A Place For Us

by Liza Gyllenhaal

“My first approach?” Liam asked.

  “Yes,” Michael said. “When Troy was here, remember? You just flat-out denied it. That worked.”

  “Glad you thought so,” Liam said, his heart hardening again. What was the point of reneging on Brandon and telling the truth, when his father would think it was all a lie anyway?

  • • •

  He must have drifted off, but the tremor of the cell phone in his hand jolted him upright. It was Phoebe:

  OK. In 1 hr. But tl NO ONE!!!!

  Liam loved being outside in the dark. Even on a night as cold and cloud-covered as this one, he felt his spirits rise as the frigid air hit his lungs. He slowly made his way down the slope of the roof, stopping when he reached the eaves above the garage, and looked out over the pale whitewashed world below. The snow-covered fields. The rickrack of evergreens running along the edge of the stream. And, beyond that, the mountains, swelling one behind the other like incoming waves, where he’d spent the happiest days of his life.

  He was only seven the first time he and his dad had gone camping. It was the summer they moved up to Barnsbury, leaving behind a sweltering city still recovering from the 9/11 attacks the year before. His parents had enrolled him in Deer Mountain Elementary School for the fall, but he’d yet to discover he wouldn’t be welcomed there. His new life in this new place still seemed full of promise. And a big part of that was exploring the Bostocks’ sprawling property and the surrounding hills and fields. He hadn’t spent much time outside the city before then, and he loved the sense of freedom and adventure the countryside gave him.

  He built a fort made from fallen tree branches in the woods up behind his dad’s studio. He spent hours watching the deer and foxes, the rabbits and wild turkeys, whose world he was slowly coming to know. He learned how to move through the underbrush as stealthily as an Indian scout. But it wasn’t until his dad took him on an overnight hike into the state forest southwest of Barnsbury that he finally understood what it was that he’d been discovering about himself that summer.

  They’d hiked all day, ending up on a limestone outcropping near the top of the highest mountain in the range. It had a ledge that jutted over the valley, giving a spectacular view of the whole region. Liam’s father told him that he used to come up here when he was a kid, sleeping in the narrow caves that cut into the mountainside. He showed Liam where he’d carved his initials into the rock face. After their campfire dinner, Michael told Liam a story about an Indian maiden who, thinking mistakenly that she’d been abandoned by her white lover, leapt to her death from that very ridge. Liam’s father fell silent for a while, watching the dying fire. Then he stood up and—without warning—howled into the darkness.

  “Come on,” his dad had told him. “Let your animal out.” Liam had scrambled up to stand beside his dad, and together they’d howled for several long, thrilling minutes. Their voices had echoed and echoed into the night. How fearless and alive he’d felt! And he came to believe that, like his father, he had something fierce and untamable inside of him, something fighting to escape, that found an answering call in the restless night woods. Later that night, after they’d climbed into their sleeping bags, Liam said, “This is the best time I’ve ever had in my whole life.”

  It was a twenty-minute walk from his house to the little playground behind the old elementary school that had become Liam and Phoebe’s meeting place. Liam knew the way like the back of his hand. How many nights had they met there last summer? Fifteen? Twenty? Soon after his cousin’s wedding, he’d managed to overtake Phoebe one evening as she walked home from working for Liam’s mom. It was near the playground where they used to play as kids, and on impulse he’d asked, “Want to go for a swing?”

  He’d felt momentarily elated as he sailed up and back beside her, but there was something else that he was after. Some other impulse, unrealized until a little later, that drew him to his sweet-natured childhood friend. She was a great listener. Sitting beside her that first night as he poured his story out to her, he could feel her empathy and concern reaching to him across the dark. And, once he had her ear, once he sensed that she wouldn’t judge him, he found himself telling her things that he’d barely been able to admit to himself. Night after night, he confided his unhappiness and fears. How he knew he’d never live up to his father’s expectations. How lonely and adrift he often felt. How drinking and smoking dope helped him forget about his problems, but never for very long. How every once in a while, when he felt overwhelmed by despair, he thought about ending it all.

