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Authors: Paige Dearth

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BOOK: Believe Like a Child
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Chapter Three

 

O
nce they were some distance from the house, Rhonda turned to Alessa and said, “Okay, let’s spruce you up a bit. Turn around.”

Alessa eagerly complied. Her new friend tugged hard on the back of the shapeless black tee shirt, twisting the fabric into a knot. Alessa was amazed at how snugly the shirt now fit and at the way she had gathered it at the back so that it was short enough in the front to expose the top of her navel. Then Rhonda turned Alessa around to face her and reached into her purse. She applied a dab of blue eyeshadow on her eyelids and defined her top and lower eyelids with black eyeliner. She took out two bobby pins from her purse and pinned Alessa’s hair back on the sides. As a final touch, she rolled on bubble-gum lip gloss. Then she looked critically at Alessa and said, “There, now we can go.”

They were headed for a keg party at the Rope, which was located in a small wooded area in Plymouth Meeting, the small town in Pennsylvania where the girls lived. As they walked the mile or so to the place, Alessa asked her new friend, “Why do they call it ‘the rope’?”

“Because there’s a creek that runs through the woods in the place where we hang out and someone tied a thick rope on a big branch overhanging the creek. When people are fucked up, they jump on the rope and swing. Problem is, you have to make sure you get off before it stops swinging, because the creek is a ten-foot drop. It’s so fucking cool! Wait until you see it.”

When they arrived, a crowd of twenty other teenagers had already gathered. They were all standing in a loose circle around a keg of beer that stood in the center of the dirt floor. Alessa was terrified that the crowd of teenagers would either reject her because she didn’t fit in or find out what she was doing with her Uncle Danny. Instead, they seemed not to notice her at all. Rhonda greeted several of the boys who immediately closed in and circled around her. Alessa noticed how the girls stared at her friend and whispered to each other, giggling and poking one another. Clearly, they had an issue with Rhonda. Must be jealousy, Alessa concluded.

Then Rhonda came over, grabbed her by the hand and led her to the keg. The girls filled up two plastic cups with beer and Rhonda offered up a toast: “To new friends!” she said. “We are going to have so much fun together.” Alessa sipped at the beer while her friend chugged it down and filled another glass for herself. As the night wore on, Alessa watched as Rhonda worked the boys in the wooded area. They were all clearly enamored by her. And she sure was a beauty! Alessa sat on a log and took it all in.

Finally, one of the other girls came over and sat on the log with her. “You know that Rhonda is a slut, right?” she remarked.

“No, I didn’t know that,” Alessa responded.

“Well, if you hang with her, everyone is going to think you’re a slut too.”

Alessa looked at the girl she was meeting for the first time and said, “Maybe I am a slut too, what’s wrong with being a slut? Just because people have sex doesn’t mean they’re bad. Maybe you should try it sometime. Another thing: Rhonda is my friend. So you should stop saying mean things about her to me. You and those girls are just jealous of her.”

Enraged by the tone of Alessa’s voice, the stranger lifted her hand and slapped her across the face, sending her flying backward off the log. The girl came around to where she lay sprawled on her back, reached down and pulled her to her feet by the collar of her tee shirt. Then she backhanded her across the face again. Alessa collapsed on the dirt and lay flat on her back. After a swift kick to her right thigh, the girl straddled her, looking down at her with a sinister grin. Alessa could now make out that the girl’s two front teeth weren’t real. Denise moved to the side of Alessa and stood, watching her with malice. She picked herself up, stunned, but kept her eyes on the ground, afraid to make eye contact with her assailant. She was petrified by the violence she had faced. She hadn’t seen it coming and regretted that she hadn’t just kept her mouth shut and her opinions to herself.

When Alessa finally looked up at the girl to gauge what her intentions were, Rhonda ran over with two of the boys who had been hanging all over her and said sharply, “Denise, cut her a break. She doesn’t even know you!”

The girl called Denise just stared back at Rhonda with contempt.

“Come on, Denise,” one of the boys cut in, “she’s a loser. Just leave her alone. Look at her! She’s scared to death. You made your point.”

Studying Alessa, Denise seemed satisfied that she had terrorized her sufficiently. Then she turned back to the crowd of teenagers.

The boy who had spoken up turned to Rhonda and said, “Come on, Rho! Let’s go into the woods.”

Rhonda turned and followed a trail that led into the woods, leaving Alessa there by herself with the other kids who had gathered around to gawk at the scene that had taken place.

