HE CAME AT ME from across the street, running despite the DON’T WALK sign. He dodged a speeding taxi and leaped onto the curb in front of me.
“Jonah!”
My pulse quickened.
“You’re Jonah Keller, right?”
He wore acid-washed jeans and a ratty black T-shirt. A gold septum piercing glinted beneath his nostrils. Matted blond hair obscured his youthful, acne-pocked face.
“Leave me alone.”
“Dude, you know your address is online? Some troll posted it on Twitter.”
I stopped on the sidewalk, stunned. I’d just emerged from my apartment building.
“But don’t worry,” he insisted nervously. “I’m not a troll. I’m a reporter from Vice.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?”
“Come on, bro. That’s not fair. We, like, won a Peabody Award—”
“Fuck off.”
“I just wanna give you a chance to tell your side of the story.”
“I said fuck off.”
I stepped forward. He blocked my path.
“Can you—”
“This . . . this is stalking.” I tried to step around him. Again, he blocked my path. I reversed course, headed back toward my apartment.
“What are your thoughts on the recent article about your history with Mace Miller?” He ran past me and stood in front of the building’s entrance.
“Get out of my way.”
“Did you—”
“Out of my way.” I shoved him aside. He stumbled, fell into a bush.
“You just . . . just assaulted me, dude.”
“Well, you fucking deserved it.”
It was then I noticed the voice recorder in his hand.
For the past forty-eight hours, I have been unable to sleep, unable to eat, unable to do anything but drink the cheap red wine from my corner bodega. I have declined or ignored the inquiries of all reporters. Their voice mails and e-mails aggregate on my phone, each message some version of We want to give you a chance to tell your side of the story. But it’s far too late for that; public opinion has already cemented, and I’ve been cast as an accomplice to Richard—the very man who has robbed me of sleep for the past eight years, who has made me terrified of sex, terrified of love, terrified of even the most basic human connection.
Still, I can’t tear myself away from the headlines. I drink straight from the bottle—wincing as the sour red floods my mouth—and Google Richard’s name. So many victims have come forward in the press with stories of the abuse they’ve suffered at his hands. A sick thrill courses down my spine as I comb through news of his destruction in the wake of these unearthed allegations: rumors of a state investigation into his crimes, the Broadway transfer of his most recent play canceled, a major studio film shelved, honorary degrees rescinded, his friends distancing themselves from him in the press. Even Kristen Sloan, so devoted that summer, has denounced him. Sandro, Charles, and Ira face allegations of their own as victims come forward, men I’ve never met yet feel I understand. Strangers who have seen the basement.
I read, with considerably less enthusiasm, about my own downfall. I never bothered to return to work, assuming I’d been fired. Yesterday, my editor issued a statement claiming he hadn’t known of my relationship with Richard Shriver or my testimony at the 2011 trial, that if he had, I would not have been hired at the Profile. Whether or not this is true, I’ll never know. It’s possible that he simply failed to conduct a deep enough Google search before hiring me in 2014. It’s also possible that he did know my history and simply didn’t care. Perhaps he believed my testimony and sided with Richard in the case—2014 was a different time.
The reporter who first broke my story—or re-broke it, rather, deconstructed it in light of #MeToo—has made quite a name for herself as the expert on Jonah Keller. Prior to publishing “Why Is Jonah Keller Allowed to Cover Sexual Assault for the Profile?,” twenty-three-year-old Jessica Ronson was a celebrity gossip editor with 467 Twitter followers, employed by a fledgling website with the dubious name of PopCandy.net. She now appears hourly on cable news to discuss my story, has amassed over twenty thousand Twitter followers, and has spawned her own controversy over the legitimacy of her reporting, which—as more seasoned reporters at the New York Times have pointed out—is rife with defamatory conjectures. Jessica favors sensation over accuracy, as demonstrated by her widely spread theory that I “procured young men for Richard Shriver” and “brought them back to his lair” despite her having zero evidence to back this up. This has served her, and PopCandy.net, rather well in our current climate. She herself has become a headline, which has boosted the site’s traffic and raised her own profile. Jessica Ronson is the face of my waking nightmare, the avatar for the cultural hatred aimed in my direction.
And yet, there is a part of me that wonders if I deserve all this, if Jessica’s story, however incorrect, contains a kernel of truth. I didn’t procure young men for Richard, but I did prevent those men from receiving the justice they deserved. This is all I can think about as the e-mails and calls and texts and tweets continue to flood my phone. Each alert triggers a flash of that basement. It’s like I’m back there again. Like I never left.
“This sinful lifestyle will lead to your ruination,” Doctor Jim, my ex-gay counselor, assured me all those years ago. Now—sweating in my apartment, sick on cheap merlot, panic racing through my body—I can’t help but wonder if he was right. What if homosexuality was the first step on my path toward damnation? What if it was Satan’s grip that dragged me into Richard’s basement?
Hell on earth, just like Daddy promised.
“YOU F***ING DESERVED IT”—JONAH KELLER ASSAULTS REPORTER
The Vice article was savage, but one line in particular set the internet on fire: “Though I was physically unharmed by Keller, the emotional trauma inflicted by this encounter has been brutal.”
