Ordinary World
Now
I pull open the door to the walk-in closet in the loft and the sight of the rose-pink silk jumpsuit hanging separately from all the rest of my clothes is like a punch in the gut. I planned to wear the jumpsuit today when Ben and I were supposed to go to City Hall at three p.m. and get married. Instead, I’m here, after waiting for Ben to leave the apartment, so I can sneak in and get all my stuff before the month-to-month lease is up next week.
Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
Trying to go on with life these past three days has been surreal. With Ben, it was like I was living life with the saturation turned all the way up. Then, someone came along and put a cloudy, black and white filter over everything. My vibrant, sexy world became a dull, gray .
As I watch Michelle and Allie carrying my photography equipment out of the apartment, I thank God I still have my friends. And I try not to think of how stupid I was to think that Ben was my best friend.
I stuff my clothes into trash bags, because all my suitcases and hard cases are being used to transport my equipment. I don’t even care about the clothes. Michelle is the one who insisted, a couple days ago, that I needed to get my stuff so Ben didn’t take everything from me. The weird thing is that this morning she did a total one-eighty and insisted I didn’t need to get the stuff. When I reminded her that I had at least ten grand in clothing and equipment in this loft, she finally relented and agreed to come with me and Allie to help me move my stuff out.
“Is this yours?” Allie says, holding up a framed picture of Ben and me, the one we took on the sand dune at sunset.
“Are you fucking kidding me? I’m not taking that even if it is mine. Please just throw away all the pictures you find. I don’t want to see them.”
“Okay, sorry,” she says, heading straight to the kitchen. But when she gets to the wastebasket, she hesitates for a moment before she sets the frame facedown on the marble counter.
I shake my head as I continue stuffing my clothes and shoes into my giant black trash bag. I’m almost done when my phone starts incessantly vibrating in my pocket. I take a few deep breaths, waiting for it to stop, but it never does. Finally, I pull the phone out of my pocket and throw it at the concrete wall, where it shatters and falls onto the maple floor in a dozen pieces.
Michelle and Allie stop what they’re doing and stare at the wreckage.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I just… I’m so sick of that thing.”
They both set down the items in their hands and come over to hug me. “It’s okay,” Allie assures me. “You’re entitled to feel the way you do. But it will get better. I promise.”
I laugh as I push them away. “It will get better?” I repeat her words. “When will it get better? When will I feel like my world isn’t going to collapse every time that fucking phone vibrates? Huh? When?”
Michelle and Allie look to each other, like children being scolded, but they don’t respond.
I shake my head. “I don’t want a phone anymore,” I say, grabbing the last two sweaters out of the closet and stuffing them in my trash bag. “Maybe I should just move to the mountains and become a recluse. No more phones or computers or social media. Just me and my camera until I die an old, senile woman with a dozen cats who eat my dead body.”
Allie smiles as she pulls her vibrating phone out of her shorts pocket. “You could be the next Unabomber. But you would only have one person you need to bomb,” she suggests enthusiastically.
I laugh as I sit on the edge of the bed, where Ben and I did so many filthy things to each other. “I feel lost,” I say with a sigh.
Allie’s eyes widen as she checks the notifications on her phone. “Charley, you have to see this.”
I shake my head adamantly. “No! Don’t show me. I don’t want to see anything on the internet.”
“No, really,” she says, taking a seat next to me. “I swear it’s not bad.”
She and Michelle exchange a look, like they know something I don’t know.
“What’s going on here?” I ask pointedly. “You two had better not be keeping secrets from me, too.”
Michelle purses her lips. “Girl, just read the damn tweets.”
“Tweets?”
Allie hands me her phone. “Go on.”
I draw in a deep breath and let it out slowly as I raise Allie’s phone up so I can see the screen. My stomach flips at the sight of Ben’s Twitter profile picture.
I hand it back to her. “No, I don’t want to see this.”
Michelle snatches the phone of out Allie’s hand and begins reading the thread of nineteen tweets aloud.
[THREAD - 1/19] Ten years ago, I was 16 when I got a call from Jordan Kroll. He offered to represent me as my agent to get me modeling, acting, and music gigs.
[2/19] Jordan invited me to L.A. to get my headshots taken by Wesley Gammett. Wes asked me to take pictures with and without my shirt on.
[3/19] Three months later, Jordan and Wes invited me to spend a week at their WMA Mansion in West Hollywood when my dad couldn’t fly with me to an audition.
[4/19] There was going to be lots of other child actors and models there, so my dad allowed me to go. He died three days ago, and this was the biggest regret of his life.
