Remember This

by Patricia Koerner

“Yes. Very nice to meet you,” I croaked. As Frank retracted the knife, slip it into his back pocket, then pull bills from his front pocket to pay the clerk, I thought of making a run for it, but I was frozen with fear. The clerk handed Frank the room key.

  “Your favorite room, the one on the end. The room next to it is unoccupied right now, so it will be quiet and restful for you and your wife.”

  My heart sank. I didn’t have a chance now. No one would hear me scream or call for help. When we were inside, I said, “Frank, you’ll never get away with this. Please let me go. I swear I’ll never tell …” Before I could finish, he backhanded me so hard, I lost my balance and fell onto the bed. My glasses flew off and disappeared out of sight.

  “Shut up!” he barked. “Get your clothes off. Get ‘em off! Now!” My hands shook as I removed first, my coat and scarf, then my shoes and stockings, then my blouse and bra, then my trousers. I was about to slide off my panties when he said with a malicious smile, “You can leave those for now.” He pushed me down and wrestled me into a face down position, then clapped a handcuff on my left wrist. I fought and struggled, but he forced my right arm behind me and cuffed it too.

  Frank then rolled me over onto my back. The cuffs hurt and I winced with the pain. He stood there for a minute, smoothing his hair, breathless from the struggle. He took his shirt off, then drew his knife. With the tip, he traced slow circles around my nipples. I went cold and my hair stood on end. “No! Please!” I begged. “You don’t have to do this.”

  “’Pay up like a man, Frank,’ you told me,” he said, mimicking me. “Remember? ‘Stop sniveling,’ you said. Well, time for you to stop sniveling and pay up.” He paused a moment. “Still, it would be a shame to ruin those nice big titties of yours.” He dropped the knife and grabbed my hair with his left hand and yanked me into a sitting position while with his right hand he unzipped his trousers…

  ***

  Frank sat in a chair, swigging cheap wine from the bottle. I lay on the bed -- on my side because the cuffs hurt when I lay on my back. I thought about John and wondered what he would think when he arrived at my house and I wasn’t there. Would he assume that I’d just changed my mind and blown him off?

  Frank held out the wine bottle to me. “Want some?”

  I shook my head. “No. Just leave me alone.”

  “Ah, come on. It’s not as fancy as you’re probably used to, but it’s not bad.” He jumped up and pulled me up. Jerking my head back, he said in a baby talk voice, “Open u-u-u-up.”

  “I said I don’t want any.”

  He pinched my nose, forcing me to open my mouth. He then poured so much wine in that I couldn’t swallow fast enough and I choked. He did this again and again until he emptied the bottle.

  “Stop it! Knock it off!” I screamed at him. “You’ve had your fun. Now let me go!” I lay back and began kicking at Frank. He laughed as he dodged my flailing legs. One kick grazed his groin and a murderous look came into his eyes. He pummeled me with his fists until I thought my head would explode. My nose started bleeding and I could taste the blood on my bruised and swollen lips. I began sobbing and moaning and begging for him to stop.

  “You need to fucking shut up,” he said as he grabbed my scarf from the floor. He gagged me with it, then dragged me to the floor and made me kneel against the bed. He pulled down my panties and violated me a second time. The pain was so horrible I wondered if I’d survive. Part of me hoped I wouldn’t. Every ounce of dignity had been stripped from me. I almost preferred death to a lifetime of remembering this.

  When he finished and got up, I crawled back onto the bed and lay down. I hadn’t eaten since lunch and all that wine was beginning to take effect. The room spun. My head throbbed. I didn’t have any fight left in me. I was ready to resign myself to whatever happened next.

  ***

  Someone was pounding on the door. “Open up in there!” There was something familiar about the voice. Frank threw on his shirt.

  “One sound out of you and you won’t leave this room alive.” He went to the door. “Who is it?”

  “Police. Open up.” I maneuvered myself on the bed so I could see what was going on. Frank opened the door a crack and positioned his body to block any view inside.

  “Yes, Officer?”

  “What’s going on in here?”

