"Hey! Kenny!"

"Melissa! How are you?"

"Good. Really good. How are you? Say, can you sit at this table and collect tickets for a little bit? I need to talk to someone. About the reunion."

He agrees – after five years, he's still eager to help me. It's like we're still back in high school. I explain to him how to take tickets for the reunion, and how much to charge if they don't have tickets. It's not rocket science. I touch his hand as a reward, then I go over to talk with Jason, who's looking hot tonight.

This is our first reunion. I'm so nervous and excited. I give a wave to my home girls – we have A LOT of catching up to do – and I approach Jason. I don't see a wife or girlfriend hovering nearby. Could he be single at the moment?

No ring! I talk to Jason, and eventually he asks for my phone number, then I talk to my home girls. After that it's just circulating around, greeting people and catching up. And, as I knew would eventually happen, Kenny finds me and corners me.

"Hey Melissa."

"Hey, Kenny, thanks for taking the tickets."

A frown flits across his face, then he says "No problem." Why did he frown? Is there something wrong with his drink? "How are you doing?"

Didn't he already ask me that? "Good. More guys chasing me than I can count. I just got hired to do PR for the law firm of Jones & Dalby."

"Congratulations – they're a good firm. And you still look great."

"Thanks." My body does a sexy little wriggle.

A sexy wriggle? Really? As I'm wondering why in the world I tried to look sexy for him, I remember doing that in high school too. I didn't realize I was doing it back then. No wonder he had a crush on me. My bad. I smile to myself. Oh well.

I wouldn't date Kenny in a million years – if you look up "mouse" on the internet, they probably have pictures of Kenny. But it's nice to see his desire. I turned him down so many times it became part of our normal routine. Yet if I needed any help, it was a quick abracadabra and he was there to help me. Like taking tickets for me. Do we ever really leave high school?

Too predictably, he offers, "Did you want to go out after and get a drink? Or desert? Or whatever you want?"

He's whining. Now I remember the annoying part of having Kenny around. "No, sorry, I have to get some serious sleep tonight. I have a big work day tomorrow."

"But tomorrow's Saturday." He's still whining.

Oops, I forgot about the day, so that wasn't the best excuse, but I run with it. "I have to work tomorrow. Big campaign coming up. They really need me." I finish that up with another wriggle.

Then I touch his arm to make up for leaving this conversation. "Gosh, these reunions are so great. It's so good that I can see you again. You look exactly the same. And it's so great that we could catch up." I look around. "Oh my God, look at the time! I still have so many people to talk to. You take care now."

He smiles, but he isn't look happy. I got so tired of his sad-puppy look. "You too," he tells me.

I turn away. Then I realize, and turn around, "Can you help with the cleanup? Everyone's going to pitch in." I wish. I'm the class vice president, so I have to help with organizing and doing things. Including getting some people to put away the chairs and cleanup, which not many people are going to be willing to do.

He shrugs. "Sure."

I smile. "Many hands make light work!" Then I walk off to talk to more of my friends.

After

Almost all the cleanup is done. I can go now, as long as no one notices me leaving a little early.

As I walk to my car, I'm realizing how nice the reunion was. I liked talking to friends I hadn't seen in five years. I unlock my car. I liked showing off my body – it's almost as good as it was then – and seeing girls who have gained five or ten pounds. Or more. I open the car door and get in. Everything went great. I open my purse and get my keys. I liked the look in the guys' eyes when they saw me again tonight. I turn the key.

Nothing happens.

I turn it again, then harder. Turn, turn, turn, turn. But my car engine is totally silent -- my battery's dead! Shit, shit, shit.

I get out of my car, and . . . Kenny's just leaving the building. Oh my God, how lucky is that? He must have stayed until the end of the cleanup. "Kenny!"

His head jerks up, he smiles when he sees it's me, and comes walking over. "Melissa? Change your mind about a dessert? Or can I buy you a breakfast?"

I try to give him a sad face. "No, but can you help me jump my car? I must have left a light on." I add, "Ditzy blond," point to myself, and my body makes another sexy move.

"Sure," he says. "This is really a good night for getting to help you."

He turns around and starts walking to his car. Was he being sarcastic? Or is he really that far gone on me? Oh well, not my problem, I'm not seeing him until the next reunion. I just need to get my car started.

