Chapter 6: Coming Out of the Dark
A/N: This chapter is brought to you courtesy the powerful need NOT to go too far into the New Year without an update, and Paula's consistent encouragement (she's my one-woman writing support group). She sprinted with me for hours over several NaNo camps and the real deal.
NEXT: Obligatory mea culpas for my prolonged hiatus… I haven't been absent, as you've no doubt noticed from my frequent appearances on FB, posting links to other authors' great stories. I belong to a vast number of groups, so you probably couldn't evade me if you tried.
What I will tell you is that editing can be a bitter bitch, especially when you know the beginning and the end, but haven't invested in the bridge to travel from point A to point B. Thank you all for sticking with me.
I'm sure the previous chapter probably threw some of you for a loop. I am a believer that canon Ana had a repressed violent streak. Are we really supposed to believe she didn't plan to blow Hyde's head off when she thought it was just him? There's just no way she could have believed that a man who attacked and tried to rape her in the break room, disabled Charlie Tango, committed arson and just pulled off an abduction for ransom would have been threatened by her waving a gun in his face. Ana may be sweet, but that doesn't make her a pacifist.
This chapter: New revelations, new problems and a light at the end of the tunnel (no, it's not a freight train).
DISCLAIMER: I don't own Christian Grey, Anastasia Steele or the FSoG franchise. If I did, Ana would've taken a miss on the ransom drop… Hell, the only reason to save Mia in Freed is Rita Ora…
LHPoV (Lawrence Henderson)
Friday, August 27, 2004
Another day, another problem. Being a school counselor is a difficult job; it can be both rewarding and heartbreaking. One of the teachers had called in a report a few days ago because one of my students, Anastasia Steele, had come in bruised and battered. Though she's new, I've seen her around the school quite a bit. She's a very beautiful girl and she keeps to herself. She seems to move with a shield around herself or something. No-one approaches this girl. It's uncanny.
Her first day of our summer program, she was sent to me for orientation. The administrators tend to send me students new to the district. Then again, she's pretty fucking smart. A lot of shit goes on behind her eyes. I felt like I was being ruthlessly assessed for weaknesses from our very first meeting. Her scan was quick,yet thorough. I gave her the student packet and offered to have another student show her around, but she declined and asked if I had a school map handy. When I informed her it was in her packet, she fiddled around a little and pulled it out, looking at both sides carefully, returning it to the packet, then pulling out her schedule to glance at it intently. I asked her if she had any more questions, but she gave me a close-lipped smile and thanked me for my assistance, leaving my office almost as quietly as she had come in.
Most kids stomp around like a herd of wild elephants, so it was somewhat bizarre to see a child so self-contained. She was very respectful, calling me 'Sir' or 'Mr. Henderson' though I'd told her to call me Larry like the other students do. It seemed a foreign concept to her to call an adult by his or her first name.
I expected her to get lost or need help, but she seemed to have easily found her classes and navigated the halls like a pro. I would never have known she was new except for the fact that she seemed to have no friends and I handed her the orientation packet as a Sophomore. She seemed very bright and well-spoken; I was disgusted when I was forced to put her in all those remedial classes because we still hadn't received records from her previous school. She tried to put a good face on it, but I noticed the quick moue of distaste and a lowly muttered 'Carla' filled with disgust. She was working as a tutor for some other remedial students by the end of the week to earn a few extra privileges.
Our summer schedule is usually reserved for students who would otherwise have to attend an alternative school due to mandatory retention, truancy, pregnancy, or some other form of delinquency, so seeing a nice girl like Anastasia attending threw me for a loop until I perused her file. Mrs Morton's divorce decree required Anastasia to take part in year-round continuing education at an accredited school.
Understandably, I expected that to mean she'd probably need to be remediated, but I was soon disabused of that notion as all the teachers were impressed with her high level of intelligence. She mainly used their classes as a study hall. She also spent an inordinate amount of time in the computer lab, but I OK'd it because it was clear that she wasn't learning anything in her other classes and could be trusted around the equipment unsupervised. She had three study halls and often skipped lunch. I assumed she was taking some online or distance courses because she had a huge stack of unfamiliar textbooks that were sent to her in care of the school soon after she arrived. While every teacher remarked that she was an excellent, respectful and responsible young lady and a credit to the school, we couldn't help but notice that her clothes looked dated and worn, though painstakingly clean and modest, wearing long-sleeved shirts and jeans in the height of our blazing Texas summer. She was a conundrum.
