Jury of One

7

A routine procedure, she has been told. Not difficult, they must mean. Not risky, they must mean.

It should just take a minute, she is told, for the anesthesia. Count backward from one hundred.

100…99…98…

He can’t know. No one can ever know. No one, but especially not him. Not Daddy.

Church confirmation, three years ago, when Shelly was thirteen and was upset over the dress Mother had chosen for her, a dispute that escalated into an argument about Christianity and God. How could there be a God? she asked her father, who as always had intervened. With famine and war and poverty? How can there be a-

93…92…91…

When you were born, Shelly, he said. That’s how I know there is a God. When you have a child of your-

We don’t advocate abortion, Shelly. We simply provide this procedure as an option for young women. You were sexually assaulted. This isn’t your-

Your father will never know. This is your body. Your constitutional-

87…86…

He can’t ever know. It would kill him.

Move on with your life.

Daddy?

Eighty-seven, eighty eighty I’m sorry eighty sorry Daddy but I can’t only sixteen years old please don’t stop loving me please forgive me you can’t ever know if you ever knew-

Can’t…ever…know…