How Far She's Come

by Holly Brown

  B.N. stared into my eyes. “Don’t sign this, Elyse. There will be other opportunities. Better ones.”

  We should have been celebrating. I was holding the winning lottery ticket, and he was telling me not to cash it in, that I should gamble on a bigger jackpot that won’t ever come. “You know Dennis is bluffing,” he said. “He doesn’t want Connie Chung. He doesn’t want anyone more established because he couldn’t do to them what he’s about to do to you. He’s going to make you pay, every day, for turning him down.”

  “He’s just hurt, that’s all. I know him better than you. I know he really loves his son—”

  “You can’t do this,” he implored. “You accept his terms, and you’re condoning his behavior.”

  “I’m so sorry I can’t live up to your standards.” I was seething now. “I actually live in the real world.”

  “Well, that’s not a world I want to live in.”

  “You don’t have to! You’re a man.”

  He stood up. “I’m going to take a walk. I need some air.”

  “Are you coming back tonight?”

  “You can’t be alone, not after . . .” By silent mutual agreement, we don’t talk about red paint.

  “You don’t need to babysit me. Take the night off.”

  He hesitated at the door, his shoes on. His conscience was telling him not to go, but I could see he really wanted to. He wants to get away from me. He doesn’t respect me anymore.

  “Please go,” I said.

  Now that I’m alone, the terror has set in. I call Dennis. I call The Tank. I call R.G. I even call York. (He wants to represent me, not kill me.) I leave messages to say I need help. I don’t care which one shows up.

  Fight or flight. I’m not going to run away. I’m going to keep on fighting.

  I write my own ending.

  Chapter 42

  The night Elyse was attacked, she called R.G. And on her Wikipedia page, “R.G.” made edits today. This section has been added:

  Quotes

  “In a world where the news is often scary, you want it to be told to you by a friend. I try to be that friend.”

  “I wish there was room at the top, or on the couch, for two women.”

  “The more appalling the perpetrator’s actions, the greater the victim’s crime must have been, because otherwise, why would this have happened to her?”

  “I had never thought of fear as motivation, as something I could use. Well, I’ve got plenty of motivation stored up.”

  “I’ve had it with men trying to overrule me and make their desires mine.”

  “Maybe this isn’t about insanity at all. Maybe all this has been entirely strategic.”

  “That job is meant to be mine. I’ve suffered for it.”

  “I write my own ending.”

  There are footnotes citing each date, but I don’t need to cross-reference. They’re from the diary I’ve been receiving. The cumulative effect is one of encouragement, an assortment to confirm that the diary has been from a friend, just like the first letter said. It’s from someone who wanted me to educate myself, to see how far women have come and how far they have to go. Someone who wants me to write my own ending, like Elyse did.

  It has to be Beth. She used to be Trish, which means she’s a survivor. She had to run away from INN, but she’s somewhere safe, communicating. She’s saying that I need to continue the fight.

  I will. I have no choice.

  THE BUILDING SECURITY hails a cab and sees me into it. I give the driver the address of one of the downtown boutiques I thought I’d make it back to but haven’t until now. If I’m being followed, it looks like I’m milking my sick day for a shopping trip, which would hopefully only make me seem more unthreatening to the powers that be. What a silly, superficial girl I am.

  I go into several stores before I find what I’m looking for: a back entrance. I wave off assistance, picking out the most shapeless clothing I can find. It’s a pair of slouchy pants with some inexplicable zippers and an oversized T-shirt with Andy Warhol’s soup cans emblazoned on it. It comes to a ridiculous sum that I pay gladly. The saleswomen, in classic New York style, have given no indication that they recognize me, but when I ask to use the back entrance, I get a quick nod and no questions. Before I slip out, I don the blond wig Reese bought me weeks ago.

  I walk down the street, concealed by people. It’s not impossible to tail me, but I’ve at least raised the level of difficulty. I take the subway for the first time, and I feel the thrill of everyone’s lack of interest. Anonymity, I’ve missed you.

