Page 4 of Total Obsession

She told me she would never do that.

* * *

I laid awake again.

"You're weird! You need to stay away from me!"

I kept hearing her words repeat over and over again in my head. They weren't right. I didn't understand why she said them. Why couldn't we be friends anymore? We'd been friends all this time. Why all of the sudden had she said we couldn't be friends?

Then the conversation from yesterday started to filter into my head. She knew what my dad did to me. Why would she let them tease me about it? Why would she laugh and agree with it?

I thought back further. I thought back to the day before yesterday. What she had said to me in the gazebo. Inourgazebo. She told me that she would never let anyone hurt me.

But, she hurt me.

She hurt me.

This was what hurting felt like.

I wasn't crying tonight. I was just hurting.

The doorknob of my room started to jiggle. I always locked my door at night. I didn't sleep well because of my father. As I got older, his attacks got less and less frequent, until I thought that they might finally stop. Even still, it always happened at night. Before I was old enough to know how to lock my door. Now, I always locked my door.

The handle jiggled again, and I pulled the covers up higher on me, thinking they might somehow save me from whatever monster was out to get me now.

I heard a growl from my father on the other side of the door, and then I heard the lock pop. He'd picked it. He stumbled through the doorway, and I could smell the alcohol on him from where I was under the covers.

"Aksel," he muttered, making his way over to my bed. He wrenched the covers off of me. I was shivering now.

"Why do you have so many clothes on?" he asked.

Because of him.

He started to sloppily grab at me. I was in sleep pants and a tee shirt. He was trying to loop his hand into my waistband. I kicked and tried to fend him off, but my father was a big guy. He was tall and overweight and it was hard to get him to move even as I kicked him with both feet.

"Stop fighting me, boy," he said, slapping me across the face. It stung and my hands came up to cup my face. I looked up to see the little Polaroid Zoey had given me yesterday propped up on my desk, the one of her kissing the very same cheek that was burning now.

He hurt me.

She said she'd never let anyone hurt me.

I'm hurting again.

"Go away," I said to my father.

He moved in and hit me harder. "You know what this is, Aksel. Just stay still for a moment and it will all be over."

I wished Zoey were there. I needed help. I needed someone to step in. I needed someone to make this stop.

Then I realize that no one was coming.

It was just me.

She said she'd never let anyone hurt me.

My father punched me in the face to try and knock me out. I fell down off the bed from the force, and I heard him unloosen his belt buckle before I saw him try and push down his pants.

I was on the floor.

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