**Chapter 2: "The First Time"**
**Trigger warnings:** Non-graphic depiction of past assault, dissociation, panic response.
**Excerpt (Opening of Chapter 2):**
Lena's therapist had a name for it: *body memory*.
Not the tidy recall of facts—*he said this, then that*—but the way flesh keeps score. The way her hips still ached before a thunderstorm, a remnant of the fall she'd taken down the basement stairs. The way her throat closed at the smell of Cool Water cologne, the same cheap scent *he'd* worn.
And the hands. Always the hands.
Michael's fingers had been gentle when they first met, tracing the bird tattoo on her wrist as if it might fly away. But that night last year, they'd turned into *his* hands—the boy from the party, the one who'd laughed when she said *wait*.
Now, as Lena scrubbed paint from her nails in the bathroom, the water turned pink. She hadn't noticed the cut on her thumb. A drop of blood smeared the sink like a half-formed thought.
*Body memory.*
The reflection in the mirror flickered. For a heartbeat, it wasn't her 28-year-old self staring back, but a girl of seventeen. Hair tangled. Prom dress straps snapped.
The girl opened her mouth.
Lena turned off the light. **Flashback (Nonlinear Snippets):**
- **The party:** Fairy lights in the backyard. Lena's friend disappearing upstairs with a boy. *"Stay here, I'll be back,"* she'd lied.
- **The basement:** A too-warm hand on her waist. *"You're too pretty to be shy."*
- **The after:** Her body moving numbly through the next day. Smiling at her mother over pancakes. *"Did you have fun?"* *"Yeah."*
**Present-Day Thread:**
- Lena digs through her closet for an old journal, finds a dried corsage from that night. Burns it.
- Michael texts again: *"You're comparing me to a rapist? That's not fair."*
- She writes (but doesn't send): *"Fair would've been listening when I said no."*
**Closing Lines:**
The ashes of the corsage swirled in the toilet bowl. Lena flushed, watching petals dissolve into nothing.
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