Hold Her Down

by Kathryn R. Biel

  "Maybe she's in the building. You know, with one of the lifeguards."

  The other woman cackled. "Maybe she's servicing them all. You know, making men out of boys."

  Elizabeth's stomach sank. She closed her eyes and tried to remain calm.

  She sat there and listened as the two women continued to make jokes and inappropriate comments about how Elizabeth might be servicing several men, and even boys, while her children were out in the pool. She had imagined what people would be saying, but this was so much worse. These women didn't even really know her. How could they think that she was really like this? Elizabeth sat there fuming and humiliated, each emotion rolling over her in waves. This was probably only a sampling. This was what everyone was at least thinking, if not saying. She needed to get out of there. Finally, the two women left to go to the snack bar. Quickly, Elizabeth stood up and packed up all of their stuff. Feeling like a pack mule, she walked over to the side of the pool where the kids were.

  "Hey guys. We've got to go."

  "Aww, Mom," Sydney whined. "Can't we stay for a little longer?"

  "Sorry, pumpkin. Hop out of the pool."

  Sydney started to pout, and Elizabeth knew a scene was coming. She had to avoid that at all costs. She didn't want any more attention than she was already receiving. And she certainly didn't want the people focusing on her children. Teddy must have sensed her urgency, and he climbed out of the pool and took his towel. Elizabeth dug his flip flops out of the bag, and he slid his feet into them.

  "C'mon Syd. We've got to get going. We're going to get ice cream."

  That did the trick and she was soon climbing out of the pool. They headed to the exit, but not before the catty women spotted her. As Elizabeth passed by, she heard one of them say, "It's about time you focused on your children instead of putting out."

  Elizabeth dropped her head, hot tears stinging her eyes. She prayed that her children neither heard nor understood. They made it to the van, and Elizabeth sat in the driver's seat for a moment, willing her tears to stop.

  "Mommy, what's wrong?" Sydney was concerned.

  "Nothing, honey."

  "Then why are you crying?" Teddy asked.

  "I'm, um, not feeling that well right now. I think I just need to lie down. Can we take a rain check on the ice cream and just have popsicles at home?"

  Sydney started to protest.

  "Please, honey. Mommy really needs to go home."

  Something in her voice must have struck a chord with Sydney, and her compassionate seven-year-old soul acquiesced. It was a wonder that Elizabeth possessed the wherewithal to be able to drive home, but somehow she made it. As she pulled into the garage, the kids scrambled out. Elizabeth just sat there. It struck her that this was her life. From now on, wherever she went, people would talk. They would speculate. They would whisper. It would follow her no matter what she did. It was like being in high school all over again.

  Oh, but this was so much worse. In high school, she had been known as shy and innocent. A nerd. A prude. This was worse. So, so much worse. And she would not have the reprieve of college in a few years to escape and reinvent herself. No, she was stuck here. It occurred to her that they could move. Could she convince Peter to move? Could she leave her parents like that? At the moment, she felt that she truly could. That could be a ray of hope to hang onto. Peter grew up in the Midwest. Perhaps he would want to move back there. Or South. Someplace warm, where there would be no ice storms to bring one to the brink of death and desperation.

  That was it. That was the answer. They would have to move. She exited her car finally and went into the house. All of the cleaning over the past week had actually helped. She could continue cleaning and weeding out, working on household projects until the house was in selling shape. She walked into the kitchen pantry and started cleaning out. This house had a great pantry, and she knew it would be a selling point. She took out a large black plastic trash bag and started cleaning out expired cans and boxes. A half-eaten bag of pretzels that had a best-by date of two years ago. A remnant jar of baby food. Stale crackers. Old beans. Trash, trash, trash.

  One bag was filled, then another. The kids started helping, encouraging Elizabeth. She had all summer to work on the house, and hopefully they could be in a new place before the school year started. After the pantry was done, she tackled the junk drawers in the kitchen. Then onto the hall closet. First the downstairs one, then the upstairs one. Before she knew it, it was dinner time. Peter was due momentarily. Elizabeth looked down. Seven bags of trash. She was still in her bathing suit. She had to change before she made supper. Luckily, she was just grilling salmon to put on salads. She could pull that together quickly enough.

