Aurora Annabelle Rivers

Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Before my eyes, he was gone. As soon as he said that, he had left me, alone. But what could I have done?
Everything was so confusing and this bewilderment was completely screwing with my head. I couldn't think straight; it was as if there was nowhere left to go.
I looked to sit down on one of the benches looking over the stream. Usually its bright and glistening waters shone, but at the moment, they were as dull and as grey as my heart was for Alex.

I lay my head in my hands, hair covering my face and sat there for a good twenty minutes humming the song 'I Don't Want to Be,' by Gavin Degraw, to myself as if it were my only comfort.
"I was hoping you would be here," a voice came from behind me. I turned around already knowing who it was.
"Just stay away from me," I said pushing my hair from my face. "I don't want to have to do anything with you, okay. So just leave."
"I don't know why you keep pushing me away; I've tried to be a better person, haven't I? I've abided by your rules as just friends, didn't I?"
"You've got to be kidding me," I scoffed. "Alex, I'm not going to sit here and discuss anything with you," I said getting up.
"So are you breaking up with me?" he taunted. There was a smirk on his face and he began to move a little closer.
"You know, Aurora, I've tried to be the person you wanted me to be, but nothing seems like its working for you." He took another couple of steps forward as I moved backward closer to the jungle-gym. "And I wasn't kidding when I said that I wasn't going to give you up."
"Alex, can you stop? You're freaking me out," I was panicking and that just seemed to please him even more, as the smirk just kept growing.
I had backed up as far as I could have, and had nowhere left to go. He came up closer to me, way too close for comfort, and took my waist in his hands. My teeth were clenched and I was trying so hard to show that I wasn't scared, when in reality I was deathly afraid.
He brought his face closer to mine and kissed me on the lips "How was that? Better than Julian, I'm sure."
"I didn't feel a thing," I said looking at him in disgust.
"Darling," he said plainly, "whether you meant it or not, with that kiss last night and what you said, I still took it as any other guy would. That I would have you, and I'll be sure of that."
I tried to block him out of my mind, but he continued. He started kissing my neck and moving his hands up and down my back.
"Alex, stop it," I said squirming to get out of his hold.
"You know it's kind of funny," he said ignoring me, still kissing my collar bone, "Even when you were officially my girlfriend, I knew that I would have you, and whether you want it or not, I'll still have you."
I was pushing him away with my hands, as if I could somehow overpower him. "That's kind of sexy, that whole resisting, but we both now that you want me as bad as I want you."
This whole 'wanting' thing, I couldn't understand where it was coming from. I had never made it clear that I ever wanted that type of relationship with him. And it was the first time I had ever seen him like that.
"Alex, stop. You can't do this," I yelled.
"No? I think I can," he said calmly back to me, as he began to unbutton my shirt. I blocked him with hands, but he pinned me so I was stuck in one position, and laughed.
When he began to unbutton my shirt again, I told him that I would scream. "No, you won't," he challenged.
"I swear I will if you don't stop."
"Well in that case," he said as he lifted me and threw me over his shoulder. I started kicking and screaming, but that didn't make a difference in anything.
"Alex, stop. Put me down?" I yelled but nothing was working. My throat was becoming dry and raspy the more I screamed, and the less it made a difference in what would happen.

