Page 51 of Every Step She Takes
I’d understood the concept of online bulletin boards and forums before now. We used them at school, but they were still relatively new. The ability to chat with total strangers online. The ability to comment about news online. The ability to talk about total strangers online. To call them a whore. To tell them they deserved what they got. To tell them they deserved… things that made me gasp and shake, that inner voice sounding exactly like my mother’s, saying this must be wrong, must be illegal, there must be laws.
That hot-tub photograph wasn’t just on CNR’s website. People copied it and reposted it and… did things to it, things I didn’t know were possible to do with photographs. They removed Colt’s hands and pasted breasts on me. They took pornographic pictures from other sites and put my head on them, pretending they were real photographs they’d found. Fake photos of me in every pornographic pose possible, including some that scorched my eighteen-year-old virgin eyes.
I walked to my desk and picked up a CD. It was an advance copy of an album by a new band Justice Kane and I talked about on Saturday night. It arrived two days ago with a note. Seven perfect words.
This is bullshit. Keep your head up.
I’d cried. When I told Mom, though, she said if Justice supported me, he should come forward and say so. I disagreed. Justice knew nothing of what happened after Colt took me away at the party, so he couldn’t clear my name, and I didn’t want public support without proof. The media would have claimed I had sex with Justice first, and he was defending me because he didn’t want to think he’d been the opening act for Colt Gordon.
I put the CD into my player. Before I could start it, my bedroom phone buzzed. I jumped for it. Nylah called three times a day to check in. A couple of other friends called daily. Then there were those I kept waiting to hear from, those who had not reached out, those I’d nudged with a quick text, only to hear silence in response.
I longed to hear from those friends. Not even so much to talk to them as to know they were still friends.
OMG, Lucy! I’ve been at my parents’ cottage all week. I just saw the news. And OMG! Are you okay?
There were, however, people I wanted to hear from even more than those silent friends. Karla for one. She’d given me good advice – don’t answer calls from numbers you don’t recognize; don’t talk to reporters; go home and let your mother help.
Since Saturday night, though, she’d been silent. She’d warned that she would be, and I understood why. She’d be putting in all-nighters trying to save her clients’ careers. Still, I hoped for a call.
The person I most hoped to hear from, though, was Isabella. She would be furious, and I expected that. I wanted her to call to shout at me, and that would be the opportunity I needed to tell her the truth and beg forgiveness.
When I grabbed my bedroom phone, I glanced at the caller ID. If it was a stranger, on Karla’s advice, I’d let it ring. The name came up as Maureen, and I knew a Maureen from Juilliard. It was only as I was hitting the button to accept the call that I realized the surname was wrong.
Karla would say to hang up, but that would be rude, and no matter what had happened, I still could not manage that.
“Hello?”
“Lucy? This is Maureen Wilcox from theNew York Gazette.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m not giving inter–”
“Are you familiar with theGazette? I know you were living in New York.”
TheGazettewas a relatively new paper. Not a tabloid, but not “establishment” either, like theTimes. TheGazettehad a younger, fresher vibe that I’d always enjoyed.
When I didn’t answer, Maureen hurried on to say that she wanted to tell my story. Not Colt’s. Mine.
“That’s what’s missing here,” she said. “Everyone wants his side because he’s the movie star. He’s the man. His angle is the only one that counts.”
Sarcasm leaked through every word, and I felt myself relaxing.
“But our opinions count, too, right?” she continued. “Women’s stories. Girl’s stories. This asshole screwed around on his gorgeous, talented wife with thenanny. Can you get any more cliché than that?”
“I wasn’t actually the nanny,” I said. “I know that’s what the media has been calling me. But I was hired as a music tutor.”
“Because you’re a talented musician. A Juilliard student. Reduced to ‘the nanny,’ because that’s the better soundbite. Or because they just presume you don’t have a role beyond looking after the kids. And I just fell in that trap myself. We all need to do better, right?”
I wavered here. I was one hundred percent on board with feminism. Equal rights for women was a no-brainer. But something about her tone made me nervous.
Maureen Wilcox had a mission, and my story would help her prove a point. That made me uncomfortable and yet… Well, her “point” was telling my story. Giving me a voice.
All I had to do was be careful not to blame Colt. Don’t give any quotes she could use to make me look as if I were embracing victimhood. Take responsibility and simply set the record straight. I didn’t seduce Colt Gordon. I wasn’t having an affair with him. I did nothing more than kiss him in a hot tub after a couple glasses of champagne, and I will never forgive myself for that, but my story wasn’t the one people heard in the news, and I wasn’t the girl they saw there.
I took a deep breath. “Okay, I’ll talk.”
“Can you do it in person?”
I hesitated, but it would be better that way. If I was unsure after meeting her, I could change my mind.