  She ran upstairs and changed. She washed her face and then released her hair from its clip. As her hair spilled down onto her shoulders, she could not help but think about Jack and the night of Nancy's party. What an idiot she had been! He must have realized that she didn't know about the book, but when? Before he asked to see her again? Was he hoping to act out some scenes? Did he really think that little of her? Hurt and shame poured in again, negating the somewhat positive feeling that cleaning had given her. The air seemed to rush out, and she was having difficulty breathing.

  "Elizabeth? Are you up there?" Peter was yelling from the bottom of the stairs. She hadn't even heard the door. She swallowed. "Yep, up here. Do you need something?" He usually didn't address her by name unless he wanted something.

  "Are you making dinner?"

  She rolled her eyes. Of course, that was what he wanted. "Just starting it now. I'll be right down."

  "Okay. I'm pretty hungry."

  She pulled her hair back up into a ponytail. The end of it was now long enough to brush the back of her shoulders as she moved her head. It reminded her of the sensual feeling that she had felt when she had taken her hair down in front of Jack. Irritated by it, she quickly twisted the ponytail into a makeshift bun and angrily used some bobby pins to stab it in place.

  All through dinner, Elizabeth tried to think of a way to tell Peter that she wanted to move. She couldn't figure out a way to casually bring that up into conversation without really filling him in. She didn't want to lie to him, either. She had no choice but to tell Peter what was going on. She knew that she needed to tell him anyway. He was going to be so angry. He had such a temper. She hoped that he did not do something stupid, like attack Jack.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: June 28, 2012

  Oh, Peter was mad all right. Maybe it was her delivery. Maybe he had had a bad day at work. Maybe he was tired. Maybe he was just an asshole. It didn't matter, because he was mad.

  She waited until the kids were upstairs, watching television in her room. "Peter, I need to talk to you."

  Silence.

  "Peter, I need to talk to you." This time, a little more imperatively.

  He sighed. "What?"

  "Can you look at me?" She stood in front of him. He shifted his position on the couch to look around her.

  "I'm watching this."

  "Peter, this is important."

  He sighed again and finally looked at her standing there. Now that she had his attention, she wasn't sure where to start. She opened her mouth to say something, but no words came out. She closed her mouth, swallowed, took a deep breath, and tried again.

  "It's about Nancy and her ex-husband's book."

  "Are you fucking kidding me?" He said, slamming the remote down into the couch cushion. Elizabeth was taken aback, as Peter rarely swore. He continued. "I had a crappy day at work, I have to mow the lawn, and you want to talk about stupid-ass gossip? Can't you leave me alone?"

  "No, Peter, I don't want to talk to you about stupid-ass gossip." Her fingers made air quotes. "This is very important."

  He gave her a disgusted look. His knee-jerk reaction surprised her. "How important can it be? It's just a stupid book."

  She steeled herself and continued. "I told you that Nancy's ex-husband wrote this book, and it is very explicit.
It's basically BDSM erotica."

  "What the hell is 'BDSM' exactly?"

  Her face reddened slightly. "Um, I think it stands for bondage, dominance, and sado-masochism. Or something like that. Anyway, from the way the book is written, it is pretty apparent that it is about someone in town. And everyone's been talking, trying to find out who it is about."

  "Really, Elizabeth? I don't see why you are wasting my time with this." Peter was getting impatient. Elizabeth was losing her courage.

  Looking down at her feet, she mumbled, "It's about me." She was nervously picking at her cuticles. She sank down on the ottoman and waited for Peter to say something.

  He did not respond. She waited a moment and then worked up the nerve to look up. Peter was watching TV again. "Did you hear me?" she said louder. "The book is about me. It's me having sex all over town."

  "What?" Well, that got his attention.

  "I mean, not really, obviously. But the main character in the book is supposed to be me."

  "Why on earth would you think such a thing?"

