Bittersweet Dreams (33 page)

He stood back and watched her drink half of it in one gulp.

“Daddy?”

“They've recorded the events and dates that Allison entered in her diary and continued their investigation based on that. Lisa Morris was interviewed yesterday, and the date that Allison claimed to be at her home when Mr. Taylor came by to pick her up is not right. Lisa's mother had taken her to the orthodontist that day. Allison couldn't have been there.”

“What's the big deal? Maybe she just got the dates confused,” I said.

“This is a criminal case, Mayfair. It goes to court. You can't claim dates and events that don't prove true and undermine Allison's credibility. It makes the diary nearly worthless.”

“Didn't Lisa describe the things Allison had told her, though?”

“The assistant DA said she did describe some of those things but in a very vague and confused way. He said she isn't going to be a good witness. She is in Allison's class, and when she was asked if she had seen any of the things Allison claimed were happening in the classroom between her and Mr. Taylor, she said no. Apparently, they've quietly questioned some of the other students and have yet to find one who corroborates any of the things Allison claimed. It doesn't seem like he singled her out.”

“But they had the pass he wrote for her to get her out of study hall, didn't they?” I asked. “Allison told me about that just the other day,” I quickly added.

“Yes, but that only confirms that she helped him correct quizzes. Apparently, he did that with other students in his class, many of them boys. It's not something no other teacher in your school does, anyway, Mayfair.”

Julie sucked back a sob and drank the rest of her Cosmopolitan. “Make me another, Roger,” she commanded.

“What else did the district attorney say?” I asked. I could feel my stomach tightening into a knotted ball of rubber bands.

My father sighed. Julie uttered a small moan. He prepared another drink for her. “In light of this,” he said, “but something he probably would have done anyway, Taylor's attorney, who saw a wide hole to drive through, asked the court to assign a child psychologist to interview Allison.”

Maybe they'd assign Dr. Burns, I wanted to say, but any attempt at humor to lighten the moment would surely go over like a lead balloon.

“A girl as young as Allison, under such pressure and emotional tension, is easily capable of getting some facts confused,” I offered.

Julie turned to me. “You think so?”

As if I had it underlined in the book I held, I lifted the volume for emphasis. “Of course. All those young girls are under great pressure. They're afraid to say anything that would involve them in any way with what's happening. Many might have been warned by their parents to keep their mouths shut. If the district attorney is good, he'll know how to navigate and build his case.”

Julie looked a little relieved, but my father only offered a knowing smile, like someone who realized I was humoring a desperately worried person.

I left them.

I wanted to go right into her room and ask Allison more about Lisa from what I knew she had written, but I was still reluctant to reveal that I had read her diary, and my father had already asked me to try to help calm things down by avoiding any conversations about what had occurred.

The only thing I did discuss with Allison, a few days later, was her upcoming session with a court-appointed psychologist. She knew I had gone to Dr. Burns, of course, so she relied on my experience.

“It's just a lot of talking, Allison,” I told her. “He's not going to make you feel bad. Tell him the truth, and tell him what makes you feel better to tell someone. Just the way you revealed everything to me, in fact.”

She told my father and Julie that I had given her older-sisterly advice about her upcoming interview, and my father came to my room to let me know how proud he was of what I was doing to make the situation easier for Allison.

“Julie just said that it's at times like this when she really appreciates how mature and bright you are, Mayfair. I think she wanted me to express that to you, too.”

“Did she?”

“Yes, she did.”

He hugged and kissed me on the cheek before leaving. Secretly, of course, I was very frightened for Allison, as I was for myself.

The proverbial other shoe dropped two days after Allison's session. The district attorney called Julie and my father in again, this time to tell them the psychologist's report was going to be devastating to any prosecution. The heavy depression that had fallen over the house only seemed to get thicker.

“This is getting to look more and more like a disaster for all of us,” my father declared.

“He's just got a very good lawyer,” I told him and Julie. “Lawyers would defend Satan if they were paid enough.”

Neither of them cared to argue or had much more to say about it.

One night soon after, my father came to my bedroom to tell me the school board was requesting that he and Julie attend a special closed session to discuss the matter. Julie said she felt like someone who had stuck her head out the window of a 747 jet. Previously, she had gathered a half dozen of her friends, mothers of other students at the school, and they had demanded a special session with the school board and administrators. The big question was how something like this could occur at a school as small as ours and right under the eyes of other teachers and staff. The conclusion the parents came to was that someone obviously was not supervising properly. My father attended the meeting, too, and I heard them discussing it afterward at home. The promise was made to conduct a vigorous investigation. But there was also the big possibility that some heads would roll.

This time, things went quite differently. I heard them arrive back home and waited in my room. Allison was already asleep. I think she had fled to bed out of fear more than anything. I went downstairs. They were both in the living room. My father was having a Scotch and soda, and Julie was sitting on the settee looking stunned.

“What's happened now?” I asked.

“It wasn't pretty,” my father said.

Julie cried, “How can I ever look my friends in the face?”

“There'll be a story in the paper,” my father said. “Of course, Allison's name won't be mentioned.”

“But everyone will know what's happened and who it's happened to,” Julie moaned.

“I don't understand. What went on?” I asked.

“Alan Taylor's lawyer was present,” my father said. He could easily start a lawsuit, but Mr. Taylor's not interested in prolonging this. Under the circumstances, everyone else was quite relieved.”

