I Never Felt Silly

There was nothing else to say.  I could hear Mary's family moving around downstairs.  I've known them all my life. Mary and I have been friends since we were born, literally.  Our parents were friends when we were born, living right here where we are now.  We grew up with our parents borrowing ladders and saws and hung out in each other's backyards or on our porches.   We hung out just to hang out.  Our families were comfortable with each other, even Mary's "dork" brother Mark was comfortable at my house, with or without Mary.  We had a comfortable life.  And sometimes that sucked.

Mary's mom yelled up for Mary to come eat dinner.  "You want to eat with us Nicky?"

"No, we just ate."

"Stay here then, I'll be back."   She went downstairs to eat.  I felt bad now that I had told Mary.  She wanted to protect me, but I made her make promised that prevented that.  I know she worried, I know she wanted to help.  She was seventeen, I made her almost forty.  She had always taken an interest in her mom's career, she even read the books her mom brought home to continuously study.  Mary seemed to understand most of what she read, and that was probably why she worried so much.  I had been doing reading and research of my own and I didn't like what I read.  I didn't want to believe what was written, because it didn't paint a very good picture for me.

I thought about mom and dad at home talking to Doug.  What were they talking about, me?  How's come they couldn't see it!  Oh God!  What if they ever found out?  Would they think I asked for it?  Would they hate me?

He was everywhere in my life.  Everything my family did, he did with us.  He was there.  He stayed at our house sometimes.  Those were the worst.  When he would sneak in to my room while my parents slept.  And they slept because they had no fears.  I always kept my eyes shut, especially at home.  He never said anything, never.  I sat up on Mary's floor and scooted over the floor to the wall and leaned against it.  I pulled my knees up and put my chin on my knees.  I wanted to go home.  But I didn't want to be there.  Maybe I should tell mom and dad.  I know they wouldn't want this to happen to me, they would make it stop.  Tell them?  No, they didn't deserve this.

It seemed like only minutes before Mary came back to the room and sat down.  "I looked, his car is gone."

"Oh...if mom asks, we were working on your research paper for psychology."  She nodded.  I looked at Mary.  I had put such a strain in our friendship.  She picked up her back pack from the floor and pulled out books and notebooks, she was an excellent student.  I did okay, mostly B's, some A's and a C every once in awhile.  I couldn't stay focused as well as Mary.  I could sit and study and work on homework over and over again like she did but it never came easy.  Not like it did for Mary.   She could read something once and have a full fledge discussion and even quote what she had read.

We did end up going over her outline.  She told me about the research her mom had helped her with.  Finally there was no avoiding it, I had to go home.  Mary walked me downstairs and out to the porch, we looked towards my house to make sure the car was still gone.  It was.  Slowly I walked off of Mary's porch.  I was very conscious of every step I took to my house.  Watching my feet place one foot in front of the other.  Examining my shoes and the gray contrast of the street with each footfall.  Nearly mesmerized by it.  I walked up our steps and through the front door.  Mom and dad were watching the news in the family room.  I headed to the kitchen to get a snack.  Mom followed me in.

"Are you okay Nicky?  I kept myself busy making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

"Yeah, why would you ask that?"  Trying to sound like it was a ridiculous question.

"I don't know, I guess I feel like something just isn't quite right."

I turned and smiled at her.  A genuine smile for someone so calm and kind.   "Mom, you are just being silly."   She smiled as I used one of her phrases on her.  I don't know how many times in my life she smiled at me and told me I was "just being silly".   Though I never, ever, felt silly.

"You're sure?" She stood with her hands on back of the chair around the kitchen table we used for nearly all of our family meals.  

"Yes Mom."  I nudged her with my elbow as I slipped past her and headed to my room.  I really did have homework I needed to work on.  Once upstairs I turned on the radio and put my sandwich on my desk.  I  grabbed my backpack and pulled my books out.  I sat at the desk.  The desk sat in front of a big bay windows that looked out onto the backyard.  Being fall, there was a good amount of leaves on the ground.  Green color still lay amongst the orange and yellows.  The leaves looked so cool, fresh, which sounds kind of stupid since they were now dead.  But they were so bright....next thing I knew it was 9:45 and mom was coming in the bedroom.

"What are you doing honey?"

I wasn't really sure, nothing but sitting and thinking.   "My homework".   

