That had been one of the many times we had sex. Each time he had sex with me, he hated himself for it, and I knew it. It didn’t sit well with me. But I couldn’t help it. I became so addicted to him, I couldn’t stop.
One day, we took the car and drove out to Runyon Canyon, and he ended up bending me over the trunk of the car and taking me from behind.
Another time, he snuck into my room in the middle of the night.
I couldn’t decide if he felt guilty for doing something unprofessional, doing it with a twenty-one-year-old, or because my background made him wonder if I was somehow punishing myself by sleeping with him.
Either way, I was enjoying not only his body, but also his attention.
Ransom protected me fiercely. Much more than before. Sometimes—oftentimes, actually—I wondered if there was more to his behavior. Why he flung himself in front of me whenever someone rushed toward me to ask for a photograph or an autograph. Why he now patrolled the house three times before he went to bed every night. Why he insisted on armoring my car. But Ransom didn’t give me anything. Even when I tried to pry information about who those people were who’d taken pictures of me the other day with Keller.
“You’ve nothing to worry about,” he’d evaded the question. “As long as I’m here, they won’t get to you.”
“And after you’re gone?”
“They won’t bother you. Trust me.”
That wasn’t a satisfying explanation to say the least, but it was all I had to work with.
My parents still tried to call and arrange for me to come home. I rarely picked up, and when I did, I told them I was busy trying to find an interesting college program. It wasn’t a lie. Not entirely. I had looked into programs, but mainly for sketching and painting.
Hera and Craig went on their two-week honeymoon to Montenegro. Neither of them tried to contact me, and I fooled myself into believing I could probably avoid them for a few more years.
All I had to do was make sure that next time we were in the same zip code, I had a bodyguard with me. Just in case Craig sought revenge.
Ransom stopped bothering me about what I wanted to do with my life. Or at least, he stopped pestering me about it. He still brought the subject up, but never pressed.
The only issue thatdidgive us a constant reason to argue was him asking me again and again to see a therapist about what happened with Craig, and the dyslexia.
Each conversation went the same way.
“Doyouhave a therapist, Random?”
“No.”
“Why’s that?”
“I’m beyond repair.”
“And I could be easily mended?”
“You show promise. Potential. Asoul. Things I don’t possess.”
“I’ll go to therapy if you go to therapy.”
This was the part he’d usually give me anare-you-insane?look.
The part where I smiled back in triumph. “There you have it.”
Life was good. Suspiciously good, actually. I should have known it would come to an end. Specifically, in the form of my family.
Three weeks after Ransom and I got back from Texas, I woke up to a string of text messages from Keller.
Keller: >>The Thornes Like You’ve Never Seen Them Before! Anthony, Julianne, Hera, and Craig discuss Love, Marriage, and Loyalty!
Keller: >> Pass the puke bucket. Hera is trying SO hard. And she looks terrible in this shoot!
Keller: >> Why aren’t you there, by the way? Looks like a whole family ordeal.