In other words, my septum-pierced nemesis sustained zero injuries from my push. This renders his claim of assault legally inaccurate in the State of New York, a fact neither he nor his editors seem interested in. He couldn’t press charges if he wanted to. Though why should he press charges when the public has already convicted me?
It was the perfect headline. The quote so awful; the word assault so triggering. The headline did not claim sexual assault, but that didn’t stop the Twitter trolls:
@JONAHKELLER is now raping reporters??!? How is he not in jail yet?
@THEPROFILE you should be ashamed of yourselves. Letting convicted abuser @JONAHKELLER report on sexual assault is an insult to victims everywhere
Fun fact of the day: jonah keller’s e-mail address is jonah.keller.84@gmail.com. Direct your hate mail to this predator accordingly
Die die die die die @JONAHKELLER . Roy in hell, you fat fuck
All these tweets contain a terrifying amount of misinformation, but I find myself particularly offended by the last. I am in hell, but I can’t confirm or deny the presence of a Roy here. Also, I am not remotely fat. I’ve maintained a svelte figure throughout my adulthood, not for the purposes of luring potential mates (sex fills me with fear and shame), but because my body often feels like the only thing I can control.
Exercise keeps me grounded. I perform set after set of crunches and lunges and push-ups and pull-ups on the bar mounted on my bathroom door frame. I don’t stop until my entire body throbs with pain. Then I strip for a shower and evaluate my body in the mirror. I’m dismayed at the ring of flab that has accumulated around my waist, eroding the valleys of muscle that once defined my stomach. Too much cheap wine and frozen pizza from my corner bodega. It’s the only place I dare to go outside my apartment. The owner’s daily greetings torment me: “Jonah! Ah, DiGiorno again. Your favorite! I have a new wine that I think you’d love!” Lorenzo has no idea what I did, and his efforts to befriend his new regular depress me. Then again, maybe I can use his ignorance to my advantage. Maybe I can run away with Lorenzo—the one person in the world who doesn’t loathe me—and retire to a tropical island where we’ll gorge on defrosted pepperoni and five-dollar magnums of merlot until we die.
I need to escape Manhattan. I live in constant fear of running into someone I know or someone I don’t know who knows and hates me. But every time I consider a getaway, I am faced with the terror of my potential freedom. I no longer have a life here, but I also don’t have a life anywhere else. I could move, probably should move—my savings account is dwindling. If I go, I’d need to act fast, while I still have the cash for a plane ticket to my new home, first month’s rent, last month’s rent, and a security deposit. I’d need enough money to keep me afloat while I find a new job—doing what, I have no idea, as the only items on my résumé are writer and waiter. The former is no longer possible, and the idea of reverting to the latter makes me want to choke down a bottle of barbiturates. Still, I suppose diner-employee-in-Kabumfuck is probably my best option, but which Kabumfuck to choose? I hear Kabumfuck, Kansas, is particularly bleak this time of year, though others prefer the ripe garbage smell of Kabumfuck, Delaware, and then there are the passionate proponents for Kabumfuck, Utah, who say there is no better place to fade into oblivion, that its hopelessness is unmatched, that the suicide rates are soaring.
“And now Jonah Keller is assaulting reporters? Just more proof that he is a dangerous, violent person,” Jessica Ronson, my sweet angel of destruction, asserted on Anderson Cooper 360. I watched the clip on Facebook this morning, contributing to the 3.6 million views. “But let’s not let this recent headline distract us from the most important issue here: Jonah Keller is an accomplice to a vicious sexual predator.”
“Accomplice is a strong word, Jessica,” Stephanie Hagger, a Times reporter, interjected. “We don’t know that he was an accomplice, we simply know he testified in defense of Richard Shriver and—”
“Oh, please, you’re splitting hairs, Stephanie,” Jessica interrupted.
“I’m not. I’m trying to distinguish between theory and fact here—”
“Fact: Jonah Keller is a fucking crony for Richard—”
“Jessica, Jessica, let’s keep this—” Anderson said, trying to referee.
“We don’t know that, Jessica,” Stephanie cut in. “It’s possible that at the time of his testimony, he wasn’t aware of Richard’s history of assault—”
“Then why has Jonah said nothing in the press? Nothing to confirm or deny—”
“I’m just saying, you shouldn’t present your opinion as fact because a lot of people pick that up and run with it—”
“I’m allowed to have my opinion, Stephanie, it was an op-ed—”
“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot about PopCandy’s lauded Opinion section.”
“Guys, hold on. I want to give Cameron Davis a minute to weigh in,” Anderson said. My chest tightened. “What’s your take on this, Cameron? You got to know Jonah fairly well while he reported on your own sexual assault.”
“My contact with Jonah was limited to a journalistic context, where he operated with the utmost care and respect,” Cameron said. “But I had no idea of his history at the time. And this news is, well, it’s just sad. To challenge or discount victims of sexual assault is reprehensible for anyone, but especially for someone who now reports on this important issue.”
And that’s where the clip ended. Frozen on Cameron’s frown. It pulverized my heart.
What do you make of all this, Mace? News outlets have also reported on your own surprising silence, your refusal to comment on these unearthed allegations. Do you agree with Jessica? Do I deserve all this hatred? Am I the true monster in this story?
These are questions only you can answer, which is why I’ve yet to contact you. I want to know I’m more than the sum of my demons, but I’m too afraid to ask.