“No, sweetie, you’ll know when I’m victim shaming. There will be no couching of language here. Here’s what I don’t get, so maybe you can explain: Let’s say your name is Marnie Cassidy. You love your older, super-successful sister Jenn. She has this super-great new husband, Peter. One day, husband Peter sends you—may I be crude?—a dick pic. Do you, Marnie, say nothing to your beloved sister Jenn? Do you not warn her that she’s married to a destructive, cheating pervert?” Hester shook her head. “Do you see my issue? Turn it around. Suppose Marnie had fallen in love and married some guy she met on a TV program. That guy sends you Schlong Selfies. Would you not tell Marnie?”
“I would tell,” Jenn said slowly. “But again it’s not that simple.”
“Okay, make it complicated for me. Tell me what I’m missing.”
“Marnie is not strong. She can be easily manipulated.”
“Right, but how could she be manipulated into not telling her own loving sister?”
Jenn started to wring her hands. “I’ve wondered that myself.”
“And?”
“I don’t really want to talk about this.”
“Tough. Tell me anyway.”
“I think Marnie felt—or maybe Peter convinced her—that if she told me about the pics, I would blame her.”
“Blame your sister?”
“Yes.”
“Instead of your husband?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, that’s interesting,” Hester said. “Like, for some reason, you’d think maybe Marnie had made the first move.”
“Or, I don’t know, encouraged it or asked for it or whatever.”
“Between us girls, do you think that’s what happened?”
“What?”
“Do you think Marnie made the first move?”
“What? No. That’s not what I’m saying—”
“Sounds like it to me. And maybe not intentionally. Maybe your sister just flirted with Peter, and he took it the wrong way.”
“That’s an awful thing to say.”
“Well, it was your theory, not mine. Either way, Marnie never told you about the dick pics. She never told you she’d had any illicit contact with your husband, isn’t that correct?”
Jenn said nothing.
“In fact,” Hester continued, “the first time you heard these terrible truths about your husband was when your sister Marnie made it public on that podcast. She didn’t tell you first. She told the whole world. Didn’t you find that odd?”
“What exactly are you insinuating?” Jenn asked.
“I think it’s pretty obvious. Marnie is what we used to call—it’s probably politically incorrect now—a ‘fame whore.’”
“Now just wait—”
“Stop acting like you have no idea what I mean. It’s insulting to both of us. Your sister auditioned for all kinds of reality shows, but she never got cast. No one noticed, no one cared. She did manage to get cast on a tiny network spinoff—only because she was the sister of Jenn Cassidy—and she was eliminated in week one. Her fame, whatever there was of it, plummeted. But lo and behold, ever since Marnie outed your husband and destroyed your marriage, well, now Marnie is a big star. She’s got that judging gig on RuPaul and—”
“What is the point of all this?”
“Maybe Marnie lied. Maybe she made the whole thing up.”
Jenn closed her eyes and shook her head. “No. Marnie didn’t lie about Peter.”
“How can you be so sure?”
She opened her eyes. “You don’t think I was skeptical too?”
“Of your sister?”
“Of everything. Do you know how reality TV works?”
“No.”
“It’s all an illusion. It’s a theater, sure, but it’s more like a magic trick. You can’t trust anything you see. I live with that every day. So yes, I trusted my sister. I still do and always will. But I wasn’t about to throw away my marriage based on a podcast drama.”
“You said your sister was easily manipulated. You thought that maybe—”
“I didn’t think maybe anything,” Jenn half snapped. “I wanted corroboration.”
“And you got it?”
“Yes.”
“From?”
Jenn took a deep breath. “Peter isn’t a very good liar.”
Hester usually kept the questions coming rat-tat-tat style, but she paused here to let Jenn elaborate.