arcing glass discharges a green glimmer of light that alerts the beast and he snatches her wrist just as it goes limp. Consciousness escapes
her.
After the swearing and smashing is long stopped—Isabel has no idea how long—her mother steals back inside to discover her daughter almost
catatonic, shivering and heaving without sound on the floor. A blood-drenched cushion is gripped between her legs and her once-white shirt is soaking red from the gash across her neck. Screwed up
pages of sopping school paper are strewn all around her on the floor, the writing illegible.
ED shouldered the burden of Isabel’s story under a canopy of heavy silence. Like many, he’d heard the words “fifteen” and “assault” and
“scar” before, a combination whose hideousness was tempered by its vagueness and so able to be touched on, though in hushed tones, in polite company and prime-time documentaries. He was
one of the very few who’d also heard the word “rape” too, but apart from the original hospital and George’s late wife, Annette, Isabel had never till now divulged to anyone
how degenerate and degrading it had been.
In the deafening quiet, Ed stared at the wall opposite them, at the oil painting of golden haystacks, an original whose fanatical and intense swirls were now almost jumping at him. He touched
his ear. How had she dealt with this… this horror? At fifteen, no less?
He pondered his own experiences; he’d averted his eyes from other fifteen-year-olds… some even younger… a lifetime of combat had taught him that nothing was unthinkable. He
too had suppressed horrors and this was hardly the moment for them to arise again. Unlike Isabel’s, his were in times of war. Raw as it still was, his first wife’s adulterous and fatal
car smash didn’t remotely qualify, though the ache was with him daily. He tried to keep his own nightmarish images at bay, for a moment even closing his eyes as if to shut them out, Isabel
probably thinking it was her story alone he was stressing over.
His arm hooked protectively around his wife. The two sat on the sofa and Ed glanced sideways to see Isabel staring blankly though the French doors, out to the patio where George and Ed’s
little boy were playing catch.
GREGORY was calling from campaign headquarters. “ Close-up say they’ve got some new angle on your past,” he told Isabel, the inflexion in his voice not
able to hide his concern. “They’re running it whether we cooperate or not.” As Isabel gripped the handset, Gregory didn’t even remotely understand her anxiety, but her tight
mouth revealed to Ed that whatever Gregory was saying, it was not good.
She attempted to compose herself. Twisting back around to Ed, she said, “ Close-up’s got something.” Her voice, already weakened, broke as she said it. “Gregory
says it’s about my past. Ed, they want me there, in the studio, but they won’t say what it is.”
“It’s an ambush, that’s what.”
“God, if they found the rapist! Ed, I’ve only just told you . I couldn’t face…”
Ed grabbed for the phone to speak to Gregory but pressed hands-free. “Samson,” he said, “Isabel’s in Detroit tomorrow with a zillion…”
“They know that,” answered Gregory, “though they don’t know about the debate preparation, which is secret… not listed on the published press calendar. The
prep’s only part way through when Close-up goes to air. The itinerary shows her with a night off, flying out to Des Moines, to be fresh for the next morning.”
Gregory had a full production crew already at work dressing up an old church fellowship hall out in Detroit’s suburbs to duplicate the actual set for the first presidential TV debate.
Isabel’s secret debate dress rehearsal was scheduled to be held there tomorrow night.
Ed wasn’t in the mood for Gregory’s blabbering. He stood, “Tell those fucks she’ll do their show… from Detroit.”
A surge of alarm shot up Isabel’s
her.
After the swearing and smashing is long stopped—Isabel has no idea how long—her mother steals back inside to discover her daughter almost
catatonic, shivering and heaving without sound on the floor. A blood-drenched cushion is gripped between her legs and her once-white shirt is soaking red from the gash across her neck. Screwed up
pages of sopping school paper are strewn all around her on the floor, the writing illegible.
ED shouldered the burden of Isabel’s story under a canopy of heavy silence. Like many, he’d heard the words “fifteen” and “assault” and
“scar” before, a combination whose hideousness was tempered by its vagueness and so able to be touched on, though in hushed tones, in polite company and prime-time documentaries. He was
one of the very few who’d also heard the word “rape” too, but apart from the original hospital and George’s late wife, Annette, Isabel had never till now divulged to anyone
how degenerate and degrading it had been.
In the deafening quiet, Ed stared at the wall opposite them, at the oil painting of golden haystacks, an original whose fanatical and intense swirls were now almost jumping at him. He touched
his ear. How had she dealt with this… this horror? At fifteen, no less?
He pondered his own experiences; he’d averted his eyes from other fifteen-year-olds… some even younger… a lifetime of combat had taught him that nothing was unthinkable. He
too had suppressed horrors and this was hardly the moment for them to arise again. Unlike Isabel’s, his were in times of war. Raw as it still was, his first wife’s adulterous and fatal
car smash didn’t remotely qualify, though the ache was with him daily. He tried to keep his own nightmarish images at bay, for a moment even closing his eyes as if to shut them out, Isabel
probably thinking it was her story alone he was stressing over.
His arm hooked protectively around his wife. The two sat on the sofa and Ed glanced sideways to see Isabel staring blankly though the French doors, out to the patio where George and Ed’s
little boy were playing catch.
GREGORY was calling from campaign headquarters. “ Close-up say they’ve got some new angle on your past,” he told Isabel, the inflexion in his voice not
able to hide his concern. “They’re running it whether we cooperate or not.” As Isabel gripped the handset, Gregory didn’t even remotely understand her anxiety, but her tight
mouth revealed to Ed that whatever Gregory was saying, it was not good.
She attempted to compose herself. Twisting back around to Ed, she said, “ Close-up’s got something.” Her voice, already weakened, broke as she said it. “Gregory
says it’s about my past. Ed, they want me there, in the studio, but they won’t say what it is.”
“It’s an ambush, that’s what.”
“God, if they found the rapist! Ed, I’ve only just told you . I couldn’t face…”
Ed grabbed for the phone to speak to Gregory but pressed hands-free. “Samson,” he said, “Isabel’s in Detroit tomorrow with a zillion…”
“They know that,” answered Gregory, “though they don’t know about the debate preparation, which is secret… not listed on the published press calendar. The
prep’s only part way through when Close-up goes to air. The itinerary shows her with a night off, flying out to Des Moines, to be fresh for the next morning.”
Gregory had a full production crew already at work dressing up an old church fellowship hall out in Detroit’s suburbs to duplicate the actual set for the first presidential TV debate.
Isabel’s secret debate dress rehearsal was scheduled to be held there tomorrow night.
Ed wasn’t in the mood for Gregory’s blabbering. He stood, “Tell those fucks she’ll do their show… from Detroit.”
A surge of alarm shot up Isabel’s
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