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I cringe. “Roxanne… ah, fuck. I’m sorry for grabbing you, okay? There’s no excuse, but I’m still sorry.”
“Oh,” she chirps, clearly surprised. “I–well, thanks.”
I clear my throat and roll my eyes to the stars. “I also wanted to tell you I took Patricia to the police station, and she filed a police report against Robert. I thought you’d want to be forewarned.”
“Good for her. I just hope it helps her heal.”
I drop my voice to nearly a whisper. “I heard what you offered to do for her. I have to say, I never expected that from you, but my respect for you has grown. Thank you for doing that for Patricia.”
I hear her breathe on the other line, and the sound is achingly familiar. She lets out a breathy laugh after a few minutes. “I’m not as much of a monster as you always thought, huh?”
“I never thought you were a monster, Roxie. You just… you broke my heart.”
“Roxie again, is it? I guess you really don’t hate me too much anymore, then.”
“Never hate. Angry, maybe. Frustrated, absolutely. But I could never hate you.” My voice is thick with emotion.
Roxanne makes a vulnerable, small sound, and this little noise lights the smallest ember within me, deep in my soul where I was sure I had purged her. As it turns out, I can never truly remove her from within me.
“Do you want to go get dinner?” she asks, almost hesitantly. “We could go—”
“I’m sorry, Roxanne,” I say, voice warmer than I had anticipated it to be. “Don’t take it the wrong way, but…”
“I get it.” Those three little words squeeze my heart so tight that I’ve got to shut my eyes to process the pain.
“I have to go. Have a good weekend,” I find myself saying.
“You too, Andries. Goodbye.” She sounds sad when she says the last word, but we hang up nearly at the same time, knowing this is the right thing to do. I remain sitting on the bench for a long time, iPhone in hand, thinking about what had just occurred. Nothing in my life has ever made me feel as weak as Roxanne does, but damn it all, when it came to her, I didn’t mind being weak.
15
Amsterdam, February 17, 2022
Andries
Patricia has been initially standoffish,but as the weeks go on, she’s started to warm up to us again, the emotional stress of having to file the police report finally starting to fade. Elise has been on edge about Patricia, so much so that I dared not tell her about my excessively amiable talk with Roxanne the night Patricia filed the report. Speaking of Roxanne, we haven’t spoken again since that day and while I have been inclined to call her from time to time, I’ve managed to keep the temptation at bay.
Besides the crunch of having to get everything done in time school wise, it has been relatively peaceful these last few weeks. My new apartment is starting to feel more like someplace I belong as it accumulates the traces of my everyday life the longer I live in it.
Arriving back at my place for a quick break between lectures, I throw my bag aside on the floor and drop myself onto the couch. My phone has been off during class, so I turn it on andleave it on the low table in front of me, ready to go and pick a book to read. But almost immediately I realize that there is going to be no such activity for me.
I first see that I have eight missed calls from my dad, but before I can register anything else, my phone is ringing. Of course, it’s Dad himself, and I pick up quickly, worried that the excessive calls are because someone is sick or hurt.
“Dad, is everyone okay?” I ask the moment the call connects.
“Oh, everyone is fine, except my company and the business I’ve spent my entire adult life keeping afloat. What have you done, Andries?!”
I freeze. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Let me refresh your memory,” his voice is tight with barely controlled rage. “Someone got an escort from your ex’s agency, fucked her when he wasn’t supposed to, and now he has just been pulled out of our office building and was arrested! Something tells me this connection isn’t exactly a coincidence!”
Bewildered, I sit up straight. “I helped a girl report an assault recently, and she also worked for Roxanne, but it couldn’t be the same incident, because the man in that situation was named Robert.”
“Wait until you hear about this part, son. Roxanne’s agency is fully cooperating with the police,andthey admitted Robert was just an alias for Karl!”
My head spins, thinking about how I had helped Karl get his promotion on Roxanne’s request. It makes me feel awful, until I realize he’d have still wanted to victimize a young woman, promotion or not.
“You should be happy, Dad. That means they managed to save you the trouble of finding out Karl was a rapist further down the line.”
