Dane(74)

"You're a fucking idiot," I spewed. "He wanted it aborted so there wouldn't be any evidence of rape. How did you not see that? How could you be so fucking blind?" My rage took over again and I was back in her face.

She began to cry harder, her words practically incoherent. "I didn't know what to do. Part of me thought she only said it was rape because she didn't want to be in trouble, or maybe she was scared of you finding out. Her being pregnant with his baby only meant they'd had sex … it didn't necessarily mean it was against her will. I thought … I thought I would've known if Todd was abusing her. I would've heard her cry for help. I mean, she never said anything else about it after the first time."

"Why do you think that is, Marie? You didn't do anything to fucking protect her!" I no longer cared if the neighbors heard. I almost wanted them to hear, to know what a piece of shit they had living next to them.

"I thought if I said something to Peter, he would figure it out. But all he did was tell me to have the pregnancy terminated. So I did. He said he'd deal with Todd. I didn't know what he was going to do, but he talked to him and said he took care of it. Things were fine for a few weeks so again, I thought it was all a lie. It wasn't until … " She trailed off and buried her face in her hands, wailing and sobbing uncontrollably.

I had no patience by that point. My voice couldn't be calmed and my anger couldn't have been tamed. I felt like a madman on the loose. My hands shook by my sides as I tried to keep from throttling her. I hated her. I hated what she did to Gabi, what she did to the innocent man who went to jail, and ultimately, what she did to me-she'd robbed every one of us of a normal life. She was a fucking monster, and I suddenly realized why Gabi had stayed away for so long. I only wished Gabi had come to me with the truth. None of what had happened over the last ten years would have taken place had I known.



       
         
       
        

"Until what, Marie. Spit it the fuck out already!"

People began to come out of their homes, standing in their yards and staring at the two of us in her driveway.

"The night when she was taken to the hospital," she finally finished her sentence. "He … Todd … he um, was extremely angry over the whole thing. He was pissed that his dad found out, and even more irate that Gabriella got pregnant. He was on something that night-not really sure what. We were in bed when he came home and then I was awoken by the screams. I didn't get there in time. He was already gone by the time she started screaming.

"I found her in the bathroom on the floor. There was a lot of blood … everywhere." Her voice grew really quiet and I had to get closer to hear her. I needed to make sure I didn't misunderstand anything. "He made sure she couldn't get pregnant that time. Oh God, Dane. There was blood everywhere. And she was just curled up on the floor with it smeared all over the backs of her legs and … ." Her sobs filled every painstaking word. "Peter was there. I begged him to call the paramedics while I sat with her. But when he did, he told the cops it was the neighbor. It wasn't me or Gabriella that did that. It was Peter. And we had to go along with it."

"No you didn't." I wanted to yell. I wanted to scream. But I couldn't. My chest was so tight I couldn't get a deep enough breath to even raise my voice above a throaty growl. "You didn't have to go along with him. You could've come forward with the truth. You could have shown Gabi how to stand up for herself. You didn't have to ruin a young man's life. And in the end, you've ruined your daughter's life. She's lived with this for years. You were too damn scared to be homeless, and in the end, the bastard gave everything to his son anyway. In the end, you ended up alone without a roof over your head regardless of what you did or didn't do. You sold your own flesh and blood out for nothing. Fucking. Nothing!"

"I know. Don't you think I know what I've done? Don't you think I'm paying for it and that I regret it every single day? My daughter has battled depression ever since then, and even tried to take her own life. That's probably why she's at the hospital now. Don't you think I feel that blame? I feel it every day of my life."

Suddenly, my own guilt set in. Gabi had begged for me to give her a chance to explain, but I didn't let her. I walked away without ever asking her why she lied. If I had taken one second over the last eleven years to even think about the first time we had sex, I probably would have known. I would have been able to at least guess that she wasn't a virgin when she said she was. There was no blood and she wasn't overly tight. She was incredibly nervous, as was I, but I just assumed that was because it was her virginity. But it wasn't. She hadn't been a virgin when we first had sex. She'd been repeatedly raped for a year by that point, and I had no clue. I didn't see it in her eyes when we were intimate, but thinking back on those early days, it became clear. The fear in her eyes was the same both before and after the incident. The shakiness that I assumed was nerves were the same before and after. I was the blind one. I'd let her down, and I continued to let her down. All those years I thought I was the one protecting her … I wasn't. I was never able to protect her the way she needed someone to.