When reports of possible abuse came across my desk, I was quite concerned. Going over her file only compounded the mystery. Anastasia's mother was listed as Carla Mae Morton, while the father was listed as Raymond Steele, but he wasn't Annie's biological father, nor was he her adoptive father. He was only a former stepparent. Her current stepfather was Stephen A. Morton who had recently married her mother and moved to Texas from Washington. We try not to make assumptions, but when a troubled child has a new (and subsequent) stepparent, it sends up red flags. Annie had two. I began to wonder if Annie's only problem was bruising. She was a great-looking girl.
I conferred with a couple of the other counselors and decided to call her mother. Mrs Morton was very brusque and short with me, telling me that Annie had fallen down a steep flight of stairs and that she was very clumsy. I knew I would get no help there; the bitch was obviously lying. Our school building is one of the tallest buildings in the area and even we didn't have a flight of stairs steep enough to bruise the entire side of someone's face like that, unless the person's hands were restrained when they fell. Most of the houses around here are basement-free, ranch-styles. Did they toss her off the fucking roof?
Every word out of her mouth besides her name was a lie, and she careful not to mention the husband. Besides, Annie was very physically fit. She excelled in gym and she was really quite graceful. I'd almost think we were referring to two different people. I called Annie in to follow-up, but she was stoic, saying that everything was fine. It was frustrating how eager these kids were to come in my office, sit down and lie straight to my face. Even OK is better than fine. Fine has a plethora of meanings, almost none of them good. When she left, I made a few notations in her file. I wouldn't be closing it just yet.
I'll call my friend Derek at the Child Welfare and let him know I might be sending an extra special case his way. If it's proven that she's been abused at home, she'll need to be taken out of that house. Some kids, though, don't do very well in foster care. It's in their eyes. A kid like Annie would do a runner rather than face a bad placement. She's extraordinarily pretty and highly intelligent, but the former would definitely work against her in foster care because the best foster placements are usually full up, and I don't want to imagine what would happen if one of the 'dads' propositions her. It happens. I won't contact the Mortons again; it could backfire on Annie if they're the type to abuse her further for making a complaint.
But as I begin to pack away my things for the day, Annie's face comes to my mind again. If shit hits the fan, she might run. Might. She could also decide to stand her ground, exposing herself to further violence. Heaven help the idiot that stands in her way if she feels she's got nothing to lose. Fuck! My gut begins to churn and as I gulp down an antacid, I decide to catch Derek on my cell. It's time for an impromptu home visit. Last time I failed to listen to my gut, a boy died.
APoV
Carla's face was priceless when I laid out her choices. I wasn't going to force her to choose between Stephen and me; that train had already left the station. No, I had aimed to twist the knife a little harder. Her decision was between riding and dying with him and self-preservation. She'd already gambled away every iota of goodwill I had towards her. Besides, I wouldn't tolerate her anywhere near me and last time I checked, jail cells weren't co-ed. It shouldn't have caused such anguish unless there was actually love in her shriveled heart for that child-molesting, pedophile rapist.
The longer she takes to make a decision, the less convinced I am to let her get away with her part of this conspiracy. She only has one chip to cash in and she's holding onto it like a woman possessed. If she had any sense at all, she'd let me go before I released hell on her. She was crying and snotting up a lung on the floor while I'd barely broken a sweat. I was tired of holding back, trying not to injure her. She better be glad I only gave her a sample of what Dad had taught me. She'd have been a greasy shit stain on the floor by the time I got through otherwise. I think Chris might be a bad influence on me, but he's right. One should use the proper words to describe things.
