Remembering

    Tahira stared out the window into the cold December night.

    In her mind, she heard the sound of the door open and saw the light flood in. She could see him standing there grinning at her in that sick way.
       
          “I’m ready for you,” he had said, licking his lips slightly.

    Tahira had stayed put against the corner of the closet where he held her captive during the daytime. She didn’t want to go near him.

    He walked towards her and knelt down so close to her that she could smell the sourness of his breath.
       
          “I said, I’m ready.”

    Tahira had felt physically ill, knowing what he was going to do.

    Stiffly, she stood up, avoiding his eyes as she followed him out of the closet and onto the bed. She had lain down on it, submissively removing her clothing. It was only a matter of a few seconds before she had felt him touching her, on top of her, inside of her, thrusting, grunting.
     
    Tahira was no longer even tempted to scream. It had happened too many times. It never got any less horrible, but it had lost its shock value.
   
    She had shut her eyes tightly and stretched her arms behind her, where he didn’t bother with them, and she had locked her hands together, squeezing. It was in this way that she had been able to at least partially steal herself away from what he was doing. Tahira had remembered then going to the beach in California with her cousins, just four months earlier in August. She had imagined the sun and the sand and the sound of the waves crashing up against the shore. She had tried to loose herself in her memories so as to avoid feeling what had been happening to her at that moment.
       
          “Tahira?”

    Her mother’s voice shocked her back to the present. Tahira turned around to face her mother, who walked over to sit by her at the window. She didn’t need to ask her daughter to know from her face that Tahira had been remembering.
         
          “Hira, it’s all over now,” her mother said sweetly.
         
          “I know,” Tahira responded softly.

    But it wasn’t over. The fact that it had all happened a year ago didn’t keep the memories from returning to haunt her. They came back so vividly that it was as though everything was occurring again.
       
          “I know it’s hard,” her mother said, looking into her daughter’s disturbed, dark eyes. She took Tahira’s hand in hers.
         
          “I can’t forget,” Tahira confided, speaking even more softly than before.

          “I know.”

    Tahira leaned into her mother’s arms, letting her mother hold her. She rarely permitted her mother to hug her anymore, and she rarely talked to her mother about how she was actually feeling.
   
    They sat like that for a few minutes, while Tahira allowed herself, for once, to be comforted by her mother.
       
          “Are you ready for dinner? I made some soup,” she said eventually.

    Tahira just nodded.