Rhythm in Blue (30 page)

A short, robust woman approached the table, pad and pen in hand.

“What can I getcha?”

Rick waited for Shelby to ask for coffee. He nodded his head and said, “The same.”

“How are you?” he asked when the woman left.

“I’m…” she thought about it. “I’m good, Rick. I am.” She made sure to look him in the eye as she said it. “How about you? How are you?”

“I’m okay. How long were you at the club?”

“A few hours.”

“Were you down on the floor?”

“No, I was on the third floor balcony with some friends.”

Rick smiled, now aware of who watched through the night.

“Are you living here in the city?”

“No,” she said with a laugh, as though the idea was preposterous. “I’m just here for a few days on business.”

“And then what?”

“Then back to Greece.”

The waitress brought their coffee and set a small tin pitcher of cream between them. As she added cream and sugar to her coffee, Rick couldn’t take his eyes off her. She finally looked back at him and though her face wore a smile, her eyes told a different story – pain and apprehension, tinged with a hint of long-repressed emotions smoldered within their depths.

“What about your friends? Won’t they be wondering about you?” she asked.

“I’m sure they know I can find my way back to the hotel.”

“What about your girlfriend?”

Rick shrugged.

“Won’t she be wondering where you are?”

Rick chuckled, “I don’t give a shit. She’s screwing Randy anyway, so this will give them some time.”

Shelby was horrified. “Randy would do that to you?”

Rick shrugged again, watching the steam rise from his cup. “So it would seem, and to be honest, I don’t even care.”

“Then why are you even with her?”

He slowly shook his head. “I can’t say. I have no idea.” He looked up and attempted a look of indifference.

Shelby rolled her eyes. “Why do you do that kind of shit to yourself, Rick?”

“What do you mean,” he asked, surprised by her question. “How do you know what I do to myself?”

“Devon tells me all kinds of things,” she laughed.

“How often do you guys talk?”

“Not that much. A few times a year, but he gives me the scoop.”

“Alright then, Devon keeps you posted. You’re good, I’m good. Then why can’t you talk to me?” he asked, but didn’t give her time to answer. “No, you know what, first, I have to apologize to you. It is so long overdue, and it’s not worth saying anything else until I do that.”

“You don’t owe me an apology, Rick.”

“Yeah, I do. What I did to you was terrible. All these years and I’ve never found a way to justify it. It’s something I have to live with for the rest of my life, but I do have to at least tell you how sorry I am.”

“It’s me who should apologize to you,” she said, shaking her head.

“Hey, no. You were just a kid. I am the only one responsible for anything that happened.”

“No, you’re not Rick. It was
me
. I knew what I was doing. I put you in an impossible situation, and knew I was doing it.” She reached across the table and took his hand. “I knew you were in love with me, and I used that to try to make you do something you didn’t want to do, or knew you shouldn’t. I thought if I could get you to make love to me, that everything would be great, that we would live happily ever after, or some stupid shit like that. Just because I was young, well, it doesn’t automatically give me a get-out-of-jail-free card.”

“You know, I was still the –” he stopped when she pulled her hand away and held it up in the air.

“I let you think that you ruined me. I knew that was what you thought that last night at the Islander, and I wanted you to think that because I was heartbroken, and confused, and hurt.”

“But the last thing I ever wanted to do was to hurt –” she held up her hand to stop him again.

“Let me do this, okay?” Rick nodded. “I threw myself at you. I took advantage of your trust. Yes, I did,” she said when Rick shook his head. “You only let yourself be with me so much because you
trusted
me
not to do anything that stupid. You know very well that if you had known I would pull a stunt like that, you would have kept your distance. So I’m sorry. I’m sorry for putting you in that position, and I’m sorry for letting you think you messed me up so bad. You didn’t deserve that.”

Rick sat back in his chair and watched Shelby as the waitress came and filled both their cups.

“I don’t buy it,” he said finally. “You changed after that, and you can’t tell me it was all an act.” Shelby sat quietly, playing with her spoon and a sugar wrapper. He continued, “How can I not feel bad about that, not feel responsible for that
bizarre
transformation?”

