I still didn’t want to go home. I thought about going to my mom’s place, but I knew she’d only want to talk about how hard things were for her now that Helen and Tom weren’t speaking to us. I thought about following Amber back to her house and demanding that we talk and work out this entire, fucked-up situation, but that, most likely, wouldn’t get me anywhere other than the back of a squad car. I needed to talk with someone who could help me find a solution to what I was going through. I needed to talk to someone who would understand.
Ten minutes later, I parked in front of a building I hadn’t been to in over a year. Desperate times call for desperate measures, I thought as I jumped out of my truck and locked it, heading through the front door that led to the faux-marble-floored lobby. Once inside the elevator, I pressed the button that would take me to the fifth floor, remembered the dread that used to fill me back in high school every time I had done the same thing.
The doors opened and I stepped through them, realizing that the air in the hallway smelled exactly as it always had—a mix of slightly damp carpet and bleach. I realized that my father might not even be home. He could be working; he could have gone out with one of his flavor-of-the-month girls. But I approached his front door anyway, rapping on it three times, holding my breath as I waited for him to appear.
“Just a minute!” I heard my father say, and I exhaled. His voice was gruff and muffled, and I wondered if he had been asleep. He opened the door, keeping his hand on the knob, just as I had on mine the last time he showed up, unannounced, at my place.
“Well, look what the cat dragged in,” he said, lifting his chin in a slight, defiant motion. There were glints of silver running through the blond stubble on his face and the hair on his head; the skin along his jawline was beginning to sag. He’d turn fifty-two in September and despite his muscular physique, it showed.
“Hi, Dad,” I said, standing up as straight as I could, my shoulders back, not wanting to look as weak as I felt. “Can I come in?”
“What for?” he asked, and it took all my willpower not to whip around and walk away.
“Something happened. I need to talk.”
“You lose your shit on the job again?”
“No, Dad. Please. I need your help.”
The tone of my voice must have gotten to him, because his expression softened just a little around its hard edges, and he stepped backward, gesturing for me to enter. We proceeded to the living room, where he still had the same dark green, fake leather couches he bought off Craigslist the year he moved out of our house. The TV was on, set to ESPN, and there were two empty beer bottles on the glass coffee table. The air smelled of fried food, and I saw a crumpled McDonald’s bag on his kitchen counter.
“Have a seat,” he said, gesturing to the smaller couch. “Want a drink?”
“Sure,” I said, and I waited to sit down until he returned with a beer for me and a two-finger pour of whiskey for him. “Thanks,” I said as I dropped onto the worn cushions where I used to sleep. The condo only had one bedroom; I didn’t have any other choice. When he didn’t answer, we both stared at the flat screen on the wall for a few minutes, not saying a word, until finally, I asked him to turn it off. He muted it instead.
“So, you going to tell me what happened or not?” he asked, keeping his eyes on the college football game he’d been watching.
“Yeah,” I said, trying to ignore what felt like a golf ball lodged in my throat. “But can you turn that off, though? Please? This is important.”
With a loud sigh, he clicked the off button on the remote and then looked at me, expectantly. “Happy now?”
“Yes,” I said. I tried to sort out where to start, finally deciding on his visit to my apartment on the Fourth of July, before the party. “We were pretty shitty to each other the last time I saw you. I feel bad about the things I said.”
“Get to the point, Son.”
I gritted my teeth, wondering if I’d made a mistake in coming to see him. But then I began to describe what had happened with Amber. I told him everything I remembered, how she looked, how she acted, how drunk we both were, and how I went to her house the next day and she freaked out. When I told him that Tom had punched me, my dad’s face flushed red.
“That fucker’s always thought he was better than me. He was probably happy to take it out on you.”
“Amber told them I raped her,” I said, forcing myself not to scream that this situation wasn’t about him. “I’m pretty sure Tom hit me because of that.” I went on to say that my mom had told me about the sexual harassment suit, and that I had come to see him, hoping he had some advice on what to do.
“She told you about that, but didn’t tell me that Amber’s accusing you of rape? I swear to god, that woman is dumb as a box of rocks.”
“Dad, please,” I said again, not wanting to listen to yet another diatribe from either of my parents about how the other was an idiot.
“Have the police talked with you?” he asked as his glass clinked on the coffee table when he set it down.
“No. I don’t think she called them.”
“Well then, sounds like you don’t have anything to worry about. She didn’t report it.”
“But she still could,” I said. “What do I say if the police show up?” I shifted in my seat, still edgy from my conversation with Mason and the altercation in the bar. I thought about the few pills left in my bathroom at home, and wished I had one with me now.
“You say nothing,” my dad said, firmly. “Not a word, you understand? You call me, and I’ll call a lawyer.”
It felt odd to have him tell me that he’d be there for me if I was in trouble; too many times he’d done the opposite, insisting that I needed to learn how to handle my own problems. “Mason thinks I should turn myself in.”
“Mason’s a moron. If Amber or her parents had any actual proof, they would have gone to the police already. The fact that they haven’t tells me that it’d be your word against hers, and in cases like that, it’s almost impossible to get a conviction.”
I allowed myself to be buoyed by his words, grateful that he seemed—at least for the moment—supportive. “How do you know?”
“Because that’s what my lawyer told me when that bitch I worked with accused me of promising to help get her on day shifts if she fucked me. She backed off once he showed her all the texts she’d sent me, begging for it on a regular basis.” He paused, looking pleased with himself. “You said Amber kissed you in front of everyone there? That you two were grinding on the dance floor?” I nodded, pressing my lips together, instantly taken back to that moment in time, when I thought all of my dreams were about to be realized. And then, the next morning, when the nightmare began as she screeched at me to leave her room. “Well, there you go. If she didn’t go to the hospital or the police, there’s not going to be any kind of physical evidence.”
“I honestly thought she wanted it as much as I did. I wouldn’t have gone ahead if—”