Tampa

chapter seventeen

The months before my trial were spent alone on house arrest in a shoddy Tampa apartment; it had wheezing air-conditioning and low-quality gray carpet that I refused to walk on barefoot. Droves of pear-shaped soccer moms set up camp on the sidewalk across the street and picketed day and night with homemade posters declaring me to be a sick child molester who deserved life in prison. I could only imagine their husbands were happy my case had given these beastly women a new hobby that got them out of the house.

Yelling and shaking signs, they became workers in a protest economy whose currency was appreciative car honks; any time they received the blaring horn-tap of a supporter, the women’s beefy arms would raise up and they’d high-five one another. Of course none of them actually looked fearful about anything, least of all me. It was quite the opposite—in my trial they’d found a sense of purpose that rendered them giddy and energized. On weekend nights when their numbers were greatest they’d often deliver choral group chants into a feedback-ridden microphone, “Teachers not touchers” being one of the more popular. There were never any men among the group, though occasionally some of the mothers did see fit to bring their young children along to practice the valuable life skill of standing on the side of the road with indignation. My house arrest stipulations allowed for court-approved prescheduled excursions to purchase food but I most often ordered in, and once it became apparent to the onlookers just where a given food order was headed, they’d incorporate the employee into their calls and protestations. “Are you over eighteen?” they’d yell to a bewildered pizza deliveryman. “You’re not safe unless you are!”

After a decade of hiding my urges, I’ll admit it wasn’t easy to come to terms with the fact that my preference had been publicly outed. It was as though in merely following my own desire I’d been catapulted far beyond the intended lands of pleasure into a realm of punishment. By some trick of the mind, several times a day I would nearly forget what had transpired—that everyone knew, that my face was plastered across newspapers nationwide—but then with all the panic of the initial realization, recent events would flood back to me until my thoughts wandered again and the cycle repeated itself for a whiplashed sensation of déjà vu. It made me recall a particular seasick feeling of my youth: I’d once had a spirited bus driver who liked to come over the PA system whenever a sizable piece of low-processed roadkill emerged in her path, usually an armadillo, that was going to cause her to rapidly decelerate. “Huh ho!” she’d yell, and we’d brace our tiny arms against the seats. The force’s weight was always greater than expected; it always gave me the real fear, as I slid against my will closer and closer to the green vinyl of the seat-back in front of me, that I might continue forward and hurtle into the air.

Ford had once expressed a similar sentiment to me after being hit with a Taser gun at work during a training exercise: he’d been incredulous at how unable he was to ready himself, mentally or physically, for the pain. “I know you don’t have balls,” he’d told me, “but imagine having them, then imagine them being struck by lightning and a hammer at the same time.” Ford always was one to ask the impossible from others, both often and casually.

“So I’m seeing everybody get hit and fall onto a mat, right?” he’d continued. “One by one. Like Noah’s ark except we didn’t even get a partner.”

He’d raised his brow at this point, as if to say, I’ll let that heady biblical reference settle into your brain for a moment while I chug down this beer. I’d crossed my legs, widened my eyes and leaned in, nodding in faux amazement.

“Anyway,” he’d continued, “watching all these tasings, I’m getting sort of tense, right? Because when they’re hit guys are screaming. Really huge guys—Bill even pissed himself.”

“You mentioned testicles,” I’d reminded him. “Were they directing the gun at your testicles?”

“No,” he’d clarified. “Course not. That’s just the best description of how it felt… shit hurts.”

At the time, it had struck me that this was a somewhat intelligent perception on Ford’s behalf—how arousal and pain share certain breakers on the switchboard of the central nervous system—even if he couldn’t quite parse the reasoning behind his word choice. All the anguish and fear surrounding the upcoming trial seemed to have settled into my nipples; they’d begun to spontaneously harden on the hour in the hopes they might be utilized as channels of release like in the past. If only I could be allowed a few minutes of Boyd teasing them with the sharp prongs of his orthodontia. As I supposed our criminal justice system knew, withholding an orgasm brought about by a second party was a hearty rattrap for pessimism indeed. It was a type of torture, only having myself for sexual stimulation: I could predict everything I was about to do.

