Going Under (25 page)

I silently cheered for myself. That last
line came out of nowhere, and it was perfect.

Amelia’s demeanor changed in a flash. She
didn’t look scared. She looked pissed off.

“Did I say something wrong?” I asked.

She shook her head. “Are you talking about
Tim Shelton?”

“Yeah.”

“Word of advice. Stay away.”

She moved to the bathroom door.

“Wait! Why?” I asked.

“He’s one of the assholes,” she said, and
opened the door.

I ran up behind her and slapped my hand to
the door, slamming it closed again.

“Tell me why,” I said.

“Huh?” Amelia fidgeted with her book bag,
moving it from shoulder to shoulder, unable to find a comfortable
way to hold it. “I’ve gotta go,” she said.

“Amelia, I . . . I really need you to tell
me why Tim’s an asshole,” I said gently.

“I’ve gotta go,” she repeated.

“Please,” I begged. “I won’t tell a
soul.”

“Get out of my way.”

“Did he make you do something you didn’t
want to?”

Amelia backed away from the door like a
scared rabbit.

“What have you heard?” she whispered. “Are
they starting up that rumor again?”

“What rumor?”

“Don’t play dumb!” she screamed. “That rumor
about me. It’s not true! I didn’t want to do it! I told him
‘no’!”

She dropped her book bag and wrapped her
arms around her stomach.

“I don’t know about any rumor, Amelia,” I
said.

“Yeah right! Everyone was talking about it
at the end of the summer, right before school started.”

“I’m new here. I didn’t hear any rumor,” I
said. I walked towards her, and she flinched. “It’s okay. I’m one
of the good people.”

I saw tears forming in her eyes, and then
they spilled over, plopping on her white, eyelet blouse. It was
instinct. I wrapped her in my arms before thinking. It didn’t feel
strange at all, holding someone I barely knew because in a way, I
did know her. She was Beth. Like I told Terry. They were all
Beth.

“I think he drugged me or something,” she
cried into my shoulder. “People were saying I got topless at this
party. In front of everyone, and that he was egging me on. I don’t
really remember. I mean, I think I do, but I’m not sure. I remember
a bed. I remember bleeding the next day, but I wasn’t supposed to
start my period. It didn’t feel like my period, and it only lasted
a day.”

I felt sick. I swallowed hard, forcing down
the urge to vomit.

“Did you . . . did you tell your parents?” I
asked.

Amelia pulled away. She wiped her face and
shook her head.

“I wasn’t sure what happened. I should have
told them, but I wasn’t sure,” she said, and then added more
quietly, “I was ashamed.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” I said.

She nodded like she wanted to believe me but
didn’t have the heart to.

“I mean it, Amelia. You did nothing wrong.
He took advantage of you. Like you said, he’s the asshole.”

She looked up suddenly, her face full of
concern.

“You can’t tell anyone,” she said. “Promise
me.”

I sighed. “It’s not my business to
tell.”

“Good.”

“But I wish you’d tell your parents,
Amelia.”

“What can be done about it now, Brooke? It’s
been months. It’s not like I went to the hospital afterwards.
There’s nothing to prove he did anything,” she said.

“There’s your word,” I offered.

“Yeah,” she snickered. “That’s good for just
about nothing.”

Fifteen

“
Beth? I thought we could go to the mall
today,” I said, lingering in her bedroom doorway. She lay on her
bed facing the window.

“
What for?” she asked,
disinterested.

“
Well, there’s a sale going on at The
Limited,” I replied. I walked over to the bed and tentatively sat
down.

“
No thanks,” Beth said.

“
It’s Friday afternoon,” I said. “What do
you feel like doing?”

“
Lying here.”

“
Oh.”

We were silent for several minutes.

“
You don’t have to stay, Brooke. Go hang
out with Gretchen or something.”

I took off my shoes and lay down beside
her.

“
I don’t want to hang out with Gretchen.
I want to stay here with you.”

Beth rolled over and looked at me.

“
I think Finn is getting frustrated with
me,” she said. “I don’t want him to be physical with me, and he’s
getting all restless about it.”

