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I stare into the sky, thinking about Sienna’s question. Water streams through my fingers.
“I mean, it’s okay if you don’t.” Sienna’s response is quick, apologetic, like she’s spoken out of turn. “It’s your experience to post or not post.”
Another wave breaks over us. A couple of guys to our right catch it and ride it all the way to shore, but I hug the board with my inner thighs to stay put. Aurora and Sienna know everything about what happened to me the night at the frat—I’ve even told them more details than I disclosed that day in the hospital. I haven’t quite known how much weight to give it. It’s certainly not something I want to glamorize or exploit. I want to be an empowering figure for the girls, not a tragic one. Too many women have been cast in that role already. At the same time, what’s the difference between what happened to me and what happened to Sienna? Not much. My situation was perhaps more violent, but we were both forced into corners—and into silence.
Since coming back to California, I’ve tried to make strides to heal—reallyheal. I found a new therapist. New medication. A support group. I took up surfing again. I’ve opened up to my family—slowly, because old habits take time. I’ve opened up to Paul, too, who is an excellent listener—patient, kind, intuitive. I guess it’s turning into something, considering that Paul is moving out this way in two weeks’ time. He’s been hinting at it for months, but I staved him off, saying I felt more comfortable with the long-distance thing—we’d meet at a central point in Chicago or Minnesota and spend long weekends together. But he applied for a job at a musicwebsite out here and got it... so here he comes. I’m nervous about it, though Kit, Aurora, and Sienna are all cheering me on.
I guess the worst that can happen is that it doesn’t work out. But maybe I should think positively for once.
There are other new things, too. After the news of the frat broke, Marilyn O’Leary was under formal criminal investigation, and the Feds came up with a number of just how many rape accusations she’d buried and deflected:sixteen.That’s more than I even knew of in my Facebook group. It probably isn’teveryone,either—consideringIdidn’t come forward, I’m guessing others didn’t as well. But still:sixteen.It’s shocking. Their names weren’t released, but I felt like I knew them all the same.
They whispered to me, those girls. They felt like sisters. I couldn’t help but imagine where it might have happened for them: in that same dingy upstairs bedroom.
I wanted to find these victims, though I had no idea how. They weren’t on the hack database. They aren’t nestled in my father’s files—and for that, I’m eternally grateful. Even the ones I spoke to on Facebook did so anonymously, through shell profiles.
But then, #MeToo started. I’ve torn through the stories that have come out so far, even though many are triggering. The stories range dramatically from rapes to hideous comments to a grown man’s hand on a girl-child’s thigh on what was supposed to be a happy airplane trip to a tropical vacation. But the message to everyone is the very same thing that was ingrained in me:Do nothing. Say nothing. It doesn’t matter.
It was affirming in the most terrible of ways. I don’t want to be part of this club, but here we all are. I admire the bravery of the women who’ve tweeted and Facebook-posted and personal-essayed the truth. And the outpouring of support and unity is staggering.
“Actually, I already did write something,” I admit now, during a spell of flat water.
Sienna blinks big, fat water droplets off her lashes. “Really? On Facebook?”
“No, an essay. I’m going to send it to an editor friend. She’s going to publish it on their site. But the thing is...” I take a breath. “It tells everything. Including stuff about the actual frat and the school. I even talk about how I had a hand in hacking the school. I thought about doing it more anonymously, giving shaky details, but, well...” I shrug. “Go big or go home.”
“Wow,” Aurora says softly. “Good for you.” Sienna nods, too. There’s pride in her expression. This will be a good thing. This is what I’m supposed to do.
A wave rises up, and I’m grateful to hold up a finger, indicatingHang on, I’m taking this one.
I paddle hard, feeling the board catch, and then I’m skidding quickly down the wave. I stand up, gain my balance, and shift my weight onto my back foot.Yes.This is always such a life-affirming rush. Here I am, balancing on a flimsy fiberglass board propelled by the full-throated power of the ocean. If I can do that, I can do anything.
The wave peters out quickly, and I plop into the water. On the shore, Kit’s sitting up straighter, applauding. I wave back, and head out again.
