Chapter 27: Escalation

When we saw Mom Tuesday morning we tried to talk to her about it. We had left for the weekend after John chased us out of our own house. Jr. did not really do anything to Jane other than grab her. Jane and I knew what he wanted to do but that was not enough for Mom. She just got mad at us for being difficult and blamed it on us. It did not help that she was hung over and most likely recovering from some drug she had taken.

We did not see John or Jr. the rest of that week at our house. Jane however did see Jr. at school. He tended to avoid me the rare times we crossed paths.

I was at practice when Jane burst into the gym and saw me and started crying. I hopped out of the water and rushed to her. She had some blood on her chin, and I asked whether she was hurt. I got her calmed down so she could answer and by then the whole swim team was gathered around us with the coach.

"Jr. and his friend tried to grab me."

"Did they hurt you?"

"No, I sprayed them," she said still sobbing.

"I am gonna kill them."

"Now Brett, lets go to the principal's office and report them," ordered the coach.

In the principal's office Jane told them what happened. She left out the history and did not tell them the whole story but enough for the principle to get really angry. He said that since they just grabbed her he doubted the police would do anything, but since it was on school grounds that he could. He said he would suspend them but felt that they would suffer more with two weeks of in house detention followed by four weeks of regular detention and a promise that if they ever got out of line one inch they would be expelled.

As we sat in the Jeep at the park, I pulled Jane in my lap and just held her. I was so scared and angry. If Jr. had presented himself I would have killed him then. Jane quietly told me everything that happened.

I was walking over to swim practice when Jr. and a friend of his were waiting for me. When I saw them, I stopped and almost panicked. I grabbed my pepper spray and stuck my hand in my coat pocket with it. I desperately hoped they would just walk by, and I started to walk faster. Really I wanted to run, but thought they would chase me for sure. How come there are such mean people? It was like they hated me and thought it was fun to hurt me. They just sped up and headed straight to cut me off, and I goofed up. They scared me bad, and I veered away from the open to try to get away and got where I could not see the road. When they caught up with me, I looked around and realized I had screwed up bad. I just kept moving as they called out to me, hoping I could get away or they would just stop. They were both behind me asking all kinds of stupid questions and being crude. When I did not answer Jr. ran around and blocked my way. It was so much worse than last time. He looked so scary, and his friend was there and I knew you wouldn't be there to save me.

Jr. said all nice, "Stop and talk a while with us Jane."

And I said, "I can't, I am late."

Then he goes, "For what?"

"Swim practice," I say and try to get around him.

"You're not really on the team, you can be late," he said smugly and stepped in my way again.

"No I can't," and I tried to get around him again. As I got to the side of him, he grabbed my bag to try and stop me. His friend moved in and grabbed me roughly from behind. I was so scared. It was like it was not happening to me or just some weird dream. Jr. leaned in to me and said, "You know you want it. Just give Craig and me a little action, and you can go on your way. I think you owe it to me."

I could smell his breath he was so close to me. It was so nasty and he made my skin crawl, and I realized 'they are going to rape me'.

I was terrified and with my arms caught I could not lift my arm up to spray them. I then remembered what you said and got mad. You would be so sad if I was hurt, and I did not want to see you hurt. Frantically, I started to fight and scream. It was like I was fighting for my life. I knew I had to get away. It surprised them when I started to fight so much. Jr. tried to cover my mouth, but Craig's hold on me loosened some. I bit Jr.'s hand as hard as I could and twisted free from them. Once I was loose, I was terrified and angry at the same time. I was afraid they would just grab me again, yet I wanted to punish them and hurt them like they wanted to hurt me, so I stood there. Then I remembered my pepper spray and took it out and aimed it carefully and gave each guy a face full of the stuff. Jr. and Craig took off, and Craig ran right at me so I sprayed him more. He just fell and wailed and puked as I emptied the sprayer on him. When it was empty, I took off and ran straight towards the high school to see you.

"I am so proud of you. I knew you could do it if you had to."

Jane just hugged me tighter, and we enjoyed being close. She still shook, and we just sat there until she calmed. It was both a bad and a good experience for Jane. It made her find her inner strength. Jane was empowered by her victory over two man-sized boys.

We never saw Mom that day as usual. I was not sure it would do any good to tell her anyway. She had been getting worse over the last couple years or so and the last few months saw a marked decline. Looking back I can see the depression, alcoholism, drug use, and lack of self-esteem plainly but I was just a confused and angry teenager when it was happening. It was Jane and me against the world.

The rumor mill was running wild at school the next day. The story got twisted greatly, and Jr. and his friend were soon thought to have beaten up a little girl all the way to having raped a little girl. Jr.'s Dad must not have found out about itor was biding his time. I guess Jr. did not tell because things were still at the uneasy truce at home when John was around that Sunday. It was not until the next Sunday that Jr. was over. He shot me a cocky little smirk and look of malice towards Jane. If we had been alone I would have did my very best to cripple him for life. Jane's triumph had mellowed my fury some but I still felt hatred for him. I did notice the bandage on his hand though and that brought a smile to my face. She went to our room right away. I stayed out to listen if anything was said. Jr. left, but I watched him go to the bathroom so I went back to the kitchen. I noticed that he was not back yet so I headed back to our room.