Chapter 22: Serena Grey ll

Having slept all day, Elyse wasn't exactly ready for bed just after midnight when the yawns started catching up to me and the Tri-Delts. I offered to stay up with her and keep an eye on her. After all, she'd warned me that she was liable to take off and flee out the door to go get her next fix at any moment. But for tonight at least, Elyse assured me that she'd stay put. Apparently she'd fought off the physical cravings over the last few days, days she still didn't want to talk about yet. All that remained were her mental issues, but for now she felt safe.

So I left her in the living room with some snacks and the TV remote, and I climbed into bed with Andie and Jamie. For the first time since the Tri-Delts had started sleeping over back in January – way back when the sex tape first came out and Kim was still living with me – we did NOT have sex. Nobody was in the mood, and even Andie wasn't up to the challenge of trying to fix that.

Instead, the girls wanted to cuddle, to snuggle in my arms and lay their heads on my chest. Somberly, the girls whispered amazement at Elyse's situation and reassured each other that such a thing would never happen to them. They mumbled their sympathies for what she was going through, and together they looked up at me and asked if I really thought I could save her.

I patted their heads and replied, "I have to try."

-- SUNDAY, APRIL 16, 2006, SENIOR YEAR --

"AAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEE!!!!!"

At the scream, I jerked upright in bed. The room was pitch black save for bright moonlight peering around the cracks in the window drapes, and I stumbled in the darkness as I climbed over Andie's body, rolled off the bed, and fell onto one elbow on the floor when my legs got caught up in the blankets.

The girls were stirring behind me and asking questions, but I was already out the door and halfway down the stairs by the time Elyse screamed for a second time.

"AAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEE!!!!!"

The table lamps in the living room were still on, and she was sitting sideways on the couch with both hands clamped over her ears as she shut her eyes and howled. Instinctively, I wrapped myself around her in a reassuring hug, but the moment my arms closed, she screamed even LOUDER and started thrashing like an open water sportfish hooked on a line.

"AAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEE!!!!!"

"Elyse! Elyse! It's me! It's Ben! It's me!"

Still, she thrashed and struggled and getting a hand loose, she threw a punch at me that I mostly dodged, her fist glancing off my cheek. Only then did it occur to me that bear hugging her was probably the WORST thing I could have done, and I immediately let go and backed away.

"AAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEE!!!!!"

"Elyse! Elyse!" I tried to shout above her scream.

As if a light switch had been flipped, she abruptly shut up. Blinking rapidly, she jerked her head left and right around the room with her eyes darting up to the corners and around to each bit of furniture as well as to me. Then, roughly pulling her bangs over the top of her scalp with one hand, she gawked at me wild-eyed and asked, "Ben?"

Panting hard, I held both hands out toward her, palms down, and replied, "Yeah ... It's me..."

She blinked again, processing that. Moments later, footsteps on the stairs drew our attention and we both turned to see Sasha entering the room, followed shortly after by Andie and Jamie.

"Hey ... You alright?" Sasha asked warily, looking around the room as if expecting to see some intruder who had come to kidnap Elyse back.

"Oh, gawd..." Elyse mumbled, pulling her knees up to her chest and hugging them while rocking back and forth a bit. Her eyes were wide as she stared at the far wall. "Oh, gawd..."

"It's okay..." Sasha soothed immediately, sliding onto the couch beside Elyse and wrapping an arm around the older girl's back. "It's okay ... You're safe now. You're here."

Only now did I glance at the clock and see that it was a little bit before 5am. Definitely too early on a Sunday morning.

"I'm sorry I woke you all," Elyse whimpered apologetically.

"It's understandable," I replied, moving forward and sitting in front of her on the coffee table. I made no move to touch her.

Andie and Jamie stood aside together, an arm around each other's waist. Jamie piped up, "What happened?"

"I don't know. One minute I was watching some stupid infomercial. The next I was SURE I was back at Jasper's house. He was..." Elyse trailed off. "That must have been when I started screaming."

"Jasper?" I asked with a frown.

She grimaced, glanced up at me, and then shook her head. "Believe me, you don't wanna know."

Sasha looked up at me and we shared a momentary glance. But then her attention was back on Elyse as she rubbed the other girl's shoulder. "It's okay. It must have been a nightmare."

Elyse nodded with a shudder and then leaned into Sasha's embrace. Sasha wrapped her up with both arms and even pecked the other girl's forehead. Elyse visibly relaxed, closing her eyes and lowering her head.

The crisis over, I looked over at Andie and Jamie and said, "Maybe you two should go back to sleep."

Jamie frowned, "You think we can go back to sleep right now?"

Andie gave me a look that stated plainly that she wasn't going anywhere without me.

I sighed and said, "It's not even five o'clock yet. We all need our rest."

"You, too," Jamie replied.

"I'll stay up with Elyse."

"No, I'll stay up with her," Sasha interjected.

I frowned. "You must've only gotten home a couple of hours ago. YOU need your rest more than any of us."

"I'm staying," Sasha replied flatly. And the way Elyse remained snuggled in Sasha's grasp made me think Elyse would much rather be with her than me anyways.

Rubbing my face, I sighed and felt the weariness in my limbs from not enough rest as the adrenaline rush began to wane. I looked at the pair of brunettes on the couch, and back to Andie and Jamie. For a moment, I thought that the "right" thing to do would be to stay in the living room and keep Sasha and Elyse company. But then I figured that the two of them would be just fine and that I also had two other girls depending on me. So with a sigh, I nodded and said, "Don't be afraid to come get me if you need me, okay?"

Sasha nodded and flicked me away with one hand. I walked back over to Andie and Jamie, letting Andie wrap her arms around me as we went up the stairs with Jamie following.

In the safety of my room, again the girls pillowed their heads on my chest and tried to calm down enough to go back to sleep. But apparently I was better at clearing my head and calming down, because I started to drift off before either of them, despite telling myself to stay awake and make sure the girls were calmed down first.

