by A. J. Sand
Hi, my name is Erica. A year ago, something happened to me on a beach in Patong. I think you were there. I really want to talk to you. Erica paused to
prepare herself to type the four words she had the hardest time saying if she wasn't in imminent danger. I need your help. No ruse. Just the truth. She left a call back number and tossed her phone to the passenger seat. In a few short minutes, her fingers had cramped, and her stomach felt like it was on the unlucky end of a wrecking ball. Now, the plan was to not chicken out in forty-eight hours.
She needed to steady herself in preparation for whatever would come next: the path for moving on, the one she would design for her life, regardless of the ending of this situation. She knew now, she had to claim her destiny, her happiness, and her well-being. None of this—neither Jeremy’s prosecution nor his roaming free—would define her going forward.
Erica started the car, turned on the music and headed for the road, and it was at the second traffic light she stopped at that she heard the buzz of her cell. There were two missed calls. From the number. Holy shit. She called. Already? Why, when she had not come forward for a long time and had changed her mind before? Okay, there was no time to delve into the mind of this woman, so with a daring veer to the right before the light turned green, Erica turned into a shopping center and snagged a parking space in front of a children’s clothing store.
Her heartbeat was throbbing at her temples when her trembling fingers pressed the phone number in, digit by digit, before pushing Call. A woman’s voice cut the rings off at two. It was timid and fearful. And a strange sort of peace came over Erica. It was one of those situations where the spider was more afraid of her than she was of it.
“Hi, Erica,” she said. “I’ve wanted to know your name for a very long time now.”
“Hi…um…uh… How are you?”
“McKenna. It’s…my name is McKenna. I’ve been imagining what this would be like for a long time, too. You were yelling. And angry. You would have every right to be.” McKenna’s voice broke on halting sniffles. “I don’t even know how you got my number, but I have been hoping I’d get to speak to you at some point, just to tell you how sorry I am about not speaking up that night. And then for speaking up and then changing my mind. I just keep messing up.”
“Believe me, McKenna, I understand more than you know. And I’m not angry with you. I know how hard speaking up can be.”
“But I want to fix it, Erica. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.” And she started with what she’d done that night on the beach, from when she’d heard their voices to when she’d trailed Jeremy back to the street.
“Why’d you change your mind after you contacted the embassy? I don’t understand. Were you worried that Jer—the guy would come after you or something?”
“No…I did something really stupid. I basically accepted a pay off to be quiet.”
A chill skated down Erica’s spine. Money, of course. But how? If Jeremy had given her the money straight up, she’d have known who he was. Did she? Or maybe someone else had.
“I kind of pushed you and what had happened on the beach to the back of my mind, and I guess the guy somehow saw that I was the person on the beach with him and followed me to my hotel. I was waiting for the elevator when a bellhop came up to me with five hundred dollars, a prepaid debit card and a note. He said someone said I had dropped it. I told him I hadn’t, but then I read the note. ‘For the trouble during your beach walk,’ it said.” Erica was familiar with those prepaid debit cards. They were a lot easier than carrying cash around when travelling. She’d had one in Thailand, too.
“Oh, God, and I know this sounds terrible, but I was a broke sometime college student on a trip she couldn’t afford with a shitty guy, and I just wanted to have fun. Five hundred dollars can go a long way in Thailand…and the card had more money on it. I needed the money, and it was more…more important than you were. I had made up a story in my head. I figured you were a prostitute, and you and the guy had gotten into a fight, and he was someone important in Thailand and I didn’t let my mind wander beyond that.” Erica cringed and did her best to keep quiet. It wasn’t that she was offended that McKenna had written her off as such, but that someone being a prostitute had not been a good enough reason to seek out help. McKenna was bawling now. “The card was refilled four more times over, like, six months, and I kept using it. I was already in, you know? I had already done something terrible, and it was a lot easier to just keep doing it, even after I found out what had happened. At some point, you just weren’t real to me anymore, as awful as that sounds.”