What the heck did she expect? I realized Carla didn't love me before I could walk (which is why I toddled over to Ray first). She's never been nurturing or concerned about my wellbeing. I can't even remember the last time she hugged me, took care of me when I was sick or even congratulated me on a good report card. If I didn't know better, I'd think she was using, but I've cleaned this shotgun shack from top to bottom almost daily and haven't found so much as a baggy filled with illicit substances or a prescription bottle. The only difference I can see is that she hasn't been operating under is Ray's watchful eye. I could only hope he's sneaking her drugs some other way. If she's allowed all this crap to happen to me stone sober, I can never forgive her.
Luckily, one of my favorite teachers back home volunteered to mentor me long distance when I explained that I had to go. Her lips tightened and she told me to e-mail her, and if I was willing to work very hard, she'd continue to be my advisor no matter what. After seeing my class schedule, I accepted her offer posthaste. No need to throw away my entire exit strategy just because Carla needed her notch scratched.
Thousands of images will haunt me for the rest of my life; proof of atrocities so dire that they had to be seen to be believed. A lot of the stuff I had to look up. Between forays to the Mayo Clinic and child abuse support group websites, I've been studying my butt off. One of the most disturbing patterns that cropped up during my research was that a lot of the kids on the discussion boards had been molested by more than one person; it was like Fate was determined to keep these poor kids down. Out of the frying pan and into the fire. Their parents just didn't get it. Even after being told and given proof, they continued to let more evil bastards into their children's lives; it was like they just said, "Oops! Back to the drawing board" and just reeled in substitute monsters to terrorize their already traumatized children. Could I ever break the abusive cycle if I stayed with Carla?
I keep working towards my dreams, but survival had to come first. Continue following leads because Three is too darn comfortable for this to be his first time. I'm quite determined to be his last victim. The one that got away. I admit that I've been a little depressed since we left Montesano, but that's only because I was shocked at how quickly my family was dismantled, ragtag as is was. The shocks didn't stop there as I discovered that Carla, not content with the affair that broke up our family, was also sleeping with two other men, both of whom were married and living in our small community. Ray and I attended church with one of the couples. Just another by-product of Carla's filthy one-woman reality show. I shook my head to clear the memories. Carla was still there, at my feet, alternately claiming that none of this BS was her fault, and slinging threats.
"It wasn't a mistake, Carla. You would've had to be thick as a brick sandwich not to notice he was giving you the hardest poundings after he and or you took turns taking potshots at me. No-one makes the same mistake twice. The second time, it's not a mistake. It's a choice and you chose him."
CPoV
Montesano, WA
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
Chris,
So much has happened since the last time I saw you. Morton has finally been tried for one of his most heinous assaults, Diane Morgan (the girl Three impregnated with twins). Diana and the Banners, her foster, now adoptive, parents came all the way out to Washington to meet me in person after the verdict was read. We spent Thanksgiving together. What did you do for Thanksgiving? Who did you do for Thanksgiving?
Dad and I were very pleased with his sentence. He got 20 years in prison without parole. And in the family court case, he was assessed back child support. When all the cases come to their satisfactory conclusion, he'll most likely die bankrupt in prison, with hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages, pain and suffering and retroactive child support.
Even with all the names I'd found, more came forward after the first trial. I can't believe the dumbass actually chose a bench trial. Did he believe he'd get more leniency by wasting fewer taxpayer dollars? He was probably either too cheap or too broke to obtain his own council because he went with a public defender. Wonder how Carla feels about that. Even he knew he was unlikely to find a panel loaded with enough degenerate bastards to hang a jury, declare a mistrial or find him not guilty. Instead, he threw himself on the mercy of the Court (who I later found out has over a dozen grandchildren, almost half of them girls). Think that's enough of a judicial bias to call a mistrial? His Honor probably wanted to throw the library of Congress at him and bury his castrated body under the jail.
Sometimes I find myself feeling a little like Jane Bennet from Pride and Prejudice, not wanting to admit there's so much evil in the world. Despite all you know of me, you'd probably be shocked to realize that the old me would've tried to forget about all of this and stuff it in the deepest, darkest recesses of my mind, to be thought of no more. But corresponding with you and reaching out to so many of Morton's victims has forever slammed the door on that option. Still, I wonder if I'd never known of the others, if I would've just escaped his brutality and kept my head down, pretending it never happened? Guess I'll have to be satisfied knowing that the world who has people like Carla and Three in it, also has people like you and Ray.