Now male erections are strange things. Obviously, there are arousal hard-ons that happen at all hours of the day. There are also morning woods that seem to be the product of good dreams, elevated testosterone, and a relaxed physical state for blood flow. And then there are bedtime hard-ons, erections that form right before a guy falls asleep, also due to the relaxed physical state for blood flow.

I got one of the latter right about then. Even though the mood wasn't conducive for sex, as I started drifting away the blood drained out of my head and filled my cock, something that Jamie discovered while stroking my body. Inhaling sharply, she muttered, "What have we here?" And she promptly opened the fly of my pajama pants and reached in to begin pumping my member.

Andie soon figured out what Jamie had found, because her smaller hand also reached inside and joined Jamie's. While Jamie grasped and squeezed the base, Andie stroked the top and used her thumb to trace my mushroom head. And as I started to groan from their ministrations, Jamie craned her head up to me and whispered just one word. "Please?"

With a groan, I rolled to my side and gently pushed Jamie onto her back. She was already pushing her own pajama pants down before spreading her legs beneath me. Andie was stroking my dick between us, but she let go when Jamie reached down and swabbed my cockhead through her labia, which were still relatively dry but rapidly moistening. And after a few moments, Jamie centered me and then pulled on my lower back so that I would press myself inside.

She was tight, and it took a little while to get myself fully imbedded. But at last I was balls deep and slumped down with my chest compressing hers, tired as I was at this early hour. Jamie didn't seem to mind, hugging my body against hers and gently kissing my neck while we simply lay there, unmoving, enjoying the feel of being so intimately connected.

But eventually Jamie turned my face to hers and we began to kiss, softly at first and then a little harder. Like tiny embers being breathed to life, our passion slowly grew until my tongue entered her mouth and I retracted my hips a couple of inches. And then I pushed forward to recapture the lost depth, and Jamie quivered beneath me before moaning and kissing me a little harder still.

I retracted again, paused, and slowly thrust forward. I did it again, this time pulling out about halfway before pressing our loins together once again. And then again, and again, and again, pulling back a little farther each time and feeling every little bump and ridge of my cock scraping along her sensitive canal. From nothing, Jamie and I built our own mood. I slid my hands up her arms before interlacing my fingers through hers and pressing them back behind her head. We made love with our mouths while our hips writhed and I crushed her big tits beneath my pectoral muscles. I never quite started "fucking" her. I never just grabbed onto her hips and thrust away. Instead, we practically crawled inside each other as we melded our still-clothed bodies beneath the bed sheets and urgently humped with my pelvic bone grinding against her clit until she finally stiffened up and came, quietly moaning into my kiss as I felt her inner muscles spasm around my invading cock.

The moment Jamie went limp, I pulled out, moved over, and dropped on top of Andie. She'd already stripped her pants and panties away and also unbuttoned her top from throat to tails. Her pussy was warm and wet and already waiting for my prick when I slid myself home. This wasn't breathing new life into tiny embers; Andie was already a hot fire ready to go, and we went from zero to sixty in no time flat as I thrust and kissed and squeezed her hands in mine while we hotly made love.

It didn't take long for either of us to cum. I'd been primed from fucking Jamie, and she'd been primed from masturbating while I fucked Jamie. So within minutes, Andie tore her mouth away from mine to gasp cutely in increasingly shorter gasps while her eyes went wild and she felt the climax approaching. At her peak, she squeezed her eyes shut and gaped her mouth open to scream, but I covered her with my own mouth and kissed her hard, muffling her exclamation while feeling her pussy clamp down around my shaft. And moments later I had to bury my own face in the pillow beside her head to cover MY scream as I nutted my load into the back of my cutie's womb.

Sleep came much easier for all of us after that.

It was after 10am when we woke, and when Jamie stirred she looked interested in a morning encore. But at the moment I was more interested in making sure Sasha and Elyse were alright, so I was quick to leave the bed and head downstairs.

Neither of them was in the living room, which alarmed me for a moment. But I noticed that the bedroom door was closed and I went over to it, turning the knob as quietly as possible, just in case Elyse was sleeping.

Indeed she was, and so was Sasha. The two brunettes were cuddled together in the darkness, and having confirmed to my satisfaction that they were both alive and unharmed, I quickly closed the door and backed away.

Again, Andie and Jamie had followed after, but once I told them Sasha and Elyse were asleep in the bedroom, they nodded and retreated back upstairs to go through their morning routines. I went into the kitchen instead and started breakfast. But once the food was ready, I glanced over at the wall calendar and let out a big sigh.

April 16. DJ's birthday. And I didn't know how to handle it.

Our relationship hadn't been so complicated before. True, we'd gone through a break-up back when she was still in high school, but that had been a pretty amicable separation and we'd still been friends by the time her eighteenth birthday rolled around. It had been no big deal for me to call her and wish her a happy birthday. Last year, she'd thrown her party in this very house. But things were different now.

Lust, love, pregnancy, engagement, abortion, break-up: Lots had happened in the last year between us, and I didn't know how to handle it.

Tri-Delt West. Sasha. Rutledge. Peyton. Elyse.

Kim.

Fuck, Peyton was right. I'm a Lamborghini. Emotional gas guzzler. Magnet for too much drama. How the fuck did my life get so complicated? It's not that my life was ever simple. But still, I wished things could be simple enough that I wouldn't have second thoughts about whether or not I should pick up my phone and wish DJ a happy birthday.

Until I already did.

"Hello? Ben? Hello?"

I blinked and realized I'd somehow thumbed over to her name in my contact directory and hit "Call". In a moment of panic, I fumbled the phone trying to get it up to my ear and actually dropped the thing. And when it hit the floor, horror of horrors, the phone snapped shut.

"Oh, shit," I breathed.

"What?" Andie asked with a frown as she walked into the kitchen.

"Just hang on a minute," I muttered as I stooped, picked up the phone, and re-dialed DJ's number.

She didn't pick up this time.

"Shit. Shit. Shit!" I muttered, re-dialing her again.

"What's wrong?" Jamie asked as she joined Andie in the doorway.

"Food. There. Now." I muttered while pointing at the range. They were the only coherent words I could manage before walking between them and out into the living room.

She still didn't pick up.

