Ken // sapphire and faded jeans

[KENNEDY DAVID MILLER]

Ken got the wine out for her and decided he would go with a beer himself. They went out to the living room and he sat down on the other corner of the couch, dropping his knees to the side. She looked so small, curled up there at the end of his couch. Ken shook his head, "Nope." His tone was light, as usual, but it was obvious he was really thinking about things. He wanted to know and protect her.

"I know you don't really wanna tell me, but I think it'll be good for you to get it out in the open, then you can move on... ya know?" Ken said with a smile. Plus he wanted to know what he was up against if that god-damn mother fucker ever came to his door...But abuse was hard to talk about, at least he assumed so.

"I could go first if you'd rather." Ken said lightly, but of course he didn't want to either, but he had shared his story before, he doubted that Hadley had.

[HADLEY CLARISSE FAIRCHILD]

As she had expected, Ken agreed that he wasn't going to let her get out of telling him. Hadley huddled even more tightly in her corner of the couch, wondering if she should at least let him go first. The truth of the matter, though, was that if she did that, she'd find a way to get out of this conversation tonight. Even so, she couldn't help but consider his offer. In the end, though, she shook her head at him. Her eyes fixed on the soft golden liquid in her glass, and she murmured, "I think it's kind of a now or never thing." Letting out a long sigh, she squeezed her eyes shut, gingerly prodding at her memory. She'd neatly locked away these memories, and she usually tried to avoid them. It went completely against her instincts to drag them out, but maybe Ken was right. Maybe she could heal somehow just by sharing them. At the very least, she supposed she could share the burden in this manner.

Taking a sip of her wine, she willed herself to start. The beginning was the easy part, really, and she marveled at how difficult it was to tell him even the most basic facts. Finally, she let out a short sigh and started with the most basic of things. "His name is Phillip. I met him in college." There. That was easy enough. And sharing that much had the rest of the story dying to tumble out. Shaking her head in astonishment, Hadley let herself continue. "He really wasn't all that bad then. He was sweet. Charming, attentive... We got engaged at graduation."

At this point came the string of events that always made Hadley feel like a fool. She quickly drained what was left of her wine. Toying with the stem of the glass, she forced herself to continue. "After that, things started to change... He started telling me what to do, who to be around, what to wear... I wanted to go to medical school, but Phillip wouldn't let me. The only thing I had going for me was that he still let me talk to my family. I never got to see them, and I could only talk to them when he was right there. But it was better than not talking to them at all." Shaking her head, Hadley placed her empty glass on the floor beside the couch before pulling her knees closer to her chest. "He started drinking and I know he was messing around with other girls... And then... He just got angry so easily. And when I did something really stupid, he'd hit me..."

Closing her eyes again, Hadley rested her head against her knees. She wanted to stop talking, to let the rest of these memories lie silently where they were. But she'd really come too far to stop now, so she forced herself to go on. Tucking a throw pillow against her chest as though it might protect her, she let her gaze focus on the wall behind Ken. "I used to tell myself that if I just stopped acting stupid, maybe he wouldn't be so mad all the time... I used to pretend that when he said he was sorry and it wouldn't happen again, he really meant it... And I started trying to think of things that would make it better." Shaking her head at her own stupidity, Hadley let out a frustrated huff.

"And then I got pregnant. I thought that a baby would be the answer to everything. Surely, he would be so enamored with the child that he wouldn't remember to be angry with me. At the very least, I thought a child would make him softer. That he'd find other ways to deal with his anger.... And, as usual, I was wrong." Hugging the pillow so tightly that it might burst, Hadley stared at the wall. She couldn't let herself look at Ken when she explained this. She didn't want to see his reaction. "I guess he didn't want a baby. And so he did what he had to do to make sure there wouldn't be one..." Her voice had gone deadly soft. "I don't actually remember what happened. I woke up in the hospital. I could barely move. They told me I'd been in a coma for four days and that Phillip was in jail. They told me that the baby was... gone." Hadley was trembling at the memory, and she desperately wanted to stop, but she was so very close to being finished. "When the doctor said I was okay for discharge, they sent someone to talk to me. Someone who works with women like me, I guess. She said that if I was still around when Phillip got out, he would probably kill me. And I knew she was right. So I checked myself out and started running..." What was left of Hadley's breath rushed out of her lungs in a sigh, and she let herself collapse against the pillow she'd been clutching. She was exhausted, and she couldn't help but wonder if she'd been right to actually tell him everything. The last thing she wanted was pity.

