Letter Fourteen #7
I struggled to pull myself free of your grasp, but I couldn’t. This was you showing me. How much weaker I was than you. How I couldn’t escape your grip, no matter how badly I might’ve wanted to.
“You think just because you got free once,” you said, “you could do it again? You got lucky. That other boy? He saved you. If he hadn’t been there, you’d be lying in a morgue right now.”
“You think I don’t know that?”
“Doesn’t seem like you do. You’re used to thinking you’re the scariest person in the room.
You’re used to running that mouth of yours and people being cautious enough to take you seriously.
But didn’t you see? Didn’t you learn the hard way?
You’re not that scary, guys like Greer aren’t the slightest bit intimidated by you, and there will always be someone more than happy to call your bluff if you keep going on about how dangerous you are. ”
“Yeah,” I said, eyes welling with tears.
“I did learn that the hard way, and now, in addition to thinking I’m to blame for what happened, I might have to live with something happening to you and Michael, too.
So while you’re sitting there feeling justified and pleased with yourself, why don’t you ruminate on that? ”
Your grip on my arm loosened. “I don’t know what happened,” you whispered.
The tears were getting to you, I could tell.
“I didn’t mean to hurt them that badly. I just—I lost control.
I kept picturing your bruises, how scared you must have been, how they almost—listen, you aren’t to blame.
I don’t mean to imply that. Just—don’t be mad at me, okay?
” You tried tugging me closer, but I planted my feet on the rug. “I couldn’t let them get away with it.”
But I wanted to hurt you for going behind my back—for putting yourself and Michael in danger—so I tore my arm free and left your room.
When I wandered downstairs later that morning, I found my dad standing over Michael, asleep on one of the sofas, an elbow crooked across his face.
Nic glanced up. “What’s he doing here?”
I shrugged.
Nic’s phone rang. He pulled it out of his pants pocket and glanced down at the screen. “I need to take this in my office,” he said, already briskly walking off in that direction.
Less than thirty minutes later, Nic charged the stairs and slammed your bedroom door open and yelled at you to get your ass downstairs. Then he bolted into the Garland Room—where I’d planted myself on one of the wingbacks—and shook Michael awake.
You walked in, wearing those blue striped pajama pants and a white t-shirt. Wide awake but clearly exhausted.
Michael groggily sat up, rubbing his eyes as you sat down on the opposite end of the sofa.
“One of you,” Nic said, hands propped on his hips, “needs to explain to me what the fuck is going on.”
He’d found out, Casey. It was that quick.
“I just took a call from my buddy on the force,” Nic continued, “and he tells me they’re sending officers by at some point today to question you two.”
You guys sat forward, both of you avoiding Nic’s gaze, both rubbing at your mouths, your body language identical.
Michael was the first to speak. “Look, Nic. They deserved it.”
“So it’s true?” Nic asked, his eyebrows lifted in shock. “You did hurt two boys badly enough that you put them in the hospital?”
The hospital? I felt sick.
Michael glanced across the coffee table at me.
“Why are you looking at her?” Nic twisted to face me, but I glanced down, unable to meet his gaze. “Someone better start talking,” he said. “I need to know everything.”
Michael talked while I gripped the chair, my heart beating fast. Nic’s face remained impassive as he listened to Michael’s story, then he slowly walked over and lifted my chin, studying the bruise on my face with fresh eyes.
He pulled the shirt away from my neck, cringing at the hand-shaped bruises there. “That Greer boy did this to you?”
I nodded.
“Did it happen like Michael said? Did he—he didn’t force himself on you?”
“No,” I said.
Nic didn’t seem convinced, eyes shimmering with fear.
“He didn’t rape me, Dad.” I didn’t miss how all three of you flinched at that word. “He just—he attacked me because I got him kicked off the tennis team.”
That’s when Nic glared in your direction. “You let her go to this party, Casey? You let my daughter go to a fucking party without my permission? Where she got assaulted and nearly killed?”
You stared down at the rug between your feet.
“He didn’t know,” I said. “We snuck out. He was in the kitchen working on a paper. We left music on so he would think we were still here.”
“Yeah? Then how did Michael manage to carry Tinsley all the way upstairs without Casey noticing?”