"SHIT!" I groaned, and this time I dialed Brooke. Surely my little sister would answer my call.

"Ben! What the hell?!?" Brooke admonished me in lieu of a greeting. In the background, I heard DJ yelling, "No, don't talk to him!"

"It was an accident! Total accident!" I whined. "I got flustered and dropped my phone."

Brooke giggled and asked incredulously, "You dropped your phone?"

"Yes! I swear to God! Total accident! I just dropped it and the clamshell closed and ended the call. I swear I would never have hung up on her on purpose."

Brooke started cackling now. "Oh, Ben..."

"Can I please talk to her? Please?"

"Sure, sure. Hang on."

Moments later, DJ's voice came over the line. "You dropped your phone?"

"I'm SORRY!"

DJ sighed, and then I heard her chuckling beneath her breath. "You know, I don't know what it is, but you have this way of always getting under my skin so that I can't stay mad at you. Believe me, I want to hate you, but I can't. I was all prepared to hate you for not calling me today for my birthday. I convinced myself that you not calling would prove that you never really cared. And then if you DID call I was going to give you an earful about how calling me after all this time apart would be a trite sentiment that didn't really mean anything seeing as how you haven't done anything in the last few weeks to try and win me back."

I frowned. "You wanted me to try to win you back?"

"Of course I did! Well no ... Actually, I don't. I meant what I said about both of us needing to forgive and move on and get some space away from what's happened between us. But my ego would of course love the idea of you crawling and groveling to try and win me back, just for spite and competitive nature's sake."

"Umm..."

"But the point is, when I saw your name flash on my phone I started working up all my righteous rage and getting myself ready to give you some mean put-down meant to cripple your emotional heart for all time and ruin you from ever being happy with any other woman ever again, and then you fucking hang up on me and don't even give me that chance! And so I throw my phone at the wall and start ranting and raving and Brooke comes running in to find out what the hell is wrong with me and I start yelling at her and you keep calling and all that ... and I find out you fucking dropped your phone!" Despite her words, DJ started laughing.

"Umm ... sorry?" I ventured.

DJ managed to control her laughing fit and sighed, "No, I'm sorry. You don't deserve my vindictive hatred. I know you tried your best. We just didn't work out, and that's as much my fault as anyone's. But I'm not dwelling on that, and once I got all that ranting and yelling out of my system, I felt much better. Really, it's probably a good thing you dropped your phone."

"Uh, lucky me..."

"I'm glad you called, Ben."

"Well if that's the case, I'm really glad I called, too."

"I miss you."

I sighed. "I miss you, too."

She took a deep breath, and in a stronger voice, she said rather dismissively. "Goodbye, Ben."

"Uh ... goodbye, Deej."

She hung up first. I closed my phone, staring at it for a long few moments, trying to wrap my head around what had just happened.

Did we just have a breakthrough? Without me even trying?

I thought about how my phone had seemingly called her all on its own, and about the forces of serendipity in causing me to drop my phone immediately after.

Huh ... maybe there IS some cosmic destiny thing working in my favor.

But then I realized something, and in a panic I re-dialed DJ's number once again.

This time, she picked up. "Uh ... yeah?"

"Happy Birthday," I said hurriedly. "Forgot to actually say it on that last call."

DJ giggled. "Thanks, Ben."

And then she hung up.

Sasha awoke just before noon to find Andie, Jamie, and me in the living room. I'd actually tried to send the Tri-Delts out, telling them to spend the rest of their weekend getting out of the house and socializing with their friends. But while Jamie was thinking about it, Andie point-blank refused to leave me alone at a time like this, and Jamie wound up sticking around to keep Andie company.

But now that Sasha was up and about, I managed to talk Andie into going out for a little while. She insisted on returning before dinner, since Sasha would have to go to work tonight, and I agreed. And only then did the Tri-Delts change and depart.

Sasha filled me in on her short time with Elyse at 5am. Once she got Elyse calmed down, Sasha started asking her about the nightmare, and about this guy Jasper. But Elyse clammed up and didn't want to talk about him, so Sasha let it go.

They kept talking, and at some point Elyse said that Sasha reminded her of a girl named Rebecca. Elyse commented that I'd met Rebecca a few times, and Sasha now asked me, "Who is she?"

I winced and shook my head, saying, "That's a complicated story."

"Ben, seriously." Sasha leveled a look at me. "I can't help if I don't know what's going on. You told me that Elyse was a high school frenemy of Adrienne's and that you've only bumped into her a couple of times since then. But there's something else you're not telling me. Who is Rebecca? What was the exact nature of the two times you bumped into Elyse in the last few years? Ben, I NEED to know."

I sighed and took a deep breath. "Okay ... I'll tell you everything. It starts literally right before Dawn and I finally became a couple right at the end of our sophomore year. There was a party in the hills at this house owned by a guy named Carter Sheridan. And at the time, his girlfriend was Elyse..."

"Hindsight is 20/20," I said with a sigh. "I can look back now and say, 'I should have known then that something was wrong and done something about it.' But at the time, I didn't realize that things would end up like this. Two years ago, Elyse was just one of many party girls I met that night. I know for a fact that she wasn't the only one put on display in that Showroom, and the other girls I met seemed perfectly happy to be there. Nobody was being held against their will. Everyone was doing drugs, fucking, and having a good time. So for Elyse to walk out with a bit of cum stuck to her chin and her boyfriend smiling and all happy, what was I supposed to think? That she needed rescuing? The thought honestly never crossed my mind. But now? Now I wonder if there was something I missed. Some sign that the Elyse I met two years ago would turn into this. And I can't help but feel guilty that I didn't do something before."

"And that's why you didn't hesitate to let her stay here yesterday morning," Sasha stated plainly.

I shrugged. "Maybe, I guess. Then again, I'd probably have done it for anyone who showed up on my doorstep like that. Is it really so strange to believe in a sense of human decency?"

Sasha held her hands up. "Seeing as how I sometimes feel like -I- was one of your rescue projects, I'm not arguing with you here. At this point, I'm attached enough that it would kill me to see something bad happen to her. I'm just saying that someone else in your position might've insisted on checking her into rehab or turning her over to the police to figure out who beat the shit out of her, you know? Let the authorities deal with things instead of taking it personally."

