MORE THAN THAT
Chapter Twenty-Three

The following day, Friday, was another day off from school, due to the horrible snowstorm. Of course, all the students were happy, since it was supposed to be the last day of the semester. That meant the next two weeks were only midterms, so they only had to go to school if they had a test.

What Rose hated about this was that Cal didn't have school at all, since he was a senior. She couldn't stand being smothered by him anymore. If only she could tell him, but she was scared, frightened by what he could do to her. However, there would be no more Lovejoy.

That boy scared her so much. The way he looked at her freaked her out. The way he spoke to her sent shivers down her spine. What was his problem? Especially the day before. What did he mean by payback? Did he have something in store for here? She hoped not, because she knew it'd be something horrible.

Rose lay flat out on her bed, hoping that she'd get to spend a Friday night alone. However, she knew if Cal came around, she'd be forced to hang out with him. Sometimes she felt like calling Christina. They always knew how to have fun together, even if it was only hanging out at each other's houses.

Then, most times, she wished it were Jack she was with. Only if she had met him before Cal. Everything would have been all right. He'd never treat her the way Cal did. It seemed as though he knew her well, and they'd known each other for only four months. There was something about Jack that made her feel connected with him. Like they had known each other in a past life.

Nothing would ever happen between them, though. Not as long as Cal was around.

*****

"What are you talking about, Lovejoy?" Cal asked his best friend. Lovejoy acted perfectly well with his facial expressions, pretending to feel bad about what he had just told Cal.

They were in Cal's living room, hanging out like on any normal Friday night. Lovejoy was putting his plan to destroy Rose in motion. He was enjoying every moment of this.

"I'm telling you she cheated on you with that Jack character," Lovejoy told his friend, pretending to feel sorry for telling Cal. "I hate to be the one to tell you this, man." Lovejoy placed a hand on his shoulder.

"My sweetpea wouldn't do that to me! She loves me!" Cal said, beginning to get irate. "Why would she do that to me with a gutter rat like him?"

"Since you don't take my word for it, read it for yourself!" Lovejoy said. He took her journal out and handed it over to Cal.

"Where did you get this?" Cal asked.

"She dropped it yesterday. I forgot to hand it back to her," Lovejoy lied. "It fell open to the page, and when I read it, I had to see if it was more than once. Read it for yourself. It is the entry of the day after her birthday."

Cal did as he said and flipped to the date. He read it, and his face grew red with anger. His temper was at an all time high. How could she have done it? Why would she kiss someone else?

"There is another time. On Halloween," he informed Cal.

"I don't want to read it now," Cal said, shutting the book. "My dear Rose, what a horrible thing to do. Go home, Lovejoy. She needs to be taught a lesson."

"I am so sorry." Lovejoy once again acted, and left with a smirk on his face.

*****

On another isolated Friday night, Christina and Jack once again hung out with each other, at her house this time. However, it felt weird after what had happened the day before with Tommy. It broke Christina's heart to know that she had hurt him badly like that. She blamed herself for the demise of his friendship with Jack. If only she could go back to the night of the party, then she'd change the fact that she had kissed Jack.

Jack tried calming her down, to no avail. He hated seeing one of his best friends distraught. Although he knew he and Tommy would still be friends if Christina had never kissed him, he didn't blame her. In fact, he understood why she had done it. How would he feel if he saw the one he loved flirting with someone else? It was even worse that it was Tommy's ex, the girl he had left for Christina. In a vulnerable and impulsive state, Christina had kissed the first guy she saw, and it had just happened to be Jack.

They sat in silence, not paying any attention to the movie they were watching. Instead, Christina wrote more poetry about Tommy, and Jack drew more pictures of Rose. They didn't need to speak to each other, just as long as they kept each other company.

Jack would look over at Christina writing and smile at her. In return, she'd do the same. Both always knew what the other was thinking, because they knew how it felt to be painfully in love.

Tommy was all that Christina had ever wanted, and Rose was Jack's dream girl. Christina wished her old friend would open her eyes already and see what was right there in front of her. She knew the old Rose would have. Someway, somehow, the old Rose was still there. Christina could feel it, and she guessed that Jack could, too. It was no wonder he had fallen so hard for her.

The doorbell rang, and Christina slowly got up to answer it. "That must be our food," she said.

She answered the door and couldn't believe her eyes.

*****

Cal came over Rose's house unexpectedly. He just stated that they were going for a car ride. He seemed normal, like he didn't know a thing. Rose got into the car, wondering where he was taking her.