A BMW is driving towards me. At first I can't understand why, but when it gets closer I can see Kenny driving. I was imagining a three-year old Hyundai. What did he say his job was? I would have remembered any job that would support a BMW.

He pulls up next to my car, to where I'm pointing. I tell him to leave his car running and to open his front hood.

He does that and gets out. I attach one of the cable terminals to my battery, then tell him where to put the two terminals on his battery. Then I attach the last terminal to my car. I get in my car, wait 5 minutes, and start my car.

Still nothing. No sound at all. Not even a click.

He says, "Sounds bad. Must be something more serious. Do you want a ride home?"

I don't know what else I can do. "God, that would be great. Thanks. I can retrieve this little troublemaker tomorrow."

"Before work," he says. I forgot about my work story.

I instruct him how to help take the cables off, I put them back in my car, I hop in his car, and we drive.

"I live at 375 Bircham Rd."

"Got it." He points to his GPS. I look – it has the directions to my house entered in. When did he get time to look up my address? How did he even find it? Did he already know my address? I wouldn't be surprised. But it's creepy.

And that makes me wonder about high school. Did he ever stand in the street outside my house, looking at my window? Or just drive by? I know he stared at me all the time in class. Well, more creepy thoughts, but again, I'm getting a ride home and then not talking to him for another five years.

We don't have much to talk about. So there's a lot of silence as he drives. Finally I ask, "Remind me what do you do? For a living?" To be able to afford a BMW.

"I write music lyrics."

"There's money in that?"

"Yeah."

"Like, would I know any of the songs you wrote?"

"I ghostwrite, so I can't actually tell you. Nondisclosure agreements and all that. But you would know several songs I wrote."

"Oh. What kind of songs?"

"Sappy love songs. They sell."

We ride in more silence, still uncomfortable. I close my eyes and try to rest. Now I'm tired. I'm almost asleep when the GPS wakes me up.

So we're about two miles from my home.

He says, "Last chance on that dessert. Or a coke, or a drink. Or whatever you want."

"No, I have to get home."

"Okay." He seems resigned. Finally! Maybe I won't get any more whining invites.

What? I open my eyes. Kenny says, "I missed the turn."

"Oh." I close my eyes.

He says, "Was there ever something you wanted, something you wanted so much that it was all you could think about? But you couldn't have it?" He sounds like he's angry and in pain.

I jolt awake. Is he talking about me? Something he wanted and couldn't have? Why is he suddenly angry?

He keeps driving straight.

I'm frightened. Why aren't we following the directions? I get anxious when I don't know what's happening. "No, that never happened to me. I usually get what I want."

He says angrily, "I thought so." I look out my side window. This section of the road is heading away from town and it's all trees, there's no houses or anything. This is like a bad horror movie.

Exactly like a bad horror movie. Kenny continues, "Then one day you realized you could."

"Could what?" He could get what he wanted? Me? My mind is racing, planning how to get out of this situation. I think I can jump out at the next light.

I'll be alone in the middle of nowhere, in the dark. But that sounds a lot better than being here in Kenny's car.

Up ahead, the light on Union Road turns yellow. Thank God.

Kenny's still crazy talking. "Was there ever something you deserved but never got? And then you realized how to get it?"

That's really scary. The light turns red. "No." My voice comes out as a squeak. He deserved me? I don't think so. He wasn't close. I'm ready to move as soon as he stops.

He speeds through the red light without even slowing down. We could have been killed. He's crazy. But it's late at night and there's no traffic. Kenny's the real danger.

My heart is pounding, my mind is still racing. But I can't jump out of a car going this fast. I'm his captive until he stops.

I start to shake. "Kenny?"

He says, in this sickly, sweet voice, "Yes, Melissa?"

"Can you stop the car?"

He slams on the brakes, the wheels screech, and my head is thrown forward and bangs against the front padding. He's wearing his safety strap. I'm dazed at little, but I see him grabbing handcuffs.

I scream and start hitting him. He reaches out and pinches my breast really hard, which really hurts, and he's grabbing my arm and trying to put the handcuff on it. I bite his neck and I can taste blood as I hear a click. I don't want him damaging my face. I try to kick his head, and he punches me really hard in my crotch and I just have to bend over in pain when I hear another click of the handcuffs.

I'm locked to his steering wheel.

