This Gorgeous Game

by Donna Freitas

  Please, God. Make it stop. Please.

  And then in one of the darkest moments, the thought goes through my mind that if he had stolen my wallet I could have gone to the police and said, That man stole my wallet, or if he had gotten in an accident while drunk and driving the police would have hauled him in and said, You were drunk driving and with a minor and that will land you in jail, or if he had just hit me, if he had just punched me in the face even once I could have gone to someone and said, That man assaulted me, and gotten him in trouble. These thoughts grow worse and worse and worse until the very last one, the worst one of all comes, That it would be easier if he had just raped me. If he raped me then I could go to the police and cry,

  RAPIST! THAT MAN RAPED ME!

  There would be physical evidence and they would take him away no matter how famous or beloved he is. They would lock him up and then he could no longer

  Write me.

  Call me.

  Text me.

  Follow me.

  Show up at the house.

  Leave notes everywhere I turn.

  Invite me places.

  Invite my family places.

  Make me have to lie.

  Write about me.

  Teach me.

  Love me.

  God. Make. It. All. Go. Away.

  Make him go away.

  I want to erase him from my life. I wish I had a Father Mark eraser that I could wipe across his existence. And then Father Mark would become Father Mark and then Father Mark and then Father Mark until finally, after a while, he was just

  Father Mark.

  Until he was no longer there at all.

  With this thought comes a single shred of strength.

  Erasing Father Mark. I can do that. I have a way to do that. I see the irony of it, how this time around, I get to play the role of God.

  Right then, I know what I need to do. For me. For me.

  But before I move, before I get up off the bathroom floor and head across my room to the couch, I have one last thing to say to God:

  Thank you, God, for this gift that is my writing. Thank you, God, for this space where I have all the power. Sorry though, God, because I think I’m about to fuck you over. Sorry ahead of time, okay?

  Then I become God the only place I can. On the page.

  I pull out my laptop and begin to type. Click, click, click go my fingers as they fly across the keyboard. I do not stop, not when the sun rises at dawn or the morning turns to afternoon and then to evening. I stay like this all day, writing, and everyone, my Mom, Greenie, my friends, Jamie, and Father Mark—of course Father Mark—tries to reach me. They worry. They think something is wrong. Am I sick? they want to know. Will I go to a doctor? they want to know. But I can’t answer. Not my cell, not texts, not e-mails, not voices or voice mails. Not yet.

  I cannot stop until I’ve made him go away. Until I’ve made this story mine.

  Mine. Not his.

  I am no longer God when I finish. I am neither God nor priest. I am once again just a girl. A seventeen-year-old girl. Olivia Peters. Just a girl.

  Like. Any. Other.

  When I finally close my laptop, I know I am ready. I call Jamie and then I call Ash and then I call Jada and I tell them, I tell them that I need them right away, that I need them to come over, and that afterward, together, we need to see Sister June.

  ON MY SIDE

  TAP, TAP, TAP GO MY FINGERS.

  My right knee bobs up and down.

  They can’t get here soon enough. I might burst.

  My mother is downstairs, sitting on the couch, worried, wanting to know why I won’t talk to her. Tell her what’s wrong. I am afraid she’ll be disappointed in me, that I will find out her faith in priests is stronger than her faith in me, and I cannot bear that possibility so I decide to wait and see, wait and see what someone else thinks. What Jamie and Jada and Ash think. What Sister June thinks.

  I don’t hear my bedroom door when it opens.

  A hand touches my back and I almost jump out of my skin but my skin stays firmly stuck to my body.

  It’s just Jamie. Just Jamie. Jamie.

  “Olivia? Everyone is worried.” He sits down on the couch, his hand still on my back. I am twisted away from him, facing the window. I fight the urge to shake him off. But Jamie will not hurt me. Jamie would never hurt me.

  “Where are Jada and Ash?” I ask, so quiet.

  “They’re on their way.”

  “I’m scared,” I say after a long while and turn, looking into his worried eyes.

