60

❗️TW: mentioning of emotional and physical abuse!!!

Joe lost track of time while still sitting on the floor with Elle in his arms, having no idea what to do now. Elle had stopped crying, with only single quiet sobs escaping her lips now and then.

As Joe's legs slowly began to tingle from being asleep and his back also ached from the less than comfortable position, he nudged Elle lightly. Slowly and carefully, Elle lifted her head from his chest and looked at him.

Joe immediately felt pity when he saw her red eyes and puffy face. He released one of his arms from her body and brushed the remaining tears from her face before brushing a loose strand of hair that was hanging in her face behind her ear.

"Shall I make us some tea?" he asked, because it was the only thing he could think of right now. Elle just nodded dumbly, snapped, and stood up.

Joe had his difficulties standing up with his numb legs, but when he finally found his footing, he leaned over and pressed a kiss to her forehead, as she stood in the room, rather awkwardly and with a heavy heart.

"You sit on the couch. I'll make us some tea" he added, stroking her cheek affectionately and making his way to the kitchen.

He hadn't even been in the kitchen a minute when Elle came shuffling into it. Without words, she wrapped her arms around Joe's sides and pressed herself against him. A little surprised, Joe put his arm around her.

"I need closeness right now" Elle whispered as she sighed and pressed herself even tighter against Joe. "No problem" Joe murmured to her and placed a kiss on her hair.

With their teacups in hand, they went back to the sofa and Joe hadn't even sat down properly before Elle had snuggled up to him again. He didn't mind at all, in fact he liked the closeness, but he wished it was because of different circumstances.

They drank their tea in silence. Joe didn't know if he should just start a conversation. Maybe just tell a story, but what if he would say something wrong? Something that would remind Elle again, that might trigger her?

"It started...it all started during my internship with the football team." Elle quietly broke the silence with a sigh at some point. "Shh," Joe pressed a kiss to her temple. "You don't have to tell if you can't" he said affectionately.

"Yes I do. You're right. I owe you an explanation and I want you to know. I want you to know why I am the way I am" Elle's voice was brittle, she tried to sound strong but the more she talked the weaker her voice became.

She cleared her throat before continuing to talk. "I...I really wanted to do the job at the time because my boyfriend back then, who I had lived with since my third year of college, played on the team. He was a cornerback. I got the internship and really enjoyed it. After the first two weeks, I already knew I wanted to be an AT."

She took a deep breath and Joe realized how hard it was for her to tell all this. "Then...then came my last few weeks. Looking back on it now, it was actually pretty obvious that it was going to escalate at some point, but...I was just blind and naive at the time...I was totally in love with him"

She blinked away the tears. "He had always been a little pissed off when his team lost. He always got pretty loud, blamed everyone who was just too close to him for losing, when I...when I became part of the team, he started blaming me for it too"

She had to pause for a moment and take a breath before continuing to speak. "At that time...it was normal for me, I blamed it on his character and that this is how he was when he once again calls me a good-for-nothing and a failure after losing a game. You don't know how many times he threw it at me that I wasn't right for the job."

She laughed wryly. "It wasn't until later in therapy that I realized he had tried to break me. Wanted to ruin me, but well, I had grown up with two brothers and was known to show any boy who doubted me what I could do. He couldn't break me down and that only made him angrier."

She sighed. "One evening it happened. He was so angry that I didn't let his accusations bother me, upset me, that he..." Elle's lump in her throat made her voice break. The words flying around in her mind just wouldn't cross her lips.

"That he resorted to other measures" she paraphrased the incident that had stayed with her for years. Still the scene haunted her in nightmares, still her eyes filled with tears just thinking about it. Still her stomach turned.

"He hit you?" Joe asked cautiously, while Elle just bit her lips nodding, but not even that could stop the tears rolling down her cheek like a released avalanche.

"the...first time it was just a slap in the face when I mentioned that he was taking the defeat worse than it was. It triggered something in him when he saw the shocked, scared look on my face as I grabbed my red stained cheek crying. It seemed to please him that I was suddenly silent, no longer talking back" Elle continued to talk as tears just streamed down her cheeks. Joe pulled her tighter against him as a quiet sob escaped her lips.

"It...happened three more times, but he always seemed to...like it more. And I...I just took it. I...I was scared, but I kept telling myself that I loved him and...that he loved me...and...and he didn't really want to do that" she stammered as sobs kept interrupting her sentences.

"He liked that I was...that I was afraid of him. Because of his attacks, I now started crying at every little thing against me...I tried to avoid him and there...there were only two ways I...how I could, because to leave him, that...that I would never have dared to do" she sobbed loudly and gasped.

"I went to the gym as much as I could and threw myself into work, into assignments for college, because that...that's how he left me alone, especially when it became daily that he yelled at me. Even if I had done just the smallest thing wrong. When I had forgotten to buy something. When the television wasn't working. I got blamed for everything, got yelled at for everything" she swallowed as more tears ran down her cheek in streams.

"How did it stop? Did you get away from him?" Joe asked gently, stroking her tear-soaked cheek, looking at her so lovingly that Elle immediately sobbed again.

"no, I...I couldn't. I didn't want to, because I was still convinced that he did it because he loved me. And...and over time, the violence and the breaking me down had kind of become normal for me...."

Goosebumps ran all over Joe's body, so vulnerable had Elle's voice sounded just at the last sentence.

Can you believe it that 40 chapters ago we were celebrating the first kiss between those two and now we are finally discover Elles past relationship? There will be a third chapter where she will continue talking about it but I just wanted to say that I've never been in a situation of emotional or physical abuse (fortunately) and I really hope that none of you had to go through something like that either. I don't know how accurate my describing or reaction about this topic is.

I don't think it fits the theme of the chapter when i would ask a question so we just end it here.

Hope you are all doing great and are having an amazing weekend!!

WHO-DEY 🧡