‘You said he raped you. How did you become so calculating? Taking the tissues out of the trash? You disgust me. What in the name of Jesus do you expect me to do?’ She handed me the phone and took our attorney’s card out of her bag. ‘Milo’s life is already ruined. He can never escape your accusation. I don’t know if Erin can ever recover. Go ahead, ruin your own life, ruin mine and your father’s. Call Donny Bouras and tell him the truth.’
I couldn’t take the phone from her hand. ‘What will Dad say?’
‘What the hell do you think he’ll say? His church will collapse. His investment clients will run for the hills. Nobody will ever want to be associated with this family again. We’re going to lose everything. Everything.’ I could feel her spittle on my face.
‘I can’t do it,’ I said.
Mom sat with her head in her hands and for ten minutes neitherof us spoke. I could feel the heat on my face from where she’d struck me. Eventually, she got up and went to the freezer and came back with a Ziploc bag of ice wrapped in a towel. She pressed it to my face.
‘If this gets out, do you understand that every convicted rapist will claim that their victims lied and schemed like you did? You will be the poster girl for rapists everywhere. “She lied. She planted the DNA.” If you tell the truth, you’ll be doing real rapists the biggest favour.’
‘Mom, I’m sorry.’
‘Jesus Christ, I don’t know how you would even think to use his … sperm like that.’
‘I saw what Kenny Carter’s looked like –’
‘Do not mention his name again.’
‘What will I do?’
‘It’s Milo or us. You can never tell anyone the truth, do you hear me? Nobody ever. Especially not Erin. You stick to your story, okay? I have to take you away from here.’
‘What?’
‘After the sentencing, we’ll need to get away. You must live with this for the rest of your life. Live your life as if you are a rape victim. You’ve been damn convincing so far. You have sent an innocent boy to jail for God knows how many years. Poor Milo. I don’t know if he’ll survive.’ Her eyes filled with tears. ‘Now, I’m going to say the same thing to you as Milo did. We never had this conversation. You have to believe your lies. If Dad or Erin ask what happened to your face, I opened the kitchen door on you by accident, okay?’
Part Two
25
Ruby
I tried several different meetings before I found one I was comfortable with. Although there was both Narcotics Anonymous and Alcoholics Anonymous, I knew that I had never taken cocaine while sober, so I stuck to AA. I even recognized a few faces from my debaucherous days. Those encounters were awkward at first until we both realized that we were embarrassed for the same reasons. I recognized one of the lecturers in Trinity; a woman who I’d partied with the previous summer; an old teacher from school and one of Mom’s friend’s husbands. But we all respected the anonymity rules.
My ‘home’ meeting was about twenty minutes’ walk from my house, but I didn’t always go to the same one. I was surprised to discover there were AA meetings everywhere, thousands of people trying to stay sober one day at a time. It seemed like the biggest private club in the world. It had taken me a while to find a meeting that was evenly split between genders and who were around my own age, in their late teens, twenties and thirties. Even among that age group, there were people who had started drinking when they were ten years old, people who had suffered or caused devastating consequences for themselves and others. People like me.
I chose my words carefully when I shared or when I chaired a meeting after my first ninety days. I talked about finding sobriety,my lowest point, my need to keep the party going at any cost to suspend reality. My self-destructive behaviour that stemmed from a ‘childhood trauma’. I kept as close to the truth as I could.
All this time, my belly was growing. Sometimes I imagined I could feel her heartbeat through my skin. I remembered Dr Amber asking me in Longhurst on my first visit who the people were that I wanted to get sober for and I could only think of Grandma, but now there was another person, another reason to get sober and stay sober. Two reasons – my child and her mother. I was aware of the calendar. I knew that by now it was too late to terminate the pregnancy. I guess I was going to have a baby, and the more I felt her moving around, the more I realized that I needed her.
Finally, Mom noticed. I think she realized earlier than she said, but neither of us wanted to confront it. And then, when I was seven months pregnant in April 2006, she could no longer ignore it. ‘You seem to have put on a lot of weight around your belly, Ruby.’ I said nothing. ‘Is there anything you want to tell me?’
‘I think you’ve already guessed,’ I said. Her face took on a lot of expressions in the next ten seconds, from dismay to exasperation to hope. It settled on acceptance.
‘Well, a new baby is never a bad thing, is it?’
‘I think it will be good for me, Mom, honestly.’
‘May I ask who the father is?’
‘He’s not in the picture. I’m doing this on my own.’
‘You mean he’s not even going to help out financially?’
‘I mean I don’t know who he is.’
‘What do you mean?’ She was horrified but said she was relieved that I hadn’t had an abortion.
