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It happened just after Rose jumped out of the lifeboat back onto the ship. While I was still focused on the TV screen, Anthony shifted closer to me, his hands going to my waist. I was innocent enough to think he was trying to tickle me. As I laughed and tried to scoot away, Anthony pushed me down, until he was on top of me.
When he pushed up my shirt, I honestly believed it was an accident. I yelped and tried to tug it down—but Anthony put one hand over my mouth as he tugged the T-shirt up even higher, exposing my breasts completely. “Shhhh,” he said against my cheek. “You don’t want them to catch us, do you?”
Catch us. Like any of this was my idea. But he’d made me afraid. If Mom or Chloe walked in, they would think I wanted to be with Anthony. They’d see me partly naked with a boy, and that meant I’d done something wrong. No, I didn’t want them to catch us. So I didn’t say anything, even when Anthony took his hand away from my mouth and slid it into my leggings.
“You want to know how to get all the boys to like you?” he murmured as he tugged my leggings down. I’d never been naked in front of a boy before, not even close. “I’m gonna show you. ”
He peeled my leggings off one leg; they dangled around my other ankle as Anthony pried my thighs apart. Only then did my stunned mind realize what was happening, and it seemed like it was too late to say anything. Why did I think that? How could I believe that it was ever too late to scream, or hit him, or just say no?
I don’t know. But I believed it.
So I lay there, paralyzed with fear and confusion, as he got between my knees. He gave me his best good-ol’-Southern-boy smile. “Good girl,” he said, and then he thrust into me.
It hurt. Not as badly as some of the girls at school had said it would, but still. My hands balled into fists at my side, hard enough that the next morning the indentations of my fingernails lingered as red marks on my palms. I started to cry. I thought when Anthony heard me he would stop. He didn’t.
At the time it seemed to last forever—Anthony on top of me, panting, heavy. He was a twenty-year-old guy; probably it didn’t take three minutes. But I felt like it was never, ever going to end. As I stared up at the living room ceiling, the fan dissolved behind a blur of tears. When the tears trickled down from the corners of my eyes, my vision would sharpen for a moment, then go liquid again.
Then Anthony started going slower, making these sounds that almost scared me—and he pulled out. I’d never seen an erect penis before, not even when he put it in me. When he came on my belly—the weird jerk and pulse of his cock, the thick white stuff spattering all over my skin—I jumped. It seemed like the grossest, most horrible thing anybody could ever do.
“There. ” Anthony smiled. “See, when the guy comes on you, you can’t get pregnant. Bet you’re glad I did that, huh?”
I nodded. Like I was glad about any of this. But all I could think about was the horror of getting pregnant. Then everybody would know, and I didn’t want anybody to know.
Anthony grabbed a paper towel left over from our earlier snacking and wiped off my belly, like it was soda he’d spilled on the coffee table. Then he sat up and tucked himself in, straightened his shirt. I pulled my tee back down; it was long enough to cover my hips. As much as I wanted my underwear and leggings back on, I couldn’t see how to put them on without flashing him, and I thought if that happened he might start again.
“You’re a pretty, pretty girl, Vivienne. And now you know it. ” Anthony grinned, like we’d had a wonderful time. I guess he did. “This is our little secret, right?”
Numbly, I nodded.
He winked. “Don’t worry. I won’t tell Chloe. Wouldn’t want to start a catfight. ”
Then he went back to watching the last bit of Titanic. I sat there, huddled on the far end of the sofa, leggings around my ankle, all the way through the end credits. When Anthony got up to go to bed, he ruffled my hair, like I was an adorable little scamp. He leaned close, and I winced at the heat of his breath against my face as he whispered, again, “Good girl. ”
It was maybe another hour before I dared to go up to my bedroom. The whole time I tiptoed past the guest room where Anthony was sleeping, I dreaded him walking out, or pulling me inside. I locked my bedroom door and sat on top of my covers, shaking. My mind kept replaying the last thing Anthony had said to me, over and over, until they seemed like the only words I knew.
Good girl.
I wish I could say that by then, at least, the worst was over. But it wasn’t.
The worst came in the morning.