  “I told you: you can tell me anything. I promise. What is going on?” he begs.

  “It’s bad. It’s really bad. You are going to be upset. Everyone is going to be upset.”

  “Olivia. Please.”

  I force myself to look into Jamie’s eyes and all I see is kindness. Trust. My heart beats so fast, so hard, that I wonder if Jamie can hear it.

  Jada and Ash enter my bedroom and close the door behind them. They rush over, move the coffee table out of the way so they have room to sit on the floor.

  “Livvy, we’ve been so worried,” Ash says.

  I am surrounded. Jamie to my left, on the couch. Jada at my feet, on the floor. Ash next to Jada, to my right, between the couch and the window, blocking my view of the space I’ve come to hate. For the first time in weeks I am not scared by my situation. I am relieved. Safe.

  A long time passes with nothing said. My eyes bore out into space when I finally get up the nerve.

  “I think there’s something wrong with Father Mark,” I say, and steal a glance at Jamie, trying to gauge his initial reaction. He doesn’t flinch. I gather my courage. I look at Jamie one more time. Then I look at Jada and Ash. Their faces say, Tell us. So I do it. I finally do it.

  I tell.

  And Father Mark has made this part easy now.

  The story he’s written is gathered into a neat pile, again sitting on the coffee table with the title page on top. I lean forward off the couch between Jada and Jamie, tap the stack with my hand, and say one word only because there is only one word necessary to say it all:

  “Read.”

  Because it’s all right there.

  “Why don’t you go first,” Jada says to Jamie. He nods okay, and she gives him the manuscript, picks it up off the coffee table and gives it to someone who is not me.

  But I have more. I have plenty for everyone. Plenty to go around.

  So I lean in a different direction this time, toward the place where Ash sits. I point at the Father Mark pile on the floor between the couch and the window, startling Ash who realizes she is covering part of it with her body, and again I say the one, the only word necessary:

  “Read.”

  Because it’s all right there.

  And as Jamie and Ash and Jada read, when their eyes become wide with shock, that’s when I begin to cry for the second time in front of someone else. Now I am crying because soon I will no longer be alone in this. I don’t want to be alone another minute and I won’t be. I rest my head on my knees. I am exhausted. So exhausted. Like someone sucked the life out of me. And I am nervous. So nervous about what I am doing. About telling.

  About making this accusation.

  I am accusing a priest. I am making accusations about Father Mark, a beloved priest, a beloved Father, a beloved author, a beloved professor. Someone everybody loves. Everyone.

  Everyone but me.

  When I hear Jamie put down the manuscript, causing Ash and Jada to pause in their ripping open, reading, and putting aside, ripping open, reading, and putting aside, making a new pile, I bury my head further into my knees, afraid to look at him, so I don’t. I don’t look.

  “I’ve read enough,” Jamie says.

  “I think I have, too,” Ash says, and I hear Jada sigh.

  “So…what do you…” My voice fades.

  “He’s obsessed with you,” Jamie states. There is no question. Only certainty. Jamie is certain for me.

&nbs
p; “Extremely,” Jada says.

  “I know.” My voice is tiny. I look up at them finally, my arms hugging my knees tight.

  Their next question is written across their eyes. They don’t need to say a word.

  “I never, ever, ever, ever want to see him or hear from him or hear his voice or touch anything he’s touched ever, ever, ever again. I don’t want him to call me, text me, e-mail me, write me letters, leave me presents, write me stories. God, I want him to go away forever. And I want him to die.” My voice is hoarse and low and I am startled by my own words. “But I messed up, right? I mean, because I never told him to stop. I never did.” A lump fills my throat and tears slide down my cheeks. “I mean, look at all this.” I gesture toward the letters and torn envelopes and what remains of the stack between the couch and the window. “I don’t even know what they say. I haven’t opened anything in weeks. I can’t bear to touch them,” I sob.

