Authors: Allison Leotta
The world needs order. If it doesn’t have that, if people take matters into their own hands, you end up with your house and everything in it being burned to the ground.
And you end up with some horrible memories. You can never get them out of your head.
I still have nightmares about what we did. I deserve them.
But that night, watching the bonfire of trash, the answer seemed so obvious. Kathy, Wendy, and I had tried the system, each one of us. It hadn’t worked. So we decided to get rid of the garbage ourselves. We’d take care of our own.
Once it was clear that we all agreed on the outcome, the rest was just planning the logistics. We put aside the beer, sat on a rock, and talked details. We’re very organized women. We covered everything. Or so we thought.
53
T
he glassy black water of Lake Huron seemed to amplify Coach Fowler’s screams. Kathy and I each grabbed one of the handles of the wheelchair and tipped it backward until the chair was reclining fully on its back and Coach’s head was on the AstroTurf floor of the boat. Wendy picked up the white plastic bucket, which was full of lake water. She poured it over his face. The screaming was replaced with gurgling.
When the bucket was empty, Wendy dipped it into the lake and refilled it. She set it down near the wheelchair and knelt by her husband’s head. He was choking and snuffling on the water in his lungs. She stroked his hair, pushing his soaked bangs out of his eyes. “Shh,” she said. “Shh, Owen.” When he quieted enough to take a breath, she said, “Scream again, and I’ll do that again. Keep quiet and we can talk like grown-ups. Deal?”
He coughed, then nodded as vigorously as his position would allow. Kathy and I righted the chair. He choked up more water, then dry heaved. He was fully awake now, his eyes wide, his wet blond hair plastered back. His head was the only part of his body he could move and he kept turning it back and forth, desperately trying to take in the situation. But now he was quiet.
Wendy opened one of the bench seats, which held a large storage area beneath the cushion. She pulled out a red milk crate full of odds and ends. Kathy angled the wheelchair until the coach was facing a bench. The three of us sat down together.
The most powerful man in Holly Grove stared at three regular women wearing T-shirts and jeans. A jury of his peers? Not exactly. But it was the closest we’d ever get.
We didn’t put a piece of tape on his mouth. That might have left a mark. And we wouldn’t be able to hear what he had to say.
I stood up and said, “Owen Fowler, you are charged with three counts of being an evil, perverted asshole. How do you plead?”
“What?”
“This is your trial. The one you deserve. The one that was never going to happen in Holly Grove.”
“This is crazy. Let me go, and we’ll pretend this was one big joke.”
“I’ll take that as a ‘not guilty’ plea. Fine. For my first witness, I call Wendy Fowler.”
You’re looking at me like I’m insane, Annie. I understand. Why not just kill the man? We considered it. We could’ve just shot him as he came out of Screecher’s one night and made it look like a mugging. That certainty would’ve been simpler. But it would’ve been too easy for him. Our goal was protecting future girls, yes, but it was also justice. And for justice, he had to know that he was being punished for what he’d done. He had to understand what was happening to him, who was doing it, and why.
Wendy reached into the crate and pulled out a small pink Cinderella sleeping bag. She stood up and put it on his lap. “Do you remember this? From the night of Isabel’s last sleepover?”
He nodded, his eyes growing big.
“I always suspected you were touching the girls from the high school. I saw them come to your summer camp, all smiles and hope, and then drop out, all haunted and hollow. I knew what you did to me, on the seat of your Corvette, when I was seventeen. But I couldn’t prove you were doing it to other girls. And I didn’t want to.
“It wasn’t easy putting up that front. I felt like a fraud. All the concealer and sunglasses I wore to cover my bruises. The willful blindness to your after-school activities.”
“Wendy, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said. “I always loved you. I—”
“Shut up,” she said. “You’ll have your chance. And don’t tell me you loved me. You were a good provider, that’s all. I had a roof over my head—two, actually. I didn’t have to scrape by for everything, like
my family had. I thought that would be enough. Even if my husband didn’t love me. At least you loved Isabel. And for Isabel’s sake, you’d restrain yourself. Our home was an out-of-bounds zone. I believed that; I had to believe it. Until the night of the sleepover.”
She picked up the sleeping bag.