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[KENNEDY DAVID MILLER]

Ken listened carefully, attentively, but he made no motion for judgement. For once, Ken was quiet and patient, listening to her tell her story at her own speed. Of course, abusers started nice, that was what made them so tricky-- that's what he'd always been told. He wanted to tell her that he was sorry, that this would never happen again, that Phillip was an asshole, that anything she did probably wasn't stupid and that was his word for it. But he wasn't her shrink, he was her friend, and she seemed to not like pity.

When she finished her story, Ken had finished his beer and his heart ached. He wanted to curse Philip out but instead he laid a hand on Hadley's knee and said slowly, "You are so brave." Ken figured she'd heard all the, you don' deserve that, speech before, so he figured he'd focus on how string she was, not how bad he'd been if he could help it.

"You can stop running now though," Ken said. She had friends, a place to live, she could turn this around. "You've been brave for so long, you can stop now." Both literal and figurative running. Maybe she could detox a bit, get used to living, to being herself again, herself from before Philip.

[HADLEY CLARISSE FAIRCHILD]

She'd heard everything she cared to hear, really. The therapists, doctors, and nurses in the hospital had told Hadley how brave she was and how smart she was to get herself out of the situation she was in. She'd also dealt with all of the pitying looks and careful hugs that people thought would somehow help. Of course, it meant a great deal more to have someone she cared about tell her that she'd made the right choice and that she was, in fact, safe. Hadley gingerly raised her eyes to meet Ken's and offered him a wan smile. "I don't feel very brave," she told him honestly. "No one's parent ever tells them that the brave thing to do is run away when they're scared." Shrugging, she wrapped her hand around his and gave his hand a small squeeze. "Thanks, though... I mean, it's nice to relax a little."

Letting out a long sigh, she released her friend's hand. Retrieving her glass, Hadley made her way to the kitchen to refill it. She peeked in at the pot pie, which was looking delicious, but wasn't quite done, and returned to the couch. "And that, I believe, makes it your turn..." With a small smile, Hadley resumed her seat, though she found herself sitting a little closer to Ken this time rather than tucking herself in the corner.

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[KENNEDY DAVID MILLER]

Ken shook his head. "Brave is doing the hard thing when its the right thing to do, and you did that. Its easier to stay than leave." Ken said to her, offering a small smile. Hadley would relax in time, right? She didn't have to keep running, she was away from him.

Of course, then it was his turn and he wished he had a more dramatic story to tell her given that hers involved baring her soul. His was a little more typical, unforgiving homophobic parent. Ken sighed, "Mine doesn't really have the same intensity as yours, but I'm gonna get us another round." Ken got up and got the bottle to refill Hadley's glass and grabbed another beer for himself. Then, he got started with his story.

"It was always pretty obvious to everyone that I was gay. I mean, I always wanted to dress up as a princess on halloween and I'd rather play house than with trucks." Ken said with a little chuckle and a shrug. "My mother didn't really care so much either way, but my dad....Well, my dad was bank manager of the bank in our suburban Michigan town we lived in and subsequently lots of people had to trust him with their money. So naturally, he didn't want to bring issues of gay rights to any sort of forefront because our town was pretty mixed on that front." Ken explained to her. "He figured I was going through a phase and tried his hardest to change me, taught me how to play baseball, made me watch football with him, dressed in conservative blue shirts, you name it, he tried it. Mom drew the line at a priest coming over to talk with me, she figured him trying to pray me straight was the last straw." Ken shook his head again. It had been an interesting life to say the least.

"After that, dad stopped trying to fix me, but he never accepted me, always figured I'd grow out of it. On my eighteenth birthday he basically locked me in a room with a female hooker, hoping I'd sleep with her and get over it. I did sleep with her, because as much as I knew I was gay, I wanted my dad to care about me. The only times he talked to me were when he was trying to make me more masculine." Ken didn't think fondly on that time. The woman had been really aggressive and he still wasn't sure if his consent had been forced or not. "The whole thing really shook me up and I was glad to get away to college, but I'd had my virginity taken by a hooker I didn't even really want to sleep with." Ken took a swig of his beer.

"College was a lot better. Of course I started by just sleeping with any receptive guy I could find, half to piss my dad off and half because I wanted to forget how my sexual life got started. But eventually I found a nice guy and we dated for a while. That break up was hard..." Ken trailed off. It wasn't much of a story, it hadn't been cheating, or a woman, it had just been falling apart, over something stupid he couldn't even name.

"My love life is okay now. My mom and my sister think its great that I'm gay. My mom runs a bakery so I just bake with her and shop with my sister. My dad still has no idea how to deal with me, and pretends to not actually be my father in public because he wants to keep his job."

Ken was finished with his story and took a long swig of his beer. He hadn't told anyone about how the hooker had actually taken his virginity before, but he figured he'd owed her that much after her story.