by Tara Bond
Chapter 25
Once I finished speaking, there was silence in Dr. Milton’s office. The only sound was the ticking of the carriage clock on the mantelpiece, which seemed exponentially loud. The tension in the room was palpable. I was suddenly aware of the tears on my cheek. Silently cursing myself for showing weakness, I wiped them roughly away with the back of my hand. There was a box of tissues on the side table next to me, but I refused to take one. Instead I blinked my eyes clear.
Once I’d composed myself, I raised my eyes to meet Dr. Milton’s. I stared defiantly at her, waiting for what came next.
She didn’t speak for a moment, until it was clear I had nothing more to say. “Is that the first time you’ve told anyone that story?” Her voice was soft, but still contained its professional detachment, which I was grateful for. I wasn’t sure I could have coped with sympathy.
I nodded.
“And do you understand what happened to you that night?”
I tried to speak, but my voice came out like a squeak, so I had to clear my throat. “I had sex with my sister’s boyfriend,” I said finally.
Dr. Milton regarded me for a long moment. “Is that really what you think happened?”
There was that tone she used—the one that people like teachers favoured when they were trying to get you to reach a conclusion on your own.
“I don’t understand what you mean.” I shifted in my chair. My whole body felt tense. I looked up at the clock. The fifty minutes was up, but Dr. Milton didn’t seem to be interested in finishing on time tonight. I opened and closed my fists, trying to release some of the tension.
“Close your eyes for a moment.” I did as she said. “Just listen to the story I’m about to tell you, and react with your instincts, without thinking.” She cleared her throat, and then began. “A girl of eighteen goes to a party and meets a young man. They go outside to talk, and at some point, they kiss. She doesn’t mind what’s happening at first, but when things start to go farther, she tells him to stop, that she doesn’t want this to happen. But he goes ahead and has sex with her anyway.” She paused to let the story sink in. “What would you say had just happened?”
“I’d say that she’d been raped.” I said it instinctively, without thinking, like she’d told me to. Then I realised with a start what the implication of that was for me. My eyes flew open. “You’re saying Toby raped me?”
“I’m not saying anything. I’m asking what do you think happened?”
My mind was whirling, trying to process what she was implying. “But I don’t understand.” I frowned, trying to make sense of what was going on. “If I was raped . . . then why do I behave the way I do?” I looked up at her, and shook my head. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“What do you think I mean? It’s what I’ve been telling you all along. I have sex. A lot of it. With guys I don’t know very well. I get drunk. Put myself in risky situations. That isn’t what rape victims do. They don’t react that way.”
Hearing that, Dr. Milton gave an exasperated sigh. That was almost the most shocking moment for me. She usually had such a good poker face, and always behaved like the consummate professional. I think it was the first time I’d seen such an honest reaction from her.
“That’s such a common misconception. What you have to remember is that everyone reacts in different ways to trauma. Yes, some rape victims avoid physical contact. But promiscuity is a perfectly normal reaction to rape, too.”
The revelation took a moment to sink in. “But . . . I don’t understand.” I wasn’t sure what to make of this. I’d spent so long thinking of myself in a certain way—that I’d led Toby on that night and got what I deserved for flirting with my sister’s boyfriend. These past few years, I’d seen my behaviour—the partying and risky sex—as proof that I’d been bad all along. Now I was being asked to see my behaviour as the consequence, not the cause, of what had happened to me that night.
And it made sense. It wasn’t long after that night that I’d begun my art course. And that was when I’d started to sleep around. I hadn’t really connected my behaviour with what had happened to me that summer. I’d just assumed that it was to do with the freedom of going off to college, of no longer being at an all-girls’ school. To me, my partying and promiscuity was a way of letting off steam, instead of a reaction to being raped.
I could feel Dr. Milton watching me, obviously understanding the thought process I was going through.
“There are different theories about why certain rape victims become promiscuous. Perhaps you were trying to convince yourself that you were fine. Or maybe you were trying to take back control of your sexuality, or prove that the rape didn’t matter, because sex wasn’t a big deal. It could be any one of those reasons, or a combination, or something utterly different, and you may never figure that out. But I can assure you that having multiple sexual partners is a classic way of devaluing the sex act. Everything you’ve described—the sleeping around and the way you put yourself in dangerous situations, such as walking down dark alleys—it’s your way of regaining control, of not being a victim.
“But what I think is most important for you to understand is that you’re certainly not alone in reacting this way. Plenty of women attempt to get over rape by sleeping around, but our society prefers not to acknowledge it.”
I could see her point. It was so much easier to sympathise with a timid wallflower who can’t stand to be around men than a promiscuous party girl—so those were the stories that got printed. That’s how I’d felt for so long—that there must be something wrong with me, that it couldn’t be rape if I’d reacted the way I did.
But there was something else bothering me about this. It wasn’t just about my reaction—it was about why it had happened in the first place.
“But I don’t understand. Why did Toby do that? He was already with my sister. They were sleeping together, and she was much more attractive than me. Why would he need to force me to have sex with him?”
