Willow
Saturday afternoon, Angie and her mom took me to the mall in Braxton for a girls’ day out.
“You looked like you could use the pick-me-up,” Angie said.
We walked with linked arms, both of us with clothing bags from Urban Outfitters banging against our thighs. All of her smart-ass T-shirts were in the wash, so Angie’s shirt was plain today. But she’d bought a new one that said, If I was a bird, I know who I’d poop on.
Bonnie had gone to buy a new set of pots and pans at Pottery Barn, and said she’d meet us at the food court.
“So what’s the story with Isaac?” she asked. “You guys are still just friends? After everything that happened?”
“Yes, nothing’s changed. He’s leaving town as soon as he can and… That’s it.”
She gave me a look. “That’s it.”
“We’ll have the play, so long as my dad doesn’t fuck it up for us. Isaac has casting agents coming to see him on opening night. Did I tell you that?”
“Only about a hundred times,” she said. “I’d say you were being smart about this if you didn’t look so sad.”
“I’m not sad.”
I loved Ophelia.
God, Isaac’s voice in that moment. I’d never heard anything like it. It drew me from my false death and when I opened my eyes, the expression on his face…
“It’s stupid,” I said, waving my hand. “The play is really intense, you know? I think it’s clouding my feelings. It’s getting hard to tell reality from fiction.”
Angie frowned. “It’s hard to tell reality from a million-year-old play about lords and ladies and gravediggers?”
“That’s art,” I said, remembering Isaac’s words. “The better it is, the more you can see yourself in it.”
She pursed her lips, nodded. “I can dig that. But he did a good thing for you the other night and I thought maybe…”
I shrugged, looked away. “Maybe it was a mistake telling him. I don’t know why or how I chose Isaac at all. The alcohol, I guess.”
“Or maybe because you felt safe enough with him,” Angie said. “The booze was just the grease to let it slip. You texted him for a reason.”
My mouth opened to deny, to say he happened to be in my contacts. But the truth was even in a drunken stupor, I knew Isaac was one safe place left in the world.
“What about later on?” she asked when I didn’t reply. “When you turn eighteen, and he’s gone off to make his fortune. Like Westley in The Princess Bride.” She stopped and grabbed my arm. “OMG you are so Buttercup. Is there a play? You should do the play.”
“Focus, Angie.” I sighed. “Given what happened with X, I don’t know that anything could happen with me and Isaac. Physically, I mean.”
Angie stopped walking. “Hold that thought. I need to tell you something.”
“What?”
“I kind of, sort of, told my mom what happened with X.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“We just have that kind of relationship. I can’t keep things from her. She wanted to know if you were okay and I started to cry.” She tentatively brushed my shoulder with her hand. “She’s not going to say anything, I promise.”
“Doesn’t she have to? Isn’t she required by law?”
Angie shook her head, her black curls flying off her shoulders. “She doesn’t work for the school or the state, and you’re not her patient. She’s not required to do anything, I swear.” She squeezed my hand. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to break your confidence. I just couldn’t help it.”
I thought I’d feel more humiliated or betrayed or scared, but it felt almost like relief. Like I had one more person on my side.
“She’s got one hell of a poker face,” I said as we resumed walking. “The entire car ride over here, she treated me like everything was normal.”
“That’s her job,” Angie said. “And you are normal. X is the heartless freak of nature.”
“She’s going to want me to tell someone, isn’t she?”
“She won’t pressure you, but I can’t promise she won’t ask a bunch of questions.”
“That’s exactly the same thing.”
Angie gave me a hard hug. “My mom is awesome. And to be honest, I wanted to tell her. I felt like maybe you could use another person on your side.”
I stared at Angie for a moment.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
At the food court, Bonnie was sitting at a table for four with a lemonade and a plate of French fries in front of her. A large Pottery Barn bag sat at her feet. She stared intently at her phone, curling her lower lip over her teeth.
“Hey, Mom,” Angie said and bent to kiss her on the top of her head. She peered at her mom’s phone screen. “Should’ve guessed. Mom’s addicted to Words with Friends.”
“The fries are to share,” Bonnie said absently, then sighed. “Here.” She handed me her phone. “You want to give this a try? I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with four A’s and three E’s.”
“You can make the sound of someone yawning,” Angie said plucking a fry and dipping the tip in ketchup.
My brain refused to cooperate as it really hit me. Three people had my secret now. I felt like Bonnie, Isaac, and Angie were playing a game of Hot Potato, tossing it back and forth among them. If it dropped, it would explode, sending shrapnel flying in a thousand directions, ruining everything.
“I got nothing,” I said, and handed the phone back.
“Stupid game,” Bonnie said with a muttered laugh, and tossed the phone back in her purse. “So, did you guys find anything good? Are you hungry?”
Angie exchanged a glance with me, then said in a low voice, “She knows you know, Mom.”
Bonnie’s expression immediately smoothed into what I assumed was her Therapist Face. Inviting, friendly and extremely calm. A look that made you feel like she had everything under control, even if you didn’t.
“I was hoping to get a chance to talk to you about that, Willow,” she said. “Although perhaps not at the mall food court.” She shot her daughter a look, then Therapist Face came back. “We don’t have to talk about it here.”
“I don’t want to talk about it at all,” I said.
“That’s fair,” Bonnie replied. “Can I just ask one question? Are you close with your mother at all, Willow? Even a little?”
“You know the answer to that one,” I said. “She’s not really someone you get close to. She keeps herself walled off with wine.”
“I see.”
“And all she really cares about is appearances. How we dress, the house we have, the cars we drive.”
The boys we like…
“Whether or not I go to the right college…”
“Do you have plans for college?”
