Chapter 23: The Real Story

Thursday, August 26, 1982

Jasmine sighed, hugging me as we met outside Drama just before sixth period.

“At least that’s over,” she said, snuggling in. That would be her trig final. We’d both had physics Wednesday, and both thought it went ... okay.

“How’d it go?”

“Sucked, but...” She shrugged. “Well, we’ll find out. I’m not that much of an advanced math girl, anyway.”

“And you don’t have to be. On the other hand, I know you can do this. And you will. We will. Together.”

“If you say so,” she said, hugging a little tighter.

“I do,” I said, grinning.

“C’mon. Let’s get dramatic.”

“Works for me.”

We started in. “Date with Jessica tonight, right?” she said.

I nodded. “Unless something’s changed. And this is probably not much of a ‘date.’”

“Fair enough. Dinner. And no, nothing’s changed.”

“Good.”

“It is,” she said, sighing. “I can honestly say I’m not in the least worried. Not anymore.”

“I’m worried about her. Not us. She isn’t a threat to us.”

Jasmine turned and hugged me tight. “I know.”

From behind her Steffie called, “Class is starting! Don’t make me bust you!”

After class, I headed outside, meeting Jessica at the same bench where — seemingly ages ago — I’d handed her a single rose and wished her a happy birthday. Those days were long past, but we were close friends. Friends, and still maybe more. Maybe. If too much hadn’t happened to get in the way. But, friends, and friends is no small thing. You can never have too many friends.

Jessica hugged me tightly, whispering in my ear, “Jasmine is watching. And waving.”

“She wants to make sure you know she approves.”

“And does she approve?”

“She does. Really. Either that, or she’s got me completely fooled.”

“I wouldn’t put that past any girl, even as sharp as you are,” she said with a grin, “But ... I think you’re right. The question is ... do you approve?”

“Mmm?”

“Car topic. Have you figured out where we’re going?”

“I have an idea.”

“Then let’s get on our way.”

I walked her to the car, holding hands, helping her into the car. Once in, I got us on the road.

“Car topic?” I said.

She blushed. “Bluntly ... my lying to you.”

“Approve?” I paused. “No. But ... understand? Maybe. It’s got to be important, big, something you need sympathy for ... but something you weren’t ready to share. And ... you don’t have to be.”

“Yes. I do.”

“I meant, not on my behalf.”

“No, that’s right. You’d let me back out. But ... I have to, for me. Sooner or later, I’ll go a bit crazy.”

“Avoiding that sounds like a good thing,” I agreed.

“Okay ... so...” she started, then hesitated. “Maybe I’ll wait until we’re wherever we’re going.”

“That’s fine.”

“In the meantime ... how are you and Jasmine? I ... well. You two did an adequate job of pretending there wasn’t a problem, but you’re not up to my standard, nor your own standard as actors.” She was smirking just a little.

“Better. One of the things about an open relationship is that there’s more to communicate and more ... risks. At least, that’s how it seems to me. In a traditional relationship, you don’t have to say things like ‘Sure, I’m dating Jessica, but she’s not a threat to our relationship.’”

She giggled a little, nodding, but also blushing. “Yet ... I was.”

I shook my head. “We’ve been over this. You and I won’t work for a long-term relationship, not without one of us changing significantly. Neither of us is nearly so invested in there being an ‘us’ that we want to change significantly. So ... no threat.”

“That’s not what I meant,” she said, shaking her head. “I agree, we don’t make sense. But your issues still revolved around me.”

“Right, but the issue was an idea of you, not you. That’s where the communication comes in — making sure everyone’s aware of what the reality is.”

She nodded. “Okay, I get that. Though ... the idea of me is what I am, most of the time.”

I chuckled. “Got me there, and it’s interesting to hear you say that. I agree, and I disagree. We all have that, you just have it more than nearly anyone else, because you work so hard on what the idea of ‘Jessica Lively’ is. And you have to, as you’ve said. But ... neither the idea of you, nor the actual you, is an actual threat to my relationship with Jasmine.”

