My Everything

(First and Last chapter)

He was tall. He was tan. He was handsome. He was my everything.

I was young, and I still am, when we first met. I was thirteen, and he was twenty. A college man—a friend of my best friend’s older brother.

We met at a party, a celebration that school was over! Jesse invited me so she’d have someone her age to hang out with, but more people than expected from out school showed up, so she was busy with them.

I wondered around the pool in my new two-piece. I didn’t go the skimpy bikini route; I didn’t want to look desperate and in my opinion girls my age rarely looked as good in them as the older girls did… and I wasn’t one of the rare girls who would look as beautiful as an older girl. But wearing a one piece was so childish, and was so much more mature than that.

There were girls wearing bikinis at the party, mostly Jesse’s brother’s friends. I avoided them. Despite the skimpy outfits running around, he saw me and paid good attention.

“Hey.” He smiled, walking over.

“Hi!” I smiled, looking him over.

“I’m Seth, a friend of David’s. You?”

“I’m Candice, a friend of David’s sister, Jesse.” I laughed, twirling my curly brunette hair around one finger.

His blue eyes looked straight into my green ones… and he smiled and I felt my heart skip a beat.

Seth spent the rest of the party talking to me; he ignored the other girls! He got me a soda when ever I asked, he met my friends, he was a real sweety! He had to leave early, though, which was sad. I walked with him out to his car, his car! And he smiled, saying he hoped to see me again soon and gave me his phone number.

After the party, I spoke with David about Seth. David said Seth was a good guy. Fun, friendly, easy to count on.

That was all I needed to know.

I called Seth when I got home, and we talked for three whole hours before my parents said I needed to go to bed. I asked Seth if he’d be my boyfriend and he said yes. It made me so happy I went to sleep just so I could wake up the next day and call him!

He wasn’t home when I called, so I emailed him instead, getting the address from David.

I updated my myspace website telling everyone I had a new boyfriend! I was that excited! I’d had boyfriend before, but this time was different. This boy was a man. Mature, handsome… my friends would be so jealous! This was so perfect, it really cheered me up and I had been really, really depressed. You have no idea how bad it was. I had to give up a boy I’d been in love with forever, he even kissed me while he was dating another girl. He had a few problems, but who didn’t? He had a bad reputation, but I bet most of I was just girls mad because he broke up with them. They said he got aggressive easy, that he was possessive. I bet it was all just talk; he’d always been a sweetheart around me.

Once all that was finished, I tried calling Seth again and again he didn’t answer. I left a message asking him to call me as soon as he got in, then I waited for my parents to leave for work and I headed for Jesse’s house.

My parents didn’t seem to mind much if I dated or not. I just didn’t tell them. They lived their life and I lived mine. Three responsible, mature adults who could take care of themselves. I’m so glad I don’t have those stupid parents who forbid you from dating till you’re sixteen, or even eighteen! Mine don’t shop for me, they know I’m old enough to pick out my own clothes, choose my own friends, and be my own person. They still bug me, though. They don’t listen to me, they say I’m childish, how annoying! They don’t understand me or my life, they think the world is still like it was when they were kids.

They think everything is dangerous and it’s not.

Every time an anti-drug commercial, they practically attacked me with the same old speech about how wrong drugs were. It was embarrassing and annoying.

I was so glad it was summer! I could go to camp and other things, stay away from them.

Spend time with Seth… oh, thinking about that made me have second thoughts about camp. More camp meant less Seth. Maybe I’d just go next year. After all, Seth was my everything.

Jesse didn’t know why Seth wouldn’t call me, but she was being a brat anyway.

“I don’t think you should be dating him, Candice.”

“Why not? He’s perfect!” I argued.

“Well, he’s twenty and you’re thirteen… that’s quite an age difference.”

I rolled my eyes. “So? Your parents are nine years apart!”

“That’s different,” Jesse tried to argue.

It was a stupid argument. “How?”

“When you get older, age difference doesn’t matter, but when you’re younger it’s… gross.”

That was the argument she came up with. It was annoying and childish; she didn’t know what she was talking about. But I was mature, I could handle any argument she could come up with. I told her I needed to go home for dinner and left it at that.

Finally, Seth called me. It was the best part of my day. He called and I told him about Jesse’s rant. He said to ignore her, that I was right, her argument was stupid.

He made me so happy.

And that’s how it was for a few weeks.

Seth drove me to the mall; he’d drop me and my friends off. When he wasn’t at work, he was with me. He’d listen to me, talk to me. It was all so perfect.

But Seth started acting different. He started making me mad.

He worked more and more, spent less time with me.

He said he was busy all the time. He was my everything, I wanted him here with me... we were supposed to deal with everything together, not apart!

But he was there and I was here.

I had to confront him about it.

“I know, Candy. I wish I could be around more.” He sighed, sitting on the hood of his car.

“Then just be around more!” I demanded.

“It’s not that simple. I want to respect you, but it’s hard.”

That confused me… “What do you mean? It’s hard to respect me?”

“Not how you think” He shook his head, “It’s just… I don’t know. I want us to have a relationship.”