The world shimmers at its edges. The ocean swirls beneath me, dark and unknowable, but that’s okay, too. I dive in, my board trailing behind me—not heavily, but oddly light and free. And when I surface, cold water dripping from my face, the beautiful horizon rounds above me, promising and powerful, truthful and terrible, wide open for whatever comes next.
51
KIT
OCTOBER 17, 2017
I sit on the sand, watching the three people I love most in the world battle a force of nature that seems way too overpowering and impossible to vanquish. My toes curl every time a wave pulls them under, but they pop up each and every time, like answers to my prayers. After one particular ride, Aurora turns around and grins at me. I smile back and give her a thumbs-up. And it hits me for the millionth time: I still can’t fathom that my daughter did what she did. It’s also hard to believe sherecoveredfrom the trauma of it.
When my father slipped away a week after taking the blame for Greg’s murder, I was bombarded with conflicting emotions. Grief. Guilt. Shock. Sadness. Even anger—I hated that the gossipy public, who’d glommed on to the story of his confession and wouldn’t shut up about it, would never know how selfless he really was. In the future, there would never be any statues of Alfred Manning on the Aldrich campus. He’d be excised from the Aldrich history books, known asthatpresident, the scandalous one. I wished I could tell everyone the truth of the sacrifice he made for Aurora. I wish I could describe the peaceful look that came over his face after he’d said he’d take the blame for Greg’s murder. It had filled him withgrace, almost like a renewed reason for living—or, rather, for dying. But I couldn’t do any of that. I had to just sit by and let the barrage of negative press roll in.
The only consolation was that Marilyn O’Leary could no longer swoop in and take his place—after a few carefully placed anonymous tips to the press that Marilyn was perhaps trying to make behind-the-scenes deals with rape victims without the president of the university knowing, reporters dug into her hacked e-mails and started asking questions. It didn’t take her long to crack; she resigned shortly thereafter.
After Dad took his last breath, Willa and I sat with his body in the hospital room in silence. I still felt so distanced from her. So much had been cleared up about why Willa was the way she was—why she abruptly left Pittsburgh, why she’d stayed away for years, even why she held us at arm’s length. But I also felt cheated. If Willa had told me about the rape, we might have been able to solve it together. We might have been close instead of the kind of sisters who occasionally traded texts. It was because of that history I turned to her in the hospital, saying, “We’re coming to California with you.”
Willa waved her hand. “You don’t have to take care of me.”
“No, we need to take care of each other. And, well, I think we need the escape.”
My house didn’t sell for what it should have—but then, I wouldn’t want to live in a place where a man had been stabbed, either. When I packed up to go, I tossed everything into a rented dumpster, easily parting with my past. I did the same with my father’s house, too. To my surprise, Dad had saved boxes and boxes of our mother’s things in the attic—old pictures, marked-up calendars, sketchbooks, even moldering art supplies. Every card she made for him, every little drawing—it was all there, squirreled away, tucked into desk drawers or bureaus and sometimes even the pockets of his jackets. I had no idea how close he kept her at all times.
Fat tears fell on the drawings. I missed my family. I even missedGreg—though I let that emotion pass quickly. I still couldn’t reconcile what had happened between him and Sienna. Whenever I tried to fully confront what Greg had done—the fury and frustration, the disappointment and betrayal, the shame in myself for choosing a man who’d do such a thing—it felt like I could only go so far until a wall came up, and I had to turn away. My chest physically clenched at how badly he’d hurt me. It ached, too, with how happy we’d once been... and how strange it was that it was both a sham and the absolute truth, all at once.
But I’d been about to do it all overagain...with Patrick. I had absolutely no idea who he was—and yet I would have tumbled wholeheartedly into a new relationship. I should have realized Patrick’s MO thevery first moment we met,when we had that long conversation about our alter egos. But I guess I’m a romantic at heart. I thought that even in our lies, we were admitting important things about ourselves. Now I know that onlyIwas doing that. For Patrick, it was all just a game to pass the time—a new identity to try on for the evening. Just like all those other women he saw. Just like all those other role-plays he was part of. Just a void to fill.