Remember when I said I wanted to write a book? That seems to be a great start, if only to purge this episode in my life from my mind. As it is, I've already filled three journals with my experience in Texas along with some of the other girls' tragic confessions. Now I'm thinking of going into some kind of law. Not to worry, no ambulance chasers here. But not a regular attorney. Maybe something like Constitutional or family law so that I can help draft legislation that doesn't bar people like me from being helped, or even believed, just because of our 'tender' years. Just think, if anyone in power had listened and done something for the first couple girls he raped, there wouldn't be so many victims now! That's what really pisses me off.
Tell me the truth. You did something to help Diane get out of her mother's house and find a good family, didn't you? And neither she nor her adoptive parents are rolling in greenbacks, yet they could afford to visit me clear across the country? Just know that one of my eyebrows has reached a comical height. It's OK if you don't admit it, but just know, I think you're awesome. And thanks so much from Diane and me.
Still Your VERY Best Friend,
Annie Steele
P.S. The twins didn't come with her. She told me they had been placed in a good home. Her mother was standing in the way of Diane putting them up for adoption because she didn't want the government to decrease her public assistance! Though they were a part of her and she loved them, their presence was a cruel reminder of her stolen innocence. Who does that to a child? Don't answer that.
I silently refolded the letter and placed it in my box. She'd sent me so many letters, that the box soon filled up. I'd bound stacks of them and stored them in a file drawer, but my favorites, I read over and over. We still e-mail or call each other frequently, but there's something powerful about words hand-scribed on paper. It had been almost a year since Annie escaped Texas, but the effects of all she had done were all around. So many victims in addition to those that Ana found came forward, I doubt he will ever see the outside of a prison in his lifetime. Or his own asshole when the other convicts figure out what he's in for… He'll give a whole new meaning to coming like a freight train. He's been on the news almost nonstop since the first trial. He won't stay incognito for long. Good riddance to bad rubbish. Fucker was worse than Ella's pimp.
What kind of man terrorizes kids? Is there some type of school that produces crops of evil deviants and teaches them how to get away with their crimes? Fucker had preyed on little girls since high school. There were still girls, and women, coming out of the woodwork to press charges against him. Once Annie submitted in the dossier she'd compiled, he was toast. Even she didn't realize how hard she'd fucked him over. Her info was just the tip of the shitty iceberg. But once the police had his scent…
I'm jealous of Annie. She was able to kick her mother's ass and fuck over her abuser, while just a couple years ago, I was still using surrogates for mine. Subs would never satisfy my urge to punish Ella for everything she allowed to happen to me. I was punishing the wrong people. Ella had been dead most of my life. Fuck, I must have been very young when Elena got her talons into me, because she actually made me believe that hurting another person would help me get over my past. Instead, she was converting me into someone as evil as the pimp who'd hurt me (or the fucker who'd tried to molest Ana), using rough sex as a temporary fix. The lifestyle was dominating me, and I had come close to becoming as big of an addict of BDSM as Ella was of crack. Instead of getting over my past, the twisted bitch had me reliving it as a different character.
While our letters have been coming fast and furious, Annie still hasn't answered any of my questions about Elena and our past relationship. She's given any mention of my time as Elena's sub a wide berth. Is she waiting to meet in person to discuss it? In every missive, she always closes by calling me her best friend, but I have to wonder if that still holds true. She deserves the best life, and if warding away the evil I've exposed her to is what she needs, I wouldn't hold it against her if she cut me loose, though it would hurt like hell.
I've even sent her letters and postcards when I'm on business trips in foreign countries. She loves the different locales I've corresponded from. So far, London was a winner. It gives me hope that we're still good, but I won't feel settled until we hash it all out face to face. Tenterhooks has nothing on this feeling of imminent peril I been experiencing for the last few weeks, but I have to rip off the bandage soon.
A few months later, when our schedules aligned again, I took some personal days and made my way to Montesano again, ostensibly for Annie's birthday. I knew this moment would come; that she'd want her answers. Who knew that time would come in her backyard, almost as soon as I'd turned up outside her door? How could I explain that when I see her, I see two people: My best friend little Miss Annie from Montesano and Anastasia Grey who lives in my dreams?