  “You did nothing wrong, Olivia,” Jamie says in a quiet voice. “He’s a priest. He’s your professor. He’s a powerful, public man. It doesn’t matter that you haven’t told him to stop. He never should have put you in this position, he never should have done this to you in the first place.”

  I take my hands away from my face and look at Jamie through blurry eyes.

  “Olivia, I may be your boyfriend but honestly—and please keep my love of the Catholic Church, the priesthood, in mind here—something is very, very wrong. Something is very wrong with this man and it has nothing to do with you. You are not to blame. It’s happened before, Olivia, to so many other people, and it is still happening to people and now it has happened to you, too. I’m so sorry, Olivia. I am so sorry that it had to happen to you, too.”

  I blink through more tears. I feel Jada’s fingers weave gently through mine.

  “Let’s gather everything he’s given you,” Ash says, and stands up. Takes charge. “The letters, the invitations, the e-mails, whatever you have. And Sister June, I know you trust her—Jada and I trust her—let’s call her now and tell her she needs to come over. I bet she knows how to handle this sort of…situation. You are not going to go through this alone. There are so many people who love you, Livvy, and who are going to help make this stop.”

  “Okay.” My voice is a whisper. “Okay.”

  “Do you have her number?”

  I gesture toward my cell, sitting on the table. This time I have no voice left.

  Ash picks it up and scrolls through the address book.

  For the first time since Jamie arrived however long ago, he touches my arm. And I am not alone anymore. Jamie and Ash and Jada are helping me. They take on my burden. They do it for me because I cannot do it any longer by myself.

  ON HATING GOD

  LETTERS. EVERYWHERE. PILES OF THEM.

  Jada handles these.

  E-mails. Most unopened.

  Jamie takes this task.

  Voice mails. Filling up my mailbox. And texts. Endless texts.

  Ash has it covered.

  They go through everything, all of it, systematically now, as we wait for Sister June to arrive. There are so many things. Almost too much to count. But count everything they do, because Jamie says it’s important to know how many of each. How many in how much time.

  My mother paces outside, worried. We’ll tell her when Sister June gets here. We’ll all talk together.

  “What if she doesn’t believe me,” I whisper at one point.

  “Everyone will believe you, Olivia.” Jamie’s voice is firm. Full of conviction.

  “Because of the story?”

  “Because of the story, yes. But because of everything else, too. There’s just so much evidence.” He sounds almost overwhelmed.

  Evidence.

  “I hate God sometimes.”

  “Sometimes I hate God, too,” Jamie says. “I think I hate God right now.”

  “But I hate Father Mark even more.” Low sounds from my mouth.

  Ash reaches up from where she sits on the floor and grasps my hand. “Try to sleep for a little while. Go to sleep. We’re not going anywhere. I’ll wake you when Sister June gets here.”

  Before I close my eyes I say one last important thing. “Guys…thank you. I don’t know what I would have done…I don’t know…”

  “It’s going to be okay, Olivia.” These are the last words I hear before sleep comes and carries me away.

  ON GOD’S ARMS

  I WAKE TO THE SOUND OF VOICES.

  Jamie and Ash and Jada and Mom and Sister June.

  The story of me and Father Mark is told for the first time out loud, and it is Jamie who tells it for me. I listen and watch as Sister June’s face and my mother’s face go from concerned to shocked to outraged as they peer at the letters and other things. Then Sister June glances through the story, his version. “This Gorgeous Game.”

  “That’s not even all of it,” Jamie says to her—and before the talk of phone calls and lawyers and therapists and meeting with deans and bishops, before all of that happens, and it does happen—Sister June’s arms reach out and pull me in. And next, my mother pulls me close and kisses my hair.

  “Oh, Olivia.” She is crying.

  “He is stalking her,” Sister June says.

  Stalking. Father Mark has been stalking me. That’s the first time the word is used and I’m not the one who uses it. Sister June does, then Mom, then Jamie, then Ash, then Jada, one by one by one, like dominoes falling down.

