The only Hope

Gerard’s pov:

Her legs were so smooth and thin. Her skin was similar to porcelain, she was like a doll. So fragile… I moved my hands up her legs slowly, caressing every single wound and scar. She didn’t deserve this, all this damage and these little red stains on her perfect skin.

I suddenly realized I had moved my hand too far up as her body began to tremble. I quickly withdrew my hand and cleared my throat.

“Stand.” I said calmly. She did as she was told, her body still shivering a bit.

Now I pulled the pants all the way up and turned away. What the hell were you thinking Gerard!? You don’t even know anything about her! Besides, she’s underage.

“I’ll be downstairs with Ghoul. You take your time.” I couldn’t even look her in the eye anymore, knowing she felt uncomfortable and knowing I wouldn’t be able to stop staring and thinking about what just had happened. Shit. I made my way downstairs, leaving her in a confused state I guess.

“Is she coming?” Frank lifted his eyebrows. His question woke me up from my thoughts.

“Yeah, she’ll be a minute.” I sat down at the table.

“You know, that was the second time I asked that question.” Frank grinned.

“What?” I wasn’t really concentrating and I think he knew.

“That’s what I mean! You’re distracted! What happened up there? She okay?”

“Yeah she’s fine.” Frank also sat at the table now, pushing a bowl of cereal to the side, where Hope’s supposed to sit.

“That’s all… You’re gonna share with me?” Frank looked a little insulted and his voice went low.

“Nothing happened, what do you want me to say?” I got a little frustrated now.

“Then why are you whispering and getting angry with me?” I looked away. Shit. I hadn’t noticed I was whispering. I felt Frank glaring at me.

Suddenly we heard someone walking down the stairs, it was Hope. She had her hair in a bun this time, I kind of liked it. I looked at Frank again, he pulled up a chair for her.

“Here you go sweetcheeks, breakfast!” Hope smiled back at Frank and thanked him.

At this point I wasn’t really sure of my case anymore. I wanted to talk, but what if she brought up the touching? What if she told Frank? Eventually Frank decided to start the conversation.

“So… Poison told me you were trained to be a Killjoy…” Thanks Frank. But yeah I told him. “Would you like to explain that?” I noticed I had been staring at her eating her cereal. I moved my chair a bit, trying to look a bit bossy, in control so to speak.

“Did he now…?” She glared back at me, but I wasn’t going to let her dominate my stern look. I looked straight back at her and at some point she lowered her eyes. Victory.

“Well…” She continued. “There’s not much to say really. I was trained when I was younger. My training started around the age of 7. I learned to observe and stuff like that. After that I learned to fight and how to hold a gun.”

“Oh so you cán shoot?” I meant this as a joke for not being able to shoot me, but she completely took it the wrong way.

“You’re just lucky you’re baby brother saved your sorry ass ánd that I am not armed right now.” Her eyes fired daggers and she ate some more cereal. Not breaking eye contact.

Frank shot a weird look at me, then continued the conversation.

“Who trained you?”

“My father.” She said with her mouth full of cereal. I saw that Frank expected a better answer than that, so I leaned in over the table.

“Aaand…?”

“And nothing, end of story.” Okay, she really didn’t want to talk about this. I guess she found it a bit too personal.

“Okay, but what about Korse?” Frank asked bluntly.

He immediately regretted his question as he saw she had dropped her spoon.

“What about him?” Her voice was low and she looked away while chewing.

“How… How did he get to you?” Frank looked at me and made some signs with his hands. I guess he had no idea what he was doing.

“Yeah, why were you there in the first place?” I added. I wanted the truth now.

She glared at me again, eyes narrowed. Then she sighed and dropped her eyes to her cereal bowl.

“I… I was 16 when he came for me. At first thing weren’t so bad, he treated me right.” She swallowed. “But then he started looking at me differently. I realized the reason I was there.”

She shifted a bit on her chair and crossed her arms a bit awkwardly.

“He needed a successor.” I gulped. I felt like I had to ask just to be sure.

“So he abducted you, just so you could… ‘deliver’ him a successor?”

“Oh no, he didn’t abduct me.” She looked a bit confused by my question. “My father just gave me away.”

Her look was now a bit disgusted. No wonder she didn’t want to talk about her father.

She continued. “Two days before I turned sixteen my dad sat down with me. He told me that very soon someone was coming to get me and that it was okay. I didn’t want to leave, but he said it was for the best.”

Wow, she was opening up now.

“I’m going to ask you something really inappropriate. If you’re not willing to answer or talk about it at all just say so.” Frank’s tone was serious. I wondered what he wanted to ask.

“Hit me.” She seemed fearless.

“What happened with Korse? Did he really get what he wanted from you?” My fists clenched at this thought.

She remained silent for a short time, but then found the courage to answer.

“He had only been… Well…” She looked at the ground, she was obviously not comfortable talking about this. She ended up not saying the word. “…for about six months.”

I interrupted her. “Only!?” Her body shocked. There was no going back now. I snapped at the thought of Korse actually abusing her.

“Only six months?” I looked at her with disbelief. Six months was a hell of a long time.

“Poison, please let her finish her story…” Frank facepalmed.

“So you think I should’ve been abused the entire time I was there!?” She stood up and threw her chair back.

“N… No! God no!” What was she thinking? I meant that six months was… Oh fuck.

She was sobbing now, Frank was trying to comfort her.

“Shit, Hope. I didn’t mean it that way. I meant that six months is pretty damn long and you act like it were “only” six months, it just doesn’t make sense to me.”

She yelled now. “I thank God every single day on my bare knees that it was only six months, yes!”

I understood now. She had been there at least a year. Frank shook his head at me.

“I’m sorry, I’m so terribly sorry.” I gave her a worried look.

“I’ll be outside for a sec…” She ran outside and closed the door behind her. I still saw her sobbing.

“Fuck.” I muttered.

“Gerard, you don’t tell somebody how she has been abused…” Frank smiled for a second, but then he realized his joke was a bit inappropriate and it disappeared.

“I know, I just hate the way she’s being all tough about this. I want her to talk, not act like nothing actually happened.” The table was now supporting my head.

“I get that, but give her time.”

“We don’t have time, Korse is coming back for her I know it!” And with that I saw Hope in the corner of my eye. I raised my head.

Fuck, did she hear what we said?

Notes