by Emily Layden
The 1996 yearbook in particular became a focal point of Louisa’s obsession: she spent long stretches staring at the space where Karen’s picture should have been, as if the slim rectangle between Kimberly Michaels and Melissa Moody might suddenly open like a chasm, a maw of answers. She studied like a map the class picture taken on graduation, desperate to ask each girl cradling a red rose in a long white dress what she knew about their erstwhile classmate. Was she someone who deserved to get kicked out, someone for whom smoking cigarettes was just an unfortunate last straw, an anticlimax in a series of greater offenses? And what about the man Karen said raped her: Did they know who he was? And what happened to him?
And maybe this is where she should have known, should have realized what was coming: Ms. Doyle guided them away from a feature on Karen herself and the allegation. If the Courant hadn’t broken all the details with the resources of an entire fully funded newsroom, she’d said, then it was unlikely that the Heron could do it with a half-dozen writers inside four weeks. Plus, she’d added: Even if they were to cultivate leads, they were likely to reach a number of dead ends due to the confidentiality that governed the case’s ongoing legal proceedings.
Ultimately they decided, together, to do an issue on sexual assault and healthy relationships generally. They’d talk to psychologists and lawyers and public health experts. They’d survey the Atwater student body to gauge their understanding of and feelings about sexual violence. They might not know what happened to Karen Mirro, but they were vaguely aware that the laws of forward progress dictated that the landscape should have improved in the twenty years since her accusation; had it? And if not, why not? It was smart: A trapdoor into the controversy. Ms. Doyle herself had helped them open it. And then she shut it.
A bubble blinks in the top corner of Louisa’s screen, alerting her to an iMessage from Anjali.
How r u feeling?
Annoyed?
Same
I just keep going over it in my head.
tbh I don’t blame Ms. Doyle tho
Really?
This surprises Louisa. Between them, Anjali is the hot-tempered one.
Yea I mean I think she seemed pretty upset too
U know?
I guess so.
I still think she should have stood up for us though.
Maybe she did tho
We don’t know what Brodie said
Do you think there’s anything else we can do?
We still have time
Louisa watches the ellipses appear and disappear as Anjali types, deletes, retypes.
Maybe we *should* ask Brodie for a meeting?
She has office hours on Tuesdays
Louisa considers this. She can count on one hand the number of conversations she’s had with Patricia Brodie: she spoke to her at an Accepted Students’ Day after she was admitted; at the end of each academic year, Mrs. Brodie visited the Heron room to thank the staff for its service to the school; and during her sophomore year, Mrs. Brodie sat in on Louisa’s history class and held her back afterward to express how impressed she was with Louisa’s questions. It was generally Louisa’s understanding that Mrs. Brodie did two things for the school: she made the rules, and she visited alumnae to ask for money.
Okay.
* * *
Mrs. Brodie’s office is cavernous. It is also, technically, from what Louisa can tell, at least three rooms in one. Her assistant, Ms. Hanifin, has her own office that functions as a kind of waiting area for visitors, which is where Louisa and Anjali sat in spindle-backed chairs for twelve minutes while they waited for Mrs. Brodie, who was—predictably, Ms. Hanifin said—running behind schedule. From Ms. Hanifin’s office they were ushered by Mrs. Brodie herself into the Head’s office, which was at least twice the size of any classroom in Schoolhouse (although, it should be noted, not any larger than the science classrooms). The back of the room features a three-sided picture window, from which Mrs. Brodie and her guests can see the forest and the Litchfield Hills, alight as they are now with the full spectrum of fall foliage: amber-tinged maple leaves and bloodred oaks and bright, Crayola-yellow poplars. In front of the window, facing into the room, three tables are puzzled together to make a kind of three-sided desk; to the left of the desk as they walk in, a round and heavy-bottomed table centers four chairs like those Louisa and Anjali waited in. Beyond the table, another door is halfway open, revealing in the shadows the contours of Mrs. Brodie’s private bathroom. This makes sense to Louisa, who finds herself imagining how awkward it would be for everyone involved if Mrs. Brodie had to poop in a stall in one of the regular bathrooms. She realizes she’s smirking, imagining the absurdity of Mrs. Brodie pooping, and she curls her bottom lip beneath her teeth, biting back the nervous laughter that threatens to burst forth.
