Page 287 of As the Rain Falls
“Feeling like I’m carrying a lie alone.”
A single tear drops onto the bedsheets.
Others follow.
Beckett pulls back a little to get a better look, and the sadness in his gaze brings me the weirdest feeling of deja vu, like we’ve done this before, when I know for certain we haven’t.
“If it’s too hard.” He swallows hard. “You don’t have to explain what André did.”
André?
He thinks it was André.
Oh, God. I really hate this.
I hate being this broken girl with broken dreams of belonging to a different body.
“It wasn’t André, Beckett. My…” I trail off, looking for the words. My mind is chaos leading to calmness, like I’m opening the windows after a big storm. “It was Nathaniel.”
Beckett goes completely still.
Horror shows across his face, but I reach for him, needing him close. It’s not a cry for help; it’s barely even a whisper.
But the truth is still just as honest when it comes out as whispering, isn’t it? Because a whisper is still strong if spoken by someone who means every word they say. It’s valuable too.
Ithasto be, or else, what do I haveleft?
“He raped me.”
The silence that follows is deafening.
I wait, the seconds stretching out. And then, just when I’m about to pull away, scared and rejected, I hear a broken sound from Beckett’s throat. I immediately close my eyes shut, not wanting to see what happens next.
“When? What…When?”
It’s what makes me break. The fact that he has questions to ask. How often did I silently pray for questions? For someone to ask me why I’ve dreaded family picture day since that night?
Why did they always make me pose right next to him?
Why did all these boys think I was so willing, never questioning the ease with which I said yes for too long, even if my body felt like it was shutting down?
I went to my mother at thirteen, asking for help, and I felt so desperate. To every plea, her answer was no. How long have I been waiting for a yes?
“You weren’t there,” I explain before he can convince himself he could have saved me. “Four years ago, I was alone at the house, and he came into my room.”
His finger brushes against my skin, tracing the numbers in silence. One first, then three.
Thirteen?
I nod, a sob sound being ripped from me.
Beckett sits up beside me instantly, pulling me into his arms. He holds me like an anchor, like he never wants to let me go, and I cling to him because I can. We mold into each other, and I feel the tension in his grips, the way he trembles against my chest, and all the ways in which he has to hold back from falling apart.
“Oh my God!” Beckett’s voice breaks, and he sounds utterly horrified. He pulls away suddenly, uncertainty and regret flashing across, tainting his beautiful features. “I didn’t… I never asked you if I could touch you. All this time… I’msosorry.”
“Beckett.” I smile, endeared. “Please touch me.”
“Can I?” He is crying. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him cry this hard since the funeral. “Can I touch you?”