Dealing with a young woman with he mind of a prodigy and body of a pocket-size Venus is a terrifying thing. Annie pulls no punches and takes no prisoners. I sometimes wonder what she was like before Carla showed her true colors, callously ripping her away from Ray, the only real parent she's ever known, and dragging her through months of hell. I think I would've liked that Annie, but this one does just fine. I was able to tell her things about my life that I never imagined I could share with another living soul. In a way, we had both been abused and neglected by people who were supposed to love and nurture us. But I'd never have met this Annie had Ella or Carla been the type of mother we deserved.
She showed absolutely no surprise when I shared the full details about my 'affair' with Elena. She remarked that it was to be expected considering that Grace had presented me to her on a silver platter, exposing all my deepest, most private secrets to a woman who was a virtual stranger. It didn't matter to Annie that my mother has known her for over twenty years. All that she cared about was the fact that Grace had handed her best friend the blueprint and and the keys to my psyche, and Elena used them both to their fullest advantage. She was almost equally pissed at Grace for exposing me to her friend. She could've knocked me over with a feather when she said that Elena having sex with me when I was underage wasn't the worst of what she'd done. I would've expected her to be up in arms about that considering her recent predicament.
"She's still in your lives, Chris, grinning in your mother's face and laughing at her behind her hand. That's plain disrespectful. What's worse is that because she's helped you so much, Grace is letting her hang around a bunch of other kids who might have it as bad, if not worse, than you! She doesn't even need to troll for victims. Your mom's delivering them a la carte!"
Balking at her suggestion, I immediately sought to defend her. "It wasn't like that! She helped me. You don't know what you're talking about!" I shouted. She didn't even flinch. She looked me dead in the eye and said something I'd never forget.
"How exactly did she do anything for you except lighten a load off your balls? 'Cause from where I sit, she did fuck all for you. Sure you stopped fighting! Most guys with a girlfriend who puts out would rather make love not war. All she did was give you an incentive. You behave as if the carrot-and-stick approach is new! Well, in your case she delivered carrot and cane. It's barely a hair older than prostitution! Can you hug your mother? A full-on hug? No! Played any touch football lately? Have sex with a girl without tying her up first? No! No-one can touch anything besides your dick, yet you treat this bitch troll like she's the second coming of the Messiah!" she sneered at me, throwing her hands down in disgust.
"I hug you," I whispered.
"That's because I'm safe," she rebutted. "You know I'm not gonna hurt you. Besides, I know where to touch you."
How ironic. The one person who could tear my heart apart in a split-second thinks she's safe?
"Look. I don't want to argue with you," she whispered, resigned, that familiar little line forming between her eyebrows. "I just think that if what she did was so good for you, it wouldn't have to be such a dirty secret. All she did was slap a vagina-shaped Band-Aid over your problems, plunge you into a world of secrets and lies, while letting your issues fester like gangrene underneath. You're probably far from the first and most likely nowhere close to the last. That's how these creepers operate. You know that! It was a set-up from the start. What kind of a grown-ass woman slaps a boy in the face and then kisses him? Bet she didn't even bat an eyelash afterwards. Stephen didn't hesitate to grope me at any given opportunity. No hesitation means habit. I'm sure getting caught by her husband just accelerated her timetable. She could no longer sub for you with her jaw and ribs all busted, but she started providing you with sexbots, each one nuttier than the one before. Really, since she helped you so darn much," she shot slyly, "why aren't you trading war stories with her right now instead of me here in the boonies on my dad's porch swing?"
The summer night was balmy and sweet, rocking back and forth, only the light from the stars providing illumination. We hadn't really ever discussed the bomb I'd dropped on her, soon after we'd resumed swapping paper letters back and forth. I guess she was giving the truth time to settle, or maybe she was deciding whether or not to jettison another fucked up person out of her life. Still, she kept answering my letters, though she never responded to the pointed questions I'd asked about her feelings regarding the relationship I'd had and still have with Elena. Sure, I had begun slowly excising her from my life like the canker she'd become, but she wasn't going quietly. Like a cancer, she had metastasized to multiple aspects of my life that there was no getting rid of her without painfully invasive surgery. She was calling and messaging to no avail. I'd started treating her like I did Grace and an iron wall of security had slid into place for her, as well. She had gone from having her calls answered by the third ring to being lucky if someone in the janitor's office picked up. She could only get to me if I wanted her to, and her all-season pass had been revoked. I wasn't even accepting visits from Grace lest she bring the harpy with her.
