Pep Talk

My second humiliation at the hands of Nikki had broken me. Yet the nature of my second beating left thoughts swirling through my mind. This wasn’t a teenage disagreement anymore. Nikki was enjoying this. She seemed to love strip wrestling. Did it turn me on? Was she just a sadist? I don’t know.

But did I love strip wrestling? Hell no, I couldn’t stand being dominated, beaten down, and stripped against my will. Yet I had to admit during those few glimmers of hope when I had Nikki at my mercy there was no better feeling.

Somehow I had to get the better of Nikki. Nikki had made it clear this was going to continue for as long as she wanted it to. I couldn’t live like that. What if she started exposing me in more and more public places?

I sat in her room with Laura, one of my fellow goth girls and my best friend. I had told her and only her what had happened between me and Nikki at the pond.

Laura was a goth girl who dressed in all black with a pair of snake bite piercings. She looked like a vampire, but she knew how to fight. Laura came from a tough family.

“Why don’t you let me deal with her?” Laura implored. “I can do it for you. She’s not so tough.”

I smiled at her. “Maybe, but I don’t want to bring you into this. What about her friends?”

Laura frowned, her black lipstick coming together in a thin line. “I don’t care.”

“But I do. It’s not right. I have to do this, Laura. I have to show her that I can beat her.”

Laura nodded. “But what if it...happens again?”

I bit my lip. That was my fear. What if it did happen again? I wasn’t sure I could stand losing a third time. I knew I had to get comfortable with what happened, and potentially losing some of my clothes again. If I could break that mental block I had a chance. Nikki didn’t seem to mind, why should I? Easier said than done though.

“Hannah, let’s just gang up on her.”

“No,” I snapped. “I have to do this. I’m going to do this. But she knows how to fight and I...”

Laura grabbed my hands and gave them a squeeze. “Let me teach you how to fight and fight dirty. I know all the tricks. She’s a girl same age as us, she’s not unbeatable.”

I gulped and looked into her eyes. I saw the same fierceness I saw in Nikki’s. I nodded and agreed.

“One thing,” I started, not willing to share Nikki’s apparent turn on for strip wrestling. “I want you to be there, but I don’t want you to help me, no matter what happens. Promise me. No matter what I say.”

Laura looked unsure about that request but agreed.

I needed the moral support. Knowing that Laura was there in the shadows would give me the confidence I needed. Even if it meant getting another beating, this time in front of my best friend, I had to do this to prove to myself that I could.

This time I wouldn’t back down from Nikki.