Ghosts of the Past

Author's Note:

First off, this is not really a sexual story, but is posted in Loving Wives because the story it's based on started here.

This is a spin-off from my Castaway series. Here is the general timeline of stories. This story might not make a lot of sense if you don't read the series. All stores after Castaway 1-5 aren't required, but I suggest reading them all before this one.

-Castaway pt. 1-5

-Beach Bum

-Survival

-Perceptions

The two "People Watcher" stories are a complete off-shoot, but it's the same cast of characters listening to Tanya tell some stories.

(Notes about THIS story) I have always wanted to go back and tell Caitlin's story. I mean, why would anyone do what she'd done to her husband? How can anyone explain her actions to any satisfaction? Aside from the Martian Slut Ray (someone's probably got a patent or trademark pending for that one by now), what could cause a normal woman to go off the deep end like she did? Maybe she wasn't so normal after all...

This is also an experiment of sorts for me. The story is mostly told through dialog, between Caitlin and her counselor. I fully expect that this may not go over well. I'm not doing this story for a score, but to wrap up some very unanswered questions I think we all had (including me). As an author, sometimes the story flows as I type it, and at the end of this Castaway I never asked myself why would she do it in the first place? I hope Caitlin has filled in some holes for us all...

I need to give special thanks to my editors, Guinahart and SBrooks103x, who always find time to read through my garbage and attempt to clean it up. I especially appreciate when I'm told that what I've written makes no sense (because it's true). I have a terrible time telling myself that sometimes, so thank you!

Disclaimers:

It's probably too long. I probably don't know how to spell very well. Somewhere, a story like this one has likely already been told. If for some reason you make it to the end and still don't like it, I will gladly give you a refund.

***************

Ghosts of the Past

"Good afternoon, Caitlin. How has your week been going?"

I sat down on her comfortable couch, smiling at my Counselor, Elizabeth Conner. My nervous smile prefaced my answer. "I'm good, Elizabeth, thanks for asking. I've been trying to do my homework just like we talked about last week."

She returned my smile. "Good, that will give us a good starting point. I've told you that in order to understand your own life better, we needed to get it out in the open. You still have a lot that I think you haven't told anyone. Why don't we start with what you've added to the journal?"

"Well, the last entry we discussed was my first boyfriend and how he seemed like a nice guy, at least until the night he raped me."

"It's good that you can finally admit that. That was a big step for you. The sex you had with that young man was not consensual. You didn't give him permission, nor did you ask for it. You did nothing wrong, other than not reporting it. Sadly, that's all too common. Most rapes are never even reported, let alone investigated."

I nodded as she spoke, so glad to have someone to confide in. Sadly, I should have trusted James enough to tell him the true shit-show my life had been before meeting him. I had shed all the tears I could over losing him, but it had been entirely my fault. It had been preventable, had I just trusted him. Trust. That was something that I didn't do easily though.

"So, after he dumped me, I felt like total trash. I was a slut. I'd had sex. I was a virgin before that night, and afterwards I felt like a tramp. I mean, how could I feel any different? I could never confide in my mother, who basically just agreed with whatever my Dad said. Telling her about it was out of the question. He would have found out and whipped my ass for it."

"Did he do that a lot? Punish by spanking or hitting you?"

"Yeah, he did. When I was very young, it was normal to get a beating for doing something wrong. If I broke a glass or something, it always meant a sore behind. As I got older, it changed. He changed," I said, shivering at the memories of my father's cruelty.

"Anyhow, after that incident, I didn't really talk to any guys. I barely spoke to my male teachers, and my dad was only marginally better. Staff Sergeant Harry Smith had never truly left him, nor had his time in Vietnam. They say, once a Marine always a Marine. I believe that. He was a decorated war hero, but I think he was missing a part of himself after all of it. He never really talked about it much."

I shook my head, definitely way off topic. "Since last week, I added some more about him. About what he did to me..."

Silence hung in the air for a second before Elizabeth helped by smiling at me, reassuring me that this was a safe place to talk about this.

