The Tenth Circle

by Jodi Picoult

  Because Jason was seventeen, the district court judge was sitting as a juvenile judge. And because Jason was seventeen, the courtroom was closed to spectators. Jason was wearing the brand-new blazer and tie his mother had bought him for college interviews. He�d gotten a haircut. His attorney had made sure of that, said sometimes a judge�s decisions could hinge on something as frivolous as whether or not he could see your eyes.

  Dutch Oosterhaus, his lawyer, was so smooth that every now and then Jason was tempted to look at the floor as he walked by, to see if he�d left a slick trail. He wore shoes that squeaked and the kind of shirts that required cuff links. But his father said Dutch was the best in the state and that he�d be able to make this mess go away.

  Jason didn�t know what the hell Trixie was trying to pull. They had been going at it, full force-consensual, Dutch called it. If that was how she communicated no, then it was a foreign language Jason had never learned.

  And yet. Jason tried to hide the way his hands were shaking under the table. He tried to look confident and maybe a little bit pissed off, when in fact he was so scared he felt like he could throw up at any moment.

  The district attorney made him think of a shark. She had a wide, flat face and blond hair that was nearly white, but it was the teeth that did it-they were pointy and large and looked like they�d be happy to rip into a person. Her name was Marita Soorenstad, and she had a brother who�d been a legend about ten years ago on the Bethel hockey team, although it hadn�t seemed to soften her any toward Jason himself. �Your Honor,� she said, �although the State isn�t asking for the defendant to be held at a detention facility, there are several conditions we�d ask for. We�d like to make sure that he has no contact with the victim or her family. We�d prefer that he enter a drug and alcohol treatment program. With the exception of the academic school day, the State would like to request that the defendant not be allowed to leave his house-which would include attending sporting events.�

  The judge was an older man with a bad comb-over. �I�m going to pick and choose the conditions of release, Mr. Underhill. If you violate any of them, you�re going to be locked up in Portland. You understand?�

  Jason swallowed hard and nodded.

  �You are not to have any contact with the victim or her family. You are to be in bed, alone, by ten P.M. You will steer clear of alcohol and drugs, and will begin mandatory substance abuse counseling. But as for the State�s request for house arrest�I�m disinclined to agree to that. No need to ruin the Buccaneers� chance for a repeat state championship when there will be plenty of other people around the rink in a supervisory context.� He closed the folder. �We�re adjourned.�

  Behind him, Jason could hear his mother weeping. Dutch started packing up his files and stepped across the aisle to speak to the Shark. Jason thought of Trixie, kissing him first that night at Zephyr�s. He thought of Trixie hours before that, sobbing in his car, saying that without him, her life was over.

  Had she been planning, even then, to end his?

  Two days after being sexually assaulted, Trixie felt her life crack, unequally, along the fault line of the rape. The old Trixie Stone used to be a person who dreamed of flying and wanted, when she got old enough, to jump out of a plane and try it. The new Trixie couldn�t even sleep with the light off. The old Trixie liked wearing T-shirts that hugged her tight; the new Trixie went to her father�s dresser for a sweatshirt that she could hide beneath. The old Trixie sometimes showered twice a day, so that she could smell like the pear soap that her mother always put in her Christmas stocking. The new Trixie felt dirty, no matter how many times she scrubbed herself. The old Trixie felt like part of a group. The new Trixie felt alone, even when she was surrounded by people. The old Trixie would have taken one look at the new Trixie and dismissed her as a total loser.

  There was a knock on her door. That was new, too-her father used to just stick his head in, but even he�d become sensitive to the fact that she jumped at her own shadow. �Hey,� he said. �You feel up to company?�

  She didn�t, but she nodded, thinking he meant himself, until he pushed the door wider and she saw that woman Janice, the sexual assault advocate who�d been at the hospital with her. She was wearing a sweater with a jack-o�-lantern on it, although it was closer to Christmas, and enough eyeshadow to cover a battalion of super-models. �Oh,� Trixie said. �It�s you.�

  She sounded rude, and there was something about that that made a little spark flare under her heart. Being a bitch felt surprisingly good, a careful compromise that nearly made up for the fact that she couldn�t ever be herself again.

