Chapter 9

 

Kait awakened hoping that it all had been a dream, a very bad dream, but as soon and her conchious cleared, she was confronted with the truth: the nightmare was real!

I don’t want to get up.  I can’t.  She rolled over in hopes of avoiding the day.  Saturday, thank God it’s Saturday.  No classes; I don’t want people to see me.  Then terror seized her, What if people can tell.  I feel dirty, with one look everyone will know!

Gretta saw Kait roll over to avoid the light coming through the window, to avoid the day, to avoid life.  “Kait, luv?”  No response.  “Luv, I know you’re awake.”

Kait rolled over to face her roommate and waited to see the look of disgust, of revolution, of pity.  She had told Gretta what happened now she had to live with the consequences.  But she saw no disgust, no revolution, no pity; all she saw was a quiet concern creasing her friends face.

“You can’t stay in bed all day, luv.”

“Watch me.  I don’t feel good.”  It wasn’t a complete lie, she did feel awful, but not with a cold, with herself.

“I know you don’t doll, but you’ve got to get up.”  Before Gretta could say anymore the phone rang.  She eyes the phone vengefully, her English accent thickened with disgust, “Who is daft enough to call at this early an hour?”

Neither of them made a move to answer it.  Finally the answering machine kicked in.  “Hey there!  We’re either not here or we don’t want to answer, so leave a message and we’ll get back to you, luv…”

“If we feel like it.”  For the most art the message was in Gretta’s controlled English accent, but Kait’s voice came in playfully at the end.

“Kait, I know it’s early but I figured you would want to get umm…that ahhh…visit out of the way.  Ahh, as soon as you get this give me a call.  I lo…I’ll talk to you later…Click!”  Jonathan’s voice ended with the click of hanging up the phone.

Gretta looked at Kate suspiciously.  “Why didn’t you pick that up?”

Kait looked down sheepishly.  “I don’t want him to see me like this.”

“But he say you last night,” Gretta pointed out.

“That was last night, I wasn’t thinking.  I don’t want anyone to see me like this, especially him.  I can’t handle that, I can’t handle seeing pity in his eyes, I don’t want him looking at me and seeing this dirty…” her voice ended with her choking back a sob.

“Oh, luv…”  Gretta was instantly sitting nest to Kait on her bed, stroking her hair.  “You’ve to go know by now, that Jonathan will never look at you like that.  He’ll never look at you as anything dirty, unless you decided to take a roll in the mud, and even then he’ll still see you as the most beautiful and wonderful thing to ever walk this ear.”  Kait made a snorting sound of disbelief.  “It’s true, and you know it.”

“But after last night…”

“After last night my ass.  The only thing last night will change concerning his feelings for you is that now he is going to be ten times more protective of you than before.”  Kait looked at her and shook her head in disbelief.  “Kait listen to me, don’t push him away.  If you can count on anyone to be there for you unconditionally, it’s Jonathan.  Not to sound like a mother hen or anything, but get off you butt and call that boy back.  He needs you just as much as you need him right now.”

Kait studied her friend, she wanted to believe her, but how could anyone look at her and not see how dirty and tainted she was?  “I’ll think about it, but for now, I’m going to take a shower.”

Gretta watched as Kait walked away.  She’s not going to call him.  Well if she won’t then I’ll just have to take matters into my own hands.

Kait finished her shower and dressed in some baggy overalls and an oversized sweat-shirt, anything to hide herself.

Pulling her hair back into a ponytail she curled up in her chair with one of her favorite books and attempted to loose herself in its alternate reality.  It didn’t work she couldn't loose herself; she was trapped where she was.  Frustrated she threw down her book and covered herself with a blanket.  She heard a knock at the door but ignored it.  She stared at a picture on the wall not far from her, trying desperately to block everything else from her mind.  She didn’t know how long she lay there when she sensed someone walk over to her.  If Gretta gives me one more of her “Call Jonathan” speaches I’m going to scream.

“Kait?”  A familiar hand ran gently through her hair, she flinched back slightly from the touch.

Jonathan felt like he had been punched in the gut.  Kait had flinched away from his touch, as if he was going to stride her or something.  “Gretta let me,” he whispered, this time without touching her.  Finally she lifted her eyes to meet him.  In her eyes he could see an emptiness he had never seen before; he could also see fear and doubt.  “Hey,” he said softly once he found his voice.  “Do you feel up to going?”  He knew it would do no good if he tried to force her onto going, she would only pull even farther away from him.  When he saw fear wise up into her eyes again he knew the needed to assure her some how.  “If you’re not up to it, I won’t push you.  I’ll only say this once and then I’ll drop it, but I think you should go.”

Kait studied his eyes, weighing her options and trying to decide what to do.  If she went, even more people would know and she would have to tell some stranger what happened.  If she didn't go, then that creep would get away with it and might hurt someone else.  Finally she made up her mind.  She had to go if it meant she might stop him from hurting someone else.  She nodded and started to get up.  In an instant Jonathan was up and helping her up too.

She gave him a weak smile, “Thanks.”

*******

Jonathan looked up his car and walked up to the police station with Kait.  The building was plain brick with few adornments.  The area around it was well kept; a path in the snow had been freshly shoveled from the walk.  Kait froze in her place when she reached the bottom of the stairs.

“You okay?”  Jonathan rested his hand on her shoulder and looked down at her in concern.

Kait thought of saying she was fine but he would see right through that.  “I’m a little scared.  I really don’t want to go in there.”

“It’s not too late, we can turn around if you want to,” Jonathan offered.

“No, I need to do this.”  Kait took a deep breath to stead her nerves.  “Okay, let’s go in.”  They walked together up the steps and into the building.

Jonathan walked up to front desk.  When the officer didn’t look up he cleared his throat, “Excuse me.”

“Oh, sorry,” the elderly man apologized.  “Is there something I can do for you son?”

“Umm, yes.  We’d like to speak to someone concerning…”Jonathan glanced back at Kait who was slightly behind him, unsure of what words to use, “an attack.”  He finally decided.

“All right, take a seat over there and someone will come speak to you.”  The officer pointed to some seats across from his desk.

The inside of the police station was the epitome of government funded programs, bare walls painted in nondescript gray.  Everything was stark and clean, nothing out of place.

A few moments later a grave looking woman in a no-nonsense suit walked up to hem.  “I am Detective Garrett.  I understand you wished to speak to someone concerning an assault?”  Her voice was cool and professional but even through her professionalism a hint of her southern roots was apparent.

Before Jonathan could respond to her question Kait stood up a little shaky.  “That would be me, yes.”  Her voice shook along with her body.

“Why don’t we talk some where more private, like my office?  It’s this way.”  Detective Garrett led them down a long corridor past dozens of doors and around numerous turns.  Finally the maze ended in front of one more door just like all the rest.  Garrett sat down behind her desk and motioned for the two teens to take a seat also.  “Now if you could just start from the beginning, I’ll try to make this as painless as possible.”  Garrett’s voice softened when she addressed Kait.

Kait took a deep breath and once again told her narrative of the events from the night before.  Garrett is silent the whole time, giving Kait her undivided attention.  When Kait finished Garrett asked a few questions then gave a heavy sigh.

“Miss Fenton, I’m going to be completely honest with you.  Finding an attacker under any circumstances is very difficult, so I can’t promise you anything, but I will tell you this, I will do anything in my power to catch this guy.  I’m going to send for the results from your visit to the clinic and get started right away.”  Seeing the devastated look on Kait’s face, Detective Garrett searched for something to say that would help her.  “It was very brave of you to go to that clinic right away and coming here as soon as you did, not many girls do.  Most of them wait weeks even months before they report something like this, and by then there is nothing that we can really do.  Now I know this is tough for you but I’d like you to give this woman a call.”  Garrett handed Kait a business card.  “This woman runs a rape survivor’s group that meets once a week; as soon as you feel up to it I think it would be good for you to give it a try.”

An hour later the two teens left the building.  Kait was exhausted; Jonathan could tell by the way she would almost fall asleep on the way back to her dorm.