According to the news, I wasn’t the only one in confinement. Jack received six months in a juvenile detention center for his attack on Boyd. In moments of clarity, I was willing to admit to myself that I shouldn’t have taken another boy to his father’s house. But Jack also could’ve saved us all a great deal of agony if he’d simply had the consideration to call before dropping by.

Though personal effects in the same drawers as my hidden stashes of prescription pills did get boxed and delivered to me, none of my medications or high-end facial-contouring creams made the journey; this was no doubt an intentional fuck-you on Ford’s behalf. I often spent entire days drinking cough syrup and scouring the television stations for boys in Jack and Boyd’s age range, their images blurry and voices echoey, to join me in dreams as I nodded off to sleep. I still hadn’t spoken personally with Ford since the incident. I couldn’t deny this disappointed me for a variety of reasons. I certainly still held the hope that he might forgive me—that we could go back to our routine like normal. Now knowing the secret life I’d have to lead in the hours away from home, Ford could negotiate for greater benefits—I’d be willing to meet a more robust monthly sexual quota with him in return for letting bygones be bygones, and I could once again have access to luxury. But if not—if we were over forever and there was no hope of gaining him and his money back—Ford was the one arena where my having been caught was a victory; now he finally knew that in our own private battle, I had bested him. Despite his needling pockets of doubt, he had more or less believed the whole time that I was his distant and mercurial wife, not an actress whose talents were cultivated to hide a sexual aberration.

I needed to play a part for the jurors, too. In order to appear as palatable as possible to them, Dennis wanted me to look as close in age to Boyd and Jack as I could. I often stood in front of the studio apartment’s dimly lit vanity mirror and practiced my courtroom expressions: doe-eyed and frequently surprised, often shocked; seldom blinking but with exaggerated motion when I did.

Additionally, I worked to produce an overwhelmed and apprehensive shakiness in response to any loud stimuli, my moist lips puckered and hopeful with nervous hesitation. I also practiced speaking in a somewhat higher and softer voice. “When they came on to me,” I breathed, pursing the corners of my mouth as though it was a difficult confession, “the attention was nice. For whatever reason I felt so isolated.” At this point I would nod imperceptibly in order to seem like I was admitting the truth to myself before speaking it. “It sounds pathetic,” I would continue, beginning a reflective stare off into the distance, “but I think all I really was looking for in Jack and Boyd was a friend.”

Dennis was meanwhile losing no time launching a battle of public opinion. When I watched him on the news, my heart would leap with a sort of near-patriotism; never before had I felt such pride in my country as I did now in considering its justice system. There he was, immaculately dressed and persuasive on my behalf, simply in return for an exchange of money! The impeccable linear geometry of his mustache made him appear unilaterally calm on camera, never moving or changing formation.

“My client is guilty of nothing more than poor judgment,” he’d often repeat. “Details about the alleged sexual misconduct will come to light that paint a far different picture than what the prosecution is claiming.” He knew we’d never be able to win over the soccer moms, but for those who might be open-minded enough to accept it, he began to lay the foundations of a commonsense defense: I was young and good-looking, and adolescent boys would want to sleep with me. On one talk show, he sat with the commentator while a picture from my early college modeling days appeared behind them on a large screen—I was bikini clad, lounging on the hood of a sports car, my blond hair fanned back in the wind. “If you were a teenage male,” the commentator began, pointing a leering finger back at the photo, “would you call a sexual experience with her abuse?”

Dennis did a purposefully bad job of restraining a smile and cleared his throat. “I think that’s a fair question to ask in terms of this case,” he answered.

Though droves of shock jocks and sensational newsmagazines offered lucrative sums for phone interviews or to bring their cameras inside my apartment for a sit-down chat, my attorney worried it might interfere with his construction of my Pollyanna image. “You’re very sexy,” he explained, “but what I want the jury to see is that you’re not necessarily aware of it.” His secretary brought the clothing I’d wear to the proceedings over to my apartment for a fitting—jumper-style dresses, Mary Jane shoes with a low heel—and went over the rules for makeup.