  “You have to promise me you’ll never do that,” Phoebe had told him.

  “I can’t promise that.”

  “Then we have to make a pact that if you ever get to that point for real, you’ll call me first, okay? You’ll call me from wherever you are and give me the chance to talk you out of it.”

  He’d agreed to that, though he’d been embarrassed when she’d actually made him hold up his hand and promise. But it had helped him in the end. The pact had given him a kind of fallback plan, a safety net. During the bad times, when he was at his most vulnerable, he was able to imagine Phoebe standing there, blocking his way like some kind of guardian angel. But now, as he saw Phoebe waiting for him on the old cement bench, huddled into herself against the cold, it came to him that he’d probably lost not just her friendship but this one last stay against his own destructive impulses.

  “Hey, there,” she said, standing up as he approached, her breath coming out in quick white puffs.

  “Phebe,” he replied, digging his hands into the pockets of his North Face jacket. “Happy New Year?”

  “Right,” she said. He wasn’t sure if she was being sarcastic. If so, it would be unlike her. It seemed to Liam that she always said exactly what she meant. It was one of the things that he admired about her, he realized now. One of the many things.

  “So, I’m sort of freezing here,” she went on, rocking back and forth in her worn imitation Uggs. “What’s up?”

  “I wanted to say I’m sorry,” he began, just as he’d rehearsed all night, but he found himself losing his nerve in Phoebe’s actual presence. With her standing right there he felt the full weight of what she had actually gone through. How hurt and humiliated she must have felt. He remembered the awful photographs that her father had shoved into his mother’s face. And Liam had as good as told Brandon to go for it! “I’m really, really sorry about what happened.”

  “You know what I keep wondering?” Phoebe asked.

  “No. Tell me.”

  “I keep wondering if you even know what happened. I mean, do you even remember?”

  “Sort of,” he said. “But not like totally.”

  “Okay, let me help you out a little, then. How about this? Your friend Brandon tried to rape me. And you just sat there—and watched.”

  “No!” Liam said. “I did not watch. I was out of it. I remember only bits and pieces. I was like blind drunk, Phebe. Really wasted. I don’t remember him hurting you. Not really. It’s hard to explain. It was weird. Like a dream.”

  “No,” Phoebe said. “It was a nightmare.”

  “Right. Yeah, I know. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”

  “And there’s something else I keep wondering.”

  “Yes?”

  “Why you’re covering up for Brandon. Why you’re letting me get away with this. These things I’ve been saying about you. The terrible things everyone’s been saying. I mean, this whole thing is such a—”

  “Yeah, I know,” Liam said, reaching out and touching her hair with his glove. When she started to cry, he pulled her into his arms. She sobbed so hard that her shoulders shook. Her breathing was ragged with tears. He held her tight against him, until she finally seemed to cry herself out, laying her check against the front of his tearstained parka.

  “Don’t look at me!” she said as she tried to use her mitten to wipe her nose. “I always look terrible when I cry.”

  “I don’t care,” he said, kissing the top of he
r woolen cap. It was the most wonderful sensation holding her like this! He could feel her warmth through their layers of clothes, the soft pressure of her breasts against his chest. He trailed his lips down her cheek, searching for her mouth, but she turned her face away.

  “No!” she said. “I look horrible. I’m covered with snot.”

  “Oh, Phebe,” he laughed. “Who cares? Come on,” he said, taking her hand. “Let’s sit on the bench.”

  He put his arm around her after they sat down, and she rested her head against his shoulder. He took her mittened hand in his gloved one and squeezed it.

  “Better now?”

  “Yeah,” she said. He was careful not to glance at her, but he could hear the smile in her voice. It made him light-headed to feel so good after being down for so long. Everything seemed possible again. He just needed to be honest with her. To lay it on the line.

  “You blamed me because you wanted to get back at me,” he said. “You thought I didn’t care. That I didn’t care what Brandon did to you. Right?”

  “Yes,” she said softly. “It seemed like he thought it was okay to do anything. Like he thought I was some kind of slut or something.”

