"The buckling mechanism is a little tricky." He says. I notice the way his Adam’s apple bobs up and down as he spoke. I want to touch them. To touch him. But it will be wierd to do so. Some heavy metal music blasted from the stereo as we drove. I don’t like those kind of songs. But I can bear with anything as long as I get to be with him like this. I keep stealing glances at his perfect face. My phone kept beeping with notifications. I tried ignoring, but it was becoming incessant. I bring out my phone from my pocket to see what the damn notification was all about. It cannot be a text cause no one ever texts me. Mrs Alice is the only one in my home who bothers to call me when I am out. "You must really like bunnies."

"B-Bunnies? I prefer a capybara."

"But you wear clothes with bunnies all the times I have seen you.

I am not a stalker or anything." He adds.

"No you’re not. If anyone is a stalker, it’s me." SHIT. Did I say that out loud?

"You stalk?"

"No I don’t—just—there is this person whom I lent a novel. She is yet to return it, so I sort of keep tabs on her and I sometimes follow her around." I lied silly through my teeth. Who stalks someone because of a novel? Silly you. Now he will think you wierd. He smiles again, " So if I were to borrow something from you now, you would stalk me?" The miniscule tilt of his head when I don’t answer further entrances me. It is going to be an integral part of all of him that is already living rent free in my head.

"Only when you give excuses to not return it." My voice was barely above a whisper.

"You do know you are too cute to be a stalker, right?"

"Cute? Did you just call me cute?"

"Are you offended? I am sorry—"

"No, don’t be. It is just that you caught me off guard. No one has ever called me before." I blush.

"They must be blind then."

Did I fall asleep somewhere?

"See you around. Cute stalker neighbor."

"See you around." I wave. I acted normal until I reach my room. I leap into bed and scream into my pillow flailing my legs about.

"It is the boy in the next house, isn’t it?" Mrs Alice said. I look away from my phone to glance at her questionably. "Don’t give me that look like you don’t know what I am talking about." It soon registers. The boy in the next house—Nate. I smile in a silly self-conscious manner. "How did you know?" I ask.

"The drawings that you hid in one of your notepads." 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

I jolt forward, eyes widening. "Did you go through my drawer?"

"You know that is a dumb thing to ask given the fact that I am in charge of anything that has to do with you." She is right. Mrs Alice has always been there. The first face in my memory is of hers, not of my mother and father, and sister. My parents placed her in charge of me while they give their full attention to Briar. Mrs Alice is doing her best to fill in as a real parent enough for me to not feel dead lonely. But it is just not the same. She pops in and out of my room in a day twice than I comb my hair in a week. Constantly checking on me and always trying to be involved in my life. She asks me everyday how school went, if I made friends. I keep telling her the same thing but she still doesn’t stop asking.

"But still. . . . . You shouldn’t have looked at it. I didn’t want it to be seen by anyone else." I grumble.

"Then you should have done a good job at hiding it. Who keeps a big drawing paper in a notepad and expects it to be hidden?" She chides.

"I guess you are right. But there is nowhere that I would have hidden it that you would not have found it."

A smile plays on her lips. "Knowing the people you are with, that is what I call being smart." I give a reciprocating smile at her statement. In my own opinion, one can never fully know someone. A person is not like a book that you can learn and unlearn. Mrs Alice thinks she knows everything there is to know about me but she doesn’t. She doesn’t know that I have been taught things I shouldn’t know at my age by a man around the same age as my father. She doesn’t know that I am the reason he is laying sick and practically vegetative. The most I have spoken with Mother is her sternly warning me to keep quiet and not say a single word out to anyone that I was being assaulted. Dad would have reacted the same way mother did if I had told him. He would rather lose me than lose an important business partner. It started one evening when he came to the house to visit my Dad. But he had gone on a business trip the day before. Mom was out doing God-knows-how-what. Briar was out with her friends. Mrs Alice had taken time off and was taking longer than she said she would. The house was empty, save for me and the maids. As well as a handful of security men whose job were to patrol the perimeter and keep intruders out. To them, that was top security. The person who violated me that day wasn’t an intruder. Years go by before I realized that it must have been planned. It was so strangely convenient. Someone from the inside had given him information that I was at home alone that day. I have thought long and hard about who it could be but I still don’t have a definite answer.

At the time, it didn’t feel wrong. I even enjoyed it. I looked forward to when the next time would be. I am invisible to my family, and there is this man who gives me attention. He speaks to me about the most randomest of things. Asks me about things that I like. Listen to me amateurishly play the grand piano in the halls. I was the one who brought him up to show him my room and the drawings I made. I don’t know how we ended up doing what we did. "Good girls do this." He said. "You are a good girl, aren’t you?" The other times after, I became the one who sort it. Sort him. He always knew specifically when to visit me. We began doing it in his car because I did not want Mrs Alice to notice or become suspicious. It wasn’t until two years later at early sixteen did I know the damaged that was being done to me. I stumbled upon a post on Facebook when a girl spoke out that she was being abused by her stepdad. As if on obvious cue, similar posts began to pop up on my news feed. That was when the world began to really tilt on its axis. I went insane with guilt and shame. I was overwhelmed. It felt like as if there was a whole Mount Everest of it enveloping me. I met Logan McCartney and accused him of taking advantage of me. "So what?" He had cynically spoke. "You make it sound as if I am at fault when you were the little slut who obediently took it. You didn’t scream like you should have. You even called me "daddy." He was right. I was an idiot desperate for attention that I did whatever. "I am putting an end to this. Come near me again, and I’ll tell my dad." I threatened him and he laughed mockingly. "He wouldn’t do shit. Why? because he is aware. You are nothing more than a pawn in bigger game kid and an instrument of pleasure for me." I was more flabbergasted at every word that came out of his mouth. I later found everything to be true. Father had bargained me off to his creep friend. The discovery was a torture and a eye opener for me. It was then that I truly believed that they didn’t care. I was rapidly falling spirally into a black, bottomless hole but no one noticed.Mrs Alice did. I gave excuses and even faked an illness to convince her that it wasn’t worse than that. I dug deeper into other victims who spoke out and their stories. Almost all of them had reasoned that forgiving themselves and their assailant was the only way they were able to get past it. Foolish idiots! How can you forgive a person who does not feel sorry, but instead blames you for what they had done? I did not feel forgiveness. I felt the need to eliminate my assailant like a pest. Logan threatening me and saying he had recordings of me amplified that need. I met and discussed with a therapist online about it. I expected him to talk me out of it. But he strangely did the opposite. He said that revenge was bad, but it is the only method that works for most victims and that I should do what benefits me. He even gave me tips and strongly warned me to be careful and not get caught.