She Stole My Comic Ending And My Crush Chapter 16

She Stole My Comic Ending And My Crush Chapter 16

When I was in fourth grade, I spent a year living with my aunt in Cedar Ridge, Oregon. Every afternoon, I

walked home along a wooded road outside town.

One ordinary day, a voice called from the trees.

“Hey, little girl.”

I stopped and turned without thinking.

Before I could see his face, a man struck me hard enough to knock me to the ground. He kicked my head and

stomach while the world flashed white around me.

Then he covered my mouth and began dragging me toward the trees.

“Don’t scream. Don’t move, or I’d kill you.”

Terror swallowed every thought. I could not understand what was happening, only that no one seemed close

enough to hear me.

Then a boy shouted, “What were you doing?”

He grabbed a stone from the roadside and ran at the attacker. The man tried to flee, but the stone struck him hard enough to send him sprawling.

The boy pulled me upright. My oversized school jacket had been wrenched half open, and he zipped it all the way to my throat with shaking hands.

“It’s over,” he told me. “You’re safe.

“Don’t be afraid.”

People came running after hearing the noise. Some knew my aunt; others were strangers.

Their voices pressed in from every direction. Questions, warnings, calls to the police, someone telling

another person not to touch the man on the ground.

The boy removed the black cap from his own head and placed it over mine.

The brim hid the crowd. For one blessed moment, the world became quiet.

Only then did I dare look up and recognize him as Mrs. Hale’s grandson from the city.

Children in the neighborhood had already told me his story. His parents were divorced, and each of them had built a new life that seemed to have no room for him.

His grandmother had left the city for a quiet retirement in Cedar Ridge. That spring, she brought Adrian to

stay with her.

The cap remained with me after the police arrived and adults separated us.

Miles’s voice seemed to dissolve into the wind. “Why didn’t you tell him?”

“Then your friendship wouldn’t have begun as two strangers meeting online.”

I said nothing.

Miles waited without pushing.

We followed the riverside path for a long time before I found an answer.

“Because I felt humiliated,” I said quietly.

The words were so soft that I was not sure whether I had truly spoken.