Chapter 9

Taylor awoke suddenly, drenched in sweat from head to toe. He was dreaming about last night again. It had taken forever to fall asleep and when he finally did he kept waking up from nightmare after horrific nightmare. The smells, the sounds, the sights were all the same. He felt like he was trapped in a time warp and he was being raped over and over again. He decided it was late enough to get up. He crept out of his room and into the bathroom. He locked the door and turned on the hot water. He needed to scald the memory from his skin. He stripped off his clothes; the same clothes he was wearing last night. He folded them gently, as if they needed to be preserved, as if they were some historic relic.

He stepped under the showerhead and that hot water immediately flushed his skin bright red. Taylor tried as hard as he could to forget. It barely seemed real. He�d never known anyone who was raped. He could not imagine this happening to someone he knew. He certainly never imagined that it would happen to him. If only he hadn�t gone to the bar last night, if only he hadn�t drank so much, if only he hadn�t gone into the bathroom than maybe none of this ever would�ve happened. He felt so used. He didn�t even feel like a human being. Anything he had left was falling away; Dawn was gone, his friends were gone, his music was gone. Now any self-respect he had was gone too.

He tried to imagine how it would be to step into his kitchen a few moments from now. Would anyone be able to tell? He felt like it was written all over him. How could he face his family? How could he look his mother in the eye? How could he even utter a word to his father? How could he do any of this after becoming the easy sex-toy of a male police officer? Maybe he was better off just going back to bed.

Dawn sat scrunched up in her desk chair looking out of her bedroom window at the still purple morning. There was something serene about the world this brisk morn. Last night had been a horror show. She didn�t sleep after she spoke to Eric. As a matter of fact, she hadn�t been to sleep yet. She cried all night. Sobbed mercilessly, without end. Dawn was even confused about what exactly she was crying for; was she crying because Taylor hated her; was she crying because Taylor was dying; or was she crying because she missed Taylor more then any words or any tears could ever make known? It was all of this, and none of it. She wanted things to be the same. She wanted Taylor to be the same Taylor he was two years ago. The Taylor who rescued her from a bad relationship. The Taylor who made her feel like the center of the universe. The Taylor who she fell in love with, and still loved, no matter how many times she said otherwise.

Taylor wasn�t like a bad dream. She wasn�t going to wake up and have it be over and forgotten. Taylor was more like a prayer, recited so many times that the words were burned onto your tongue forever. Dawn knew she wasn�t going to wake up tomorrow morning and go on with her life, even if that was the best thing for her. This was going to hurt for a very long time, if it ever stopped at all and she wished that Eric would understand that.

Eric was ill of Taylor�s name, of his very being. As much as he tried to pretend Dawn always heard the scorn in his voice when she sighed for Taylor. She wondered if the affections of a person who was already ill with your problems was worth the best friend she�d lost. Even if that best friend was only the shell of a person now, it was the shell of a person who cared about her, or did once.

She picked up the phone, and slowly began to dial Taylor�s number; her fingers shaking like willow leaves in a warm summer breeze. She reached the last digit and commanded her finger to press the button, but she stood still, the receiver clenched firmly in hand and her trembling hand poised over the nine. Dawn dropped down against the desk, weeping anew and cradling the would have been telephone call in her hand.

Isaac walked passed Taylor�s bedroom door and decided to peek in and check if he was still sleeping, but he wasn�t there. Something didn�t sit right with Isaac about last night. Something didn�t sit right about the last few months. Taylor wasn�t Taylor anymore. Isaac wasn�t sure what exactly had changed; there were so many little things. It seemed as if the spirit had been pulled from his body. He was limp, physically and emotionally. So many times Isaac has tried to think of something to say to him, but he didn�t know the words.

Suddenly Taylor appeared from the bathroom dressed completely in black.

�Hi,� Isaac said feeling strangely uncomfortable.

�Hi.�

�Feeling any better?�

�Uh, yeah, much.�

�I�m glad,� Isaac responded, but Taylor said nothing, so Isaac continued, �Are you okay Taylor?�

�Yes Isaac, I told you, I�m fine�The whole thing with Dawn just you know, it aches.�

�Oh, well, why don�t you call her?�

�Because,� Taylor sighed, �It�s over between us.�

�No chance for reconciliation?�

�Not really.�

�Aside from that though, are you really alright, because you seemed to be wearing out, long before Dawn disappeared?� Isaac asked pursuing Taylor�s grief further.

�Now you�re just being dumb��

�But you aren�t answering my question.�

�Maybe because it isn�t any of your business,� Taylor spat, �I really don�t need you doing the whole �big brother� act now just because you suddenly decided to remember I was alive! I want to be left alone. If I wanted your pseudo-intellectual quasi-therapist crap I would�ve asked for it!�

Isaac just stared at him not quite sure what he was seeing; an ungrateful brat or a cry for help. Isaac felt rage in his blood and rage at Taylor, at anyone, for him was not a common feeling. He tried to swallow it, to just let it go.

�What�s the matter Isaac the light of reality to bright for your rose-colored glasses?� Taylor hissed.

�You know what Taylor? Go to hell. I don�t care what happens to you anymore. You deserve it,� Isaac said and walked down the hall back into his room.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Taylor retreated back into his room. He hadn�t meant to snap at Isaac that way. He could not make him understand though. He could barely make himself understand. He did not feel real and that feeling was not something he could express in words.

Up until last night he thought that there might be hope. Not a lot, but perhaps one vain ray of hope that hung on while he crumbled. Last night though as he stared at the cold, blue vinyl of the car seat he knew that there was no hope. The little bit of his soul that he hadn�t lost through the vomiting, or that had not bled from his pores, or cried from his eyes, died last night.

He wondered what life was worth when you had no soul; when there was nothing left inside you except the things that frightened you most.