Eight
The day that changed her life began in an ordinary way, as most extraordinary days do.
There was no cold wind in her chest, no sense of impending doom.
She woke up thinking of the movie they were going to see, happy that Binta still enjoyed going to the movies with her.
She and Binta would sit next to each other in the dark theater with large popcorns, fingers greasy with melted butter.
The popcorn always disturbed her stomach, but the pleasure was in sitting next to her daughter, the warmth of her daughter, so known and yet so new.
To think they now talked of the weather like Americans.
“It’s actually not going to be too cold today, Mom,”
Binta said.
“Yes,”
she said.
December’s chill had lifted slightly.
She wore a new soft brown sweater, bought from Ross last month, nice enough for the theater; she would go from work to the theater and meet Binta there.
Her jeans felt a bit tight, she was putting on more weight than she wanted.
Amadou loved her wide hips—he called her body “stop work,”
because it distracted him—but maybe she should watch it.
She didn’t want him to return from prison thinking she had gone beyond the bigness he liked.
She bought a coffee from the food truck, her usual, with milk and sugar.
It was owned by a Hispanic man with a carefully tended beard.
She didn’t know his name, but after she once bought Binta a hot chocolate, he began to ask her, every day, “How’s your daughter?”
and she said, “Fine, thank you.”
Lin was taking a sick day and so she had the twenty-eighth floor.
She hoped the guests didn’t have late checkouts, so she could leave early enough, maybe even wander around with Binta in the shop near the theater.
Almost every room on the floor had the Do Not Disturb sign on the doors.
She walked by each one, deflated, thinking of how much time it would now take her.
Near the linen closet, Jeff from Room Service was wheeling away a trolley.
“Nobody in 2806,”
he said.
“All yours.”
“Oh great,”
she said.
The kind of thing she said to sound American.
Oh great.
Oh my God.
Words that felt foreign in her mouth, more foreign than other English words.
She knew that 2806 was the largest suite on the floor, but if she started it now, she might still make it out on time—if none of the other suites had late checkouts.
She knocked loudly, just in case, calling out, “Hello? Housekeeping! Housekeeping! Hello?”
She unlocked the door and walked into the room.
Room, indeed, this soft-toned space bigger than her apartment.
Each time she entered a suite, she thought it was such a waste of space, with beds wide as fields and whole sections of the suite often left untouched by guests.
Guests liked it, but she thought they liked having stayed there, more than they liked the suites themselves.
How do our tranquil musings become stabbed by shock? She registered swift movement before she saw the naked White man.
He had silver hair, he was not tall, he was pudgy, his belly was thick, and he was coming toward her.
Before she averted her eyes, his erection registered as an aggressive pinkish blur.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”
she said.
Her hands flew to her face, to cover her eyes, backing away, mortified, thinking of how she would explain invading a VIP’s privacy to Shaquana.
Jeff said the room was empty and nobody answered when I knocked and next time I will wait another minute …
But the man was still moving, now next to her, not trying to cover himself at all.
He reached out and slammed shut the door she had left half-open.
“Don’t be sorry,”
he said, and he enclosed her breasts in his hands.
Both his hands on both her breasts as if they were his, as if her body was his, as if she knew him and he knew her.
Surrealness was descending around her like fog.
“Please sir, no.
Please, stop, please sir.”
He pushed her toward the bed and down to sit on the bed.
He was strong, which surprised her, as he was not a young man.
His pushing was a propulsion, a separate unheeding energy of its own.
She felt shocked, dazed, wondering if it was happening even though she knew it was happening.
“Sir, please.
Stop.
My supervisor is outside,” she said.
“Nobody is there,” he said.
It happened quickly, the speed dizzied her.
He yanked up her dress, and as she tried to pull it down again, he wrenched down her stockings, and slid his fingers furiously between her legs.
She pushed him away, but she did not push too hard—he was a VIP, she could not lose this job—and she ran for the hallway, but he was relentless, alarmingly swift, upon her again, animalistic, possessed, a brute animal.
He was pushing her down to her knees, her back against the wall, roughly shoving her shoulders, to get her down, to keep her as he wanted her, and her shoulder shifted and cracked in dissent.
He was forcing his penis into her mouth.
She clamped her lips together, shaking her head.
