by Charley Lynn
“When I woke up, I was horribly depressed and sad; having feelings like I’d never had. I remembered a little of what had happened and I totally freaked out. I threw on my clothes, crying the whole time. I ran out of his building and found a taxi. I was a mess; I wasn’t coherent enough to give the driver Aunt Rosemary’s address. The taxi driver took me to the emergency department at Rush Medical Center and called the police. He told them that he didn’t think I was very old and while he didn’t know what had happened to me, he’d want someone to help his daughter in the same situation.”
“At Rush, I told them I didn’t think I’d been raped, but I couldn’t remember anything. They did a rape kit, they took my blood—I don’t even know what all they did. I couldn’t stop crying; they had to call my parents because I was a minor; Mom gave them permission to give me something to calm me down. He had given me MDMA...Ecstasy.” Rosemary was sobbing now; Mike reached over and pulled her close.
“Baby, you don’t have to tell me the rest of it.”
“I do. I need to tell you. You need to know and I need to know you know.”
“Okay.”
“He hadn’t raped me. It was apparently all about getting nude pictures of me. But the police wouldn’t do anything because there was no proof I hadn’t taken the drug willingly and Armand denied that there were pictures. They said models do drugs and that stuff all the time, so they really didn’t believe my story. John and Connor came to Chicago to get me and I went home with them. Aunt Rosemary contacted the modeling agency and threatened them with a civil suit; they let me out of my contract without retribution.”
“I was a total mess. Armand denied everything. He told the police that I took the drug recreationally and I was delusional about the pictures. He said I had tried to come on to him, but he locked his bedroom door and let me come down on my own. There was no evidence of any pictures--that they found. So, on top of everything else, he managed to make me look crazy.”
Rosemary wiped her eyes. “I occasionally got phone calls from him, but he didn’t start acting crazed until about two months later; I think he waited until the police lost interest. He didn’t really believe I wouldn’t come back to Chicago. I started to think I was catching glimpses of him at different places when I was in Des Moines, but he never revealed himself. I was questioning my own sanity--I know I got more scared and nervous all the time. That went on for a few weeks.”
“Then…then, Pete was killed. Pete was very religious and…just a great guy. It wasn’t romantic, we were just great friends. He planned to be a pastor; like I said, we went to church together and he was a year ahead of me at Roosevelt. He was the only one, other than family, that I told about the Ecstasy and Armand. He was a good friend to me—he never questioned my story or made me feel like it was my fault. He helped me a lot.”
“Almost every day after school, we walked to our cars together; he’d hug me and we’d head our separate ways. One day, we were talking in the school parking lot before we went home. He reached out and gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek. We joked about his poor little old car that he kept piecing together; then he jumped in his car to go to work.”
Rosemary covered her eyes. “He started to drive away. He was turning left out of the parking lot when a big SUV came screeching past and hit his twenty-year old Toyota. He was killed in front of me. The SUV took off; they never found the vehicle or the driver.” Rosemary sobbed while Mike held her tightly.
“At the cemetery after Pete’s funeral, I saw Armand in the back of the crowd, but John was with me and Armand didn’t approach me. A week or so later he started getting bolder about following me. He talked to me -- he told me how sorry he was that my friend had been killed and offered to help me through it. He kept telling me he was sorry he had let me take the ecstasy; that he should have stopped me when I wanted to find out what the drug was like. I knew that was wrong—I knew it. But I was so upset and I didn’t have any other friends. I was weak; I met him for coffee, but I knew as soon as I sat down that it was a mistake. I tried to leave, but he insisted I was embarrassing him and ordered me to sit down and listen to him. I was so used to following his orders, I did it. I didn’t stay long—he was nasty to me. I finally ran out.”
“A few days later, he started calling me again. I told him he needed to leave me alone, but he kept following me. He left me notes, roses in the bed of my truck—he got bolder with everything he did and more convinced that I was playing hard to get. I never met with him again, no matter how much he insisted. I didn’t see him for a while, but I didn’t want to look over my shoulder every minute I was in Des Moines for school. I quit dancing lessons in Des Moines and agreed to transfer to Ivy for my senior year. Other than with you, I haven’t been to Des Moines since last summer when I did costumes for a couple of dance studios.”
Mike held Rosemary close while she cried quietly. She took a deep breath. “A few weeks after I saw Armand the last time, the Chicago PD notified my parents that they had found three pictures of me on the dark web. Three not-quite nude pictures, in provocative poses.”
Mike’s grip on her shoulder tightened. “That…” He stopped himself by snapping his jaw shut and grinding his teeth. He pulled Rosemary closer to him and enclosed her in his arms. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he whispered.
Rosemary sobbed again for a few minutes, then finally calmed down; it helped having Mike’s arms around her. She leaned back and looked him in the face. “You know the night you asked me out?”
“Yeah. Not a shining moment in my life as a playa.” Mike grinned weakly.
Rosemary smiled slightly. “I was so freaked out because Armand told me constantly that I was backward and ugly and that if anybody asked me out, it was only because they felt sorry for me. Intellectually, I knew that wasn’t true of you, but I still went there. I just couldn’t help myself. “
Mike’s arm tightened around her. “I’m not a particularly violent guy, but I’d like to meet this guy in a dark alley.”
