Текст книги "Captive in the Dark"

Автор книги: C. J. Roberts

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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 15 страниц)

THREE :

I was seven the first time I was warned about being a whore. It was one of the very few times I spent time with my father and I remember it vividly because he scared me.

We were watching Return to the Blue Lagoon and the character Lilly had just panicked over blood she found between her legs. I was too young to understand what was happening so I asked my dad. He said, “Women are dirty whores and full of dirty blood, so every month they have to get rid of it.”

I was stunned into fearful silence. I imagined myself being emptied of blood, my skin shrunken down the bone. “Am I a woman Daddy?”

My father drank deeply from his rum and coke, “You will be someday.”

My eyes misted over with tears as I imagined the horror of being exsanguinated, “How do I get more blood?”

My father smiled and hugged me. The smell of the liquor on his breath would always be a comfort to me, “You will baby girl…just don’t be a whore.”

I squeezed my father, “I won’t!” I leaned back and looked in his drunken eyes, “But what’s a whore?”

My father laughed outright, “Ask your mother.”

I never did. I never told my mother about the things my father said, though she asked whenever he brought me home. Instinctually I knew they would only fight if I did.

Two years later, on my ninth birthday I had my first period and cried pitifully for my mother to call a doctor. Instead, she burst into the bathroom and demanded to know what was wrong. I looked up at her, shame radiating throughout my body and whispered, “I’m a whore.”

I was thirteen before I saw my dad again. And by then I had a deep understanding of what a ‘whore’ was.

My mother had been a ‘whore’ for falling in love young and becoming pregnant with me…and my brother…and my sister…and my other sister…and my other brother…and well – the rest. I was destined to become one because of her. Whoredom, it seemed, was in my blood, my dirty blood.

My grandparents believed it; my aunt’s believed it, as did their husband’s and their children. My mother had been the youngest of her siblings and their opinion weighed heavily with her. So most importantly – she believed it. She made me believe it.

She dressed me in floor length dresses, forbade me make-up, earrings, or anything more exotic than a barrette for my hair. I could not play with my brothers or my male cousins. I could not sit on my fathers lap. All this was to keep my inner whore at bay.

By the time I was thirteen, I was fed up with my families Puta Manifesto. I rebelled at every opportunity. I borrowed shorts, skirts and t-shirts from my friends. I saved money from birthday cards and the occasional stipend my mother gave me for babysitting while she went out to search for her next boyfriend to buy tinted lip gloss and fingernail polish.

My mother was thrown into fits of pure rage whenever she found these things in my room. “Disgraciada!” she would yell while pitching my pilfered items at my head. I was a disgrace in her eyes. “Is this what you’re doing behind my back? Wearing this…this…nothing! Showing your tits and your legs like street trash!”

I always cry when I’m angry, overwhelmed by emotion, I can’t control my face leakage or my mouth, “Fuck you Mom. Fuck you! You’re the whore, not me. I just...” I sobbed, “I just want to dress like other girls my age. I’m sick of paying for your mistakes. I didn’t do anything wrong.”

My mother’s eyes swam with tears and fury, “You know Livvie, you think you’re so much better than me,” she swallowed, “but you’re not. We’re more alike than you even know and…I’m telling you…act like a whore and you’ll get treated like one.”

I sobbed loudly as she gathered my things in a trash bag. “Those clothes belong to my friends!”

“Well, they’re not your friends anymore. You don’t need friends like that.”

“I hate you!”

“Hmm, well…I hate you too right now. All I’ve sacrificed…for a brat like you.”

***

I awoke, gasping and disoriented, the edges of the dream dissipating, but not the dread lingering inside me. The darkness was so complete, for a second, I thought I hadn’t woken from my nightmare. Then slowly, frame by frame, it all came back to me. And as each frame was cataloged and stored away in my mental library, a faint but growing concept took hold, that this nightmare was reality, my reality. I suddenly found myself longing for the dream. Any nightmare would be better than this.

My heart sank to new depths, eyes burning in the darkness. I looked around dispassionately, noticing familiar objects, but none of them mine. As the haze cleared, ever more steadily into cold hard reality, I thought, I really have been kidnapped. It hit, hard, those words in neon, in my head. I looked around again, surrounded by strangeness. Unfamiliar space. I really am in some strange place.

I wanted to cry.