He just turned on the radio and tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. Whenever they stopped at a red light, he'd just look at her and smile. She didn't know what was coming, and Cal couldn't be happier with that.

About twenty minutes later, Cal parked his car by the Brighton Beach boardwalk. It seemed odd to her that he'd bring her there, since it was winter and they never came here. The last time she had come to these parts was to see Christina, which was so long ago.

"Why are we here, Cal?" Rose asked with a smile.

"I don't know. It just seemed more peaceful here."

"Oh. Okay."

"Do you want to tell me how long you've been carrying on an affair with that loser Jack Dawson?" Rose's mouth dropped open at the question.

"What are you talking about?" Rose yelled.

"Don't fuck with me, Rose! I know that you kissed him at the Halloween party and in the school library, you little slut!" Cal was outraged and grabbed her hair with one hand. The other wrapped around her throat. Rose coughed, desperately wanting him to let go. Cal mocked her and let her go.

"What?" Rose couldn't believe he knew.

"You're gonna pretend you don't know what I am talking about? You actually thought you could get away with it?" Cal slapped her.

"How?" Rose asked, wanting to know who he had heard it from.

"I'll tell you how!" Cal opened the glove compartment and took out her journal. "This is how I fucking found out!" Rose was shocked when she saw what he held in his hand. He had read her journal. She couldn't believe he had read her innermost private thoughts.

"Where'd you get that from?" Rose asked.

"Don't worry about that now. I thought you had finally learned your lesson. I guess you're stupider than I thought," Cal insulted her.

"I'm not stupid! Give me my journal back!" Rose screamed. Cal grew furious with her, not believing that she had just yelled at him.

"You want your journal back? Take it back!" Cal threw the journal right at her face. "I'm gonna teach you a lesson that will make you never want to disobey me again!" Rose was scared of the sound of his voice. There was something very eerie about it.

Cal attacked her, climbing right on top of her body. He pulled the recliner to make the passenger seat go back. Rose began to scream, but he instantly clamped his hand over her mouth.

"You like this, don't you, Rose?" Cal teased her, uncovering her mouth.

"Get off me!" Rose yelled at the top of her lungs. This only made Cal even more frustrated. He slapped her right across the face.

"Shut the fuck up!" he yelled at her. Rose began to fight, trying to claw him with her fingernails. Being the strong guy that he was, he grabbed her wrists tightly, making her cry out. He bound them together and held them over her head with one hand as he slapped her again. "Don't move!"

He took his other hand and slipped them inside her sweatpants and down into her underwear. With two of his fingers, he plunged them into her opening, making her cry out in pain on purpose. He kept going deeper, making her cry out in pain.

"Cal, you're hurting me!" Rose cried out, but he would not stop.

"You like it! I'm gonna go into you so rough you won't even know what hit you!" With those words, Rose knew he was planning on raping her.

Cal made the mistake of letting her go and getting off of her to sit up and unbuckle his belt. Rose instinctively grabbed her journal from the side of the passenger seat and smacked him across the head with it. She kicked him in the face repeatedly with all her strength. Quickly, she unlocked the door and crawled out of the car.

"You're not going anywhere!" Cal grabbed her legs, and she screamed. She flipped herself over and kicked him in the face again. Cal cursed as he held his nose, creeping his way towards Rose. She moved back, with the journal clutched in her hand. He suddenly pounced on her, pinning her to the ground. He knocked her mouth with his fist, a stream of blood beginning to flow down the side of her jaw. Continuously, he slapped her, hitting her harder and harder across the face. At one point he even hit her in the eye.

Rose hoped this was just a horrible nightmare, but she knew it couldn't be. Somehow, she managed to free the arm without the journal in her hand. She dug her nails right into his crotch, and he began to wail. She pushed him off her and got to her feet.

Rose kicked him in the ribcage over and over again. She wouldn't stop, taking out all the hatred she held for him. It was for all he times he had ever laid a hand on her. Before she could kick him again, he caught her foot and got back up. It seemed that he had too much strength. He grabbed her by the throat, but before he could do anything, Rose gave him a hard kick in the groin. Cal fell to the ground, and Rose immediately ran.

She had to get out of there. She didn't want to go home, so instead Rose ran to the first place she could think of that was closest--Christina's place.

It took her only a few minutes to run there, since Christina only lived two blocks away from the boardwalk. Rose was nervous, not having gone there in such a long time.

When she reached the house, Rose slowly walked up the steps. Her hands trembled as she rang the doorbell. Her heart pounded fast when she heard Christina opening the doors. When she finally opened the front door, there was a look of shock on Christina's face.

