ON MONDAY MORNING WHEN MY father drops me off before school for practice, there is an OPP car parked out front. For the first time since I made my decision, I’m a little bit scared. Everyone knows that there weren’t any biological samples. It’s practically the first thing Polly told me when I woke up. If all of a sudden the police announce they have something, someone is bound to do the math, and then the rumour mill will start up again. I’m not sure I can deal with that. Polly can somehow tell this as soon as she sees me. Her silent appraisal is enough to give me my spine back. I nod, and we get changed in silence.
“Come on in, everyone,” Caledon says when we go out into the gym, and we sit down in front of her instead of starting our warm-up. “You all know Constable Forrest,” she says, and indicates the uniformed officer. He’s either on duty early or this is a special occasion.
“Good morning, guys,” Forrest says casually. “I know you’re all busy with practice, so I wanted to get right into it. You all know that one of your teammates was attacked and sexually assaulted a couple weeks ago at Camp Manitouwabing.”
Everyone in the room, except for Polly, flinches at that. Well, it looks like I’m flinching. I’m actually startled, more than anything. No one ever comes right out and says it. It’s refreshing.
“You also know,” the constable continues, “that no biological samples were collected. However, I am pleased to tell you that one of our secondary samples has yielded testable results, which means we now have a comparison sample we can use to test against the perpetrator.”
He looks right at the boys, all of whom are looking at their shoes. Then Dion stands up.
“What do you need?” he asks. The other boys stand beside him in varying states of discomfort. I’m a little bit proud of them.
“Just some cheek cells,” Constable Forrest says. “I’d prefer if you volunteer them, but if for some reason you think you need a parent or a lawyer, you are, of course entitled to decline.”
None of the boys decline. They line up, swabs are produced, and before much time has passed, Constable Forrest has a collection of sealed tubes, each with a DNA sample contained therein. I am almost positive that none of them will match. Dion and Cameron both looked relieved once their sample has been collected. Clarence hands his over, chewing on his bottom lip. Eric turns bright red. Tig and Leo are straight-faced, but I don’t think it’s guilt. Tig probably isn’t fully awake yet, and Leo is still looking at his shoes. For the first time, I force myself to really consider that it was him. I brace for the nausea I’m sure will follow, but it doesn’t come. I’ve known Leo for too long, kept too many of his secrets, even though I wasn’t sure what I’d done to earn them in the first place. We were a series of miscommunications, but not that far. I don’t know how I’m so sure—all I can remember is a boy’s voice—but I know it wasn’t him.
“Thank you all very much,” he says, and then he heads towards the gym door. When he leaves, he walks right under the row of banners, dating to the mid-seventies, from when Palermo Heights was good at sports instead of being good at cheerleading. The banner above the middle of the doorway is senior boys’ basketball, and Constable Forrest was a starting forward the year it was won. He left town, of course, for police college, but he came back. A lot of people do. I have decided that I am not going to be one of them.
“On your feet, girls,” Caledon says. “Warm-up time.”
We start to run. Caledon is watching me closely. I feel exactly the same as I did on Friday, the same as I did before. I don’t feel like my body is doing something of evolutionary importance. But she can tell. The police officer might have been obtuse enough for the boys, but Caledon has figured it out. I hope not too many other people are as insightful as she is.
We run and stretch, and then it’s all choreography until Caledon dismisses us for school. Everyone makes for the showers, but I cross the floor in the opposite direction, to where Caledon is collecting the cones we used to mark the floor for formation.
“Polly and I are going to miss practice a week from Friday,” I tell her. I don’t ask. Missing practice does not usually go over well with Caledon. But here we are.
“I’ll work around you,” she says. Yeah, she definitely knows. And she knows what I am going to do.
“After that, I should be back full-time, though,” I say. I wonder whether some part of me will always try to be that healthy, well-adjusted person who got on a school bus three weeks ago. I wonder whether that’s part of healing. I should definitely call that therapist as soon as possible.
“Don’t push too hard,” she says. I am almost positive she means the exact opposite, though.
“Can I ask a ridiculously personal question?” I ask.
“Yes,” she says. The smile on her face is kind, and unlike anything I’ve ever seen from her before. “And no, Florry’s father has never been part of her life. I knew he wasn’t going to be, right from the start, and I knew what my options were. It was hard, but I did it, and I’m glad I did.”