  Stalking. Stalking. Stalking. Olivia is being stalked. I have a stalker. A priest stalker. A famous novelist stalker. I have a priest, famous novelist, professor stalker.

  And then Greenie comes.

  When I hear the story told for the second time out loud, my story, told by my family and friends, it is a different story. It becomes a story about a girl who is stalked by a priest. Taken advantage of by a priest. I learn that it’s not her fault. How of course she’d be afraid to say anything, how it’s scary to make that kind of accusation about someone like Father Mark, especially someone like him. How manipulative he’s been. How I’ve been manipulated, how they’ve all been manipulated. Father Mark found shocking, clever, creative ways of getting to me, playing with me like it was all one great challenging game and me, his favorite plaything.

  I am Father Mark’s favorite plaything.

  But not anymore. Because now, now I am surrounded by people who love me, and not that other kind of surrounded I’ve felt for so long—the threatening kind—and I am grateful after so long to finally feel protected. To not be alone.

  My mother sits on one side of me on my bed and Jamie on the other, holding my hand, and Greenie on the floor nearby and Sister June on the couch with Ash and Jada. They sit there for I don’t know how long. As long as it takes. As long as I need them to. As I go in and out of sleep, I think about everyone’s arms around me, embracing me, loving me, and I think about the framed poem that is perched on a little stand on my mother’s dresser. The one I’ve always thought so cheesy, that famous poem about footprints in the sand, the one where the narrator thinks those places on the beach with only one set of footprints are the moments when God has left her, even though God promised never to leave, and finds out instead that those were the moments when she could no longer walk, that the one set of footprints is God’s. That God has carried her when she cannot walk herself.

  I’ve never been able to give myself over completely, in that I surrender to you, God sort of way people talk about, that Mom and Greenie talk about as if it’s something they do every day. I’ve thought before how this must be what taking a leap of faith really is. Faith is letting yourself fall and believing, knowing that someone, something, this being we call God is waiting there to catch us in a big, soft, God-sized baseball mitt.

  I’ve never had that kind of faith before.

  But I have faith in the people that surround me now, and I know, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they will catch me if I let myself fall. I know. And so I do. I let myself fall.
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br />   When I wake, everyone is still here. All of them.

  And I know. I know I know I know that everything is going to be okay.

  I no longer have to carry this burden alone.

  I am not alone.

  It is not a game. That was

  a wicked thing for me to say … If

  anyone ought to know it, I ought.

  —THOMAS MERTON

  ON GRATITUDE, REVISITED

  IT’S A BEAUTIFUL AUGUST EVENING, ONE OF THE MOST perfect nights so far this summer. The dresses in my closet, untouched for so long, beckon, in particular the long white linen one with the blue sash. Slipping it over my head, I let the fabric fall around my body and look in the mirror. The reflection shows a girl I no longer recognize, eyes sunken from lost sleep, long thin arms, face gaunt from not eating enough. Hair stretched high into a tight ponytail.

  “Olivia?” Mom calls from the living room. “Everyone is here.”

  This news sparks a smile—just a small one—but with it comes a glimmer of the person I’ve always known looking back from the mirror. I tug on the band holding back my hair and watch it fall around my face, a bit tangled and knotted, but I don’t reach for a brush.

  Better, I tell my reflection. It’s just a matter of time when things will get better and better, and then maybe someday, all better.

  I descend the stairs one by one, my hand gripping the banister, my feet a bit unsteady, until I reach the bottom and look up. This will be my first time out since everything…it all…

  Began.

  “Hey, Livvy.” Ash meets my eyes with a smile. “Don’t you look fantastic.”

  Happiness ripples across everyone’s faces. Mom, Ashley, Jada, Greenie, Luke.

  I try to copy their expression but can’t quite manage to. Everyone keeps their distance. Or maybe they give me space. Will things always be this awkward? Will I always feel this weird? Damaged? Ashamed? For a second the urge to turn around and walk back upstairs is almost overwhelming. But it passes. And I stay where I am, both feet firmly on the floor.