“That’s two questions,” I said, with a small smile. “Not anymore.”
Bonnie nodded. “I just have one more and I promise I’m done.”
“Mom,” Angie drawled.
“Is that little black X on your wrist related to your assault?”
I glanced down at the table at the ink below the meat of my left thumb.
“Yes.”
A short silence fell.
“Okay, no more questions, Mom,” Angie said. “Willow will hate me for telling you.”
Bonnie smiled, and Therapist Face was replaced by Super Mom. “Angie said that you were playing Ophelia in the HCT’s production of Hamlet. That sounds exciting. Are you enjoying the experience?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I like it a lot.”
“She loves it,” Angie said. “The play, I mean. I’m just talking about the play, nothing else. I mean, what else would I be talking about?”
I whacked her in the arm.
“Have you ever acted before?”
“No, never,” I said. “I just had this idea that it could help, you know?”
“Express feelings in a safe way?”
I nodded. “Yeah, exactly that.”
Angie’s eyes went between her mom and me. “Oookay, I’m just going to grab a slice of pizza. Willow, you want one?”
“Pepperoni please, and a Diet Coke?”
“Mom?”
“I’m fine, love.”
When Angie was gone to wait in the Sbarro line, Bonnie reached across the table and took my hand in hers.
“This really isn’t the right place, but I feel I need to tell you that I’m sorry. For what happened to you. It was a terrible crime, and it wasn’t your fault.”
I nodded. My hand squeezed hers to keep my tears back. “Are you going to tell me to report it?”
“No, I am not,” she said. “I think the perpetrator belongs in jail, and in a perfect world, you could drive down to the police station right now, tell your story, and they’d question him as relentlessly as they would you. But in my experience with sexual assault survivors, sometimes coming forward can be as traumatic as the event itself. I don’t say this to deter you. I say this because I believe you’ll tell your story when you’re ready. In your own time, and in the way that’s best for you. Right now, that’s all you should be concentrating on. Okay? What’s best for you.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. Somehow, Bonnie had given me permission to stop holding my breath every minute. To just breathe.
“And if you ever want to really talk, I’m here for you.” She turned my hand over and rubbed her thumb over the X. “I’d really like to see these go away.”
“Me too.”
Bonnie patted my hand and let go. She handed me a napkin, took a French fry and sipped her drink. And all at once, I was back to being a girl sitting at a table with her best friend’s mom.
“What’d I miss?” Angie said, plopping a slice of pizza and a drink down in front of me. “Nope, never mind. Attorney-client privilege.”
“Indeed,” Bonnie said. “So back to this play you’re doing. I saw Oedipus Rex back in January. Isaac Pearce is an incredible talent.”
“Yeah, he is,” I said, and nudged Angie again. “Shut up”
Angie’s eyes widened over a mouthful of pizza. “I didn’t say a word.”
“He’s the one who brought you to our house the other morning?” Bonnie waved her hands. “I’m not circling back to the circumstances. This is pure girl talk.”
“Yeah, he was the one,” I said. “I told him. And it wasn’t pretty, as you saw. We’ve gotten kind of close. From the rehearsals,” I added quickly. I still hadn’t told Angie about our dance at the lookout point. I kept that memory for myself, like a little treasure.
“And now you have feelings for him?” Bonnie said, plucking a piece of pepperoni off her daughter’s pizza slice. “Sharing personal experiences will do that. It’s almost impossible not to feel closer to someone.”
“I guess. But we can’t get involved. He’s going to be leaving Harmony soon. Casting agents are coming to the opening night of Hamlet.”
“Oh. So you’ve talked about your feelings for each other?”
“Mom,” Angie said. Her eyes started to roll but then abruptly stopped. “Wait a sec, I actually want to know the answer to this one.”
“Yes, we talked about it.” I struggled to keep my smile and my tone casual. “And it’s for the best. To stay professional. Besides, he’s older and more experienced and I’m…not.” I smacked my hands to my face. “God, I can’t believe I’m talking about this now too.”
Bonnie smiled. “Sometimes talking is like pushing a heavy boulder downhill. It seems impossible at first, but once you get going, it’s easier and easier.”
“There’s not much more to say about the situation,” I said. “Except that it sucks.”
She tilted her head. “You like this boy?”
I nodded then shrugged. “But it’s not the end of the world.”
“Maybe it’s for the best,” Angie said. “If he’s leaving town. I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“That makes two of us,” I said, feigning a lightness I didn’t feel.
Neither Angie nor Bonnie pushed the point; I guessed I was becoming a really good actress.
That night, wrapped in blankets on the floor, I read my Hamlet script by the light of my phone. I was struggling with the little songs at the end of Act Four, which Ophelia sings after she descends into madness.
“It’s hard to know what to do with these lines,” I’d said to Martin at rehearsal.
“At the root of all madness is an unbearable truth,” he said. “It is known only by the person suffering the delusion. Ophelia’s songs reveal the truth. Think about what it could be.”
In my nest of blankets, I pondered. Was the root of Ophelia’s madness grief for her father? Was it her broken love for Hamlet? Was it both?
“In order to keep her father’s love,” I murmured, “she gives up Hamlet. Then she loses her father’s love anyway. She’s left with nothing. And it’s unbearable.”
It was unbearable she hadn’t followed her heart.
I shut the script and pulled up “Imagination” by Shawn Mendes. The song Isaac and I danced to at the overlook.
I shut my eyes and sleep took me down along the current of the beautiful song. My blankets became Isaac’s arms. The hard floor was his chest. My last thought was something else Martin had said: when confronted with yes or no, always choose yes.
Choose yes, I thought, drifting.
Isaac looked down at me, a question in his eyes.
I smiled.
Yes.