The Incident

by Andrew Neiderman

  Yeah, there she would be beneath him, maybe in the van or maybe at his place, and suddenly she would scream, ‘It was you!’

  ‘Me?’ he’d claim, looking baby innocent. ‘I don’t need to force myself on any girl. Girls force themselves on me. If anyone in this place has been raped, it’s me.’

  ‘No, it was you,’ she’d say. ‘I couldn’t forget The Drill.’

  Oh, what the hell. Why deny it now? It’s years later. Who gives a shit?

  Yes, there she was coming out of that drugstore in South Fallsburgh, looking more grown-up than most girls her age. She was always cute, but now she was pretty. She looked like a woman and so different that he had to take a second and even third look. She was walking along, waiting to cross the street. He pulled over and watched her in his rearview mirror, and then he made a U-turn and followed her to her new car. He thought she might have glanced at him before she got in, but he couldn’t be sure. She didn’t look as if anything had frightened her, but, then again, how could simply seeing him frighten her? Or even talking to him?

  For fun, he waited for her to start her car and drive away. It gave him a charge, so he turned around again and followed her. When she turned at Old Falls, he knew she was going home. He should have gone home, too, and left well enough alone, but he didn’t. He continued to follow her. He liked toying with her. With all the time that had passed, he felt quite safe. Maybe it was past some statute of limitations anyway. One thing for sure, the police had long given up on solving it.

  He saw her glance in her rearview mirror and wondered if she realized it was him. She knew he didn’t live in her town. Maybe she was wondering if he was following her. She didn’t speed up and he didn’t pass her. He really did like teasing her. What would it be like now, he wondered, now that she was a woman? Surely, she’d got laid many times in college. That’s what he had heard about college girls – loose, often drunk, in orgies, as wild as the boys. Those sororities were just clubs for girls to find new boyfriends. That’s what he’d been told. It almost made him wish he had gone to college, but, then again, what for? He could get plenty here always. Maybe they were occasionally girls you’d like to put a paper bag over their heads, but in the dark all cats were the same, weren’t they?

  She looked a little freaked when he turned along with her at the main cross street in Centerville a good ten minutes later. And when they left the village and headed toward Sandburg, she did speed up. He deliberately didn’t, but he stayed on her tail.

  I don’t have to go faster to keep up with you, he thought. I know where you live; I always knew where you lived, even before that night.

  How would he do it now? He would be alone, of course; he didn’t need any help. Things would be different. What about crawling through her bedroom window late at night? He’d take off his clothes first. He could move like a snake if he had to. He’d slip in beside her naked and hold his new hunting knife to her throat and whisper, ‘Scream and I’ll kill your parents, too.’ Shit, she’d give right in. Then he’d go at her, softly at first. No sense in making noise. He’d keep one hand over her mouth and then, there he was, The Drill. Sometime along the way, he envisioned her closing her eyes and enjoying it. She might even think she was lucky.

  ‘Bet you never thought it could be like this. I got your sweet spot,’ he’d say.

  She wouldn’t speak. She didn’t have to.

  ‘Oh, you’re so much better,’ he would say. ‘Grown-up girls are definitely better, but then we didn’t think you were a virgin. You sure weren’t acting like a virgin. The way you stood out there in the street, not caring who was watching you. It was what we called a fuckin’ invitation.’

  He couldn’t laugh too loudly. He might wake her parents and that would be nasty, very nasty.

  When he was done, he would turn her over on her stomach and just lie there beside her, stroking her ass, calming her down.

  ‘Go to sleep,’ he might say. ‘If you’re good, I won’t come back. Tonight.’ He might even stay right there until he was sure she had fallen asleep or at least pretended she had. Then he’d slip out the window as quietly and gracefully as he had come in.

  He’d scoop up his clothes and put them on a little ways from the house. He knew exactly where: behind an old oak tree. He knew everything about that house and those grounds. He might even have a cigarette before going home. He would be that confident. Why, she wouldn’t even report it in the morning. And if she saw him somewhere days afterward, she would look away. Of course, he would smile. He might even be polite and make sure to say hello. ‘How are you?’

  He’d force her to look at him.

  ‘Fine, thank you,’ she would reply.

  The fantasy was getting him so excited that it was becoming uncomfortable. The drill was demanding more room. He loosened his pants and unzipped his fly. A little relief, but no satisfaction.

  He slowed up and when he saw her turn up the road to her house, he pulled over. He wanted to jerk off, but the heavy traffic kept him from doing it. People were looking at him, wondering why he was just sitting there. Frustrated, he made a sharp U-turn and sped off. He didn’t calm down for miles and until he had to slow for traffic. Then he took deep breaths and sat back.

  He wondered how long she would be here. Was she home for good? If she was, he would revisit that pussy. Then he realized he was acting nuts, pursuing her like this. Someone might spot him or she might even pull over and ask him why he was following her? One question could lead to another. Why put himself in this sort of danger?

  What the hell was it about that girl that made him crazy? Why couldn’t he just forget it all as he had for so long? Why the hell did she have to come back here anyway? Whatever happened would be her fault now.

