Her father didn’t turn around to look at her but spoke in a voice she’d never heard him use before. Stay in the car. No matter what happens to me.
It was April 29, 1992, and the officers on trial for the videotaped beating of Rodney King had just been acquitted. Los Angeles, impacted by decades of racial tension and police brutality, swelled with anger. Pockets of the city had already started to explode, just as James and Elise were on their way to the airport.
James got out of the car slowly but was tackled. They pinned each of his limbs to the pavement, accusing him of having stolen the car. Elise curled into a ball and covered her eyes, terrified by the police officers barking bad words at her father. Seconds later, two of them came back to the car. Elise held her breath as the pair began rummaging through the car.
“Fuck.”
Elise opened her eyes to see a White officer with squinty eyes staring over the seat at her. He groaned and hit the seat with a fist.
“Relax, man.” This officer was White, too, but he smiled. “What’s your name?”
Elise couldn’t find her voice. The other grabbed her wrist, pulling her out of the back seat. Elise started yelling, and her father, who was facedown in the street with three officers kneeling on his back, told her to calm down. Elise started kicking, trying to get to him. The officer only held her tighter and tossed her like a ball into the back seat of a police car. The next thing she knew, she was sitting alone in a metal chair in a cold room, shivering without the jacket packed in her backpack. There was only one window, and the only thing she could see through the black wires running through it was a sea of uniformed White strangers. She knocked on the glass, but no one even looked at her. Hours passed. She didn’t know where her daddy was. She knew her phone number, but no one would let her call her mommy. They just kept saying, Someone’s coming. Her parents always said that if she got lost, she should look for someone in a uniform; clearly, these weren’t the uniforms they meant. It was dark before someone came. Dirty, Elise remembered him saying as he shook his head at her, smelling the stench of her urine-stained jeans. After nine hours, Elise and James left the police station with their lawyer. When they finally reached home, Elise traced the cuff marks on his wrists with her fingertips. Elise’s bright young mind exploded as she processed the concept of hypocrisy. She became slow to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance at school. The teacher sent her to time-out every day, and then Elise refused to come out of time-out, preferring to continue reading.
The St. Johns sued the LAPD. Her parents took her to her favorite Mexican restaurant to talk about her upcoming interview with the lawyer. They knew what had happened but not what the officer said or how he made her feel. Elise was out of diapers shortly after she started walking, at seventeen months, and was beyond embarrassed that she hadn’t been able to hold it. She felt she had let the side down by giving in and relieving herself. Her parents said testifying was her choice, and so she refused to talk to anyone about that day. James’s story couldn’t be corroborated, and the case never went to trial.
Elise felt tears spring to her eyes. “I should have testified.” James put his hand on her back.
“You never should have been in that position.”
“But she was, and neither one of us could protect her,” Sarah said, looking at Giovanni and Noele who had never heard this before.
Reality grounded the room. The business of righting wrongs sometimes ended in murder. It would have seemed overblown, conspiracy-driven even, had Charlottesville not been in recent memory.
Sarah had the last word. “Either give the money away or don’t, but everything else—everything—is off-limits.”
CHAPTER 46
Elise
Monday, November 6, 2017
“Look.” Rebecca balanced Kitty’s small brass mirror in her palm. She’d been looking for an icebreaker since they boarded the plane to London.
Elise recognized it immediately. “Oh, you got it!”
“Paid a lot for it.”
“I took it for polishing, and look…” Rebecca turned it on its back to reveal the tiny initials MML engraved on its bottom. “After no one said anything at the memorial, I figured you didn’t know, and I didn’t have permission to tell you.”
Elise hadn’t been the only one who Kitty wrote a letter to. Mrs. Pew, Rebecca’s grandmother, had received one tucked inside her memorial invitation. She’d been so shocked to hear from Kitty, she told Rebecca and Alison everything immediately.
“Talking about Kitty means we’ll have to talk about my family too,” Rebecca said. “Some of them are no better than the rapists and murderers in the news. If people go digging into Kitty’s history, they’ll find Teddy Lakes.”
Elise understood her frustration.
“We don’t even know that side of the family,” Rebecca said. “It’s not fair. My mom knew they were bad people and kept us away.”
“Then say that. Publicly shame it.”
“And then what?”
Elise couldn’t answer—truthfully, she kept arriving at the same dead end.
“You have to let all this go,” Rebecca pleaded.
Elise felt her eyes roll. “Sarah talked to you?”
“She did.”
“I—we—decided to give the money to a few charities,” Elise said.
“Good, because talk about reparations will cause issues. Tons of questions.” Rebecca waited for her agreement. “Right?”
“Yep,” Elise opened the plane window shade.
“And I won’t be around to help.”
“I know.” In four days, she was off to Milan to meet Gabe.
“Moving to work, I think you should skip even mentioning Kitty on this press tour.” Rebecca waited for Elise’s agreement.
“What about the studio?”
“I pushed back. We did give Vogue an exclusive, so everything about Kitty is off-limits now.”
“Probably best not to give the FBI any more information,” Elise said resignedly.
“Correct.” Rebecca’s tone heightened like it did when she had an idea. “You could name a few charities you all will be donating to.”
“We don’t know.”
“I’m reminding you of all the positives because we do have another issue: there are photos of you staying overnight at Jasper’s.”
“That took longer than expected.”
Rebecca rolled her eyes. “Seriously? You couldn’t have given me a heads-up?”
“I want to call off our wedding, and I knew how that would go, so…”
“Not in your favor. There’s an interview with a waitress—she’s been fired, of course, but she puts you there with Jasper in March.”
Elise knew who it was. Poor thing had run into the corner of a table when Elise walked in that night.
“This is going to be terrible for you.”
“Not really. The night I met Jasper was the night I found out Aaron was cheating on me with Maya.”
Rebecca gasped. “Maya Langston?”
“Yeah, he’s in love with her.” Elise scrolled to the evidence on her phone and passed it across the aisle to Rebecca.
“So, he cheated on you.”
“Yeah, but we can spin it as a mutual breakup and praise ourselves for our acting skills during a tumultuous time in our relationship. That way the film, and our talent, maintain center stage.”
“Shit, you’ve gotten pretty good at spin.”
Elise smiled at her. “I’ve learned from the very best.”
“Only when it comes to you,” Rebecca said with a laugh.
“Well, we’ve been the best team.” Elise reached across the aisle for her hand.
“You started talking about quitting, and it occurred to me that I’m just floating. My life is contingent on yours.”
“Rebecca, you don’t have to do anything.”
“I can hear the contempt in your voice.”
“You can’t help who you were born to. None of us can.” Elise got an idea. “If you want to do something, you could donate money in Kitty’s name.”
“I will, but anonymously. Technically she’s my great-aunt. How crazy is that?”
“Insane. Maybe you could convince the Lakes corporation to donate.”
Rebecca scoffed. “They certainly have exposure.” Elise could tell she didn’t take the suggestion seriously.
“Others would follow suit if they did. Or if they had another reason to.”