  “Nothing, Officer.” Frank’s voice took on a toadying, smarmy tone. “It’s just me and my wife … you know.”

  The door then crashed open, knocking Frank off balance. It was John! But no, it couldn’t be. I started crying. Was I having hallucinations now? Was I losing my mind?

  John surveyed the room. When he saw me, he grabbed Frank by his shirt. “You son of a bitch! I’ll kill you!” he yelled. He slammed Frank against the wall, then grabbed him by the hair and smashed his face on the table. Frank put up a fight, but at five foot six and about one hundred fifty pounds, he was no match for John, who was no longer the slim youth he was when we met, but now carried more than two hundred pounds on his six foot three frame. In no time at all, John had Frank in a headlock, his left arm twisted behind his back. He marched Frank over to me. “Take those handcuffs off,” he ordered. “Now! Before I rip your arm off.”

  “OK, OK,” Frank gasped. He retrieved the key from his pocket and removed the cuffs from my wrists.

  “The gag, too.”

  Frank pulled the scarf off then, sensing an opportunity, drove his elbow into John’s stomach. In one movement, he freed himself and grabbed his knife. I heard a yelp of pain from John as Frank swung the knife at him. Frank swung again and again until John finally caught hold of Frank’s arm and twisted it, forcing him to drop the knife.

  I watched as if through a cloud of fog, one eye swollen shut, as John knocked Frank to the floor with one punch and dealt him half a dozen more blows and several kicks. When he yanked Frank to his feet, Frank’s face was bloodier than mine. John’s hands tightened around Frank’s throat. Frank clawed at John’s hands as he struggled to breathe. I wanted to stop John before he killed Frank, but I was so stiff and sore, I could barely move. Finally, to my relief, John released Frank.

  “Now, get out of my sight,” said John, as he shoved him toward the door. Frank hesitated a few seconds then, still gasping for air and clutching his side, and keeping a wary eye on John, picked up his knife and his shoes, then staggered out the door. A few minutes later, I heard his car start and then tires squealing as he sped out of the parking lot.

  I began stumbling around, looking for my clothes. I then felt around for my glasses. I finally found them under the bed. Thankfully they had not been broken. John came out of the bathroom and knelt in front of me with a wet washcloth. Gently, he washed the blood from my face. “Let’s get you out of here and to the hospital,” he said.

  “No! What if someone recognizes you? That’s all we’d need.”

  “You’re going to the hospital, Hannah. You need treatment.” His tone told me he would not be argued with. He helped me dress because I was dizzy from the wine and I was beginning to feel nauseous. When we stepped outside, it was dark and the cold wind cut like a knife. John’s Range Rover was parked at the far end of the lot and I barely made it into the front seat before I felt the strength go out of my legs.

  As we sped back toward Salt Lake City, I asked John, “How did you know where to find me?”

  “Laurie told me.”

  “So you know everything then?”

  “Yes. I know everything.”

  I turned away from him to weep with shame because I couldn’t look him in the face. “And you still came for me. Why?”

  “Why do you think?” Deep down I knew, but I was so full of self-loathing that it didn’t register.

  The nausea I’d been feeling now rose up like a tidal wave. My stomach wrenched. I yelled to John that I was going to be sick and to pull over. I jumped out even before the vehicle had completely stopped and ran into the weeds off the side of the road. I only got about ten yards or so when my legs
buckled. I vomited up foul, bitter tasting bile. John stood behind me, holding my head. I continued retching until nothing more came up. John then picked me up and carried me back to the vehicle. It was then that I noticed his torn, blood soaked shirt sleeve. “John! My God, you’re cut. You need to see a doctor, too.”

  “It’s not that bad. Let’s just get you to the hospital now.”

  We stopped at an InstaCare clinic we saw near an exit. We thought we would be less conspicuous and there would be less chance that John would be recognized. Still, to be safe, we agreed that he would wait outside. I went in and told the receptionist that I had been mugged. It was only when I was alone with the doctor that I said I’d been raped. “You should report this to the police,” she said.