Alan Taylor was going to act like he was doing everyone a favor, but I was sure what he was really worried about was it going any longer and my coming forward. Allison's diary inaccuracies and fragility were one thing. If I were the witness, it would be a totally different situation. I could describe details of his apartment, where we got the pizza, even the wine he had served me, and both Julie and my father would remember that was an evening I did not call or come home for dinner. Maybe he'd be concerned that someone had seen us together. If the police really investigated, it could come to that. No psychologist or misdated diary was going to change it, good defense attorney or not.

Of course, there was the possibility that people would still think I was out to avenge my family, my stepsister, and anyway, I didn't think my father and Julie were up to another barrage of depositions, investigators, and public scrutiny.

“Damage is done to the school as it is. It will be mentioned in the stories, of course, and this sort of thing is not good for a private school always looking for potential new students with parents who have fat checkbooks,” my father said.

“Mr. Taylor didn't ask for anything in return?”

“A good recommendation, apologies. He's already lined up a new job, apparently.”

“You didn't apologize to him, did you, Daddy?”

“No.”

Julie sobbed harder. She looked up at me. “You believed her,” she asked with some note of hope in her voice. “Why?”

All of a sudden, my opinion was very important to her. Was this my time to make my case, start them at Alan Taylor again, and once more turn the school topsy-turvy?

I looked at my father. Should I do it? Should I tell them both exactly why?

“There's no point in doing this sort of thing to ourselves,” my father said, sensing my reluctance. “Let's not go over it and over it. It's done. Over. Let's just work on our recuperation. Get things back to normal as quickly as we can.” He looked to me for confirmation.

I said nothing. I turned and went up to my room.

In the days that followed, Julie seemed to wither right in front of me. Her arrogant posture and condescending tone were gone. She practically tiptoed, slouched over, and was unusually quiet at dinner. My father was upset and did the best he could to cheer her up, but she often broke into periods of sobbing.

This time, I took the opportunity to suggest that she go see Dr. Burns. “If there was ever a time when someone needed some therapy, Julie, it's now, and it's you.”

After she flew out of the room, my father told me he didn't think that was funny.

“It's not meant to be funny, Daddy,” I told him. “She's obviously in a bad depression and needs either some medication or counseling. She's not eating properly. She's spending too much time sleeping. Next thing you know, she'll abuse alcohol or drugs.”

He frowned, but I could see he was taking me seriously and wondering if having her see someone for professional counseling wasn't indeed necessary.

Both he and Julie were worried about Allison, too, but oddly, when Allison returned to school, her friends treated her more like a heroine than a girl who had done something evil. Allison told me about their conversations. She claimed that many of her friends refused to believe it hadn't all been true. I understood that they could talk about Alan Taylor openly, since he wasn't in our school any longer. Now that they weren't in front of a district attorney or giving a deposition, they comfortably swore that Mr. Taylor did single Allison out and spent more time with her than he did with them. Some even claimed to have had similar experiences. It was like one of those mass-hypnosis situations. Maybe they thought it made them look older or more sophisticated to have been titillated, teased, and inappropriately touched. So Allison had gone a little too far with her accusations. So what? She did what she had to do, didn't she?

I stood back and watched her in school and laughed to myself when I saw how popular she had become. It made me feel a little better about the outcome. Everyone wanted to know the details about her being questioned by the district attorney and a psychologist and about the things she had said. She got away with it by admitting that she had exaggerated a little, but saying Mr. Taylor had still been after her “bod.” In any case, after a while, I thought she had outdone her mother when it came to being a little arrogant. She was the one strutting around the house, not Julie. Her phone was always ringing, and invitations for parties and dinners with friends were constantly being offered to her.

I was the one who had new troubles in school. I had forgotten about the bitches of
Macbeth
. They boiled their venom and came at me whenever they could with their snide remarks about how bad an influence I was on Allison. Most of the time, I ignored them, but one afternoon outside the library, I decided enough was enough.

“Your little stepsister is quite the liar, isn't she?” Joyce Brooker asked me. She practically put her face right up against mine. “I guess you trained her well.”

“Afraid she's competition for you?” I replied, not backing up a step.

“Just whose fantasies were they?” Cora Addison asked, stepping up beside her with her hands on her hips. “Yours or hers?”

I spun around on her and smiled. “I think she told me she overheard you dreaming out loud and got her ideas from that.”

“That was a silly question, Cora,” Denise Hartman said. “They can't possibly have been
her
fantasies. They involved someone with a penis.”

They all laughed.

That brought some other students around to listen and watch, and then more gathered to see what was happening to cause such interest.

“From what I hear, you're the one around here who's involved with more penises than an urologist,” I replied.

“A what?” Cora asked.

“Oh, I forgot. You're a little slow and need someone to translate English for you.”

“You're such a freak,” Denise said. “No wonder your stepsister is so screwed up. Who wouldn't be screwed up living with you?”

“What did your father do to have someone like you, take drugs?” Joyce said.

“No,” Cora said over their laughter. “He has to take them now, now that he has to live with her and admit to being her father.”

“Unlike your father, who's not sure he
is
your father, is that it?” I fired back.

“Bitch,” she said.

“That's what I hear the boys around here call you, ‘my bitch,' ” I said.

Everyone howled, and Cora turned bright pink. She looked at her audience and then, without any warning, swung her pocketbook at me and caught me on the left side of my head. She must have had something heavy in it, because it dazed me. I stumbled and then lost my footing and slipped on the short step at the library door. When I fell, everyone took off in every possible direction.

I heard Mr. Martin call my name as I was struggling to my feet. “What's going on here?” he asked, helping me up. “My goodness, your head's bleeding, Mayfair. What happened?”

I felt my temple and looked at my fingers. The amount of blood didn't surprise me. “It's all right. Head wounds usually bleed like this,” I told him.