Sanctuary

Content warning 2, electric boogaloo: again, I feel like I should put one of these here, it will be the last one for quite a while, I promise. This chapter contains an abused girlfriend recounting her time with her boyfriend and some of his abuses. Similar to last time, this will only go on until you see the line of asterixis (like this ********), after that, you can read as normal.

I kicked a pebble, it clicked and clacked over the cliff wall and down into the ocean. The waters, tinged with the pinks and purples of sunset, crashed on the rocky shore as the sound of waves distracted me from the silence on our little corner of the promenade.

“This thing is tall, huh?” I looked back at Aly, who was staring at the horizon like she had a personal vendetta against it.

“Don’t worry, the others will be back soon, and then I will say what I want to say to everyone, all at once.”

She was sitting on one of the couple stone benches that dotted the path of the promenade. These in particular were a few feet away from the brick road and were positioned over a rocky cliff, allowing any passerby to have a particularly privileged view of the sun setting over the sea.

She was right, I was nervous. I had dealt with dozens and dozens of patients before, in and out of the hospital, all of them dealing with heavy topics themselves, and I had always managed to keep a cool head and to act professionally and with purpose, all in the pursuit of offering them aid. And yet, here I was, having to help a friend of mine deal with a serious situation, and I couldn’t get a hold of myself, was pacing around, and, perhaps worse, she could see right through me.

Thankfully, my anxiety induced internal ramblings were interrupted by the return of our other friends, each holding a bowl of ice cream in either hand.

“Hope you’re hungry! We got the larger ones for everyone.” Barbie handed us each a bowl while trying to temper her enthusiasm for the big dessert due to the mood this situation required, especially when giving Aly hers.

“Ok… looks like it's time to talk now. I should tell you guys what led to what happened at the beach.” Aly had received the ice cream, but hadn't taken a bite, settling for swishing the M&Ms around in the bowl with her spoon.

Each of us took a deep breath, and got ready to listen. Bi rested her back against the railing near the cliff and listened intently as she ate, sparingly. Barbie settled for standing, nervously switching her weight from one foot to the other while she devoured the dessert, as if her discomfort at the situation would vanish alongside it. And I sat alongside Aly on the bench, too worried about her to even pretend to be eating.

“Wait, before you start.” I uttered, temporarily breaking the tense silence. “I want you to know that we got your back. No matter what you tell us, we got you.”

“Yeah, for sure!” Barbie agreed vehemently, with resolve in her eyes.

“He’s right. We do.” Bi’s was serious. Matter of factly. And truthful.

“Thanks owner. Thanks girls.” Aly nodded and smiled at each of us. “Gee, that gave me goosebumps. I better start talking before I lose my nerve completely.”

And so, before any of us could interrupt or offer any more words of encouragement, she told us her story.

“So, Luke and I go way back, as some of you may already know. Our families knew each other, so we met pretty early in our lives, though we only truly became friends in middle school, and by the end of high school, we were already dating.”

She talked in an incessant wave, like she couldn’t stop, or else she would drown in her own words.

“He was sweet back then, you know? We always hung out, we had all these inside jokes, and he was always by my side in the difficult times. When we dated in high school, everyone said we were the dream couple. Beautiful, smart, funny, we really had it all in each other, and it was clear to see how happy we were. It’s weird thinking about that now, it feels like I’m talking about completely different people.

“After we got to college, it all started to change. First of all, we left our parents’s homes to move in together, which gave us more time to… you know.” She did the universal symbol for ‘fucking’. We smiled, smirked or giggled at the unquestionably funny display during a serious conversation, but the reprieve wouldn’t last long. “And we did it. A lot. Which was fun, and sexy, and it felt really good. But he also started acting differently.

“It was subtle at first, or maybe I just didn’t wanna see it back then. He started by wanting to follow me everywhere, which I see now that it can be weird, but we were dating back then. Wanting to be around each other all the time is part of the charm. What a fool I was.