He opens his door and hops out. The back door opens as I start pulling on the handcuff, but I can't get loose

Suddenly he's at my door, opening it. I'm still pulling on the handcuff as hard as I can, hoping I can break the steering wheel. I turn to him ready to claw his face to shreds.

And I'm looking at a gun. Pointed straight at my face.

I'm petrified. I can hardly even breathe. I whisper, "What do you want?"

He starts laughing, exactly how crazy people laugh too loudly at their own private jokes. "Sex with you. It's my fantasy. Is that to much to ask?" He hefts his gun and I look at it.

Kenny wants to have sex with me. Alert the media. Now I'm just angry. And I'm so tired of Kenny and his stupid crush on me. "Have you lost your mind? How many times do I have to tell you no? I'm not having sex with you."

"Um, yes Melissa, actually you are. You can agree to have sex me." He shrugs. "Or I can force you." I shudder. He adds, "Either way works for me."

"You can't get away with that. That would be rape, pervert."

"I just want to have sex with you. At least once. That's normal. That isn't perverted." He's whining again.

"I don't want to argue about it, Kenny. Fine, tell yourself you aren't a pervert."

He has another set of handcuffs in his hand. He hands them to me. "Put these on."

"No."

"Please, Melissa, don't make me do necrophilia." There's a powerful loud blast from his gun, blowing out the window on the driver's side. So her shot into the car and the bullet went right in front of me I'm quaking with fear. My ears hurt, and I don't know if I can hear.

Necrophilia might be sex with a dead body. I don't want to die, and I don't want him fucking my dead body. So I handcuff my other hand to the door. Then Kenny puts a chain around my neck, fastening me to the head rest.

Prisoner

He climbs back into the driver's seat, looks at me, and says, "You're beautiful, Melissa." He reprograms the GPS with a single press, and we drive.

In a lot of silence. Finally I ask, "Do you have a girlfriend?"

"Not at the moment."

"Did you ever have a girlfriend?"

"Four. They never last long. I broke up with my current girlfriend when I decided to come to the reunion."

More silence.

But the pieces fit together. He somehow thought there was some chance I would end up sleeping with him tonight. If I had agreed to dessert, if we had gone to have sex – which was totally out of the question in any version of reality – he wanted to be free. I guess that was thoughtful. Or mousy.

"So you didn't want to be unfaithful."

"Yeah, something like that. Plus, whenever I had sex with her, I was always picturing you. So I don't think our relationship was going too far."

Even after five years I'm still that important to him. I would be flattered, except unfortunately it's just Kenny.

We drive up a long driveway to a dark house. It's small and shabby-looking. He tells me he rented it for two weeks. We park in the garage, then he pushes me into the house and upstairs to a bedroom. The handcuffs and chains are adjusted so that I'm lying spread-eagled, chained to the four corners of the bed.

I'm so angry at him I could spit. I feel like the fire coming out of my eyes should be burning him to a crisp.

Then he starts leaving. He can't leave me here like this. "Where are you going, Kenny?"

No answer from him. Suddenly I'm terrified again. If he leaves me here, I'm going to starve and dehydrate. No one would find me here. No one would think to even look. I'm going to have a very slow, very painful death.

He comes back. I'm so glad to see him. He has a case, opens it, I'm already starting to get angry at him again for doing this to me, and he sets up a video camera. To take a video of me. Of him having sex with me. "Pervert!" I spit out.

"Don't go there, Melissa. You don't want to make me angry. We already agreed not to call me a pervert." He starts the video, then sits down on the bed next to me.

"So, here's the plan, Melissa." His hand goes under my skirt and he starts tracing lines up and down the bare skin of my thigh. It's disgusting. "I'm going to rape you."

I flop my body. He gets my message – I don't want his hand on my thigh. But he just ignores me and puts his hand right back where it was, on the inside of my thigh close to my vagina. There's nothing I can do. "Rape is the only way you can ever get a girl, right Kenny? You loser!"

"Tonight I'm the winner." His hand finds my panties, and he's rubbing my crotch. "I have no trouble getting girlfriends and dates, Melissa. I'm rich, remember?"

"Then why, why are you doing this to me?" I'm pleading.

Pain runs across his face. "I always wanted you." He looks down and his hand stops rubbing me.

"You always wanted to rape me?"