She tapped the spoon on the table nervously and wouldn’t look at him. Her hesitation and antsy fidgeting reminded Rick of the way she behaved when she told him she wanted to be a songwriter.

“Because you’re not responsible,” she said at last.

“How can you say that? There’s no other explanation.”

“There is, you just don’t know what it is.”

Rick tilted his head and waited for her to continue. She was quiet though, and it was obvious her nervousness was growing, and she looked as though she might completely lose her composure. Rick reached across and took her hands in his.

“What’s going on Shelby?” He could tell she was on the verge of tears, so he tried to calm her by caressing her hands. “Take a few deep breaths. You’re okay.”

She giggled nervously. “Oh God,” she said. “I can’t believe I’m going to do this.”

“Do what Shelby?”

“Tell you. Tell you what happened.”

“What happened?” He took a couple of napkins out of the dispenser and handed them to her, as tears started to drop from her cheeks.

She used them to dab at her face with shaking hands. Rick began to worry, what could be so much worse than what happened between them? Her obvious distress sent his heart to the pit of his stomach.

She took another deep breath, and he thought she was going to start, but instead she pulled her hands away and reached for one of his cigarettes. Rick lit it for her, patiently waiting for her to speak.

After a few drags, she began.

 “You remember my parents were gone camping, right?” He nodded. “I was supposed to stay with Morgan, but I stayed home, I guess hoping you might change your mind and show up. Well, wait, let me back up. Do you remember Takis? I told you how he had started stalking me, right?”

Rick nodded, and he had a foreboding that what he was about to hear would be terrible. He remembered the feeling he got from Takis the night he sat with Shelby at the Islander, and was already wishing he had kicked the kid’s ass when he had the chance.

“While you guys were there, and even before that, he and his friends would follow me. If they found me somewhere isolated, they would attack me. Slap me around, punch me in the gut, that kind of thing, until I could get away, like that night you and Devon found me with them.” He handed her another napkin and took one of her hands again. His focus began to wane as he imagined the sick punk abusing Shelby in the way. How could anyone be so mean?

A few blinks and deep breaths cleared his head, and he concentrated on her story. She wiped her face and continued. “I didn’t tell anyone because I was ashamed, and I was afraid if my parents found out, they wouldn’t let me out of the house anymore. So I kept it to myself. The day before our little incident, Takis found me again in an isolated spot and started hitting me. Before he let me get away, he told me I could make it all stop if I wanted to. I asked him how. He told me if I could get him some drugs, he would leave me alone. I asked why, and he said he just really wanted to try something that would get him high. I told him there was no way I would be able to do that, but he said ‘No, I know you know where you can find drugs.’ He said if I got him something, they would leave me alone. He told me to meet him the next day, same time, same place. If I brought him something, it would be over. If I didn’t, they would keep it up and make things even worse. I was desperate for it to stop, so I did it. I stole some hash from my dad before they left to go camping. After our thing, I had to meet him a few hours later. I really didn’t want to go – I felt like shit and I’d been crying non-stop.”

Rick shook his head and squeezed her hand. Her flow of tears increased, and her voice came out ragged as she continued. “But I did. I went because I wanted it to end. I was tired of being afraid to walk out the door. I met him just on the edge of town. It was this place along the coast where a lot of new hotels were being built, but it was quiet because it was Sunday. I met him and I gave him the hash. Within like a minute, one of his thug-buddies drove up on a motorcycle. Takis handed him the hash, and the guy rode off. I couldn’t understand what was happening, and I asked him, I said ‘What the hell are you doing?’ He told me that his friend was going to hold onto it for now.” Shelby had to stop to blow her nose and compose herself. Her red face and eyes were swollen from crying. The waitress kept an eye on them from the counter, but no one else seemed to notice. The teenagers had left, but another couple came in and sat near the door. Shelby took a few more deep breaths.

