Be honest, and share about Greg?
I—I guess. I just don’t want you to share it with anybody, okay? Because it’s really private and hard for me to talk about. So pinky swear, okay? Okay. Thank you.
I should probably start at the beginning, right? That’s how all stories start. Uh… so, we met in school. It’s kind of cliche, actually. I had a few close friends, but it wasn’t like I was special or anything. I sort of closed myself off at that point because of what happened with my dad. Reese was there, and so was Dylan and Lacey, but other than that it was really just me. He was sort of like, the almighty, everybody-and-their-grandma’s friend kind of guy. You know those kind of guys? The kind of guys who know they can get whoever they want, whenever they want. That was sort of what got me about him. Especially when he chose me, out of every girl he could be with. He chose me.
Moving on.
We’d shared looks in the hallway before, you know, just passing by each other. I used to think he was looking at my friends and not me, but he was looking at me. When we actually met, I couldn’t even talk. I was just heading down to the office to get something for my teacher when he knocked right into me. He was a lot bigger than me, obviously, so I hit the ground really hard. To say he had a charming smile would be an understatement. It was a movie star smile. He had movie star hair, and a movie star body, too. Or at least I thought he did. To me, he was the epitome of perfection. Boy was I wrong.
That’s kind of what started our relationship. He was eighteen at the time, and for some reason, older guys dating younger girls was sort of the thing in my school. A lot of seniors were dating freshman. Looking back on it now, it’s actually really creepy. But anyway, he was really sweet to me. He did a lot of things that you would expect sweet boyfriends to do. He bought me flowers, and brought me fresh fruit. He called me every night and we had little dinner dates, you know, puppy love kind of stuff. Looking back, there’s some things I notice now that I didn’t notice when it was happening. He got really possessive over me, for one. He didn’t like me hanging out with certain people, or talking to certain guys, which was rare enough to begin with. He used to drag me by the wrist if I didn’t walk fast enough, or he’d yell at me on the phone and hang up before I got the chance to say I was sorry. I guess I just thought those were normal relationship things, you know? Like, every couple had their ups and downs, and those were ours.
But it got worse.
I remember one week specifically, he didn’t talk to me at all. He caught me joking around with Dylan about how we were going to marry each other and have little fabulous Dylan and Jayme babies, which just pissed him off to the max. I thought we were for sure over, until he finally called and apologized for ignoring me. As naive as I was, I invited him over for a movie night to make up for lost time. It was supposed to be really fun. We were supposed to be all alone, just enjoying each other’s company with a good movie, you know? And we did, for a little while, until one part in the movie came on.
The sex scene started playing. I guess he thought it was hot, because he turned to me and asked if I wanted to make out. I thought making out was supposed to be five minutes of kissing, but soon, five minutes turned into ten minutes, then kissing turned into grabbing, grabbing turned into hitting, hitting turned into dragging, and dragging turned into… well, into forcing.Â
He forced me, to have sex with him. Actually, scratch that. It wasn’t sex. There was nothing sexy about it. It was rape. He raped me. I’m gonna skip through this part, because it’s not something you want to hear about, and it’s definitely not something I feel like talking about.
It was the worst night of my entire life. He left right after, like he’d done what he planned on doing. He left me on the bed, bruised and beaten. I had to walk myself to the bathroom, get in the shower, and wash the blood away from my thighs.Â
It was traumatizing. Clearly, because now I have PTSD from it.
After that, he scared me into staying with him. He started getting really violent. If I didn’t play the TV low enough, if I didn’t come over to his house at the exact time I was supposed to, if I… if I didn’t make his sandwich the right way… he’d hit me. With the sandwich thing, he took the knife I was using and held it to my hip so I would listen to him. And you know, when someone has a knife to you, no matter where it is on your body, you should probably listen to them.Â
He used to threaten my mom. He threatened to do what my dad did to her, but to the tenth degree. The weird thing though, was that he never publicized the abuse. He made it a point to make it look like we were a happy-go-lucky couple. For example, one night, he sat me down, tied my hands behind my back, and forced me to listen to instructions on how to act happy. I’d forgotten how to be happy by this point, so I had to learn to act it. Another night, he made me cover up my bruises in front of him, so he knew I was doing it right. If I didn’t, he’d just make more, which made them harder to cover up, which again, meant more bruises. It was a horrible cycle.
I didn't know how to get out of it. So, I tried starving myself. I thought, if I didn't look the way he wanted me to look, that he'd finally be done with me. That he'd let me go once and for all, and never look my way again. Eventually, I'd buried myself so deep, that I thought smoking would help me lose even more weight. By this time, I was dangerously underweight, and people were definitely noticing. I spent time in the hospital for it, which was safe for me, because he rarely came to visit. But after I got out, it continued.Â
Eventually, my mom knew she had to get me out of there. This was around the same time she found out I had powers, and the same time she found out about Dalgaard, so before Greg could even blink, my mom packed me up and shipped me off. He wasn’t happy about the break up, as you can probably guess, but if I hadn’t done it, I’d probably be dead right now.
So yeah… that’s my story.
Sorry for the visuals.Â