  The Milstein Microform Reading Room inside the New York Public Library is stately and beautiful, with grainy wood and brass accent lamps and massive wrought-iron chandeliers hanging from high ceilings. I lap up the silence and the air-conditioning. It’s hot under my wig.

  The librarian finds nothing odd in my request. It occurs to me that librarians are a little like priests or prostitutes in that way: they must have heard it all. She gives no hint of recognizing me, though I realize five minutes after our interaction that my wig is askew.

  After a brief tutorial in the microfiche arts, I’m left to my own devices. A few hours later, I’ve found what I’m looking for. More than I dared hope for, actually. Now I’ve got more information about the past. I just need to make the connection to the present.

  I could really use some help from a journalist. From a friend.

  I get into a cab, fairly certain no one’s following me, and give the driver Reese’s address in Brooklyn. I pay in cash, in case INN is monitoring my credit cards. Other than the trip to the Hamptons, it’s my first time leaving the island of Manhattan. At a glance, Williamsburg is a lot more my speed than my current neighborhood, but right now, I’m not looking at real estate; I’m recruiting.

  Reese’s roommate answers the door. I met her that night at the club with Pietro, so she recognizes me and my wig. The reception is not exactly warm.

  It might help if I could remember her name, but no such luck. “It’s good to see you again,” I say, smiling. She remains stony, one hip thrust outward to effectively block the door-frame. “Is Reese here?”

  “Nope.”

  “You don’t happen to know where she is, do you? It’s really important that I talk to her.” She stares me down. “I need to apologize. I feel awful about everything.” Still nothing. “Edwin agreed that she can have her job back at double the salary. It wasn’t easy to convince him.”

  She gives a nasty smile. “I bet it wasn’t.” A pause. “She’s near the Williamsburg Bridge. She likes to sit on a bench there and think.”

  “Do you know which bench?”

  “If you really want to be forgiven, you’ve got to work for it.”

  That’s how I find myself walking up and down the promenade along the river by the Williamsburg suspension bridge, not even knowing what river it is. It’s a sort of brown gray, not nearly as beautiful as the Hudson was the night I walked with Chase, and I’m sweating profusely in the heat. Beneath the wig, my scalp itches, but I don’t dare remove it.

  I’m about to give up, thinking this was all just retaliation, when I notice someone who, despite the heat, is in a sweatshirt, the hood pulled up. While she’s hunched over in a very un-Reese-like posture, I move closer. The bench is one of the least popular as it has a clear view of what could be a belching toxic waste plant.

  “Hey,” I say. “I’m so glad to see you.”

  Reese gives a sideways glance, then repositions her hood.

  “Your roommate said I could find you here.”

  “Yeah? What’s her name?” When I can’t answer, she says, “That’s what I thought. She texted me. I thought about leaving, but then I wanted to hear this great offer of yours. Double the salary, right? And let’s throw in the Williamsburg Bridge.”

  I’m struck by the anger and bitterness radiating from Reese. It’s like she’s had a personality transplant. “I was lying. There’s no job offer.”

  “What a shocker
. Cheyenne’s a liar.”

  “I’ve never lied to you before. I’m here because I owe you a big apology.”

  “That’s all? There’s nothing in it for you?”

  So this is what Reese thinks of me. That I’m all about myself, that I use other people.

  I wasn’t that way before INN, I know that. But now, I can see Reese’s point. I’m not sure I have shown personal interest in her throughout our relationship. I’ve been trying to get information and support. That was Reese’s job, but it’s not friendship.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m hoping you’ll forgive me, and we can be real friends going forward.”

  Reese shakes her head. “Priceless.”

  “I know I didn’t treat you the way I should have.”

  “I tried to help you. I got Pietro to give us that place because you needed to get out of town. And then you turned on me. You said you never betray a friend, but you just abandoned me when I needed you.”

  Reese needed me?

  The last time I saw her. The red-rimmed eyes.

  “I know I’ve been self-involved,” I say. “And paranoid. When someone suggested that you called TMZ, I went back over everything that’s happened, and it seemed to make sense that it would be you.”

