Chapter 24 The Incident
The Incident
I didn’t think it through. If I had even waited until the next day, my temper would have abated. I would have seen how foolish my plan was, that destroying Milo would also destroy me, and many others. And I know he would have kept his word and not told Erin or anyone.
I gave the police all the evidence they needed. I didn’t think ahead to a court case. I never thought that Milo would go to prison.
Once the lies were told, I had to keep track of them. I didn’t know what to do. It had all gone too far. Dad withdrew Erin’s short story from the New England Journal. Milo never found out it had been accepted.
Months later, I gave my testimony behind a screen so that I wouldn’t have to face the court, or the jury, or Milo.
But it was all very exciting. Before we went to trial, I rehearsed my answers with the prosecutor.
I enjoyed the attention and put in my best performance, acting nervous and terrified.
I thought it would be all over in a few days.
Instead, it went on for weeks. His defence attorney tried to trip me up and at times I got confused.
He kept asking about the denim shorts. He also asked about how my clothes had come off, in what order.
I contradicted myself but then said I was shocked, confused, and I didn’t remember.
And that part was true. It was hard to remember things that didn’t happen.
He suggested I must have removed them myself.
I denied it. I answered the same questions, asked in a hundred different ways.
I was afraid of making a mistake but, before the final week of the trial, I knew that I was believed.
Dad paid attention to me all the time and told me repeatedly that he loved me and that none of this was my fault. I guess I was easier to love now.
One strange thing was that, according to Dad, Principal Bermingham didn’t remember me asking permission to go home.
He was adamant that I’d lied. But his lie worked in my favour.
In court, I said I went home with a pain in my stomach.
If he had remembered that I’d said I had menstrual cramps, then my lie would have been revealed by the forensic examiner who would have told the court that I wasn’t bleeding.
But he also said I could not be trusted.
I don’t know why he said that. My homeroom teacher verified that I had told her I wasn’t feeling well after first period that morning.
I told my mother the truth.
We were home alone. It had been a few weeks since the trial had ended and the next day Milo was to be sentenced.
Dad was out and Erin was staying in Saima’s house.
I think in those days she couldn’t bear to be around me.
Mom had to be able to fix this. I sobbed my way through my story.
I told her everything: how I’d wanted Milo to love me instead of Erin, how I’d come on to him, how I’d planted the evidence inside my body using the tissue.
I told her how I had lied to the police, how the blood on his jacket was from where I’d banged my head, and how he had said we would keep it a secret to protect Erin and me.
The bruises on my inner thighs, which matched his thumbs, were from when he tried to push me away, and he had gripped my wrists to keep me off him.
I didn’t need to tell Mom that I was Doug Cooper’s daughter, the Pastor of the Holy Divine Church, a sworn virgin who went to Bible Camp, who had felt sick that morning and came home alone to an empty house. All the odds were stacked against Milo.
‘You need to stop it, Mom. You need to help him,’ I begged her.
My mother slapped me across the face so hard I fell to the floor. In shock, I looked at her furious face.
‘Mother of God, you little bitch. How could you do that to him? To your sister?’ she screamed at me. She paced up and down the room, wringing her hands. ‘How did you even know what to do?’
I told her about Kenny Carter. She looked like she was going to be sick. I didn’t tell her about the twenty dollars. She sat and put her head on the table and covered it with her arms, breathing heavily, and stayed like that until I said, ‘Mom, what am I going to do?’
She whispered, ‘It’s too late now, don’t you see?
You have had eight months to tell the truth, while Milo has begged for freedom.
Nobody believed him when he said you had tried to seduce him.
He couldn’t explain the DNA, could he? You scheming bitch.
’ I had never seen Mom lose it this way before.
Any trace of an American accent she’d picked up was gone, pure blasphemy and Irish rage pouring out of her. ‘Why did you do it?’
‘Erin gets everything she wants, all the time.’
‘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 neither of 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? ’