Dr. Milton sighed again, as though she’d been expecting the question, but also felt slightly frustrated by it. “What you need to understand is that rape isn’t about sex. It’s about control. That’s what Toby wanted from you. And he was able to get that again by making you feel like what happened was your fault.
“From what you’ve told me about Toby, he’s a very clever narcissist/sociopath who gets off on manipulating people. Half of the excitement for him will have come from getting away with doing this behind your sister’s back, and still having everyone look up to him.” She paused, allowing this to sink in, before delivering the final blow. “In fact, I imagine you’ll find that you aren’t his only victim.”
I drew a sharp intake of breath. The thought was both horrifying and freeing. For so long I’d blamed myself for what had happened. I’d found it impossible to label what Toby had done as rape. When I thought of a rapist, I saw a stranger, a monster in a mask carrying a knife. It certainly wasn’t an attractive, well-educated man on whom I had a crush. But now, talking it through with Dr. Milton, it began to make sense. I finally understood what had happened to me, and why I’d reacted to it the way I did.
“So,” Dr. Milton said after a moment, “now that you’ve finally admitted to yourself what Toby did to you, the question is: What are you going to do about it?”
* * *
I didn’t remember much about the journey home. There was too much going through my head after today’s session.
I now understood why I’d reacted to Richard the way I had the other night. Sex to me had never been something to be enjoyed with someone I cared about. I could cope with it only as a meaningless act, when I was numbed by alcohol. I knew that I needed to explain this all to him, that I owed him that much. I just had to work out what I was going to say. And I couldn’t do that tonight. I was still trying to process all of my feelings about what had happened to me, never mind trying to manage someone else’s reaction.
> As I walked from the Tube station to my flat, I wondered what to do with the rest of the evening. It was my birthday, which I never much liked to celebrate. Lindsay had suggested meeting me at home, and said that we could go out for a pizza, just the two of us. But I wasn’t even sure I could face that. Right now, I just wanted to be alone.
It took all of my energy to drag myself up the five flights of stairs to my flat. As I slotted the key into the lock, a sixth sense told me that something wasn’t right. I was on my guard as I pushed open the door.
“Surprise!” Thirty voices shouted out the greeting.
I stood frozen in the doorway, my heart racing at double time. I saw my mother and father’s beaming faces, and Lindsay and Adrian, along with Helena and Rex . . . A big banner hung across the ceiling with the words Happy Birthday. It took me a split second to work out what was going on—that someone in their wisdom had decided to throw me a surprise birthday party.
And as if that wasn’t bad enough, as my eyes scanned the room, they settled on Toby, his arm thrown casually around my sister, beaming at me as though he hadn’t done anything wrong—as though he hadn’t lured my eighteen-year-old self away from my family, forced me down, and raped me. And then, worst of all, made me believe that it was my fault.
My jaw tightened, my hands closed into fists. And I felt white-hot hatred grip me.
Chapter 26
“Happy birthday, darling!” My mother stepped forwards, and wrapped her arms around me. I was still frozen to the spot, my eyes riveted on Toby. I was literally shaking with rage and shock, consumed by the realisation that I’d come to tonight about what had happened between us all those years ago. And it was made worse knowing that I couldn’t react the way I wanted to, not right now, surrounded by my family, friends and work colleagues.
Fortunately all my guests seemed to have mistaken my cold fury for being stunned into silence by the surprise. My father hugged me next, followed by Lindsay.
“You really didn’t guess at all, did you?” she said, beaming. “I can’t believe we pulled it off.”
She looked so pleased with herself that I had to force a smile, and say thank you, and what a wonderful surprise it was . . . pretty much the opposite of everything I was actually feeling.
I spotted Richard to one side—again, someone whom I could have done with avoiding.
He came forwards to greet me. “Happy birthday, Charlotte.” He kissed me briefly on one cheek, and I could feel him holding back, as though concerned about my response after what had happened between us the other night. “This is for you.” He thrust an envelope into my hands. I opened it—it was a two-day trip to Paris on the Eurostar. At dinner, I’d talked about wanting to go back to see the museums, and he’d remembered.
I looked up at him. It was one of the most thoughtful gifts I’d ever been given. He’d put so much effort into it, and I wished I could enjoy it. That was the thing about Richard—even though things were strange between us at the moment, he was never the type to be petty. He was too mature for that.
My heart ached for what might have been between us if everything had been different. And it just made me hate Toby even more, for taking something from me that I could never get back—my enjoyment of physical intimacy.
There was so much I wanted to say to Richard. But before I could find the right words, Kate came over—with Toby in tow.
“Come here, birthday girl!” She hugged me to her. But I hardly noticed she was there—I was too busy staring over her shoulder at Toby.
I couldn’t drag my eyes away from him. After that summer night, I’d always disliked him. But somehow what he’d said to me back then had made it feel like it was my fault. I’d felt like I’d led him on, that I’d made him betray my sister. But now I realised the truth—that he had manipulated me, turning an innocent crush and flirtation on my part into something abusive and violent. I’d spent years despising myself, but now I finally felt able to direct that anger where it belonged. My hatred for Toby burned through me. Seeing him schmoozing his way around the room, acting like he was a good person, I wanted to stand on a chair and tell everyone what he’d done to me.