“How much did you get?” How much was I worth?
“My silence was worth five grand every month. I paid rent, I bought clothes, I partied with my friends, and I knew I was accepting it from someone I didn’t know who had done a very, very bad thing. God, you must hate me as much as you do him. If it gives you any justice, you should know that I’ve been struggling with an alcohol and sleeping pill addiction for a long time now to numb myself from what I’ve done.”
Tears filled Erica’s eyes as she stared at nothing past the windshield. She didn’t hate her; she felt terrible for her, actually. And what difference would her bad feeling make anyhow? Like her own feelings about herself, dwelling on what McKenna should’ve done wouldn’t change the present. Life could not be rewound, and it certainly couldn’t be made to stand still; it just kept moving, forcing everyone to do the same. There were so many times when that forward motion had felt cruel, especially when she thought her own world had ended. But as she started toward healing, she realized it hadn’t. And it wouldn’t. It got harder and harder to stand still in a moving world. And in that moment, and upon finding that revelation, she was thankful. “I don’t hate you, McKenna. And I’m not just saying that because I want you to help me. I can tell you’ve been struggling with this—”
“My best friend won’t even talk to me anymore. Everyone’s wondering why we don’t live together and I can’t tell them. And I feel like I’m wearing a scarlet letter that only I can see. I wish I had just done the right thing and marched that money and the debit card right over to the police when I got it and the note.”
“Do you still have the card?”
“Yes. I can’t bring myself to throw it away. I guess I wanted to keep the proof in case I ever womaned up and faced what I’d done. But I’m scared, Erica. I’m so, so scared. That’s why I didn’t go and meet with the police. I probably broke international law or something. I don’t want to go to jail. I really don’t know what to do.”
“I get it, McKenna. I know what fear can do.” There was also the huge issue of telling her who the assailant was. Much like her, if McKenna’s name got out, she would face severe scrutiny, harassment and even threats. So, once Erica divulged his identity, McKenna might decide to go silent again—and Erica wouldn’t blame her—but all of this had to be her choice. Her choice. Something else dawned her, and it knocked a gasped out of her like a brick was dropped on her chest. In her blind bid to regain control and protect her friends, she had taken the choice to help her away from them. And that was unfair.
McKenna’s voice rose to just above a whimper. “I don’t understand how you can be so kind to me. You haven’t blamed me once. You haven’t told me how horrible of a person I am. I walked away when you were being attacked. I just… walked away.”
“I’m really tired of being angry, McKenna.” Erica sighed. The compassion she felt for her would’ve trumped all the bad feeling anyway. Maybe being back with Bryson had pacified a lot of those things. “And I know there’s nothing I could say to you that would make you feel worse than what you’re saying to yourself, I bet. You didn’t hurt me, McKenna. But someone else did. Yes, there may be risk for you if you come forward and there might be even more of it than you know.”
McKenna had a lot to think about, and Erica wasn’t sure that she wouldn’t back out again. But it was important for her to know the truth, including the identity of
Erica’s assailant, so that she could at least make an informed decision about whether she would want to be a part of the case in Thailand. All Erica had was her faith at this point. For all she knew, McKenna could go to the press tomorrow. She doubted it, but she realized that the more control she tried to have over this situation the more out of her control it got. But she had other matters to worry about.
Adam. His name popped into her head the minute she ended her conversation with McKenna. He had been in Jeremy and Chase’s inner circle—he had been willing to confront Leko and Kai the night of the alley fight—so she wondered if he knew something about those payments.
Over text message, he agreed to meet her the following evening at a café not too far from where his job was. He was sitting at a corner table looking anxious when she and Bryson walked in. Bryson had insisted on coming for support but she suspected he didn’t trust Adam. She didn’t know if she did, but he had seemed genuine at Luz. Adam placed an order of nachos and beers for the table, and while the mood didn’t lighten completely, Bryson seemed willing to accept the gesture of kindness.