Her thigh still throbbing from Denise’s kick and her face burning from the slaps she had received, Alessa went over to the keg and filled herself a fresh cup of beer. She stood there and guzzled the beer until it was gone. Then she filled another glass and walked back to the log she had been sitting on earlier. She sat alone and continued to drink her beer, trying to absorb what had just happened.

One of the boys came over and sat beside her. He was tall and thin, with black hair that came down to his shoulders. He had a nice smile and his voice was husky and tender when he spoke. “Hey,” he said, “I’m Carl. You doing okay?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Alessa conceded. “I’m not really sure why that girl got so mad. She was talking about Rhonda being a slut. So I defended her. Next thing I knew, she’s pounding on me. Who is she?”

“Her name is Denise. Nobody fucks with her. She can kick most of the guys’ asses here.” Carl lowered his voice to a soft, deep whisper. “She’s a really good fighter. She learned how to fight, after she got her ass kicked in seventh grade and lost two of her front teeth. She took boxing and karate lessons. She’s fucking crazy and you should never disagree with anything she says. No matter what crazy shit she tell you, just pretend to agree with it. That’s what the rest of us do; we let her think she’s right.”

“I wish I’d known,” Alessa said regretfully.

“What did you say to her that made her freak out on you?” he persisted.

“She called Rhonda a slut and I stuck up for her.”

“Oh, that will do it!” Carl was shaking his head from side to side, indicating to Alessa that she was guilty of a serious infraction. “Denise can’t stand Rhonda, but doesn’t mess with her, because she knows all the boys will stick up for her. She just hates her.”

“Why does she hate her so much?”

“Rhonda gets a lot of attention from the guys in our group,” Carl explained. “She will do shit that the other girls won’t.”

“Like what?”Alessa asked.

“You know, she’ll mess around with us.” He looked at Alessa for a moment, then said, “Rho will have sex with any one of us, if we want her to. She likes to have sex and that pisses the other girls off, because they’re all a bunch of prudes. So Rhonda gets more attention from us guys then the other girls do.” He went on, “Not to mention that she is hot and has great tits!”

Alessa blushed at his description of her new friend’s breasts, but a smile broke out on her face, nonetheless. “So, is that why she went into the woods with that other guy?” she couldn’t help asking.

“Pretty much. She’ll be back, though. In the meantime, you want to smoke a joint?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never smoked a joint.”

Carl reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out a joint and lit it. He took a long, hard drag on it and held his breath. Then he handed it to Alessa who mimicked what he had just done.

Denise was watching them as she walked over to Alessa. “Gimme a hit,” she said with authority.

Alessa had no idea what she was talking about and Carl quickly leaned over and explained, “She wants some of the joint.”

Alessa quickly handed the joint to Denise. Afraid to even look at her, she kept her eyes fixed on the ground.

“You know, we’re cool now,” Denise said, handing back the joint. “You just pissed me off with what you said before. So are we cool?”

Alessa lifted her head and looked at her. “Yeah, we’re cool,” she replied, though she wanted to scream:
sure we’re cool! Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, you bitch bull dike! I have survived torture and pain from the inside out and you are nothing more than a walking piece of shit!

She would never dare say all that aloud to Denise for fear of provoking her into violence again, but in her mind, she was free to think it and find refuge from Denise’s fury.

Alessa had been sitting with Carl on the log and talking for an hour by the time Rhonda reappeared. Her hair was tousled and the rainbow on her tube top now sat off-center.

“You doing okay?” she asked Alessa, throwing Carl a suspicious glance.

“She’s doing fine, Rho,” he retorted. “Fix your tube top, will ya?”

Rhonda looked down at herself and giggled as she readjusted the rainbow to center it on her perfect, B-cup breasts. When it was time to leave the Rope and walk home, Carl got up and accompanied the two girls to the end of the woods. Here he stopped. Rhonda looked at him, nodded and moved off to wait for Alessa at some distance from the spot.

Carl looked down at Alessa and said, “I liked talking to you tonight. You’re pretty cool.”

With that, he bent down and kissed her. Alessa was seasoned and knew just how to kiss him back. As he felt the depth of her kiss, Carl reached down between her legs and gently drew his hand across the outside of her jeans. She had been touched, rubbed, jabbed and banged there so many times before, but this touch was different. Alessa was confused and unsure as to whether it was the effect of the joint she had smoked or the presence of Carl that was causing a rush of excitement to flow through her veins, making her dizzy and warm inside.