I wanted to cry for not seeing this coming. I wanted to cry for the uncertainty of my future. I wanted to cry for wanting to cry. I wanted to cry because I was most likely going to die before I got to experience life. But mostly, I wanted to cry for being so horribly, tragically, stupidly female.

I’d had so many fantasies about that day he’d helped me on the sidewalk. I’d felt like a princess stumbling across a knight in shining armor. Jesus Christ, I’d even asked him for a ride! I had been so disappointed when he said no and when he mentioned meeting another woman my heart had sunken into my stomach. I cursed myself for not wearing something cuter. Shamefully, I had fantasized about his perfect hair, his enigmatic smile, and the exact shade of his eyes almost every day since.

I closed my eyes.

What an idiot I’d been, a damned foolish little girl.

Had I learned nothing from my mother’s mistakes? Apparently not. Somehow I’d still managed to go all retarded at the sight of some handsome asshole with a nice smile. And just like her, I’d gotten good and fucked by him too. I’d let a man ruin my life. For some reason beyond my understanding, I hated my mother in that moment. It broke my heart even more.

I wiped angrily at the tears that threatened to escape my eyes. I had to focus on a way to get out of here, not on a way to feel sorry for myself.

The only light came from the dim glow coming off a nearby nightlight. The pain had subsided into an overall soreness, but my headache still raged. I was unbound, lying under the same thick comforter, covered from head to toe in a thin layer of sweat. I pushed the comforter away.

I expected to find my naked body under the comforter. Instead I found satin, a camisole and panties. I clutched frantically at the fabric. Who had dressed me? Dressing meant touching and touching could mean too many things. Caleb? Had he dressed me? The thought filled me with dread. And underneath that, something else entirely more horrible; unwelcome curiosity.

Fending off my conflicting emotions, I set about inspecting my body. I was sore all over, even my hair hurt, but between my legs I didn’t feel noticeably different. No soreness on the inside to suggest what I couldn’t bring myself to think might happen to me at some point. I was momentarily relieved, but one more look around my new prison and my relief evaporated. I had to get out of here. I slid out of bed.

The room appeared run down, with yellowing wallpaper and thin, stained carpet. The bed, a huge wrought iron four-poster, was the only piece of furniture that appeared new. It hardly seemed like the kind of thing that belonged in a place like this. Not that I knew much about places like this. The linen on the bed smelled of fabric softener. It was the same kind I washed my family’s clothes in at home. My stomach clenched. I didn’t hate my mother, I loved her. I should have told her more often, even if she didn’t always tell me. Tears stung my eyes, but I couldn’t fall apart right now. I had to think of a way to escape.

My first instinct was to try the door, but I dismissed that idea as stupid. For one, I remembered it being locked. For another, if it wasn’t, the chances were good I’d run right into my captors. The look in that guy, Jair’s, eyes flashed through my mind and a violent shiver of fear ran down my spine.

Instead, I crept to a set of curtains and pulled them back. The window was boarded shut. I barely contained an exasperated scream. I slipped my fingers around the edges of the wood trying to pull it up, but it proved impossible. Damn.

The door opened behind me without warning. I spun around, slamming my back against the wall as if I could somehow manage to blend into the curtains. The door hadn’t been locked. Had he been waiting for me?

Light, soft and low, filtered through, casting shadows across the floor. Caleb. My legs shook with fear as he shut the door and walked toward me. He looked like the Devil himself, dressed in black slacks and a black button up shirt, stepping slowly, deliberately. Still handsome enough to make my insides clench and my heart stutter. It was pure perversion.

In the fall of light from the door his shadow loomed long and dark. Unbidden, words once made ominous by Poe, now manifested as flesh in the man before me: “Suddenly I heard a tapping, as of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.”

Crap, crap, crap. Okay, that last part was me.

Caleb raised his hand as if to hit me and I threw my arms up to protect my face. His hand slammed against the wall. While I cringed, the bastard laughed. Slowly, I moved to bring my arms down and cover my breasts. Caleb grabbed both my wrists in his left hand and pressed them to the wall over my head. Pinned between him and the wall, I reacted like a frightened hamster. I froze, as if my stillness would discourage his predatory nature. Like a snake that only eats live mice.

“Are you hungry?” he asked, soft and low.

I heard the question, but the words had no meaning. My brain ceased to function as it should. The only thing my mind could focus on was his closeness. The intense warmth of his soft fingers pressed into my wrists. The clean, wet smell of his skin in the air around me. The invisible pressure of his gaze upon me. What was this?

