Bright Young Women(15)
“I wish I could say I am here to reassure you,” Mr. Wren said, “but I am here to put the fear of God in you.”
Someone moaned. Someone coughed. Someone dropped her dirty tissue on the floor and banged her head picking it up, muttering ow accusingly. Hadn’t she endured enough?
“Last night,” Mr. Wren continued, “about half an hour after this person fled your residence, he broke into an off-campus apartment on Dunwoody Street and beat another female student within an inch of her life.”
I brought my hands to the back of my neck and dropped my chin to my chest. Protect your neck. This is what you do when a bear attacks you. Denise taught me that, driving through Ocala National Forest on our way to her parents’ house. Black bears denned in the sand pines, and there were safety signs posted everywhere. What you do is you lie on your stomach and you spread your legs wide and you clasp your hands around the back of your neck and you don’t fight, never fight, even if you’re being torn limb from limb.
“But she survived?” I heard myself ask.
“She’s at the hospital with the others, but that’s all I know for the moment.”
Upstairs, one of the police officers slammed a door, and Bernadette grabbed my arm so hard she left half-moon indents in my skin.
“Whoever this person is”—Mr. Wren was speaking through his teeth, as though repulsed by his own fear—“he’s a sick individual. He’s depraved. He should have sought help for an illness a long time ago. And we cannot rule out that he specifically targeted this sorority, or the girls he attacked, or that he won’t come back, or that he hasn’t been planning this for God knows how long. The threat level is extremely high.”
What I remember of that moment is the way we clutched at one another, desperately, the way we dug in our nails and held on for dear life. We were affectionate in The House, but this was about making sure we were all here, that we were hearing this, that we were living this. Overnight, we had fallen through the looking glass. Denise used to tell me how Salvador Dalí would deprive himself of sleep and stare at objects until he could reimagine them into something else, until their true nature revealed itself. I was shivering, delirious with fear, seeing The House for what it really was: a tank for waterfowl, open for the season.
“I recommend that you avoid anything that could identify you as a member of this house. No sweatshirts or pins. If you have stickers on your cars, remove them. Travel in groups of at least three. Do not travel alone with any men for the time being.”
“Not even with our boyfriends?”
Mr. Wren gasped, making some of the girls gasp louder. “Especially not with your boyfriends.” He looked so terrified at the prospect of us spending time alone with our boyfriends that I found myself wondering if my own shadow may be involved in the plot against our lives.
“But what are we supposed to do?” I asked. “Where are we supposed to stay tonight?”
“We’ve put in an order for extra locks, though they won’t arrive for a few days,” Mr. Wren said. Locks. That’s what they did for us. Locks. “Some of the other sororities are having fraternity members stand guard through the night.”
“But you just told us not to see our boyfriends,” Bernadette said.
“I said not to see them alone. In groups is different.”
“There’s nowhere we can stay?” I asked, insulted, already knowing the answer was no, or it would have been the first thing he’d offered. I had a hard time imagining that the Stepford wives in training at Alpha Delta Pi, in their grand brick mansion, wouldn’t be rescued on white horses. “Empty dorm rooms, or a hotel?”
“I may be able to fit a few of you into alumni housing. But we don’t have the budget to pay for a hotel for all of you. If you’re able to stay with family and friends who live nearby, I’d strongly recommend that you do so.”
“Tomorrow’s Monday,” I pointed out, wringing my hands nervously. “Do our professors know what happened? Will we be penalized for not attending class?” Grades were never not a concern of mine, even at a time like this.
“I can make sure of that,” Mr. Wren said in an offhand way that sent me spinning. Not something he had already done, or was planning to do, or would absolutely do. Where was everyone’s sense of urgency? I felt stark raving mad with urgency.
“And what about all of them?” I gestured in the direction of the front window, though the press had accumulated not just there but at the side door, descending on us when we left for the church service. Any illusions that they would handle us gently were shattered the moment they followed us inside the chapel and yelled at us as we walked back to the house. “Are they allowed to be here? Are they allowed to bother us like this?”
Mr. Wren asked me to bring him the pad of paper with all our written questions and concerns; he would take them to the president and sort it out as best he could. I never heard from Mr. Wren again, but over the next year of my life, one of my questions was answered time and time again. Yes, the press was allowed to be there. They were allowed to be anywhere I was. And yes, they were allowed to bother me like that.
* * *
Dr. Linda Donnelly called back later that morning.
“I couldn’t even get down the street,” she said breathlessly. “It’s a scene over there. Don’t talk to any members of the press. You know that, right?”