“Then he wanted to restrict the parties and places I could go to. I made excuses for him in my head, ‘I didn’t go to parties to hook up anyways’, and ‘I could use the free time to study for tests’, and ‘I could also use all this free time to address my increasingly bigger pile of requests from my digital artist side gig.’ So I kept excusing it. And he kept being controlling and possessive. I convinced myself he would change for some reason, even though it kept getting worse. Idiot me.”

She stopped her torrent of words for the first time. She was misty eyed, took a deep breath, and I noticed she had a bit of trouble doing it, trying to keep herself from crying. I put my hand on her shoulder and squeezed a little.

“Thanks, owner.” She wiped her incoming tears.

“Anytime. Continue only when you’re ready.”

“Yeah.” Barbie agreed. “Or don’t continue at all if you don’t want to. No pressure here.” She nervously switched from one foot to the other again, completely giving up on even trying to sit.

“No, no, it’s ok. I want to do this.”

Barbie and I nodded, and Aly continued.

“This all became impossible to ignore last year. I couldn’t go out by myself anymore, or with the gang, not even just the girls, Luke had to be present, all of the time. He told me that everything he did was to prevent anything bad from happening to me, that he wanted to always be there to protect me. Or so he said. It bothered me, but I let it go. Again. We were all stressed from the pressures of college life, and from our jobs, so I wanted to convince myself it was just that. That once our tests were over, once we were on vacation he would magically go back to the sweet guy he was a year or so back. God, I took a year of all of this and thought it was normal, so stupid.” Her voice seethed with hate, but I couldn’t tell if it was at Luke or her old self.

All of us made a motion to offer some words of solace, but she gestured for us to stop. She wanted to keep going. And so she did, her anger growing.

“It all came to a head on the night of a friend’s birthday party. Luke couldn’t go because he was studying for an important test, or he had some big presentation at work the next day, it doesn’t really matter. He forbade me from going, and when I tried to push past him through the doorway and leave, he grabbed my arm and shoved me back inside. I tried to argue, to leave again, but he slapped me and locked me up in the bedroom.”

She couldn’t hold back her tears anymore. She was clutching her knees ‘till her knuckles went white, staring daggers at the ground before her. She tried to keep talking, but her sobbing throat wouldn’t let her.

I couldn’t stand seeing her like this. I threw my arm around her shoulders and brought her in for a tight hug. Her warm tears fell down my chest. She clutched my arm with the **** of the rage inside her and did not let go.

The girls all moved in to console Aly, but she stopped them with a look. I couldn’t see what it was from my position, but it was enough to give them pause. Bi nodded, respected her silence, and went back to her position near the edge. Barbie had more trouble restraining herself, she wanted to help her friend after all, but in the end she didn’t take any more steps towards us.

It was an uncomfortable silence. Aly cried what she needed to. The **** of her fingers left red marks in my arms. She eventually began speaking again.

“He apologized to me the next day. He said he was very sorry, that he was really stupid, that he really was a million times sorry, that he would, truly, never do it again.”

She let out a long sigh.

“And the worst part is that I believed him. He was understanding, he listened to me, to all the complaints I made that day. He really promised to never do it again. We kissed, and we had a good day afterwards. I loved him back then, and he truly told me everything I wanted to hear.”

She took another pause to gather her words. And then I interjected, because I couldn’t hold it in anymore.

“Oh, of course he did.” I said, venomously. I couldn’t help myself, this guy was getting more and more hatable by the minute. “Of course a controlling asshole would know everything you wanted to hear, and of course he would say it back to you to keep you under his control.”

“We would see assholes like this at the station from time to time.” Bi complemented my point of view. “Thinking they’re the shit, talking down their girlfriends from reporting on them. You can’t do anything if the women don’t report on their partner’s abuses. We tried getting proof on these pieces of shits whenever we could, sometimes they were even involved in other crimes and we got to be extra hard on them when they were caught. But some of them do get to walk away.”