When I failed to respond, the fingers of his right hand trailed across the underside of my right breast, the fabric of my camisole made his fingers warm satin against my flesh. Our earlier exchange forced its way into my consciousness. “Go fuck yourself.”

“…I’d much rather fuck you.”

My knees slightly buckled and my nipples hardened. I took a sharp breath and leaned away from his touch, forcing my tightly shut eyes into the skin of my upraised arm.

His lips caressed the shell of my ear, “Are you going to answer? Or must I force you again?”

Food? My stomach suddenly twisted sharply. A primal pain. Yes, there was my hunger, when he reminded me of it. I was absolutely starving. I mustered up my courage by taking a deep breath. “Yes.”

I felt his smile against my ear, and then his fingers held my chin. In my peripheral vision I watched him lean into me. His breath was cool against my heated flesh.

“Yes,” he repeated my response, “you’re hungry? Yes, you’re going to answer? Or yes, I have to force you again?”

My heart raced. I felt his breath on my cheek. There was suddenly not enough air, as if his proximity sucked it out of my lungs.

“Or is it just, yes?”

My lips parted and my lungs pulled in deep, bringing in as much air as they could. It didn’t seem like much. I forced myself to answer through my panic.

“Yes,” I stammered, “I’m hungry.”

I knew he smiled, though I couldn’t see it. A shiver, so strong my body nearly jerked toward his, ran down my spine.

He kissed me softly on the cheek. I think I whimpered. Then he walked out of the room leaving me paralyzed even after I heard the door shut.

Caleb returned shortly with a wheeled cart laden with food. My stomach gnawed as I smelled the meat and bread. It was difficult to control the urge to run toward the food. Then Jair followed him into the room carrying a chair.

Seeing Jair made me wish the floor would open up and swallow me. Earlier, when Jair had sought to rape me, I had (once again) tried to find protection in Caleb’s arms. I suppose that somewhere in my head, I’d clung to the hope that this man, this Caleb, would protect me. All I could see was that horrible, feral look in Jair’s eyes. He wanted to hurtme.

The door shut and I looked up to find Caleb sitting next to the food. We were alone again. Fear and hunger tore at my insides.

“Come here,” he said. His voice startled me, but I moved to walk toward him. “Stop. I want you to crawl over here.”

My legs shook. Crawl? Are you kidding me? Just run. Run right now. He stood looking straight at me. Run where? See how quickly he slams you to the ground and drugs you again! My knees hit the floor. What choice did I have? I put my head down but I could still feel his eyes on me like a weight that promised his hand. My knees and my palms moved across the ground until I reached the tops of his shoes.

I was trapped. I was nearly naked. Weak. Scared. I was his.

He bent and gathered my hair in both his hands. Slowly, he lifted my head until our eyes met. He looked at me intently; brows knit together, his mouth set in a hard line. “I wish he hadn’t done this to you,” he said while stroking the corner of my left eye. “You really are a very pretty girl; it’s a shame.”

My heart twisted. A memory, the memory ripped through my defenses and surfaced at the forefront of my mind. My stepfather had thought I was pretty too. I was a prettything, and pretty things did not fare well in this world, not in the hands of men like him. Instinctively, my hands grabbed his wrists in an effort to guide his hands from my hair, but he held me firm. Not rough, just firm. Without words, he made himself clear; he wasn’t done looking at me yet. Incapable of holding his gaze, I averted my eyes to some point just beyond him.

The very air around me seemed to shift to accommodate him. His breath skated across my cheek, and beneath my trembling, sweaty hands, his forearms hinted at his immense strength. I shut my eyes and took a deep breath in the hopes of calming down. The smell of him mingled with the food and rushed into my lungs. The combination did strange primal things to me. I suddenly felt carnivorous. I wanted to tear the flesh from his bones with my teeth and drink his blood.

Unable to help myself, I whispered, “It’s your fault he did it. All of this is your fault. You’re no better than he is.” It felt good to say the words. I felt I should have said them sooner.

A bead of sweat trickled down the side of my neck, its slow crawl over my collarbone, across my chest, and into the well of my breasts served to remind me of my body. My soft, breakable body.

He sighed deeply and let out a slow breath. I shivered, unable to discern whether the sigh meant he had calmed, or he was about to slap me senseless.