“I hope you never do. He’s not a big guy, but he’s mean. I never saw any evidence of them, but I always suspected he had guns somewhere.”
“You know this worries me, right?”
“I knew it would. But I wanted you to know about it. Mike, I don’t think he knows where I am. He doesn’t know John’s name; at least I never told him what it is. I don’t think I’m completely safe from being found, but I’m fairly confident.”
“Can you show me what this guy looks like?”
“Yeah. There are pictures in a box on the shelf out in the foyer.”
“I’d like to know what he looks like. Can I get the box?”
“Sure. It’s right outside the door, in the first cabinet.”
Mike carried the box into the room and set it in front of Rosemary. She opened it, but he noticed her hands were shaking. “Here, let me look.”
“I know it’s silly.” Rosemary sat back on the couch and clasped her hands together.
“It’s not silly.” Mike moved the box so it was in front of him. He started removing stacks of eight x ten color photos—all of Rosemary. “Babe, these are beautiful. You’re a knockout.”
She blushed. “Under that stack—there should be some candid shots.” He shuffled through some photos until he found some of Rosemary with a man who appeared to be at least a decade older than her, and several inches shorter.
“Is this him?” He showed her a photo.
“Yes, that’s him.” Rosemary looked away.
“Okay.” He dug into the box and found about a dozen shots of the same guy. He chose four different views of the guy. “I’m taking these, okay?”
“That’s fine. I should burn the rest.”
“No, keep them. In case you ever need to show them to a…to anyone. Hey?” He looked over at her and grinned. “Could I have a couple of these photos of you?”
“Sure. Take whatever you want. I have multiple copies of almost everything, anyway. What are you planning to do with t
hem?”
“Wallpaper my bedroom with them.”
“Ha. Ha. You’re a nut.”
Mike pulled her closer and stroked her hair. “I’m nuts about you, that’s for sure. You’re everything I didn’t know I needed. In five months, you changed everything.” He grinned. “That’s saying a lot, since for at least two months, you didn’t know I existed.”
Rosemary blushed. “Oh, I knew, all right. I’ve known about you since Miranda brought a picture of you to vacation bible school. I sneaked into her empty classroom and stared at that picture for at least twenty minutes.” She blushed again. “Later the same day, I saw you at baseball practice. All six-six of you.”
Mike laughed. “I saw you, too. But, you never looked up at me. All summer, I just wanted you to look at me. It drove me crazy that you never looked. I did everything but stalk you, but you wouldn’t look at me.”
“I looked, but only when you weren’t looking. I didn’t know how to talk to you. So, I just looked.”
Mike studied her, his eyes tender. He reached up and stroked her cheek. “You rock my world, Rosemary Desiree Bakker. I meant what I told you earlier; there’s nothing you can tell me that will change that.” Rosemary smiled. She didn’t answer, but she laid her head on Mike’s shoulder.
A few minutes later, they went back to sitting on the couch. Mike ate the rest of the pizza; Rosemary was quietly curled up next to him. Suddenly, Mike remembered something. “Hey, I’m curious about something.”
“What?”
“I know you modeled last summer. Do you still have a contract?”
“No, I don’t have a contract. But I freelance for other agencies. I only work with about a half-dozen photographers, all of whom have solid reputations for not harassing models. My Aunt Rosemary negotiates everything before I agree to take a job; including which photographers I’ll work with. I don’t work as often since I’m not under contract, but I actually get paid more per gig.”
“Okay. I see.” Mike settled back into the couch and put his arm around Rosemary. He decided to change the subject.
Chapter 35
“Tell me about your dad.”
Rosemary smiled. “I never knew him, of course. What I know about him is what I’ve heard from my mom and my grandparents. He was my grandparents’ only child; their house is like a shrine to him. It must be horrible to lose your child, but to lose your only child—that would be even more heartbreaking.”
“You said your grandparents tried to get you away from your mom?”
“Yeah. My mom says she was a basket case when he died. She was nineteen, she was pregnant and she was a widow. She and Dad met her first day of classes at Central. She was late for her first class, and she ran right into him outside her dorm. He reached out and grabbed her before she fell. Instead of going to her first class, she went for coffee with him. She said they were inseparable from then on.” Rosemary grinned. “Mom says he told all of his friends, ‘Yeah, she took one look at me and she fell for me.’ She said he always thought that was so funny.”
“He was two years older—he was a junior at Central. They planned to get married after he graduated, but Mom realized she was pregnant at the end of the school year, so they eloped. My oma freaked out about them getting married, but she was really freaked out about my mom being pregnant.”
“My oma accused my mom of getting pregnant on purpose to trick my dad into marrying her because he came from money. She actually hired a private investigator to find out that Mom’s parents weren’t well-off and Mom was on scholarship. My dad just laughed at Oma. When Oma told my dad he was disowned, he decided to join the Marines early. He had planned to enlist as an officer after college, but he knew he could support them if he was in the service. He convinced Mom to move back in with her parents and go to a community college until I was born and he had a duty station.”
