Secondhand

The night I told Austin I loved him was the first night in quite some time that I hadn't had nightmares. It was a little ironic, considering the events leading up to both of our confessions, but I slept better than I had in a long time. Shayley had realized as soon as he talked to us that morning what had happened between us. He never said a thing, surprisingly, but I knew he could tell. He had been asked out by a guy he had gone to college with after reconnecting one day at work and things were going well, if his lovesick gushes over dinner were any indication. I was happy for him, I really was, but this side of Shay was freaking me out a lot. I wasn't used to him behaving the way he had been recently, and it was just an odd adjustment. Basically though, everything had been going perfectly.

Well, until today, that is. Why it took so long to happen, I don't know, but today Austin and I had gone down to the police station to be questioned. I didn't want to relive any of what had happened that night, but I knew it had to happen if my attackers were to be caught and punished for what they had done. This world was only getting worse and worse. People are so sick.

Throughout the questioning, I had to work so hard not to break down in tears. What had happened made me feel so worthless. I had beat myself up about it constantly, feeling like I deserved it. I did deserve it. Austin didn't know that I felt this way; no one did and it was going to stay that way. Currently, Austin was in a separate room to answer questions of his own about what he saw, which was pretty much nothing helpful. The police officers and detectives that I spoke with were compassionate, but the questioning couldn't have ended sooner. They asked all the questions I expected them to.

“Do you know why anyone would want to hurt you?”

Nope.

“Do you know who it could have been?”

Unfortunately, no.

“Can you identify any of the people?”

Not a simple thing to do when you're blindfolded or they have a ski mask on, is it?

The commentary in my head was all that got me though. That, and the promise of being reunited with Austin as soon as it was done. I wanted the men who had hurt me to pay for what they had done, but I didn't want to talk about it again. It still hurt and it probably would forever. The effect of rape didn't just go away. I was scared of that.

For example, things had gotten heated between Austin and I the other night and, though I hadn't necessarily wanted to, I had to stop him before anything happened. He had said he understood, but he looked sad. I wanted to explain to him that it wasn't his fault at all and I had tried to. He said he knew what I meant, but I felt so terrible. I wanted to make him happy more than anything and I surprisingly wasn't terrified of moving to that step in our whatever-we-are-we-are relationship. But I couldn't because I still hurt so much emotionally.

Austin had assured me that I had never deserved it, though I never told him I felt like I did. He told me he didn't want to push me into something I didn't want to do, but he didn't seem to understand that it was something I wanted to do, I just couldn't. I was scared.

I walked out of the questioning room after the officers had finished with their endless ream of questions to find Austin waiting for me in the main lobby of the police stations.

“Hey. You doing alright?”

I nodded in silence.

“Have you been waiting out here long?”

“About five minutes, so not really.

“Oh, alright.”

With that, we left the station and got into the car.

“They thought I did it.”

“What?”

“The police. They thought that I was the one who raped you.”

“Are you kidding?”

“Why would I kid about that?”

“Well, they know that you didn't now, right?”

“They should. It took a while to convince them, though.”

“H-how did you?”

“Let's just say it wasn't exactly my brightest moment.”

“What do you mean?”

“I may or may not have yelled at them.”

“What was there to yell about?”

“I told them I would never do something like that. Not to anyone, but especially not to you. Because I love you.”

This was the second time he had told me he loved me. We were both still cautious with our feelings and definitely weren't the type to throw around “I love you” just because we could. I sighed and rested my hand on top of his over the center console.

“I love you, too. I can't believe they thought that. Why the hell would I have stayed with you if you had done that to me?”

“Because I'm irresistibly sexy, not to mention charming, a good cook, and a passionate lover?”

I laughed at him and he smirked as well.

“Yeah, Aus. Obviously. That's it.”

We arrived at the apartment building and went upstairs. My heart sped up when I noticed the door was ever so slightly ajar and Shayley was working. I nudged Austin, gesturing to the door and he nodded in recognition.

“I'll go in there first.”

“No way.”

“Alan, I don't want you going in there.”

“Too bad. I'm going in too.”

“Fine.”

He sighed and we approached the door slowly.

“Hello?” Austin called out as he pushed the door open.