Noel

I was wrapping up my life. Back at the house that I had brought for Cheryl and myself. The place where we had stayed ever since we married was there, but sadly the marriage wasn't. I had taken an off from the work and come down here early morning.

Last night I had realized that things were never going to change between us, and there was no longer the need for me to chase the truth. Even if it was in the light, nothing could turn back the time and bring it all back. Cheryl had turned bitter and was now hurting me. Nothing could ever take that hurt away from me, and that had made me realize that there was no need to flog a dead horse.

I had too many things in this house. Too many reminders which I had been holding off to, and I knew I had to let go.

Christine

I looked at the various photographs that Cheryl had left behind. All the things that once were part of her now lay packed in this bag. Everything was packed and wrapped up.

Noel had called me to his old house to pack all these things up. He was finally selling the house.  He had told me to send all of these things for donations. All the money that came would go there.

When he had told me this, I had been ecstatic because it was for the best.

No one should keep on suffering through the loop of endless pain.

The past was never easy to remember and opening it up will only end in taking out all the dirt that I had put so long to forget. I had been in therapy for so long that now I understood that.

How my family had dropped me was shocking for me? My sister and I had never been on good terms but Noel had been like a brother to me and when the fingers had been raised on him because of me I had been the one to step up.

I smiled at the courage of going up against them. If I had been the naive girl then I would have never forgiven myself.

Cheryl had always hated me enough to not let me be the bridesmaid even at her wedding. I had been the one to sit at the edge and watch my sister get married. I was the second child and she had the first one, the golden child. She had been the apple of my parent's eyes and even though it wasn't that they didn't treat me well but it was just that I had spent half the alive under her shadow.

When I had grown to mine I had indulged in things that I was never supposed to be. Maybe if I hadn't done things like that then no one had ever had the opportunity to point a finger at me. Maybe I would have been able to explain myself.

Some nights all I wanted was to leave everything behind.

Everything already felt like it was falling apart. Drugs would do that to you. I had enough in my system. Breathed them in since I was seventeen. I was getting sick of myself.

Jayce had been the first who had given it to me. He liked to see me dance and the seventeen-year-old me loved the attention. Felt so good under his gaze, how his fingertips touched me under the table, and how he made me feel.

I wasn't the golden daughter and no one cared what I did but he did. The seven years gap between us didn't matter to me. The first time he had touched me was at a party I shouldn't have been. It was at a club where I shouldn't have been allowed but no one was ever there to look over me. I had a few friends and even they were busy. I was the nobody who was unwanted.

Jayce has seen me. Our eyes met and I had danced for him. I felt wanted then and he had dragged my drunk ass out of the club only to push me against the wall to kiss me, I was a goner. He was all I had wanted, all I desired. It was wrong but I was addicted to the attention I got.

Love.

I had thought it to be love.

Our dance had begun since that night and we kept it a secret. I did whatever he asked, wherever he asked, and stripped whenever he asked. All I wanted was his attention, have his eyes on me, touch on my skin. I was naive and lost. I didn't see that I had gone on the wrong side.

The first time he had asked me to take a pill all I wanted was just to make him happy. The first time he had another man touching me I was high and just wanted to please him.  When he took my virginity all I cared about was he happy with me.

Everything just revolved around him and his happiness. I became a slave myself and I didn't even know.

All I wanted was to please him in return for his love.

I was so high on the attention and loved it that I let all my lines blur. It cost me everything.

Soon as I had hit eighteen he was taking me to the sex clubs. Indulging me in all kinds of kinks and lifestyles I had never known of. Tieing me up, choking me, whipping me, and getting off in pain. He said that it was a pleasure. I didn't like it but he made me believe this was what real love and pleasure were. All I wanted was for him to never leave and keep on loving me. However, when I had stepped into the more I became a part of his life, I was able to see another side of him. He showed me off, he let others touch me, and then he would punish me for it.

Drowned with drugs and looking for love I let him take over my body and mind. He manipulated me, brainwashed me, and hurt me.

I would be green with envy when other women approached him and whenever I got mad he would give me a pill to chill. I would lose myself in the high and soon enough we would fuck making me forget why I was fighting in the first place. It went on for three years until I felt sick of it. I felt like drowning, suffocating. No longer could I feel the love.

Noel was the one who had caught me taking a pill and he had told me to get off them. For the first time in my life, someone had the care of me. He had given me an ultimatum or he would get the authorities involved. Scared shitless I had decided to stop taking them at home.

Noel on the other hand had me going to see a doctor. I realized the mess I was making of my life after a while.  It took time but I was able to get over the addiction to drugs. Detox was never easy and I saw myself failing most of the time. Noel helped and all he had was a concern for me. He was just like a good friend, a protective brother something I had never had.

When the drugs started to wear off I saw for the first time what was happening with me and Jayce. I was his possession. It felt like he owned me. The necklace he had given me was nothing but a collar. Sometimes he had taken me against my will and I let it happen. I let every humiliating thing happen to me. He had entrapped me in his lifestyle and I saw clearly I was threatened by it. He would whip me, abuse me verbally and mentally, hit me in the places I wouldn't show, record me and it was nothing but derogatory. The drugs numbed everything I felt while he took advantage of that always.

I wanted an out and I had raised my words to him. All I wanted was to break from him and the life I was leading. I saw him getting mad and locking me up in a room. No one besides Noel cared to look for me and even he couldn't find me. I had never told anyone about the sick things I did with Jayce. I was scared that everyone would see me in another light and hate me.

With every time I denied Jayce of the things he did to me I saw his anger rising. Behind closed doors, he would take it out on me anyway he could, making me avoid him altogether. I filled my days with classes and activities so I wouldn't have to see him. I made plans with my parents and friends just to avoid him. Dancing, cooking, part-time jobs I did everything to avoid him.