“You just couldn’t keep your hands off those girls, could you? Not even in our own house? I came down that night to get a glass of milk. And there you were, with Zoë Malone—Isabel’s best friend!—on your lap, showing her the Holly Grove yearbook. Telling her she was a good girl. Your hand was pushing up Zoë’s nightgown—it was up past her thighs. She was ten! What would have happened if I hadn’t come down then?”
He pursed his lips and looked away. She grabbed his face and turned it to hers, like he was her disobedient child.
“Answer me!” she said. “I was your wife for ten years. I cooked your meals, washed your underwear, made you respectable. I deserve an answer.”
“Baby doll.” His voice was soft and pleading. “I was just showing a little girl a book. I would never do what you’re suggesting. Not when I had you upstairs. The most beautiful woman in Holly Grove in my bed, and I’m going to mess around with a ten-year-old? That’s crazy.”
“You had an
erection
.” She whispered the last word. Nice churchgoing mom didn’t like potty language, not even in the middle of Lake Huron. She let go of his face and took a step back. “You were rubbing that little girl against your
erection
.”
“No, no, no. You were tired, baby doll. You thought you saw something that you didn’t actually—”
“Don’t insult my intelligence, Owen. I
know
what I saw. Do you think I’d have you here—like this—if I weren’t sure? I
know
who you are. I know you better than anyone else in this world does. You might be able to fool the town, but not me.” She stared at him. “You’re a child molester.”
He looked down at his silver-wrapped knees. He nodded.
It was an acknowledgment. And that made me pause. There’s something about a bad man admitting his sins that has power.
But it was my turn, and I wasn’t giving it up, not after all this.
I reached into the milk crate and pulled out the big trophy I got when I set the record for the high jump in 2004. It was a standard track-and-field trophy: a large brass woman frozen midstride, standing atop a heavy wood and marble base.
“I trusted you,” I said. “I thought you cared about me. I fell in love with you. And then you raped me. After that, I never trusted another man. For ten years. I barely graduated from high school. And here I am. A dead-end life. Because of you.”
“I thought—” He glanced at his wife. “I thought you wanted me as much as I wanted you. I thought it was, you know, consensual.”
“I said ‘no.’ And I was a kid.”
“But you got me all riled up! You can’t tease a man like that and just expect him to pull back. You were the one who—”
He noticed us glaring at him. He stopped and cleared his throat. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You’re right. I’m very, very sorry.”
There’s not much to say after someone apologizes. It makes me wonder why people don’t do it more often. I sat down.
Kathy’s hands were shaking as she reached into the milk crate. She pulled out a tiny lavender ski jacket. It was the one Hayley used to wear when she was a little girl. It was the one she’d worn in Meijer that day that Kathy put on the big fruity hat and Hayley tried to eat the “gapes.”
“She was my little girl,” Kathy whispered. “My baby. She was all I had. And you killed her.”
Kathy might have had more to say, but she couldn’t. She sat down and cried. Wendy sat and put her arm around her.
I looked at Coach Fowler. “Do you have anything you want to say in your defense?”
“God, I’m so sorry, Kathy.” His voice cracked. He looked at each of us, one by one. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. Wendy, I’m not a good husband. I know that. You deserve better. Jody, I’m sorry for what I did to you, and what it did to your life. You deserved better too.”
“Then why didn’t you
do
better?” Wendy said.
“I wanted to.” He started to cry. “I just couldn’t. I’m sick. I know what I did was wrong. I tried to change. I couldn’t.”
“You’re always telling your athletes about self-discipline. Was that just BS? Or does it not apply to you?”
“I wanted it to be true. I tried.” He was sobbing. “I know exactly what those girls went through. I went through it too.”
“What are you talking about?” Wendy asked angrily.
With his face scrunched in pain and his hair slick as a wet rat, he was barely recognizable as the golden god who reigned over the football field. He choked out the words between sobs. “My stepfather . . . used to . . . to touch me . . . when I was a boy.”
We stared at him, at each other, then back at him.
