The Pain of Loving Her

Chapter 15

I wake up with Clarke's arm tightly wrap around me. It feels good to be held every once in a while. Her alarm clock says its 7:30. I think I finally feel asleep around 3:00. I'm not really tired enough to go back to sleep but I don't want to wake up Clarke up. I slowly turn around to face her. I place a hand on my side and rest my forehead on hers. I hope she sleeps for a while I need to figure out what I am going to say. After what happened there is really no dodging this conversation. Who knows it may be good to finally talk about it.

I must have fallen back asleep. I wake up because of thunder outside. Clarke is gone. I sit up and look around for my phone its 9:00 now. I get up and go the restroom when I return Clarke is sitting on the bed with two mugs. I grab the one she hands me and climb in beside her.

"Good morning" I say giving her a kiss on the cheek. "Sleep well?"

"As well as I could." She returns the kiss. I wrap my arm around her pulling the blanket around me.

"So I owe you an explanation." I say knowing the faster I get this out the faster I will start feeling better.

"You don't have to if you don't want to." I can tell she is just trying to be nice.

"I don't want to but I think I need to." I take a deep breathe. "So..."

"Wait not yet" Clarke interrupts before I can start. She takes the mug out of my hand and places both of them on the table. She sits up, wrapping a blanket around her shoulders and faces me taking both of my hands. "Okay now you can talk."

***Trigger warning: Sexual Abuse

"So when I was about seven or eight years old there was a girl, Costia, that lived on my street. She was probably about 13 or 14 I can't remember. Her younger sister, Claire,  was one of my close friends. I spent the night over there a lot. One night we were having a camp out in  her living room. Claire and I were both in sleeping bags. Costia wanted to join us but there wasn't another sleeping bag. Claire didn't want to share hers so I offered. I had always admired Costia." Tears are starting down my face at this point, " Claire had fallen asleep and Costia asked if I want to play a big kid game. I said yes. She started kissing me and I just let her. I didn't react and she eventually started instructing me on how to kiss her back." I have never cried this much in front of someone before. 

"Lexa you don't need to go any further," Clarke says positioning herself behind me so that I am in between her legs holding on to me tightly. I glad she is behind me because the rest of the story would be hard to say facing her.

"I need to." I pull both of her arms around me she rests her chin on my shoulder. "Costia stopped there for that night telling me not tell anyone. The next weekend I went back over to their house. We had another sleep over. This time she moved the game down to her chest area I followed her instructions to afraid what would happen if any adult figured out. This continued after the fourth or fifth time she began touching you know. It moved from touching to more than that and soon she had me doing things to her. This happen every few weekends for over a year and a half. It only stopped when her parents got divorced and she moved with her mother to St. Louis." I can feel tears from Clarke on my back. She is gently rocking me back and forth, trying to soothe me. She doesn't say anything for a few moments.

"Lex I don't know what to say."

"You don't have to say anything." We lay back on the bed. I turn around to face her. She tries to wipe the tears from her face. I grab her neck and kiss her. It feels so good to finally get this out.

"You didn't deserve any of the things that happen to you baby. You know that right?" Her forehead is placed on mine.

"I didn't deserve it the first time but every other time I did. I never tried to stop it I let her do it and therefore a have to take the blame for some of it." I begin to shake. All the thoughts that have been consuming me for years are finally coming out.

"No Lexa. It is not your fault. You were little and probably scared to death. What she did to you was wrong."

"I let her take everything from me my first kiss, my first time, my innocence, the ability to love myself." The choke on the last words.

"Those firsts don't count. She may have taken away your innocence  and that deeply hurts me but I will not let her continue to make you hate yourself. Lexa Woods I love you and I promise you I am going to try everyday to get you to love yourself again. We are in this together. And if I ever see this girl I will kick her ass. She is lucky I don't hunt her down right now."

"Clarke I love you too. I'm sorry to put this on you."

"There is nothing to apologize for. I'm  glad you trust me enough to tell me."

"Well I'm also sorry for last night. I thought that I could do it and honestly I kind of wanted to. It was going fine but then I started panicking and having memories. I know"

"Baby stop" she interrupts  me. I push a hair out of her face and wipe away a tear then continue.

"No. I know that you like having sex and that it is an important part of a relationship for you. I will keep trying but I can't make you any promises. I don't want this to ruin what we have but I will understand if you can't deal with it."

"You really think that I'm going to leave you because you won't force yourself to have sex with me. Lexa that would be so wrong of me. Yes I wanted it and was confused when you pulled away last night. But Lex I want you to take a look at your wrist right now." She waits until I do. The band aids only cover up a part of it. It looks awful. "You see those scars that's all I could think about last night. Finding you in that bathroom last night was the worst thing I have ever experienced. I had never been more scared in my life. When I opened that door I was afraid of what I would find. I thought you were going to be bleeding out and I thought it was because I hurt you in some way. I'd much rather have you alive than killing yourself because you pushed yourself to have sex with me."

I can't think of anything to say I just hug her tight. Why was I so stupid? I never even stopped to think about what it would do to her. I could have really messed up last night. I should have thought about what I was doing the emotions were just so strong.

"I love you Lexa."

"I love you too." We lay tangled in each other until we both fall back asleep, crying has  exhausted us both.

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Sorry that wasn't a fun chapter but it was important. I promise the story will be happier for most of the time from now on, especially the next few chapters. In other news my last day of school is tomorrow so updates will happen more frequently. Thanks for reading and voting it means the world to me.