“He didn’t. That’s how Casey caught us—but I begged him not to tell you.” Nic was glaring pretty hard at you, so I rushed to add, “It’s my fault, Dad. Casey is innocent.”
“No, he is not innocent,” said Nic, rounding the coffee table. “After everything I’ve done for you, Casey, do you have any idea how close you are to losing it all?”
When you continued to stare at the floor without giving him a response, it made Nic angry. So angry that he reached down, clasped your chin in his hand, and shoved your head back, forcing your gaze to meet his. “You look at me when I’m talking to you, son.”
Michael drew back on the sofa, watching this go down, shocked. It shocked me, too. I’d never seen my dad handle anyone like that.
Throat bobbing frantically, you gripped Nic’s forearm.
“Do you realize what you’ve put at stake by taking this matter into your own hands?” he asked you.
“It wasn’t just him,” said Michael, rushing to defend you. “It was my idea, too, Nic.”
“You’re supposed to look out for him, Casey—not help him make poor decisions.” Nic jabbed his finger at Michael. “This could destroy his whole life.”
Michael made a face at this, brows lowered in confusion, likely wondering why the decisions he made in life should be your concern at all.
With Nic’s hand still clamped down on your jaw, you said, “You think I don’t plan to take the fall for him—for the both of us—if I have to?”
“You should’ve come to me,” Nic snapped. “You should’ve let me handle this.”
“Yes,” you agreed. “But she’s my responsibility, and I messed up by letting her go. I saw what they did to her, and I wanted them to pay. I’m sorry, Nic. I’m so fucking sorry.”
Nic dropped his hand from your face and gripped your shoulder. “You’re lucky I have a friend on the inside, who alerted me to this incident ahead of time—so we can get our stories straight. If we do this right, no one gets in trouble and this all goes away.”
I remember wondering how—and why—my dad would have connections to the police.
But, anyway, that’s exactly what the three of you did: got your stories straight.
Nic sent me upstairs, ordering me to stay there, hoping to keep my bruised face out of sight.
An hour later, when the doorbell rang, I creeped across the landing outside my room and positioned myself against the wall, as close to the mahogany spindles as I could get without being spotted.
But curiosity got the better of me, and I peeked through the spindles, anyway, watching Nic open the door to a male detective and a male officer with the Boston PD.
Nic and the detective greeted each other with warm smiles, shaking hands in a way that suggested they knew each other. It made me think this detective might’ve been his “friend on the inside.”
The detective glanced up—toward the eye in the ceiling—and I quickly drew back.
I listened as you and Michael, sitting side by side on the stairs, fielded the officers’ questions.
I didn’t catch much of what you said, just enough to know your stories lined up.
Enough to know it would all go away, exactly like my dad said.
That night, my dad made me stand before him in a sports bra while he snapped pictures of my bruises with his phone.
“What will you do with the pictures?” I asked, pulling my Harvard sweatshirt on and retreating back to the bed.
“That detective who stopped by earlier? He says the boys don’t want to press charges—their parents are the ones pursuing this.
So the photos are leverage. If they want to come after Michael and Casey, they need to understand I’m fully prepared to go after their boys, too.
But their boys won’t recover from allegations of attempted rape and murder—not to mention drugging a girl.
If I have to, I’ll destroy their lives for fucking with my family. ”
For the first time ever, I saw a glimpse of myself in Nic. He could be dark, scary, and vengeful, too.
Softening, he pocketed his phone and joined me amongst my pillows.
He didn’t ask questions about that night or try to fix it. He just sat there, steady and close, like he used to when I was small and emotions felt too big to carry on my own.
Maybe that’s why I finally allowed myself to break. Because, for the first time in days, I didn’t have to hide anymore.
All the fear and shame came crashing out at once, sobs tearing through my body. Nic held me until the final cry poured out, like he’d done countless times over the course of my childhood.
By the middle of the week, I learned that Greer and Rory were gone.
Not in the hospital, gone. Gone from my school forever, gone.
Which meant those pictures had not only worked in Nic’s favor—they’d helped him remove those boys from my world altogether.
Whether I liked his involvement or not, my dad had handled it.