  Unexpectedly, he grew sullen. There was something about her that made him feel inferior. That was it. She was still too damn smug. She should look mousey, timid, unattractive. She was looking too damn good. She looked as if she had left him so far in the past that he was non-existent. He had no effect on her life after all. It was as if he was the one who had been violated.

  For the longest time – years, in fact – he had felt powerful. Now he felt weak, and if there was one thing he didn’t like, it was being put down by any girl.

  This isn’t over, he thought. Not by a long shot.

  Maybe I’ll make it a regular thing. Every five years or so, I’ll be at her. We’ll have an anniversary.

  He laughed and felt better.

  Enjoy yourself while you can, he thought. I’m coming back, sweetie pie, coming back for another taste and another and another.

  He turned on the radio and started to sing along until he made the turn toward his home and a flood of bad memories from those high school days came rushing back like a wave crashing over him. There were so many nasty things in that water. His miserable home life, the way his father treated him, diminished him with his wisecracks. Even his mother didn’t come to his defense. And being poor, having to shoplift to get the stuff others got easily. Then there was his brother’s death, his mother’s bitterness. And forget about thinking it was all in the way of punishment for evil acts. Except for Louis’ death, much of it had happened before he was ten, for Christ’s sake.

  When he thought about it now, he concluded that he was just getting even with an unfair world. Why wasn’t he dealt some of those free passes? Why did he have to work twice as hard as some of his classmates, the ones from the well-to-do families? What he did didn’t stop the unfairness, but at least it made him feel better about himself. ‘Hurt me, I’ll hurt you,’ he said out loud to no one in particular.

  Or maybe God.

  All his life, people were waving God at him like some sort of threatening whip, especially his mother. But he didn’t fear God. There were too many so-called good people who had terrible things happen to them, like Dr Fairmont and his wife who were killed in a head-on two years ago on the Olympic Hill. He was minutes behind that accident and gaped at the sight. Both had hit the w
indshield so hard that it sent spidery cracks through it. If such a thing could happen to someone who helped people, saved them, what the hell?

  He saw no good and evil.

  There’s just me and you, he thought, and fuck yer, whenever I can.

  He laughed until he was in his driveway and had turned off the engine.

  Then he looked at his life looming in front of him. He’d never be rich. The girls he went with weren’t the sort that would make a good home for him and his kids. He couldn’t even imagine kids now. He drove a crap car, lived in an old house and didn’t have any real friends, no one really to depend on. Shit, now that he gave it some thought, what did he have to look forward to? He felt like punching someone in the face. Maybe he would tonight. Maybe he’d get good and drunk and do just that.

  Got to celebrate somehow, he thought.

  She’s back.

  And she looks better than ever.

  Probably thanks to me.

  After all, I opened her like a buried treasure.

  Me.

  The Drill.

  He stepped out and walked into a shadow as if that was truly where he lived.

  SIX

  Although the details of the Incident became painful to recall even with the passage of time, Victoria often vividly remembered every moment of the morning after. She never stopped questioning herself. Could she have done more to help solve it? Was it the fault of lazy, indifferent police or did she just want to forget so much that capturing the villains wasn’t as important? How terrible would that be?

  She was still in the hospital the day after, of course. Sometimes the scene would flash in her mind like the scene of a movie she knew she would never forget. There were other post-Incident scenes. For a long while, they would recur just before she fell asleep. It was why she hated going to sleep, being mentally unoccupied, even for a few minutes.

  She was back there again.

  ‘Lieutenant Marcus,’ the policewoman had said when she introduced herself, and then quickly had changed it to Patty Marcus. ‘I’m with the state police. Your local police department has asked us to step in and help with the investigation,’ she added, emphasizing local as if it was derogatory.

  Victoria’s eyes were barely open. It felt better to keep them nearly shut when she was awake. Her bed had been tilted up the way it was when she ate the little she ate. Now she was dozing in and out. She had been in the hospital less than twenty-four hours, although she had no sense of time then. She wasn’t even sure whether it was morning or afternoon. The tray of food beside her, however, told her she had been served lunch.

  Her body still ached, but they had cut back on pain medicine. She wasn’t aware that the main reason was so she could talk to this policewoman, who stood there with a clipboard in her right hand, held against the side of her body, looking more like a basketball or baseball coach. She reached for the chair nearby and brought it closer to the bed.

  ‘I’m going to need you to tell me everything you remember, every detail no matter how small or insignificant you might think it is. Understand?’ she asked. Without waiting for a response, she took a pen out of her breast pocket and rested the clipboard in her lap. ‘Let’s confirm some basic stuff first,’ she continued. ‘Your name is Victoria Myers and you’re fifteen years old. Your birthdate is April seventh, 1947, and you currently reside at twelve Wildwood Drive, correct?’

