“Callie hurry up or there’s going to be a huge line!” Callie, my best friend since second grade, and I were getting ready to School House a local bar about twenty minutes from where I lived. Callie and I where only sixteen but with our charming good looks and fake I.Ds we could get in practically anywhere. “Keep your panties on I’m almost done!” Callie replied, capping her Sex Kitten Charcoal Black liquid eyeliner and pulling a shirt over her head. I rolled my eyes and grabbed my keys. “Oh yea tonight’s going to be f - u - n.” Callie flicked me in the back of the head then started down the stairs.
School House was packed. College students were dancing around tables, set up randomly around and two girls I knew from school where stripping on the bar, dollar bills tucked between their breasts. “One vodka tonic and one rum and coke please.” Callie bellowed slapping a twenty on the bar, leaning over so that the bartender could see directly down her shirt. He didn’t card us. Callie Cat Purr was her full name. Literally! Her mother, who was a neurotic mess, had always loved cats and fell in love with her husband because his last name was Purr. When people asked her her name, she said Callie Cat like it wasn’t the name of a world famous stripper. She was dressed in a black leather mini, her endlessly long legs stretched out from the ten inches of fabric. Her D cups where incased in a size- too- small grey tank top that showed off her bellybutton ring, and her strawberry blonde curls loose around her shoulders. In shorter terms she was a sex pistol. I looked down at my boring 5’4 legs incased in jeans and my too- big- for- my- skinny- body b***s where snug in a bright lime green v-neck.
A shoulder stabbed me in the back, hitting one of my newer bruises. “Oh dude I’m sorry!” A guy with blonde hair, emotionless green eyes, and dressed in a green t-shirt, Billabong surf shorts, and flip-flops, was looking me up and down. Assessing my looks. “Hi I’m Robin.” He extended the hand that wasn’t holding his Bud. I shook it. “Aphrodite.” I answered wincing at the sound of my horrible name. “Hey the Greek goddess of love is in my presence! It must be my lucky night!” I was shocked. Most idiots couldn’t read or pronounce my name. Let along knew I was named for the Greek goddess of love. I’d always wished for a simpler name like Sally or Carol, but at this moment Aphrodite was my favorite name. “How’d you know that?” I asked a flirtatious tone in my voice that I’d never noticed before. “I took a Greek mythology class in ninth grade.” He answered confidently, almost cocky. “Wow I’ve never met anyone who knew that.” “I know a lot. Hey you want to dance?” Looking back at Callie, who was engrossed in a conversation with the bartender, I decided it was ok to run off with this random stranger.
Robin pulled me to the middle of the dance floor. Music pumping I began to grind my pelvis against his. Shaking and sweating as the music pounded around us, lights flickering red, green, blue, and white all over the floor. For a minute I realized how Callie felt. Dancing was an escape from her insane cat-loving mother and cocaine addicted father. Now it was mine.
We danced until Robin pulled me over to a dark corner. Pushed against a wall his tongue pushing against mine, my leg hitched around his waist. We were heating up. My t-shirt was rising higher and my breast violated. I felt like I was drowning. Big salty tsunamis crashing all over me. My head couldn’t break the surface and I couldn’t swim. “Please. Please stop!” I felt like I was gasping for air. My lungs felt as if I was breathing in nails, it was so painful to breathe. “Aphrodite are you ok?” The voice seemed familiar. Soft and panicked. Robin was it? Had he just witnessed me drowning? Could her hear my heart pulsing? “Aphrodite are you alright?” He asked again the worry hitching in his velveteen voice. “Yea I’m sorry I got distracted.”
Suddenly I had a shooting headache and all I wanted to do was go home. I looked at the gorgeous guy across from me and smiled slightly. “Di? Diti? Aphrodite!? Where are you?” Callie was bursting through the crowd. A hickey clearly visible on her neck. “There you are!” She threw her arms around me. Squeezing too tight and beating a bruise. I winced away from her and she threw me a sympathetic look. Ignoring her I turned back to Robin. Without a word I pulled out a pen and scribbled my name and number on his hand. Who knew if he’d ever call? Who knew if I was giving my number to a psychopathic stalker? To be honest I didn’t care. Hooking my arm through Callie’s we walked out of School House.
Jorge came home drunk. Again. I hid in my room, the sound of pots and pans crashing echoed through the house. I kept silent praying he wouldn’t find me. It was starting to rain. The smell sifting through my open window. I was looking out the window at the particles of water falling to their death when I heard a crash and the sound of heavy footsteps behind me. I didn’t move. I knew what was coming but I braced for it. “You dirty, rotten, w***e!” Grabbing me by the hair he jerked me back, my head slamming across my headboard. The heavy, rusty smell of blood filled the room and the warm fluid chilled my back. I just laid there. Earning me a punch in the face. My father never pulled a gun on me. Or a knife. I’d seen him use both with my mom. I remember the gleam of the knife right before he slashed it across Mom’s neck. I almost would’ve preferred the knife, at least then I wouldn’t have to think it was my own flesh and blood hitting, kicking, and strangling me. He hit me one more time then walked out. I reached up to touch the freshly bleeding wound and for the third time in a week I cried.
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