What makes someone evil? The devil? I don’t believe in that. Biology? Maybe some people are predisposed to that sort of thing. But mostly, I think it’s evil happening to them. Kids who are victims are more likely to grow up to become predators. That doesn’t mean it’s their destiny; a lot of survivors never hurt anyone else. But for those who don’t escape, who stay in the line of succession like unlucky crown princes, evil is passed down like a monstrous heirloom. We’re all victims of the victims who came before us.
“I don’t . . . know why . . . that made me . . . do it . . . it’s not the person . . . I wanted to be . . .” He could barely get the words out. “I’m so sorry . . . I need help . . . please . . . I’m sick . . . help me.”
Tears mixed with the lake water on his cheeks. Snot dangled from his nose in long shuddering strings before landing in slimy loops on the duct tape. He shivered beneath his silver body cast. If I’ve ever seen a more pathetic sight, I can’t think of what it was.
I reached in my pocket for a tissue at the same time that Wendy reached under the steering wheel for a rag. She cleaned him with it, briskly wiping the tears and snot off his face. As she did, she looked over and saw that I was holding out a crumpled Kleenex. In unison, we said: “Oh shit.”
We realized it at the same time. The urge to clean off his face was a tipping point. You can’t murder in cold blood an unarmed person you still have the instinct to nurture.
We couldn’t kill Owen Fowler. But we had no clue what to do with him now.
54
A
nna didn’t want to fight with Cooper in the car. He was having a hard enough time simply sitting in it while she drove toward the courthouse through the morning rush-hour traffic. But he wouldn’t let the issue go.
“Don’t do it this way,” he said, again.
“I have to. It’s the only way to get justice.”
“The judge has all the power in this town. He’ll send
both
you and Jody to jail.”
“He has power because no one’s ever challenged him. He’ll lose that power once this comes out.”
“He won’t go down without a fight. He has contacts, in and out of jail. He might have you killed first.”
“Oh, come on. He’s corrupt. He’s not Scarface.”
“He may wear a robe, but a man acts like any other animal when he’s cornered.” Cooper was sweating, although winter blew in from the open windows. He wiped his brow on his shirt and turned around to look at Jody. “Can you talk some sense into her?”
“I think this is the most sensible thing she’s planned since she got here.” Jody grinned at Anna in the rearview mirror. Anna grinned back.
Cooper slapped the dashboard so hard, Anna jumped. “Dammit, Anna!”
“Coop,” she said. “Let’s not fight in the car.”
“Where else are we going to fight? This is it! You’re about to throw yourself on a funeral pyre.”
“Look,” she said. “I went all the way to D.C. to help people.
I didn’t realize how much Holly Grove needed help. This is my chance. This could change everything.”
Anna turned onto Main Street and approached the courthouse square. There were more protesters than ever. She slowed to avoid hitting them. People in Guy Fawkes masks raised their fists and chanted Jody’s name when they saw the SUV.
“You don’t have to get yourself killed trying to fix the world,” Cooper said.
“Isn’t that what you signed up for in Afghanistan?”
“I was serving my country. It was my duty.”
“This is
me
serving my country,” Anna said. “This is
my
duty.”
“What about us? What am I supposed to do when my girlfriend gets killed?”
Anna was silent.
“Right,” Cooper said. “There is no ‘us.’ We’re just ‘friends having fun’ while you’re on a break from your real life.”
“Coop.” She brought the car to a halt at a stop sign and turned to him. “That’s not—”
“I can’t watch you drive into an ambush. And I can’t be in this car.” He swung the door open, got out, and slammed it shut behind him. He strode into the square, where he was quickly swallowed up by the crowd of protesters.
Anna was so startled, she just sat there looking into the place where he’d disappeared. A car behind her honked, and she turned forward, blinked, and put her foot on the accelerator again.
“Don’t mind him,” Jody said from the backseat. “That was just his claustrophobia speaking.”
Anna nodded and gripped the steering wheel tightly, so Jody wouldn’t see that her hands were trembling.
Twenty minutes later, the sisters sat next to each other in court, waiting for the judge to take the bench. Anna’s heart pounded painfully against her ribs.
She glanced back behind her. A dozen reporters sat in the row behind them. She wished she had copies of her motion to give them.
But it was already 9:00
A.M.
The side door opened and Judge Upperthwaite walked out, followed by his legal entourage.