore with me. I didn’t think. I’m so stupid,” I say, my voice faltering as my anxiety starts to peak once again.
“Cara, it’s not you that has to be sorry and I’m not going to stop going with you. Not until the day you stop seeing that fuckin’ quack. You’re my woman, and I’m going to do whatever it takes to keep you safe. If it means me leaving you for a couple hours to beat the shit out of the punching bag at the clubhouse or getting in the ring to fuck someone up then so be it. As for calling yourself stupid, I hear it again and I’m going to spank your ass.”
At this announcement, I gasp. He wouldn’t, would he?
“Now, tell me why you thought I would be cheating on you,” Nerd demands, the edge in his tone still there.
“Um, because you’re a guy and have needs. I well, um, see up until everything, the one thing I hadn’t shared at therapy yet was, um . . .”
“Spit it out, babygirl,” he interrupts.
“I was a virgin,” I sputter.
“What?” he asks, baffled by this news.
“I was a virgin,” I repeat.
“Heard that, Cara. So, you’d never had a man inside you and those fuckers took something special from you,” he snarls.
“Um, yes,” I murmur cautiously.
“And you thought because I’m a man and have needs that I couldn’t control them?”