“So, what do you need my help with?” Adam asked with a nervous smile.
“You and Chase still aren’t friends, right?” she asked.
“No, we’re not. I’d be at a bar right now if we were, trust me…” Adam said, laughing a little. “I’m going home and to bed. An assistant to junior agent position just opened up at my job, and I want it. So, early to bed and early to rise.”
“How can I be sure of that?”
Adam’s expression scrunched into confusion. “I don’t know, but we’re not. Look, all we did was get into fights and trouble when we went out. My girlfriend’s pregnant…” He handed her his cell, smiling, as she swiped through many pictures of him with his hand on a woman’s bulging stomach. “…I can’t have people like him around my son, you know?”
And it was all she had to go on, so she went on just faith. Bryson squeezed her knee under the table. “Last year, after Jeremy got back from Thailand, did Chase mention anything about weird payments?”
“Yeah…actually. To one of those, um, debit cards. Chase orders them in his name and puts money them. Jeremy uses them when he travels so he can get cash from ATMs to, uh, pursue his…recreational activities….” Adam conspicuously brushed his hand across his nose. “…Locally. Anyway, Chase said a few times Jeremy got weird about making sure the card had money on it, even though he doesn’t use it when he’s in the States. I think it was, like, five or six grand a month for a few months. I was standing behind him one day while he was sitting at a computer and I saw him make a transfer. He and Jeremy argued about it because Chase teased him about it one day and he got upset. He told him just to send it. And you know how Chase is about his brother. I remember one day he joked, ‘I think Jer has a secret baby mama.’ And we laughed about it. Why?”
Holy shit. Erica couldn’t believe it, even as a chill lashed her back. There was even more proof connecting Jeremy to this attack. They had the smoking gun now.
“Could you swear to that if you needed to?” Bryson asked.
“Uh…why would I need to? Was he doing something illegal?” Adam asked as his eyebrows leaped for his hairline. She wasn’t ready to tell him right now, but she would ask for his help eventually.
“I know this is weird, but I’ll fill you in completely when I can, okay? Thanks for doing this. And it would be great if we could keep this to ourselves. Congratulations on the baby.” After Bryson threw a few dollars on the table, they said good-bye to Adam, and headed back to the apartment. Tonight, after the week she’d had, she was really glad she was back with him. She probably never would’ve gotten to sleep if she were alone tonight.
“Wow,” Bryson said when they were both in bed and she was snuggled against him. “Jeremy just keeps raising the bar for how despicable he is. He’s dragged his brother into his heinous acts, too. Chase is a shitty guy, and he certainly doesn’t have my sympathy, but you’d think Jeremy would at least protect the one person who always looks out for him. He essentially made his brother complicit in all of this.”
“Nope. No honor amongst thieves as they say.”
“You did good this week, baby.” He kissed her forehead.
“Thanks. Thanks for being here every step of the way,” she said, and quickly added, “I know I never have to say it, but I want you to know how glad I am for you.”
“Every step of the way, for sure. So, you’ve taken care of McKenna and Adam, but what are you going to do about your friends? Are you still worried about involving them?”
“I am,” she said in a sigh, but at the end of day, she was realizing that the only way to put this to rest was to keep asking for help. It wasn’t chasing the memories she would never get back. It wasn’t about confronting Jeremy. She had to let go of the notion that not doing something on her own was akin to ending up like Karen or seeming weak. She just couldn’t do this alone anymore. “But it really has to be their choice and not mine.”
“Baby…” Bryson shifted out from under her and rested his head on his palm. “…What are you going to do when you find out which one of them told Chase?”
“Nothing because it’s not one of them,” Erica said steadfastly as she frowned. It wasn’t even something she was willing to argue about. There was no way. She was sure of it.