  “I’m sorry. He’s one of those guys who takes what he wants. Who’s just used to getting his way all the time, you know?”

  “So? Is he like making you lie for him?” Phoebe said, turning to Liam. Even in the dark he could see that her eyes were red-rimmed, her lips puffy. He fought back the urge to kiss her. He needed to stay focused. They had to sort this out.

  “No, I decided to do that on my own,” Liam said. “It’s kind of complicated. But now—Phebe—what’s happening now is just crazy, don’t you think?”

  “You mean about what my dad’s doing?”

  “Yeah, this lawsuit! Against my parents. They had nothing to do with any of this. It’s just wrong to go after them—you know that. It’s just not fair.”

  “There’s a lot that’s not fair,” she said.

  “Yeah, but come on! You know what this is really about.”

  “Do I?”

  “It’s about my mom’s money, of course. Why else would anyone want to blame my folks?”

  She pulled away before he knew what was happening.

  “I should have known!” she said, getting up from the bench. “Man oh man, I never seem to learn. I’m such an idiot. You know what? I’m just an absolute total idiot when it comes to Liam Bostock!”

  “Hey! Hold on!” Liam said when she started to walk away. “Where are you going? What’s happening here?” He ran after her when she didn’t turn around, and grabbed her wrist.

  “Don’t touch me!” she said, jerking her arm free. “I know what you’re trying to do. I know what you’re thinking: ‘Give fat, stupid Phoebe a kiss or two, and she’ll do anything I want.’”

  “That’s not—”

  “Well, I’m not a pushover anymore,” she went on. “I’ve learned the hard way. I won’t be manipulated. I won’t be treated like some—”

  “Where’s this coming from, Phebe?” Liam asked. “What did I do?”

  “Don’t Phebe me anymore, Liam. My name is Phoebe, okay? And my father is planning to sue your parents because I was brutalized in your house. I was made to feel like shit! And you know the worst part of it? It wasn’t actually when your friend Brandon tried to force his stupid dick into me. It was when he said, ‘What’s the big deal? Liam told me you’ve been putting out for him since seventh grade.’”

  “Phe—”

  “Tell me that’s a lie, too. But you can’t, can you? I know just by looking you in the face. I know because I know you better than you know yourself sometimes. And it’s sad. It’s really, really sad. Because the fact is I used to love you so bad it hurt. And now I don’t love you anymore, but it still hurts. Worse than ever.”

  12

  Phoebe didn’t want to go to the hearing, but her dad kept at her.

  “You won’t have to say a word,” he told her. “But your being there will send a message to the magistrate and the Bostocks and their lawyers. You’ll be putting a face on the crime—and that’s important.”

  “Where are you getting all this from?” Wanda asked. “You’re sounding more and more like some lawyer yourself these days.”

  “I’m not ashamed to admit that Cranston and Cranston has been giving me advice,” Troy said, referring to the Boston law firm he’d hired to pursue civil charges against Liam and his parents. “And I refuse to apologize for trying to make sure that justice is done here.”

  “Whatever,” Wanda said. “You do what you need to do. But I’m not going to let you talk Phoebe into going to this thing against her will.”

  As Troy’s words sank in, though, Phoebe began to seriously consider what her father was saying. How her presence in the courtroom would make it clear that she was the innocent victim—and that she wasn’t afraid to stand up for herself. Phoebe’s fight with Liam on New Year’s was still raw and painful, something she tried hard to keep bandaged away in the back of her mind. But it kept cycling through her thoughts anyway. How Liam had made it sound like this whole thing was just her dad’s attempt to get his hands on the Bostocks’ money. How what Brandon had done to her—what Liam had let him do—was nothing. How her pain and suffering didn’t even count. She began to picture herself walking into the courtroom and everyone turning to look at her—admiring her courage and the new Forever 21 jacket her dad had bought her at the mall.