  “No! No police. Please, or I’ll leave now.” I got down from the exam table.

  “All right. I can’t report it without your consent, but I ask you to reconsider. Whoever did this should be in jail.”

  I nodded. “OK, I’ll think about it.” Though Frank did belong in jail, there was no way I was going to the police. I couldn’t bear the humiliation, plus I worried that John might face charges for the beating he gave Frank.

  When the doctor finished and released me, I went with John to his hotel where I sat in a hot bath until the water turned cold. I then slid wordlessly into bed. John gently pulled the covers over me and sat beside me on the bed, thinking perhaps that I wanted to talk. I couldn’t bring myself to talk about it. I just wanted to block it out of my mind. I took his hand and squeezed it. It was all I could do then to express my gratitude. The last thing I saw before sinking into an exhausted sleep was John settled in a chair next to my bed, reading a script he had brought with him.

  46

  I woke to the sound of John setting a room service tray on the table. “Come,” he said when he saw that I was awake. “You need to eat. I’ve ordered you a pot of hot tea and some toast.” I noticed he’d bandaged his arm and a number of cuts on his hands.

  While I nibbled at the toast and sipped some of the tea, John said, “Hannah, I’m going to tell you now what I tried to tell you two years ago, but this time I want you to listen.” I nodded for him to continue. “When Rachel confronted me with those ticket stubs, she told me she knew that for a long while before we separated, my heart wasn’t in our marriage, and that it was with someone else. She thought that having another child would turn me towards her again. That’s why she got pregnant with Robby. I thought for sure she was going to want a divorce, but instead, she wanted to strike a deal. She would tolerate my relationship with you on the condition that I remain married to her and take care of her and the children financially. She didn’t want to know who you were or anything about you. That meant of course, that our relationship had to remain secret. If I didn’t keep our bargain, she’d divorce me, take the children and take me to the cleaners. I didn’t care about the money, but I love those kids, Hannah. I couldn’t let her take them and never let me see them. You and I could have continued as before. Nothing about that changed. That’s what I was trying to tell you.” What he didn’t say was that if I’d listened to him before, none of what I’d just been through would have happened. He knew he didn’t have to.

  It was a cold, stormy day and neither of us felt like going out anywhere. I was still in quite a bit of pain and I couldn’t bear to face anyone with how I looked. I was sure that people would look at me and could tell what happened, and judge me. It was irrational, I know, but I believe now that I thought that because I was already judging myself. So, John and I stayed in the hotel room. I did not want to talk about the rape. I wanted to think only about positive things, so I told him about the exhibit and how excited I was about it. He and I read through the script he had with him. It was for an episode of a series John was doing a guest appearance in and was going to shoot in a couple of weeks.

  The next day, Sunday, the storm had passed and it was a sunny day. John and I decided to have breakfast on the balcony. The warm sun and the fresh air revived me somewhat. I was relieved to see the swelling on my eye and lips had come down some and the bruises on my face and marks on my wrists had begun to fade. John and I talked again about the rift between us. I told John how I went into a tailspin when I thought he’d betrayed me.

  “I was deeply hurt too, when you just cut me off without a word,” he said. “The only things that got me through each day were my children and my work. I would have done anything for a chance to explain everything. I didn’t know what to do. When Laurie contacted me, I couldn’t believe I finally was getting that chance.”

  I confessed that even at that moment, I was craving a fix, to just float as if on a cloud and forget everything. He took me into his arms and held me. Instinctually, I wanted to push him away. I couldn’t stand to be touched. However, I fought this impulse with all my strength because I wanted to be held by him, to be close to him again. He said, “I know you have the strength to get through this. You can look straight at the thing which promises to take all the pain away and yet turn your back on it and move forward. I know you can.”

  Before we checked out of the hotel, I changed the bandage on John’s forearm. The cut was deep and ugly. I was dismayed. There was no doubt that it would leave a permanent scar. Now we both were going to be scarred by this ordeal, one way or another. I wondered if what happened would drive us apart, but on the contrary, it would bond us even closer. It was to be a turning point for us. From then on, we were never to be out of each other’s’ lives again.

