What No One Else Can Hear (16 page)

D
REW
CAME
back to Dottie’s house after he had dropped Stevie off.

“You okay, man?” he asked me. “You look terrible.”

“Of course I look terrible. Do you see what this is doing to Stevie? It’s all so stupid.” I had gotten up and was pacing, with my fists clenching tighter and tighter with every step.

“You gonna have a meltdown now?” I heard a slight chuckle in his voice, but I knew he was partially serious.

I collapsed onto the couch. “If I thought it would do any good, I would.”

He came over to the couch and scooted closer. “That won’t do any good, but how about a hug? I’ve seen you with Stevie. The physical contact is just as good for you as it is for him. Since you can’t hug Stevie, I hereby lend my services.”

I grinned and leaned forward. He enfolded me in his strong arms, and I would have been content to just stay forever.

Finally I was calm enough that I thought I could sleep, so I told him that.

“That’s good, Jess.” He squeezed me once more before standing up and pulling me with him. “You go on to bed. I’ll be here when you wake up. And you can always have as many hugs as you need.”

I smiled and dragged my exhausted body to my apartment. I half expected to go to the forest, but the evening’s activities must have worn Stevie out. He couldn’t make it to the forest when he was asleep, so in a way it was a good thing he wasn’t there. Maybe that meant that he was still getting some much-needed rest.

S
TEVIE
AND
I weren’t the only ones affected by this whole mess. Obviously Dottie and Drew, by virtue of staying in the same house, were pulled into it too. Other staff members were being asked questions by lawyers and journalists, and just generally being harassed. But the unexpected victims in this were the other kids on the hall.

The frequency of tantrums and meltdowns had gone way up. But the child most affected by what was going on with Stevie was his best friend, Ryan.

Ryan, who had started to come out of his shell just before this whole thing blew up, had stopped talking completely. He didn’t even use the words he always had, even before Stevie started encouraging him to speak. He didn’t play with blocks anymore, didn’t draw or paint as Stevie had been teaching him to, and he barely ate. He would follow the group wherever they went if told he had to, but he didn’t participate in anything. If left to his own devices, he would just sit in the doorway of Stevie’s room, watching his distressed friend.

Several times, when Stevie was sitting in the corner of his room, either in a trance or just staring, Ryan would go in and sit beside him. Stevie didn’t say anything to him, and Ryan didn’t even try to talk. He just sat, whether lending or receiving comfort, no one really knew. But Stevie didn’t seem to mind, so the staff allowed Ryan to be there as much as possible.

D
REW
AND
I were on the sofa in my apartment one evening, watching DVDs, trying to get my mind off of things. But Drew noticed it wasn’t really working.

“Would another hug help?” he asked as he scooted closer.

He’d been hugging me a lot more since all this began and it did indeed help a lot.

I fell into his embrace and we stayed like that for a long while. He finally settled against the couch, pulled me with him, and we continued to cuddle while watching the rest of the episode.

When it came time to change the DVD, Drew pushed me away a little so he could get up and do so, but I didn’t move completely away as he had meant for me to. I stayed close to him as he moved to the edge of the couch, and that brought our faces very close together.

I couldn’t help myself. I leaned in and kissed him.

More than a peck, but not overly passionate. Just enough to send the message that I was interested.

He kissed me back for a moment, then nudged me away. “Jess. As much as I would love to pursue this, I don’t really think now is a good time. Do you?” When I just looked down and didn’t answer, he touched my chin and got me to look at him again. “I want this, Jess. I really do. I have for a long time now, but I didn’t know if you were interested in me that way. I’m thrilled to know you are, I really am, but….”

I tried to look away again and mumbled that I was sorry, but he moved my head back around toward him.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for, Jess. At any other time, I would respond very differently. But I don’t want our relationship to be about stress relief, and I’m afraid if we start it right now, that’s what it would be.”

“You think I would just use you like that?”

He wasn’t fazed by my anger and still wouldn’t let me look away. “Not for a second. But as uptight as we both are right now, we wouldn’t keep it to kissing. I know at least I would let it get away from me, and we’d be… well, we’d be doing a lot more than kissing. I don’t know about you, but I would second-guess myself in the morning. I’d wonder if we started a relationship right now because we would have gotten around to it eventually anyway, or if it was because we each needed someone to help with the stress and the other of us was handy.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that, but I finally answered. “I’ve wanted a relationship for a while, but I wasn’t sure you would be interested in it, and I wouldn’t risk ruining our friendship, and….”

“Then what caused a change tonight?” he asked gently.

It was a valid question, and one I had no answer to. Not one I wanted to address anyway. In the back of my mind was the thought that if the trial didn’t go the way we wanted, this might be the only chance we had for something more. But I didn’t want him to go along with it because of that any more than I wanted to start something for stress relief. So I told him, “I don’t know.”

He stroked my hair and scooched around so he could see me even better, but that took him farther away from me, and I felt more than physical distance between us.

“Stop,” he said pleadingly. “I can hear you thinking. I’m not pulling away. I’m really not. I lo—care so much for you, Jess. There’s nothing you could do to push me away. And like I said, I want a relationship with you if you do. But—”

“Now’s not the right time.” I finished for him. I had caught that slip, and it went a long way toward making me feel better about our relationship.

He just nodded.

I wasn’t sure what to do after that. Drew finally got up and changed the DVD. But when he sat back down, I was at a loss. Did I move against him and cuddle like we had been? Did I go back to my side of the couch again?

“You’re thinking too loud again.” He simply grasped my shoulders, pulled me back against him, and held me as he had been. “Nothing’s changed, okay? At least not for the worse. We both know now that we want a relationship, and when we can both be sure of our motives, we can start one. Okay?”

It wasn’t okay at all as far as I was concerned. But I did have to admit, if only to myself, that he had a point. If I started a physical relationship with him right now, I’d always wonder if it was because sex was an excellent stress reliever. We’d been doing everything else to get my mind off things. Was I just suggesting another diversion tactic? I’d definitely wanted him for quite a while now, so I knew any relationship we started wouldn’t be just about sex, but like he said, “why now?” if not for stress relief.

I didn’t want my relationship with Drew to be just that. I had long ago realized I loved him. I hadn’t been sure at first if I loved him as a friend or as something more, but now I was sure of it—I loved him as something more. And if starting a relationship with him right now was going to make him uncomfortable, I could wait. I just hoped we wouldn’t have to wait years because I was doing jail time.

I snuggled in close to him again and felt him relax against me as we continued watching TV.

O
UR
COURT
date was finally coming into view, having been placed at nine weeks from my arrest. Not as good as I was hoping, but nowhere near the year that I feared, so when I first heard the date, I thought nine weeks was doable.

It was turning out to be the longest nine weeks of my life—and of Stevie’s. At just two weeks away now, the press started hounding me and anyone I knew. It became so intense I couldn’t go out of the house. Kyle had asked for police cruisers to keep an eye on the place because of the vandals, and every now and again, they would ask the reporters to leave too, but usually it was a media circus on the front lawn.

Thank God the reporters hadn’t been there several weeks back when Stevie had come here. I couldn’t imagine what that would have done to him.

One morning, both Drew and Dottie had to fight their way to the car just to go to work. Finally I got sick of it, and against Kyle’s instructions, went out front and talked to the press. I got no less than six mics shoved in my face as soon as I opened the door.

Everyone tried to talk simultaneously.

“If you’ll speak one at a time, I’ll be happy to answer any question you have.”

“Why did you decide to come out now?” one reporter sneered at me.

“Because you all very nearly knocked down two of my friends earlier when they were just trying to go to work. I’m hoping that if I give you your interviews, you’ll give Dottie some space. Her house has been repeatedly vandalized already, and for her to now have to fight her way to her car just to go to work? She didn’t do anything to earn all this negative attention.”

“She’s harboring a pedophile.”

“First of all. This is where I’ve lived since I got to town. I pay rent. I’m not a fugitive, so no harboring. She’s just collecting rent from a tenant like anyone with an apartment for rent. And I’m not a pedophile. Innocent until proven guilty, remember? Dottie’s just trying to stick by a friend who’s been wrongly accused.”

“So you’re denying that you, um,
hurt
Stevie Liston?”

“Hell yes, I’m denying it. I would never hurt Stevie. I traveled across the country to find him to help him. Not to hurt him.”

“How does the prosecution have so much evidence, then?” That was the same reporter who had sneered earlier. I wasn’t sure why he was particularly angry, but he seemed to be.

“It’s taken out of context at best and fabricated at worse.”

“You’re accusing Mr. Liston of fabricating evidence?”

“No. I imagine it was a former coworker who gave Mr. Liston the so-called evidence. I don’t have a clue how the meeting went down or what all the former employee told him, but I do know he blames me for losing his job, and he promised me it wasn’t over. He’s not at all above twisting facts to meet his needs.”

“Who is this coworker?”

“I don’t want to name names. I imagine it will come out in the trial.”

“It won’t be hard to find out. We can look at the center’s records to see who was fired since you’ve been there.”

I just smiled and shrugged. I knew that, but I still had enough self-preservation left that I didn’t want to get sued by Chuck for slander.

“So you didn’t pull a naked child into a room against his will?” Same sneering reporter. He wasn’t going to let go of this.

“All the so-called evidence is chopped to bits and twisted around to show something that simply did not happen. The entire video will show me doing my job, helping to calm down a child who had lost control of his emotions and behavior, who had torn off his own clothes, and scratched at his own skin.”

“You expect us to believe—”

“Sir, you may believe anything you want. I’m just telling you what happened.” I was getting a little put out with this guy.

Several other reporters started throwing insults my way. I was able to just absorb them without reacting… too much. By now I had gotten quite good at that.

Finally, one reporter returned to questions and asked, “How do you feel about the upcoming trial?”

I answered, “Elated! I welcome the chance to prove in a court of law that I didn’t do anything to hurt that little boy. Not only would I never hurt him, but he had been doing a hundred percent
better
since I came to work with him. I am looking forward to being able to tell my side of what has become a smear campaign and a witch hunt. And I especially relish the opportunity to show Mr. Liston the
real
evidence, whole and uncut. My former coworker presented a skewed view to the man, for whatever personal reasons, but in so doing has done more harm to Mr. Liston’s little boy than I ever could have.”

As expected, my interview was broadcast on every news station that night—some with a positive spin, some with as negative a spin as possible with what was actually said, and some just showed the tape with little or no comment. Kyle was fit to be tied that I hadn’t followed his instructions and made his “if you don’t listen to me, I can’t properly defend you” noises, but all in all, I think the interview helped our case more than it hurt. Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned the evidence. Maybe I shouldn’t have accused Chuck of anything before we had the opportunity to prove it, and maybe I did take a little of the shock value away by presenting the description of our “secret weapon” before the trial. But, damn it, I had taken enough. Dottie had suffered enough. This was one thing I could do, and whether or not Kyle liked it, I was glad I’d done it.

Kyle wasn’t the only one who didn’t like it, however.

“What the shit, Jess?” Drew stormed in after his shift that evening. “Imagine my surprise when I saw you on the evening news.”

“I couldn’t stand it anymore, Drew. I’m sick and tired of all this shit, and I just couldn’t take it anymore.”

“Two weeks, Jesse.” He was still mad. “All you had to do was wait two more weeks.”

“I know, I know. Kyle already called and ripped me a new one.”

“Rightly so, Jess. You may have just ruined everything. Kyle wanted that to be a surprise for a reason. He wanted the shock value for the jury.”