But then, as my sister released me, my heart contracted. As much as I wanted to get revenge on Toby, the problem was it would also mean hurting Kate. And my family, too. How would my parents react when they found out what Toby had done to me? What if the shock caused my father to have another heart attack? How would I live with myself then?
But I also knew I couldn’t let him get away with what he’d done. I’d let that happen for far too long already.
“We got this for you, Charlotte.” Toby held out a beautifully wrapped gift. I just stared at the package in his hands. I was shaking so hard that I knew if I took it from him, I’d drop it.
The sea of faces blurred in front of me. My chest tightened, and I found it hard to catch a breath. It felt like everyone was crowding around me, wanting a piece of me. But still, the face I kept seeing was Toby’s. It was like some surreal sequence in a film, where everyone seemed to blur into him.
“Sorry,” I said abruptly. “I’ll be right back.”
I ran into my room before anyone could stop me. Slamming the door shut behind me, I threw myself onto the bed, burying my head into the pillow, as though it might help shut everyone out.
* * *
I’d been in my room for a couple of minutes when I heard a soft knock on the door.
“Charlotte?” My sister’s voice floated through, and I groaned. “Can I come in?”
Before I had a chance to tell her no, she’d already opened the door a crack. Seeing I was alone and just curled up on the bed, she took the opportunity to come in.
“What’s going on? Is everything all right?”
“I’m fine. Just tired and a bit . . .” I tried to think of a suitable excuse. “Overwhelmed. But I’ll be out in a minute.”
I’d hoped this would make her go away, but instead she came over to perch on the side of the bed. Thankfully my room wasn’t its usual disaster area. I presumed Lindsay must have put my clothes away and made my bed, knowing that we had guests coming round. I made a mental note to thank her later.
“What’re you doing?” I struggled to sit up. “Look, I don’t really have time to chat. I just wanted a quick break to gather my thoughts. But I’ve got all my guests here. It’d be rude to hide out.”
“This won’t take a moment, I promise. I just want to talk to you about something.”
I folded my arms around my knees. “About what?”
Kate sighed. She picked absent-mindedly at a thread on my duvet. “It’s to do with Toby.” My heart stopped. What was this? Did she know? “Look, Charlotte, I know this can’t be easy for you. But I really need you to get over this weirdness with Toby.”
“Weirdness?” I echoed.
“Well, I saw you in there. You barely looked at him. And it’s not the first time . . . I’ve been wondering what it’s all about and, well, he said you might be jealous.” She blushed a little saying it. “That you’d kind of had a crush on him.”
“That’s what he said?” I laughed bitterly. “Well, that’s hilarious.”
She looked sharply at me. “What do you mean by that?”
I hesitated. I didn’t want to tell her now, not like this. I needed to discuss how to proceed with Dr. Milton first. I wasn’t sure of the best way to tell your sister that her fiancé had raped you, but it probably wasn’t at a birthday party full of your friends and relatives. That is, if I even told her at all.
I shook my head. “Just leave it for now. Trust me, you don’t want to know.”
She frowned. “Look, I can understand if you’re feeling, well, a bit jealous. Everything’s working out for me right now—with my job and getting married. And it’s natural for you to feel a bit like you’re flailing—”
“Oh?” I tried to keep my voice light, but it was hard not to feel irritated by her sense of superiority. It was bad enough feeling like the infe
rior sibling, without it being made clear that that’s exactly how I was perceived. “Is that how I feel?”
“Yes, and I understand why. I mean Toby told me what happened on my twenty-first birthday.”
I went very still. “He did?”
“Yes. And there’s no need to be embarrassed.”
I saw the sympathetic, understanding look on Kate’s face and alarm bells began to ring. “Kate”—I peered more closely at her—“what exactly did Toby say happened?”
She sighed. “Well . . .” She sounded hesitant, so I grabbed her by her arms and turned her to me, so she’d have no choice but to be honest.
“Kate. Tell me what he said.”
“That you confessed to being secretly in love with him, and tried to kiss him, and he rejected you.”
The words were like a slap across the face. It took me a minute to process the lies he’d told, and then I gave a short, harsh laugh. “I don’t believe this. That little shit—”
A pained look crossed Kate’s face. “Charlotte, please. I know you’re upset, but—”
“I’m not upset!” I exploded. “I’m furious. God, you really don’t get it, do you?” I shook my head in disbelief. “I don’t fancy Toby! I’m not secretly in love with him! He raped me!”
The words were out before I could stop them. I clamped a hand over my mouth, but it was too late. There was silence. My sister just stared at me, as though she was having a hard time processing what I’d just said.
“I cannot believe you!” The words hissed from her mouth before I had a chance to say anything. “You nasty little liar.”
She got up then, and headed for the door.
“Kate, wait. Please—” I called, but she wouldn’t stop, so I had no choice except to get up and follow her outside.
Most of the guests were in the sitting room, and as we came out of my bedroom, they turned to see us—Kate storming towards the hallway, followed by me begging her to wait. It was obvious we were in the midst of an argument.