He looks up and smiles. "Well, that was one of my fantasies." His hand starts wandering again, this time under my blouse and on the bare skin of my stomach. "I mean, I had so many fantasies about you I can't remember them all. Mostly it was you loving me and wanting me." He caresses my face. "I just wanted you, Melissa."

"You really don't have to explain yourself to me, Kenny. I'm not your psychologist." His hand pulls away from my stomach and he pinches my breast again. "So, rape me Kenny. I have a big day tomorrow, I can't stay out that late." I literally cannot stand to look at his sad-puppy face for another minute.

He's running his fingers over my breast, trying to caress my nipples through my blouse and bra. "It's not that simple, Melissa."

What? "What's so complicated?" No one else has any trouble with rape. He starts unbuttoning my blouse to get at my breasts.

"Think about it, Melissa. What happens after I rape you?"

"I try to kill you."

He dismisses that with a wand wave. "That's not a worry. I can get you home no problem." He's got his fingers under my bra now. "What happens after I drop you off, Melissa?" He pinches my nipple, hard enough for it to hurt.

"STOP PINCHING ME!"

He shrugs. "Stop being a bitch."

"You have a lot of unresolved anger issues, Kenny."

"I'm working on them right now."

"I bet." I'll report him to the police so fast it will make his head spin. Then he can write his sappy love songs while spending twenty years in jail. His finger excites me a little. That's a surprise. A silver-lining. "I promise, I won't tell anyone."

"Yeah, right. I don't even believe you about having work tomorrow. How can I possibly believe that you won't report me?"

Now his finger is rubbing my crotch again. And that's starting to feel good. It's so confusing to have these feelings while having this conversation.

"There's a simple solution, Kenny. Really simple. Let me go right now." My body moves towards his finger, revealing a lot more than I wanted to. He notices and a quick look of surprise flashes across his face. Then his face goes back to bland psychopath.

"There's a huge field for me to bury you in. No one will find you. No one will ever know what happened to you. I'll be back in LA, hundreds of miles away."

A sob comes into my throat. His hand goes under my skirt, and a hand slides under my panties at my crotch. "Please don't kill me. I'll do anything."

"Sorry, babe." His fingers are now tickling my clit, but I'm too distressed to feel anything good. It's just fingers, violating me. I start to cry.

Suddenly he snaps his fingers on his other hand like he just had an idea. I stop crying momentarily and look up at him. He smiles, "I know what we can do."

"What?" There's hope?

"Well . . . what if you pretended to have sex with me voluntarily? Like that you wanted sex."

"No one would believe that." Now his fingers feel good on my clit. It's really distracting.

"I understand that you don't want to have sex with me, Melissa. That's my life. Poor, pathetic Ken. You didn't even want to have a dessert or drink with me; the only way for me to have sex with you is to force you."

"Rape. Call it what it is." Even if his finger is exciting me, I didn't say he could put it there. I try to block out the pleasure. "You threatened to kill me. If I say yes now, that isn't a real yes."

"But the threat's still on. Unless you want to act like it's all totally voluntary . . ." He adds, "I'm guessing you could be a really good actor if you wanted to be."

I try to get away from his finger so I can think, but his finger just follows me. But I understand now there's more to the camera than trophy hunting. "If I act like it's voluntary, then I try to report you, there's a videotape making it look like I wanted the sex."

"Exactly. Do you think that'll work?"

"Yes," I say quickly.

His finger stops rubbing me. "Well, let's give it a try. If you can produce a video that makes you look like a willing participant, I'll drive you home. If not . . . Well, let's try not to think about burying your dead body in the ground and covering you with dirt where your flesh will start rotting away."

"I can."

"I'm hoping for you, Melissa. Well, let's start."

"Can you first check that the video is working right?"

He frowns about something, then gets up, looks through the video at me, then returns to the bed and sits down.

He looks at me and says in this theatrical voice, "Wow, Melissa, I didn't know you were into bondage."

Ugh. I've never done bondage before. It's hard for me to believe anyone likes it. "Yeah. It's like, a real turn on for me. Thanks for doing it for me."

"It seems so, I don't know, perverted."

I start to get angry, then try to cover that up and remain calm. "I guess it is perverted. Some people just are perverted." I look at him, he knows who I'm talking about, but his face shows nothing.

"So, what do I do now?" He asks me.

Let me go. "Um, take off my skirt and panties."

