3. 2022

EMMA

"Why would you say yes? I mean, weren't you scared? Worried?" Stranger danger has been around since the seventies, so surely, she knew better than to stay with a man she had just met.

With my spine pressed uncomfortably against the warped metal chair, I watch her head fall back, the tips of her hair brushing against her elbow, while her lips spread into a beaming smile.

"Scared?" she asks, still laughing at the ceiling. "At the time, I didn't think there was more to be scared of. I had bounced from home to home, living with some of the worst people imaginable. So no, Emma." Bunny stops, finally looking me in the eye. "I wasn't scared. He didn't give me a reason to be."

"Ever?"

"No." Dropping her stare, Bunny examines her cuticles, picking at the traces of blood lining the thin skin before flicking it somewhere off to the side. "He was actually really sweet—soft."

The blues in her eyes take on a different shade as her sentence comes to a close. I wouldn't say sad, because that isn't quite right. I rack my brain, thinking of the word, but it isn't until her gaze finds mine again that it comes to me.

Remorse.

She's sorry.

"Did you two become…close? You worked together. You lived together. I can only assume you became…friends."

"Oh, it was—It was more than that." I figured, but my mother taught me it was rude to assume. She also scolded me about controlling my face, hating every time my thoughts or emotions showed in my expressions. That was a skill I had yet to master, even now, as Bunny chuckles.

"It wasn't like it is now. He wasn't a creep or a pervert. He took care of me. He…loved me."

"But?" I do assume then, because I can hear it in her voice, that something went wrong.

And I was right. "But I had a dream. I had goals, and I wouldn't give them up simply because he whispered he loved me while I was in his arms."

"He wanted you to stop pursuing modeling?"

"Mhm." She nods, smiling while biting her lower lip. "So the first opportunity I had, I took it."

"And how deep into your relationship was that? When did that first opportunity come?"

Bunny doesn't need to think about it. The date flies from her mouth with absolute certainty.

"About three months in. April 17, 1994."