The Incident

by Cami York

  The look he’d given me then was one of pure hate. I recoiled and almost fell on my ass from the force of it.

  I drove myself to school, I don’t know how. But by the time I got there I knew that everyone knew, everyone had seen. It was the most awful feeling in the world.

  I’d gone in search of Jill who was the last person I remember seeing that night, but she’d acted cold, distant.

  “How could you? All these years you walked around with your nose in the air like you were better than the rest of us, and all along you were nothing but a slut.”

  “What? Why are you saying these things? You know I would never do anything like that. Something must’ve happened to me. I would never…”

  “Just save it okay. The innocent little girl act is played out. Everyone knows what you really are now.”

  Her words cut like a knife. Not just the venom behind them, but the fact that she’d said everyone knew. That could only mean…

  I saw it on the face of the kids I passed in the hall. I heard it behind every snicker as I passed by. It was the worst day of my life.

  I don’t know how I kept going back there day after day, but I had to. It was the only time I could see Brandon. But he wouldn’t even talk to me.

  It killed me when I saw my so-called friends comforting him. The way they would look at me over his head with a sly smirk as they rubbed his arm or back.

  The fact that he didn’t seem interested didn’t ease the pain. They were allowed to get close when he wouldn’t even look at me.

  “Brandon!” My throat was on fire again but I had to make him hear me. This might be the last chance I get. He still wouldn’t look at me, like I wasn’t even there.

  “I didn’t do this. I don’t know what happened that night but I know that I would never betray you...”

  “Does your parents know?” He cut me off and finally looked back at me.

  “No, please…” I started hyperventilating and he looked panic.

  “Baby, stop it, calm down.” Baby, he’d called me baby. Even in my state hearing him call me that was like balm to my soul.

  Just then the door opened and my parents walked in. “Everything okay?” They looked from him to me, and back as they approached the bed.

  “Yeah, everything’s fine. I think I’ll leave you guys alone. I’ll come back in the morning.” He moved as if to leave the room.

  I don’t know what happened, but hearing him say those words, watching him walk away for what could be the last time, broke something inside me and I lost it.

  It took those three: two nurses, and a doctor, to calm me down and get me back into bed. I hadn’t even realized I’d thrown myself from the hospital bed.

  I was clinging onto him with what little strength I had left, sure that if he walked out that door I’d never see him again. I looked into his eyes hoping he could read the desperation in mine.

  I was dying inside, there was nothing left. “Please…” The words don’t leave me got stuck in my throat.

  “What’s going on? You two have a fight? Brandon?” Daddy looked at him like he was ready to tear his head off.

  “No, we’re not fighting.” I only calmed down when he came back to my bedside. The doctor said I needed to rest, that they should leave and I had enough strength left to croak out the word no, before I fell into darkness.

  The cops were there the next time I woke up. I came awake to hushed tones and whispers. I looked around the room fitfully, more aware this time than the last.

  My heart settled its rhythm once I found Brandon sitting on the chair next to my bed while my parents and the officers sat at the table near the window.

  The room was different and for a split second I thought they’d taken me home, but one look around told me I wasn’t.

  Brandon wasn’t aware that I’d come awake and I stole those few moments to look at him. Would he ever love me again? Would that face be there when I wake up for the next sixty years?

  He was looking at the others with a strange look on his face, one of his thoughtful squints. It was only then that I picked up on some of what was being said and my heart sank farther.

  “I find it very strange that up until this point your daughter has never done anything like this. Even her conversations with her boyfriend are rather tame compared to some we’ve seen. And how did the images originate from her phone? Who was the one handling it?”

  “Our tech guy says it wasn’t one of those selfie things, the angle’s all wrong. So somebody else was in that room other than the boy.” The other officer spoke up.

  “What’re you saying?” I heard daddy shift on his seat when he asked that.

  “We don’t know for sure, but it looks like she was set up. Did your daughter say anything to you about that night?”

  “Until my kid tried to kill herself we had no idea any of this was going on.” I closed my eyes quickly when daddy turned to look at me on the bed, feigning sleep.

  “Brandon, you wanna say something? Did you know about this? Is this why you haven’t been coming around lately?” Before he could answer the anger in daddy’s voice the first cop spoke again.

  “It’s made the rounds at school. Apparently she was being harassed. None of the teachers or the principal got wind of it, but pretty much the whole student body knew or saw the images.”

  “What do we do now?” My heart was racing so fast and so hard I was sure they could hear it from across the room. I wasn’t aware that I was crying until I felt his fingers on my cheek, wiping them away.

  My eyes opened on his. There was such turmoil in his look I hurt for him. What did it mean? Did he finally believe me?

  It didn’t even matter that my parents had found out my dark secret, as long as he was there to hold my hand.

  “Now, we get to the bottom of it. There’s a lot at play here. First whoever did it can be charged with distributing child porn.”

  “She’s almost eighteen.”