Just then, Rhonda called out, “Let’s go, Alessa! We need to get home.”

Alessa said goodbye to Carl, turned and ran toward the place where her friend was waiting for her. On their way home, Rhonda asked, “Carl is pretty cool, huh?”

“Yeah, I like him. At least, he was willing to talk to me, while you were off with that guy. So what were you doing in the woods with him anyway?”

Rhonda beamed and turned to Alessa excitedly. “Giving him a blow job. Uh, you know what a blow job is, don’t you?”

Alessa thought to herself:
yeah, I have been giving them since I was eight years old!
But instead, she said, “Yeah, I know what it is. You sucked his dick, right?”

Rhonda laughed at her friend’s candor while Alessa thought to herself, if giving a blow job made Rhonda a slut, maybe she was a slut too.

On their way home, they talked incessantly with each other. Rhonda had observed there was something different about this girl. Unlike the other girls in her grade, Alessa didn’t seem jealous of her or disgusted with her for going off to have sex in the woods. This girl seemed to understand her. Rhonda liked her and knew instinctively that they would become the best of friends.

When they got to Alessa’s house, Rhonda said, “I’ll call you tomorrow. There’s another party at the Rope. If you want to come, you can.”

Relieved that she finally had a person her own age to hang out with, Alessa answered, “That would be great! I had fun tonight—after my ass-beating was over anyway.”

The two girls giggled and hugged and Alessa headed back into her house of horrors.

Chapter Four

 

G
oing to the Rope became a regular weekend event for Alessa and Rhonda. By summer, they had come to depend on each other. Rhonda was generous with her clothes and make-up. Alessa readily accepted all the help she could get to improve her appearance.

Meanwhile, things hadn’t changed much for her at home. Uncle Danny was still the pedophile he had always been, except that now, he was meaner, because he resented her growing friendship with Rhonda.

“That Rhonda is trouble,” he would tell his sister, Caterina. “You shouldn’t let Alessa go out with her.”

For the first time in Alessa’s life, however, her mother’s ignorance and self-absorption worked in her favor. Caterina couldn’t care less, as long as her daughter stayed out of her hair and didn’t get into trouble. But she did use the opportunity to warn her to behave.

“Don’t you go doing things with any boys,” Caterina warned.

“What things, Mom?”

“Like letting them touch you where they shouldn’t. Don’t you come home and tell me you’re pregnant; if you do, I’ll kill you.”

The thought of pummeling her mother to death flashed through Alessa’s mind for an instant. It was ironic how worried Caterina professed to be about “boys”, when her own brother had been raping her daughter since she was a child. Alessa loathed her mother for her failure or unwillingness to see the truth and for not only doubting her word, but threatening to beat her, if she made another allegation against her Uncle Danny. And now, the selfish fool, Caterina was suddenly concerned about Alessa’s sex life! Although she was only fourteen, Alessa knew that her mother was a nut job, a self-centered woman who would never be able to help anyone other than herself. However, it didn’t matter quite as much, ever since she had found comfort in her friendship with Rhonda.

Alessa slept over at Rhonda’s place whenever she could, denying Uncle Danny the opportunity to embark every night on his free sexual adventure. She and Rhonda confided in each other, but kept her relationship with her uncle a deep, dark secret. Noticing that Alessa had grown closer to Carl, Rhonda promised not to “do him”, out of loyalty to her friend. By the end of summer, Alessa and Carl were taking off their clothes and making out in the woods on a blanket that all the Rope kids used. While they were into a lot of heavy petting and engaging in oral sex, neither of them considered that as officially having sex, because they hadn’t had intercourse yet. Alessa always told Rhonda everything she did in the woods with Carl.

Lying in her friend’s bed one Saturday night after a party at the Rope, Alessa was taken aback when Rhonda asked her, “So when are you going to have real sex with him?”

“I don’t know,” she replied uncertainly. “He keeps asking me, but I’m afraid of getting pregnant. My mother threatened to kill me, if I did.”

“Have you had an orgasm yet?” Rhonda asked.