As much as I hoped that somebody would be in his house to stop him, of course as always there wasn't. He walked up the stairs into his room, shut the door and locked it so I couldn't happen to manage to get out. He put me on his bed, pinning me down once again and took his shirt off, while I was still begging for him to stop.
This was a complete disgusting and filthy monster. It wasn't or couldn't have been the same Alex that I knew. There had been a definite change he told me before, which was true but it wasn't anything positive. He had become a revolting and nauseating mongrel.
He brought his hands down to my shorts, trying to slide them off while I was squirming to keep them on. He lay on top of me and again started kissing me, everywhere. It was so repulsive; I knew that I had done wrong, but had I really deserved what was coming next?
"Please, just leave me alone, I didn't do anything?" I barely let out.
"Oh? Is that so?" he began as he started for my bra.
"You think that just because I took everything back, that I don't still feel anything for you; but do you really think that this will make that feeling grow. Every second you keep me here like this, you don't know how happy I am that I actually have Julian and that you ended things with us before." He scoffed at that and I could feel his hands everywhere; moving all around me and if I actually had eaten something, I wouldn't have minded throwing it all up in his face.
"I'm sorry, okay? I didn't mean it, Alex. I'm sorry."
"Do you think I could give a f*** if you're sorry or not? You still did it and it hurt me, don't you understand that? Now just shut up so I can get this over with."
"Alex, stop..." I began but he cut me off.
"Shut the hell up," he yelled. I couldn't believe how forceful he was being, I'd seen him angry, but never as horrible as this.
He started to take off the rest of his clothes, until I whispered through my tears, "What did I even do to deserve this? I didn't do anything."
He hesitated, then stopped and turned to just sit on his bed, letting me go. "You don't even know. So I'm guessing that it wasn't you who told me that you loved me and took everything back? You weren't the one in my car who told me that you loved Julian, right after I told you how sorry I was about everything; after I opened up and told you how I felt? Aurora, you didn't even know; that night you broke my heart."
He got up moving over to the window and put his shirt back on.
"Just get the hell out," he whispered shakily over his shoulder. I got up trying to clear the tears from my face and gather my clothes which were sprawled all over the place.
I dressed quickly as I moved towards the door and unlocked it and finally I left the room. I practically flew down the stairs feeling so icky and disgusting and terrible, not even noticing what I was knocking down in my pathway to the door.
It was all over me; his smell. I could still feel his hands all over me, as if it left a permanent mark there. I didn't want to ever see Alex again, I could care less about him and I knew that this time I meant it.
I felt so trapped and even more alone than I thought was possible. I needed to clear my mind, but of course as usual nothing came of it.
As soon as I got out of the house I started running; sprinted actually, I didn't know where to, but just ran. My heart and head was throbbing as if he had stabbed me there repeatedly.
I tried not to slow down, pretending it was a race. Everything went by me in a blur and all I thought about was getting onto the track and running.
I didn't want to deal with anybody; not Julian, not Amanda, and certainly not Alex. Everything I knew would disgust me when I looked at it, somehow it would bring me back to think about that night.
'But how could I have been so stupid?' I thought. I could feel myself growing tired as I continued to run, but I needed to get away from everything.
Finally I stopped, still unable to take in any of my surroundings until I heard a voice calling me up ahead.
I couldn't see who it exactly was, everything was so fuzzy and with my head still spinning, that didn't help at all.
"Aurora," the voice called, "Are you okay?" The person ran up to me, but I couldn't even tell if it was a male's or female's voice. There were words being sprawled at me and I could even differentiate what they meant separately or even together.
I remember my knees and ankles giving way, and falling into a pile of clouds.

When I opened my eyes, it was like I had done it for the first time. The lights which were as dimmed as they could be, shone like the morning sun, but thankfully that wasn't out anymore.
"How are you feeling?" a voice came from behind me. I was curled up into a ball with a thick woolen quilt wrapped around me keeping me warm, and I didn't want to move to let any cool air in.
I nodded my head, but shut my eyes to keep out the powerful and intense lights. My head began throbbing again and I groaned, still unaware where I was.
I felt a hand on my forehead and then, "I don't think she has a fever, but she's probably coming down with something."
"Should we take her to the doctor?" a voice whispered. I couldn't tell who it was, but somehow recognized the soft sounds.
I tried to speak to tell these two people that I was fine and didn't need to go to any doctor, but instead a noise of a car engine erupted from me.
"Sleep well," the familiar voice came again and the two pairs of footsteps made its way outside after thankfully turning off the lights.