  �I�ll just, um, let you two talk,� Trixie�s father said, and even though she tried to send him silent urgent messages with her eyes to keep him from leaving her alone with this woman, he couldn�t hear her SOS.

  �So,� Janice said, after he closed the door. �How are you holding up?�

  Trixie shrugged. How had she not noticed at the hospital how much this woman�s voice annoyed her? Like a Zen canary.

  �I guess you�re still sort of overwhelmed. That�s perfectly normal.�

  �Normal,� Trixie repeated sarcastically. �Yeah, that�s exactly how I�d describe myself right now.�

  �Normal�s relative,� Janice said.

  If it was relative, Trixie thought, then it was the crazy uncle that nobody could stand to be around at family functions, the one who talked about himself in the third person and ate only blue foods and whom everyone else made fun of on the way home.

  �It�s a whole bunch of baby steps. You�ll get there.�

  For the past forty-eight hours, Trixie had felt like she was swimming underwater. She would hear people talking and it might as well have been Croatian for all that she could understand the words. When it got to be too quiet, she was sure that she heard Jason�s voice, soft as smoke, curling into her ear.

  �It gets a little easier every day,� Janice said, and Trixie all of a sudden hated her with a passion. What the hell did Janice know? She wasn�t sitting here, so tired that the insides of her bones ached. She didn�t understand how even right now, Trixie wished she could fall asleep, because the only thing she had to look forward to was the five seconds when she woke up in the morning and hadn�t remembered everything, yet.

  �Sometimes it helps to get it all out,� Janice suggested. �Play an instrument. Scream in the shower. Write it all down in a journal.�

  The last thing Trixie wanted to do was write about what had happened, unless she got to burn it when she was done.

  �Lots of women find it helpful to join a survivors� group��

  �So we can all sit around and talk about how we feel like shit?� Trixie exploded. Suddenly she wanted Janice to crawl back from whatever hole good Samaritans came from. She didn�t want to make believe that she had a snowball�s chance in hell of fitting back into her room, her life, this world. �You know,� she said, �this has been real, but I think I�d rather contemplate suicide or something fun like that. I don�t need you checking up on me.�

  �Trixie-�

  �You have no idea what I feel like,� Trixie shouted. �So don�t stand here and pretend we�re in this together. You weren�t there that night. That was just me.�

  Janice stepped forward, until she was close enough for Trixie to touch. �It was 1972 and I was fifteen. I was walking home and I took a shortcut through the elementary school playground. There was a man there and he said he�d lost his dog. He wanted to know if I�d help him look. When I was underneath the slide, he knocked me down and raped me.�

  Trixie stared at her, speechless.

  �He kept me there for three hours. The whole time, all I could think about was how I used to play there after school. The boys and the girls always kept to separate sides of the jungle gym. We used to dare each other. We�d run up to the boys� side, and then back to safety.�

  Trixie looked down at her feet. �I�m sorry,� she whispered.

  �Baby steps,� Janice said.

  That weekend, Laura learned that there are no cosmic referees. Time-outs do not get ca
lled, not even when your world has taken a blow that renders you senseless. The dishwasher still needs to be emptied and the hamper overflows with dirty clothes and the high school buddy you haven�t spoken to in six months calls to catch up, not realizing that you cannot tell her what�s been going on in your life without breaking down. The twelve students in your class section still expect you to show up on Monday morning.

  Laura had anticipated hunkering down with Trixie, protecting her while she licked her wounds. However, Trixie wanted to be by herself, and that left Laura wandering a house that was really Daniel�s domain. They were still dancing around each other, a careful choreography that involved leaving a room the moment he entered, lest they have to truly communicate.

  �I�m going to take a leave of absence from the college,� she had told Daniel on Sunday, when he was reading the newspaper. But hours later, when they were lying on opposite sides of the bed-that tremendous elephant of the affair snug between them-he had brought it up again. �Maybe you shouldn�t,� he said.