  John was going to begin rehearsals the next day for the series episode he was appearing in, so he had to start back to Los Angeles. He dropped me at home and I began collecting myself before Guillermo returned. I’d decided my story would be that I was walking to my car and was attacked and mugged by two men. I would say that I didn’t get a good enough look at them to make a positive identification.

  Though John had run my clothes through the coin laundry at the hotel, I washed them again. I took another long hot bath to ease the pain I still felt through my whole body. As I was putting on clean clothes, I noticed the scarf I had worn stuffed into my handbag. I pulled it out. It was still tied and covered in blood stains. I was going to throw it away and then remembered that it had been a gift from Matty. I untied it and soaked it in the sink until it finally came clean. When it dried, I put it away, but it would be years before I could bring myself to wear it again.

  Feeling hungry for the first time in days, I decided to cook some chorizo with rice and pineapple. I was just turning the stove off when I heard Guillermo’s key in the door …

  47

  I hardly knew where to begin putting my life back together. I took a couple of days off to give my injuries time to heal before returning to work. When I did, I jumped right back in. I arranged for a special viewing of the exhibit for my classes and one for the members of Terpsichore. Being busy helped me, but I was terrified that Frank would be back to exact more revenge. Once, I thought I saw him loitering in the corridor after one of my classes. I had a panic attack and bolted out of the building. When I pulled myself together, I went back in and saw that it was just a student waiting around for his girlfriend to get out of class.

  In a phone conversation we had about a week later, John had told me that on impulse, he brought with him his police badge from Mean Streets that he’d kept as a souvenir. He flashed it at my neighbor and at the desk clerks at the motels he went to in his search for me in order to get information from them. I was certain that John was going to be found out and in trouble for impersonating a police officer as well as for what he did to Frank. For weeks, I jumped whenever the phone rang or someone knocked at the door. By now John and I also communicated by e-mail and several times, I e-mailed him and expressed my worries about this. He replied that it had crossed his mind, but felt that the chances were slim that anything like that would happen. Frank surely wasn’t going to go to the police and expose himself to kidnapping and rape charges, he pointed out. My nei
ghbor and the motel clerks would probably prefer not to become involved. I hoped he was right, but it was only when Christmas came and went that my anxiety abated.

  The exhibit was a great success, even more than I’d hoped for. My students enjoyed it as did everyone in Terpsichore. It got wide and favorable reviews in the media. The night Terpsichore attended, I took all of them to dinner afterwards. It was the first time that I went an entire day in which no thoughts or memories of the rape invaded my mind.

  One night right after New Year’s, I woke to Guillermo shaking me. “Hannah, wake up. Come on,” he was saying. He sat down on the edge of the bed. “I could hear you from my room. This is the third time this has happened. I’m getting worried about you. Maybe the doctor can give you something for these nightmares.”

  I agreed to check into it, but I needed help for more than the nightmares. I had other loose ends, as it were, to deal with. After some research, I found Sarah Fuller, a rape counselor with a good reputation and began seeing her weekly. We took one issue at a time, beginning with the nightmares and other post-traumatic stress symptoms. Sarah made it clear that they wouldn’t just “go away” and suggested some tactics with coping with them. Next, we talked about the self-loathing I felt. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I somehow deserved what happened because I acted rashly when John made the decision to remain married to Rachel and because I did drugs and had a tawdry affair. “Hannah, you made some serious mistakes and you should own that – own it and then move past it,” she said. “No one deserves to be violated and degraded. Frank did what he did because he was full of rage and hate, not because of anything you did.”

  Next, we took up my marriage to Guillermo. “Given that you are in love with John and that the two of you have decided to no longer fight your feelings for one another, don’t you think it might be more honest to get a divorce?”

  “Probably.” I knew she was making a valid point. “But I can’t deal with another emotionally wrenching ordeal right now. There isn’t any compelling reason to get a divorce, at least not immediately. Though I’m in love with John, I still have some feelings for Guillermo. I want to see first if there is anything to salvage of our relationship.”