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“Why does it matter, Ann?” I ask. “I’m legally an adult, so why does it matter if I wear jeans, and why does it matter if I walk five blocks to the only real city around here?”

“Do you hear yourself?” she demands. “You sound like one of them.”

I’d rather be one of them than one of you.

“It’s an incredibly simple question,” I reply. “Why do you refuse to answer?”

“I think you should leave,” Ann says. “You might be comfortable surrounding yourself with bad influences, but I am not.”

“Gladly,” I reply.

I can’t believe I thought she’d one day be my bridesmaid, my child’s godmother. She only liked me because she could see her own reflection when she looked at my face.

That’s narcissism, not friendship.

She marches up the stairs while I text my mother.

Ann told me to leave.

I pack my stuff while I wait for her to reply, which takes longer than it should.

I’m sure you can work it out.

I stare at her response. No. I will not remain in this house after Ann has thrown me out. I climb to my feet and grab my things, though I’ve got no idea where I’m going.

And then...I do know where I’m going.

In her photo on Facebook, Kelly Maguire barely looks any older than me, but it says she teaches at an elementary school in Odenton. They’d be on spring break at the moment, so that doesn’t help much.

It takes a fair amount of digging to come up with an address, and then I pick up my backpack and start to walk.

She lives on the far side of Odenton. I’ve walked over five miles by the time I get to her tiny house, and it feels like a mistake to even go to her door, but I do it anyway. I just need to know. I need to know why people are making all these claims about her.

The woman who answers is no one I can see my father liking. She’s cute, but not beautiful like my mother, and she’s just not the kind of woman my father would respect. She’s wearing a lot of makeup, with yoga pants and a tank. All perfectly normal, but things I’ve heard him comment on derisively in the past.

It’s a relief. This isn’t a woman my father would have anything to do with.

I’m about to apologize when something shifts in her face. “What are you doing here?” she demands. There’s knowledge in her eyes. She knows who I am.

My mouth opens.

“You can’t be here,” she says. “Tell your father to leave me alone. I signed the non-disclosure agreement. Now go.”

My shoulders sag. Would she have signed an NDA if nothing had been done to her? Would she be asking that my father leave her alone unless he, at least once, had not?

“I just want to know if it’s true,” I finally say. “I just want to know if my father is the kind of man people are saying he is.”

I see a glimmer of sympathy in her eyes. “If you came all the way here to ask me those questions,” she says, “then I think you already know.”

Then she shuts the door in my face.

27

Istumble blindly, as if I'm underwater, until I find a park bench where I can collapse.

Toddlers squeal and a mother beside me frantically searches a diaper bag for something while the baby in her lap cries and it's all so...normal. These are the people we were so scared of when we lived in New Hope? I bet none of them has raped someone.

I want to tell myself that Kelly Maguire never truly confirmed anything...but she did.