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“Zoe, something did happen when you were younger. I don’t know all of the details because you never really told me. Not me or your daddy. All I know is it happened.”
She rubbed my hand rapidly like a mother trying to warm her toddler up outside in the dead cold of winter. “All what details, Momma? I’m so lost! So completely lost!”
“I know you are, darling. Something happened, and somehow you managed to bury it deep inside you. It was the reason we really moved to Atlanta from Dallas in the first place.”
“Momma, you aren’t making any sense.” I kept looking-from her to Jason and back, wishing someone would throw me a life jacket because I was sinking fast.
“You remember how we moved in the middle of the year and you were a transfer student and all of that?”
“Yes, of course I remember. Daddy got a job in Atlanta, and we had to move right away.”
“Actually, your father accepted the job because we needed to move right away. We needed to get out of Dallas.” She broke out into wails, but I couldn’t cry. I was petrified.
“What happened to me in Dallas, Momma?” I sat up further on the bed, let go of her hand, and started shaking her. Not because I was angry with her, but because I wanted her to tell me the freakin’ truth. “Momma, look at me. What happened to me in Dallas?”
Jason and the two doctors weren’t saying a word. Then again, I guess there wasn’t anything for them to say. They were just as confused as I was. “Zoe, baby, I don’t know exactly what happened, but—”
“Yes?” I let go of her shoulders and clasped her hand. I started rubbing her hand like she was the toddler. “Go on, Momma!”
“One day, about a month into your fifth-grade year, you came running in the house crying, and your clothes were torn.” My eyes bulged out of my head, and Jason put his arms around my waist to try to brace me for whatever was about to come. “You were late coming home from school, and I was worried. I called your father at work, but he told me to calm down. He figured since you walked home from school everyday, you probably just stopped over a friend’s house for a little while, lost track of time, and forgot to call.”
I didn’t remember any of the things she was talking about, and that made me ten times more scared than I was before. “What happened to me on my way home from school, Momma?”
She grabbed both of my cheeks in her frail hands and pulled my face all the way up to hers until our noses were touching. Her tears were rolling down both of our cheeks, not just her own. “I don’t know, baby! You would never tell me. You would never tell your daddy or anyone else. All I know is I felt so bad that I didn’t call the police or try to look for you, even if you were only an hour late. I should’ve realized you wouldn’t go someplace and not call. I should’ve realized something was wrong, and I’ve lived with this
guilt ever since.”
I threw my arms around her, almost yanking the IV needle clear out of my arm to do it. “It’s not your fault, Momma. It’s not your fault!”
Jason gathered both of us in his arms. “It’s going to be okay.”
My tears started flowing, and I wasn’t sure they would ever stop. Never had I been so utterly confused. I thought the whole situation with Quinton, Tyson, and Diamond was fucked up. Now, I come to find out something happened to me when I was just a child that was the underlying cause of it all. “I had to have told you something. What did I say?”
She started shaking her head, and Marcella came over with a tissue for her to blow her nose out. Once she completed the task and wiped some of the tears from her face, she replied to my question. “Zoe, the only thing you ever said to us was, ‘Why did they hurt me?’ ”
“Why did who hurt me?”
“I DON’T KNOW!” She was screaming, and Dr. Ferguson bumrushed into the room to make sure everything was under control. Dr. Graham politely showed him to the door and assured him things were fine. He reluctantly departed.
“You came home crying with your clothes ripped, and I called your father back immediately, telling him to get off work and come home. You kept saying, ‘Why did they hurt me?’ over and over again, but you wouldn’t say anything else. It was like you were in a trance or something. My immediate thought was that you’d been raped, but you wouldn’t even let me touch you down there. Every time I tried, you pushed my hands away violently, so we took you to the emergency room. They had to strap you down to examine you. You put up one hell of a fight, kicking and screaming and—”
“And? Was I raped?” I clamped my eyes shut and waited for her to reply, hoping the answer would be one I could live with. Jason was crying too by that point, but they were silent tears. No noise was coming out with them.
“According to the doctors, you were not raped. They did say you were bruised down there and red. No penetration though. They were very definite about that point.”
Dr. Graham jumped in and asked, “So Zoe was the victim of some type of sexual trauma other than rape?”
“Yes, Doctor, she was.” For the next few minutes, my mother and I were tightly intertwined in a bear hug, consumed in wails. All of those years, she’d blamed herself for something beyond her control. “Doctor, I wish I could be of more help, but after a couple of weeks, Zoe started acting real strange. She acted like nothing even happened, and when my husband and I broached the subject, she gave us the impression she didn’t remember. He and I decided the best thing was to just move away and leave it all behind—especially since we never discovered who harmed her. In our eyes, that meant they could do it again. We didn’t trust anyone after that. Everyone was suspect.”
Jason, who loves my mother almost as much as he loves me and wanted to comfort her, told her, “It’s not your fault. Zoe’s going to get through this. We’re all going to get through this together.”
My mother glanced up at Jason. “She almost lost you because of this. She almost lost everything. My baby even tried to kill herself, and all these years I thought she was faking about not remembering. I thought she pretended not to know just so she wouldn’t have to talk about it. When she fell in love with you, I was so happy, because I was scared she would never lead a normal life and find someone who truly loved her.”
“I do love Zoe. You know that more than anyone.”
“Yes, I do know that, and I’m so very grateful that she has you, Jason.”
I was totally unnerved. “For the life of me, I don’t remember any of this.”