  “Almost don’t count in a court of law. The law says that she’s still a minor for the next month and a half and since the offence took place while she was still seventeen it stands. We’ll do some more digging. We’ve already lined up interviews with everyone who was at the party. We’ll keep you posted.”

  I heard chairs moving and slitted my eyes open to see mom and dad get to their feet to shake hands with the two men before daddy followed them from the room.

  Mom came over and stood next to the chair where Brandon was sitting. “How is she doing?”

  “She’s asleep.”

  “Did you know about all this?”

  “Yes!” He didn’t even hesitate.”

  “Where were you, what happened?” Oh mom, don’t blame him. It was not his fault.”

  “I got there late. One of the guys was running behind and I had to wait for him. By the time we got there she was nowhere around and none of her friends knew where she was. I searched for her and called her phone but there was no answer.”

  “But didn’t Jill take her to the party? What did she say happened?”

  “She said Kristi disappeared as soon as they got there and she hadn’t seen her since.”

  “None of this makes any sense.”

  “I thought she’d gone back home, but, she wasn’t there.” I’m guessing he knew because he’d climbed up my window. “The next day I got the pictures…I.”

  “And you didn’t stop to think that that wasn’t her? That she’s not the kind of girl to do something like this? Look at her Brandon, what the hell did you people do to my daughter?”

  “I didn’t…but I didn’t stop the others and I didn’t protect her when it was happening.”

  “So you left her to face it alone. I hope your pride was worth it.”

  I bit my inner lip to keep from crying out. She wasn’t saying anything I hadn’t thought myself, but I still couldn’t bear to hear her say those words to him.

  Just then daddy came back into the room. “Come on Janine let’s get some coffee down
stairs. Brandon we’ll bring you back something to eat you haven’t eaten all day.”

  I heard footsteps across the carpet and then they were gone.

  “You can open your eyes now, they’re gone.”

  6

  I opened bloodshot eyes on his, but there wasn’t much change. He still didn’t look like the boy who’d been in love with me just a little while ago.

  I wanted to be angry with him for not trusting me. But my lack of memory of that night held me back. How can I be mad at him when I didn’t even know the truth myself?

  All I was certain of is that I would never have done anything like that in my sound mind. I was afraid that I’d been drugged, but the greater fear was, what exactly had happened to me in those few hours that I was unaware?

  I’m terrified of finding out. Brandon and I had never had sex. He wanted to wait until I was eighteen.

  It wasn’t because he was afraid of the repercussions because he’d already turned eighteen a few months ago, and this state has very stringent laws when it comes to underage sex. It was just a thing with him.

  We’ve done some pretty heavy petting in the last year and a half, but he would never take things any farther even though sometimes I’d try to coerce him.

  I can’t imagine how he feels believing that I’d given myself to someone else. The thought made me sick. I’d only been thinking of myself these last few weeks, never giving a thought to how he felt.

  The images that were floating around were more suggestive than anything else, but it doesn’t take much of an imagination to figure out what it means when there’s a naked girl spread out on a bed with a man’s torso standing next to her.

  My mind and body revolted and I sat up. “I need the restroom.” He helped me up and stood outside the door until he heard me being sick, then he came in and knelt next to me, holding my hair as I threw up bitter liquid.

  My tummy cramped and my throat hurt. It was only as he stood me in front of the sink and I got a look in the mirror that the severity of what I’d done hit home.

  My limbs started to shake and I wanted to scream and run away. A monster looked back at me, there was nothing behind my eyes.

  I stared through tears at what I’d done to myself and what it meant. I’d tried to kill myself. Me, Kristi Bronwyn had tried to leave everything and everyone I know. I was taking the coward’s way out.

  I never would’ve imagined that I was the kind of person who could be this weak. How did I get here? How did me not wanting my family to see what I had become push me to this point?

  I looked at him in the mirror and sudden anger rose up inside me. I remembered what the cops had said and wondered how complete strangers could be the only ones willing to give me the benefit of the doubt.

  I smashed my fist in the mirror trying to obliterate his face, suddenly hating him as much as I loved him. He had driven me to this.

  Even as I thought it I knew my thinking was a bit skewed and confused, but my mind was too jumbled to separate reality from fiction.

  “Stop it baby.” He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me back.

  “Don’t call me that.” I tried screaming the words at him but they only came out in a coarse squeak.

  “Talk to me baby, what’s going on?” Like you care. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you. Even his arms around me hurt.

  “What do you care?”

  Saying those words out loud made my heart hurt. He didn’t care, that was the bottom line. If he’d cared he’d have listened to me, he never would’ve believed the worst of me. I wouldn’t have done that to him.

  He carried me back to bed and got me settled, but where just a few moments ago I would’ve died without seeing his face, having him near, I now wanted him gone. “Go home Brandon, I don’t want you here.”

  I turned away from him, hating myself as much as I did him. I was so confused, so torn. Nothing made sense and I still didn’t know what happened to me that night.