I was of two minds about Elena, and I'd been forced to face facts; whatever Elena had done for me was in the past. And if I wanted Anastasia in my future, I couldn't allow Elena to hang around like a bad smell. What would we talk about? We used the vast majority of our business meetings to discuss our subs, and there was no fucking way I was ever going to talk about Ana with her. First of all, if Ana ever found out, she'd be wearing my balls for earrings, and that would be the closest my dick would ever get to her. Secondly, I have a feeling Ana would kick both our asses.
"Look. I don't care what you do with the bitch troll. Just keep her the hell away from me. I mean it. I have a whole can of whoop to spray all over her decrepit ass, and I won't be stopping for any safe words," Ana states emphatically, an I'm sure somewhere in Seattle a frisson of alarm slithers down Elena's spine. I've seen how Ana plays. She may look like sugar and spice, but she's got an edgy way about her, like she'd slice a fucker in a blink.
Anastasia was all over my ass about Elena, especially after I made the mistake of starting an argument in support of her, someone I already had severe misgivings about. No matter how you looked at it, our beginning was traumatic, and despite whatever amount of good I'd ascribed to her, there was no disagreeing that what she had done was illegal and immoral, with not even a shade of gray. Elena took me, an already troubled kid, and gave me yet another secret to keep from my parents. I could never say that what she had done was completely altruistic. Yes, I'd become a billionaire, but that wasn't the initial intent of her slapping me, kissing me, or taking me into her dungeon.
Sure, she may have seen some potential in me, but there was no way she could have ever predicted the meteoric success of GEH in such a short amount of time. So when she says that she made me, that was an unequivocal falsehood. If anything, it was a combination of Nature and nurture. She may have kept me on a pretty straight path but the determination to never live in squalor, hunger or cold lit the biggest fire under my ass.
Ana swears that beating an already abused kid was a terrible idea, and if I needed my ass whooped that bad, my parents should've dispensed them. And pointing me toward little petite brown-haired girls was downright despicable. In Ana's mind, Elena had escalated my prior abuse into a cyclical situation. A further bit of insanity to go along with the rest. Like a playdate. And here I was defending her!
Though her face was turned away, I could still hear Annie sobbing. It was brave of her call me on my bullshit instead of just taking it and pretending everything was alright like everyone else seemed to. The only one who came close to calling me out in my day-to-day life was Ros and that's because honesty was necessary in our line of work. Deals could be made or lost on the strength of our word and integrity.
"Annie, I'm sorry," I whispered lowly. I was sure she couldn't hear me, but of course she had.
"Yes, you're sorry," she muttered contemptuously. "You're a sorry son of a bitch for defending that she-devil to me of all people. Don't worry. I'm just gonna chalk your word vomit up to Stockholm Syndrome."
Damn, she has some balls on her to put me in my place without flinching. We're rocking back and forth on the swing when out of nowhere her slight form bumps into my side trying to push me over. I shoved her back and soon we were shoving each other back and forth, her small, flip-flop clad feet digging into the wooden planks of the porch, struggling to gain purchase to knock me on my ass. Once again friends.
"Chris," she inquires, her head leaning on my shoulder. Sounding slightly morose, she continues, "I don't mind being your safe harbor, but you gotta want to to be saved. Don't waste my time if you're just gonna turn around and run back into her arms."
"I'm never going back to Elena," I vow. I feel something, almost like the heavy weight of my shackles shifting, mocking me with my impotence. Elena's going nowhere unless I confess to my parents what she did…what we did. So, even as I pull away, I'm still haunted by my past. She's not letting go.
"Then why the hell is she still around?" she challenges, breaking into my reverie.
And there it was.