I shrugged. "But it is personal. I know her. I've known her for years. And maybe that makes all the difference in the world."

Elyse suddenly spoke up behind me. "You knew Elyse Laughton, high school Cheer Captain and Queen Bitch of the school. You didn't know Serena Grey."

Sasha sat up straight and looked past me. "You're awake."

Elyse nodded. "And hungry. Always hungry, it seems. Part of the meth withdrawal."

"We've got plenty of food," I said quickly, standing up and heading for the kitchen. "We need to put some curves back on those bones."

Elyse glanced down at herself, still wearing Sasha's pajamas from yesterday. And even though Sasha was three inches shorter and in very fit shape herself, it was clear that the PJs were quite baggy on Elyse's emaciated frame. With a sigh she commented, "Yeah. I always dreamed of being super-skinny, like some high-fashion model, but I think this has gone to the extreme."

I glanced back and grinned to see an actual smile on Elyse's face. "Good to know you've got a sense of humor about it. You look like you're feeling better than you did yesterday."

"Getting a good night's sleep – TWO nights' worth, actually – will do that for a girl. Can't remember the last time I got even five hours straight without some guy waking me up to..." Her voice trailed off.

Although halfway into the kitchen already, I stopped in my tracks and turned back. Poking my head back into the living room, I asked, "What was that?"

Elyse's smile was gone, replaced by a deep frown as she stared at the floor. Her shoulders were hunched and her skin had gone pale. But just as she started to cry, Sasha hugged her again and brought her down onto the couch.

"Hey ... hey..." Sasha said gently but firmly. "It's okay, you're safe. You're in Ben's house. Nobody's going to get to you here, alright?"

Taking a deep breath, Elyse came back to the present and turned to look at Sasha. "Right ... right..."

Coming back to the living room, I sat down on the other couch, my butt at the edge of the cushion and my knees pointing toward the girls. "Elyse ... Please ... I know it's hard for you to talk about, but we can't really help you if we don't know what's going on. It's just me and Sasha right now, alright? We're here to help, and we're not going to blab any of your secrets ... Please ... Tell us what happened to you."

She was already slowly shaking her head in the negative. "I ... I can't..."

I pinched my lips and exhaled through my nose, momentarily disappointed. As much as I wanted to know what was going on, I refused to push her any further. And with a deep breath, I put my hands on my knees and stood up to return to the kitchen and get her some food.

"It wouldn't have done you any good to try and rescue me two years ago," Elyse said suddenly, her eyes fixed on the far wall. "While I wasn't exactly happy with the situation I found myself in, it was a situation I chose to be in. I was already an addict at that point, and Carter was my source of drugs. I wouldn't have left him for any reason, not then. There was nothing you could have done."

I turned back to find Elyse staring at me, and I promptly sank back down onto the couch.

"It was an arrangement I'd learned to accept," she continued. "Carter fucked me whenever and wherever he wanted. I let his friends fuck me whenever and wherever he wanted. I showed up whenever and wherever he wanted, and he kept me supplied with as much weed and crystal meth as I could handle. I wasn't even his only girlfriend. Carter kept a bunch of us like that, willing thralls to be used by him and his friends. He called all of us his 'girlfriends'. Rebecca was one of them, too."

Elyse's gaze had returned to her lap as she hugged herself, palms on her elbows, and I now looked across her at Sasha, who pursed her lips and gave me a helpless shrug.

"My roommate, Celeste, eventually figured things out and tried to talk me into getting clean. She was a real friend, and she only wanted the best for me. But I couldn't break free. I was too much of an addict. I didn't even make it through my Senior year, dropping out after I failed all of my first semester classes and then moving into a room in Carter's mansion so I'd be more convenient for him. That was a little over a year ago."

Elyse's eyes were filled with moisture at this point, although she wasn't yet crying. Sasha squeezed her arm tightly.

"It was around this time last year that I tried to get clean for the first time. All of my old classmates were graduating, including Celeste. She tried to help me. She even assigned our old friends to keep watch over me while I detoxed, screaming and ranting about needing my next hit. But in the end I ran away, ran back to Carter. He simply gave me the bong and plugged me back into his harem as if I'd never left. My choice, he said, whether I wanted to be there or not. He wouldn't hold it against me. Not that time he didn't."

At that point, Elyse shuddered and the first teardrops started to fall. Sasha now wrapped both arms around Elyse's shoulders.

"I tried to get clean again over Thanksgiving. Celeste was gone now, but Cameron hooked me up with this girl named Kelly. She was one of Carter's 'girlfriends' when I first met him, but she'd gotten herself clean and out before I really got sucked in. Having been through it before, she really knew how to help me. But in the end I ran back to Carter and confessed everything. I sold out Cameron for helping me. And I told him I'd been with Kelly, which for some reason got him really, really angry. He always told me he would never make me do anything I didn't want to, but he said there would still be consequences for my actions. I didn't see Cameron again for about a week after that. And although she didn't look like he'd physically harmed her, I could tell that he'd done something because she was obviously scared. And Cameron never got scared. She was his favorite, his right-hand woman. She was untouchable, or so I'd thought. I think Carter ordered her to stay away from me after that, because she'd always been so nice, but after the Kelly-thing she barely ever spoke two words to me."

I was leaning so far forward that I nearly fell over. "Cameron. She's still there?" I asked intently.

Elyse looked over at me. "Yeah. You know her?"

"Kind of. Long story, but I don't want to interrupt you right now. I'm sorry." I sat back, my mind working. The mention of Cameron reminded me that Amber still hadn't gotten back to me, and I resolved to call her a second time. It was one thing to ask for her advice in dealing with Elyse, but it had been clear that she was friends with Cameron and she had to know if her friend was in danger.