“Pretend you’re going on a date and have to walk past your conservative father to get to the door,” she said. “Transparent peach blush, a hint of neutral lip gloss. The one thing we’ll play up is your eyes. Very clean eyeliner, super-thin lines. The mascara is so important.” It’s ironic to note that her own makeup looked like that of a prospective showgirl who was escorting until her big break came. “It has to be fresh. If your mascara clumps on you, at this trial, it’s like, ‘She’s guilty.’ You know what I’m saying? You can only use the lightest kiss of it. But that tiny amount will also make all the difference in the world.”

Given the reason for their interest, when the trial finally rolled around I thought I would find the reporters unappetizing. But after weeks of being sequestered, it was nice to be outside and have photographers vying for me to look at them. For the most part they were persistent but not cruel—what they wanted most was for me to give them a coquettish smile, which of course I couldn’t do; instead I worked on seeming uncomfortable with attention of any sort. I clung to my attorney and acted as though I had never before been aboveground: never seen a camera or even other people before, never heard my name said aloud.

I have to confess that in the courtroom that first day, even though I truly wanted to pay attention, I caught no more than five words of the opening arguments. Instead I was creating fantasies that incorporated the prison environment instead of ignoring it: they involved the new holding cell I’d be taken to that evening. The image that immediately came to mind was being woken from sleep by the approach of a horde of famished, emaciated young men—orphans, perhaps, in tattered clothing with Oliver Twist accents who approached the bars of my cell and began sticking every erotic appendage they had in between—in my mind I could see them lining up to form a row of erect penises in various stages of growth. Their groping hands would reach forward on arms extended out to where the shoulder’s bulk strained between the metal, their tongues wriggling and searching from eager mouths, as though they viewed me as a food source. How delightful it would be to make my way down their queue, giving each a different treatment: sometimes bending down to suck as the fingers of multiple owners greedily fought to cram inside me, other times turning around to be penetrated while my neck received the frenzied licks of deer tasting salt. At one point I was able to look up and return to the courtroom proceedings when I noticed the prosecutor, a man named Delany, pointing at me with a villainous, outstretched finger: I peered over at the jury with a hurt look on my face that insisted Delany and I had once been best friends but now he’d turned into a terrible gossip. I, on the other hand, sitting silently, had taken the high road.

I soon found that my actual holding cell did not fit the specifications of my daydream. Its entrance was a solid reinforced door that had a rectangular slot for a food tray to enter. This opening was not of a preferable height nor angle for a budding youth’s penis to reach inside, a design flaw that had the effect of irrationally increasing my panic: my hands protectively reached down and held my crotch as I realized how long my obligatory stint of sexual castration might last. Rather than sleeping, I sat in the dark for some time after lights-out and wondered how many months I could reasonably go without any adolescent physical contact, not even the ability to give a shoulder squeeze or a lower-back pat. Prior to arrest, my record on the outside had been perhaps six or seven weeks—though such a drought was heavily supplemented by porn—before I’d go indulge in a flirtatious conversation in the cereal aisle of the grocery store or hit the mall and at least have the visceral pleasure of being close to adolescent males. Even these tame encounters powered up a source of electricity inside me, whether or not our bodies ever touched when we spoke or walked past one another in a crowded store. More than the sexual attacks and harassment I was sure would come, I’d never be able to make it in prison for this reason alone; there’d be no oxygen for the affliction that burned inside me.

The lights in my cell suddenly came on at this epiphany. This supernatural effect was multiplied by the fact that it was the middle of the night—for a moment I thought some divine force had just agreed with me and my cell door was about to crack open, allowing me to tiptoe out and escape. The doorknob did in fact turn seconds later, but there was nothing magical about it: no orgy of foundlings in tiny white briefs grappling for sexual consolation filed in; no masterful escape plot unfolded. Instead, Ford opened the door.