"Still?"  You've been up here for almost two hours.  I guess this is part of being a senior."

I couldn't help but smile at her.  "Yeah I guess so."  She sat on my bed, which meant she wanted to talk.  I just twisted in my chair to look at her.  

"Nicky I get the feeling something is wrong.  Are you sure everything is okay?"

God.   How do I tell her?  How do I not tell her?  She was leaning over a little bit, looking at me.  I can't talk to her about this.  It would kill her.

"Yes mom.  I promise.  I guess I'm just a little tired, we've been working pretty hard on the paper and the year book."

"Maybe you're working too hard?"  She looked concerned.  She looked at the books on my desk.    Please don't go there!  "No mom"  I tried to keep the panic out of my voice.  I had to have this to do.  "I really enjoy it, it feels good  to see all of this come together.  It's not a bad tired, it's a good tired.  Like I'm accomplishing something."

She watched my face.  I could feel her eyes scanning me.  I must have smiled at the right time because her face softened.  "As long as you're sure you're okay."

"I am."  She got up and placed her hand on my cheek.  She kissed my other cheek.  "I love you Nicky.  Don't stay up too late."

"I won't."  She closed the door as she left my room.  That just made me feel worse, not only do I lie to her, I convince her to believe it.  All she wants to do is talk to me and all I want to do is not talk to her because I'm afraid she'll figure it out.  This happens more and more, instead of talking with her and dad I go to Mary's or come up here.  Not wanting to talk about "it" and in the process not talking about much at all.

I went through my homework as quickly as I could.  Alternating between Algebra III and looking out the window.  Not even looking at anything.  Just looking. I made myself go to bed around 10:30 after going downstairs to tell mom and dad goodnight.  Back in my room again I didn't feel like sleeping but I laid on my bed.  I started to think about Doug.  Sometimes I wanted to ask him why me, what did I do?  Sometimes I felt sorry for him, and I don't even know why.  I hated him for that.  He never once talked once he started touching me, but before and after he would.  Once on the way back from a movie he had asked me when I would quit school and marry him.  That was just a little while ago, and that scared me.  Did he think this was something other than what it was?  Was he serious?  Or just playing mind games with me.  Him asking me that was almost as repulsive as anything else he had done to me.  I sat up on the bed.  

This Is A Story. The Characters are Fictional. The Facts Are Not.

"Can you help me at my new apartment?"  I kept my back to him as he sat with my parents at the kitchen table. I kept washing the dishes and pretended that I didn't hear him.  Mom and I had a pretty good schedule going with who did dishes and who did dinner.  I liked helping at home, especially since mom went back to work and I reaped some of the rewards of a two income household.  And most times our home was very comfortable and happy.  This was not one of those times.  Sometimes I wondered how mom and dad couldn't perceive my discomfort, my anxiety.  I guess we can all act pretty normal when we want to protect someone, and I sure didn't want my mom and dad to know.

"Nicky, Doug is talking to you."  I could feel her smile at my dad as she said behind me "sometimes she just zones right out".  Dad would be smiling back at her, they always seemed so pleased with one another.  I don't mean smirkey pleased, but quietly, pleasantly pleased with each other, with life, with me.  I didn't ever want to destroy that.  I turned my head and grinned quickly at them.  I barely glanced at Doug.  I had promised myself that I would not put myself in "that" position again.  I had always succumbed to his requests.  Requests usually made in front of mom and dad so as to to seem innocent.

"I'm sorry mom.   What?"  I twisted just enough, keeping my hands in the hot and soapy water, to look at mom.

"Doug was asking if you could go and help set up his new apartment."

I kept my hands in the water, washing an already clean plate.  "I can't mom.  I promised Mary I would help her with her research paper.  I have to work on my own paper and the year book, and the school paper.  We're working  every day on final drafts for the first issue."  Doug never said a word, I knew by now his little tricks.  He would plant the suggestion then let them talk me in to it.  In some pathetically twisted way, this made it even better for him.   "Sorry mom I can't."  I turned back to the dishes and finished them.

"That's okay, I guess being a bachelor means I need to do these things for myself."  I kept my back to him and could feel them looking at me.  Expecting me to say something.  I put the plate in the other side of the sink, rinsed all the dishes there with the hose.  I took my time.  Dried my hands.  I turned to walk out of the kitchen and looked at them as I walked out.