Alessa shook her head vigorously. Rhonda turned on her side to face her. Then she tugged Alessa’s underwear away to the side and began to caress her between her legs. Alessa started to experience the sensation that often gripped her when she was with Carl. As Rhonda continued teasing her with her feather-soft touch, her friend began craving for more. When Rhonda’s fingers stilled for just a few seconds, Alessa thought she would go insane. At fourteen, Rhonda was an expert. She knew exactly how to drive her girlfriend to the brink of sexual insanity and leave her hovering there. Alessa looked up at Rhonda with crazed eyes that begged her to continue with what she had been doing or she would surely die.

Rhonda reached down and began to caress her softly again. At the same time, she leaned in to kiss Alessa’s lips, parting them lightly with her probing tongue. With Rhonda still fondling her, the two kissed. Alessa’s back arched and her body felt electrified, weightless with a desire she had never known before. At just the right moment, Rhonda slipped her fingers into her. With infinite gentleness, she slid them in and out until Alessa couldn’t take it anymore and her first orgasm exploded within her. Rhonda rolled onto her back and stared up at the ceiling.

“That is an orgasm,” she announced.

Alessa’s response was barely audible. “That was the most incredible feeling I’ve ever had in my whole life!”

Rhonda giggled, proud to have given her friend her first orgasm, and they talked into the night until they had both fallen asleep.

The next morning, after showering and eating breakfast, they headed down to the playground at Plymouth Elementary School. There was a dodgeball game on and Rhonda quickly joined the crowd, throwing and catching the ball for her team. Alessa wasn’t particularly athletic and decided to sit it out. Carl was there too. As she watched him play, she realized how much she liked him. He had been so nice to her all summer and Alessa wondered to herself if Carl could ever make her feel the way Rhonda had the night before.

After the game was over Alessa, Rhonda, Carl and half a dozen other boys and girls walked over to the Plymouth Meeting Mall for lunch at Roy Rogers. Alessa was truly happy when she was with Rhonda and Carl; her friendships with them ensured that the rest of the group accepted her. When she was with the two of them, she felt like a normal teenager.

After lunch, Rhonda and Alessa went into the Gap and laughed as they tried on jeans and tee shirts. Alessa enjoyed the experience, because she didn’t get new clothes too often. Even when she did get a new shirt or a pair of pants, it was never two items at the same time. And there was no way her mother would ever buy her clothes from the Gap; she only shopped at K-Mart in Norristown.

Having got used to the idea of not receiving new clothes from Caterina, Alessa had ceased to long for them. Accepting the limitations of her reality was what kept her sane and enabled her to see the truth in other people. Alessa had no doubts at all that her mother was self-centered, her father little more than a shadow and her uncle a perverted asshole. This was a situation she would have to come to terms with on her own, for her siblings weren’t around often enough to help her through it. In fact, other than Rosabella, she hardly knew them. She had come to understand that Rhonda was her true confidante, even though she could never bring herself to disclose what her Uncle Danny had been doing to her all her life.

Alessa had dinner at Rhonda’s that night. Her friend lived with her mother, Zoe, who was single. Alessa thought she was the coolest woman on earth. Quite unlike her own mother, Zoe was charming and beautiful and had long, curly, light brown hair. Dressed in tie-dye shirts and jeans, she had an elegance about her that mesmerized Alessa. To her, Zoe seemed like she was always barefoot, happy and engrossed in all the music that the girls loved. When they were with her, they ate fish sticks and French fries, TV dinners and Ellio’s pizza. In this hideaway, Alessa was able to enjoy all the luxuries her own mother had insisted were “too damn expensive to buy.” Zoe was also the first person who told her that she had pretty eyes.

“Your eyes are warm, Alessa,” she had said, “because they are such a light brown. It’s like I can see into your soul. You have a good soul, Alessa. I can see it.”

Alessa loved Zoe almost from the moment she met her. Whenever she was at Rhonda’s house, watching Hitchcock and eating Jiffy Pop popcorn—another food Caterina had condemned as a waste of money—she felt like she belonged. Her nights with Rhonda and Zoe ensured that she was safe from her Uncle Danny and even though Zoe had a different guy friend sleeping over every weekend, they were all very nice to the girls.

Over time, Alessa became a permanent fixture at Rhonda’s house on weekends. Her friend had become aware of how different she was during the week—more withdrawn and sad. The Monday morning before Easter break, while they were changing for gym class, Rhonda noticed a bruise on Alessa’s inner thigh. It hadn’t escaped her that her friend just wasn’t herself that day, and decided to ask her about the mark on her thigh.

“I don’t know,” Alessa replied, averting her gaze.

