What Belle Saw

“Oh, no…” I paced around the room. “Oh fuck… God damn it, why did I give her my phone?” I chided myself.

I’d opened all the recent apps, and she’d seen quite a lot in only a few seconds. First, my camera roll. It looks like she took a goofy selfie, and when she went to the photos to see how it looked, she found all the BDSM stuff I’d saved the night before. It was pretty standard, honestly. Nothing too crazy, except for one photo, which I had to assume she’d seen. This one was a little iffy, even for me. CNC is a touchy subject, and sometimes the line between the C and the **** is blurry. Which, to be fair, is how a lot of people like it. But there was something about this particular photo of a woman, bound, crying, in the middle of being violated…I’ll just say that if she was acting, she was a very good actress.

Then, there was my internet browser. I opened it up. “‘Fuck Me Like You Hate Me’: Stupid Free Use Hole Slapped In Airtight Gangbang”. The thumbnail was a brunette with big tits, arms tied behind her back, makeup running down her face.

Well, that’s nice. I’m not sure if she saw that, though. Anything could probably make Belle scream. But I knew it had to be the stuff from the camera roll. That’s where she would’ve gone after taking the selfie. And boy, was there a lot in that camera roll. The most recent stuff was easily the worst of it.

This wasn’t something you fix by talking about it. This is something you bury and never, ever acknowledge even once. How would that go? “Hello, Belle. I need to sit down and talk to you about something. Yes, I’m referring to the hardcore pornography that seems to have depicted a ****. That was all just for fun between consenting adults. What’s that? How do I know? Well, I just do. Because I don’t want to think about the alternative. Anyway, please oh please do not tell your parents about any of this or twist the story to make me look like a bigger creep than I already am. Alrighty then, have a nice day reading the Bible in your homeschool classes!”

Hell, she probably thought I was a **** based on the BDSM photos. Wait--the BDSM photos…

I opened my camera roll again. “No, no, no…” I’d completely forgotten that I was in a bunch of these photos. I opened one up. I’d taken these the night before last with a girl I’d been seeing for a while. She liked to be tied and gagged with duct tape, fucked in the ass while she begged for mercy. I’d filmed the whole thing and taken some nice screenshots afterwards. Belle had seen those.

God, what must she think? I got worried for a moment. Just how sheltered was she, anyway? Surely, she knew this was…a thing, right? She wouldn’t jump to the worst conclusion. Right? I exhaled. Relax, I thought — I’d done nothing wrong. Worst case scenario, she reports me to the authorities because she doesn’t know this is something consenting adults sometimes do. But really, though. What were the odds of that? I don’t care how helicopter-y your parents are. Kids get into trouble. Early on, they start to veer off the freeway that their parents want them to drive down. She must know something about kinky sex stuff. I took a deep breath.

All I could do was wait. Hopefully, nothing at all happens. I hope to fucking God that she doesn’t say anything to her parents. Actually, that was the worst case scenario. There’s no way the story would stop with them. They’d spread the hell out of it, no doubt. Fuck!

I buried my head in my hands. “God, if you can hear me…please do not let Belle tell her psycho parents. Anything but that, I’m begging you.”

My phone buzzed. New text.

“This is Belle.” I picked up my phone, eyes wide. Buzz.

“I’m not going to tell anyone what happened tonight.”

I stared at the phone, stunned. Did a fucking monkey’s paw curl or something? Technically, this is what I wanted, but that text…did not look good on my screen. It was so easy to misinterpret. So little information, just waiting for someone to read too much into it. My heart beat faster. God damn it, this was a disaster. I closed my eyes and tried not to hurl my phone on the ground.

“Fucking bitch!” I muttered. First of all, I had no idea if what she said was true. She could change her mind tomorrow morning. But far, far more importantly: Don’t fucking send a text like that! Holy shit! For the love of all things holy, do not ever send me a text that just says “I’m not going to tell anyone what happened tonight.” That could mean anything! That is some wildly incriminating-sounding shit. Especially if you are Belle and are fucking 17! Or whatever age she is! And when your parents monitor the shit out of your phone!

Jesus Christ, what a mess. What a fucking mess.

“That message could…it could ruin…” I muttered. I tried not to think about it. I resisted sending back “I don’t know what you mean.” No, just don’t say anything.

Of course, I hadn’t done anything wrong. I was just worried about the optics of it. Maybe I was being neurotic, but you can see how it could’ve gone all wrong, right? Belle’s parents spy on her, see the message, and demand to know what this cryptic text means. She tells them that I have “****” images on my phone, including ones that I’m in. “Oh my, darling! Why did he expose you to these images?” What, are they gonna believe she psychically guessed my passcode? They’ll see me as doing it on purpose, obviously. Grooming. Then her parents will tell mine, and there’s no way it all ends there. Minimum, a few dozen people will hear something. Something something inappropriate sexual something with Belle — yes, sweet, innocent little Belle. What a fucking pervert. I hope they chops his balls off.

“Well, we had a nice run, America,” I said to no one. “But I like my balls. Next stop, Mexico.”

I waited for a few extremely tense days, thinking that any moment I’d see the flash of police lights, my life imploding because of a high school girl and her deranged parents. But it never happened. I never replied to Belle, and she didn’t reach out again.

Not until a year later.