Snow falls gently to the ground around me, and I can hear carolers singing “Joy to the World” down the street. I begin to shiver even though it isn’t cold. I knew I shouldn’t have come back for the holidays. It brought back too many awful memories. Memories of then. Memories of him.
For years he had completely ignored me, and I will admit that I did everything I could to get his attention. I wore hip-hugging jeans and low cut shirts, and bikini’s that showed as much skin as my mother would allow me to show. I wanted him to notice me, just like every other girl in high school back then. He was the star of the football team, and I knew that he could date any girl he wanted. I wanted him to date me.
My crush started when I was fourteen. He spent nearly every day at my house that summer, in the pool with Tim, or throwing a football around. I always inserted myself into their activities. I thought I was being subtle, using the excuse that I wanted to spend more time with Tim, but when I look back now, I see how obvious I was.
Both he and Tim knew that I liked him, and Tim teased me endlessly about it. But as the summer drew to a close, and Tim realized that my crush hadn’t died down, he warned me, “Be careful with him, Nikki. I don’t want you to get hurt.”
I thought it was ridiculous that Tim was warning me away from his best friend, and I thought that he was just jealous that he might want to spend more time with me than he did with Tim. So I waved the warning off and kept doing everything I could to get his attention.
I don’t think I realized how much he had started to notice me. He started to spend more time with me. Alone. He even made a few advances, but I was so naive that I didn’t really notice. I didn’t notice until he took things too far.
I was over at his place to watch movies. His parents and his sister, Danika, weren’t home. I think they had gone Christmas shopping. I was so surprised that he had asked me to come over and watch movies, and not Tim. I do think Tim was working that night, but I ignored that little detail. I was just so excited that he wanted to watch movies with me, a mere freshman.
I remember him kissing me. I was ecstatic, but hardly knew what to do with myself. I had never had a boyfriend, but I had seen movies, so I copied what I had seen. Apparently that was what he was looking for, because he didn’t stop.
I never wanted him to do what he did. Never. But he did, and he wouldn’t stop, even when I begged him. It was Christmas holidays, and he was graduating that year. He truly was the King of the school, and he made sure everyone knew it. He was arrogant, and, although I didn’t know it before, aggressive. After that night, I continuously heard Tim’s voice in my head, warning me against him. Be careful...I don’t want you to get hurt.
Even now, five years later I can’t look at him: I’m afraid that he’ll do it again. And he knows how terrified I am. I think he thinks it’s funny. He’ll follow me into an empty room and give me that look. The one that lets me know that he knows he can take whatever he wants, when he wants, and if he wanted to, he’d do it again. I always leave quickly.
That’s why I never come home. I always ask my family to visit me at school. I haven’t been home for Christmas once since I graduated from High School. My family doesn’t know what happened that night. My parents think what Tim thinks: that he shot me down, and I just haven’t forgiven him. I wish he had shot me down. Then I could forgive him.