“Yeah, I remember working on some cases like this.” I reminisced. “Sometimes it’s hard to get the woman to truly accept what they were going through. Sometimes it’s denial, but sometimes it’s some sort of dependence…”

“Thank God I have you guys!” Aly butted in, rather loudly. “I mean… you know, thanks for, well, this.” She gestured to our group together in the promenade. “This is the first time in a long while that I feel that I can breathe!”

I gave her a quick hug and Barbie quickly added:

“Own, buddy! We care about you!” She had finished her ice cream by now and definitely had not known what to do with her hands ever since. She had settled for wriggling them over each other. “So… how does your story go from there to today? I don’t want to be rude, but it has been a downer on the mood.”

Aly smiled through the tears “There’s not much left, though I guess I should finish this soon.” She wiped the ones that were left, took a deep breath as her smile assumed a bitter twist, and readied herself for the final stretch of her story.

“I was relieved back then, after he apologized, I mean. Relieved for about a day or two, but then it became clear he understood he had crossed a line and was completely free to do it again. After the second time he did it, I cried a lot.

“After that, I knew I couldn’t let this go on. Even though I was living with him, I knew that in emergencies, my parents would welcome me back for sure, but I didn’t want to make them go through all this. See their daughter surfer, learn a boy they saw grow up was now a piece of shit. I knew this was an option, but I saw it as a last resort situation.

“I also checked with a couple of close friends to see if I could also live with them for a time, or if they could help me move out while Luke still lived there, which was NOT going to be a pleasant experience. That’s when one of them messaged me about the Certificate of Ownership. She had heard of it from a friend at a party, and it seemed like a pretty good solution at the time. Once I held the Certificate in my hands, it was just a matter of time until I snuck out of Luke’s sight while we were out, and then I went to find you, owner, so I could hopefully move in with you. It honestly felt like a foolproof plan, after all, Luke wouldn’t wanna risk getting in trouble after damaging someone else’s property, right? Turns out I underestimated that asshole.”

Now, with no more stories to tell, with no more pretense to keep talking, Aly’s tears ran in an unabashed stream down her face.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” She kept apologizing, the same words flowing over and over and over out of her with unstoppable ****. She balled one hand into a fist and smashed it against her own leg in time with her words, like hitting herself would somehow put a stop to the unending current of words and tears. The contempted smile she wore after recounting the events had transformed into a poisonous gnarl that now framed her features.

I hugged her to try and make her feel better, but she didn’t react at all. Barbie was paralyzed by her friend’s display, by the sudden outburst, but Bi kneeled in front of Aly and firmly placed a hand on her knee. Aly closed her eyes, as to not have to look at absolutely anyone at this moment, to not look at her friend with such hate in her eyes, but the blonde remained there, resolute. We were all expecting a compassionate face, a soft expression, anything like that, but what we got was a serious, no nonsense face.

“Alyssa. Look at me. What he did is not your fault. You did nothing wrong. He is the only one to blame for what he did. Say this back to me.”

The shock that came from expecting warm comfort and receiving a stern and direct rebuttal of her fears, broke Aly out of her hate spiral. She leaned her whole weight onto me and I wrapped my arms around her so tightly that I wished I could protect her from all the evils of the world with just that hug. But that’s not how this works.

“Do not blame your old self,” Bi continued “do not blame your naivety, or your trusting nature. It was him that brought this upon you. And only him. Nod if you understand.” She squeezed Aly’s knee softly. Aly nodded.

“Awwwwn, you guys!” Barbie rushed over, went around us, and wrapped both Aly and me in a big, soft hug. She rested her head on both of our shoulders and I could feel her crying too, the warm tears rolling down my arm.

*******************

By the time we broke off the hug, Aly was trembling. The surge of emotion had left her body drained and tired, not to mention all the effort that she had exerted earlier that day. Bi had promptly retrieved a towel to help her warm up, and me and Barbie were both providing body heat and tender touches on either side of her.