"Yes. My own father. How could he? I've pretended to love him since that last year of high school, but that was the year he became a monster. I never told James about him. I don't know why, maybe I was too ashamed?"

"Caitlin, I will keep reminding you of this. You did nothing wrong. Did you ask for what he did to you?" she asked gently.

"No, I didn't. I begged him to stop, actually. He ignored me."

"Did you ever tell your mother?"

"I was too ashamed, and I was certain she'd never believe me. I never told anyone, not even James."

She looked at me, smiled and gave me a nod. "You are starting to understand things better, I think. We still sound like we have a lot to discuss, but you are starting to understand that keeping a large part of your painful history from him was just another sign of your lack of trust."

"I know. After so many good years, I still had never truly learned to trust him. I didn't see it back then. My marriage was as close to perfect as it gets, and I still couldn't trust him."

I sniffled, grabbed a tissue and cleared my eyes. "My dad didn't just rape me like that guy did. No, he was far worse. He terrified me for that entire year until I was able to move out.

"I remember the first time it happened. My mom had gone to some conference for her work and he'd stayed home. The first day she was gone, he came home from work and went upstairs to shower like normal. After about a minute I heard the shower turn on, but then he yelled for me to come upstairs. He needed my help with something.

"He hadn't done anything to me before that point, aside from the painful reminders on my ass, so I went upstairs to see what he needed help with. He was in his bedroom with just a towel wrapped around his waist, and he smiled when I entered the room. It was odd, seeing him nearly naked like that, so naturally I looked away from him. I asked him what he needed help with, and that's when he grabbed me.

"He told me that he needed my help, that his wife was no longer doing it for him. I was confused and angry and tried to push him off me. I remember telling him that he was hurting me and to let me go."

"I still see his rage, the anger boiling just under the surface bursting as he hit me. He'd hit me in the stomach so hard that it knocked the air from my lungs." I closed my eyes, again reliving that horrible moment.

"Go on, Caitlin. It's okay," Elizabeth assured me. I blinked away the tears I thought I'd cried out already.

"Thank you. To this day I still see the anger on his face, the rage. He hit me so hard I couldn't breathe, and then he started ripping off my clothes, pushing me face down onto the bed. It was the worst thing I'd ever had happen to me, my own Dad..."

Elizabeth put her hand on mine, gently squeezing it. "It's okay, Caitlin. You're safe with me here and he can't ever do that to you again."

"Thank you," I said, blinking away the moisture gathered and running down my cheeks. I wiped my face with the tissue and soldiered on.

"After that first night, I was terrified. Each night after that, he would sneak into my room at night. He never said anything, just pulled my pajama's off and underwear down, and got on top of me. I lay there taking it, crying. I remember telling myself that maybe I deserved it. Maybe I did something to earn this punishment he was giving me."

"That's not true, Caitlin. You never deserved it. That wasn't punishment for anything you did wrong. It was a sick act of violence, of control and power. A large percentage of rapes are due to some form of control issues. How were things at home during that time with your mom?"

"Hah, my mom. The only good thing she did for me at the time was take me to the doctor's to get on birth control. I learned to pretend everything was fine and completely ignored her. I tried to tell her once, about my dad. I no more than suggested he was doing something with me that I didn't want, and she yelled at me. She called me a liar and didn't talk to me for a month. When she did, it was to give me an instruction or something equally as impersonal. She never believed me, so I went along with the notion that nothing wrong was happening. Every night, I cried myself to sleep after he would leave my room."

"Do you still talk to them?"

"Occasionally, but mostly just to let them know what's going on with my daughter, Madison. I don't call my mom and spend hours on the phone with her or anything like that."

"When did the abuse stop?"

"That's easy, when I left for college. I no longer lived under the same roof, so he couldn't sneak into my bed at night anymore." I closed my eyes and again tried to put those horrible nights behind me.

"I can see it still hurts, doesn't it? It's okay, you need to let it out."