  Victoria stared at her. She was intrigued with the light but visible hair over her lip. Granted, it looked like peach fuzz, but why would a woman want it visible at all? Maybe it was the medication she was on, but suddenly she could see the smallest details in everything. It reminded her of Gulliver in that part of Gulliver’s Travels when he was in Brobdingnag and he was the tiny one. All the imperfections in the giant people’s faces were exaggerated. Skin pores look like deep holes and nostrils like caverns.

  ‘Correct?’ Lieutenant Marcus said, a little louder.

  ‘Yes,’ Victoria said, both happy and surprised at the sound of her own voice. She thought she had lost it.

  ‘I know it’s early on here, but we find it’s best to interview victims as close to the event as possible. So …’ Lieutenant Marcus improved her posture as though that really mattered now or as though she was preparing to go on some sort of fast ride, like a test pilot. ‘You were walking home through the wooded area because …’

  She waited.

  Oh. I’m going to finish sentences, Victoria thought. It’s like a game. ‘It’s a shortcut from the center of the village to my house,’ she recited.

  ‘OK. About what time was this? When you started out for home from the village, that is.’

  ‘It was just a little past ten thirty. I have to be home by eleven.’

  ‘And who were you with just before you left the village?’

  Now she was going to get someone else in trouble, she thought, but she had a feeling that this policewoman knew the answers to the questions she was asking.

  ‘Wayne Gerson and Tommy Marks. They go to my school. They gave me a lift from Sandburg Lake.’

  ‘To the village?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She stared at Victoria a moment. ‘Did you ask them to take you home?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did they know you were going home?’

  She thought about it. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Let’s talk about the time you were at the lake. Were you with friends?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And they were?’

  ‘Mindy Fein, Jena Daniels and Toby Weintraub,’ she recited. ‘Mindy and Jena are in my class. Toby’s a senior.’

  Lieutenant Marcus looked as if she was checking things off.

  ‘Now, at the lake, did you tell anyone about your shortcut home?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did Mindy, Jena or Toby know that was how you would go home?’

  ‘Jena and Mindy knew I take the shortcut, but …’

  ‘But?’

  ‘Mindy disappeared with someone at the lake and Jena …’

  ‘Drank too much and fell asleep?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. She obviously knew that, Victoria thought, so why deny it?

  ‘Did this Wayne and Tommy know that was your route home?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t think so.’

  ‘If you were worried about getting home on time, why didn’t you ask them to take you?’

  ‘They were interested in being in the village. I didn’t have a chance to ask them,’ she said. She didn’t want to say that they were looking for someone to buy them more beer since they were underage, but maybe Lieutenant Marcus already knew that, too?

  Lieutenant Marcus had the sort of face that seemed devoid of expression most of the time. She couldn’t tell if the policewoman was doubting her or thinking or what.

  ‘Did they drink too much, too?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. She really didn’t know what was too much.

  ‘Did you? You drank at the lake,’ she quickly added.

  ‘I wasn’t drunk when I started for home.’

  ‘Have you been drunk?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So how do you know you weren’t?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Do you think it’s possible you told the boys you were going to take the shortcut but forgot? Do you think you might have told someone at the lake but forgot?’

  ‘No.’

  Lieutenant Marcus looked down at her clipboard. ‘OK, so you started out for home from the village. How do you get on to the path in the woods?’

  She described the alleyway between Kayfield’s and Trustman’s and the turn where the path began.

  ‘Did you look back before you were completely through the alleyway?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you see anyone watching you go into the alleyway?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I mean, boys looked at me when I got out of the truck, but I can’t remember if any were still watching me.’


  ‘How long were you in the village after you got out of the truck?’

  ‘Just long enough to put my clothes on.’

  ‘Clothes on?’

  ‘I mean over my bathing suit.’

  ‘Why didn’t you put your clothes on before you got into the truck?’

  ‘I was … just thinking about going home.’

  ‘Were you running away from something or someone?’

  ‘I was with someone but I didn’t want to be with him anymore,’ she said. ‘Yes.’

  This time Lieutenant Marcus’s look was sharper. Although she showed little evidence of it, Victoria’s replies were beginning to pique the Lieutenant’s interest.

  ‘Tell me what you remember about who you were with,’ she said and sat back again.

  ‘He’s a city boy. From the Bronx. His friends called him Spike. We saw them in the village before we went to the lake and then they came to us at the lake.’

  ‘Did he give you something to drink?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All right. Describe him.’

  ‘Describe him?’

  ‘Tall, short, heavy, thin – what?’

  ‘He was quite a bit taller than I am.’

  Lieutenant Marcus looked at her clipboard. ‘You’re five six. So he was a little over six feet?’

  ‘I guess.’

  ‘Go on. Do you remember his eye color, hair color, any distinguishing features, scars … anything?’

  ‘He had dark hair, more black than brown. His eyes were more like … I don’t know, gray or something. I remember thinking he looked a lot like Marlon Brando in Mutiny on the Bounty.’

  Lieutenant Marcus smirked. ‘So he wore what? A leather jacket?’

  ‘No, just a black T-shirt and jeans with … yes, shoes that looked like boots, you know. Short boots. Oh. He had a watch with a silver band.’