  “Someone suggested me?”

  “Edwin.”

  Reese shakes her head again. “And it just made sense, huh?”

  “It’s been a minefield for me since I started at INN. That’s not an excuse; it’s just my head space. Please. Can I explain?” Reese still isn’t looking at me, but maybe that’s better. It lets me detail everything that’s happened, all I’ve chosen not to share with Reese, or anyone else, including Graham attacking me and what I’ve learned about Edwin and INN.

  I can feel that Reese is looking at me, but I can’t look back. I’m so ashamed. I jumped into this with both feet, thinking I could trust my instincts and my initial read on Edwin. A lot of this is my own fault.

  Reese reaches over and takes my hand. Despite how moist her palm is, I’m grateful for the touch.

  “Laxatives,” Reese says. “They put a shitload of laxatives in your lunch. No pun intended.”

  “How do you know?”

  “It’s what they do, along with that teleprompter trick, and the note on your chair. I’m pretty sure all that is Nan and Belinda, securing their places with Rayna. That’s just jockeying for position. But there is something evil at that place, and I don’t use that word lightly. And now, with Beth . . .” She trails off, turning her brimming eyes to the water.

  I feel my chest tightening. “What about Beth?”

  “You don’t know yet? It’s all over the news.” She pauses, searching for the best way to say it, and then just plunges in. “They found her body. She drowned, more than a week ago.”

  They got to her. The sorrow is a gut punch. Maybe I didn’t really know her, maybe she was just a figment of my imagination, of my longing for the mother I never had. But the loss sure feels real.

  Reese and I sit in silence for a while, absorbing. Then I ask, “Have they figured out who she was?”

  “I don’t think so.” Reese meets my eyes. “You have?”

  “It’s a long story. Do you know who Elyse Rohrbach is?”

  “Obviously. She’s a feminist broadcasting icon, and pretty much a superhero.”

  When Elyse was attacked in her apartment, she managed to fight and then flee, her self-defense training kicking in. She got down the hall, banging on every door and screaming for help.

  She later identified her assailant as York Diamond, but just as she’d suspected, it was a made-up name. The man in question was actually Trish’s husband, Vince Malick. Vince had hatched a plan to get rid of Trish’s competition. He needed Trish to keep her job, since she was the only one working. He wanted to drive Elyse crazy so that she’d blow her shot.

  Unfortunately for him, Elyse didn’t crack. Trish did. She was drinking heavily due to the stress, and she was caught under the influence at work. Dennis gleefully gave her the choice to resign or be fired. She resigned, thinking then she could still salvage her career.

  Vince decided that Elyse needed to be punished. He shouldn’t have had continued access to the studio, but somehow, security was lax enough that he was able to get in and spray paint the death threat on the wall of Elyse’s dressing room. That was going to be the end of it, according to him.

  Then he found out that Elyse would be taking over Trish’s job permanently. He went to her apartment and tried to make good on his threat. According to his lawyer, he was temporarily insane.

  The jury didn’t buy it. Not when there was this clear sign of premeditation:

  Vince learned that Elyse was accepting the job and that she was home alone, without any security, because she left it on the answering machine that he’d set up under the alias York Diamond. In that message, she asked if he could come over to talk about how he might be able to negotiate on her behalf. She was never planning to be his client, but somehow, she had decided that he wasn’t to be feared, that Someone Else was the true danger. She had unwittingly asked for protection from the man who had threatened to kill her. She was so terrified of being alone that she lured her attacker right to her.

  Elyse fought Vince off, but the side of her face was slashed, leaving a raised scar, paler than the surrounding skin. Elyse refused to hide it on-air. She called it her badge of courage. Her popularity skyrocketed, and she could go anywhere. She took another morning show gig, and within the year, Morning Sunrise was canceled amid an ocean of bad publicity. Dennis lost his job.

