The Collar

She handed over her ticket to the man at the door and he checked off her name.

“Excuse me,” she asked him, her voice shaky, “where do I sit please?”

He leered at her and she pulled back. Pretty, she was used to unwelcomed attention, and it always made her stomach lurch, especially today. He grabbed her hand, then laughed as she tried to pull away, pointing to her ticket.  

“Seat A3, a window.”

Blushing, legs shaking, she tried not to scurry up the steps, tried to keep her face from cracking as she looked for her number on the rack above the seats. There was a young man sitting in the aisle seat in her row. She almost got off the bus; but she could not afford to miss this chance. There was only a short window of time for the child. Though a bus would take longer, the people organizing the operation had told her that neither the media nor the aggressive activists out to kill her were likely to cover a bus station. Besides, people had gone to some trouble to send decoys via the train, in vans (with a variety of the expected organizations logos) and one on a plane. So she agreed to the bus. She suspected the usual protesters would assume she was coming by plane, train, or maybe even car or van, but they would never suspect the bus.

“Excuse me?” she pointed to her seat with her book-holding, purse-hanging hand as she placed her black bag in the rack above, next to a battered, tired satchel.

“Oh, sure,” he said and stood up and stepped into the aisle to let her in.

Thank god I did not have to squeeze by him, she said to herself, one of the rare times she had thanked the man upstairs, even reflexively, in the last few months. Catching herself she took it back as she sat down.

“Thank you,” she whispered to the stranger, her eyes cast down towards her seat.

She tried not to slump against the cushioned back as she tucked her purse to the window side and put the book in her lap. Pulling back the grimy orange and teal curtain, she glanced outside as the bus began to rumble, then back up. Her shoulders heaved as she silently sighed. She opened her book, Rigoberta’s autobiography, hardly material to keep her mind off things—what was she thinking?

She took the heavily creased paper from the book and read it over, yet again. . .

Name: Kailey Robertson

Age: 11

Gender: Female

Height: 4’ 9”

Weight: 82 lbs.

Physical description: Black hair, brown eyes, olive skin.

Aspect: Withdrawn, unable to make eye contact, refuses to respond to questions. According to mother, victim has not eaten since incident.

Case history: Mother brought daughter in because of suspected rape by stepfather. Physical examination revealed repeated violent sexual assaults, likely over the last several months. Victim is 2 months pregnant.

Requested treatment: When informed of pregnancy, victim vomited. Given treatment options (each option was explained in detail, due to victim’s age and lack of response), victim gave a soft nod to option of termination.

Police briefs were always so bleak. In this case they had the DNA evidence and, although the child refused to press charges, or even name her attacker, or even talk at all, they were going to press charges for statutory rape. Of course, on the rare chance that the case went to trial, the rapist would receive a maximum of three years, if he was found guilty.

. . . ‘a soft nod,’ a gentle or caring soul had taken the notes, as suggested by the humanity of including the adjective in the medical report. Maybe that’s why they finally got some kind of response, some semblance of life. All other records revealed a catatonic young girl with overt symptoms of depression: not eating, not sleeping for the first week and then sleeping almost solid for the next and not responding to any stimulus—counselors, pictures, questions, videos, music, friends . . .

Friends. . . what eleven-year-old wants her friends to see her in the hospital knowing she’s been raped. She herself hadn’t wanted to see anyone when it had happened to her, and she’d been twenty-three. She couldn’t imagine her reaction had it happened when she was eleven. Her own experience was part of why she had agreed to perform the operation, though no one outside her tight circle of friends, and one counselor, could possibly have known what she shared with the victim. She had never gone to the police and she still wondered if she should have, if it would have made any difference.  Her experience with violent offenders against women reminded her that the odds of a conviction were low and the odds a painfully traumatic court room cross examination quite high.

Of course, the situation was different, and not just due to her age at the time. Not a stepfather, her attacker; instead, a student in her dorm from another floor. . .

She looked out the window as the bus rolled to a stop. Dusty town, bells ringing in the church tower, people walking up the steps for a Holy Day mass; she couldn’t even remember which one it was. I wonder if they realize?, she thought.

“Excuse me?”

She turned to the stranger, “Yes?”

“You wonder if they realize what?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, turning toward her seat mate, eyes on her left arm, “ I didn’t mean to say it out loud, didn’t even realize I had.”

His eyes followed her gaze out the window.

 “What would church goers need to realize?” he asked.