  She had looked at him carefully, not sure what he was trying to imply. Did he not want her around 24/7, because it was too uncomfortable? Did he think she cared more about her career than her daughter?

  �Maybe it will help Trixie,� he added, �if she sees that it�s business as usual.�

  Laura had looked up at the ceiling, at a watermark in the shape of a penguin. �What if she needs me?�

  �Then I�ll call you,� Daniel replied coolly. �And you can come right home.�

  His words were a slap-the last time he�d called her, she hadn�t answered.

  The next morning, she fished for a pair of stockings and one of her work skirts. She packed a breakfast she could eat in the car and she left Trixie a note. As she drove, she became aware of how the more distance she put between herself and her home, the lighter she felt-until by the time she reached the gates of the college, she was certain that the only thing anchoring her was her seat belt.

  When Laura arrived at her classroom, the students were already clustered around the table, involved in a heated discussion. She�d missed this easy understanding of who she was, where she belonged, the comfort of intellectual sparring. Snippets of the conversation bled into the hallway. I heard from my cousin, who goes to the high school�crucified�had it coming. For a moment Laura hesitated outside the door, wondering how she could have been na�ve enough to believe this horrible thing had happened to Trixie, when in truth it had happened to all three of them. Taking a deep breath, she walked into the room, and twelve pairs of eyes turned to her in utter silence.

  �Don�t stop on my account,� she said evenly.

  The undergraduates shifted uncomfortably. Laura had so badly wanted to settle into the comfort zone of academia-a place so fixed and immutable that Laura would be assured she could pick up just where she left off-but to her surprise, she no longer seemed to fit. The college was the same; so were the students. It was Laura herself who�d changed.

  �Professor Stone,� one of the students said, �are you okay?�

  Laura blinked as their faces swam into focus before her. �No,� she said, suddenly exhausted by the thought of having to deceive anyone else anymore. �I�m not.� Then she stood up-leaving her notes, her coat, and her baffled class-and walked into the striking snow, heading back to where she should have been all along.

  �Do it,� Trixie said, and she squeezed her eyes shut.

  She was at Live and Let Dye, a salon within walking distance of her home that catered to the blue-haired set and that, under normal circumstances, she wouldn�t have been caught dead in. But this was her first venture out of the house, and in spite of the fact that Janice had given her father a pamphlet about how not to be overprotective, he was reluctant to let Trixie go too far. �If you�re not back in an hour,� her father had said, �I�m coming after you.�

  She imagined him, even now, waiting by the bay window that offered the best view of their street, so that he�d see her the minute she came back into view. But she�d made it this far, and she wasn�t going to let the outing go to waste. Janice had said that when it came to making a decision, she should make a list of pros and cons-and as far as Trixie could tell, anything that made her forget the girl she used to be could only be a good thing.

  �You�ve got quite a tail here,� the ancient hairdresser said. �You could donate it to Locks of Love.�

  �What�s that?�

  �A charity that makes wigs for cancer patients.�

  Trixie stared at herself in the mirror. She liked the idea of helping someone who might actually be worse off than she was. She liked the idea of someone who was worse off than she was, period.

  �Okay,� Trixie said. �What do I have to do?�

  �We take care of it,� the hairdresser said. �You just give me your name, so that the charity can send you a nice thank-you card.�

  If she�d been thinking clearly-which, let�s face it, she wasn�t-Trixie would have made up an alias. But maybe the staff at Live and Let Dye didn�t read the newspapers, or ever watch anything but The Golden Girls, because the hairdresser didn�t bat a fake eyelash when Trixie told her who she was. She fastened a string around Trixie�s waist-length hair and tied it to a little card printed with her name. Then she held up the scissors. �Say good-bye,� the hairdresser said.

  Trixie drew in her breath at the first cut. Then she noticed how much lighter she felt without all that hair to weigh her down. She imagined what it would be like to have her hair so short that she could feel the wind rushing past the backs of her ears. �I want a buzz cut,� Trixie announced.