Her words were warm, comforting. I broke down and am not ashamed to admit that. "How could he... be... such a monster?" I hiccoughed out between sobs.

Eventually, I stopped shaking and got ahold of myself. "Sorry."

"Don't be sorry, I'm glad you trust me enough to tell me about the pain in your life. That's why you're here, right? You wanted to better understand why things happened in your life, in your failed marriage. I think we're making great progress in getting you to open up and be honest about some pretty bad stuff. Rape is a crime, Caitlin, and you are the victim here, not the criminal."

"Thank you," I sniffled. I seemed to be doing that a lot in her presence.

Without even glancing at the clock, she instinctively knew that it had been an hour already. "For next week, I want you to keep writing in the journal about your time in college. You can tell me all about it."

I stood and hugged her, thanking her as I left. On the trip to my car, I tried to remember happier times, when we'd been a whole family. I did this to myself a lot, thinking about my happy home with James and Madison.

It would be a long week ahead.

***************

"Welcome back, Caitlin. How has your week been?"

"You ask me that every time, and you know what, I've had a pretty shitty week."

"Sorry to hear that. I ask how your week has been every session because I'm genuinely interested. I always hope you have a good week, but now that you've shared it was not good, do you want to talk about it?"

"Well for starters, work was terrible. I hate my job and I hate the assholes I work for. My boss tried to make a pass at me yesterday. What an ass! I told him to fuck off and die. He's married with two kids, the prick!"

Elizabeth snickered at my comment, smiling at me. I once again silently thanked heaven for a person like her in my life.

"Then, I get back to my apartment and checked my mail. I got a postcard from Maddy, from Hawaii again. I know she's trying to cheer me up, but honestly it just reminds me of how fucked up my life is. I should be with her. I should be with him."

"How about we talk about your journal some more? Have you made any progress since last time we spoke? I think you were heading off to college, right?"

She was right to change the subject, even if she was being as subtle as a jack-hammer. I need to stop thinking about what my life should be and live the life that I do have. I thought about what I'd written in my journal since last week.

"So yeah, I got out of the house by going to college. It was everything I'd hoped it would be, at first. I was free from my parents, free from my dad. Classes were interesting, and I made some friends that I got along with really well. I hadn't met any guys that were boyfriend material, but I did have a few one-night stands. I mean, it was college, right?

"I tried to enjoy them, but there was no connection. I think one of the guys managed to get me off, but the others were done before I felt like we got started. My first summer I stayed for the summer session. My excuse to my parents was that I wanted to graduate as quickly as possible."

"I'm just guessing, but you did that to avoid your father, right?"

I nodded. She knew me so well already. "Yeah, I couldn't stand the idea of spending another night under his roof. Anyhow, that next fall semester is when I met Jack. He and I started dating and quickly became a very dedicated and exclusive couple. He made me laugh, and the sex turned out to be pretty spectacular. We wound up moving into an off-campus apartment together.

"He lied to me, too. He swore to me that I was the only woman in his life, that I was the one. Heh, what a crock of shit. A professor was sick one day, so class was cancelled. What a fucking cliché. I came back to the apartment to find him banging the blonde from next door. I yelled at him and left, but he somehow convinced me to give him another chance. He said he was sorry, that he'd never do it again. I should have known better. Things were good for a while before I got suspicious that he was doing it again. He seemed to be showering more often than normal and kept saying it was because he was working out at the gym.

"It didn't even come as a shock, the day that I skipped class and watched him go next door to her apartment. He figured that if he wasn't in our apartment, I wouldn't find out. Needless to say, I moved back into the dorms after that."

"So, he cheated on you twice? That's awful."

"After that, I buried my head in the books and focused on my grades. I was doing well, until I met Tatiana. She and I quickly became friends, sharing the same distaste for men after being burned. She had a similar story to mine, both the problems at home as well as college. Her older brother had caught her smoking pot and used it to blackmail her into having sex with him. Thankfully for her, she'd reported it to the police, and he was eventually convicted of rape."