[5/19] At the WMA Mansion, I was introduced to drugs, alcohol, and sex. On my third night, a friend and I were severely drugged and sexually assaulted by Jordan & Wes.
[6/19] When I awoke from my drug-induced stupor, I wanted to report the incident to authorities. However, I was told that if I did bring the incident to the attention of...
[7/19] ...law enforcement, they would not believe me. Jordan claimed the police knew what they were doing. He said I would be charged because I’d had consensual sex...
[8/19] ...with one of their victims earlier that day. I, being a frightened, traumatized 16-year-old, believed them. Years later, I found out that not only had they...
[9/19] ...violated me, they had set up recording devices in my bedroom at home, and had footage of me and my girlfriend having sex. Jordan used this footage...
[10/19] ...to blackmail and extort me for 3 years. Three days ago, I met Jordan at my lawyer’s office to sign an NDA agreement prohibiting Jordan from releasing...
[11/19] ...the footage from my bedroom. In return, I would not tell anyone what he and Wes did to me and my friend when I was 16. Jordan secretly released the footage...
[12/19] ...three days ago at the exact moment he was walking into my lawyer’s office. My mother and father are now dead. The person I love most in this world has had...
[13/19] ...her reputation dragged through the mud. Her privacy and trust have been violated beyond belief, and I’m partly responsible. I should never have trusted...
[14/19] ...Jordan with something so sensitive. I should have exposed him at the very first opportunity. For this mistake, my loved ones and I will likely pay for the rest...
[15/19] ...of my life. I can live with that. What I cannot live with is knowing that I have hurt someone I deeply care about. If any good can come of this, I hope it is this:
[16/19] If you or someone you know has been the victim of a sexual predator, don’t stay quiet. That is how they control you. And they get off on that just as much.
[17/19] I hope the others who stayed at the WMA Mansion will come forward, but I understand if they don’t. In the end, these predators will get their comeuppance.
[18/19] R.I.P. Dad. You were the best dad I could have hoped for. Give Mom a hug for me. And to my best friend: Always love us, I will. I’ll be there at 3, as promised.
When she’s finished reading the eighteenth tweet, she hands me the phone. Tweet nineteen is a link to a YouTube video of Ben performing a cover of , and I can’t help but smile through my tears when I see Allie accompanying him on the piano as he plays guitar.
I close the video and go back to the Twitter thread to see the responses. I’m surprised to see that the first reply below Ben’s final tweet in the thread — probably promoted to the top of the list due to the number of likes and retweets it’s received — is from Katie Lindberg. There’s a picture attached to the tweet.
When I tap the photo to open it up and zoom in, I realize it’s a picture of a sheet of paper. The logo at the top says it’s from Choice DNA Laboratory. My eyes slide down the page and zero in on the words “Wesley Gammett” and the numbers “1 in 113 billion” are highlighted in fluorescent yellow. If I’m correct, this paper is proof that Wesley Gammett is the father of the boy people once thought might be Ben’s son. Ben and Katie were drugged and assaulted by Wes and Jordan.
The only text in the body of the tweet is the hashtag #metoo.
I look up from the screen at the smiling faces of my two best friends, who have been acting really weird today. “I know you obviously knew about this,” I say to Allie before turning to Michelle, “but did you know?”
Michelle shrugs. “I might have been consulted yesterday about how to get you to San Francisco today.”
I shake my head as I stare at tweet number eighteen for a few minutes, my heart aching as I think of how Ben has been hurting all these years. Carrying a secret that has literally turned his and my world upside down. Trying to protect me and failing over and over again.
I’ll be there at 3, as promised.
So will I.
I glance at the time at the top of Allie’s phone and my heart drops when I see it’s 2:41 p.m. “Oh, my God. I’m not going to make it to City Hall.”
Michelle smiles as she takes the phone out of my hand and gives it back to Allie. “I’ve got a chili-powered Beetle outside that says you will. Let’s go!”
I can’t help but laugh with giddiness as I stand up and dump the contents of my trash bag onto the bed. “Hold on. I need something,” I say, digging through the clothes and shoes until I find it.
I untangle my lucky black cashmere scarf from the hanger it’s caught on. It doesn’t match the threadbare Minnie Mouse T-shirt I’m wearing, or my ragged, hole-y cutoff jean shorts. But it certainly elevates the no-makeup-bedhead look I’m sporting from the neck up. If getting married in cutoff shorts and no makeup, to a guy who’s constantly surrounded by paparazzi, doesn’t scream “I ,” I don’t know what does.
Frank would be proud.
I loop the scarf around my neck and hold my head high. “Now, we can go.”