Kaylee rubbed her forehead out of frustration. "Do you think I've been threatened with a knife before? Do you think I've been in a fight before? Don't you think I was scared?" Her blood began to boil. "So you left me to fend for myself. You stood there and watched!" Now she was yelling. She tried to calm herself down, not wanting to be angry about it anymore, but it wasn't doing much good.
"You didn't even go to get help," she added. That was one of the worst things.
"I know, I'm sorry. I have gone over it in my head a thousand times, and there are so many things I would have done differently, if I had it to do over."
Their eyes met for the first time when Kaylee looked up. The sadness in his voice was clear. She saw the tears pooling in his eyes. "I hope that one day you can forgive me, and maybe then we can be friends again, if nothing more."
"I hope so too," Kaylee told him, then watched him walk away.
She didn't know if she'd ever be able to completely put this behind her, but she knew that she had to be strong in order to move on and keep living the life she knew before the attack.
Chapter 5
Another city, another concert. The excitement was gone for Kaylee. No longer was each new place an adventure; now it was something that struck fear to her very core. After each concert, instead of hanging out in the dressing room, she went to the bus to be alone. When she and the band were in large groups, she made sure that one of the guys was by her side so that nothing happened to her.
She was so bored, feeling as if she was stuck on thetourbus all the time. When she considered venturing out on her own, the fear threatened to overwhelm her. She didn't feel she had any other options, not after that night. It had been almost a month, but she could still smell the man, still feel his hands marking her body.
During that month, she rarely got a good night's sleep. She'd end up going to bed early, then tossing and turning from the nightmares that plagued her. Sometimes the dreams were so bad she woke up screaming, waking the whole bus and making them worry about her even more than they already did. Those were the nights Ashton pulled her into his bed with him. For the rest of the night, she'd sleep well.
So there she sat one night, alone on the bus, waiting for the guys to get back from partying. They had a kick ass concert and everyone sounded great. She was sure they were going to make it a late night since they always partied extra hard after a great show. She missed being there with them. She missed riding their high, feeling the same jubilation that they felt after a night like that. She missed meetingnew people.
But he had ruined that for her. In one night, someone turned her world upside down.
A loud banging on the door woke Kaylee from her daydream, and her heart raced. She didn't know whether to curl into a ball, answer the door, or call for help. Her emotions and her imagination ran wild.
"Kaylee? It's Brandon. Open up," he yelled through the door.
Kaylee went to thewindowand moved the curtain ever so slightly to look out and see if it was actually Brandon standing there. Satisfied that it was in fact him, Kaylee unlocked the door. "Hey," she said, her nerves still on edge. "Why aren't you at the party?"
"I didn't feel like it tonight. I was hoping that we could hang out for a little while, spend a little quality time together." Brandon sat on the couch. Over the past month, he had worked hard to try to get back into Kaylee's good graces. He was making progress, but he could tell that she still didn't completely trust him.
"That's fine, but I don't know if I'm good company tonight," she said sadly, and sank back into the couch.
Brandon wanted to yell at her and shake her. He wished she would snap out of her funk and go back to being the woman that he had first met. He understood that she was hurting, but she couldn't let what happened take over the rest of her life. "I'm not asking you to entertain me. We can watch a movie."
"That's fine. Whatever works for you."