I send the message and wait for her reply. I’m hiding out, scared of the media’s reaction. Tonight, after the show airs, my life has the potential to change completely. It’ll be a repeat of what happened before, when we turned everyone away, when we told them we didn’t want to talk. That we refused to talk.
In the years since, there have been so many theories about what happened to me. I was a runaway. I asked for it. I wanted to be with him. I wanted to be his sex slave. I was desperate to escape my strict parents. I hated my life. I was a sullen preteen looking for fun. I was a fucking whore who deserved everything that happened to me. I was a dirty cunt who liked to suck dick.
Every single one of those horrible lies had been said about me, spread all over the Web. There are videos on YouTube devoted to my supposed lies. I watched one once and then immediately threw up afterward. I can still remember what the video said.
Temptress. Whore. She enticed him by dressing provocatively. Fucked him because she wanted it. Remained silent after she was rescued because she was guilty. She had secrets to hide. She was a drug addict. A slut. The bitch whore girlfriend of his son and they shared her between them.
Because I survived, for some reason, I’ve been blamed. I asked for it. For a serial killer to abduct me in broad daylight and keep me captive like his own personal plaything.
My phone dings and I check the message from Brenna.
I really don’t want to watch it. I heard enough the day you did the interview.
Wasn’t that the truth? I’m about to respond to her when another text comes through.
Mom called and asked if we should all be together tonight. I said I would check with you first.
Um, no. I don’t want to be with Mom. She’ll cry and try and comfort me and I’m over it. I said my piece. But I do want to watch it. Alone. I want to see how they portray me. Lisa swore up and down that it would be a positive piece. That it wouldn’t make me look bad; I was a victim.
I corrected her and said I’m not a victim. I’m a survivor. Big difference.
Huge.
I want to watch it alone. Tell Mom thanks but I need to see it by myself.
I send the text before I can second-guess my decision and wait for her reply.
My parents never moved. Mom is still in the house I grew up in and Brenna isn’t too far away, living in an apartment with her boyfriend, Mike. She’s a third-grade teacher at the same elementary school we attended. It still blows my mind—my impatient, mean-as-crap older sister teaches a bunch of eight-year-olds every day and loves it.
I moved on purpose. I’m an hour south of where I grew up, in a very small town not far from where the kidnapping happened. I live in the middle point and why this reassures me, I don’t know, but I don’t like to question my motives too closely.
Considering everything going on, I’m in hiding right now. I’ve taken all the extra steps to not be found and I like it that way. I prefer it. What with the News in Current commercials in constant rotation, highlighting that moment when I’m shown a letter he sent me that I didn’t know about—thanks, Mom, for keeping that particular secret from me—and the look of sheer panic on my face right before they go to his mug shot, I’m glad I took those precautions.
That’s the moment I hated the most during the interview. Well, that and one other, where I had to vehemently defend the boy who saved me from a monster.
Who saved me from his dad.
My cellphone rings, startling me, and I nearly drop it from my fingers. I glance at the screen and see it’s Mom.
Great.
“Darling, are you sure you want to be alone tonight?” She sounds worried. I can hear it, practically feel the emotion vibrating in her voice. “What if you become terribly upset? I don’t think this is something you should experience by yourself. We want to be with you.” And by we she means her and Brenna.
“I appreciate your concern, Mom, but I don’t want to come over.” I sound stiff. Wooden. Like how I used to talk to Dad.
“How about Brenna and I come over there,” she suggests.
“Please, Mom.” I sigh and close my eyes, searching for patience. I don’t want to get angry. She means well. “I’d rather do this alone. I swear if I feel sad or get scared or whatever, I’ll call you.”
“Okay.” She huffs out a long, tired breath. “Okay. I just—I want to be there for you.”
“You always have been.”
“Your father . . .” Her voice drifts and she sighs. She misses him. So does Brenna. They’re both very fragile and don’t talk about him too much because his death is so fresh.
I don’t feel the same. I’d already lost him long, long ago.
Saying nothing, I wait for her to continue.
“He may not have reacted the way we wanted him to, but you need to know he loved you the same. Before it happened and after,” she says.
She’s defending him and I get it, but she’s lying. He may have loved me, but not the same. He viewed me as tainted. Not his little girl anymore. A woman in a little girl’s body.