Mrs. Brodie seems to fit the room she occupies, which is not to say that she is cavernous but that she is equally impressive: tall, thin, with angled cheekbones and beady, dark eyes. Today she is in her standard uniform—a kind of androgynous set popular among serious and still-working women in their sixties and seventies, khakis beneath a turtleneck and a red cardigan, topped with a patterned silk scarf tied in a loose knot, centered at her sternum. Louisa imagines that Mrs. Brodie was pretty in her own way, once, in the way that skinny and angular people are.
Mrs. Brodie slides a chair from where it’s nestled at the edge of the round table, and motions for the girls to do the same. She places her palms in her lap and leans back in her chair and smiles at the girls; as if by reflex, Louisa smiles in return.
“Thanks so much for making the time, ladies. I know how busy you girls are.” This opening statement strikes Louisa as absolutely ludicrous. As busy and overextended as Louisa perpetually feels—in this very moment she is reviewing the to-do list she keeps shelved in the back corner of her skull, a running tab of homework and projects and pages to read and emails to answer and summer program deadlines—she knows they are not, in fact, any busier than the Head of School.
“I also want to thank you both for all the time and effort you’ve put into the Heron over the years,” Mrs. Brodie continues. “A vibrant and widely read student newspaper is absolutely essential to our community health and identity. Would you believe me if I told you I still keep the front page of our bicentennial issue on my fridge?” She says this with such wide-eyed delight that Louisa leans back slightly, the back of her rib cage crunching against the chair. And then Mrs. Brodie allows her face to drop, her smile to shift to a frown, her eyebrows to inch toward one another. “Now,” she says, “I understand that you’re feeling a little disappointed about changing direction for the first issue.”
Louisa notices that Mrs. Brodie does not use any specific noun to direct the change, as though the change in direction is happening of its own accord, as if by magic. Next to her, Anjali shifts forward in her seat, cocking her chin at an upward-tilting angle.
“We worked really hard on this issue, Mrs. Brodie. We believe that it’s fair, and well reported, and well reasoned.” Anjali and Louisa had gone over their talking points during lunch. They were to focus on the quality of the writing and the judiciousness with which they’d selected their features. At some point, they would pivot to the significance of the topic matter, which they would pitch as relevant regardless of the Karen Mirro situation.
“I believe you,” Mrs. Brodie nods. “And I wish we could all share in your work. I really do.”
“If we cut the alumnae letters,” Louisa interjects, “the issue will be free of any reference to Karen Mirro or the ongoing … um, case.” Louisa didn’t know if a lawsuit was technically a case, but it seemed against their best interests to use the word “scandal.”
Mrs. Brodie nods again. Louisa looks at Anjali. “And yet,” she begins, lowering her chin and peering over the top of her tiny, delicate, wire-framed glasses: “It wouldn’t be hard to make the connection, yes?”
Anjali and Louisa exchange a look.
“What if…” Louisa pauses,
the nervousness of a new idea pulsing at her temples: “What if its relevance is exactly the reason—from a public relations perspective—to publish it?”
Anjali’s head whips in Louisa’s direction, her eyebrows raised. Louisa has veered far off script.
“And what do you mean by that, Louisa?” Mrs. Brodie drops her chin a degree more.
“If we cut the Opinion section, with the alumna letters, then the issue could be received and interpreted as an effort on the school’s part to cultivate a healthy and safe environment”—Louisa realizes her sentence has brought her to a cliff, and the cliff is the word “sex,” which she would rather die than say in this room to Mrs. Brodie—“where, um, relationships are concerned.”
