The Terrible Trial of Kennedy Abrams (Treadmill II)

VI

VI

            Kennedy hesitated for a moment before recognizing that she owed Rebecca a bit more of an explanation than she had given.

            "Before we get into that, let me just explain something else. Just...so you understand what happened with me and Hank before the accident."

            "I know what happened." Rebecca replied, looking as if she were about to roll her eyes but stopping short. "You told me that night when you yanked me out to your car."

            "I didn't tell you the full truth that night." Kennedy replied, "I told you what I thought would make you the lowest level of angry with me."

            Rebecca was quiet.

            "Alright," she said, "Spill."

            "Hank Wilcox was a friend of my father's," Kennedy began, "My father always told us that Hank was the reason we were able to go to college, the reason we were able to afford our house. He was the reason that we were as well-off as we were, and my father always said it had something to do with his business. He didn't really give more of an explanation than that. So, when Hank and I started sleeping together, I already knew he was loaded.

"It got to the point that he was buying absolutely everything for me, and I stopped relying on my father for money at all. I stopped speaking to my father, partly because I was a bit embarrassed of the fact that I was sleeping with his good friend, and partly because my father had always been a verbally abusive piece of shit and I was happy for an excuse to not have to speak to him anymore.

"So, when I started to feel guilty about the affair and realized I could make money on my own, and not be reliant on Hank or my father, I tried to cut everything off, just like I told you a few weeks ago. When I talked to you then, I wasn't completely honest about my family's connection to Hank. I knew who he was when I went to see his set, and I knew who he was in the bar. He knew who I was, as well, but he hadn't seen me since I was a kid. Then, when he told me he wanted to leave his wife for me, I ended it. Like I told you."

"How is this giving me any new information?" Rebecca asked, crossing her arms and cocking her head to the side. "You told me all of this when you kidnapped me from my own apartment."

"Shut up, I'm getting there." Kennedy rolled her eyes, "As you know, Hank started calling and texting me constantly, calling me a bitch before saying he wanted me back and would leave his wife anyway, and then started threatening to pull his funds from my father's business. I told him I didn't care, he called my father and told him I stole money from Hank, and that he would be pulling the funding from my dad's practice.

"That's when my dad started calling me constantly. But while my father was trying to get a hold of me, Hank knew exactly where I lived. I would get home from class to see black sedans parked outside my apartment building, with tinted windows and license plates from Florida. It happened every day for two weeks, until I told the police. They told me I was being paranoid, and that the sedans could have been there for a myriad of reasons. But, regardless, the next day the sedans were gone.

"Next came the late-night visits to the apartment. Hank would show up once, twice a week at the minimum, always in varying degrees of sobriety, yelling through the door and insisting I open it up. So, I moved. I moved and blocked his number and blocked him on every platform I could think of. And this worked until the beginning of August, when he found me outside of the gym and almost succeeded at forcing me into his car and back to Tampa with him. That's the day I started making The Plan."

"The plan where you managed to convince me that I was somehow at fault for you running someone over?"

"Okay, I didn't 'run him over,' he flipped over the top of the car," Kennedy corrected instinctively. "But, I guess...yes. So, now you know the reasons behind everything. You know what Hank did, for real this time."