I've received some negative feedback about allowing Jenny to be raped in the last chapter. I can't really apologize. That was the direction the story took in my mind. I didn't want to cheapen the story with Jenny's rape, but to introduce some aspects of real life, to make the characters more real and believable.
What happened to Jenny is something that really happens to young women, and often those young women are afraid to come forward, as Jenny was. I don't want to make trivial the emotions a woman feels after such a brutal experience.
Yes, it adds some grit to the story and takes away the perfect, love-story quality it seemed to have at first. My hope is that the new elements I've introduced will help me continue the story into many subsequent chapters.
Just a heads up... This chapter has a happy ending. ;)
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In the shower when she got home, Jenny washed away the mascara, blood and dirt.
Joey stood outside the door. He didn't feel equipped to deal with this. He wasn't sure what had even happened, but he had an idea. When the water shut off, he knocked on the door softly. "Jen?"
Jenny wasn't ready to see him or anybody. In the shower she'd thought about it, and she knew she SHOULD tell, but she didn't know if she had that kind of courage. She was sad, heart-broken. She wanted Joey to hold her, but she didn't want him to know the shame she felt. Still, she couldn't stay in the bathroom all night. She took some ibuprofen from the medicine cabinet and swallowed it with a sip of water, wrapped herself securely in a blue towel and opened the bathroom door.
Joey had been pacing as he waited on her, but when the door opened a crack, he stopped and waited, eager to see her face. When her face appeared as she opened the door fully, anger flooded him so quickly he saw stars. His vision seemed to go blurry around the edges. "Who did this to you?" The bruises on her face and neck were fresh, and he meant to seek retribution immediately.
Before she could answer, he was reaching inside his bedroom door to find his keys on hook beside it.
"Joey, no..." Jenny almost whined. "Just... don't go anywhere, okay? I need you with me." It was true, but her primary thought was to keep him from killing someone.
Joey didn't know what to do! He wrapped an arm around her and guided her into his bedroom. "Jenny... I need you to tell me what happened, okay?"
He wasn't pushy or demanding, but she knew he'd keep asking until she eventually told him. So she let it all out, and the tears came as she told him about what she'd lost. She shook as she cried, and he held her.
He didn't know how to react to this; he wasn't prepared to ever have to deal with anything like this. He hated Rick, HATED him. He wanted him in jail, but he'd have to convince Jenny to tell someone what had happened, and he was pretty sure she'd just washed away the evidence. If he'd known maybe he could have convinced her to call the police before she had. He couldn't imagine how she must feel. He held her, rocked her back and forth.
He didn't want to push too hard, but he had to try. "Jenny, can we tell someone about this? Can I help you get dressed and we call someone to at least give a report and try to do something about it? He can't just DO this to you and live his life like it never happened while you're left to deal with it."
Jenny was almost despondent in her response. "What does it matter, Joey? It's done. No matter what I do, I can't undo it." But she knew... she knew she could try to keep it from happening again with someone else. Who knew if he'd done it before to someone before her?
Joey understood the weight of her words. "It" in Jenny's mind was more than the act. It was the culmination of all it meant. She thought Rick had taken from her something that she wanted to share with someone else. He hoped she wanted to share it with him. "I... he didn't take THAT. That is something you give away. If you didn't consent, he didn't take it. Not in my mind. He HURT you, and he deserves to be punished. Sex shouldn't hurt in that way. What he did wasn't sex, Jenny. It was violent and evil and wrong."
Jenny wanted to believe him, to let his words sink in and help her healing start, but he didn't even know ... he couldn't understand what she felt. "Joe... You don't understand. You don't know how this FEELS." She screamed the last word through gritted teeth and hugged herself.
"No, I don't. I can't pretend to. I have no idea, Jenny. But I'm here. I'll walk through this with you, and I care, even if I can't understand."
She let him hold her a little longer, and then she decided it was time to get up and get about doing something. She looked down at Joe, who still sat on the bed, with a serious expression. "I'm strong. I can handle this, especially if you help me. Let me get dressed, and we'll go down to the police station. I don't want Mom and Dad to know yet. Will you drive?"
"Of course I'll drive!" Now Joey was fulfilling every bit of his promise to his brother. He was someone she could trust, someone she could talk to. Their relationship had changed so quickly -- from niece and uncle, to lovers and now... they wouldn't ever be the same again. He ached deep in the pit of his stomach when he recalled the story she'd told him. This wasn't their typical bedtime story. It was one he'd rather had never happened so that she'd had no story to tell.
.......
The rest of the night wasn't without pain and difficulty. Jenny had to recount her story again for two different officers. They had to go to the hospital, and he held her hand through the entire process as she was swabbed and examined.
When they returned home, it was nearly 6AM. Her parents would be up getting ready soon. They weren't working, but they had plans to go to some kind of gardening expo a few towns away. He let Jenny change into one of his t-shirts and tucked her into his bed. Then he made his way down the hall to his brother's and sister-in-law's room. He couldn't be the one to tell them, not unless she asked him to, but he had to do something to protect her until she was ready.
Joey knocked on the door and heard some shuffling within. There was a groan, a moan, and then finally someone opened the door. It was his sister-in-law. "Jenny..." he began. "She got home late, and she had an awful headache. I was still up, and I got her some medicine. I think it's one of her migraines. She's in my bed because the curtains are darker. I'm trying to keep all the light out."
Jane nodded. "I think I've got some stronger medicine in my bathroom if you think it would help. Hydrocodone? She's been prescribed it before for migraines." Jane went to retrieve it, and he waited. He figured it couldn't hurt. She did have a headache, after all, and it might help her get some rest.
.......