“Which could be infuriating, you know. Part of me wants it to be a threat.”

“I get that. But most of you doesn’t.”

She nodded. “Most of me doesn’t. Whoever I wind up marrying, he needs to be himself, and happy and comfortable. You wouldn’t be, not without those significant changes.”

I pulled into the parking lot of a Fuddruckers, which was new to Houston.

“Oh! I’ve heard of this place, I think. Never been,” Jessica said.

“I think you’ll like it.”

“Well ... duh,” she said, giggling. “Otherwise we wouldn’t be here!”

I chuckled, getting out and walking in with her. We stared at the menu a bit, then ordered. A small burger for her — no cheese — and a slightly bigger one for me — with cheese. Nothing like the monster burger first-life me would’ve ordered, but I do burn a lot of calories. So does she, but obviously today she wasn’t super-hungry, unlike last time.

Food ordered, we headed back into the restaurant, finding a table away from other guests.

She sighed once we were seated. “So ... good choice. Not too crowded, no one from Memorial here ... no excuses for me not to talk.”

I nodded. “Obviously, anyone from Memorial would be bad.”

“Really, really bad.” She drew a deep breath. “Okay. So ... most of what I said last time is ... true enough, but not enough. I did date the guy ... the guy in Austin, I mean. And he’s pressuring me. But ... he’s not going to show up and throw me into a car. That’s why ... well. Some sort of self-defense spray sounds great, because there are other jerks who might need it. Him? No.”

I read between the lines. “He’s a ... threat. But not physically.”

“Oh, he could beat the crap out of me. Or you, unless your karate worked. Or ... well, not Cal, but half the football team. More than half. Still, yeah, if I pissed him off, that would be the wrong thing. Except I’m going to piss him off.”

“Tell me whatever you want to.”

“I don’t want to tell anyone anything, but ... hell. I probably do.” She hesitated. “Okay ... rip the bandage off time. I had a reason for lying, but the thing is ... you couldn’t really help me without knowing the truth.”

I nodded, listening.

“So ... starting ... at the start. We ... dated. All that. Made out. But I wasn’t the airhead I made myself out to be.”

“That was a bit of a red flag.”

“I know, right?” She smiled a bit. I hoped that was a good sign. “He started pushing, and I said ‘no’ and backed off. He tried to push me, but I wasn’t having it. In the end, he backed off, but he was always ... around.”

“I can see that.”

“I had friends then.” She blushed. “Fine, too dramatic. I have friends now. You, obviously. Some of the girls. Some of them... ‘work friends’, I guess. Some are just polite rivals. Anyway ... I didn’t have that drama then. We were all just friends, but not the same. Sheila was a really close friend, but so was ... um. I’m going to just say X right now.”

“Okay,” I said, nodding along.

“X and I were really close. Oh, also ... I figure you’ll share most of this with Angie and some with Jasmine, and that’s okay. But ... not Sheila. I don’t know how much you talk now, but ... yeah, no. I need to figure out what I’ll share there, myself.”

“I won’t. Well, not unless I feel like she needs to know something, but you’ll know if I think that, and get a chance to talk me out of it.”

“Fair enough. I’d say the same thing the other way. She doesn’t need to know this. Anyway ... X was dating a guy. A football guy, naturally. Not the guy in Austin. Long story short ... X was an idiot and ... well. Let herself get talked into a really bad idea.”

“The sort that are really, really consequential in nine months?”

“Yeah. That sort. This is why I told the story I told. I had to keep X out of it. Except ... I can’t. And you ... you’ll keep X out of it, as much as you can. But ... I had to talk with her, make sure I could tell.”

“That makes sense, of course. You could just make it about you. Except ... well ... I’d probably learn things I shouldn’t.”

“Right. Anyway, back to the story.” She gave a deep sigh. “X was terrified. Fourteen, parents who would explode, then explode again if they found out who it was. A guy who ... well, he could change and grow. Maybe. But the odds of that marriage working were ... low. Really low. Realistically, she’d have been ‘sent off to stay with her Aunt for a year’ or the like. Maybe two years. Maybe four. Maybe there really would be an Aunt, maybe an expensive boarding school.”

