Chapter 261 : Broken promises mixed with lies, but he can’t know the secrets I hide

“Esmee…. Emsee are you there?”

“Yes, yes or course I am sorry,” I had no idea how long I had gone away for inside my head but it was long enough for me to have been ignoring Emmet and now I had no idea what he was saying. My flash backs where rare now and had got increasingly less over the years of my adult life and normally I could keep them at bay with the help of an elastic band and a strong will, but some memories still hurt too much; still lurked under bolts and chains at the back of my head waiting to be discovered. It had been years of my life since I had felt such pain, since I had been… abused. The trouble was I could still not see it properly, could not quite use the word abuse and link it to myself. My mother and father had warned me of the dangers of strangers and told me men were not allowed to touch me in places that where meant to be private. I was prepared and I was warned. They had read the books on how to keep me safe from paedophiles but they had not considered - and why would they - that there best friends teenage daughter would be the one to steal my innocence. They dropped me off into her hands more times than I could count and I let her play her “games.” After all strange men were not allowed to touch my private area but nothing was ever mentioned about woman and least of all “auntie” Julie.   I just thought that it was OK and once I learned that it wasn’t I could never find the words to say. No one new about Julies times with me. She was considered a loving helpful girl that would do anything for anyone. She was paid little for looking after me and my parent’s loved her like there second daughter. We all cried at her funeral after she had taken the overdose of her mother’s sleeping Pills and not came out of her comer; even I had. What was worse I still couldn’t really say with any confidence or conviction that I hated her for what she did and what was even more stupid, was even after 16 years  not being baby sat by her I could still not tell a living soul on planet earth about what she did… not even my husband. That didn’t mean I couldn’t remember every horrific detail.

“What do I do with her Esmee? How can I help? She thinks I am going to abuse her, rape her even. She asked me to do it. I mean can I even work with her at all now from a professional point of view or am I a threat now?”

“She knows who you are Emmet. Her asking you to do that is her way of asking for comfort. When most kids get a cuddle when they are little to make the pain go away she got abuse. Children can’t process that in their heads so they just become numb to it. She associates the abuse with not feeling anything and when you are feeling everything so intently, what could be better?

“I should walk away. I should sign off her case cover my back and make sure only females deal with her,” Emmet said in a matter of fact way, his logical mind coming in to try and protect him from the absolute devastation of the circumstance. It was not him. He wanted to do something different. To leave Mi now, to not try and make it OK would kill him inside.

“So that’s what you should do. Now what do you want to do Emmet? What makes you human?”

“I want to wrap my arms around her and tell her that it’s going to be OK now. That no one will hurt her like that again,” I could hear the solidness in his voice forming again as I allowed him to chase away logic with what he felt. He was so much more sensitive then he looked and he liked to admit, another reason why I could never tell him what happened. I might have been the one that was … abused… but it would be him it destroyed and what would that achieve? Would he even look at me again, or touch me? What would happen if I was no longer pure in his eyes? Would he/could he even love me if he found out I was soiled goods?

“Hold your head up. Stop destroying the foliage, go back inside and get a female NA to come with you but go back and see her.  I know this sounds crazy but open the bathroom door for her as well. It’s strange but I guess if you have suffered that sort of abuse looked bathrooms would be terrifying. They were utterly sickening. There was a reason none of the bathrooms in our house had a lock. After that give her that cuddle, let her know she’s safe. It’s what she wants and needs. To know that it isn’t her fault, that she is still worthy and whole.”

“You terrify me with your knowledge. Promise me… promise me that no one’s ever hurt you like that darling.”  I had to hold the phone away from me and press my hand over my mouth to stop the sob that stretched up from my chest with my tears and out of my mouth before running over to the sink and urging twice trying to budge the agony of what I was going to have to do. I was going to have to lie to him. Not just avoid the question like so many times before but actually deceive the man who picked my broken body off of the streets and made a home with me, a life, made a person out of a wreck.

“I just read the books and got what they meant Emmet. Woman’s intuition or something like that I guess. No one has ever done that to me. Now, go and see Mi, she needs you.”

“I love you Honey.”

“I love you too Emmet. Whatever happenens always remember that.”