  The hairdresser faltered. �Darlin�,� she said, �that�s for boys.�

  �I don�t care,� Trixie said.

  The hairdresser sighed. �Let me see if I can make us both happy.�

  Trixie closed her eyes and felt the hairdresser�s scissors chatter around her head. Hair tumbled down in soft strawberry tufts, like the feathers of a bird shot out of the sky. �Good-bye,� she whispered.

  They had bought the king-sized bed when Trixie was three and spent more time running from nightmares in her own bed straight into the buffer zone of their own. It had seemed a good idea at the time. Back then, they had still been thinking about having more kids, and it seemed to say married with a finality that you couldn�t help but admire. And yet, they had fallen in love in a dormitory bed, on a twin mattress. They had slept so close to each other that their body heat would rise each night like a spirit on the ceiling, and they�d wake up with the covers kicked off on the floor. Given that, it was amazing to think that with all the space between them now, they were still too close for comfort.

  Daniel knew that Laura was still awake. She had come home from the college almost immediately after she�d left, and she hadn�t given him an explanation why. As for Daniel, she�d spoken to him only sporadically, economic transactions of information: had Trixie eaten (no); did she say anything else (no); did the police call (no, but Mrs. Walstone from the end of the block had, as if this was any of her business). Immediately, she�d thrown herself into a tornado of activity: cleaning the bathrooms, vacuuming underneath the couch cushions, watching Trixie come back through the door with that hatchet job of a haircut and swallowing her shock enough to suggest a game of Monopoly. It was, he realized, as if she was trying to make up for her absence these past few months, as if she�d judged herself and meted out a sentence.

  Now, lying in bed, he wondered how two people could be just a foot of distance away from each other but a million miles apart. �They knew,� Laura said.

  �Who?�

  �Everyone. At school.� She rolled toward him, so that in the plush dark he could make out the green of her eyes. �They all were talking about it.�

  Daniel could have told her that none of this would go away, not until he and Laura and even Trixie could get past it. He had learned this when he was eleven years old, and Cane�s grandfather took him on his first moose hunt. At dusk, they�d set out on the Kuskokwim River in the small aluminum boat. Daniel was dropped off at one bend, Cane at another
, to cover more ground.

  He had huddled in the willows, wondering how long it would be before Cane and his grandfather came back, wondering if they ever would. When the moose stepped delicately out of the greenery-spindled legs, brindled back, bulbous nose-Daniel�s heart had started to race. He�d lifted his rifle and thought, I want this, more than anything.

  At that moment, the moose slipped into the wall of willows and disappeared.

  On the ride home, when Cane and his grandfather learned what had happened, they muttered kass�aq and shook their heads. Didn�t Daniel know that if you thought about what you were hunting while you were hunting it, you might as well be telegraphing to the animal that you were there?

  At first, Daniel had shrugged this off as Yup�ik Eskimo superstition-like having to lick your bowl clean so you wouldn�t slip on ice, or eating the tails of fish to become a fast runner. But as he grew older, he learned that a word was a powerful thing. An insult didn�t have to be shouted at you to make you bleed; a vow didn�t have to be whispered to you to make you believe. Hold a thought in your head, and that was enough to change the actions of anyone and anything that crossed your path.

  �If we want things to be normal,� Daniel said, �we have to act like we�re already there.�

  �What do you mean?�

  �Maybe Trixie should go back to school.�

  Laura came up on an elbow. �You must be joking.�

  Daniel hesitated. �Janice suggested it. It isn�t much good to sit around here all day, reliving what happened.�

  �She�ll see him, in school.�

  �There�s a court order in place; Jason can�t go near her. She has as much right to be there as he does.�

  There was a long silence. �If she goes back,� Laura said finally, �it has to be because she wants to.�

  Daniel had the sudden sense that Laura was speaking not only of Trixie but also herself. It was as if Trixie�s rape was a constant fall of leaves they were so busy raking away they could ignore the fact that beneath them, the ground was no longer solid.

  The night pressed down on Daniel. �Did you bring him here? To this bed?