Between working on the documentary, school, working for her clients and making up for lost time with Bryson, Erica found it easy to relegate looking at the things Matt had given her to a lower position on her priority list for several days. Maybe she was scared of what she would find. She didn’t want to go back to Bryson and have to say she was wrong. Leko, Kai, Dylan, Wes, Abel, Ribsy and Odette were her friends...her family. Why embrace her just to turn around and betray her? It had to be something else.
“Do you want me to open them?” Bryson asked as they sat on the floor of the living room. Erica hugged her knees to her chest and shrugged. After seeing the memory card chock full of photos of her, she was admittedly nervous. She didn’t want to open them period, but when he started to rip the flap away, she snatched them away and started doing it herself. “I knew that would get you.”
“Jerk. You can open the other one.” She gasped as she pulled the sheets out. They were incredibly detailed notes on the surveillance and observations and interviews of her and her friends over the several weeks. Names and a few descriptions had been redacted for privacy. It was odd to see his reflections on their conversations about her attack. Erica bit her lip as she remembered how those moments had seemed like genuine friendship
They really hadn’t gotten anything. But it seemed like it was still easier for Chase to believe that she was a ‘whore’ than his brother was a rapist.
“I’m really sorry you had to be the one this happened to,” Bryson said.
Erica’s head snapped up. “What did you just say?”
“‘I’m really sorry you had to be the one this happened to.’ That’s what it says on this post-it note. On the only not redacted page I’ve seen since I opened this envelope.”
Erica shifted until she was right next to him and could see the sheet herself. Holy fuck. It was Matt’s notes on the source of Chase’s information. Matt had given her a sign in the end. He wanted her to know who had started all of this. And sure enough, the name of the person and the details of the interview were right there, unedited, for her to read.
Enough – Chapter 15
“I know you’ve had a few days to process it, but you sure you want to do this, E?” Bryson asked her when they pulled up to the curb in front of That’s So L.A. Fitness. He pulled her hand from her lap and pressed it to his lips a few times. Erica smiled and speared her fingers through his blond locks. They couldn’t stop touching each other since getting back together.
She looked through the large plate glass front to the moving bodies inside. “Yes, I am. You know it’s naïve, but I guess, as a woman, I’m stupid enough to think that other women wou
ld stand in solidarity with me over a sexual assault. I shouldn’t think this, but it bothers me. I know what she did, but I want to look her in the eye and make her explain herself.” And she was angry about it. Even now her heart was racing, her pulse pounding.
She felt the weight of Bryson’s hand on her thigh. “Okay…but you’re not going to beat her up, right, E?”
“Bryce!” Erica said, laughing when she whipped her head around to his concerned expression. She had thought about it, just to indulge in the fantasy. “No because there’s been enough violence surrounding this situation. I’m talking. That’s it. Maybe yelling and cursing, too,” Erica added when she kissed him and then hopped out of the car. “Ten minutes.”
“Okay, baby, I’ll circle the block a few times. And if you do hit her, I’ll gladly be your getaway driver.”
After a wave, Erica stepped inside and scanned the room. That’s so L.A. Fitness was huge: machines downstairs and classes upstairs. But Kai’d said she’d be here; he’d called pretending to have questions regarding his tour dates from last year and had made some small talk. Erica finally spotted Kai’s tour manager, chatting with a guy who was using a weight bench. Just the sight of her made her blood cook and her stomach churn. She had let this chick into her apartment. Had been excited to work with her. As Erica approached, Ashley’s eyes widened in surprise before she pressed out a questioning look.
“You bitch,” Erica said. “You awful, awful traitorous bitch.” Or shouted, because all the nearby eyes fell on them.
“Excuse me? What the hell are you talking about?” Ashley’s skin blanched and she clenched her jaw, but there wasn’t a trace of surprise in her expression. She knew why Erica was there.
Ashley couldn’t believe she was doing this as she listened to rings on the other end of the phone. It didn’t feel right, but in her business you actively avoided missed opportunities. They were a taboo. So you had to jump when you saw one.