  Elizabeth took a deep breath. "Um, last October. I guess not last October, but the one before that. Columbus Day weekend. About eighteen months ago, you were away. We weren't getting along really well. You had been away for almost two weeks, and I was really burnt out. Susan invited me up to her house for a gathering on a Friday. My mom took the kids, and I started driving up the mountains to her house."

  "I'm failing to see where the BDSM comes in."

  "Hang on, I'm getting there. Anyway, it was sleeting, and freezing rain while I was driving up there. I was worried about deer, and I hit a pothole. I got a flat tire. I tried to change it, but I knocked over the hubcap with the lug nuts in it, and I couldn't see to find them. I had also left the lights on while I was doing this, so the car battery died. I was very upset and feeling very depressed. I wasn't dressed for the weather, which had turned to snow and ice in the mountains. I wasn't sure if I was going to make it," she paused. "Or if I wanted to."

  "What do you mean by that?"

  "What you think I mean Peter. I thought maybe I should just stay there until I died."

  "Are you fucking kidding me? You were going to kill yourself over a flat tire? How unstable can you be? Maybe you shouldn't be alone with the kids."

  "Peter, just let me finish. And no, I wasn't going to kill myself over a flat tire. I wanted to die because I was so depressed about my life. I was overwhelmed with work and parenting. You were never here, and when you were, all we did was fight. We had no marriage left. I had failed at marriage. I felt like a failure as a mother. But then I realized how much I would be failing the kids if I didn’t keep going. So I got up, and nearly froze to death walking. I finally got to a house, and I was so cold. I had frostbite starting and hypothermia. A guy answered the door. He seemed to know me, but I think I was in shock. My hands were so cold that I couldn't move my fingers. He had to help me get undressed and he put me in the shower to warm up. He gave me warm clothes. When I started to thaw out, I figured out that he was Jack Davis. I knew him in high school and went to my prom with him."

  "Still, not seeing where all this is going."

  "Jack writes under the pen name of 'J.P. Devaney.' He's the author of the book. But I didn’t know any of this. I couldn't go anywhere, because of the snow and ice, so I stayed there for the night. He let me talk and vent, and eventually he went down and fixed the tire and jumped the car. I was a mess. I mean, the whole wanting to die thing really shook me up. I could not believe that I had reached that point. I knew something needed to change. Jack was a great sounding board, or so I thought."

  Elizabeth paused, trying to gauge Peter. He sat there, expressionless. "You never called me."

  "I couldn't. My phone had died. Plus, you were in Michigan. You couldn't help me." She wanted to add that he probably would have just yelled at her about how much a tow truck would cost. She continued. "I never realized that when he talked about his son, he was talking about Nancy's son John. He encouraged me to hang in there and told me to get myself straightened out. It was nice, you know? He knew me way-back-when, and kind of reminded me of the person I used to be. I left there on Sunday, still unsure about what to do. About how to change things so I wasn't miserable. Then Sydney got sick, and I vowed to make things better. Anyway, I hadn't heard from him or talked to him. Not until Nancy's party last week."

  In a soberingly quiet voice, Peter said, "He's the one who brought you home?"

  Elizabeth nodded. "Yeah, see, that's the thing. I guess everyone knew that he was the author of the book. I didn't know. I only knew him as Jack, and I still hadn't read more than the first few pages. I was more embarrassed about him seeing me right after I had contemplated suicide, and about what an emotional wreck I had been. Then, everyone started being nasty to me, and Julia wouldn't call me back. Then, I saw Jack on a morning talk show. I finally put two and two together."

  "So why do you think the book is about you?"

  "I don't think it is. I know it is—unfortunately."

  "That's pretty presumptuous."

  "No, not really. The book starts off with the main character, a writer, being all drunk and lonely. It is in the middle of a storm, and the girl he loved in high school shows up on his doorstep. What he wrote was pretty much exactly what happened when I showed up at Jack's house. At least initially. Then, it veered from what really happened. A lot."

  "Exactly how much?"