"I guess so."  was all I threw back at them as I escaped through the door.  I couldn't wait to go outside because I didn't want to feel trapped in the house.  I walked out of the house.  I walked down the street until I got to Mary's house and I sat on the steps.  Mary was the only one who knew.  And I had only told her in the past few months.  It was while talking to Mary that I had decided I would not let it happen again.

I'm sure I left mom and dad kind of befuddled.  I never denied Doug anything before.  If he requested some kind of 'help' from me, I did it.  If he wanted to take me out to dinner or a movie, I said okay.  No, I didn't want to, but I felt I had to.  I didn't want to upset mom or dad.  Doug had been a part of their lives for a very long time.  Mostly dad's.  Doug had a rough life growing up, and dad's family felt sorry for him.  He was almost always included in their family plans because his own family didn't include him in anything.  At one point Dough's family situation got worse.  My grandpa had a meeting with Doug's family and somehow Doug ended up living with my dad's family.  So they were kind of raised as brothers.  I actually called him 'uncle' until about two years ago.  But I felt like that made him as good as my real uncles.  When I stopped calling him 'uncle' my parents couldn't understand it.  Doug told them it was no big deal.  

Even though I had promised myself I wouldn't let it happen again, this was the first time I had just not "let" it happen and I was very scared.  My whole insides trembled.  This was not my norm, protecting myself.  I waited a few minutes then got up and knocked on the front door.  Mary came racing to the door, and got there right before her fifteen year old brother.

She opened the door and called him a 'dork'.  He halfheartedly punched her in the shoulder and walked away.  There was a time when they would have pummeled each other, but like their parents said ... "they are growing up".  Probably none too soon.  They could get pretty vicious.  At least in my eyes.  Not having any siblings I didn't completely understand these physical assaults.  Sometimes I envied them.  Sometimes I went home eternally grateful my parents stopped at one, me.

Mary reached out the now open door and grabbed my wrist and pulled me in.  I followed her upstairs to her room.  Once inside she closed, slammed, the door.

"I'm sorry Nicky.  I tried to get out when I saw his car down there but mom wouldn't let me out until I cleaned my room.  I tried to get it clean!"  I looked around and was surprised at the near cleanliness of her room.   "But I couldn't get it done fast enough."

She sat on her bed and I sat on the floor.  "Don't worry Mary, nothing happened."  She eyed me suspiciously.  Even though I had told her, she knew I didn't always tell her everything.  "I swear Mary.".  She relaxed a little.  When I told her she had wanted to tell my parents, then her parents, and it was very difficult for her to not tell her parents.  Her mom is a counselor and she felt her mom could help.  But help meant telling mom and dad.

Mary and I had made this deal.  Whenever she saw his car at our house she would call or show up and see if we couldn't thwart his plans.

"Did he try anything?"  Mary wasn't in to sordid details she was in to protecting me.  It was her nature.

"Yeah he asked if I would go to his new apartment and help him set it up."

"You're kidding!  What a prick!"

"The worst of it?  I would have really helped him clean it and set it up and then...."  We were both very quiet. For the obvious reason, reality, that made us both mad and thoughtful.

Quickly Mary smiled to cover her watery eyes.   "But Nicky!  You did it!"

I knew what she was talking about.  I didn't just 'let it happen'.  I said no.  I left.  I protected myself.  Why didn't I feel better?  I liked that I was here instead of in his car, on the way to hell.  I felt guilty but I couldn't tell Mary that.  I felt nauseous.  I laid back on the floor with my knees in the air, it felt like there was very little air.  Mary laid back on her bed in the same position.  We were very quiet.  I needed quiet.  Mary could tell.  My heart felt like it was on the war path.  My ears were ringing.  My hands were quivery.  I didn't really like talking about this.  Sometimes I was relieved somebody else knew.  Other times I wished I had never said a word.  It meant sharing something.  Something that I didn't want let alone want to share.  Sometimes that just made it twice as bad.  Other times though, like now, the sharing almost seemed to lighten the load.  Mary knew, but she didn't pry.  She didn't push me.  She was quiet when I needed quiet.  Like now.   This was new to her and she wasn't sure how to tread.  It was not new to me and I didn't know how to tread.   The sharing was new.   And the sharing was scary.