The Good Son

“Do you think Belinda should have known?”

Stefan said, “I’m telling a truth that no one will believe. It makes it almost impossible for me to move along in my life. But truly I never abused Belinda.”

Deanie just let Stefan’s words sit there. She didn’t respond. In a moment, she nodded crisply. The segment was over. Stefan took off the mic by himself and went inside.

Now it would be my turn.

Why had I given Stefan her business card? Why had I agreed to this? Why wasn’t Stefan here, encouraging me, like I’d encouraged him?

I was still gasping from Stefan’s revelation about Belinda. And I was shocked at myself for being so shocked.

The crew began by filming me supposedly writing at my desk, then moved quickly to my kitchen table where I had spread out the materials for my upcoming book. Deanie Kessler introduced me, then asked me to explain what the book was about. And I skipped right into a snare: “Women in literature who were obsessed, with men mostly but also with society and the dangerous amusements there, with their reputations...”

As if listening to a simultaneous translator, I reflected on how my words sounded—even as I spoke them.

Great. Just great.

“Don’t use that part about my book,” I told Deanie Kessler.

“Why not? It was really just a warm-up question anyhow but tell me what bothers you about it.”

This was like therapy.

“Nothing,” I said, guaranteeing that the quote would make it past the final edit.

From that moment, every word I said seemed fatuous. I knew my son. I knew that the awful event that happened was an aberration. How? He told me. I knew Stefan was basically a gentle person. He even chose not to play college football because it was too rough.

“Given everything, given what he did to this girl, can you say that your love for your only son has never diminished?”

“I...of course not. I love him. You never stop loving your child.”

The final segment featuring me would last about eight minutes. The whole time the crew of In Our Times spent at our house comprised about eight hours, which felt like eight years. Finally, as I was watching the crew pack their gear and leave, they waved to the protestors, who waved back. Exhausted, I retreated upstairs to my bedroom.

Early one evening a couple of weeks later, I was in that bedroom again with my sister Amelia and Julie. We lay three across on my bed in a row, relaxed as kindling in a box, and watched the segment. Downstairs, Stefan and Jep watched the show with Amelia’s husband, Andy.

Why was I surprised to discover they had interviewed Jill?

I should not have been surprised.

Why was I surprised when a third of our segment was devoted to her contention that the community was in danger when violent offenders were released, and that was why the work of SAY was more important than ever? Why was I surprised when she said that Belinda chose to go to college in Black Creek yes, in a youthful rebellion against her strict Southern Baptist upbringing, but also to escape Stefan’s increasingly controlling behavior?

Dating violence wasn’t even considered domestic abuse in some states, she said, and it was rarely reported—like rape a couple of generations ago. Jill’s organization had grown and now hosted events at high schools and colleges. There was now a phone network, staffed by girls for girls, to say, yes, what you’re going through is wrong and it has to stop. If Belinda could have spoken about what she was going through, Jill said, she might still be alive today. “I’m really proud of the young women of SAY. They’re strong and beautiful. There are more than seven thousand SAY volunteers around the country, including some young men, because they get abused as well. If Belinda could see this, she would be so gratified. I hope she can see it.”

Belinda never used drugs, Jill added. She understood why Stefan was suddenly offering to support SAY, but clearly, that would be inappropriate. Offenders like Stefan should not be allowed to come back to the places they lived before.

“But what if their support system is there?” said the host. “That’s so key to staying on the right path.”

Jill shrugged.

“Protecting the innocent comes first,” she said. “Our whole society has failed to protect the innocent, and so our whole society has failed.”

Chopin’s “Nocturne in C Sharp Minor” accompanied a photo montage—a family Christmas before Belinda’s father died, Jill and Belinda on a dock kicking droplets of water into the air, Stefan and Belinda swing-dancing, Jill majestic in black lace at Belinda’s funeral, SAY protestors circling the state capitol, Jill unfurling a petition of thousands of names, then a photo of Jep and Stefan, forehead to forehead through the open car window the night he came home—the picketers and TV cameras a smeared traffic of light in the background...and the last one, of Stefan and Will in April on the golf course at Nine Springs.

Who had taken that? Who had been watching Stefan swing a golf club?

Amelia winced. She said, “Now that’s subtle.”

There was also a photo montage of our family, and I had no idea where those pictures had come from—of Stefan playing with Molly when Molly was a puppy, Belinda and Stefan dressed as playing cards for a school party, Stefan and Jep after a football game. Stefan’s edited account of his time since prison sounded authentic, and even Maggie Slaney gave him credit for his effort with The Healing Project.

My own words closed our portion of the show: “A person has to be seen as more than the worst thing he has ever done.”

Julie said, “I thought Stefan did just great. You too.”

“I hope something good comes from it,” I told her. “Or at least, I hope nothing bad comes from it.”

We listened to the guys rattling around downstairs, the refrigerator opening and closing, a muffled laugh from Andy. We ventured quietly downstairs.

“...like watching a train wreck,” Jep said.

“Not him, though,” Andy said. “I was proud of him. He was direct and honest.”

I stepped down into the kitchen, where all of them were eating slices of pastrami out of the butcher’s wrapping, first dipping the slices in a saucer of mustard. If anyone felt a lack of composure, it wasn’t evident from their food consumption. “I was the one who looked like a train wreck?”

“They meant Jill, listening to Jill, and I know what Dad means. It just rolls right over anything you have to say because she has the moral imperative,” Stefan said.

I thought of all the other narratives, the girl who sold the drugs, the drugs themselves, all part of my quest to find another story, another part of a story, all part of that niggling sense that there was something I didn’t know, something that was important, stoked by the caller with the sobbing voice, her assurances that she knew the truth and that Stefan was in danger. Was this all because, even after all this time, my own mind was incapable of fully accepting the one truth? And yet, I didn’t know that Stefan was part of a love triangle. Why had Stefan never said so, in so many words? Or hadn’t I given him a chance? I assumed that what I had heard was the truest thing, that Belinda was avoiding Stefan because he got too deep into drugs and she had no use for that. Even Julie wondered why I hadn’t asked the police about Belinda and Stefan’s friends, why I had never looked through the police reports.

I decided right then that I would do this. It was the last stone, but it was unturned. And then I would get on with my life, no more digging in the ashes. I would call the detective, Pete Sunday, tomorrow, and ask him to send me the files.

“I’m going to Will’s. See you in the morning,” Stefan said.

“Wait,” I said. “Did this do what you wanted it to?”

He stopped for a moment and went into the kitchen cupboard where I kept a bin with spare toiletries, rummaging until he found a disposable razor and a toothbrush, which he put in his pocket.

“Mom, I’m going to go to church tomorrow. Meet me there?”

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