Salem Falls

by Jodi Picoult

  She was straggling behind. Her blond hair had managed to untangle itself from a ponytail and swung in front of her face like a veil as she bent to pick up her belongings. "Hey, Pele," Jack called out.

  She glanced up blankly.

  "God, you're making me feel old. Forget Pele. Mia, then. Or Brandi."

  "Not quite." Ruefully, Catherine tugged at her jersey. "See, I still have my shirt on." After a moment, she added, "Thanks for giving me a chance today."

  "A smarter move," Jack said soberly, "would have been to let the wing trap the ball and bring it back into play. I could just as easily be standing here asking you what the hell you were doing, instead of holding you up as MVP."

  "I know."

  "If you're going to do such a low percentage kick, I'd better teach you how to do it without hurting yourself in the process."

  Catherine's head snapped up. "For real?"

  "Yeah. Come here." He tossed her a ball and ushered her toward the flag so that she could do a corner kick. In the meantime, he assumed the position she'd been in, by the goal. "Go on."

  She tried, but the first shot landed in the goal. "Sorry."

  Jack laughed. "Don't ever apologize to your coach when you score."

  Smiling, Catherine tried again. The ball curved toward the midfield, and Jack started running. His blond hair caught on the wind, and he could feel every cell of his body straining with the pure joy of play as he kicked his feet up and pedaled them to change position, catching the ball and firing it back over his dropped right shoulder. As he fell, he braced his palms, landing on the flat of his upper back and rocking forward.

  "Wow," Catherine said. "You make it look so easy."

  "I make it look less painful." Jack got up, then put his hands on Catherine's shoulders. She smelled of powder, and there was mud caked on the tip of her ponytail. "You land here," he said, skimming his palm over her upper back. He slid his arms down over hers, flexing the palms out. "You're going to roll down your spine, so that you hit your shoulders and your elbows and your forearms and then your butt makes contact."

  They switched places, so that Jack could lob the ball over her shoulder from behind. With each try, Jack offered a new piece of advice; with each try, the sun sank a little deeper in the sky. On the seventh attempt, Catherine landed perfectly. "I did it. I did it!" She leaped to her feet and threw her arms around Jack's neck. "This is so cool!"

  Laughing, Jack set her away from him. If he could bottle the enthusiasm of the average fifteen-year-old, he'd be a very rich man. He tossed Catherine her water bottle and jacket. "Go on home, Pele."

  "That's Brandi, if you don't mind."

  He grinned as she bounced her way across the darkening playing fields. And he wondered how, in the three months she'd been on his team, he ever could have underestimated Catherine Marsh.

  "You're shitting me." Jay Kavanaugh stared at the television set over the bar, his bottle of Bud arrested halfway to his lips. "She's not sixteen."

  "She is," Jack insisted. "I kid you not."

  They both watched the teen pop princess jiggle her way through an MTV music video. "But ... but ... Jesus, look at her face."

  "It's all makeup."

  "Guess she keeps the cotton balls to apply it stuffed in her bra, then?"

  Jack took a pull of his drink. "Early bloomer."

  "That's no bloom," Jay muttered. "That's a whole fucking tropical rainforest." He grabbed the remote control off the bar counter and turned the channel to a movie in which Arnold Schwarzenegger was pummeling a man bloody. "There. Something less inflammatory." Jay slid his empty bottle across the counter and gestured for another one. "I don't know how you do it."

  "Do what?"

  "Stick yourself smack in the middle of sin every day."

  "What the hell are you talking about?"

  "Jeez, you're surrounded by ... by sixteen-year-old pop princesses all day long."

  "Jessica Simpson is not enrolled at Westonbrook."

  Jay shrugged. "You know what I mean. I know DAs who won't drive home their teenage baby-sitters. How can you look at them day in and day out and not ... notice?"

  "Because I'm their teacher and that would make me as moral as a slug." Jack grinned. "You don't interview felons and suddenly decide to turn over a new leaf of crime, do you?"

  Jay twisted the top off the bottle that the bartender set in front of him. "No ... but sometimes I look at a drug dealer all decked out in Armani and before I can stop myself, I think: 'It's got to be a nice life, long as you don't get caught.' "

  Jack lifted the beer to his lips. "Well," he admitted, laughing, "sometimes I think that, too."

