Page 11 of Shade
Nothing ever made me feel the way I do on a bike, well, expect Rhya.
I used to feel that way around Rhya, but that was a long time ago. Before the abuse, before the drugs, all of it, she made me feel alive. Probably because most of the time I was with her I was doing something illegal that could land my ass in jail or like dirt bikes, dead.
Not anymore.
Now there’s only sadness and her using me. With the change in my thoughts, I think about her and remember in detail me telling her I was done. Was I? Could I be?
Before the plane takes off, I send Auden and text message to check on Rhya for me.
Me: Can you check on Rhya for me later.
Auden: Yeah, I’ll swing by later and check on her. Safe flight.
I turn my phone off and tuck it in my bag before takeoff.
I want to get some sleep before we arrive in Seattle in a few hours, but my mind keeps drifting back to Rhya and the things I said to her.
Like it or not, I’ve always been a Band-Aid for Rhya. She uses me to erase the bad. She lived a life of sex, drugs, and bad decisions. From an early age, she chain-smoked and fucked. She was deep into the lifestyle of fucking people over at the time, and I wasn’t just innocent to the ways of the world she was in, I was oblivious.
After that night at Glen Helen when she was raped by her brother’s best friend, she begged me to have sex with her. I don’t know why either. We were just friends, or I thought we were. Naturally I was attracted to her, but at fourteen I think I was attracted to anything with tits.
Every chance she had, she was kissing me and attempting to get me to fuck her. I was fourteen and she was thirteen. I wasn’t even thinking about sex like that, but she was for some reason. She grew up faster than she needed to and it wasn’t by choice. Unfortunately for me, because of that, she forced me to as well.
I understood it, in part, but then again, I had no idea what happened that night in Glen Helen would pave the way for what was to come. I really didn’t. At the time, I didn’t know about what her father and uncle did to her either. Jaime was just the dam breaking to the point of no repair.
When she was fourteen and I was fifteen, we began messing around physically. Innocent touching at first, but there is nothinginnocentabout Rhya Morgan. She was trouble from the beginning, and to this day I don’t know if anything she ever told me was the truth. I don’t know if any of it was.
After a few blow jobs and me fingering her a time or two, I finally had sex with her, my first time, her. . . I have no idea. It was when I was sixteen and she was fifteen. It was after a race at Glen Helen again, and she ended up sleeping in our trailer, and she got into my sleeping bag with me in the bunk. Luckily for me, my brothers were out causing trouble and didn’t catch us. Rhya cried the entire time. I hated myself after that night.
I turned my head because while she was crying, she wouldn’t let me go and kept begging me to continue. I didn’t want to stop, but I also didn’t know what to do. I wanted to erase the memories for her. It never worked.
And that was my first mistake and has continued ever since for the last five years. Whenever something bad happened to Rhya, she used me to forget about it.
Rhya and I have never had an actual defined relationship. Two weeks after she had sex with me, she was back to messing around with other motocross racers, and then back to me again.
It’s a fucked up situation. I stayed loyal to her for over two years and then lost interest and moved onto other girls. The closest I’ve ever come to a relationship is Rhya though, and that should tell you a lot about my current love life. Non-fucking-existent and usually consists of whatever girl manages to have the balls to come up to me. I’ve never even been on an actual date with a girl. Unless buying them drinks at a bar all night and then fucking them in a bathroom counts.
Probably not though, huh?
About the time the plane takes off, Willa looks over at me from her phone. “What happened with Rhya? Anything I need to know about?”
Willa’s in the business of protecting me publicly, and there have been a few times where she’s had to defend my actions with Rhya to the media and their ever-present curiosity into Shade Sawyer’s love life. They know about Rhya, her drug use and my inability to cut her out of my life. I hate that they know, too. Mostly because it paints the picture of me being weak and I don’t want to be known asthatguy. I don’t know anyone who would.
I’m not entirely sure how to answer Willa’s question.
I don’t know what happened with Rhya. Now that I’m away from those lying eyes, I think I want to call her and apologize, and I know it’s wrong.
If I tell Willa any of that, she’ll slap me upside the head. For years Willa’s been my only voice of reason when it comes to the shit I put myself through with Rhya. If it wasn’t for Willa, I’d probably be dead myself trying to protect Rhya from her own life.
But I’m not, and I’m thankful someone is looking out for me because it’s sure as shit never been Rhya.
I breathe in, deeply, then exhale slowly and stare at the screen displaying a movie I have no interest in before me. “I told her I’m done.”
Willa’s voice is tender when she asks, “Do you mean it?”
“I’m not sure,” I answer honestly. “I want to be sure. I want to be done with her and her problems, but I also know she has nobody else. How can I just abandon her like that?”
Tilting my head in her direction, I look to Willa for advice. Something she usually gives me free of judgment. “She has Reece, Shade. He’s always there for her and doesn’t put up with her shit either.”
