Rogue Royale (#Wattys2017)

RR -- IX.

IX.
I woke up with his arms around me. I passed out on him last night, so I had no idea what happened later. But I guess, he had brought me to his room and fell asleep beside me. I sighed as I recalled what we talked about last night.

It was indeed a rape. I've been in denial of it for years, kept convincing myself it was just nightmares. I didn't want it to be real. I really had a hard time suppressing the possibility that they weren't nightmares but real ones.

And who did it, I wasn't sure. The voices I'd heard were vague and distorted. There were no faces in my nightmares to recognize.

And now, I've found out JP was there. Why hadn't he done anything when I was being touched? What happened that night? If he was there and knew it all along, why did he disappear?

He disappeared while I waited for him to come back and make me feel better.

I didn't know who to tell what happened. Mom? Dad? What would I tell them? I wasn't even sure what happened. I woke up in the hospital alone. I was in shock for some unknown reason. The last sane moment I remember was drinking in that summer party and passing out in someone else's arms. I had an idea that I might had been drugged and raped but I couldn't remember anything. I felt so alone.

All I knew was I started to change. My behavior changed. I didn't talk to everyone and felt even more distant to everyone around me. There's only one person I wanted to see but even him seemed to be missing. Realizing I had no one, I packed and left on a cold night. And the rest is history.

I felt him shift and I realized he was awake all this time. I doubted if he even slept a wink at all.

"What happened that night, JP?" I asked. This is now or never.

I heard him inhale sharply as if he himself was avoiding this question. "You don't remember?"

"I don't. The last thing I remember was waiting for you that night," I said. "You never came."

We needed to talk that night. I had something to tell him, he also had something to tell me. I never knew what he wanted to say but mine was something about telling him we should stop seeing each other. I was going to leave for New York, I was going to be 18 in fall and I had to decide whether to go on with the adoption process or not.

But I was never able to tell him that.

He shifted so he could pull me closer to him. I could feel his heart beating so loud. He didn't say anything for the first few moments until he finally gathered his courage. "I was held back on my way to you."

I braced myself.

"Before I knew it, someone smashed into my car. I got out and checked what happened, only to be knocked out cold. I woke up in an abandoned warehouse chained. I found familiar faces gathered around me. They were, as you can guess, those guys I beat up one moment in my life," he narrated. "I guess they came back for revenge. It didn't matter. Somehow I expected that day would come. What I didn't expect was when Zac and Drake showed up, an unconscious girl slung on Drake's shoulder. My insides went numb when I realized it was you."

I remembered Zac in the party trying to talk to me. I, of course, ignored him because I had nothing to do with him anymore. I disappeared in the crowd, as people were grinding into the DJ's music. It was the annual summer street party. A lot of people came to party, dance and listen to some good music by participating bands. I was alone waiting for JP. AJ was in Grandville visiting his girlfriend while MJ was in Germany with Aunt Jessamine who wasn't feeling well.

A girl approached me with several drinks on her tray, handing me out a drink. I took it from her grudgingly, annoyed at Zac suddenly showing up. What I didn't know was the bottle not only contained beer, but something else to shut my senses down.