Sensing that something was wrong and that she was not willing to discuss it, Rhonda let the subject drop. Alessa would never have confessed to anyone that the bruise had come from her Uncle Danny’s big fingers burrowing into her thigh the night before. For the first time, she had made an attempt to resist him, knowing that he would use brute force to get his way anyway, by locking her thighs together. Uncle Danny hadn’t been in the mood to tolerate any resistance, however. He had grabbed her thin thighs and forced them apart.

“After-all, I own you,” he had said to Alessa when he was finished with her.

By Easter break, the two young teens had been friends for a year. They shared everything with each other—except Carl. Alessa hadn’t yet had intercourse with him. Nor had she had an orgasm since her first one with Rhonda. She didn’t dare tell her friend why she couldn’t have an orgasm with Carl. Alessa knew it was because every time he touched her, she thought of her uncle. Over the last six months, Carl had grown so insistent about having sex that it didn’t seem like it would be special anymore, when it did eventually happen.

At a party at the Rope over Easter break, Alessa and Carl were in the woods, making out. They were both naked. Drunker than usual, Carl was sexually charged. His passion was obvious as they kissed and touched each other, breathing heavily and enjoying the moment. Carl said what he always did. “Come on, Alessa, let’s make love.”

“No, Carl,” she answered, “I don’t want to get pregnant. Plus, I want it to be special.”

“Oh come on, Alessa, just a little bit,” he urged, climbing on top of her.

Alessa started giggling. “No, Carl, stop it,” she said, “and you know why too. Come on, stand up and I’ll give you a blow job.”

Carl was too drunk to pay attention. He stayed on top of her and, without warning, entered her with a quick, hard thrust. Alessa was startled and scared. Why would Carl do this to her? She had told him firmly that she didn’t want to. She tried to push him off her, but Carl pinned her arms above her head and his strong thighs held her legs in place, as he thrust into her over and over again until he was satisfied.

When it was over, he came to his senses and realized what he had done. “Oh my God, Alessa!” he exclaimed remorsefully. “I am so sorry. I was just so excited I couldn’t stop myself. Please don’t hate me. Please…”

Although the experience wasn’t foreign to her, Alessa was surprised by what had just happened. Catching her breath, she said, “It’s okay, Carl. I just can’t let myself get pregnant.”

Just then, a thought struck her. Her gut began to twist and her lungs felt so constricted it was hard to take a breath. If Carl could get her pregnant, so could her Uncle Danny! Alessa began to heave, as her stomach gave way to fear and anxiety. She would rather die, if her disgusting uncle made her pregnant! Her Uncle Danny, the pig of all pigs, scum of the earth.

Confused, Carl didn’t know how to deal with the situation. He supported Alessa by the shoulders, until she had finished wretching. Then dressing quickly, he helped her to put her clothes on and guided her gently out of the woods and back to the Rope. Alessa looked over at the others, boys and girls laughing and yelling, a bunch of teenagers having fun, and realized, once again, how different she was. There was no doubt in her mind that she was damaged goods, scarred forever by her childhood. She would never be like the others. She wondered if she could ever enjoy peace of mind, having experienced nothing, but turmoil for seven long years from the time her uncle had chosen her as his sex toy. And as she watched her peers, drunk and a bit out of control, she wondered if she would ever feel as happy and carefree as they did.

Deep down, Alessa was aware that no normal girl her age would have reacted the way she had. She had actually assured Carl it was okay that he had forced himself on her. She knew her response was perverse. But so inprisioned had she become by now to sexual abuse, it didn’t elicit the response it would have from a normal teenage girl emerging from a forced sexual encounter. Alessa knew how fucked up she was for being less upset about being violated than about getting pregnant. She felt like a mutant.

When Rhonda saw how pale her friend was, she ran over to her and had her sit on one of the logs. Denise, the bully, was staring at Alessa, a nasty smile playing on her lips. Alessa caught her eye and thought to herself, “Please God, not tonight. Do not let Denise beat my fucking ass tonight.”

Carl read the fear in her eyes and followed her gaze. Then he caught the malicious look in Denise’s eyes. Stepping in front of Alessa, he blocked her view. Whispering to Rhonda that it was time for them to leave, he helped Alessa to her feet and walked her out of the Rope. Although there was silence between them, Rhonda guessed something had gone terribly wrong. But she kept her questions to herself, waiting to ask them when she was alone with Alessa.

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