An author's note: This story was planned as erotic horror but since the first chapter didn't to show much of that, I decided to publish it on IR. This chapter isn't pure horror but the plan is to make it more so with each chapter as it suits the story, and in general the story will get a bit heavier. There's rape mentions and discussions on this chapter and the ones that will be published after this, but there is no detailed rape on the story nor is it itself about rape.
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2. Try To Focus On Reality
Sofia's POV
A nightmare woke me up today, although telling myself 'this can't be real' had never felt honest enough to wake me up before. Even with the light from my phone I was afraid when I found myself in bed, because I knew the rest of the apartment was still dark. But there was no one with me. During the last year I lived with my parents, I would keep the bedroom door locked at night, just for the feeling of safety, because I might as well. But in this so-called 'tiny apartment', the door to the bedroom is just a ladder to the bed. No way to be locked.
You'd think (understandably) that if you were raped, your most common nightmares would be about being raped, but mine is one where I am publicly executed. I wake up as soon as a man puts a cloth bag over my head. It's pretty strange. One would usually wake up when they know for sure they will die, right before the impact. But if you can't see the moment of impact, I guess your brain might as well assume you are dead.
In the morning I felt like another person, which is generally a good thing. But once I went down the ladder I saw a spot on the floor below the front door that was white, a paper. It was blank on the upper side, but as I got closer it became obvious there was something on the other side. I turned it around to reveal a drawing that was erased and drawn over itself several times, at different parts, judging by their blurriness. But it was simple stick figures, so a few seconds were enough to notice it was supposed to depict a person raping another. It wasn't sex. The one on top had a twisted smile and angry eyebrows drawn on, and the one on the bottom was crying.
I left it on the floor and went up to the bed to take my phone, thinking I would want to keep a picture of it before anything else. Just to later figure out what to do. As I went down the ladder I could see already from my peripheral vision that there was nothing on the floor beside the front door. I still approached it as if it would reappear in the meantime. It seemed like it wouldn't make sense, but it still could. If I reached enough for an explanation I could reason that someone could take it from under the door. That would mean, of course, that someone had put it there and stood there waiting for me to pick it up and put it down again. What I knew made more sense though, was that I had simply imagined it. I did get to touch it and notice its details, but any of the senses can be deceitful, especially when one has just woken up. There was nothing else on the apartment (closer to a room) that was different, so I left it at that.
My hope of seeing that Asian man again without having to message him and risking looking desperate got higher when I'd seen a few nights back that my schedule would be different this semester and some days I'd have class in the morning. The first class was alright. So alright that it's pointless to say anything else. The real issue is that when I was in public I felt the fight between the two sides of me. One wanted to blurt out that I was raped and who did it, and the other had to be keeping an eye on that side. In any case, I sometimes got the sensation 一however ridiculous一 that people could tell somehow, just by looking at me.
By the end of both my classes for the day, I still wanted to find excuses not to leave campus and especially not to go back to my apartment. Then I found the best possible one. The Japanese-American man who had done the best job at seducing me a few days before. I had made that profile to see if I was really ready to have sex again, and went to his place because I liked him. I recognized him among a few trees even from afar. Even though I did walk towards him, I knew that it was likely he might feel awkward about seeing me again.
"Hey" again I went for the most casual word I could "Akio."
"Hi, how's it going?" he asked. His deep voice reminded me immediately of how subtle his accent was, compared to mine.
I've developed a soft crush on him since we slept together, just by thinking of the way he kissed. It was passionate and horny 一bordering on desperate, if I wanted to be rude一 but I liked that he was so shameless about sex
"I'm alright" I said. At that moment he looked at me and got a hand on the tree beside him.
"Don't you want to sit down?" he asked.
Instead of replying, I did just that, sit down on the grass. Then he sat down beside me.
"I like your style," he said, apparently referring to the cameo on my necklace judging by the direction of his gaze "A lot of girls seem to go for that Victorian look."
"Yeah, these last years I've seen more with lace and pintucks on clothes, long skirts, high necklines, stuff like that."
"You know, Victorian influence changed Japan a lot." he said "Some historians believe they're indirectly the reason why Japanese porn is censored today."
"Oh," I said "So, there was porn in Japan then? As paintings?"
"Yes, some woodblock prints were erotic. You might have actually seen one of the most... infamous ones. It's known in English as 'Dream of the Fisherman's Wife'."
"Doesn't sound familiar." I said "What is it?"
He got closer but spoke on the same level.
"Well, it shows an octopus performing oral sex on a woman, while another octopus is sucking her mouth."
"Oh my God" I said "Oh wait, I think I've seen that. And I guess Europeans thought it was weird?"
"Well it is pretty weird. But it seems the Japanese of those times. Uh, the Victorian times, not of that painting, I mean. It seems they didn't want to be seen as uncivilized by Europeans. I could be wrong, this isn't my area of expertise."
I was silent because there was nothing I could add to it. He spoke again.
"So what class did you just have?"
"Aesthetics." I said.
"So it's about art?" he asked.
"Not yet. He was talking about the word 'aesthetic' itself and what it used to mean and such." I said. I wasn't sure whether I would bore him with more details, so I left it at that.
"What are you thinking of working as?" he asked when I didn't continue talking.
"A philosopher" I wanted the joke to seem serious for a moment, but I felt myself blushing before I had even finished talking.
He laughed, as I expected, but didn't follow it with a 'No, really.'
"I want to do research, write, maybe take part in a few textbooks here and there."
"What are you most interested in?" I asked, after noticing that most of the questions had been from him "Modern history, or...?"
"Not really." he said "I like Ancient and Medieval, well, feudal, the most. Of East Asian countries specifically."
His voice was not quite a whisper but a lower tone.
"You want to come to my place after class?"
"Well, I'm actually done with my classes for today." I said "But yes, I do want to."
"Oh. I still have one left. Why don't we see each other here when it's over?" he asked
"Alright, yes." I said "I'll be waiting for you."