Elyse now pulled Sasha's arm off her shoulders and sat back, slumping against the backrest. With a deep breath, she looked down and started fiddling with her nails, scratching away invisible dirt and picking at her cuticles. "Anyways, Carter dumped me as a girlfriend then. He wouldn't let me go back to the harem or anything, no matter how much I pleaded. I promised him he could fuck me whenever and wherever he wanted. I promised I'd do all his friends, I'd suck them off one-by-one and do it all in the Showroom without hesitation. I told him I'd do anything for another hit, and he shrugged me off by saying, 'Fine. Then pay for it.'"

My eyebrows popped up. "Pay?"

Elyse shrugged, now staring vacantly away. "Yeah, as in money. He said he'd give me a discount on street value, for old times' sake. But that was it. He was done with me and as far as he was concerned, I was just another party girl hanging around upstairs. I'd been tainted, and I wasn't 'special' to him anymore."

Sasha and I exchanged another concerned look.

"I told you I'm flat broke. As you might guess, I spent every dime I had on meth. Then I liquidated my mutual funds, my 401K ... And when all that ran out, I started getting desperate."

Elyse sat up again and hugged herself, prompting Sasha to wrap her arms around Elyse once again. Elyse shivered, stared at the floor, and then continued.

"That's when Carter turned me into a whore," she said, now staring so far off into the distance I wasn't even sure her target was on Planet Earth. "Really, it wasn't so much of a leap from before. He made me fuck his friends to get my fix. Now he 'sold' me meth on credit and made me pay him back by fucking his friends. Same thing when you break it down, really. His friends didn't even know the difference. Except then he started making me fuck random people on the street."

Now Elyse pushed Sasha away and stood up, still hugging herself. She paced away from us and over toward a window, except that she wasn't looking out of it. Her head bowed, she hunched over and continued speaking with her back to us, as if too ashamed to even face us as she said what came next.

"The reality was: I was old pussy. I'd been with Carter for years already and his friends had all already had me every which way. There wasn't enough demand for my body to fill my debts, so he sent me out into the streets to pick up real johns like an ordinary streetwalker. I told him I couldn't do it. I had too much pride. That's when Carter hooked me up with a new identity as Serena Grey for this job ... That part's not important. But I had a new license, new social security number, everything. From that moment on, Elyse Laughton was dead. Serena – the new me – is a whore, a prostitute. I fucked for money, and I turned it over to Carter to pay for my drugs. Nearly got arrested a couple of times. Unfortunately, I wasn't all that good at it. I wouldn't sleep with just anybody. Carter said 'Serena' still carried 'Elyse's' pride. I was being too picky, and it was getting in the way. I couldn't make quite enough money to cover my drug debts."

Sasha got off her couch and came over to mine, sitting beside me and squeezing my left hand so tightly between both of hers that I worried she might break a bone.

"And that's where Jasper came into the picture," Elyse said with a sigh, still hunched over although she turned around to face us. "Not a nice guy. You wouldn't want to know him. Spoiled rich guy who's never worked in a day in his life living off his Daddy's royalties. Invented some stupid contraption that made millions and died, leaving the entire fortune to this shithead. He's got the personality of a doorknob and thinks girls are disposable toys. He drugged and raped Celeste, and he's done it a bunch of other times as well. I don't know how he manages to avoid ending up in jail, but maybe it's because he preys on girls like me."

"Elyse," I interrupted. "Did Jasper rape you?"

She barked a short laugh and looked away. "Depends on how you define 'rape'."

"Forcibly. Without consent."

Elyse sighed. "Forcibly? Of course. All the time. Without consent? Well ... I can't say I didn't have a choice whether or not to be there."

"You were coerced into a choice. Legally, that's not consent."

She shrugged. "I wanted meth. I did what I had to do to get it. It is what it is."

"That's still not right."

"Right, wrong, does it matter? I did it. I couldn't afford to pay street rate for the meth I was consuming, not even with Carter's discount. The thing is: Carter hates Jasper's guts and kicks him out every time he tries to get into the house. Even though he uses and abuses girls himself, Carter considers himself 'above' slimeballs like Jasper. But in the end, Jasper actually saved me. He had the money and basically offered to buy me from Carter, to become a live-in punch board for him and his friends. As much as I detested Jasper, at that point I was too desperate to care. Really, it wouldn't be any different than being Carter's 'girlfriend', or so I thought."

"But it was different?" Sasha asked quietly.

Elyse returned to the couches and sat on the furthest armrest away from us. She folded her arms over her chest and fought back the urge to cry. And in a dry, haunted voice she explained, "When Carter and his friends fucked me they at least tried to get me off. We girls were playthings, but we were toys they wanted to take care of and play with again. Jasper's house was a meat grinder. He and his friends literally just used me. Anywhere, anytime, any hole. Didn't matter if I was sleeping or tired or what. I'd be shitting on the toilet and some asshole would walk into the bathroom and shove his cock into my mouth, throat-fucking me before blowing his load and then standing there for another couple of minutes so he could piss on my face as well. I learned real quick to keep my asshole lubricated at all times, since they weren't really particular about doing it for me before shoving it in. If I wasn't compliant, they'd beat the shit out of me. And I told you I couldn't remember the last time I got more than five hours of sleep, because even at 3am there was at least one of them who wanted to get his rocks off."

Sasha started crying now, and -I- had to hold her.

"All day and all night the guys used me. But they kept me stashed with meth. Getting high out of my mind was the only way I could cope with what was happening, and I always told myself it wasn't really happening to ME. It was all happening to 'Serena'; that was the name they used for me anyway."

Elyse's eyes were unfocused, and her arms were limp. She just sort of stared out at nothingness, and it looked like a stiff breeze would knock her over. Her lower lip quivered, and she was fighting off tears again. Sasha trembled, and I squeezed my arms more tightly around her.

After a deep breath, in the same haunted voice, Elyse quietly continued, "But then sometimes even meth wasn't enough for me. Sometimes I couldn't lose myself in 'Serena' and I cried over what was happening to 'Elyse'. I actually started asking for Jasper to roofie me so that I'd be unconscious and wouldn't remember the things those bastards did to me. Better the bliss of ignorance than some of those memories, you know?"

Sasha was visibly shaking, and her sobs now started to get Elyse's attention.

But instead of looking sympathetic for Sasha, Elyse sat up straight, looked over at the young woman who had been giving her nothing but support for the past two days, and sneered haughtily, "Can't handle it little girl? A dose of reality too much for your sheltered little mind? What's wrong? Don't want to hear about them putting out their cigarette butts on my skin? Don't want to hear about the time I got DP'd by a beer bottle and a pitching wedge? Huh? Let me tell you about the guy who made me suck off his golden retriever. Let me tell you about the guy who shit in my mouth and made me swallow it while he ate me out. Let me tell you about--"

Sasha'd had enough. She bent over the couch and hurled all over the floor.

"Is she okay?" Sasha asked, wiping her eyes and swallowing thickly.

Standing in the doorway to Sasha's bedroom, I raised both eyebrows and asked, "Is SHE okay? Elyse goes off the deep end and starts spouting shit to deliberately upset you to the point where you heave all over my living room rug ... and you ask if SHE'S okay?"

Red-eyed, Sasha nodded seriously.

I sighed and replied, "Yeah, she's fine. Back in her room."

Sasha sighed and finished buttoning up her new blouse.

When she threw up, she'd gotten some vomit on both her shirt and jeans. Elyse had watched impassively while Sasha and I worked together to clean up the mess, and then Sasha had gone up to her bedroom to wash her face and change her clothes. I'd stayed with Elyse, watching her as everything sunk in for her. But after a minute, Elyse had fled back to her room and closed the door, locking it from the inside.

Worried that she might slit her wrists or something, I'd retrieved a master key and let myself in. Elyse was sitting up on the far edge of the bed, her back to me as she stared out the window. She'd looked over at me and nodded her understanding when I told her to leave the door open. And then I'd come upstairs to check on Sasha.

"Are you alright?" I asked gently.

Sasha pinched her lips together, stood up from the bed, and came over to me. I hugged her as she approached while she buried her head against my shoulder. And then with another sigh she replied, "I'll be fine. Might have nightmares about the things she's been through. But I'll be fine."

I bent and pecked Sasha's forehead. Moments later, she tilted her face to mine and I kissed her lips. And then I cradled her head against my shoulder while she cooed and snuggled her nose deeper against my neck.

The moment of tenderness was a welcome relief after the horrors Elyse had just described, and neither Sasha nor I moved for a long few minutes. But eventually, she pulled away from me and head-nodded toward the door.

"We should go talk to her," she said.

I sighed. "Am I doing the right thing? Would it be better for everybody if I turned her over to the authorities to get this all sorted out and helped get her into rehab? I want to help her, but not at the expense of you and the other girls."

"After what she's been through? Yeah, you're doing the right thing," Sasha reassured me. "Worst thing that happens to me or Andie or Jamie is that we spend a little less time with you. Worst thing that happens to her is that she ends up back in that hellhole doing God knows what to buy her next fix. Seriously ... you're doing the right thing."

"You, too. I think you're doing far more for her than I am."

Sasha shrugged. "She has trust issues with men. It's understandable."

"So I should probably ask Peyton to come hang out tonight when you go off to work?"

Sasha frowned. "Actually ... not tonight. I think I'll call in sick and help you keep an eye on Elyse. She's only been here a day and I know we're not out of the woods with her yet. Maybe by next weekend I can go back."

"You sure?"

Sasha bit her lip. "Tell you the truth, after everything she just said, I'm not exactly in the mood to take my clothes off in front of strange men, you know?"

I blinked and hugged Sasha again. "I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"I don't know. Just felt like the right thing to say."

She sighed and squeezed me back. "I'll be alright. C'mon. Let's go."

Elyse was right where I'd left her: sitting on the far edge of the bed with her back to us, staring out the window. She didn't react when we entered the room, or even when I walked around and in front of her. Her eyes were dead and unfocused, seeing nothing. But when Sasha settled onto the bed beside her and laid a hand on her leg, Elyse finally turned and started crying.

"I'm sorry..." Elyse mumbled through her tears. "You don't deserve to have me turn on you. You've been nothing but kind and I--"

"Shh," Sasha soothed, stroking Elyse's leg. "It's okay. Nothing a load of laundry won't fix, and it wasn't your words that made me sick to my stomach; it was the things that have been done to you."

Elyse shook her head. "I shouldn't have dumped all of that on you at once."

"Did it all really happen?"

Elyse blinked, her eyes turning wary. "I didn't make that up."

"I didn't think you did." Sasha shook her head. "I just meant, what happened, happened. You don't have to sugarcoat anything for us. Yeah, I had a hard time stomaching it – I'd like to think anybody would have a hard time with that – but I need to know what happened to you."

Elyse shrugged. "I'm not proud of what I did. I look back at it now and realize just how fucked up I became, the lengths I went to for my next fix, and it horrifies me."

"Is that why you left?" I asked. "You realized you didn't want to do those things anymore?"

Elyse shook her head. "No. I was tolerating that shit. Anything to get more meth. It wasn't until after I got clean for about a week that all that stuff really hit me."

I canted my head to the side. "Then what made you decide to leave?"

Elyse squeezed her eyes shut and bowed her head. "Jillian."

I jerked my head back, thinking of the silicone and Botox-enhanced blonde I'd hooked up with at Carter's party. "Jillian? What about her?"

Elyse stared out the window again and sighed. "She died."

My eyes popped open wide. "Wait, what?"

Elyse shrugged, not looking at me. "Overdose. Got a little too wired up at a party and her heart failed. Just like that." She snapped a finger for emphasis.

"Holy shit..."

"Carter didn't want an ambulance showing up at the house, so he had a guy drive her to the hospital. Didn't matter. She was dead before she got out Carter's front door. I'll never forget the vacant look on her face as she lay there, eyes open and staring at nothing. Not breathing, not moving, already gone."

I turned and held my head in my hands as I paced to the side of the room. "Dead? Shit..."

Elyse sighed and finally looked up at me. "So I got out. I saw my own future right in front of me, her body going cold on the floor. So I told Carter and Jasper I was done. I grabbed what I could and I ran away. They both said 'good riddance'. Didn't need me anymore. Had fresh blood, fresh pussy that hadn't been destroyed by meth yet. I'd turned into this hollowed-out skeleton you see before you and it was getting to the point where the guys didn't want me around, like I'd scare off the other girls simply by my appearance. So I left."

"Where'd you go?" Sasha asked.

"Went to a bar and slept with a guy just to have a roof over my head for the night. Talked him into keeping me around for another night with promises he could fuck my ass, but I got my first craving and went a little nuts. Got spastic and went for his wallet. He smacked me hard enough that I blacked out. Woke up next to a dumpster in the alley, no money, and not even my bag. Went back to his place and hung around all day hoping he'd come back and let me in to at least get my clothes and other stuff, but he didn't come back that night. Finally broke a window in the middle of the night only to find that my bag wasn't there. I searched everywhere and couldn't find it. I have no idea what he did with it. I stole all the cash I could find and his laptop computer. That's when my next craving hit and I found a low-life dealer downtown who didn't have any ice, but he gave me some weed for the computer and a blowjob. I spent the second night huddled under a storefront with a couple of old homeless women on Telegraph. With trash bags and dirty blankets, I blended in enough with them that nobody bothered me. That was Tuesday night."

"Tuesday? But you didn't show up here until yesterday morning. Were you on the street the entire week?"

"I didn't have anywhere else to go. Celeste and my old friends have graduated and moved on. I wasn't going back to anyone connected to Carter. I had no idea what I was doing, only that I couldn't go back on meth. I couldn't wind up like Jillian."

"How did you get in touch with Adrienne?" I asked.

"Internet search. Went to a public library on Friday and tried to dredge up anyone who knew me. But I didn't have phone numbers for Candy or Katrina or the rest of my high school friends. They're all graduated and working and not at their old homes. Found some parents through the white pages, and I left a message at the old house for my high school boyfriend Joey, but it's not like I have a call-back number. Figured I'd call them back again later. But then I stumbled onto Adrienne's agent and badgered my way into talking to her yesterday morning. And she led me here." Elyse took a deep breath and looked up at me. "You guys are my last hope."

I stopped pacing and looked at her firmly. "We won't let you down."

To the end of not letting her down, I left Sasha to comfort Elyse and excused myself to make a phone call. Despite my best intentions, dealing with a meth addict seemed quite beyond my capabilities and experience, but at least I knew someone who had been to the brink herself and still come back.

Amber finally picked up her phone.

"Ben. Heyyy, I'm sorry I didn't call you back sooner," she apologized straight away. "I was out late last night and got pretty shit-faced if you know what I mean. So I've been dealing with the consequences all morning."

"Sorry to hear that, but I hope you at least had a good time."

"A great time. It's always nice to see old friends."

"Speaking of seeing old friends, any chance I could get you to swing by my place in Berkeley?"

"Your place?" Amber asked, her interest clearly piqued. "Interesting. You've never invited me over there before."

I sighed. "Unfortunately, it's more than just a social call. Would you happen to remember a girl by the name of Elyse?"

"Elyse? Uh, well actually..." Amber sighed. "You're talking about Carter's place, aren't you? 'Elyse' isn't exactly the most common name."

"It's not, and yes, I'm talking about the same girl."

"What about her?"

"She's here, at my house right now."

"Excuse me?"

"It's a long story. I didn't mention her the one time you and I talked about that place, but we actually went to high school together. The point is: she's trying to get clean from her addiction and I could use some advice."

"Put her in rehab. That's the best possible advice I could give."

"She doesn't trust the places and she doesn't have any money, either. C'mon, I don't think you went through rehab to get clean, did you? Surely you've got to have some ideas."

"Of course, but for one thing I was never a full addict. I enjoyed the stuff, and I got the cravings, but it never became debilitating, and certainly not to the degree of Elyse's addiction."

"So you already know how addicted Elyse got."

"She's about as extreme an addict as there is. Violent, even."

My tongue felt thick as I swallowed, and I wondered again if I was endangering the other girls by bringing Elyse here. Still, I'd made her a promise that I wouldn't put her on the street. Pinching my forehead, I asked, "Can I trust what she's telling me?"

"Probably not. What has she told you?"

"Uhh, that Carter dumped her as a girlfriend and she's been trying to eke out a way of paying for drugs ever since. A lot of horror show stuff there. And what really got her to crack was that about a week ago this other girl named Jillian overdosed and died. Elyse freaked out, ran, and swore to get herself clean."

"Well, that stuff is all true."

"Jillian's really dead?"

Amber sighed. "I still keep in touch with Cameron. Yeah, Jillian O.D.'d."

I made a face, even though she couldn't see me. Taking a deep breath, I said plainly, "I don't know how to handle this, but I promised her I'd try. I'm sorry for dragging you into this, but is there any way you can come over here and help me out?"

"Gosh, any week but this one."

"Why? What's going on this week?"

"I'm out of town. There's this medical conference I'm attending all week, but I flew out early because it's in the same city as E-Beth – you remember, my best friend from high school. We went out last night and that's why I got shit-faced. I won't be back until Friday."

Groaning, I replied, "I see."

"I'm sorry."

"No, not your fault." I took another deep breath. "Well, do you at least have any other advice you can give me over the phone? C'mon, Miss Doctor. Surely there's some medical wizardry you know about that helped you and that can fix her."

"That's just it: there aren't any medications that counteract the specific effects of methamphetamines, or that help an addict stay abstinent from the drug. The only treatments are behavioral."

"Pretty much what I read online."

"Like I said: get her into rehab."

"Maybe. That stuff isn't cheap, though."

"Just how much of an old friend is she to you?"

"It's not that I want to put a price on a friendship, but to be honest we have never been friends. She's practically a stranger. Maybe Adrienne might feel different, and she's got the money..." I sighed.

"I'm not going to tell you how to decide that," Amber explained.

"I know, I know."

"Barring formal rehab, though, all you can really do is support her the best way you can. I had to fly out to E-Beth's place so she could help me. I was also supremely motivated, focused on a goal, and I was never the addict that Elyse is. You can do your best; you can provide her someplace safe, and give her distractions to keep her mind off her cravings. But at the end of the day, it's up to her how much she wants this, how strong she is against the addiction."

"She doesn't want to end up dead."

"Then I hope for her sake that's motivation enough."

I returned to the girls, and Sasha and I brought Elyse back out into the living room so she could eat something. Despite her ravenous hunger, she'd been distracted by telling us the details or her sordid recent history. But now that the story was over, her appetite had come back with a vengeance.

It was breakfast for Sasha as well, and I was ready for lunch myself. We sat and ate and talked about everything but Elyse's situation. Seeking distraction, she wanted Sasha and me to tell her about school and our friends and why there were two Tri-Delt sorority girls living in my bedroom. She'd noticed the Tri-Delt West charters which had since been taken down, so we talked about that gimmick. And she seemed fascinated by my whole harem setup that was so completely different from the scene at Carter's.

She also wanted to hear news about back home. I apologized for not knowing much about Candy or that old cheerleader crowd. But I told her about the Irvine Spectrum expanding and finally building the parking garages. We chatted about Macy's taking over the Robinson's May stores, except for the one at South Coast Plaza being turned into a Bloomingdale's. And of course, I talked about Adrienne's career.

Elyse got a little melancholy at that. She reminisced about first meeting young Adrienne almost ten years ago in junior high, taking the shy girl beneath her wing and teaching her how to manipulate boys. She spoke of her regrets regarding the way their friendship deteriorated without really going into the details of why, other than to say that she'd become a jealous bitch. She'd always worried that Adrienne would eventually surpass her in beauty and popularity, and apparently in the end, Adrienne did.

We'd been talking for hours, and as the conversation started to die out, Sasha suggested that we get out of the house for a bit. Elyse had spent plenty of time over the last week alone with her thoughts, and Sasha thought it would be a good idea to be distracted for a bit. Elyse apologized for not having anything to wear, which of course turned the outing into a shopping trip to get Elyse new clothes. Nothing outlandish, of course. Elyse had been trained to view any gifts as coming with a price tag, and she was loathe to be in my debt any more than she already had.

"Unless you want a piece, and then we'll call it square," she remarked off-the-cuff, turning around and bending slightly at the waist to indicate her intent. "You certainly deserve it just for putting me up."

"No," I replied almost angrily, although I tried to keep my tone even. "Not now. Not ever. You don't owe me anything."

Elyse looked ashamed and averted her eyes. In the end we went to Target and got Elyse some basic clothes and personal effects like toiletries and makeup. And while we were there, Andie called me to ask how we were doing and if I needed them to come back to the house anytime soon. Peyton was with her, and Andie said that the Tri-Delt President also wanted an update on our patient.

"We're all fine," I replied, leaving Sasha and Elyse to their clothing selections as I stepped away. "Feel free to swing back at dinner, or even after if you want to stay and hang out with your friends. I'm sure they miss being with you."

"My friends miss being with you."

I thought about that and said, "Then invite them to come over. Tri-Delt West may have formally ended, but my friendships with them haven't."

Andie paused. "Are you sure? With Elyse there?"

"What? You worried she's going to scare them off?"

"Well, not scare them. But things are certainly ... awkward ... around her."

"And it's only going to get more awkward the more you girls stay away. She's my guest, and she's going to be around for a little while. To be perfectly honest, she could use a few more friends and a few more eyeballs keeping an eye on her. It's alone with her demons when she's most at risk. Even if the girls don't want to interact with her directly right away, I think it's best that she's around other people, period."

"Um, okay then. We can work with that. I can see Jocelyn now, thinking 'Project!' She'll take Elyse under her wing and make her feel welcome."

"Yeah, Jocelyn's good at that," I agreed before the line started beeping at me to signal an incoming call. I pulled the phone away from my ear and glanced at the display, my eyes popping when I saw the ID read: DJ. "Oh, got another call I gotta take. I'll see you girls tonight?"

"Sure. For dinner. See you then."

"Thanks, cutie. Bye." Quickly, I switched lines and rather breathlessly answered, "Hello? Deej?"

"Hey Ben. How are you?"

"You serious? YOU just called ME for the first time since we broke up. I'm deliriously happy!" I enthused with a grin.

DJ giggled. "Glad to hear it. And about it being the first time in forever that I've called you, I'm sorry. Breaking up was really hard to do and I know I didn't handle it all that well. I know I said some hurtful things and kinda shit on the feelings we had for each other, mostly out of anger but also I think because convincing myself that you never really cared about me made it easier for me to move on. I'm sorry about that."

"It's okay. I get what you had to do."

"But I want to start making it up to you. At the very least, I want to stay friends."

"I'd like that."

"So ... and you can thank Brooke for talking me into this ... I'd like to invite you to my birthday party tonight. Not as my boyfriend, of course – and just to reassure you, I don't have a NEW boyfriend or anything like that – but just as a friend."

"Tonight? Uh..." I grimaced, thinking about Elyse.

"Other plans? A hot date perhaps?"

"What? No, no. Just ... it's ... It's complicated."

DJ snorted. "With you, it always is."

"I'd really like to be there."

"Then BE there, alright? Eight o'clock. Just a little get-together in the hills."

"In the hills? You're not doing this at Vivian Wang's place?"

"We got somewhere better. Lexi's new boyfriend has this amazing pad up in the hills. It's got these gorgeous views of the whole city lit up beneath it at night. He's still in the 'trying-to-impress-her' phase of the relationship, so he offered to host us for tonight. Just be cool and suppress your big brother instincts for a bit, alright? I know you'll always think of us as your innocent little froshlings, but we ARE gonna be drinking and smoking weed tonight."

I frowned, the little details of DJ's party ringing little alarms in my head. 'Get-together'? Up in the hills? Drinking and weed? Gorgeous views?

And the fact that Lexi Gilmore is a 5'9" brunette with green eyes?

No ... It can't be.

"Um, just curious, Deej. You say this is the house of Lexi's new boyfriend. You wouldn't, by chance, know his name, would you?"

"Sure," DJ chirped. "It's Carter. Carter Sheridan."