This is really happening...
I tried to scream, but all that came out was a weak groan. A wave of nausea washed over me. I turned my head to the side, and I threw up into the sand, choking on the chunks of fried chicken as they came back up.
Had it been only an hour since I was with Jake? Was it possible?
Because now I was in hell. With the devil himself.
Owen didn’t seem to notice the vomit, and if he did, he didn’t seem to care. With one motion, he pulled down his jeans and freed himself of his boxers. He forced one hand under my back, yanking me closer to him, and with the other hand he thrust himself inside me. I could feel the grit of the sand from the beach tearing at my insides like shards of glass. The burning was like nothing I’d ever experienced from external touch. This wasn’t like my skin was being ignited.
I cried out.
This time, I was the flame. The pain was blinding. All I saw was white.
I couldn’t make myself believe what was happening. As a product of the most fucked up home in some deviant God’s creation, I was being faced with the one thing I’d managed to avoid. This can’t be happening. I kept telling myself over and over again. This can’t be happening.
Only, it was happening. There was nothing I could do to stop it.
The pain was worse than when my mother carved me up like a fucking Thanksgiving turkey. It was worse than being stabbed.
Worse than being beaten.
Worse than anything.
I cried out again and again as he entered me. Every sound from my mouth was answered with a blow from his closed fist. “Don’t fucking cry, you bitch,” he spat, thrusting harder, punishing me. “I know you like it.”
He closed his eyes and moaned. When he opened his mouth, I could see strands of saliva connecting his top and bottom teeth. I tried to scream again, I wanted someone to hear me, but this time, no words came out. “I heard you moan like the whore you are when you fucked Jake tonight. I know this shit turns on girls like you. So, moan, you fucking bitch!” With a twist of his hips, he sliced into me like a serrated knife. The more I tried to resist, the more forceful his thrusts became.
I could no longer feel my limbs.
Owen suddenly pulled out of me, scraping my insides like sandpaper, flipping me over onto my stomach like I was a rag doll. With one hand on the back of my head, he shoved my face into the wet sand. “That’s what you fucking get for trying to scream.” His next thrust sent painful shockwaves through my body, I’m pretty sure I lost consciousness for a minute or two.
I was being torn apart from the inside.
I didn’t know how much more I could take. My body was shutting down. I wasn’t gasping for breath anymore. Only small pulls of air kept my heart pulsing slowly, deep within my chest.
“It fucking hurts, doesn’t it?” he hissed through gritted teeth. “Bet Jake didn’t fuck you in the ass!” Taking fistfuls of hair, he yanked and pulled for leverage until he yanked hard enough to rip out patches of hair and scalp. It made the same sound as a stubborn zipper. “You see now, don’t you? A part of you is mine now.” He almost giggled when he whispered those words. I could smell him even through the sand. I could smell and taste my own blood and vomit. I could actually feel my insides coming apart as every grain of sand ground against them.
My mind wandered to the news reels I’ve seen where people describe the aftermath of a tornado: It was a surprise… sounded like a death train… left everything broken and twisted in it’s wake… almost killed…scared to death…lost everything…would never be the same…
I’m not going to survive this.
I opened my mouth to scream into the ground. Instead, I welcomed wet sand into my lungs, gagging until I dry heaved and forced even more of the beach into my throat.
I’m going to die.
I was never going to see Jake again. Just when I thought I finally had something I could trust, something real, it was all being taken from me.
By force.
How stupid I was to think I could ever be happy. I was being punished for wanting more than what I had been dealt. I was going to die here. I lifted my head from the sand in one last attempt to stay alive.
Owen flipped me back over and pressed his hands into my chest forcefully to steady himself. I felt the crack of my ribs and heard bones snap. He kept talking, but now, his voice was just a muffled sound in the distance.
Smaller background noises seemed amplified. A nearby cricket chirping. The rustle of palm fronds in the wind. The splash of mullet jumping into the canal.
Help, please someone... help.
Instead of help, I received only more blunt force, more blinding agony across my battered face.
And then, I died.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN