In Harmony(94)

As Dad went to answer the door, I looked to my mother, who sat statue-still, her face pale and her fingernails drumming the armrest.

I stared after my father, my entire body trembling, then turned tearfully to my mother. “Mom…?”

“You have to understand,” she said. “He’s under so much pressure.”

“He’s acting like a maniac.”

“It’s not his fault. You know how he gets when he thinks he’s being pushed around. We just found out…” She pressed her fingers to her lips.

“Mom, what?” I swallowed hard. “What did you find out?”

My dad stormed back into the living room with two male police officers in tow. One tall, one shorter, both intimidating in size and uniform. The taller of the pair had Murphy on his pin, the other was named Underwood. Each had a gun strapped to his waist on one side, a baton on the other. Their glances went up and down my body, taking in my short shorts, my sleep shirt with no bra. Two men pinning me to the couch with their hulking presence and flat stares.

My dad crossed his arms and spoke. “Mrs. Chambers, next door, saw a young man leaving our house by the back door. She called the police, thinking we had a breakin.”

I mustered my courage. “What was she doing watching our house in the middle of the night?”

“She heard your parents arguing, young lady,” Murphy said. “Would you like to tell us what happened here tonight?”

“And it better be the truth.”

“Nothing happened,” I said. “We were sleeping. That’s the truth. Why is it so hard to believe, Dad?”

“Because he—”

“Because he’s poor?” I cried, tears streaming down my cheeks now. “Because his father’s a drunk? What if he were rich? What if he went to private school? What if his father was the CEO of a billion-dollar company? Would you believe me then?”

Mom went pale, staring at me.

My father’s expression faltered, confusion in his eyes. “We’re not discussing ridiculous hypotheticals,” he said. “We’re talking about what happened tonight.”

“Nothing happened tonight,” I said.

It happened last summer.

Call the police, Angie had said.

Now the police were here. Standing in my living room, large and imposing, detached and bored, dealing with a family drama at four in the morning. I felt no malice from them, but no sympathy either. No connection. No sense of safety. They filled up the room with a masculine indifference to the experiences of a seventeen-year-old girl. How would they react if I told my parents the truth about Xavier?

All at once, I could envision it perfectly from their perspective. A scared young girl who got caught with her boyfriend in the house, telling everyone that the real crime occurred almost a year ago, with a different guy, in a different town, in a different house with no evidence. It would look like the worst, most pathetic kind of deflection.

Telling them the truth wouldn’t hurt Xavier. It would only destroy everything around me. It would open me up to invasive inquiry, endless interrogations to prove something that could not be proven. To answer question after question with I can’t remember.

I looked up at my father.

“Nothing happened,” I whispered. “I keep saying it and you can’t hear me. I’m saying words with my voice and they’re the truth and you can’t hear me.”

My father sighed and turned to the officers. “Can’t you just arrest him, or bring him in for questioning? He violated her in my—”

“Stop saying that,” I screamed from the couch. “He didn’t hurt me. He never has.”

Underwood held up the palm of his hand to me, his voice hard. “You need to calm down.”

“It’s not technically a violation, sir,” Murphy said.

“But he’s nineteen years old. She’s only seventeen.”

I stared as these men stood over me, talked about me as if I weren’t there. I was here. Yet I wasn’t. Half dreaming, half awake. Going insane because everything made perfect sense.

“The age of consent in Indiana is sixteen,” Murphy was saying. “But if you want us to bring him in to answer a few questions, we could do that. They’re still investigating what happened at the auto yard station, and it’s not the first time his name’s been on the radar.”

I couldn’t speak or breathe as a different scene unfolded. Isaac arrested for questioning. Brought to the station in handcuffs. Sexual assault added to a list of crimes he never committed. The final act in the tragedy of his life story. A story he never asked for.

“No,” I said getting to my feet. Or tried to. My knees buckled and I sank on the carpet by Dad’s feet. “You can’t do that. Please listen to me. I won’t…I won’t see him again. I promise. He’s leaving town. Casting agents are coming to see him in Hamlet. He’s leaving Harmony. Please, Dad. He needs this show. Don’t take that away. I promise I won’t see him again.”

The officers exchanged looks. “Sir?”

“Dad. I’m begging you.”

A silence descended. My father’s jaw worked side to side as he thought.

“Thank you, officers,” he finally said, his eyes heavy on me. “I think we have this under control. However, I reserve the right to change my mind and have him hauled in. If I find the story is worse than what my daughter is insisting. Regina?”