Actually, Louisa does not have a hard time imagining Mrs. Brodie having sex. She’s old, sure—maybe sixty-five, sixty-eight—but she’s really kind of elegant, and it’s sort of fascinating to imagine a time when she might let her guard down.
“So,” Louisa continues, emboldened by the fact that Mrs. Brodie has not yet interrupted her or otherwise kicked her out of their office, “in a way, publishing the issue supports the idea that Atwater is a place that protects and nurtures not only the academic growth but also the social-emotional well-being of its girls.” Louisa remembers that phrase—“social-emotional well-being”—from the Peer Educator application, which she thought about submitting before she was named coeditor of the Heron.
“Have you considered joining our debate team, Ms. Manning?”
Louisa knows this kind of compliment. Adults always do this: tell her she’s smart, precocious, exceptional in some way unrelated to the task at hand—before denying her whatever she’s really asking for. “I think I have a full plate as it is,” she says, to be polite.
“I’m sure you do. While you make a compelling point, Louisa, I believe that Atwater has other policies and practices we can point to as fostering an environment that—as you say—nurtures the social-emotional well-being of our students.”
Louisa can hear the air quotes around the last phrase, as if Mrs. Brodie is mocking her.
“In fact, I would argue that a newspaper issue dedicated to—what are you calling it? Sexual health?—may actually be a detriment to the emotional health of many of your classmates, who might see the obvious connection and feel confronted by a topic they find confusing or even triggering.”
Anjali can’t help herself: “So that’s why no one is talking to us about Karen Mirro? Because it might be triggering?”
“Ms. Reddi, I understand that you’re upset right now. I would suggest that you talk to your Dorm Parent or one of the school counselors if you find the topic of sexual assault an emotional challenge.”
“It’s not the topic. It’s the fact that nobody tells us anything,” Anjali snaps. “It’s the lack of information that presents an emotional challenge.”
“I think what we’re trying to say is,” Louisa begins, afraid that Anjali has crossed a line, “we think that this is a really important issue—one that does a service to the school. And it’s really good, too. It’s the best one I’ve been a part of.”
There is a long pause while Mrs. Brodie adjusts in her seat, her shoulders bobbing as she shifts her crossed legs. “Has either of you ever heard of a sand mandala?”
Anjali shifts her head to one side, raises an eyebrow.
“No? Sand mandalas are a Tibetan Buddhist tradition. Tibetan monks construct these gorgeous, massive—I mean, really huge”—she spreads her arms wide, gesturing at the circumference of the table—“designs out of grains of colored sand. First, the monks draw the mandala—mandalas are these incredibly intricate, ornate, symmetrical designs that typically symbolize the complexity of the universe. So the monks sketch the mandala, and then—instead of painting it—they use straws and funnels and teeny tiny scrapers to lay millions of infinitesimal grains of colored sand on top of the design. It takes them weeks or even months to finish one. And the absolute focus and steadfastness required? I mean, you can’t even sneeze!
“And when you look at a sand mandala from a distance, you can’t even tell that it’s made of sand—it looks like paint.
“But then, after all that—after hours and hours and hours, one grain of sand at a time—they destroy it. Just wipe it all away.”
“Why?”
“The destruction of the mandala is meant to symbolize the transitory nature of things, the idea that everything that passes across this earth does so only fleetingly. But I like to think that the whole thing is also about valuing the process over the product, you know?” She pauses, waiting for some kind of affirmation from the young women in front of her. “You ladies are like the monks, you see: You did the work, with diligence and dedication. You built your issue, grain by grain. And now…”
“And now we have to destroy it,” Anjali says flatly.
Mrs. Brodie tilts her chin toward the ceiling, her eyes searching the beams above. “You’re better for the work,” she says. “And now you have to share that wisdom with the school in other ways.”
* * *
Louisa loses a game of rock-paper-scissors with Anjali, and so it’s her job to send the news to the Heron group text. She does this as she walks back to Whitney, long balloons slipping into the chat as quickly as she steps.