  "Mostly all of it. But it gets worse."

  "How does it get worse?"

  "Umm, remember how I told you that Nancy's ex was asking for access to her Facebook and stuff like that?"

  Peter shrugged. "I don't know. I guess, maybe."

  "Well, I'm friends with Nancy on Facebook. He used it to view what I was posting. Especially my photos. So these graphic sex scenes happen in the book, and they're set all over town. But when he's describing the woman, she's me. He looked in my pictures and described my outfits. Exactly. He was stalking me."

  "And you had no idea?" Peter was getting agitated. His eyes were getting a little wild. Elizabeth knew he was about to fly off the handle.

  "No, how could I? I didn't know who he was, in relation to Nancy. And Nancy's been all pissy because he dedicated the book to this mystery woman. But now everyone knows that it's me."

  "How did they not know before?"

  "He called me Liza. No one knew that I used to go by that."

  "And how did they find that out?"

  "As we were leaving the party, I told him I didn’t mind if he still called me Liza."

  Peter sucked in a breath. "I thought you didn't like being called that anymore."

  "No, actually, it was you who insisted that I go by Elizabeth. But that's not the point. And now, everywhere I go, people are talking about me. Saying horrible things about how I'm a whore and stuff like that."

  "Just ignore them. Tell them it's not true."

  "But, I can't. There's more."

  "What?" Peter was getting angry.

  "He describes me. All of me."

  "That could be anyone."

  Elizabeth shook her head. She pulled her iPhone out of her back pocket, and quickly searched for the book. As soon as she got a picture of the cover image, she handed it to Peter. He stared at it for a minute.

  "How does he know this?"

  Elizabeth swallowed. She knew this would be the bigger issue for him. "I told you, he had to help get me undressed when I first got there."

  "He saw you naked?" Peter said through clenched teeth.

  "Mostly, but you don't understand. It was literally life or death."

  Peter was silent for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, in too calm of a voice he said, "So, let me get this straight. Eighteen months ago, you were so unhappy, but you never said anything to me. You wanted a divorce and tried to kill yourself. And the only reason you didn't was the kids." Elizabeth nodded. She wanted to correct him that she didn't want a divorce, but really felt that they had no
marriage left. She could tell he was getting ramped up. She let him continue, so he could get it out of his system.

  "You bungled something so simple as changing a tire, and then just happened to stumble upon the doorstep of your ex-boyfriend."

  "He wasn't my ex-boyfriend. We didn't even really date."

  "Whatever. You then proceeded to tell him everything you didn't tell me, and then spent the weekend with him."

  "I spent the weekend at his cabin, trying to pull myself together." Elizabeth was getting pissed at having to defend herself.

  "And you stripped for him."

  Elizabeth's jaw fell open. She could not believe this was the angle Peter was taking on it.

  "Then, even though you are all up in everybody's business, you have no clue that this guy has written about you. And when you finally see him, you spend the evening with him instead of with your friends, and then you leave the party with him. Do I have it right?"

  "No."

  "What part is not correct?"

  "I mean, that's right, but not really." She was getting flustered at the cross examination. She hadn't expected this from Peter.

  "Did you or did you not spend the weekend with him?"

  "I spent time at his cabin, yes."

  "Did he see you without your clothes on?"

  "Mostly." Elizabeth looked down at her feet, ashamed.

  "Did you or did you not sneak off with him at Nancy's party?"

  "No, we didn't sneak off. We were just talking in private. I was shaken up by seeing him there. That weekend was a pretty low point in my life and I was embarrassed that he had witnessed it."

  "But then he brought you home."

  "Yes."

  "Did anything happen?"

  Elizabeth wanted to be outraged that Peter would even ask, but she was on the defensive and felt guilty about her behavior. About wanting to see him again when he asked. She paused for just a moment too long before responding, "No."

  He stood up. "If the adulterous shoe fits, Hester, then maybe you should wear it. I'm outta here." She shot to her feet in defiance, enraged that he would even dream of making that comment. She was so angry and hurt that she could not even form words.