His voice, thinly coated with civility, filled my head, “I’d watch what you say to me pet. There is a world of difference between me and him. One that I think you’ll learn to appreciate, despite yourself. But make no mistake; I am still capable of things you can’t imagine. Provoke me again and I’ll prove it.” He let me go.

I sank without thinking, back down to all fours, once again staring at his shoes. I was sure I’d completely break down if I tried to imagine all the things I wasn’t capable of imagining, because I could imagine some pretty horrible things. In fact, I was imagining some of those horrible things when his voice interrupted my thoughts.

“You’re entire life is going to change. You should try to accept that, because there’s no possible way to avoid it. Like it or not, fight it or don’t, your old life is over. It was over long before you woke up here.”

There were no words, no me, no here. This was crazy. I had awoken with sweat and fear to this, this darkness. Fear, pain, hunger, this man—eating at me. I wanted to put my head to the tops of his shoes. To stop. The words hung in the air like a speech bubble still clinging to his lips. How long before? Before that day on the street?

I thought about my mom again. She was far from perfect, but I loved her more than I loved anyone. He was telling me I’d never see her again, that I’d never see anyone I loved again. I should have expected those types of words. Every villain had a similar speech, ‘Don’t try to get away, it’s impossible’, but until then, I hadn’t realized how truly terrifying those words were.

And he stood above me, as if he were a god who had torn the sun away, not caring for my devastation. “Address me as Master. Every time you forget, I will be forced to remind you. So you can choose to obey, or choose punishment. It’s entirely up to you.”

My head snapped up and my shocked, horrified, pissed off eyes met his. I wasn’t going to call him Master. No. Fucking. Way. I was sure he could see the determination in my eyes. The unspoken challenge behind them that screamed, ‘Just try and make me asshole. Just try.’

He lifted a brow, and his eyes responded, ‘With pleasure pet. Just give me a reason.’

Rather than risk a fight I couldn’t possibly win, I returned my eyes to the ground. I was going to get out of here. I just had to be smart.

“Do you understand?” he said smugly.

Yes, Master. The words remained unspoken, their absence duly noted.

“Do. You,” he leaned forward, “Under. Stand?” He drew out each word as if speaking to a child, or someone who doesn’t understand English.

My tongue pushed against my teeth. I stared at his legs, unable to answer him, unable to fight him. A lump began to form in my throat and I swallowed hard to keep it down, but the tears eventually came. These were not the tears of pain or fear but of frustration.

“Very well then, I guess you’re not hungry. But I am.”

At the mention of food my mouth surged again with saliva. The smell of the food twisted my stomach into tight knots. While he tore off pieces of bread, my nails dug into the thin carpet where my tears now dripped onto the floor. What did he want from me that he couldn’t just take? I sniffled, trying not to sob. He touched me again, stroking the back of my head.

“Look at me.”

I wiped the tears from my face and looked up at him. He sat back in his chair, head cocked to one side. He appeared to be considering something. I hoped whatever it was wouldn’t cause me more humiliation, but I doubted it. He picked up a piece of cut meat from his plate and slowly stuck it in his mouth, all the while looking at my face. Every tear that sprang from my eye I quickly wiped away with the back of my hand. Next, he picked up a piece of cubed beef. I swallowed hard. He leaned forward and held the delicious smelling morsel to my lips. With an almost unabashed relief I opened my mouth, but he snatched it away.

He offered again. And again. Each time I crawled closer and closer, until I was pressed between his legs, my hands on either side of his body. Suddenly I threw my arms up around his hand and wrapped my mouth around his fingers to get the food away from him. Oh my god, so good.

His fingers were thick and salty against my tongue but I managed to wrest the meat from between them. He moved quickly, his fingers found my tongue and pinched viciously while his other hand dug into the sides of my neck. He squeezed, making me open my mouth in shock as pain cascaded down my throat. The food fell from between my lips to the floor and I howled around his fingers at the loss. He let go of my tongue, and his hands found control along the sides of my head as he tilted it up toward his. “I’ve been entirely too kind and you’re going to learn just how civil I’ve been. You’re very proud and very spoiled and I’m going to beat it out of you twice.”

Then he stood up with enough force to push me backward onto the floor. He walked out of the room and shut the door. This time I heard the lock.

Beside me the food beckoned.