  The thought of what might’ve happened made my head spin and I didn’t want to talk anymore. My life was over; I knew it. From now on I’ll just be a shadow of the person I once was.

  I was beginning to feel exactly the way I had when I walked into my closet with the rows of designer wear and hung myself.

  There was an empty desolate feeling in the pit of my stomach and nothing but swirling colors where my thoughts were supposed to be.

  He didn’t leave. I felt the heat of his body at my back and realized he was now lying on the thin cot behind me.

  His arms came around me and I felt safe and cold at once. Where were those arms two weeks ago? Why had you left me alone to face that hell?

  There was a war raging inside me. The anger that I couldn’t find the last few weeks seemed to be back in full force and it was all aimed at him.

  But then the love I had for him, the love that hadn’t faltered not once while he was acting like an ass begged me to give him a chance. The chance he never gave me.

  How was I supposed to deal with this mess that was going on in my head? I felt like I was going crazy and I realized it was because I felt betrayed.

  He was the one person I expected to have my back, to be in my corner no matter what. And no matter how I told myself that he had every right to doubt, I couldn’t shake the belief that he should’ve believed me.

  I wanted to say all of this to him but my throat hurt too much to talk and I was suddenly too tired to think.

  My lids fluttered and closed and I escaped into the darkness again. Sleep was my new friend. Only when I was asleep did anything make sense and there were no unanswered questions.

  The next time I woke up he was gone. I knew it even before I looked at the chair he’d sat in. Would I ever get over my need for him? Or was I destined to go through life missing him when he wasn’t there?

  The thought only made me feel lonely and sad as I searched the room for my parents. Mom was curled up in a chair while daddy read a magazine. He picked his head up and looked at me as if he felt my stare.

  With a quick look at my sleeping mother he came over to my bed. “Hi baby, how’re you feeling?” He kept his voice low so as not to wake mom as he brushed my hair back from my forehead.

  I closed my eyes in shame as fresh tears started rolling down my cheek. “I’m so sorry daddy.”

  “No baby, I’m the one who’s sorry.”

  He sat on the bed beside me and pulled me into his arms. What was he sorry about? He hadn’t done anything wrong

  “I should’ve been there, should’ve known that something was wrong with my little girl.” Oh no! “That’s not true daddy, it’s not your fault; none of this is.”

  He didn’t answer and it only made me feel worse knowing that he was blaming himself for my screw-up.

  I wanted to ask where Brandon was. I missed him even though I was the one who’d sent him away. And how could he just leave? “We sent Brandon home to get some rest. Poor kid’s been sitting in that chair for two days without sleep. He’ll be back later this evening.”

  I felt my body relax at the news. I waited for daddy to bring up what I’d done, to ask me a thousand questions or even to yell at me for being stupid.

  But I should’ve known better. Daddy has never yelled at me a day in my life. His silence only made me feel worst though. I wanted him to tell me what an awful person I was.

  “Come on baby, have some of these ice chips, they’re supposed to help ease the pain in your throat.” I sat up and let him feed me the ice even though I could’ve done it myself.

  We were practically alone for ten minutes before mom woke up and he never brought it up once. Mom once she woke up did pretty much the same and I was beginning to stress over the fact that they couldn’t even bring themselves to say anything about it.

  They must really hate me now. I hadn’t given any thought to what this would do to their standing in the community, daddy’s business; mom’s friends.

  I felt even worse when mom came over and kissed my forehe
ad with a forced smile on her face. She hugged me to her chest for a while and I felt safe, but now there was something missing.

  The tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife. Was this going to be our life now? Were they always going to look at me with that wary look in their eyes?

  Like they expected me to flake any second. How am I ever going to make this right? Is that even possible? I didn’t even feel like the kind of person who’d try to take their own life.

  Even now I told myself I will never let myself get to that point again. But how can I ask them to believe me when I was lying there with a mark around my neck from where I’d tried to do just that?

  7

  I slept most of the day away and each time I opened my eyes Brandon was once again sitting in the chair next to my bed.

  Sometimes I’d wake to hushed tones and find the three of them with their heads together at the table in the window.

  The next morning a nice doctor came to see me. I knew right away that she wasn’t the same as the one I’d been seeing the last few days and when she asked the others to leave the room I knew I was right.

  “Hello Kristi, I’m Dr. Swanson, how are you feeling?” She sat in Brandon’s chair and pulled it closer to the bed.

  “I’m fine I guess.” My heart started thumping away in my chest and I didn’t know why but she made me nervous.

  “I wanted to ask you some questions if you don’t mind.” My body started to shake. I had a pretty good idea where this was going and I didn’t think I was ready.

  She didn’t jump right into the obvious question of why I’d tried to kill myself; instead she let me do most of the talking.

  I found it got easier as time went on to spill all the dark bile that was trapped in my gut. The more I spoke and she listened the clearer it became that the one thing pushing me was the not knowing.

  I felt lighter once I got it all off my chest. It was much easier talking to someone who didn’t know me. There was no judgment in her eyes.