Jodie Picoult - Salem Falls

May 1, 2000

Salem Falls,

New Hampshire

They made her stand on a piece of paper and brush off her clothing, so that bits of dirt and leaves from the forest floated down. Gillian stared at the pristine white sheet, transfixed by the way it grew dirtier and dirtier.

The doctor, thank God, was a woman. She had asked Gilly’s age, height, weight, the date of her last period and Pap smear. She wanted to know if Gilly had ever had any surgeries or hospitalizations, if she’d been under psychiatric care, if she was on any medications, if she’d been sexually assaulted before. Then she asked where penetration had occurred, so she’d know where to collect evidence. Gillian had stared at her blankly. “Vaginally,” the doctor explained. “Orally. Anally.”

Gillian had no recollection of giving answers. She felt as if a steel shell had formed around the core of her, making it impossible to hear clearly or move swiftly. She pictured the shell growing thicker, until one day it cracked and inside there was nothing but dust. “Is my father here?” she whispered.

“Any minute. Okay?” The doctor smiled gently and put down the file she had been writing on. Gilly saw words scrawled across the top: Patient reports a sexual assault. It made her shiver.

Gillian unbuttoned her shirt. “My socks,” she begged in a whisper. “Can’t I leave them on?”

The doctor nodded. She glanced at the bloodstain on the blouse and carefully placed it into a paper bag marked for forensic testing. Gillian’s underwear-a yellow bikini marked FRIDAY, although it wasn’t-went into a separate paper bag. Finally, she folded the piece of paper beneath Gilly’s feet and put it in an evidence bag.

While Gilly stood like a horse on the auction block, the doctor walked in a slow circle around her. “I’m just looking for cuts and bruises,” she explained, bending down to get a closer look at a mark on Gillian’s thigh. “Where’d this come from?”

“Shaving,” Gilly murmured.

“And this?” the doctor pointed to a bruise on the bottom of her wrist.

“I don’t know.”

A camera was removed from a drawer; a photo was taken. Gilly thought of the carvings on the bottoms of her feet, the scars they could not see. Then the doctor asked Gilly to climb onto the examination table. She swallowed hard and clamped her thighs together as the doctor came closer. “Are you going to . . .”

“Not yet.” After the doctor turned off the lights in the room, a bright purple bulb flared to life. “This is just a Wood’s lamp.” She held it an inch above Gilly’s arms and breasts as she moved it over the surface of her skin.

It was pretty, the violet glow over her shoulders and belly and hips. With prompting, she relaxed the muscles in her legs so that they parted. The lamp swooped over and up. “Bingo.”

On her inner thigh, a small paisley-shaped spot gleamed alien green beneath the lamp. “What is it?” Gilly said.

The doctor looked up. “Dried semen, most likely.”

Amos Duncan roared into the hospital, wild-eyed and terrified. He stalked right to the nurse’s station in the ER. “My daughter. Where’s my daughter?”

Before the nurse could answer, Charlie Saxton slid an arm around his old friend’s shoulders. “Amos, it’s all right. She’s here, and she’s being taken care of.”

At that, the big man blanched, his face contorting. “I need to see her,” he said, heading in the direction of the swinging ER doors.

“Not now, Amos. God, think of what she’s been through. The last thing she needs is you barging in while the doctor is doing the physical exam.”

“A physical exam? You mean someone else is in there poking and prodding her?”

“DNA evidence. If you want me to catch the son of a bitch, I need to have something to work with.”

Slowly, Amos turned. “You’re right,” he said hoarsely, although he didn’t like the idea at all. “You’re right.”

He let Charlie lead him to a bank of chairs that faced the door Gilly would exit. Clasping his hands between his knees, he rocked back and forth. “I’m going to castrate him,” Amos said softly, his tone completely at odds with his expression.

Then Gillian walked out beside a young female doctor carrying a stack of evidence bags. Amos looked at his daughter and felt his insides constrict. Anxiety rose inside him, until it fairly pushed him off his chair. “Daddy,” Gillian whispered.

For a long moment they simply stared at each other, exchanging an entire conversation in silence. Gillian flew into his arms, burying her sobs against his shirt. “I’m here now,” Amos said soothingly. “I’m here, Gilly.”

She lifted a tear-stained face. “D-Daddy, I-I-”

Amos touched his fingers to her lips and smiled tenderly. “Don’t you say anything, sweetheart. Don’t say a word.”

Ed Abrams and Tom O’Neill had driven their own hysterical daughters home and had returned to the hospital to keep a support vigil for Amos Duncan. Now that Gillian had been treated, Charlie would begin an investigation. There was nothing left for them to do now but return to their families.

They walked through the lobby of the ER. “God, it’s a shame,” Ed said gruffly.

“Amos’ll make sure the motherfucker hangs. He’s got the resources to make it happen.”

The men stepped into a night as warm and rich as silk. As if by unspoken agreement, they stopped at the curb. “You don’t think . . .” Tom began, then shook his head.

“That he saw us?” Ed finished. “Jesus, Tom, I’ve been thinking that from the moment Charlie told us what had happened.”

“It was dark, though. And we all were wearing black.”

Ed shrugged. “Who knows what he focused on when we were beating him to a pulp? Maybe this . . . this was his way of getting back at us.”

“It worked.” Tom rocked back on his heels. “Think we ought to tell Charlie?”

“It’s not going to change anything now.” Ed let his gaze slide away. “I think . . . I think it’s best kept between us. That’s what Amos would say.”

“If I knew that something I’d done had hurt my own daughter, I’d want to shoot myself,” Tom murmured. “This must be killing him.”

Ed nodded. “That’s why he’ll kill Jack St. Bride instead.”

Charlie knocked on the door of the hospital lounge before entering. Amos had requested a moment alone with his daughter, and he wasn’t about to refuse the man. They sat huddled in plastic seats, their fingers knit together tightly. “Gillian. How are you doing?”

Her eyes, when they met Charlie’s, were absolutely blank. “Okay,” she whispered.

Charlie sat down. “I need you to tell me everything,” he said gently. Glancing quickly at Amos, he added, “It can wait until tomorrow morning, if you feel that’s better.”

“She wants to get it over with,” Amos answered.

“I’m going to have to ask you to leave us alone for a minute.”

“No!” Gillian cried, clutching at her father’s arm. “Can’t he stay with me?”

Charlie stared at her, seeing not the bedraggled teenager sitting across from him but a ten-year-old playing Capture the Flag in his backyard. “Of course,” he said, although he knew this would not be pleasant for Amos. Hell, if he’d been in the man’s position, he wouldn’t want to hear in graphic detail what had transpired.