  • • •

  With its wide granite steps and Federal-style pillars, the Harringdale district courthouse looked imposing, even majestic, and Phoebe felt goose bumps rise on her arms as she and her dad walked across the domed rotunda, their footsteps echoing on the inlaid marble floor. She’d been given the day off from school and was beginning to feel nervously excited about what lay ahead. But the courtroom where the “show cause” hearing with the magistrate was to be held turned out to be a disappointment. Phoebe imagined it would be like the one she’d seen in old Law & Order episodes: a sunlit, spacious chamber with murals on the walls, a witness box, and an impressively elevated bench for the judge.

  Instead, the room that Troy and Phoebe were directed to had a dropped soundproof ceiling and was lit by recessed energy-saving LED grids. The paneled walls had a prefab look, as did the nondescript raised desk in the front of the room, which was flanked by tired-looking flags. Two tables faced the desk, each with three ordinary office chairs, one of which was occupied by the familiar bulk of Phoebe’s uncle Fred. Five wooden pews behind the tables were divided by a center aisle. Scattered in the first couple of rows were half a dozen people Phoebe didn’t recognize, including a man who turned as they entered and walked toward them with his right hand outstretched.

  “Troy,” he said, clapping Phoebe’s dad on the shoulder as he reached them. He was a tall, fit fiftysomething, dressed in a charcoal gray suit.

  “This is Henry Cranston,” Troy said, giving Phoebe a little nudge. “Go ahead and shake his hand. He won’t bite.”

  “And you must be Phoebe. We’ve heard a lot of great things about you from your dad.” His grip was firm and dry. She could feel him sizing her up.

  “Hi,” she said, suddenly shy. She saw herself through Henry Cranston’s eyes. The new white leather fringed jacket that fit her snugly, the black tights and short denim skirt. The curly red hair that, despite the clips, she could do little to control. She’d dressed herself up when, she realized, she probably should have toned herself down. Her dad didn’t know any better, but she guessed that if her mom hadn’t left for work before Troy picked her up, she would have sent her daughter back upstairs to change into something less revealing.

  “Your dad told us that you didn’t want to be here today,” the lawyer went on in a confiding voice. He had a tan, leathery face that crinkled around the eyes as he smiled at her. “I really appreciate that you changed your mind and overcame your concerns.”

  “Thanks,” Phoebe said, feeling better. “Bu
t I don’t have to say anything, right?”

  “No, you don’t. And because you’re underage, your name won’t be mentioned. A ‘show cause’ hearing is just what it sounds like. The police present all the evidence they’ve gathered to the district magistrate and he or she decides if it seems like enough to go ahead with the cases—the attempted-rape case against Liam and the Social Host Liability charges against his parents. Do you understand what all that means?”

  “Pretty much,” Phoebe said. “My dad’s been kind of coaching me.”

  “Great,” Cranston said, turning his smile on Troy. “Why don’t you two come sit with us? I brought two associates with me. We’re in the third row back. But, wait—there’s something I want you to know.”

  “What’s that?” Troy said.

  “While doing a little preliminary legwork, we learned that Chief Henderson is Phoebe’s uncle. I’m sure you would have mentioned this, Troy, if you realized it was a problem. Because it’s a major conflict in our book. I took Henderson aside earlier and suggested that someone else on his team present the evidence. I pointed out that it could look prejudicial if he did it. And negatively impact not just these proceedings, but our efforts with the civil suit. Believe me, the Bostocks’ lawyers are going to try to do everything they can to get these cases thrown out of court before they even get started. And the chief’s relationship to Phoebe is one big red flag.”

  “Right,” Troy said, nodding. “Of course. You did the right thing.”

  But Phoebe wasn’t so sure her uncle agreed. As she took her seat between her dad and Cranston, she noticed that Uncle Fred was sitting ramrod straight, his back to them, his neck flushed a deep red. She knew from conversations she’d overheard between her uncle and her mom how much time and effort he’d put into the investigation.

  “We appreciate all your hard work,” Wanda had told her brother when he dropped by the house the day before to wish Phoebe luck.

  “Hey, it’s my niece we’re talking about here,” he said. Phoebe was aware how protective her uncle was of her mom and her, especially since the divorce. She knew he took pride in keeping an eye out for them, cruising past the house whenever he was out on patrol.