I tensed, unsure what to say. It was weird
hearing Beth talk about Finn and their physical relationship. I
knew they had sex. I knew they were probably still having sex even
though he and I were. Did I have no self-respect?

“
I feel lost, Brooke. I don’t know what
to do,” Beth said.

I took her hand.

“
You don’t have to do anything, Beth. You
can just lie here. That’s okay.”

“
You’ll stay here with me?”

“
Of course.”

“
But don’t you want to do something fun
tonight? Go to a party or something?” Beth asked.

“
Nope. I want to hang out with
you.”

“
I’m not very much fun right now,” she
admitted.

“
That’s okay,” I replied.

We lay in silence for a time. I started
counting the dots on her ceiling.

“
How do I get better, Brooke?”

I wanted to tell her to talk to her parents,
to talk to a doctor. I wanted to tell her to press charges. I
wanted to tell her to be brave. But I didn’t.

“
It’ll just take time.”

“
How much time?”

“
I don’t know, Beth.”

There was another moment of silence. I
stared at Beth’s ceiling wondering how to make my friend come back
to me, wondering where to find the strength to stop sleeping with
Finn.

“
Look what I’m wearing,” Beth said,
pulling the tarnished half heart out of the front of her
shirt.

I rolled over to face her.

“
I thought it went with my outfit today,”
she said.

I giggled.

“
We should start wearing them again,
don’t you think?” Beth asked.

I nodded. “We definitely should.”

Beth grinned. “Do you think we’ll be best
friends forever?”

I grinned, remembering Beth’s answer to this
question when we were eight years old. “Sure. Why not?”

She laughed, remembering it, too. “Exactly.
Why not?”

“You’re going to kill me, Beth,” I breathed
into the blackness of my bedroom.

I paced the length of the room wearing fresh
pajamas because I soaked my other ones with sweat. I was so sick
and tired of waking up every other night drenched with sweat. My
face felt tight from the dried tracks left by tears. I rubbed my
cheeks roughly trying to erase the tightness, but all I managed to
do was make my face hurt more.

“I’m doing the best that I can,” I said.

Do better.

I whirled around and stared into the
opposite corner of my room.

“Who’s there?” I whispered, feeling the jolt
in my chest, the aching in my fingers.

Nothing.

“Beth?”

He raped me.

I wanted to run for the bedroom door, but I
was certain she’d block my escape. Should I call for my dad? I was
scared out of my mind.

He raped me, Brooke. What are you doing
about it?

“I . . . I’m working on it. I know about
this league, Beth. I know about some others.”

I don’t care about the others. Why haven’t
you gotten Cal?

“Are you hearing yourself?” I cried. “Do you
hear what you’re asking me to do?!”

It was your plan, Brooke. I didn’t come up
with it. But now that I’ve had time to think about it, I rather
like it.

I stood dumbfounded, staring at the
ghost.

I mean, don’t you deserve it? You slept with
my boyfriend. You lied to me. You’re a despicable human being.
Don’t you deserve to be treated like shit?!

“No! I don’t deserve it! I don’t!” I yelled
into the corner of the room.

Yes you do. Yes you do. Yes you do. Yes you
do . . .

“Shut up!”

Yes you do. Yes you do. Yes you do . . .

“DADDY!” I screamed. “DADDY!”

I heard my bedroom door ripped open and felt
my father’s arms go around me. I opened my eyes, dazed and
confused.

“It was just a dream,” Dad said. “You’re
okay, honey.” And he rocked me side to side while I cried into his
chest.

“I’m scared!” I wailed.

“Don’t be scared. I’m right here,” Dad
reassured me. He continued to rock me, stroking my hair and
shushing me as my sobs became fewer and more infrequent.

“Please don’t leave me,” I begged, clutching
him.

“I’m not going anywhere, Brooke,” Dad
replied.

I eased my desperate hold on him, and he
looked down at my face.

“Did you dream about Beth again?” he
asked.

I nodded reluctantly.

Dad didn’t say anything. He just held me
until I asked to leave the room and sleep somewhere else in the
house. He walked me out, and I could feel an angry, unsatisfied
Beth hovering in the corner of my bedroom.

***

Dad eyed me cautiously over breakfast the
next morning. I was pale; I could feel it. I think my dream within
a dream drained half the life out of me. I was so terrified. I
tried to steady my hand as I brought the cereal spoon to my mouth,
but it was no use. I shook violently, and Dad, unable to bear the
sight of me struggling to eat, plucked the utensil from my feeble
grasp.

“Dad, I’m not a baby,” I said. But I felt
like one in that moment, and I wanted to cry all over again.

“Who said anything about anyone being a
baby?” he asked.

He dipped the spoon in my Corn Flakes and
brought it to my mouth. I acquiesced to being fed because I was
hungry, and Dad was doing a much better job than I did.

After I woke up screaming last night, Dad
brought me downstairs. He made me tea and turned on a Christmas
movie. It was the middle of November, but I think he chose
Miracle on 34
^th
Street
because
it was innocent and pleasant. And full of hope. And I think he
thought it might lull me into a peaceful sleep, listening to the
sweet voice of a young Natalie Wood scrutinizing Kris Kringle’s
whiskers. I nuzzled my father and fell asleep against his chest,
hearing the famous line at the end of the movie repeated over and
over in my sub-consciousness: “You’ve still got to believe!”

“Brooke?” Dad asked after I took my last
bite of cereal.

“Hmm?”

“I think you should talk to someone,” he
said. “I thought about your old psychologist. I could set up an
appointment. What do you think?”

I leaned back in my chair and crossed my
arms over my chest.

“It’s so self-indulgent, Dad,” I said after
a moment. “And I still have panic attacks. What did all that
talking really do for me?”

“Well, while you were going, you were
better,” Dad said. “Remember? The attacks subsided.”

I sighed.

“Will you think about it?” he asked.

I nodded.

“And it’s never self-indulgent to do
something that makes you happy and healthy,” he said.

I smiled just to placate him. I wasn’t
convinced.

***

By Wednesday I felt like my old self. Still
guilt-ridden but no longer shaking. No longer terrified to sleep in
my bedroom. No longer convinced that Beth was an angry ghost who
hated my guts. Something else was going on in my brain, and next
week I planned to discover it with the help of my former
psychologist, Dr. Merryweather. God, I hated her name. It made me
feel like I couldn’t talk to her about any of my problems—like I
had to be all sunshine and smiles in her office because she was
happy. Or at least her name suggested it.

“I want you to do something for me,” Dad
said over dinner.

“Oh yeah? What’s that?” I replied.

“Thursday is Family Night at the Y,” Dad
said. “I want us to go.”

I laughed. “Are you freaking kidding
me?”

“No. I think it would help you to run around
and lift some weights and work out some of this stuff going on with
you,” Dad said.

“Dad, you cannot be serious. Family Night?
Can we say, ‘Lame’?”

“Totally lame. And we’re going,” Dad
said.

I narrowed my eyes at him. Only then did I
realize that Dad had been to the gym three times this past week. He
bought a membership at the beginning of the school year for us, but
he rarely went. I went on occasion, but I’m not really a gym girl.
I prefer to take solitary walks or do a workout video in the
comfort and privacy of my living room. Curtains drawn, of
course.

“Who is she?” I asked.

“Huh?” Dad gathered the dinner plates and
took them to the sink.

“Who is the woman you’ve been working out
for? And will she be there Thursday night? Is that why you’re so
insistent on going?”

“Brooke, I have no idea what you’re talking
about,” Dad replied, but he wouldn’t turn around and look at my
face when he said it.

I jumped up from the table. “Oh my God, Dad!
I want to know!” I squealed, and just like that, Beth, my
nightmare, my guilt, all dissolved to nothing.

Dad finally turned around, a silly grin
lighting up his face.

“Did you completely forget about fall
conferences, Brooke?” Dad asked.

“What?”

“With your teachers,” he clarified.

“No, I didn’t. You met with Mrs. Hayes,” I
said. “She’s older than dirt. And married.”

Dad chuckled. “Yeah, I met with Mrs. Hayes.
But then I popped into English class.”

My mouth dropped open.

“Just spur of the moment kind of thing.” He
looked proud about it.