Once came a point when I  knew he was getting out of hand. I had to rely on Richard to help me.  Every fight with him would end him up locking me somewhere or hurt me. Richard was the one who had to let me out. I would call him to help me up.

Jayce was obsessed, crazy, and an alcoholic. It scared me to shits with the way he stalked me but after a while, it stopped.

He was a maniac, following me when I was out. I couldn't go anywhere. The calls and the sick promises he made to punish me, made me throw up. I was scared of my own phone. I never told my doctor what had gone behind the closed doors and secret clubs. The fear and shame always held me back and still did.

Then one-day calls didn't come. No longer he followed me around but all those months when we were fighting I was living in nothing but fear. Richard had told me that Jayce wasn't going to disturb me, that he respected my choice.  It took me three months to go out again and he was there but never approached me. We had broken up. No longer was I scared of him. It was over.

Never again I go down the same path. He never contacted me but deep down I was still scared of him.

Picking up an old box I looked at it feeling it to be similar. I have never had one but I knew Cheryl had many. She liked them and once it has become an obsession for her. Noel and Richard, both had given her those for three years straight.  She treasured them the most.

I opened it up, twisting the key I let it play. The beautiful melody hitting my notes.

I felt something as the music kept on playing.

A flash passed through my eyes making me drop the box I was holding.

The music was playing somewhere in a room. I couldn't remember exactly but another memory came.

"Why don't you have a celebratory drink with me. It is my birthday after all."  Richard asked me and with a glass of champagne in his hand for me. I was at his house. Everyone was present. My family was right there. Cheryl was dancing with Noel.

I was smiling looking at them. Longing for something like they had. Jayce had approached me once at the party. I had been sacred and the way he looked at me ran chills inside me. He had a date with him so I tried to feel at ease.

But the way he had smiled at me I felt like I was back in the room with him as he punished me.

"Thanks, Happy Birthday by the way. It is a great party." I wished him as I looked at the people all around from the corner.

"It is." He walked away from me leaving me alone looking at people.

Jayce was looking t me even though he had his arm around another woman. I saw the tilt of those lips making my stomach churn with uneasiness. He smiled at me and out of courtesy I smiled back. Finishing my drink I stood in my corner.

I felt uncomfortable. Maybe I had too much to drink.  I just wanted to drink water or splash my face with water. The thoughts were jumbling up.

"You really thought I would let you go?" I heard as someone licked my ear with an arm wrapped around my waist.

The unknown memory just came and went. I stepped away from where I was standing looking at the broken box now on the floor. It was a lost memory I didn't remember for so long.

That drink.

I couldn't believe what I just remembered. No, he wouldn't do that. Richard wouldn't that. He was family. However Jayce was his blood. 

I knew it was him. Hist touch, his marks and his vent up anger. 

He had hurt me. All those marks and blood. It was his punishment. Tears welled in my eyes as all I wanted was to throw up.

"Christa," I heard Noel calling me. He was coming here wiping away my tears. I bent down to pick up the broken box, collecting the broken pieces.

"Hey, are you done?" He asked from the door. I didn't look up as I collected everything. My heart beating rapidly against my chest. I had no idea that I wanted to tell Noel about this or not. After so long I had seen him happy, he was trying to be happy in life, and here I was pulling him back to the past.

"Yeah, it's a lot of stuff but I'm done. Someone from the organization will come and collect everything up tomorrow." I told him making sure my face was composed as I looked at him. He nodded to me with a smile.

"Tired?" I just nodded to him because right at this moment it was hard to hold myself. I couldn't believe my words.

"Just want to go home and lay down for a bit." Standing here in front of him felt as if I was being crushed under a rock. The guilt was weighing me down.

"No problem. Do you want me to drop you?" I looked past time rather than at him.

"No, I have just a small little shopping to do on the way back home for personal things. Hence, I would just get them and drive up to my home." He didn't ask or pressured me. Soon I was heading back home. Every minute in his presence was choking me.

This had happened to him because of me.

Driving in a haze I reached back home. Only when I had cut off the engine, I screamed in the confines of my car. Banging the steering.

All the pain Noel had gone through was all because of me. It was all my mistake. This all was on me. How could I have let it happen to him?

He was destroyed because of me and I hated myself for it. It ripped me apart knowing how everything was my fault.

I took his life from him. All my fault. I wept for the pain I had caused him. The pain that had destroyed him.

Jayce and Richard had been the ones who had done everything. It was them. They both had the motive. Richard wanted Cheryl and Jayce wanted to hurt and punish me. He had wanted me to crawl back to him but I hadn't. 

Why didn't I see it through? Why didn't I tell Noel about everything?

All the shame I felt from my past just made me want to kill myself. I destroyed Noel and it was suffocating me.

I wanted to talk to someone. I wanted to go and ask Jayce how could he do this to me. Go to Cheryl and tell her this, rush back to my parents and tell them that Noel was all innocent and this was all my fault. There was no one who I could talk to, to tell them because no one would believe me.

None of them were on my side. Tears ran down my cheeks as I felt the desperation.

Every minute passing as I kept this pain and guilt to myself made me feel as I was bleeding myself dry.

I banged my head over the steering feeling as if it could take away some of the guilt from me but it didn't. Nothing helped. Nothing could.

A knock on the window had me looking up at a concerned familiar face.

"Allyson," I breathed out the name with nothing but utter desperation. She was the only one I had. The only shoulder to cry on.

Fingers crossed.

Hope you all liked it.

Christa is remembering things.

Should she tell Noel?

And what could she do without proof?

Who do you think is involved?

Is even Cheryl in it?

What are your guesses let me know?

So sorry I couldn't update it earlier.

I had been stuck in this chapter for months.

I have been trying to update all of my books, 'trying' being the keyword.