  Dinner at the Marsh household was a stiff affair, with Catherine and her father sitting across from each other at a long, polished table and eating whatever she'd managed to cook for them. "Pasta again?" Reverend Marsh asked, picking up the bowl and bringing it closer to heap on his plate.

  "Sorry. We're out of meat and chicken."

  "The Lord turned water into wine. All I'm suggesting is a trip to the grocery store."

  Catherine reached for her glass of milk. "I haven't had a chance, Daddy."

  "Ah, but that's where you're wrong. You've had the chance. You just chose to use that time for a different purpose."

  "You have no idea how amazing an opportunity it is for me to be able to play first string. I can't just throw that away."

  Ellidor twirled his fork in the spaghetti. "Barbaric, if you ask me. All those half-dressed young girls being put through their paces by some drill sergeant."

  "Daddy, we're not half dressed. And Coach St. Bride isn't the Devil."

  The minister pinned his daughter with a stare. "They are still not the sorts of girls you ought to be spending time with," he said. He stood up, walked to the sideboard, and tossed a Glamour magazine onto the table. "Which one of them gave you this smut? It was right in your gym bag."

  "It's not smut--"

  Ellidor lifted the magazine and read from its cover. " 'How to look like a siren for less than $25' 'Can you keep your man happy?' " He glanced at Catherine. " 'Ten sex secrets to drive him wild.' "

  Catherine stared at her plate. "Well, that one's worse than normal. It was last year's Valentine's issue. Cynthia gave it to me because there was this really cool haircut in it."

  "I brought you here to Westonbrook so that you'd be less tempted by the things that lead young women into trouble. Magazines like this are just the first step. From here, it's an easy slide to boys, to drugs, to drinking." Ellidor sighed. "Catherine, what would people think if they knew that the chaplain's daughter was a slut?"

  "I am not a slut," she said, her voice pitched low. "And if they saw me reading Glamour, they'd think I was like any other fifteen-year-old girl."

  "That's the problem," Ellidor said, touching his daughter's cheek. "You're better than all of them."

  Catherine leaned into his palm. And thought, But what if I don't want to be?

  "Well," Jack said, looking up from his seat as Catherine emerged from the locker room. "You look nice."

  It was an understatement. Dressed in a short black skirt and a tight sweater, she appeared nothing like the ragged scrapper who'd run up and down the field under his explicit orders until he was certain she'd collapse if asked to take another step. He hadn't asked, for just that reason: If he'd wanted it, Catherine would have driven herself into the ground.

  Jack closed the salt-and-pepper composition book he used to record notes on the team's practice. "Your dad taking you out to dinner?"

  Catherine smiled wryly. "On a weeknight? That's got to be a sin."

  Jack had wondered more and more often how a prig like the Right Reverend Ellidor Marsh had managed to create a girl as vibrant as Catherine. He knew Catherine's mother, a free spirit who didn't fit the mold of church wife, had walked out on the family when Catherine was still a toddler. Maybe that was where her personality came from.

  "I am going out to dinner," Catherine admitted shyly. "But
on a date."

  "Ah. Your father knows, of course."

  "Oh, absolutely." Catherine glanced at Jack's book. "You write about me in there?"

  "You bet."

  "What do you write?"

  "All my wicked little thoughts," he joked. "And a few decent plays we might try every now and then."

  The door opened, and Catherine's date entered. His eyes lit on Catherine as if she were a feast. "You ready?"

  "Yeah." Catherine slipped her arms into her coat. " 'Night, Coach." At the door, the boy very properly put his hand on the small of her back.

  "Catherine," Jack said, "can you come here for a moment?"

  She came so close that he could smell the conditioner she'd used in the locker room, and the harsh pink soap from the showers. "How well do you really know this guy?" Jack asked softly.

  "I'm a big girl. I can take care of myself." Catherine walked toward her date again. "But Coach," she added, "thanks for wanting to do it for me."

  "For Christ's sake!" Jack bellowed.

  For the sixth time that day, the ball had sailed right past Catherine Marsh. His intersquad scrimmage was going to hell because his center couldn't keep her mind on the game.

  Jack blew his whistle and strode angrily to the middle of the field. "I'm sorry," she said immediately.

  "Sorry isn't going to do you a hell of a lot of good when you get slammed in the head by a ball going twenty miles an hour! Or when we lose Districts because this team never gets itself together!" With every word she seemed to fold in on herself. "Catherine," he sighed. "What's the matter?"

  "Coach," another player called. "It's five-thirty. Can we go shower?"

  He looked at his watch. Technically, it was 5:20. But this entire afternoon had been a waste of a practice, because whatever fog Catherine had contracted seemed to be catching. "Go," he barked. Catherine started to slink away, but he grabbed her upper arm. "Not you."

  She took one look at him and started to cry. "I need to get to Woodhaven."

  There was no public transit to Woodhaven, which was thirty miles away, and a cab ride's cost would seem astronomical to a fifteen-year-old without an income. But as far as Jack knew, there was nothing in particular in Woodhaven that merited a visit. "What's there that you can't find in Loyal?"

  "Planned Parenthood."

  The words fell between them like a wall. "Catherine, are you pregnant?"

  She turned the color of the sunset. "I want to keep from getting that way."

  With a fundamentalist father, asking for birth control wasn't going to go over very well. But there were other options that didn't involve visiting a women's clinic.

  "He won't wear them," Catherine admitted softly, reading Jack's mind. "He says they're not a hundred percent and he doesn't want to take that chance."

  Jack jammed his hands in his coat pockets, distinctly uncomfortable. Although he had taught teenagers long enough to know that sexual intercourse occurred shockingly young, there was something about Catherine doing it that made him feel a little sick. She had been his Atalanta, swift and unspoiled, running faster than anyone could catch her.

  "Please, Coach," she begged, just as embarrassed to be pleading as he was to be hearing her.

  "Catherine," he said, "we never had this conversation." And he walked off, determined to believe that this was not--and never would be--his problem.

  Catherine, a straight-A student, failed a test. And the next day's pop quiz. "I want to talk to you," Jack said to her as the other students filed out. "Wait for a minute."

  She remained at her desk. The exam, with its unprecedented scarlet letter, glared up at her. Jack slid into the seat beside hers. "You know this stuff cold," he said quietly, and she shrugged. "I could give you a makeup test."

  She didn't answer, and Jack felt temper swell like a wave inside him. "You're too smart to throw your academic career away for some guy," he argued.

  Catherine turned slowly. "If I'm going to fuck up my life," she said, "does it really matter which way I do it?"

  Her eyes, which had always seemed to take in the whole world at once, were absolutely flat and expressionless. It was this that tugged the words from Jack he truly did not want to say. "Have you ... has it ... "

  "No. We're waiting, to be safe."

  Jack forced himself to look at her. "Are you sure? Because if you pick this moment, with this guy, you're stuck with it for the rest of your life."

  Her brows drew together. "How do you know if you're sure?"

  God, how to answer that? His first time had been in the back of a limousine owned by the father of the rich girl he'd been seducing. Years afterward, he never could look their chauffeur in the eye.

  "There's one person," Jack said, stumbling. "When you find him, you'll know."

  Catherine nodded. "He's the one."

  "Then I'll drive you to Woodhaven."

  She had come out of the squat brown building holding a little compact full of birth control pills, which, when opened, looked like the toothed jaws of a gator. "I have to take them for a month before they start to work," Catherine said, although by then Jack did not want to hear any more.

  One month and four days after Jack had driven her to Woodhaven, Catherine showed up late to practice. She played hard that day, doggedly running up and down the field and firing the ball so hard at the practice goalie that twice, she knocked her down. She played, Jack realized, like she was punishing herself.

  And that was how he knew it had happened.

  Although he could not really articulate why, Jack didn't speak to Catherine after that, unless it was to instruct her in a certain play. Catherine didn't seek him out to ask questions on her technique. They won four games. And still Jack and Catherine moved quietly around each other, like two magnets of the same pole who are forced into close contact and cannot help but shy to the side.

  It took all the courage in the world to knock on the door of his classroom.

  "Come in."

  Catherine took a deep breath and wiped away the mascara underneath her eyes. Coach St. Bride stood in front of the chalkboard in the empty classroom. Posters dotted the walls: Charlemagne, Copernicus, Descartes. She walked up to one, mostly so that she wouldn't have to look at Coach. "What made Alexander so great anyway?" she murmured.

  "Take my class next year and you'll find out." He frowned and took off the wire-rimmed glasses he sometimes wore. "You okay?" he asked quietly.

  She had always thought his voice was as lovely as wood smoke--a strange thing to compare it to, but in her childhood nothing had quite made her feel as much at home as walking through a brisk afternoon and seeing the curl of gray snailing out of the chimney. He started walking toward her, and oh, God, she was going to absolutely lose it. She had to tell him, she had to tell someone, and she thought that if she did, she would die of humiliation. It would be like ... what was it, from biology ... sublimation. Like being here one moment, and then poof, evaporating into thin air without a trace, so that no one would ever know you had even been there.

  "Catherine?" he asked, just her name, and she turned away.

  She found herself facing a map larger than any she'd ever seen. It covered nearly one entire wall of the classroom, an uneven patchwork quilt of countries and oceans. Lakes were the size of diamond chips, cities no bigger than a pinprick. You could step inside and lose yourself.

  With a sob, she whirled and threw herself into Coach's arms. He staggered back at the unexpected embrace, and when he realized she was crying, lightly patted her back. He did it awkwardly, not used to giving comfort to his students, and somehow that made it even sweeter.

  "He broke up with me. He ... he did it ... and then ... and then ... " She couldn't finish, and it didn't matter, because Coach St. Bride understood.

  His hand fell onto the crown of her head. "Oh, Catherine. I'm sorry."

  "No, I am. I am, because I was so stupid." She wrapped her arms tighter around him. And she gradually noticed how the fine hairs on his nape were the
color of Spanish gold; how his hands were large enough to hold her together. With great care, she opened her mouth and pressed it against his neck, so that he would think it was only her breath. But she could taste his skin, the salt and spice of it, and her eyes drifted shut. You were so, so right, she thought. When you find the one, you know.

  May 2000

  Salem Falls,

  New Hampshire

  Different jails smell the same.

  Stale. A little bit like piss and a little bit like biscuits rising. Sweat; swabbed disinfectant. And over all this, the heady scent of anxiety. Jack shuffled beside the correctional officer, his handcuffs swinging between his wrists. I am not here, he thought dizzily. I am lying on my back on a wide, green lawn, sleeping in the sun, and this is just a nightmare. Knowing that he was about to be locked up again when he was wrongfully accused was enough to make him tremble. Who would believe the man who pleaded his second case from the confines of a cell?

  "Name," barked the recording officer. He was overweight, stuffed into his little glass booth like a dumpling in a Pyrex dish. "St. Bride," Jack said, his voice rusty. "Dr. Jack St. Bride."

  "Height?"

  "Six-two."

  "Weight?"

  "One-ninety," Jack answered.

  The officer did not glance up. "Eyes?"

  "Blue."

  Jack watched his answers being scrawled across the booking card. Allergies. Medications. Regular physician. Distinguishing characteristics.

  Person to call in the event of an emergency.

  But, Jack thought, isn't this one?

  The guard led Jack to a room the size of a large closet. It was empty, except for a desk and a row of shelves stacked with prison-issue clothing. "Strip," he said.

  At that moment, it all came back: the feeling of being a number, not a name. The absolute lack of privacy. The mindlessness that came when every decision was made for you, from when you ate to when the lights were turned off to when you were allowed to see the sky. It had taken almost no time at all to strip him of his humanity at the Farm--and it had all started the moment Jack had put on the uniform of a convict.

  "I'd rather not."

  The guard looked up at him. "What?"

  "I'm here in custody. I'm not a prisoner. So I shouldn't have to dress like one."

  The correctional officer rolled his eyes. "Just get changed."

  Jack looked at the stack of orange clothing. Faded and soft, from years of others wearing it. "I can't," he said politely. "Please don't ask me to do this."