The Slow Moon by Elizabeth Cox Read Free Book Online Page A

name, she knew he was somebody she wanted to be with, and she began to sketch his face in her notebook.
    Sophie hadn’t believed Crow would ask her out, since she was two grades below him. But he had, and for a month now he had walked everywhere with her. In the cafeteria he sought her out, he walked her to classes, and after school he drove her home, or to town. When someone teased him about her, he made a noise through his nose.
    “
You
wish!” he said.
    Tonight had been Sophie’s idea. She hoped they could go off somewhere alone, and when they got to the party, she suggested they go out behind the house. They took a blanket.
    In the woods Crow touched Sophie, and when he did, she told him to lie down on the leaves with her. He hesitated.
    Sophie had been instructed by other girls about ways to touch a boy, ways to kiss. Since she had arrived in South Pittsburg in January, Nikki and Stephanie stayed close to her, making her their good friend. They were both juniors and didn’t usually hang around with younger students, but Sophie’s unusual beauty made her popular with the older boys. Her large dark eyes always looked wet. She was competition, even though she was young, so the girls befriended her, instructed her, told her whom to date.
    Sophie touched Crow through his pants. She had thought about this night so many times in her room—imagining how she would make him love her. In her mind he told her he loved her, said she was beautiful. In her mind he came unraveled with love. She had not thought she would let him enter her, but their kissing lifted to a pitch of desire she hadn’t expected to reach.
    When Crow tried to go inside her, she urged, “Not all the way.” She was trying to be careful.
    “Okay,” he said. “Okay.” But they went too far and she told him to stop. He was breathing hard and didn’t hear her, then when he heard her he pulled out.
    “I came a little bit,” he told her. “I don’t know if…”
    “Do you have something?” she asked. And he remembered he had left the condoms in the car.
    “I’ll be right back,” he said and got up, pulled on his underwear. She laughed.
    “You’re going like that?”
    “It’s not far,” and he ran off.
    Sophie covered herself with Crow’s shirt. She watched him disappear and heard the crunching of his feet evaporate. Night sounds filled the woods, leaves rustling. She heard some voices, but they seemed to be coming from the house. “Crow?” she said. “That you?” Then she saw them, or the shadow of them.
    A heavy darkness clung to the uneven surface of their faces. They looked craggy, mountainous. One cursed under his breath and another stood back, in the shadows of the trees. A word or sound passed between them. A direct word, then a quiver around the mouth, a flinch at something rooted, or unrooted, between them.
    Sophie didn’t remember the exact moment or exactly what happened, but as someone fell on her—wrapping the shirt around her head, knees hitting the ground beside her—another held her down. No one spoke. The only sounds Sophie heard were feet shuffling to get into position, and a tiny distant humming in her head that promised to take her far off from this moment.
    She jerked suddenly, trying to push someone off; but he clamped down harder, holding her with his legs and knees. He held her arms flat on the ground. She heard his breathing. She heard her own voice calling to Crow, but the shirt was pushed tightly around her mouth so that her voice was muffled. She wanted for Crow to come back, to fight them, to pull them off.
    “Please,” she cried. “Please, don’t!” Her voice sounded dry. She could barely hear herself. She felt the blanket beneath her. Her bra lay beside her head. Then she felt someone inside her, pushing. She struggled, then grew still, extremely still. She felt dizzy, wishing her dizziness might dim the pain.
    Someone jumped up, and another was on her. He made a sound but she didn’t feel him enter