Rosemary sighed. “He was killed in a training accident less than a month after he started basic training. My mom said she fell apart. She didn’t go back to school, she didn’t work or do anything—she just stayed in her room and cried. My oma somehow managed to get the Marine Corps to let them take my dad’s body. They had a funeral and buried him without even telling my mom and they never mentioned her in the obituary or at the funeral. They wouldn’t tell her where he was buried; she had to go to the Marine Corps to find out where he’d been buried.”
“That’s really cruel.”
“It is cruel. My oma has always held my mom responsible for my dad’s death; although that makes no sense. My mom didn’t leave the house for most of her pregnancy, except to go to the doctor. Her parents, who are wonderful people, left her alone to grieve. When I was born, she realized that she had to put her sorrow aside. She put me in daycare, found a job and started taking classes while she lived at home.”
“My oma and opa waited for Mom to pick me up from daycare one night. Oma accused Mom of not being equipped to care for me. She told Mom they were going to take me away from her because they could provide for me so much better than she ever could.”
“But that didn’t happen.”
“No, it didn’t, but they tried. They sued for custody and guardianship. They’d had a private investigator watching Mom all along, so they brought up in court that she never left the house, and implied she was mentally ill. They told the court they lived in a big, beautiful home in Pella while we lived with my grandparents in a two-bedroom house in a not-so-great part of town in Des Moines. They said her age was a detriment to being a good parent and that she wasn’t a church-goer.”
“But they didn’t win?”
“No. All they got was the right to see me one Saturday a month from ten in the morning until two in the afternoon. After I turned seven, they had the option to change that to a weekend visit every six weeks from early afternoon Saturday – early afternoon on Sunday. Things got ugly again when my mom married the boys’ dad, but my mom was older and wiser, so things didn’t get out of hand. Oma’s still not nice to her; Opa’s very civil, but Oma is hardly civil at all.”
“Did they complain about you modeling?”
“Oh, yeah. Oma had a fit about all of it—the fact that I was being put out in the public eye; it was ‘unseemly.’ The fact that I was gone a lot and the fact that I was making money. The money I was making was a real bone of contention—she accused my mom of exploiting me for her own gain. That’s one of the reasons Mom hired the financial counselor.”
“What about when she married John?”
“Well, they had been nasty to her about the divorce. Not that they liked the boys’ dad; they didn’t. They actually seemed to like the idea that she was marrying John. They were critical of Mom and John having a wedding, saying it was unseemly since it was her third marriage. However, John wanted a small wedding; he thought it was important for all of us to experience the ceremony and realize we were creating a new family unit. I stood up with Mom at the wedding and they didn’t like that—they have a strange idea that a girl should never draw attention to herself. They were rude about Mom and John having Jared. My mom really can’t do anything right as far as my Oma is concerned.”
“Does your grandmother complain to you about your mom?”
“No, she doesn’t complain, actually. When I was younger, it was constant criticism about Mom. When I was about eight, I came home from a weekend with my grandparents all upset because Oma had said terrible things about Mom. Mom got an emergency restraining order, put me into counseling and took them to court. My therapist recommended they not be allowed to see me and she had a lot of examples of things Oma had said that hurt and confused me.”
“My mom’s boss, a kids’ psychiatrist, testified about how traumatic it is for a kid to be subjected to negative comments about a parent. The psychiatrist is well-known in Iowa and testifies in court a lot about kids’ issues. My grandparents lost their rights to see me without supervision; they hated the supervision, but they went along with it. In the last couple of years, since I’ve
been able to drive, I see them a couple of times a month for dinner.”
“But you said they don’t say things about your mom to you.”
“Not really, because I pretty much just leave when it starts. Instead, Oma calls Mom and complains directly to her about whatever is bothering her.”
“Did she call her today about the fact that you have a boyfriend?”
Rosemary laughed and snuggled into Mike’s shoulder. “She did.”
“Did your mom tell you what she said?”
“Yeah. Oma called her early this morning, before I even had a chance to tell Mom about it. Caleb had told Mom about seeing them, so I think Mom was half-expecting her to call. Oma started in on her this morning, complaining about me dating. She said I was too young and that she didn’t know anything about you. She told my mom very bluntly that she didn’t want me to end up pregnant, like she had. She was rude. She said she was sure you were only interested in me because they have money.”
“Mom said, ‘Mrs. Bakker, my daughter is an intelligent girl with good instincts about people. Her friends, including whom she dates are none of your business. However, for your information, her boyfriend is in the top three percent of his class and he’s being recruited to play football and baseball in college. He comes from three generations of teachers and five generations of farmers. His mom has been a member of our church for eighteen years. His late father was also a member of our church. Rosemary told me that you suggested Mike is ‘trailer park trash.’ He isn’t, but you are the one who, the entire time I’ve known you, has placed so much emphasis on money. I know you use the threat of disinheritance to try to keep Rosemary in line. I know you did it to David, too. The thing is, Mrs. Bakker, it’s an empty threat with Rosemary. She’ll make five times your net worth in the next three years. I think you would do well not to irritate your granddaughter with your small-minded thoughts about someone you don’t even know.’”
