She shook her head at the memory. “When I looked over and saw him looking so completely disappointed by my refusal, I just...shut out that voice in my head yelling no and simply yanked up my top and bra without thinking. After his friends finished hooting and hollering, he spent the entire rest of the night treating me like a princess. And I remember distinctly feeling like what I’d done had been totally worth it.”
“From then, his requests started to get more intense. In the beginning, I swear, I said no. A lot. But he’d changed his tactic from the flashing incident, going with a more sweet and cajoling approach that somehow had me starting to say no less and less each time.”
Blinking slowly, she met Connor’s gaze head-on, “I’m not saying this was all his fault, because it wasn’t. Yes, I felt pressured by the thought of losing him but part of me felt okay going with it as long as it was under the pretense of ‘him making me do it.’ That became the easy button for me to push to do every depraved thing he wanted me to do.”
“The first time he had me do something for a bigger crowd was at his friend’s house with a bunch of his teammates after they’d just won a big game. All the other guys’ girlfriends were there too. And after a few beers, most of the couples had started making out and stuff. No big deal. I was doing the same with my boyfriend. But somewhere along the line, it was like I blinked and a full-blown game of musical chairs with sex partners was suddenly happening all around me. Then out of the blue, I was picked up off the couch and led down on to my knees by these two massive linebackers.”
“That’s when he came to my rescue. My boyfriend. He pulled me off to the side and told me how he didn’t want to share me with any of his friends. I was so damn thankful for that, for him. So when he went on to explain that I could I just give him a blowjob in front of everyone to get them off my back, I did it. Without any hesitation.”
She swallowed the acrid taste in her mouth at the vivid memory. “Can you believe I’d felt special that night? To be the one girl whose guy wouldn’t share her.” She laughed bitterly at herself. “Of course, it was just all part of his long con.”
“After that night, for a while, everything was great. Fairytale-like. I was so smitten with him that a part of me did this whole ‘told-you-it-wasn’t-a-big-deal’ thing. Which is probably why I was so blindsided by the party at his friend’s house a few weeks later—basically a huge orgy.”
Abby watched the muscle tick in Connor’s cheek and did her best to tamp down her mortification. “He said the same thing as last time, that all I’d have to do was ‘perform,’ no big deal. But then before I knew what was happening, all my clothes were dragged off by what felt like a hundred hands and he’d kissed me up onto the center of the dining table with everyone surrounding it, guys and girls. And video cameras.”
She didn’t realize she was shaking until she felt Connor squeeze her hand. “I still remember the big crystal chandelier above that dining table. Weird, huh? There I was naked in front of dozens of kids, half of whom didn’t even go to my school, and all I could do was stare at that chandelier. Half hoping it would fall from the ceiling so I could stop. Get up and go home. But it didn’t fall. It kept right on hanging there, twinkling at me…”
“...While I masturbated for them all.”
Something dark and vicious crossed Connor’s face.
Along with pity.
Stifling, drowning shame almost prevented her from going on. But she continued, wanting, needing him to understand. “I can still hear them yelling, egging me on. But I just couldn’t...finish. So they started demanding I do other things instead with the other girls and guys there. I was drunk, and a little high off pot, but I still knew for certain that I didn’t want to. I’d had more than enough.”
Though she’d replayed that night hundreds of times in her head, the next part still slammed her like a wrecking ball each time. “When I started crying and grabbing my clothes to leave, my boyfriend just wrapped his arms around me and began ‘comforting’ me. Telling me how he’d never been more turned on in his life watching me up there. He laid it on thick, telling me how unbelievably sexy I was, how special I was to him. And then he busted out the big guns. He looked me square in the eye and told me he loved me. Loved me. That’s all it took. Three little words and I was crawling back on that table, holding his proud gaze while I headed over to the small group of kids who’d taken my place in the spotlight. All the while, the cheering from around the table got so loud…”
She shut her eyes. “It was so loud I didn’t hear my parents come barging into the room.”
Knife-sharp humiliation and remorse sliced through her fresh like it did every time she saw their devastated faces in her mind.
Connor’s face right now was just as cutting.
“Apparently, some girl from the party had called my house, told my parents where I was and that I was in trouble. I never found out who though. I never got to thank her for putting a halt to something I would’ve regretted more than having my folks see me like that—as the free entertainment at a high school sex party.”
She trudged through the rest, didn’t bother glossing over how stupid she’d really been back then. “My parents didn’t say a word. They just threw a jacket on me and rushed me out to their car so fast, I almost didn’t see my boyfriend in all the chaos. But he made sure I did. He planted himself next to the entrance and blew me a kiss goodbye...before turning to a drunk girl beside him and pulling off her top. Her skirt came off next. And then he started feeling her up right there in front of me. Showing me how quickly he could replace me. Watching and smirking at me the whole time. And I actually cried over that, over him the entire ride home.”
“I would’ve killed him,” Connor snarled then, enraged. “Still could if you give me his name. That guy was a sick, twisted psycho who took advantage of you, Abby. He broke you, practically brainwashed you. For chrissakes, you were what, only seventeen?”
“Sixteen. And yeah, that’s what my folks kept telling me.” Hot tears welled in her eyes. “To this day, I still can’t believe I put them through all that.” Her voice broke. “After how hard they worked to give me a great childhood, that’s how I repaid them. I didn’t have a sad home life or tragic backstory; my own selfish idiocy was the sole reason I’d turned into a teenage slut.”
“Don’t ever call yourself that!”
She jumped, never having heard such a hard edge to his voice before. “But I was. For him, at least. It’s okay. I don’t blame myself or anything self-destructive like that. I certainly don’t absolve him or think of him as anything less than a sociopathic piece of scum who deserves every karmic torture coming his way in hell. But I don’t ignore or make excuses for my part in it either. I’m not proud of who I was then and my not sweeping it under a rug is what has made me who I am today. Like you said, I could’ve said no at any point. It was on me that I didn’t.”
When he started to object, she shook her head firmly. “No. Don’t try to convince me otherwise. I was a victim, yes, but a participant as well. My body, my decisions. And as you can see,” she waved her hands over herself. “I turned out just fine. From porn star to professor.”
“That’s not funny,” he bit out.
“Yeah, my mom doesn’t like that joke either. Whenever I make a crack like that she always scolds me and tells me I should let go of the past. Let go more, period. She seems to think I overcorrected a bit with my life, but I don’t. I like who I am now. If guys call me a goodie-goodie stuck-up tease, so be it. I know who I am.”
“And who is that, Abby?” asked Connor softly.
“I’m the nice girl by choice—my wish, my reality.”