She watched the wrinkles between his eyes form, just above his bumpy nose, as his pale blue eyes widened. Damn, this was not a bus ride conversation.

“Please, I’d rather not talk about it,” she said, noticing her hands were shaking.

“But you seem upset. I’m not trying to intrude, just to understand.”

She looked at him and saw an open, honest expression, a look framed with care. She remembered how he had gotten out of his seat to let her enter, instead of making her squeeze by him. His eyes lacked the wolfish glances she often found in others. Instead, they reflected something of a vulnerable small animal, maybe a lamb.

She turned towards him. “Have you read the story in the paper, the one about the excommunication of any doctor willing to perform an abortion on the raped little girl?”

He nodded his head. “I have; it’s a very sad situation.”

“Did you ever ask yourself if they are going to excommunicate her rapist?”

His eyes widened openly. “No, though part of the issue is that rape is not a mortal sin and murder is,” he quietly asserted. “Honestly, though, I hadn’t given much thought to the stepfather. I guess I assumed the laws and courts would punish him.”

“Punishment,” she bit out, “three years with good behavior is likely the maximum he’ll receive, if anything. That little girl might grow older, but she’ll never recover.”

He looked down at the hands grasped in his lap. “I guess I thought he’d get a longer sentence,” he whispered.

His voice was both gentle and sad, but her anger at his ‘rape is not a mortal sin’ comment flared.

“No one, not the TV stations, nor radio, nor the papers, NO ONE covered the story of the rapist. From the moment the Pope gave his edict, the media was far too concerned with the Church’s role in excommunicating any doctor brave enough to rescue that poor child from a pregnancy wrought through evil.”

“There did seem to be a lot of attention on the excommunication,” he acknowledged, his tone even.

“That’s why, when we passed the Church, why I asked myself if they realize, if they thought of that child as they blessed themselves with holy water. If they considered the ramifications as they placed a dollar in the collection basket. If they thought about what it means to punish a rape victim further by forcing her to give birth—as though being raped was something that required a confession.”

“You sound quite familiar with the Catholic mass. Are you Catholic yourself?” he pushed.

“EX-Catholic,” she barked.

“Oh,” he whispered, as the sides of his mouth turned downwards.

“You see, I’m the one,” she lifted her chin. “I’m the doctor.”

She ended up spilling the rest of her story, a story she had never been able to tell the police or even her family. Yet here she was, telling it to a total stranger on a public bus.

“I remember, it was the Wednesday evening before Thanksgiving and almost everyone was gone—the dorms were deserted. I’d been trying to decide what to do for the Thanksgiving break. I couldn’t afford a ticket home, not even on the bus,” she snorted. “At the same time, though, I could hardly afford to stay if they were going to close the dining halls. . . That’s what had been going through my mind when I answered the knock at my door.

“When I opened the door, I was certain he was looking for my wealthier, prettier roommate, Lauren. I’d seen him in Lauren’s circle of friends, walking through the Quad. I knew he was not there to talk me, especially not the me I was then, a mousy, poorly dressed, Mexican scholarship student. I’d been clearly out-of-place from day one. I was one of the students who would go to dinner early so fewer people would notice that I ate alone. The only people I really knew, besides Lauren, I’d met through group projects or my work study job. He was a fraternity type—blond good looks and an athletic grace seemed to bless his every move.

“’Hi,’ he said. I’ll never forget, just an innocent ‘hi.’ I remember feeling flattered that a white, wealthy boy from the “city” would say hi to me! When I first got to school, I had no idea that when people said “the city” they really meant the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Lauren nearly died laughing when I asked her ‘which city,’ but she was kind enough to stop when she saw me cringe and she at least took the time to explain. I remember thinking there was this secret society of the beautiful ones whose membership was made up of the slim, tanned, white wealthy at the university, those who had known each other since their first toddler play dates were supervised by their nannies. In one of my first late night heart-to-hearts with Laurent I discovered most “city” nannies made more than twice what her mother did.”

She took a deep breath, bit her lip, then returned to the story.

“I remember he was wearing an Abercrombie shirt that likely cost more than my entire outfit, including my shoes.

“I remember thinking, what’s he doing here when everyone’s gone? What I managed to eek out was something like, ‘Um, Lauren’s not here.’

“My response appeared to surprise him. As he pushed the door open and stepped further in, I automatically backed up, totally confused.

“’Well, it’s not Lauren I’m here to see,’ he said quietly.