I freeze. She seems so sure. She never talks about herself, though she puts up with a tremendous amount of chatter from self-involved high school students. I know her degree is in health sciences, and I know she went to teachers’ college, because she’s a teacher, but aside from that, our coach is a mystery, one who’s spent the better part of a decade pushing me to be what I am today.
“It’s not the same.” She holds the stack of cones in her hand and leans back against the stage looking at me with a serious face. “You and I, we’re not the same. Not even close. I said yes, and you didn’t even get asked the question. A lot of people are going to say some truly stupid things to you in the near future, and if you happen to punch any of them in the face in front of me, I’m not going to do anything about it.”
“Thanks,” I say. “And I’ll do my best to make sure Friday is the last practice I miss.”
“Okay,” she says. “Now you better book it, or I’ll be writing you a late slip.”
I make it to history just before the bell, and we’re neck deep in whether the War of 1812 was a British victory or an unfortunate draw for the next hour. Usually I would love this back and forth. The teacher plays devil’s advocate and keeps asking questions designed to side with the Americans, but her heart’s not really in it, and we never get much past “if you attack and don’t gain anything, you’ve lost.”
We’ve got a lab day in chemistry, which I had totally forgotten about, and somehow I end up working with Tig, both of us knocking heads over the Bunsen burner while we try not to spill anything or explode.
“So, are we allowed to be friends still, or what?” I ask, when he goes more than twenty minutes without making a sarcastic comment about the fact that since I forgot it was lab day, I had to tie my hair back with string.
“You mean since I voluntarily gave the DNA sample that will clear me for sure?” he asks.
“No, God, no,” I say. “I meant since your best friend and I kind of dumped each other very publicly the other day at lunch.”
“Oh, that,” Tig says. “Boys are a bit different from girls when it comes to that, I think.”
“In that Leo’s not going to break up with you if you talk with me?” I ask.
“Our relationship is very stable,” he says, sounding like himself again. “We can survive a little divergence of social groups. And hey, I picked you to be my lab partner, didn’t I?”
“I think that was more a case of ‘both of us got here at the same time,’” I say, but I feel better anyway. Tig being an ass is one of the most important foundation pieces in my life, at least at school.
“You say tomato, I say tomato,” he says, pronouncing both a’s the long way. “Do you want to talk about our feelings now? Because I should put down the acid if I’m going to cry.”
“Don’t be a jerk,” I say. Except I really do want to talk about my feelings. I’m pretty sure no one will overhear us. Everyone is busy and chatting with their lab partners. Unlike grade nine chemistry, where we were packed in like sardines, this class is actually spaced out on the lab benches. As long as I keep it together, we could probably talk about anything. “Okay, be a jerk,” I say. “But just tell me: Does Leo honestly think that I wasn’t raped?”
“I would punch him in his face.” Tig’s whole body goes still when he says it, which is not usual for him, and I know that he is more serious than I have ever seen him in my entire life. “In his face. But he does have a jealous streak, and he’s kind of upset about how much time you spent with other guys those weeks. How you always seemed to make time for Polly, but not him. Like, he feels that had you been dancing with him like you were supposed to, none of this would have happened.”
“Like I was supposed to?” I drop my voice to a whisper to avoid squeaking, and a couple students look our way. I glare, and they turn back to their own workspace.
“Calm down,” Tig says, which only makes me more angry, but he’s got a point. “I’m not saying he’s right, and frankly I think that’s kind of an assholish stance to take, but that’s where his head’s at, and you did ask.”
I turn the gas on and light the burner. We set the beaker on the mesh to boil, and take half a step back to wait. I check the thermometer, and realize that when he got supplies Tig got one with the wrong range.
“Watch the beaker,” I say, and head for the supply cabinet.
Leo is there. He must have had the same issue. He looks at me, and all the anger and helplessness I felt in the doctor’s office, in the cemetery, in my bedroom, in the change room, and everywhere else I’ve been since I got back to Palermo bubbles over. He thinks I brought it on myself. And he thinks that’s a good reason to turn on me.
He starts to look away, and I reach out to grab the cabinet door. And then, without meaning to, I slap him across the face as hard as I can, and stalk out of the room.