His hand, in a swift sharp squeeze, forced open her jaws.
She knew in that moment that he did not think of her as a person alive and breathing like him.
She was a thing, a thing to own and invade and discard, and this frightened her.
His penis was in her mouth and with both hands he shoved her face against his groin.
He was thrusting quickly and grunting and she left her mouth open, because even in her shock she was afraid to hurt him, this VIP, this naked White man.
A final violent thrust, and he withdrew.
Her mouth was full of worms.
She ran out of the room, spitting the vile sourness from her mouth.
Her throat itched and her stomach turned, and the overwhelming sense was of her body, her spirit, her soul in rebellion.
She was spitting and spitting.
She was spitting on the opulent floor that it was her job to clean, but she could not help herself.
Near the elevator she stopped, clutching her belly to restrain the vomit.
Then he appeared, wearing a jacket and shiny shoes, pulling a black carry-on.
It shocked her, how quickly he had dressed, how unaffected he was by what he had just done.
He saw her standing there and he looked blankly at her, through her, and then walked into the elevator.
Goosebumps prickled her skin.
It really felt as if he was an evil djinn, not human, part ghost and part animal.
She did not know what to do.
She went into room 2820, which was unoccupied, and stared confused at the perfectly made bed, then walked out of the room again.
Her stomach was heaving.
Had what happened really happened? She had walked into a room and, like evil made incarnate, a naked White VIP had come rushing at her.
She heard footsteps and jumped, panicky.
It was Shaquana.
“Everything okay, Kadi?”
wanted to nod and say everything was fine, but she was overcome by the liquid sensation of losing control.
English was difficult enough; now the words refused to come.
“What will happen if a guest…”
She stopped, feeling the cold wind in her chest, a gathering fear that things would fall apart.
“What happened, Kadi? What happened?”
“The guest push me and force me.
In my mouth, he put…I spit it out.”
She gestured.
Shaquana’s eyes widened.
“Oh my God.
In room 2806?”
nodded.
“He’s a VIP, but I don’t care,”
Shaquana said, already reaching for her phone.
—
Her left shoulder aches, as if something inside has been moved from where it should be.
She feels the urge to hold that shoulder, to try and keep it whole, or stop a further splintering, but she doesn’t want to call attention to it.
Between her legs, where he grasped with animal force, she feels not pain but dull violation, a faded throb.
Outwardly she holds herself rigid, standing beside Shaquana, but her whole body teeters, unsteady, disoriented.
All the parts of her previously at peace no longer are.
Mike, the head of security, is talking to her.
She sees him sometimes in the hallways, and he always says, “Hi, how are you?”
He is tall and walks with authority, his back straight.
He is talking to her in a kind voice, saying, “We’ll go downstairs now, we’ll go downstairs to the manager’s office,”
speaking slowly, as if he thinks something has happened to make her unable to understand.
When the elevator doors slide open, he stands back to let her go in first.
Shaquana is hovering, a blur of black uniform, saying, “You’ll be okay, Kadi, it will be okay.”
In the elevator, nobody speaks.
Her mouth is sour.
Disgust fills her at the thought of what is left in her mouth, the remnants of worms, the lingering slithering slimy worms that she did not fully spit out, and now her throat is rising in resistance, her stomach churning, and the heave of the elevator makes her want to bite down on her lips to keep herself still, but biting down will only make the worms sink deeper into her mouth, her saliva, and sully her, stain her in a way that she can never undo.
“I want to wash my mouth,” she says.
“You can’t rinse your mouth, Kadi,”
Shaquana says.
“Not yet.”
Shaquana reaches out to rub ’s shoulder, to show support, but it is the left shoulder, the one in distress, and tries not to flinch.
The manager is standing by his office door, looking restless and agitated, clutching an unusually large cell phone.
Shaquana tells the manager the guest’s name, and the manager says, “Oh my God!”
and glances up at the ceiling as if suddenly overwhelmed, calling on his God.
“Tell me what happened, ,” he says.
“I want to wash my mouth,”
says again.
“No, you can’t.
You have to go to the hospital so they can check you out and collect evidence,”
the manager says.
“And we’ll call the police.”
Mike says to the manager, “You go ahead and call.
I’ll get in touch with the detective.”
“No, no,”
says.