FOUR :

My hunger was an angry living thing, clawing and howling along the insides of my skin. I fell on the feast like a starving animal—forcing food and drink down my throat as fast as I could. I didn’t even register what I shoved in my mouth as chicken or refried beans. It was food to fill the emptiness in my belly and I ate until I couldn’t. Until I was full.

Oil and salt and food chunks smeared my hands and my face as my throat constricted around the last of the buffet. My hunger no longer gripping me, I finally saw the single plastic fork amidst the empty paper plates. Frantically I clutched at it and ran to the boarded up window, stabbing uselessly at the boards. As my meal continued to make its way to my belly, the plastic fork shattered under my hands as I pried at the window. Breathing quickly and shallowly around the food, I finally threw the broken pieces across the roomtowards the closed door.

Tears once again blurred my vision as an overwhelming tide of fear and sadness dragged me under. You’re not going to get out of here. You’re fucked. He’s going to come back and he’s going to do something awful. Really, really, fucking bad and there’s nothing you can do to stop him. Please, please, please God, please get me out of this.

I rushed toward the darkly lit bathroom, lifted the toilet lid and vomited everything I’d eaten. I screamed into the bowl between surges of spicy bile. My voice echoed against the porcelain, a strangled gurgling sound that finally gave way to weepy moans and heavy breathing. I flushed before the sight of my puke could make me sick all over again. I actually felt a little better after that. Hungry again, but calmer.

I tried to flip on the light, but apparently that too had been removed. In its place there was another nightlight. The bathroom was a work in progress, the new mixed in with the old. I carefully ignored the Jacuzzi tub where I’d been stripped down and man-handled. Just one glance and his hands were on me again. I looked away sharply, focusing instead onwashing my face and rinsing my mouth in the pedestal sink. I had to get the taste and smell of puke out of my head.

Above the sink, there was a circular metal plate. Inspired, I dug my fingers around the shallow lip, trying to pry it off but it was embedded into the wall. Dully, I stared at it. It was so shiny and flawless it was almost like glass. In it, I saw my face for the first time since I’d been taken. The skin around my eye had taken on a light purplish-green color; it felt puffy to the touch. I could now open it enough to see out of, but it looked disfigured when compared to my right eye. I touched it with my fingers, surprised that it hurt less than it did earlier. I looked terrible. Aside from my swollen and bruised eye, my hair was a tangled mess. Strangely, I found myself trying to arrange my hair. I felt like an idiot the moment the absurdity of it hit me. Yeah Livvie, don’t forget to look cute for the handsome kidnapper. Stupid!

I didn’t know what was happening to me, but Caleb was at the center of it. He was the source of all this pain and confusion. Whatever had befallen me or would befall me, it would be on account of his distorted and perverted appetite. Defeated, I turned around and began walking out.

The bedroom door swung open, making me jump. Frantically, I searched around the bathroom for a way to escape or somewhere to hide. It was irrational, as I’d already established there was no escape. Nevertheless, instinct is instinct. My instincts said to hide, even for the few seconds it would take for him to find me.

Caleb walked directly to the bathroom humming. As he reached the doorway, I hid under the sink. In plain sight.

He approached me calmly, without the malice he exhibited before and called for me in a calm voice. “I want you to get up.”

He stretched out his hand toward me. Weary, I stared at it for what seemed a long time, thinking of the damage waiting to be done by that hand. His calm and my fear hung between us in a thick and heavy coil. He was going to hurt me, something in me knew it. That certainty nearly numbed me. Searching to work my way into his good graces, I reached out tentatively, waiting for the snake to strike. I touched his out-stretched hand, wanting to recoil and shrink back. But I didn’t. He smiled. It was a smile that struck me instantly as both beautiful and evil.

He wrapped his fingers around my wrist, and from his touch, an electrical energy trickled into me. I was utterly petrified. He pulled me up slowly, and soon, I stood staring at him with wide eyes and anxious breath. He held the palm of my hand up to his face so that I felt his skin for the first time. The intimacy of this single act forced my eyes to the floor and I abruptly feared his kindness more than his cruelty.

He ran my fingers across his face, holding my hand firmly when I tried to shrink away. He was clean-shaven, soft, but undeniably masculine. His touch was simple, but specific, meant to show me he could be like a lover, gentle, intimate, but also that he was a man unaccustomed to hearing the word no. Yes. I understood. He was a man, and I? I was nothing but a girl, not even a woman. I was meant to fall at his feet and worship at the altar of his masculinity, grateful that he’d deigned to acknowledge me. All this, from a simple touch.