“I get it. Awful situation.”

“Yeah. And ... wellllll. Um. So. Yeah ... it’s legal to ... um. Take care of the problem. But not when you’re fourteen and your parents wouldn’t approve. And they wouldn’t approve.”

I nodded again. “Of course.” In 1982 we’d just gotten started unpacking the tangle of policies that are parental notification and consent laws around abortion. It wasn’t really going to get any better by the 2020s, just more complicated. When the issue is so divisive and so fraught with emotion and heartache, and there are so many vastly different sets of circumstances, how can one policy cover all the cases without making some of them terrible?

She continued. “So ... anyway. Friends. I had them, and ... we used them. A parent of a friend of a friend who knew a guy. Another guy with a car. A carefully crafted fake sleep-over. All that, and a hundred miles or so each way, and ... problem solved. She wasn’t happy, but terribly relieved. The guy never knew. Still doesn’t. Never will.”

“Makes sense. Except you’re going to tell me there was a loose end.”

“Yeah,” she sighed. “The guy in Austin is the brother of the guy with the car. He knows the whole story, and ... well. The guy who actually did it would be in jail, X would maybe be criminally in trouble — plus her life would be totally ruined — I’d be dragged through the mud, all that.”

“His brother would be caught in the crossfire.”

She shrugged. “They don’t get along all that well. That might be a plus.”

“And he’s blackmailing you, I’m assuming.”

Just then they called our order.

“Saved by the bell,” she said, blushing slightly.

We got up, picked up our burgers and the fries we were sharing, then went to the toppings area and got our burgers set up the way we wanted them. That’s the big idea of Fuddruckers — the burgers are themselves pretty good, but picking your own toppings just how you want them is the point of the place.

Once we’d gotten our food arranged, and taken a few bites, she drew a deep breath and continued. “So ... yeah. He’s blackmailing me. And X, too, though ... but, mostly me.”

“Because you’re you.”

“Yeah. Because I’m me.”

“And...?”

“He found out and blackmailed me back then. I managed ... just barely ... to keep it to the blowjob that I talked about last time.”

“Restrained of him, I suppose.”

She blushed, looking down. “This time he says that won’t be enough. It’s got to be ... more.”

“Or he’ll spill the beans on the whole thing.”

“Right.”

“Can he do that without implicating himself?”

She bit her lip. “I ... don’t know? I mean, he didn’t have anything to do with the abortion. He can claim he heard about it and had an attack of conscience, and deny anything to do with pushing me.”

I nodded. “And you can deny it, but the accusation is enough to do damage.”

“Yeah. It’d be ... bad. Really bad. Not just for me, not just for ... X ... or those in legal trouble, but the fallout would hit everyone in cheerleading and ... well ... a lot of people.”

“You can’t give in to him.”

She blushed. “I ... don’t want to. I mean, I really don’t want to. But ... what can I do?”

“Do you want my advice?”

“I wouldn’t have shared this if I didn’t.”

“You have to be ready to go nuclear. Which sucks, I know, but the odds are that you won’t have to. On the other hand, if you’re not willing to play the cards you have, there’s no way out of it, and you may lose anyway.”

“I ... huh? Oh. You mean he’ll demand more.”

“If he gets one time, he can get two. Or ten. Or get some time for his buddies.”

She blushed deeper and shuddered. “Um ... fuck. I was trying not to think about that, I guess. What cards do you mean?”

“How old is this guy?”

“He’s ... um ... a sophomore right now.”

“Three years older than you?”

“Yeah.” She blinked. “Oh!”

“That blowjob was a felony. A felony on top of a felony, since even though legally you couldn’t consent, you were also unconsenting.”

“I consented.”

“Nuh uh. Coercion isn’t consent. It’s rape.”

She blinked again. “I don’t think...”