Faking It • Queen FanFiction

Cʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 69

Hello, this is just a trigger warning for description of sexual assault and physical assault. Feel free to skip this chapter and let me know if anybody has been made uncomfortable by this :)

"Birdie?"

"Roger."

"Can I ask you something?"

"Fire away."

"Why don't you like to be touched?"

The cold air thickened with tension. For the past hour they'd been sitting in silence as the world outside darkened. Subsequently, the living room was plunged into blackness as neither of them wanted to break their warm-ish hug to turn on a lamp. At this question, however, she peeled herself out his arms begrudgingly and flicked on the light, leaving a gaping, icy gap between them. "Okay, it's about time you knew the facts. I've kept so many things silent for a while now and I think you should know the truth."

Bernie's straightforward sombreness alarmed Roger and he sat up to listen carefully to every word that left her lips. "You have my full attention," he leaned forward and gently pecked her lips before she continued. A brief smile flashed across her face.

"As you know, Holden and I used to date. It was almost a year ago to the day that I broke up with him, eighth of November."

"No way, that was when Sheer Heart Attack was released. Blimey, time goes fast..." Roger interjected, suddenly wistful but snapped back into reality when Bernie continued.

"Yeah, and I got given a sheer bloody heart attack, I can tell you... My breakup with Holden wasn't exactly a peaceful one. Something you should know is our partnership wasn't one of equality. He was always abrasive, but I found it roguishness sexy, quite like I do in you."

"Are you comparing me with Holden?" The offence Roger took was genuine as he pointed a finger at himself.

"No. I'm saying you're sexy and he's not." She charged on with the story before Roger could make any input on that comment, "Like I said, there was no equality, and for the last six months or so we were together, I was something of an object to him. My meals were ordered for me without me even catching a glimpse of the menu, before we stopped eating out altogether. My 'free time' was monitored, I wasn't allowed a full-time job, I was the housemaid and I had no control over finances. Even my own wage packet went straight to him. It wasn't until he first hit me that I realised none of that was normal and I needed an escape route. But where was the exit in a spherical room with no doors or window?"

"In a - what?" Roger spluttered, confused.

"It's a metaphor, Roger. I meant that I didn't have an escape route when my entire life was under Holden's surveillance. Keep up. Anyway, he often hit me for things, trivial things. Things that were his fault, even. Like when he got home late from work and I got given a bloody lip for 'letting his tea go cold'."

"Oh, Birdie, that's awful, I'm s-"

"No, no, no sympathy yet. I'm not done. You can cuddle me and kiss my head when my story is finished. Now, it wasn't just the physical mishandling. I could deal with that by giving him a strong dose of guilt. Because who wants to walk around with a scarred girlfriend on their arm, huh? Not him. It was in the bedroom that things got...overwhelming-" she broke off. This was an extremely uncomfortable topic to be discussing with Roger of all people. She wanted him to know, but couldn't bare to spill the naked truth.

"So far, this story is the worst I've ever heard. You don't have to tell me the rest if you don't want to." Across from her, he took her hand in his and kissed it, rubbing little circles over her knuckles with his thumb. She looked down at their hands and carried on, ploughing through.

"You're not going to like this. Now, there were many days where I was not willing to do the things he wished me to do for him, to him, with him, etcetera. So," she gulped loudly, pushing the resurfacing emotions down, "he made sure he got what he wanted, whether I was willing to or not. That's to put it nicely. One night, he'd come home from work in the shittiest of moods and I remember my stomach just dropping. When Holden came home in a bad mood, it was hell on earth. But not only was he pissed off, he was also hideously aroused and seemed to want to take me right then and there on the dining room table." Pausing for breath, Roger's grip on her hand tightened, but lovingly and he silently reassured her. Momentarily closing her eyes, she inhaled through her nose and exhaled through her mouth.

"At this point, I didn't really have the...you know, drive to do anything - uh, sexual, as I was in such a low place that I had no energy for anything. But, of course, this meant nothing to Holden and he pressed on anyway. Cut a very long story short, I managed to flee the house that night, escaping to Brian's with barely a nightgown to cover myself. Yes, I walked around the streets by myself, barefooted in only a summer dressing gown with my own blood on it. How I didn't get stopped, attacked or arrested is beyond me. But if it hadn't been for Brian that night, I might not be sitting here right now."

Bernie also added the story of what happened a few days before leaving for Rockfield on the end, just for good measure. "So yeah, that's about it. To answer your question in a very long-winded way, I don't want your hands where I said because it reminds me of where hands touched me before. Foul hands. Hands that deserve to be firmly locked up in prison. And if the memories fade, the scars won't. I'm covered, and I don't want you to see that."

Roger was rendered speechless, but not in a good way. The way in which Bernie spoke about such horrifying experiences so brazenly chilled him to his very core. Nobody should have to go through that and then just accept it, whilst their abuser went consequence-free. Surely the justice system wouldn't have allowed that? Bernie would never know, as she felt too violated to report it. "Birdie, I'm so sorry. I don't know what else to say, I wish I could make it all go away." He held out his arms for a hug, but she shook her head, not wanting to be confined to the claustrophobia just then.

"You can't. That's the thing, you can't, I can't, he can't, nobody can. I'm spoiled goods. So I understand if you don't want me living with you anymore." She pressed her knees up to her chest, joining her hands round her legs, curling up into her own body. She didn't want to be confined in somebody else's arms, but she was fine with limiting her own space, as she could easily get out of it.

Without the ability to reach out to her, Roger was at a bit of a loss. Nothing he could say or do would make anything any better, so he just sat closer to her, not touching her, but letting her know he was there. He brought the duvet back round them and lit a cigarette, hoping it would warm him up. "Look. I'm incredibly proud of you."

"Proud of me? Are you drunk?" Lifting her head up, she couldn't believe what she was hearing. What was there to be proud of? She felt weak, involuntarily subservient to even the memory of what Holden did to her.

"Yes. And don't for one minute dare to blame yourself. That could've happened to anybody, it's not your fault. Do you hear me? It's not your fault." He had her full attention and she clasped onto every word he said.

Then the tears came. "Nobody's ever told me that before."

26/4/23