Hey guys. We just met with Mrs. Brodie to appeal. It’s a no-go. I’m really sorry, and I just want to say that I’m so proud of the work everyone put in on this issue. We’ll meet on Monday as usual to regroup.
Noo:'(
that bitch
This is some bullshit
what did she say
Louisa thinks about the sand mandala.
The same stuff Ms. Doyle said.
So sorry L.
we should just publish it anyway
Yeah!
I mean what could they do? Fire all of us?
lol probably
Hah
But seriously
Don’t delete any of your work. Leave it loaded in InCopy. I want to hang on to it.
Why
K
I still believe in the concept, so maybe it’s something we can revisit when this whole thing is over.
sounds good
* * *
In a typical school day, most Atwater students do not check their school email more than once or twice. Very few of them have it linked to their phones, because the Outlook app is, in a word, “annoying,” and so they prefer to just check their mail from their computers. Anyway, nothing distributed via email is ever all that urgent, and so there’s no real reason to have it an icon-tap away.
This is how Louisa knows something is wrong when she wakes up the next morning to a barrage of texts telling her to check her email.
From Anjali: Omg check your email
From Hitomi: What is this email!
On the Heron group chat:
Everybody check your email!!!!!!!
omg who did this
A and L was this u guys
o shit
Louisa crawls to the front of her bed and reaches across the floor to her desk, where her laptop sleeps in its charger. Pulling her computer back into her lap and nestling into her pillows, she flips open her screen and enters her password. In seconds she’s on her email, where the most recent message—sent at 12:02 A.M.—is from [email protected].
Louisa immediately feels sick. She is struck by a number of entirely improbable and yet—in her panicked state—plausible scenarios: Did she sleepwalk last night, in her dreams building an anonymous account to smear the Head of School? She’s read about fugue states; maybe one happened to her? Can anyone account for her whereabouts at 12:02 A.M.?
Inside the email is a single link, and Louisa recognizes the URL before she clicks. It’s the same format they use when they distribute the digital version of the Heron to the school after it goes to print. With her breath caught in her chest, she clicks through, some tiny corner of her brain still hopeful that it isn’t exa
ctly what she knows it is, her hope alive as long as the page loads.
But there it is: the entire issue.
STATE OF PLAY: GIRLS AND SEX
THE DEFENDER: ONE ALUM’S FIGHT
AGAINST MILITARY ASSAULT
TIME FOR A CHANGE? WHY WE NEED
A TITLE IX FOR THE MODERN ERA
There’s the graphic Mia designed (Getting Help After Sexual Assault), a flowchart of pathways for how to report and how to find support. There’s Macy and Bryce’s survey, the private lives of 280 of her classmates folded into graphs: a pie chart cleaved in half to reflect the 50 percent of students who reported talking to their parents about consent; another sliced to account for the places Atwater girls learned about sex, with a triangle sized at 18 percent to represent the number of students who cited “porn” (a number that seemed low to Louisa, if she was being honest, although she allowed that “learning about” sex from porn was different than merely watching it, which even she had done once or twice out of curiosity). A bar graph ranked the places an Atwater student was most likely to seek help if they or someone they knew were in an unhealthy relationship: “a friend” towered like a skyscraper (193 of the 278 responses) over “a family member” (46 responses) and “a trusted nonrelative adult” (28). Even now, Louisa feels the familiar swelling of pride at a job well done.
She scrolls back through the PDF, looking for—she can’t help it—any mistakes, any misspellings or misplaced punctuation or dropped quote marks. Usually, she and Anjali (and sometimes Hitomi) do a round of copy edits once the files are all loaded in, one last polish while Mia waits impatiently to finish layout. It becomes a bit of a competition between the three of them, who can find the most errors.
Louisa feels her heart in her throat. On the second page of the file, on what would be the first inside page of the newspaper if they had gone to print, at the very top, beneath the words “FROM THE EDITORS”: