On the Plus Side

Page 58

When we walked into Devin’s house I thought Dad was going to have a heart attack when he saw Jenny. She looked beautiful. Her hair and make-up were perfection and the green of her dress brought out her eyes beautifully.
Dad and I met Justin, who seemed like a really nice kid, and then, like a proud older sister, I watched as he gave her a pretty corsage and opened the car door for her. I was so proud and sad at the same time. I looked around me.
I watched Jenny go and looked over at Dad. I shouldn’t have been there. Once the cute couple was completely out of sight I told Dad I was going to head back home. I had no idea what he and Jenny knew, but since the excitement of Jenny’s moment was over, I felt out of place.
“You can stick around, Lilly. Maybe have some dinner with an old man.” Dad said as he took a quick swig of his beer.
“I’d love to, but I really gotta get home. Me and Shannon have some plans tonight and it’s getting late.” I tried to come up with a quick reason to leave.
Being there, in that house full of pictures of Devin when he was younger was making me crazy. The desire to go to his room, lie in his bed, and cry was too overwhelming. As sad as it sounds, even the smell of the old house was depressing me.
“OK, honey. Don’t be a stranger.”
“I won’t,” I lied.
I reached up and gave him a quick hug. I knew I’d probably never see him or Jenny again. Sadness filled me, and before I started to cry and made myself look like an idiot, I quickly turned to leave.
“He misses you,” Dad called after me.
I stopped.
“What?”
“I just thought you should know. Devin misses you.”
Crying was becoming a regular thing for me these days. I cried the entire way back to my apartment. When I got home Shannon finally forced me to tell her what was going on. She hugged me while I cried on her shoulder.
With swollen eyes and an achy throat, I fell asleep in my bed.
At around eleven that night my cell phone started to ring. In a sleepy haze, I almost didn’t answer it in time.
“Hello,” I answered half asleep.
“Lilly! It’s me, Jenny! Could you please come and get me?”
She was in a panic.
I sat up quickly and rubbed my foggy eyes.
“Where are you?” I asked quickly.
I could tell by the sound of her voice that something was definitely wrong.
“At an after party. There’s a bunch of coked out older people here and some fucker grabbed my tit. Justin’s drunk and can’t drive. Please come and get me,” she begged.
I got directions as I tied my shoes and threw my things in my purse.
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Don’t move!”
I was out the door and at a house full of people my age in no time. I got out of my car and made my way through the crowd on the front lawn. The music was so loud I could barely hear myself think.
When I got inside of the house I went up to a few girls and asked if they knew where I could find Jenny. No one seemed to know who I was talking about. I saw Justin passed out in the corner then, after searching the entire first floor and breathing in entirely too much second-hand smoke, I took the stairs two at time.
I threw open every door I came to searching for Jenny. The music seemed to follow me and I still couldn’t hear anything, but out of nowhere the sound of a screaming girl seemed to pierce through the loud rap song that was playing.
I ran toward the scream and ended up in front of the very last door in the long hallway. Without a second thought, I slammed the door open. There struggling on the bed was Jenny and three older men. She was fighting them off with all of her might as they ripped at her pretty green dress.
Memories of that day in the woods when I was being attacked by the malevolent cheerleaders ran through my mind. I could hear my screams in my mind, I could hear myself begging for them to stop beating me, and then Jenny screamed again and it pierced my memories and brought me back to the moment. They were trying to rape her. I only had a second of shock before I went in for the attack.
“Get away from her!” I screamed.
I picked up a huge, red vase and slammed it against the head of the first guy I came to. It shattered as he fell to the floor out cold. The other two attackers swung around on me and I saw Jenny’s terror-filled eyes as she struggled to get off the bed. Her dress was ripped and her hair was a mass of tumbling curls. Black mascara ran down her face with the tears that were rushing down her cheeks.
“What the hell?” one of the guys said.
“Who the hell are you? Look, Eric, it’s a baby hippo!” They laughed.