Page 75 of Corrupt Game

It went on for a couple of months. Every day, he’d tell me to come out after dinner and play house. It wasn’t until a neighbor saw me leaving his apartment one night, crying after being made to do things that no twelve year old should, that she reported it.

Within hours, I was whisked away to a new family. I had no idea if I was going to a better place or one that was much worse. Thankfully, it had been the same one that had been looking after Andy.

Somehow he sensed that I hadn’t been treated nicely at my last placements and stood watch over me that first night so I could sleep.

They only took in emergency situations and small children. We had been so scared that they’d made an exception to their rules and kept us both.

It formed a bond that had been almost unbreakable over the years. We were inseparable through junior high and high school. It wasn’t until Andy graduated that things began to change.

The foster family had continued to keep both of us, knowing we didn’t have many years left in the system. I’d already been through so much and they needed my help taking care of thesmall children. It was the best situation somebody like me could get.

That was one of those weird things. I wasn’t someone that had ever thought about having a family, but if I had gotten pregnant, it wouldn’t have been the end of the world. Someone small to love me would have been okay.

I hadn’t ever planned to have a family until I stayed with the Bakers. It was the one chance I got to be around children and have them love me unconditionally. Not something I was used to back in the day or even now.

Normally, a foster family wouldn’t have allowed one of the older children who had left to return. But they had sensed our bonds and allowed him to come visit me when he was able.

When I aged out of the system, they let me stay until I could move into the dorms three months later. It was one of the few kindnesses I had during my years in foster care.

The Baker family had moved on to other children after that. They’d sent the occasional card or letter during the holidays, but I hadn’t heard much from them.

Even at my college graduation, Andy was the only family that had shown up. The memory started to overwhelm me with the pain that I’d gone through. My chest tightened, and I rubbed at it to soothe the ache.

I wasn’t equating what Mr. Holdt was doing to me as the same thing because he wasn’t the same evil bastard doing things to me. I had chosen this when I’d sign the documents, and I could walk away anytime.

The assumption that he’d killed Andy made him evil, but even that wasn’t the same type of evil as someone who had taken advantage of a young teen.

Those types of evil humans were in a separate category from the rest of the evil in the world. I was certain that there was a special place in whatever kind of afterlife for those who hurt children.

Other people might have let it change who they were, but I knew that it hadn’t been my fault. It was Brian’s fault. He’d been the one to initiate it and then convince me that what he wanted me to do wasn’t wrong.

Everything inside me had said otherwise. It wasn’t something that kids should be doing.

Not having parents to explain the birds and the bees discussion with me, I had taken that lesson to learn more on my own. I didn’t want to be taken advantage of again.

The therapist that they’d insisted I see for the six months after that, had assured me that sex was a natural part of life.

When I’d tried to take Andy’s clothes off one day, he’d laughingly told me no. We were siblings and he would never see me in that way or try to take advantage of me. He made me know that I was safe with him and always would be.

Embarrassed, I hadn’t mentioned it again, but from that day on, he had tried to give me pointers after a few particularly bad dates.

We’d laughed at some of the come on lines that guys would use to try to get me to sleep with them.

By the time I got to high school, I had lost my virginity to one of the nice guys in my class.

It wasn’t until later on that I realized that Andy had asked him to date me which had led to us having sex. I thought that he had slept with me on his own, but it had been nice.

Nice in a way that made me want more.

I thought back with fond memories of those few months. I had jumped that poor boy over and over again. It had taken a while before I realized that sex and love were two different things.

When I’d broken up with him, he had seemed relieved that I wasn’t going to make him commit to me. He’d been that type of nice guy that would have felt obligated to marry me if we’d dated through high school. There weren’t any feelings there, and it wasn’t good for either of us to keep up the pretense that there were.

It had been one of a few times in my life that I had seen what a real family was about. His parents had always treated me like I wasn’t a foster kid.

Having been abused earlier on, it made me more sexually active during high school and college. Going after the happiness of the moment or a quid pro quo than an actual relationship.

Maybe that was why Ian was taking things at a much slower pace. He was trying to show me that it wasn’t just about sex but more about the relationship.