Chapter 25 #2
parents would know. Her friends would know. And worst of all, Bennett would know that the “ex-boyfriend” she’d allowed him to think
was just another college guy was actually the fifty-six-year-old professor they’d both sat under.
She couldn’t bear it.
The year of the ninth New Year’s party, she had just weaned Norah at nineteen months. It had been a grueling year. Olivia
was emotional, weak, exhausted. As the old crew ate and bantered and played a trumped-up version of Pictionary with body paint,
Olivia imagined herself banging on the glass wall between her and the rest of humanity. I’m here! Help! I’m trapped! She didn’t normally drink more than a single glass of wine, but that night she needed more.
When her stomach started to protest the whiskey and the beer and the tequila, Phelps offered her his bed to lie down in.
Bennett was nowhere to be found, so Phelps stayed to make sure she was okay.
He wasn’t doing so well either. He had just lost the restaurant to a freak fire, and Kylie had filed for divorce.
They both leaned against the headboard, their hands close enough to touch.
Phelps opened a bottle of cognac and started pouring out his woes.
Then he said, “But what do you know of drama, Miss Olivia? You’re like Galadriel, Elf Queen.
Above the paltry problems of us mortals. ”
Something in her snapped. Someone had to know—someone in this goddamn world—that she was not Galadriel. She was not above them. She was one of them. She was fucking one of them.
“I’ve had shit too,” she said, beckoning for the cognac.
“You?” said Phelps, disbelieving.
Urgency took over. Sitting in the low lamplight in Phelps’s master bedroom with the mouth of the cognac bottle warm from both
their lips, she said, “Bennett doesn’t even know this. There was a professor . . .”
It all came out. Phelps held her hand as tears poured down her face.
She must have fallen asleep soon after.
Then there was the rhythmic breathing. The groan.
The next thing she remembered was stumbling out of the room, disoriented and confused, right into Jenn. The face of judgment.
“I can’t believe what you just did.”
Olivia was devastated. She’d opened herself up, and look what she’d gone and done. There was a reason for that glass wall.
She wasn’t to be trusted.
Two weeks later, she took a pregnancy test. It was positive. Bennett was so happy. Olivia felt cold as ice. She had made an
unforgivable mistake, and she couldn’t possibly tell Bennett, and now the rest of her life would be an act of pretending.
The next five years, when things felt desperate, she dealt with it alone.
She took up running. Practiced thankfulness.
Threw herself into freelance work, into raising the girls, into being someone Bennett didn’t regret marrying, and prayed to a God she didn’t believe in that she would have the strength to hold her secret until the grave.
If that condemned her to unbearable isolation, well, it was her own fault. Her price to pay, and no one else’s.
“Who hasn’t gone?” Phelps was saying, wielding the BB gun. Olivia snapped back into the cold night. “Hey, where’s Bunny?”
They all looked around.
“I’m here!” came Bunny’s voice from a slight distance. She was coming toward the group from a copse of trees, with Will right
behind.
“Where were you two?” said Jenn.
“Talking,” said Will.
“About the virus,” Bunny jumped in. “I know none of you want to talk about it, but it might be serious. It’s all over China—”
“It’s going to be just like SARS,” said Phelps in a tired, know-it-all voice. “It won’t make it here.”
Just like SARS. Things doomed to repeat themselves. Phelps would get away with it, just like the professor. Unless . . .
What if Olivia told Bennett that her so-called “cheating” with Phelps had not been consensual at all? That his best friend
had assaulted her? Would he believe her? She had only just confessed to Bennett hours ago about the cheating. Would he question
her quick revision? Wonder why the story had already changed?
“Like we need more problems other than our current POTUS,” said Bennett with a laugh.
And if Bennett did believe her? Would he storm out of the party, Olivia in tow?
Tackle Phelps? Cut ties with his best friend?
Kill him? No. She was thinking crazy. She didn’t need Bennett to do anything.
Didn’t want him to do anything, except support her, believe her.
But however Bennett reacted, she could not let things repeat. Professor
Larkin had gotten away with it. Phelps could not.
“Trump is a genius,” declared Ted, walking toward them. Wow. Olivia hadn’t noticed he’d gone off either.
“What?” exploded both Doug and Allie.
Ted laughed. “A psychopathic genius. The problem with the liberal party is, they’re constantly underestimating him. They think
he’s a glorified idiot, but . . .”
“I have to take a piss,” announced Doug.
“Hillary would have been so much better,” said Allie. “I cried when I saw the election results.” She turned to Olivia. “How
did you feel? You have daughters.”
Olivia’s mind sluggishly turned from the events of five years ago to election day, fall of 2016 . . . She’d felt violent that
morning. She remembered thinking she’d like to kill Trump if she had the chance, for the sake of her daughters. He’d bragged
about grabbing someone’s pussy, right before the election. When that came out, Olivia had thought with relief, Well, now he’s shot himself in the foot. She was so confident America would pick Hillary she didn’t even stay up to see the election results. Then, he was elected
anyway.
No one cared about sexual assault victims. No one would care about Olivia.
“I was . . . upset,” she said vaguely.
“I’m just gonna go over there,” said Doug.
“Hillary would have been boring,” said Ted. “And this is a liberal speaking. People couldn’t care less about policy. People
want to be entertained!”
“How many times do I have to tell you to shut up, Kristos?” said Phelps. “No one wants to hear your political takes tonight.
Now someone take this goddamn gun and shoot some fucking Santa plates.”
“I’m up next,” said Jenn, stepping forward with a fierce edge and grabbing the gun.
“Now that’s the energy I’m talking about,” said Phelps.
Ted sidled up to Phelps and spoke in what he likely thought was a low voice.
“So . . . your hot date. Allie . . .” His voice lowered into an inaudible mumble. Phelps laughed sharply. What were they saying?
Didn’t matter. Olivia wasn’t interested in hearing some kind of gross male discourse about how hot Allie was.
Olivia watched Jenn raise the gun and wished her problems were as simple as a sexually adventurous husband. She would gladly
figure out Bennett in a dress.
A strong sound of rustling came from the cornfield that abutted Phelps’s backyard. The corn stood pale and tall in the dark,
sparkling in the moonlight.
“Uh . . . guys?” Olivia said. Everyone’s attention turned to the corn.
A patch of stalks shook violently, scattering wetness. There was a grunting sound. Olivia backed up a step. What wild animals
were native to northern Indiana?
“What the—” muttered Phelps as the corn shook even harder.
“Oh, my God . . .” moaned Bunny.
Just as Olivia took another step back, Jenn took three swift steps forward. She pointed the BB gun into the corn and shot.
Pumped, and shot again.
There was an explosive shout from the corn, then a long groan. A human groan. Someone pitched forward, out of the corn and
into the mud.