Remember Me

Chapter 12

By day three, the wounds on my back had healed and I could get up and walk around painlessly. Well, almost painlessly. One thing that was on my mind wasn't so much causing me physical pain, but mental pain. By that I mean it hurt to think about it, and it brought me dangerously close to tears when I did. The fact that Jordan had raped me, when I was only thirteen. I debated wether or not I should tell him, and decided I should. I just couldn't decide when. Once today when he was in the fields supervising, I 'worked' behind him, and when he turned around and caught me staring at him he looked at me questioningly, making me turn bright red and scurry away wordlessly.

THREE HOURS LATER:

Finally. My work was done and I was retiring to the girl's cabin. All would have been perfect if it hadn't been for my reading lesson, which was to start in just a few minutes. I sat limply on the floor of the cabin, thinking to myself.  

'Tell him,' said one side of my brain to the other.  

'NO, you goof!' argued the other side. 'He'll be offended, or maybe angry. We wouldn't want history repeating itself.' Good point, brain, I told myself, just as the door opened and Jordan stepped in.  

"Hey," he said, smiling. I managed a weak grin and pulled the book from under my bed silently. We were about a half hour into the lesson, and as I stuttered over about the tenth word in a row. he gingerly pulled the book from my hands and looked me in the eye. 

"You're acting weird," he announced. I met his gaze and resisted the urge to break down crying right then and there.  

"No ... no I'm not," I denied, but I realized how weak and unconvincing those words sounded. He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. 

"Is there something you're not telling me?" he asked, and I could see... what was that? Fear? A small trace of fear in his eyes? Oh god. 

"Umm..." I hummed, thinking of the best way to word this. "Ye-yesss..." My voice trailed off. I never knew nerves like this existed in me.  

"What?" he asked, and for one brief, shining moment, he held my hand in his, but immediately looked down and released it.  

"Umm... uhh..." What the hell was I supposed to say? 'Oh, hey, do you remember when I was thirteen and you were sixteen? Yeah, you beat me and raped me, but no worries!" I imagined that going over like a ton of fucking bricks. 

"Tell me," he said, and held my hand again. This time he didn't let go. 

"Ummmm..." Oh god, I thought. Here we go.