"What if I want to take off your blouse and bra too, and see you completely naked?"

"Oh, Kenny." I try to sound as sexy as I can. "You can do whatever you want to do." I do NOT want to be naked in that video.

He smiles. "I guess that's the point of the bondage?"

And the gun. "Yes. Plus I just want us both to be happy." I want to be alive.

My blouse is already unbuttoned, but it won't actually come off, because my arms are chained to each corner of the bed. So he just pushes my blouse out of the way as best he can.

He says, "I thought you didn't want to have sex with me."

I look at him, puzzled. Then I figure out the part I have to play. "Of course I do. I, uh, just said that to you in front of my girlfriend. She, um, had a thing for you in high school, so I didn't want to make her jealous."

"You're such a tease, Melissa." I try to give a sexy wriggle, but it comes out unnatural.

He's unsnapped my bra. "I'm guessing pinkish nipples." He pushes my bra out of the way. "Yes!"

"You're so smart, Kenny." Ugh.

Then he has the problem that he can't pull down my skirt. Thank God.

"Oh my gosh, Melissa. What do I do now?" He's still being theatrical. It's really annoying. "I never did bondage before. You've done it lots, right?"

"Oh yes." Not. "I should have taken my clothes off first."

"Why didn't you tell me that?"

Because I didn't want to take my clothes off. Because I didn't want this to work. Because I was focusing on the gun in your hand. "It's more exciting for me if you just rip my clothes off." I try again to do a sexy wriggle, but it feels all wrong.

He unchains one of my legs and aggressively pulls my skirt off, leaving it pooled on my other leg. He grabs my panties. "I'm going to guess Landing Strip." He pulls them off. "Ah, Brazilian. That was my second guess. But I was close – they're both sexy but nothing creative."

He's insulting me. I can't believe his hostility. Maybe he'll kill me no matter what I do. but I have to at least give him a choice not to. He starts taking off his clothes. When he gets to the last item, boxer shorts, he asks "Did you want to guess how big I am?"

"No?" I squeak. "Really big?" I don't even want to look. He pulls down his shorts, and he's normal size. And he's rock hard.

He falls on top of me, buries his head in my breasts, and starts kissing me. It starts to get exciting, especially when he nibbles on my nipple.

But then I see the camera. A video of me, that could go on the internet and ruin the rest of my life. I want to tell him to turn it off, but he needs this video. Then I see the gun on the dresser, and I just get angry at him. Angry at his mousiness. Angry at his endless crush. Angry that he didn't move on. He's now kissing my other breast, but it isn't exciting, it's just rape, and I'm angry.

Then he looks at me. "Aren't you supposed to pretend to struggle, like you're trying to get away?"

"Well, um, yes. I just didn't know if you wanted that."

"You were afraid it would put me off? That I would take your struggling as saying no?"

"Um . . . yeah."

"Well, now I know you're just pretending. You can struggle."

Can I actually break away? I start pulling the chains, as hard as I can. I just want something to come loose. I try throwing myself in different positions, thrashing around as hard as I can. I'm praying for a miracle.

Then I feel him trying to shove his cock into my vagina. I start thrashing even more, trying to get away from him. Which is working, but then he gets lucky, and his cock pushes into me. I don't know why I'm lubricated. And he starts thrusting.

I might as well just accept it, and try to enjoy it. Then I see the camera, and that leads me to the gun. I'm getting raped, and my pleasure is gone.

Finale

Suddenly he stops. He's completely inside me. Did he cum? Damn, he didn't put on the condom. How could I let him forget?

He looks me in the eye. "Truth or Dare?"

He wants to play games? I wish he would just rape me and get it over with, but he might get angry. I start to think of possible Dares and realize that can't possibly be the best choice. "Truth."

"Favorite teacher in high school."

"Mr. Grant."

"Why?"

"That's two questions." He starts pinching my nipple again, out of sight of the camera. It's a really sharp pain. "His eyes were so blue. He had this way of being sexy."

He thrusts in and out of me a few times, then says, "Your turn."

"Truth." I add in a tiny voice, "or Dare."

He smiles at my discomfort, then is nice to me and says, "Truth."

"Did you think about me at night? In high school."

"When I masturbated? Yeah. Lots. Not always, but most of the time."