“He said his friend would hang on to it for the time being, but if Takis instructed him to, the guy would take it to the police. I looked at him like he was crazy and asked him why he would do that. He said, ‘I will have him take it to the police and tell them it came from your father unless you do something.’ I asked him what? What the hell did he want me to do?” Shelby paused again to catch her breath, and shook her head. “He laughed, and it was an evil laugh. He pointed to one of the hotels under construction and said, ‘You’re going to go in there with me and I’m going to fuck you, and you’re going to let me. If you don’t, he takes it to the police.’”

Rick felt his whole being sink as chill ran through his body. He didn’t want to hear what was coming, as though not hearing it would make it untrue. He held her hand and rubbed her arm with his other hand to encourage her to continue, but already his anger was reaching its zenith.

“He told me I could think about it for five minutes. He walked away, over to a cliff, and sat throwing rocks over the edge into the water below while I thought about it. I knew that if they took the hash to the police, the police wouldn’t even ask questions, they’d just arrest my dad and put him in jail – you know how they are about drugs there. He’d be in jail for years and my mom and I would have been deported, forever. I didn’t want to give in to him, didn’t want him to win, but I couldn’t be responsible for what would happen to my family if I didn’t, so when he came back, I agreed to do it.

“I followed him to the hotel. He led me up the stairs to a room where the floor was finished, and once we were inside, he told me to take off my clothes. I did what he said, and once I took my clothes off, I saw his dangerous grin as he inspected me, and I knew right then I was in more trouble than I thought. I was standing there, naked, humiliated, and terrified, and then, out of nowhere, two of his friends walked into the room. I got so scared, and I pleaded with them. I said ‘No, no, please don’t do this.’ I begged them, but Takis grabbed me by the hair and started punching me. I screamed and he threw me down to the floor. One of his friends put his hand over my mouth. Takis took his shorts off, knelt over me, and started fingering me. It was weird, here they were, about to rape me, but they were trying to do things to get me into it, like we were all lovers and this was just some kinky orgy. When I didn’t respond to their
fondling
the way they wanted, they got really mad and started beating me again, and then, they took turns raping me. Takis went first. He was so angry – I still don’t know why – and I could tell he wanted me to hurt, and he made sure I did. They hit me, they bit me, and they kicked me. I don’t know how many times they did it. It seemed like it went on for hours. Then, they left me lying there – naked and bleeding.”

Shelby looked up at him with a tear-stained face, and said, “A few hours earlier, I was so willing and eager to give it to you, but instead, they ripped it away from me. I hated you, I wanted it to be your fault instead of mine. I am so sorry.”

Rick was speechless. All he could do was to look at her and continue to squeeze her hand. He knew there were tears in his own eyes, but more than anything he wanted to jump on a plane and go kill the fucker.

When he was sure he could speak calmly, he asked her, “Do you think if we had made love that things would have gone differently?”

“No, I don’t. I may have at the time, but I can’t tell you why. I can’t tell you anything about what I felt, other than it felt like I died that day, I just stopped living. All I did after that was play the guitar and work on my music. Sometimes I’d go see Erin. She always made me feel a little stronger.”

“Did Erin know about this?” Rick demanded, ready to kill his own sister for not having told him.

“No, she didn’t.”

He calmed himself again. “Did you tell your folks?”

“Rick, I never told anyone, until now. I’ve kept it to myself, and a few years ago, I was finally able to admit that I was the only one to blame, not you. I saw your reaction to me that last night, and I could tell you thought it was all because of you, and it made me feel good that you thought that. That’s why I wrote you that terrible letter.”

“The letter, yeah, that was…devastating,” he admitted.

“I’m so sorry Rick, if I could take it back, I would.”

Reaching into his back pocket, Rick pulled out his wallet. With his fingertip, he pried into the smallest compartment. He had to dig a little, but he was finally able to grasp it and pull it out. Holding up the folded square of paper, he said, “I’ll let you take it back.” He had opened and refolded it so many times over the years that he had to tape it back together in places, for so long, it was all he had of her, but Rick needed to let it go.

Shelby gasped in shock as he presented it to her. Carefully, she opened it. Seeing what she had written brought more tears to her eyes. She pursed her lips and tore the letter into bits. She looked up at him, “I do take it back, thank you. It’s one of the most rotten things I think I’ve ever done to anyone,” she said, as her tears continued to fall.