to. “When did she start working the streets?”
Lewis looked up at me as if had slapped her in the face. And in a way, I had. In the space of one question, I had told her she was a terrible parent and failed Grace. “Grace was a good girl,” she hissed at me. “She was.”
“I know that, Mrs. Lewis, and you did the best you could. No one could ask for better, but sometimes even the best isn’t enough for some kids. And according to the police she was working the streets. They have evidence to that effect.”
In truth, I had no idea if Whitford had any such evidence, but her body having been found in a farmer’s field outside of the city was enough for me. In this city, the only women found in such circumstances were murdered prostitutes. Facts didn’t lie. “Whatever you can tell me won’t get her in trouble because it’s too late for that. The only way you can help her now is to tell her story, and maybe some of the information you give me, the same information you probably gave the police, will help find her killer. To tell me the truth, that’s the only thing you can do for Grace now, except for loving her and remembering her.”
I knew I was full of shit, but I felt a need to know more about Grace, to get more of her story. I wanted to find out how she went from a loving home to end up in a field, and I needed to do this to Mrs. Lewis so she would show me and those who read my story the deep pain she was feeling.
Despite what people continually proclaim, they aren’t looking for good and happy events in the news. Sure, everyone likes the bit about the kid being saved after falling in a well, or the dog rescued after being trapped on the spring ice of the North Saskatchewan River. But if a newspaper had only those kinds of stories, people would stop reading it.
People want to read about other people’s pain and suffering, and they also like to talk about these stories to their friends, family, and coworkers. Many, many years ago, I wrote a story about a horrific murder/suicide in which a father and husband slaughtered his family, also killing the girl who rented the basement suite downstairs before cutting his own throat. Because of the number of people killed and the horror of the story, it ran on the front page.
I did my best to forget it, but when I visited my parents that week, one of the first things my mother asked me was if I had heard about this story, describing the details of the crime and the speculations about who he’d killed first, and so on. I told her that of course I heard about the story because I wrote the damn thing myself, didn’t she see my byline on the front page. But she kept going, kept talking about how sad it was, and how this family died and wasn’t it horrible and so on. The only way to get her to stop talking about it was to threaten to leave. Even then she managed to slip it into the conversation while we were eating.
So it’s true that newspapers cover the “bad” stories in order to sell newspapers because they do sell newspapers. It’s the kind of thing people read and talk about. But that never made it easier to cover these stories. Lewis had fallen into a fit of weepiness and I just sat there watching her, hating myself for creating such pain and hoping that whatever information she had would help me.
“She would call every month or so and I would try to get her to come home and stop doing all that stupidity and get a real job,” she said, blubbering through the words.
“But she said I didn’t understand, that I didn’t understand who she was, what she needed. The money was too easy and it was kind of fun, which I didn’t understand. How could that be fun? But she was FAS, and with no more structure in her life, she had no conception of the consequences of her actions. I tried to tell her that, tell she should come home or at least get help, but she would always laugh at me, like I was some sort of old lady who didn’t know what life was about.
Lewis looked up at me as if had slapped her in the face. And in a way, I had. In the space of one question, I had told her she was a terrible parent and failed Grace. “Grace was a good girl,” she hissed at me. “She was.”
“I know that, Mrs. Lewis, and you did the best you could. No one could ask for better, but sometimes even the best isn’t enough for some kids. And according to the police she was working the streets. They have evidence to that effect.”
In truth, I had no idea if Whitford had any such evidence, but her body having been found in a farmer’s field outside of the city was enough for me. In this city, the only women found in such circumstances were murdered prostitutes. Facts didn’t lie. “Whatever you can tell me won’t get her in trouble because it’s too late for that. The only way you can help her now is to tell her story, and maybe some of the information you give me, the same information you probably gave the police, will help find her killer. To tell me the truth, that’s the only thing you can do for Grace now, except for loving her and remembering her.”
I knew I was full of shit, but I felt a need to know more about Grace, to get more of her story. I wanted to find out how she went from a loving home to end up in a field, and I needed to do this to Mrs. Lewis so she would show me and those who read my story the deep pain she was feeling.
Despite what people continually proclaim, they aren’t looking for good and happy events in the news. Sure, everyone likes the bit about the kid being saved after falling in a well, or the dog rescued after being trapped on the spring ice of the North Saskatchewan River. But if a newspaper had only those kinds of stories, people would stop reading it.
People want to read about other people’s pain and suffering, and they also like to talk about these stories to their friends, family, and coworkers. Many, many years ago, I wrote a story about a horrific murder/suicide in which a father and husband slaughtered his family, also killing the girl who rented the basement suite downstairs before cutting his own throat. Because of the number of people killed and the horror of the story, it ran on the front page.
I did my best to forget it, but when I visited my parents that week, one of the first things my mother asked me was if I had heard about this story, describing the details of the crime and the speculations about who he’d killed first, and so on. I told her that of course I heard about the story because I wrote the damn thing myself, didn’t she see my byline on the front page. But she kept going, kept talking about how sad it was, and how this family died and wasn’t it horrible and so on. The only way to get her to stop talking about it was to threaten to leave. Even then she managed to slip it into the conversation while we were eating.
So it’s true that newspapers cover the “bad” stories in order to sell newspapers because they do sell newspapers. It’s the kind of thing people read and talk about. But that never made it easier to cover these stories. Lewis had fallen into a fit of weepiness and I just sat there watching her, hating myself for creating such pain and hoping that whatever information she had would help me.
“She would call every month or so and I would try to get her to come home and stop doing all that stupidity and get a real job,” she said, blubbering through the words.
“But she said I didn’t understand, that I didn’t understand who she was, what she needed. The money was too easy and it was kind of fun, which I didn’t understand. How could that be fun? But she was FAS, and with no more structure in her life, she had no conception of the consequences of her actions. I tried to tell her that, tell she should come home or at least get help, but she would always laugh at me, like I was some sort of old lady who didn’t know what life was about.
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