"Was she a good friend?"

"For a long time, yes. I moved out of the dorms and we became roommates. We shared everything in that apartment, including each other. I trusted her, and felt she cared about me, so it felt natural when we became lovers."

"Did your husband ever know that you had been with a woman before?" she prodded.

"No. Just like a lot of things, I never told him about that. I told him I dated a few people before him, but never really in any detail."

"Why not tell him that one was a woman?"

"Honestly, at first, I was worried that he wouldn't approve, and it would cost me my relationship with him. After a while, it was easier to just leave it in the past."

"In any relationship it's critical to have good communication. The past is just that. History."

"I know, Elizabeth, and I regret not talking to him about my past more than ever." I took a sip of water and continued. "Tatiana and I had something special. She seemed to understand me, and we got along great in between the sheets, too. All of that came crashing down when she told me that she was going out on a date, with a man.

"I begged her not to go, that I wanted her all to myself. I told her that I loved her, but it didn't even faze her. She told me she was just going to dinner and a movie, nothing that serious. What she didn't tell me was that she would bring him back to the apartment with her.

"I was deep into some homework, trying to block out the pain of her going out, when I heard them. She was giggling like she was drunk, and I heard some whispering between them. I was shocked when Tatiana opened my door, stumbling in and introducing the guy she brought home. I was pissed, so I told her to get the fuck out. She started crying, drunk and belligerently trying to say she was sorry. Apparently, the dude she brought home still expected to get laid, so he pushed her onto my bed, pulling her pants down and off her legs. He pulled his own pants down and moved on top of her while she was crying. I tried to help stop him, but he just pushed her aside and roughly grabbed me. He raped us both that night, beating me until both of my eyes were puffy and nearly closed. She was so out of it that she didn't put up much of a fight."

"Oh my god, Caitlin. Please tell me you reported it?" Elizabeth begged.

"Yeah, for all the good it did me. He was arrested and ended up getting 10 years in prison. I blamed Tatiana for cheating on me, but mostly I blamed myself for trusting her. She had been just like all the others, lying to me. Had she truly cared about me, she never would have gone on that date. I think that was the point when I learned that I couldn't trust anyone."

"What happened after that? Did you go back and finish school?"

"Yup, even graduated with honors. Tatiana tried to beg for forgiveness, but I was done with her. I moved back into the dorms and ended up staying there until I graduated. I stayed single after college intentionally, that is until I met James."

Again, Elizabeth seemed to have a sixth sense of the time, as she stood up. "Caitlin, what I want you to do for next week is spend some time writing about the early years with James. Really open up to how you felt about him, how you interacted with each other. Sound good?"

I left the office with bloodshot eyes and feeling good about it. It felt good telling someone of the pain I'd endured.

***************

My "homework" had been a tough assignment to get through, using a lot of tissues to mop up the tears I thought I'd already cried out. I had been tasked with writing about my early years with James in my journal, and it had been a bittersweet trip down memory lane.

"Last time we spoke, I asked you to write in your journal about James, and the first few years with him. How did that go?"

"It was tough, I'm not gonna lie. I had to look back at some really great memories, and some not so great memories."

"Let's start with the great memories. What did you write down about those?"

"My first entry was about when we met. I had already graduated college and was working at my first job with a small manufacturing company in Richmond. Dating wasn't even on my radar then, having sworn off love in general as a waste of time.

"I had to fly to New York to help for a presentation of a new idea to some venture capital group. On the return trip, James was riding along as a passenger. He had just started flying for that airline, and we struck up a conversation during the short flight.

"He was so charming that I forgot about my self-imposed celibacy for a time, and just enjoyed the conversation. We mostly talked about what we were currently doing with our lives, and what we did for fun. James was really funny, and his wit was amazing. He was confident, and I was responding to that.

"Before we went our separate ways, he stopped me and asked if I would like to go to dinner with him sometime. We went to a very nice place, don't remember the name of it now, but it was a wonderful night."