He raised his right hand, pushing my hair off my shoulder, and then caressing the back of my arm. A violent shiver ran down my spine causing me to move back. The cold porcelain of the sink grazed my skin. As if it were a dance, he stepped forward. His fingers speared into my hair, possessive, cradling my head as I continued to stare at the floor. He kissed my fingers; nibbling at them with his teeth. The slightly sharpened canine, once part of his boyish charm, now imbued him with a sinister obscurity.

My heartbeat pulsated in my ears, my breathing became labored. Anxiety coursed through my body only to settle in my stomach, making me feel nauseous. I thought: Do I fight him? Do I risk his temper? My instincts didn’t say run, or hide, they said, stay still. They said…obey? Please stop.

He dropped my hand, setting off alarms; not knowing what to do with my hands, I put my arms around myself. I felt as though he were burning a hole through me with his eyes. The intensity with which he stared at me bordered on obscene. What was he doing to me in his mind?

A very strange thing was happening inside me, an awareness that was as basic and simplistic as male and female, masculine and feminine, hard and soft, predator and prey. Yes, I was terrified. But there was also this undercurrent of something very vaguely familiar. Lust? Maybe. My eyes darted off his face. I had fantasized about this guy, dreamed about him touching me. I had hungered for his eyes on my naked skin. Imagined his soft mouth on my breasts. And now here he was, touching me. It was nothing like I had imagined.

This was unlike any fantasy I’d ever had, even the really morbid ones. I admit, I’d dreamt of being ravaged by Anne Rice’s vampires. I’d seen it on the big screen in my head. It’s the eighteenth century, and I’m standing in an alley, the handsome, questionably evil Lestat is between my thighs. I’m a whore and he’s just another patron. I sense how dangerous he is, how predatory, but one kiss and I don’t give a damn. I know he’ll sink his fangs into me, but I throw myself at his mercy in the hopes that death won’t be the end of me.

This was nothing like my dreams. In a dream you can’t really feel. Every touch is subject to your imagination, what you think a kiss feels like, what you think being fucked feels like, what you think real fear feels like. If you’ve never truly felt it, then your mind can’t truly recreate it. I knew about kissing, had an inkling about petting, but I lacked all knowledge of intent. When my boyfriend touched me, I knew he’d stop the second I asked, conversely, I knew this man wouldn’t. Intent made all the difference. This was real. Real touching, real intimidation, real man, real fear.

He caressed my face, running his fingers over my earlobe, down the column of my throat, the back of his fingers brushing across my collarbone. My breathing became broken, heavy. This was wrong, and yet, it didn’t feel so bad. My fear sat heavy and low in my belly, but farther down a different kind of weight was taking shape. I made a sound of protest, begging him in my wordless way to stop. He paused long enough to breathe me in before he continued. I shook my head slowly, trying to pull back but he held my head firmly in his other hand.

“Look at me,” he said, his voice controlled, but wavering. I shut my eyes tight, slowly shaking my head again. He sighed. “I want you to look at me.”

I didn’t obey, frozen with trepidation. This can’t be happening. Not to me. But it was happening, and I was unable to stop it. I whined, pulling my head back against his hand. He grew further agitated when I drew my hands up, touching his wrists.

“No-o-o,” he said softly, as if reproving a child. My hands shook badly and my knees felt as though they might buckle. He tightened his grip in my hair, forcing my head up. I closed my eyes even tighter as soft, tearless sobs broke past my lips. I was treading the thin line of his patience while falling off the thin line of my sanity. He leaned in, kissed my cheek, then the nape of my neck. I sighed fretfully, pulled away, but I wasn’t getting anywhere. He touched my lips with his thumb, trying to hush my sobs and whimpers.

“Where is all your bravery now pet? No clawing, no hissing? Where’s my tough girl?”

My heart sank into my stomach. I had no idea where my bravery had gone. Had I ever really been brave? I don’t think so. I never had to be brave. I settled for being invisible, the person behind the camera. How I wished I could be invisible now.

My voice was gone, strangled by the magnitude of the moment. I was in the grips of a panic attack when he let me go. I slid to the floor, covering my face with my hands as I told myself repeatedly, I am not here. This is a dream, a horribly fantastic dream. Any moment now, I’m going to wake up. I brought my knees to my chest and rocked back and forth. The mantra just made it seem more real.