No one, I think. Not Blythe. Not her obnoxious friends. Certainly not Sean Nessel.
“Think of the amount of people you could reach if it goes viral,” Terrance says. He fiddles with the keyboard. His voice trailing off. “I know it’s nothing now. But with your story in it, it could become something. It could become something meaningful.”
There’s a pause, and this time it feels important, like it’s one of the biggest decisions I’ve ever had to make in my life.
“Are you ready to do this, Ali?” Terrance says to me. “Because if you’re ready, this is going to be a goddamned tornado.”
I think of Sean’s hand over my mouth and his horrible, disgusting excuse: I got carried away.
I think of the blood between my legs.
I think of the bruise I had on my shoulder for a week.
I think of my father and how I’m going to explain this to him.
Everything in my body is telling me to walk away right now. To forget the article. To tell them it was a mistake. But I close my eyes. Think back to that night. Me crying on the floor. And I want everyone to know.
“I’m ready,” I say.
42
“Ask Me If I Care”
by Alistair Greenleaf
It was like any other day. I was smoking in the C-wing bathroom at school when I noticed another student, Reggie. All I said was, “How ya doing?” and she proceeded to tell me how she was raped.
“Raped?” I said.
“Oh, yeah. We were both drunk at this party. I willingly went up to a bedroom with him. No doubt, I was into it at first. But then I said no, because I got scared and didn’t want to go any further. Plus I was drunk and confused. And he, well, I guess I was just a body. An object.”
Do I want to know this? I thought. Do I care? Why did I ask her how she was doing?
It’s a simple question, just one to make the time go by when you’re smoking in the handicapped bathroom, crammed in with a bunch of other girls. Four other girls were there. The kind of girls who stare down at you. Who judge you for breathing. The kind of girls who protect each other at all costs.
“There was one girl who knew about it,” Reggie said. “She knew it all.”
“How did she know?” I asked.
“Because the guy, you know, my rapist, told her. It was her job to persuade me not to tell. And she even had her own experience as a freshman. But her assault was sanctioned, whatever that means,” Reggie said.
Now I know all this, this tale of sexual assault, and I don’t want to know it!
I want to un-know it! I was just being friendly. I didn’t expect her to reveal her personal life. I didn’t expect her to talk about rape.
I feel bad for this girl. Rape is almost impossible to prove. The most popular kid in school? His best female friend? Their word against hers? Isn’t this the exact reason why statistics show that most sexual assaults aren’t reported?
Still, is this information I need to be privy to?
People walk up and down the hallways of our school and ask at least twenty times a day, “Hey, how you doin’?” It brightens their day and makes it seem like you’re actually interested in their existence.
I was just trying to smoke, y’all.
“I was a virgin before this whole thing started, just a girl enamored with this boy. Made a collage book of him and everything. I’m sure it wasn’t his intention to rape me, but when I said no—and I said no loudly and clearly—he put his hand over my mouth, pinned my shoulder down to the floor,” she said.
I noticed the bruises on her upper arm peeking out. The marks where he must have held her down.
Oh God, why do I deserve this grueling tale? Why do I have to be left with the responsibility of knowing this?
Because I asked her how she was doing.
Have I learned my lesson? Will I take a chance and ask someone how they’re doing, or will I simply nod and turn away?
The latter will probably avoid any type of unwanted conversation, but it will take me a while to get out of the old habit.
“Anyway, no one is going to believe me because he’ll just say ‘She wanted to do it . . .’ or ‘I can get any girl I want, why would I rape someone?’”
No, a simple hi will do just fine.
43
BLYTHE
It’s been a few days since I spoke to Ali. Hoping she’ll change her mind. That maybe she has. The two of us passing each other in the hallway like clouds. A nod. An acknowledgment. Hardly anything.
Suki sees it first on Instagram.
“There’s something going around. Something about Ali,” she says.
“Like what?”
“Something about Sean. Something about you.”
“I told you she was going to do that school paper thing,” I say. “We already knew this.”
“No, B. Something else. In some trash blog,” she says. Her face weighted down. Serious. “You don’t even know the half of it.”
* * *
In C-wing stall. Donnie, Suki, Cate, and I read Ali’s article. It’s published on a website. Something ridiculous called the Underground. Anything that can be accessed by anyone is not “underground,” but that’s beside the point.
“She’s fucked our whole senior year,” Donnie says.
“Oh, stop. Who’s going to read this article? This thing? Some stupid article from a newspaper dork?” Cate says.
“Tap through to see the list of likes,” I say.
“This