Actually waking up was like suffering from a bad hangover, not that I've ever had one. I opened my eyes and thankfully there was no sun to hurt my head. My throat was parched and I felt so empty and faint and hot and sticky.
I was dying of heat, and quickly stripped from the quilt which I lay inside. I got up trying to navigate the room in the dark, but gave up after I stubbed my toe a couple of times. There was a glinting to the side and I could tell that it was coming from a doorknob. I opened it up not knowing where that would lead and met a cool almost-summer night breeze.
I stepped out onto the patio or balcony or whatever it was and found a rocking chair, which could be mistaken as a rocking couch. The warm winds calmed my swirling head and soothed my throat as if I were drinking warm milk right before bed.
The rocking chair had a shawl over it and I pulled it on top of me as I tried to rock myself back to sleep. I couldn't though. Instead a movie played inside my head; of everything which took place after the encounter of Alex at Swirlies.
I wanted to cry, but couldn't muster up enough energy to do so. My eyelids grew heavy, but not because I was tired, even though I was, but they were being filled with the imaginary tears which would soon fall down my face.
"I was hoping you would be awake," a voice came from the doorway. "How are you feeling, Aurora?"
"Like crap," I barely answered back. I couldn't speak with such a dry mouth.
"I brought you something light to eat hoping you would have waken," it was that familiar voice again, but instead I actually knew who it was.
"Thank you, Manda," I said taking the glass of water gratefully which was in one hand. She sat next to me on the rocking chair as I gulped down the ice cold water. There was a prepared cucumber-melon sandwich in the plate, and again she watched me as I gulped it down.
It was if my body was completely refreshed, but the coldness from the water made me shudder and hold on to the shawl even harder.
We sat in silence, while I realized how patient everybody had been with me, throughout everything. I definitely didn't deserve to have these people in my lives; I owed it to her.
"Amanda, I know you've wanted to talk for such a long time, and I regret pushing you away. I know that if I didn't, none of this would have happened. Not any of this," and again my eyes were welled up ready for the tears to fall.
"Rory, its okay. What happened though, what wasn't I there for?" she asked frantically.
After calming down again I began, and from that same day we all met at Swirlies, what exactly had happened after Julian and I had both left. From there up until when she found me.
I didn't dare look at her face while I told her everything; I was too scared to see her reactions. But she burst out when I had finished.
"Oh my God. Aurora I had no idea, are you okay?" She took me in her arms and held me, while the same imaginary tears turned palpable again and poured down my face.
I sat back up wiping the tears away and realizing how much I had let out to her. It was all a bit strange telling her all of this, since the last time I had done it was to Julian. I sighed; it was as if everything had a way to relate back to him.
"Rory, are you sure he didn't do anything. Oh, you have been so scared. I feel terrible that I wasn't there for you. You know there probably is a way where you can get him fined for sexual hara..." but I cut her off. I didn't want to hear any talk about punishing anybody while I knew that I was the one to be punished; I was the cause of everything.
"Manda, I just don't want to bring it up again. Let's just leave it, I mean he let me go and I'm here alive, not pregnant right?" I tried to make a joke out of it, but apparently she didn't get it.
"I'm just so sorry about everything, especially... Never mind, "she stopped.
"I've thought about everything that happened and what kills me the most is what he told me."
"Who? Julian?"
"No," I shuddered at his name, "Alex."
"Why? Rory, the guy practically raped you."
"But he didn't." I struck back at her, "He didn't, but he told me that I broke his heart. I've never felt so horrible about anything else before; I mean how horrible of a person am I? To do something like that?"
"First of all you're not, Rory. You're just confused and need to think some things over before you do anything. And besides, he deserves whatever crap he gets."
"But Manda, I feel terrible. Not only for breaking his heart, but I feel horrible for being sad about it. I mean like you said, he could have... Well, I just can't believe that I still love him."
There was a noise back in the room, and then the closing of a door.
"Don't worry about it," she said diverting my attention from the noise back to the attention. "It's okay," she whispered and held me again. It was just like her to be this caring and understanding; yet it made me feel even more like an idiot for treating her different.
"Manda, it's driving me crazy knowing that I've lost him. I mean even after all of that, I still care about him, you know. I know its crazy, but the thing is I don't blame him for what he did."
"Rory, don't say that. You don't deserve to be treated horribly at all, no matter who's doing it to you. Just rest, we'll figure out everything tomorrow. The best thing for you to keep you're mind off of everything, is to go to sleep." I nodded agreeing with her.
"Now go to sleep, you have only a couple of hours before you have to get ready again. There's school tomorrow, if you forgot." I nodded again, trying to keep calm and letting her rock us both back to sleep.