  Elyse remained a force in broadcast journalism for the next twenty years. She received some of the biggest contracts in network history and was instrumental in getting New York’s antistalking law passed, as well as being an advocate for victims’ rights. She married Barry Nadler, the writer from Morning Sunrise, and had three children with him.

  Meanwhile, Trish claimed that she never encouraged or knew about her husband’s actions, and there was evidence to suggest domestic violence at home, yet the public reaction was harsh. She received death threats, and with two little girls to raise, she needed to get out of the public eye. There are still people who believe she had to have colluded with her husband, that she’d set him up and walked away scot-free, though they’ve never been able to support the contention. There’s a Free York Diamond website, which features lots of comments like, “You know she was in on it. All bitches are evil.” That’s part of why the Wikipedia entry has undergone so much editing.

  “Eventually, Trish wanted back in,” I say. “She emerged on-air after September eleventh as Beth Linford, with dark hair and colored contacts. No one was combing headshots from 1991, so she got away with it.”

  “Or she just thought she did,” Reese says. “Do you think someone from her past came back to get revenge? Someone who thought that she was complicit in what happened to Elyse?”

  “I don’t know yet. But I know that someone from Elyse’s past is at INN. Rich Garrett.” Ty’s executive producer, the suck-up. R.G.

  The diary never said what R.G. did for a living. It didn’t say that he’d worked as a producer at a different network. He and Elyse had met while they were both at the campus TV station.

  Somehow, in all the parsing of the case, the internet never seized on his role in what happened to Elyse. It was practically a footnote in the trial coverage; I’d had to go through with a fine-tooth comb to find it. York Diamond learned all the details about the stalker’s MO—the things he couldn’t have gleaned from People magazine—from Rich. They met in a bar across the street from the Morning Sunrise studio and became friends, of sorts. Or Rich thought they were. It turned out that while he was crying in his beer about the one that got away, York Diamond (i.e., Vince Malick) was taking notes on how to send Elyse over the edge.

  What I don’t know yet, what I’m hoping Reese can help me figure out, is how Rich fits into my story, and into what’s going on at INN now. Did h
e repent and become a feminist, and now he’s the one giving me the diary entries and posting on Wikipedia, sending me a message I haven’t yet been able to decode?

  “No,” Reese says firmly. “If Rich is involved, in the present, there’s no way he’s trying to help you. He doesn’t give a shit about women. He acts as Ty’s pimp.”

  It’s clear she knows from experience. “What happened?” I ask softly.

  “It was going on for a little while. I didn’t want you to think less of me. That’s why I didn’t tell you.”

  “What was going on?”

  Now it’s her turn to avert her eyes while she tells her story. They do this to us, and then we’re the ones who feel ashamed.

  “I was hooking up with Luke,” she says. “It was really casual, and there was a lot of alcohol involved. It’s not like I wanted him for my boyfriend or anything.”

  “What did he do to you?”

  “It wasn’t him. Not exactly. It was . . .” She lets out a shuddering breath before being able to continue. “Rich kind of orchestrated this whole thing with Ty, so Ty wouldn’t have to hit on me directly, and instead of me thinking how creepy that was, I was flattered. I mean, Ty’s married, and he’s more than twenty years older than me, and I’m flattered?”

  “Don’t do that,” I say. “Don’t blame yourself. That’s how they keep us powerless, worrying about our mixed signals and our mistakes. We’re allowed to make mistakes, and it shouldn’t cost us like it does.”

  She nods, slowly, before continuing. “So Ty and I were, you know, together a few times. Luke just disappeared from the scene, like there’d been some prearrangement. Or like Luke had been auditioning me for Ty, because one time, Ty said, ‘I know you like this; I saw you.’ It barely registered because I was so drunk.

  “The last time, Ty met me in our usual spot. He seemed really aggressive. He was grumbling about you, about how he could barely get a meeting with Edwin anymore and meanwhile you’re up on the Jumbotron and going after the president. I was uncomfortable and said I needed to leave, but he”—her eyes well up—“he forced my head down and wouldn’t let me back up until I did what he wanted.”