What business did we in fact have here at all? What titer of hubris so possessed us to think that we could right wrongs, repair damage, offer compensation—this much for an eye, this much for a limb, this much for a mother’s love and protection, this much for a life? Good purpose was no defense. What I was experiencing, and Julie could not, was the plain recognition of the role reversal that had begun like the distant sound of sirens and now come roaring up with lights ablaze and knocked me flat. For the first time in a long time I thought of Jill. Not the menacing Jill. But my once-upon-a-time friend Jill. Jill, grief-stricken, deprived of her lovely daughter. Her Bindy. Her only.
Then I said, “Maggie has a right to her hate. But in my mind, even though this isn’t true, in my mind…”
“Roman is Stefan.”
“That’s right.”
“So maybe Jill has to be the next recipient of The Healing Project. If she is open to it. Maybe it is time for Stefan to express his deep remorse directly to her.”
If I hadn’t already been sitting down, my legs would have gone slack with the immensity of the realization. “That’s impossible.” But even as I said it, I knew Julie might be right.
“It certainly will not be easy,” she said.
“Julie! There’s an ocean of distance between easy and confronting Jill McCormack!”
“You don’t have to be the one to confront her.”
“What else could Stefan’s plan for renewal be?”
“Remember the rules call for no direct contact between the participant and the victim’s family,” Julie said. “So I’m thinking the clearest message of remorse and amends might be for Stefan to offer to support Jill’s organization SAY. If she would have him. He would have to make the case why in his letter. After all, she formed it in honor of Belinda.”
But how would that even be possible? Why didn’t Julie suggest that he run the hundred yards in nine seconds…or cure cancer? The idea was so outrageous that it bewildered me to respond. And that was before considering whether Jill would even allow it. Besides, wouldn’t Stefan joining SAY somehow be seen as an admission on his part that he had physically abused Belinda before her death, something Stefan categorically denied. It could be seen as evidence to corroborate the belief that he was a habitual criminal who simply didn’t get caught until his crime escalated and he committed the ultimate offense. Something I knew was not true. And yes, it could be powerful, a boost more effective for the message of SAY than any public relations campaign could ever be. But it would also wipe out any hope of a good opinion of Stefan from anyone who knew about his past. It would keep his past alive to be judged all over again. By new people.
“Honey,” Julie said, “let’s go home so you can clean up and maybe have a nap. Then, if you want, we’ll go out and get a nice dinner and talk about it.”
I tried to force lightness into my voice, but the tears had a stranglehold. “Do you think he could really go through with that? Joining SAY? Would they even have him? Stefan shied away from any kind of violence. He flinched when someone hit a woman or a kid on TV. He really believes in that message, in that sense. The police told us that they tried to find evidence that he was violent with Belinda before that night, but they couldn’t find any. They were pretty eager to charge him with whatever assault they could.”
“Well, no one can charge him with anything else now. It’s Stefan who clearly thinks he got off too easy. Remember The Healing Project was his idea after all,” Julie said. “That’s coming from somewhere. And maybe it will turn out to be enough.” She paused for a moment and drained her own bottle of water, then handed me another one. “Did you ever ask him how they seemed when they were together that fall up there in Black Creek? Did you ask any of their friends who might have seen something? Knew something?”
“I didn’t know any of their friends from up there. He was only there a week or so full-time when it happened. We had just seen Belinda for the holidays…afterward, I assumed the police did all that. I just concentrated on taking care of what was right in front of me. Stefan. First in rehab and then in jail. We didn’t spend the time we had together talking about the…the past.”
“Did you ever contact the detectives afterward and follow up?”
“No,” I said.
Julie said, “Why not?”
Why not indeed. Since the night in the hospital when Detective Pete Sunday described the injury that the golf club had wrought to the back of Belinda’s head—and in a blurt of new nausea I now realized that image was now twinned in my mind with the photo of Jessamyn we had just seen—I hadn’t dared to risk knowing anything more. In fact, I made it a point not to know anything more. Who in my situation would want to? What good could it possibly do? Or was I just too locked in shock to question anything at all? I just knew I had to move forward.