It's gross to actually imagine that. He thrusts into me a few more times, I can't stop him – or for that matter start him or control anything – then he says, "Truth or Dare?"

The truth hurts too much. "Dare."

"That's easy. I dare you to suck my cock."

"Truth."

He smiles triumphantly. I never saw that smile before. "Which guy did you like most in high school?"

That's too easy. "Ronny James."

He starts pinching my nipple before I even get a chance to explain. "He was the star of the football team. He walked with this really sexy swagger. And he had lips to get lost in."

"Did you ever have sex with him?"

I try to answer as quick as I can, before he can pinch me. His hand is at my nipple when I say, "A few times. Four."

He thrusts into me some more, and he's getting faster, and trying harder. But I'm not feeling him thrusting inside me. Then he just stops and pulls out of me. I look, and he's small and soft. "Did you cum?"

I startle him. "What? Oh, no, I didn't."

"Do you have this problem often?"

"Huh?" He looks at me puzzled. Then he realizes, "No. It's just that I was fucking you, and it was my fantasy, and you were beautiful, and then . . . "

I wait.

"I don't know. Suddenly you were just a hunk of meat. You're so shallow."

"With a beautiful body," I remind him.

"I guess. But I live in LA. Beautiful girls litter the streets. Why was I so fixated on you?"

"But you were." I desperately don't want to think of myself as a hunk of meat he masturbated to.

"I was. I was. Until a few minutes ago, I was. Wait just a second."

He reaches into his pant's pocket. I'm positive that whatever he pulls out, I'm not going to like it. And not be able to do anything about it. But it's just paper and a pen. He sits down and starts writing.

"Um, can you let me loose?"

"Just a second. I have to write down some song lyrics before I forget them."

I realize I'm still being filmed. There's no modest way to position my body so the camera can't see my vagina. "Can you at least turn off the camera?"

"For God's sake, Melissa, can you stop bothering me for one minute? Just one minute. Is that too much to ask?"

"Can you at least put some clothes on me while I wait?"

He whirls on me. "I was asking just one fucking thing from you. And you can't even let me have a minute to write down some lyrics."

I say with spite, "You were constantly asking me for things. Would I go with you to this dance, or that movie. I lost track of how many times tonight you asked me to go for something afterwards."

He smiles. "I stand corrected. Could you, just for once, say yes?"

"Just put some clothes on me. And dress yourself. And stop the camera. Is that too much to ask? Or are you going to try to fuck me again?"

"That fantasy left the station." He looks back at his paper. "Fuck. I can't work now." He starts putting on his clothes.

The Ride Home

We're riding home in the car, and we're both silent. Finally he says, "I always imagined you firmer. In your breasts."

Am I supposed to make excuses to him? I work really hard to stay thin. Women sag with age. I don't have breasts filled with silicone. I shouldn't have to apologize.

He asks, "You were firmer in high school?"

"A little."

"That's good to know. You're a little disappointing now. Now I'll always have the image of your slightly saggy breasts."

Is that what other guys think of me now?

He says, "Your ass was probably firmer too."

"THERE"S NOTHING WRONG WITH MY ASS."

He puts one hand out, facing me, in mock surrender. "You still have a great ass."

"Thanks."

"I just imagined them firmer in my fantasies."

"I'M SORRY I'M NOT GOOD ENOUGH FOR YOU."

"Whoa, Melissa, calm down. You still look pretty good. My getting soft had nothing to do with how you looked. It was, just, the women in California that I date are all really smart and interesting. It was, like, why did I ever have any attraction for you?"

He shrugs. "High school. I didn't know any better. I was such an idiot."

More silence. Then I say, "You're not getting away with this, you know."

"I'm not?"

"Won't your car be on some surveillance camera?"

"I broke the camera at the reception hall."

We ride in more silence. Then he talks. "I had this fantasy that we'd have this great talk at the reunion, and you'd see how cool I was now, and realize I was the good guy who always loved you. So you'd go with me out to get something to eat afterwards. And you'd be impressed by my car, and we'd have this great conversation. Then you would take me home and we'd have passionate sex."

I don't know what to say. That was so unrealistic.

"And it wasn't like that at all at the reunion. You just blew me off. That's why I sabotaged your car. It was childish, I know."

"What? You made it so my car wouldn't start?"

"You didn't figure that out?"

I shake my head no.

"In my fantasy, you were beautiful and smart."