That made my heart speed up again. He really was perfect. “That’s what I want, too! And it’s what we have.”

“It doesn’t feel like it. It feels like we’re just playing around. I want commitment; I want a real promising relationship. I don’t want to think that you’ll go to high school and forget me when someone else comes along. And I don’t want to forget you, but I need more. And… well, I’m afraid of that. I’m afraid what I want will be something you can’t give me.”

That made my heart stop. “Are you… Are you breaking up with me?”

“… I’m sorry, Candy.”

I felt like crying. “No… please, no! We can get commitment; we can get promise rings or something. You know I’d never leave you, Seth, you know that!” And I meant it.

He was my everything! He couldn’t just… leave. Leave me here all alone…

“… We can give it a try, but promise rings? Come on, you’re more mature than that. Besides, I can’t afford something nice and you deserve the best.”

“I don’t need the best,” I stated. “Besides, you could get me a better one later.”

“Candy… do you know what promise rings promise?” Seth asked.

“Everything you promise…” I replied, but Seth shook his head.

“It promises a commitment.”

“Isn’t that what you wanted?”

Seth sighed. “It’s not good enough if you have nothing to back it up, Candy. Not enough money to get married, but not enough commitment that some silly rings would fix it.”

“You… you’d marry me?” I gasped, excited.

“Of course, Candy. I love you. Why else would I be dating you if I didn’t plan on going all the way?” He seemed so sure. “I just need… more.”

“Anything you need, Seth, I’ll give it to you.” I promised, begging him not to leave.

“You’re sure about that?” He asked.

Why did he need to ask that? He was my world, my everything! What wouldn’t I do for him? He loved me, and love is the most important thing there is. “Absolutely, you just name it!”

He didn’t name it right away, but he promised things would be better from now on.

He started seeing me a bit more often, but then whole days would pass without even a phone call. He said he was just trying to think things through…

I told him to stop thinking and just tell me what he needed.

And he did. He said it wasn’t a big deal—that everyone was doing it. He said it could be done in a meaningless way, or in a special way. A way that would guarantee commitment, which would be a bind that could never, ever be broken. It was the ultimate way to prove your love to a person.

He said he’d see me every day, that things would be perfect, that we’d be closer than ever before. He said I’d feel so much better, said I’d feel amazing, beautiful, glowing, everything all the woman on the commercial said I’d feel.

He said he loved me. And he was my everything. I was mature enough to handle anything. And a mature relationship required commitment, adult situations. And everyone was doing it, that’s what Seth said. He’d take care of me.

… So we slept together.

It was in his dorm on the tiny, smelly twin sized bed. I didn’t feel loved, or taken care of, I felt… weird. It mostly felt like I was just there for his use. It hurt, the first time. He had said it wouldn’t, but it did, and not in a good way. He didn’t talk to me, he didn’t slow down when I asked him to, and when it was over… he went to work. He got up, got dressed, and went to work.

I went home; worried that maybe I’d done something wrong. I didn’t feel better, I felt worse. I felt ugly, I felt like a toy. I was there for his use and had somehow let him down.

And he started working more. But I did see him every now and then, when he wanted to sleep with me. I started making him talk to me afterward, asking what it was he wanted, because our relationship wasn’t getting any better, it seemed to just be getting worse. The first time hurt the worse, but there was always this hope that Seth’s promises would come true.

He hated it when I made him talk about it, and when he did talk it was usually saying how I could improve.

Improve?

I wasn’t experienced in this, even though it seemed like he was. I didn’t care about ‘improving’ I just cared about him!

But enough was enough! I confronted him again, asked why he wasn’t keeping any of his promises! And he… he laughed at me. He said if I didn’t want to do things his way, then this was over. I told him it wasn’t fair, I told him he was a liar.

Then he held me down… and I was wrong, the first time didn’t hurt the worst. This did. I screamed for him to stop and he wouldn’t. I cried and begged him not to, told him he was hurting me.

When it was over this time, I tried to run, but he wouldn’t let me. I told him I’d tell the cops, he said it wouldn’t matter. Said everyone knew we were dating, hell I’d even put it on my myspace page. Said this was just something couples did, and the cops would understand that.

He said my parents would be furious and… he was right. I’d get in so much trouble.

Only after he stated all this did he let me go, and I ran.

Now here I was, sitting in my room with the door locked and my father’s gun.

They’d see the bruises around my wrists, my throat. They’d ask questions and I’d have to admit everything! I wasn’t mature enough, I was a child… it took one man to make me see that. I had nothing—nothing. Not even myself anymore, he’d taken everything from me.

He’d be the end of all my troubles. He was the reason I pulled the trigger.

After all… he was my everything.

I am an advocate for ending modern day slavery, and I hear about cases all the time where girls date men who will sell them to others… One girl I read about was dating a man over ten years older than her, because a friend of a friend said he was a good guy. She went missing a few weeks later.

I wrote this story as a warning, as a teaching tool, as a way to tell of true events in a fictional setting. Candy and Seth do not exist, but the people they represent do.

And that is my kind of writing.