Chapter 7 Behind The Bar
AGNES
I sat on the bus, staring out the window and giving the home I had grown to love with Adams one final goodbye.
I was going back, back to the dirty pit I swore I would never return to.
My stomach felt sick and I had squeezed my knuckles so hard that they had turned pale. My mind drifted back to the note I had left for Adams, feeling regret swarm my belly.
I told him not to come looking.
I hated myself for writing it and I hated myself even more for being thrown back into this twisted game with a man that I had done everything to escape.
I was back on Tony’s radar.
Back when I met Tony, he hadn’t been this violent, evil, blackmailing pig. He had been nice and charming and beautiful and I had fallen in love with him. He used to come by the diner where I worked, bringing me flowers and gifts until I had accepted to be his girlfriend and then he changed.
All of a sudden, he didn’t want me to work anymore, he didn’t want me to hang out with any of my friends. I was young and naive and I mistook his intensity for devotion. I used to joke about liking how possessive he was until his possessiveness started to suffocate me.
Then he claimed that he hated the way other men looked at me and made me dress in longer, less fitting clothing so I would look less like a ‘whore’.
Through all this, I had deceived myself into thinking it was normal, that he just didn’t want anyone to take me from him, but the scale fell off my eyes the day I walked into his apartment and found him with another girl.
That was the day I saw the real Tony, I had confronted him angrily, screaming in tears, asking him why he would cheat on me. Tony had been nonchalant, refusing to apologize or even beg for my forgiveness, so I told him it was over and it was like his mask slipped, because as the words left my mouth, he slapped me hard across my cheek.
I remember standing there in a daze, feeling the sting of his attack, with tears rolling down my eyes.
That was the day I left him.
But Tony refused to let me go.
He started sending apologetic messages, sending flowers and notes to my apartment and when I didn’t respond to that, he started sending threatening messages, warning me that if I didn’t come back then it wouldn’t end well for me. I tried to block him but he always found a different number.
And then the worst happened.
He sent me a text that still makes me shiver when I think of it.
“If you don’t meet with me, someone will get hurt. Don’t test me, Agnes. You are mine.”
That was the night I gave in and met with him.
I found him at the back, standing beside his car with a cigarette in his mouth.
I still remember the way his eyes lit up when he saw me.
“You came,” he said with a smile.
I frowned, folding my arms. “You didn’t exactly give me a choice.”
“I don’t know why you are allowing my little mistake to stand in between us Agnes, I know you miss me, I miss you too,” Tony said, stepping closer to me.
I stayed in place, refusing to allow him to intimidate me.
“You cheated on me and hit me, that wasn’t a small mistake,” I fired back at him, then his countenance changed.
“Since you left me, you have started dressing like a whore again,” Tony said venomously, his eyes dropping down to my jean clad body, making the exposed skin on my arms and legs produce goosebumps.
He was a monster, I had just been too blind to see it.
“You can call me whatever you like Tony,” I said coldly, glaring up at him. “But we are over, let this be the last time you threaten me or send me any weird messages, or I will involve the police—”
Before I could finish my sentence, Tony slapped me so hard that I felt my jaw shift. Tears welled in my eyes from the pain and I turned to him in fear, stumbling backwards.
He followed me until I was backed up against the wall.
“What do you think you are doing?” I asked, like my heart wasn’t racing in fear.
Tony didn’t answer, instead his hands found my shirt and ripped my blouse open, exposing my bra to him.
“Tony stop!” I screamed, trying to push him off me.
He laughed cruelly. “Since you want to dress like a slut then I am going to treat you like a slut.
He held my wrists down with one hand while the other hand went underneath my skirt, fondling my thighs until he reached my underwear.
“Please I beg of you, stop!!!” I cried loudly, hoping someone would hear us and come to my rescue.
But no one was coming.
Tony ripped my panties away and started fumbling with his belt, as he held me down.
He pulled out his cock while his eyes glinted cruelly at me. “I know you have missed this.”
Suddenly, he shoved me to the ground, making me land on the hard concrete with my knees.
I dragged myself up, trying to crawl away but he was faster and stronger. He grabbed my waist, pulled me back to him and lifted up my skirt, pressing his hard length against my thighs.
“God please,” I cried out. “Please don’t let him do this.”
I closed my eyes, trembling in fear and resignation. He was going to force himself on me, he was going to hurt me right here at the back of this bar.
Just as he was about to penetrate, a huge force pushed him off me.
The force turned out to be Adams, he had appeared like a knight in shining armor and saved me. I remember staring at him as he was beating Tony up while I arranged my clothes. He had saved me that night with no questions and since then I had lived with him, feeling too scared to go back to my house so that Tony won’t find me again.
But all good things have to come to an end.
The bus came to a stop and I looked up only to find that I was back here again. Back in the same street, across the damned bar that Tony had assaulted me in.
I was back like a sheep being led to the slaughterhouse.
I wanted to run. God, every part of me wanted to bolt. But Tony had me by the throat again, not with his hands this time, but with the secret he still held.
The pictures, those pictures I had sent to him when I was still head over heels in love with him, now he was using them to make me face him again.
Now there was no going back.
The bus door hissed open, and I stepped down, every muscle in my body tensed immediately, my palms clammy with fear.
The bar loomed ahead, dark and familiar. I swallowed hard.
Tony was waiting.
And I had no choice but to face him again.