"Oh, my God! What happened?" Christina asked, extremely concerned.

"Christina, what's wrong?" Rose heard Jack's voice ask.

"I should go," Rose said, and turned around to leave.

"Rose?" She heard Jack call her name, and stopped dead in her tracks. Keep going, Rose! she told herself. Instead, she slowly turned her body around and looked at Jack standing behind Christina.

"Hi," she whispered. Jack covered his mouth. He knew this was the work of Cal. She had cuts over her eyebrow. The corner of her lip was bleeding. Her eye was beginning to bruise. Only a monster would do something like this. "I’d better go."

"You're not going anywhere! You need to get cleaned up!" Christina grabbed Rose's arm before she could leave and dragged her inside the living room, sitting her down. "I'm gonna go get some ice and a cloth."

When Christina went into the kitchen, Jack just stared at Rose looking down at the floor. All these thoughts ran into his head about what he wanted to do to Cal. What made Cal snap this badly? Jack wondered.

"So…" Jack only managed to say.

"So what?"

"What happened?" Jack quickly asked.

Before Rose could answer, Christina came back into the room with a cloth and a bowl of ice cubes. They watched as she placed a bunch of cubes onto the cloth and wrapped it up.

"Here." She handed it over to Rose. "Put this on your mouth and put more ice on it for your eye," Christina instructed her. "What'd your crazy boyfriend do now?" Christina bluntly asked. Jack gave her a look. "What? I'm assuming he did this to you, since he is the only crazy asshole I know of!"

Rose laughed at her comment. "Well, Christina, your assumptions are correct. He read my journal and found out about Jack and me kissing in the bathroom on Halloween and the day after my birthday!" Jack opened his eyes wide. So now Cal knew, and it was his actions that had led to Cal's craziness.

"Shit. I'm so sorry, Rose! This wouldn't have happened if it weren't for me," Jack apologized.

"Don't blame yourself. It took the both of us to do it." Rose gave him a weak smile.

"So, what's the whole story?" Christina asked. Rose gulped and told them the frightful event.

*****

After hearing her story, Christina and Jack were left disgusted. Who could do something so sadistic and twisted as trying to rape their own girlfriend? Christina cursed in Spanish, horrified by the graphic details. She was happy that Tommy wasn't at all like that. Tommy is a good guy, Christina thought to herself. Before she could start crying, she turned her attention back to Rose.

Jack couldn't believe the audacity Cal had had in putting his hands on Rose. He couldn't fathom the thought. Someone as beautiful and kind as Rose did not deserve this treatment. Cal had gone too far this time.

"I'm so glad you kicked his ass!" Christina clenched her fists.

"Yeah. It was my only escape. By the way, sorry that I just showed up here like that. I haven't been here in so long. I just didn't know where else to go. I know he'd never think of me coming here," Rose said.

"You don't have to apologize, Rose. It's not your fault your boyfriend is a nut job. You're welcome anytime you want." Christina smiled at her old best friend.

"Thanks." Rose sighed. "I'm scared to go home and have my parents see me like this. They can't know what Cal has done. It will get back to his parents, and Nathan Hockley will accuse me of being some kind of whore. Cal will probably be at my house, as well, waiting for me."

"Then don't go home, Rose," Jack suggested.

"What?" Rose asked.

"Don't go home. Stay here. Only if it is okay with you, Christina." Jack looked over at his friend.

"I don't mind at all," Christina responded.

"What about your mom and stepdad?" Rose wondered.

"You know them. They always go away," Christina answered.

"Okay, but what about your sisters?"

"Camilla doesn't even live here anymore. She lives with our dad. Celia won't mind. She will understand. You know that. Remember, she was the one who always gave us the best advice."

"I don't know, guys," Rose said.

"Oh, come on! It will be like old times!" Christina pleaded. Rose found it weird that Christina was begging her, since they weren't close anymore.

"Besides, we're concerned for your safety," Jack said. Rose could tell that, in his heart, he truly did feel like he needed to protect her.

"Fine. I'll stay," Rose agreed, due to Jack's conviction.

"Good!" Christina said.

"One thing, Rose," Jack said.

"What is it?" she asked.

"You now know that you have to break up with him, right?" Jack asked, to make sure she didn't go back to him like always.

Rose paused. She was definitely sure now. This was the end. No more of his abuse and bringing her down. She wasn't going to take it anymore. "I know. I know for sure now."

Chapter Twenty-Four
Stories