We ride some more in silence, then he says, "So maybe I better spell this out. If you accuse me of anything, I sue you for slander, and I'll show everyone the tape."

"I'll claim I was forced."

He just shakes his head like he's disgusted with me. "Imagine your PR department. How is it going to handle someone in the law firm, who's accused of slander? And to settle the issue and convince people you were raped, they have to carefully look at a video of you apparently having consensual sex. That's going to be a PR nightmare."

He continues the story of my shame. "So, your PR head has to choose between trying to defend a marginally valuable employee, or just get rid of her and find some other employee.

"Oh!" he says in mock surprise. "You're interning in the PR department. I just remembered that. You are so easy to replace. Firing you is going to be a no-brainer."

He's right. About everything. We ride in silence.

"I can't believe I wasted my high school experience having a crush on you."

I never asked him to have a crush on me. If I ever encouraged him, it was only because he made himself so easy to use. That wasn't my fault.

He turns right.

He says, "I probably won't be going to any more reunions."

I don't think I'll go to any more either. "I'm sorry for how I treated you. In high school."

The car jerks to a stop. This time I have on my safety strap. He looks at me. "Really?"

I shrug. I'm not sure I did anything wrong. But I guess I never thought about his feelings. "Yeah. I guess."

He starts up the car. "Hmmph. Well, that's something."

"Sorry about tonight. Really, I thought it was going to be this really great sex with my fantasy girl. If I had known how disappointed I was going to be, I could have saved us both a lot of time and trouble."

I am more than a little tired of hearing about how inadequate I was. He was raping me, for God's sake.

He turns right.

"Well, it was a learning experience for me, Melissa. I hope you were able to learn something too."

"Nothing good."

He laughs nervously. "No, I guess not."

He stops in my apartment parking lot and unlocks the chain around my neck and the chain tying my hands together. So I'm free.

My confidence in myself has been ripped to pieces. I'm still feeling horny from his fingers exciting me. And I'm not looking forward to my small, lonely apartment. I don't like to admit it, but I get lonely and insecure.

Meanwhile, sitting next to me is a nice guy, who also is rich. I look over – he's kind of cute in a geeky way. And he had the balls to capture and rape me.

I want a second chance at keeping him hard. I know I can do it. "Did you want to come in for a drink?" I'm embarrassed how much that sounds like a straight invitation to sex. I add, "Or a dessert? We talked about that." I try to make it sound like his idea.

"What?" he says, distractedly. "Oh, right, that. I had a big night, and I have a long drive tomorrow. Plus I have a great idea for some lyrics. Which I need to write down as soon as I can. So, sorry, but no."

This is a horrible finish to my night. I've learned that I haven't changed since high school. Now I don't even like who I was in high school. But Kenny has grown and moved on.

Plus I learned how easily I can be raped. And it's hard to look at Kenny driving a BMW and be proud of my internship.

He asks, "Do you want some money?"

I look. He's holding out a hundred dollar bill towards me. I would like a hundred dollar bill. But not for sex. "No thanks."

"You have to get your car fixed."

Oh yeah. I forgot about that. I snatch the hundred out of his hand.

I get out and start walking to my apartment door. He drives off without waiting to see if I get in safely. I wonder if there's a video of me taking that hundred. Probably.

A Few Months Later

I'm . . . recovering.

I was Stalker Raped. For two months I worried about STDs, but I think I'm okay on that. It wasn't like Kenny to have an STD.

Kenny was brutal to my self-esteem. It's slowly coming back, but I don't think I'll ever be confident like I was. If anything, I'm even more needy to hear a guy say how good I look. And I'll never be the breezy girl I was – I know how easy it is for a guy to rape me. I'm a little more anxious and careful about everything.

I just want to forget and move on. I'm slowly able to do that. I try to stop reminding myself of that night.

But I'm trying to be a better person. I am. I used sex for . . . my own vanity, I guess. Or my own needs. I can't enjoy sex very much now, because I keep worrying the guy will lose his erection because of me. I still get nightmares where I'm alone in a small room with some faceless guy, and he's criticizing my body and my personality. Then I wake up depressed.

A new song by a famous singer comes on my car radio:

     I gave you up for my fantasy girl.
     Now I'm sorry, now I'm sorry.

I turn off my radio. I hope that doesn't become a hit.