“So… I feel like today’s happenings have worn Aly out to the bone.” Barbie said as she nuzzled her head into her friend’s neck, “What do you guys say we take her back home, make her feel very welcome, and give her some relaxing times?”

“I would like that a lot.” Aly whispered, very much missing the double entendre the goth had laid into her question.

“As much as I would also love to be a part of those relaxing times, we have an issue at hand here.” I said to the group. Barbie stared daggers at me for seemingly ruining her plans for some fun time, but it had to be said. “Look, I have a single person’s bed, ok? It could hold two people kinda fine, and we could stretch it to hold three when Bi first arrived if we squeezed together, but there’s no way in hell the four of us are going to fit there.”

“You’re right!” Barbie sure turned around fast. “And you guys couldn’t have been too comfortable on that bed either. Not to mention the noise we’re gonna be making, I wouldn’t wanna keep the fine people in your home up all night.” And got her analytical brain firing off on all cylinders pretty quickly as well.

“Uhum… wait, what?” Aly murmured, too focused on the prospect of sleeping in a comfortable bed tonight to pick up the implications on the second half of her friend’s sentence.

“You’re right. And I’m assuming your place is off limits too, Barbie? For pretty much all of the same reasons.” I’ll admit, I was getting swept up on her ideas, her energy was pretty infectious when she got excited. “Your parents are great, but I wouldn’t want to submit them to our antics, unexpectedly, and on a Sunday night.”

“You’re very correct in all of that, yeah. Aly’s place is, ya know.” Barbie made a raspberry sound with her tongue that scared poor Aly awake, even if she had completely lost the thread on this conversation. “Which means, we have only one option available…”

“Wait, why is everyone looking at Bi?” Aly asked, confused, but fully awake.

“Ok, yeah, my place is pretty good for what you have in mind.” Bi answered all of our prayers while leaning against the railing with her arms crossed, like an angel, a cool and suave angel. “I do have a couple’s bed and, truth be told, my roommate moved out a week or so ago, so there wouldn't be anyone to worry about either.”

“Then it is decided!” Barbie exclaimed as she jumped to her feet, startling Aly in the process. “We’re going to Bi’s–”

“Hold your horses, I do have a condition beforehand.”

“Wait, what? Why?!” Barbie was flabbergasted, and, if we’re being honest, a little annoyed that her suggestions of a good time weren’t being immediately acted upon, especially by this group.

“I don’t know if you know this,” Bi continued, “but running at full speed while wearing this kind of bikini isn’t the most pleasant of experiences.” She gestured to her skimpy swimwear and, as usual, the three of us were no longer looking her in the eyes. “So, owner, you own my body, and you can do whatever you want with it, but I ask that next time you want to admire my exquisite form in public, you ask me to wear something a bit more practical? Like a sports bra, or a one piece bathing suit. To be honest, I’m asking this more for your protection, so I can run faster and intercept any threats sooner. If you ask me, it’s beneficial to both sides, really.”

That most unexpected request got a giggle out of Aly. It was nice to see her smile after everything we had gone through today, so it made me smile too.

“Bi, you no longer need my permission to wear a sports bra, you can do that whenever you want, wherever you want, just make sure to show it off to me when you do.”

“Will do, owner.” She winked.

“As for your condition, I accept. Feel free to wear stuff that is also practical when I ask you to wear something sexy. Just make sure to veto it with me first, I gotta see it from every angle before I give it the green light, after all.”

“You got it.” She clicked her tongue as she winked at me once more.

“Ok!” Barbie interrupted us as soon as she could, she put a foot on top of a bench and extended her arm, pointing forward, like she was setting directions at the bow of a ship. “Now that that is settled, we trace a course to our next destination: to Bi’s house we go!”

“I have an apartment.”

“To Bi’s apartment it is!”