“Shepherd residence,” said a man who sounded like he had a phone on his nightstand, like gravity was pinning his voice to the back of his throat. Robbie’s father.
“Mr. Shepherd?” I said.
He coughed up some morning phlegm. Then, formally, “Speaking.”
I exhaled hard and led with the only thing that mattered to a parent. “First I want to say that Robbie is fine. My name is Pamela Schumacher, and I am the chapter president of The House. I’m calling because there has been an incident. An intruder broke in and some of the girls were hurt. They’ve been taken to Tallahassee Memorial Hospital to be looked at.”
Mr. Shepherd aimed straight from the hip. “Are we talking about rape?”
“No,” I replied, matching his tone, thinking it was some sign of maturity that I could discuss rape without so much as a wobble in my voice. I thought of Denise’s underwear crumpled on the floor, even as I declared, proudly （proudly!）， “No one was raped.”
“Let me find a pen,” Mr. Shepherd said.
Mr. Shepherd took down the address of the hospital and thanked me politely for the call. I thought, Well, that wasn’t so bad, and in doing so placed a hex on myself.
Eileen’s mother dropped the phone when I said Eileen had sustained some injuries to her face, and her younger brother picked it up and finished the conversation with me. Jill’s parents demanded angrily that I let them speak to someone in charge. I am in charge, I said just as angrily.
I hung up and counted five deep breaths before punching in the phone number for the Andoras’ home in Jacksonville. I didn’t even need to flip the directory pages to the A’s—I’d had Denise’s number memorized since the first break of freshman year.
It was still early but, like Mr. Shepherd, Mrs. Andora answered on the second ring, even though I knew the Andoras didn’t keep a phone in the bedroom. “Well?” she asked with a heavy sigh, suggesting she had been waiting for this call. “How is she?”
I wondered who had gotten to her first. Maybe the Shepherds. Denise and Robbie were both from Jacksonville. They were a year apart, but surely their parents had crossed paths over the years. “It’s Pamela,” I told her. “She’s at the hospital, but she’s going to be fine.”
There was a long, bargaining pause, as though there was still time to take back what I’d just said. “Who is at the hospital?”
“Denise,” I said, less sure of myself. “They took her a little bit ago.”
“Denise?” Mrs. Andora sputtered. “Why? Why would she be at the hospital?”
“I thought you knew.”
“Knew what?” When all language abandoned me, she repeated herself in a shrill tone that terrified me. “Knew what, Pamela?”
“You asked how she was, like you knew—”
“Knew what? Knew what?” Mrs. Andora was shouting by then. I wanted to tell her to stop, that she would startle the cats. She had four, and they were very skittish.
I came to, clinging to the edge of the counter with both hands, my chin in my chest, the phone spinning on the kitchen floor, wondering how the hell the phone had ended up spinning on the kitchen floor.
I picked it up and asserted bullishly, “There’s been an incident.” I thought that about summed it up, but then I realized Mrs. Andora was no longer listening to me. She had pulled the mouthpiece away and was hollering for Mr. Andora, something about Denise being in a car accident.
“No,” I said, feeling unspeakably tired all of a sudden. I wished I could hang up the phone and walk away from this conversation, from the confusion, have someone else explain it to them as well as to me. Then I wanted to lie down and sleep for a week straight. “Not a car accident. It was a robbery. Maybe. We aren’t sure.”
“A robbery?” Mrs. Andora cried. “What are you saying, Pamela? Why don’t you know? Where are you? Is Denise with you? Can I talk to her? It’s Pamela, Richard. No, Richard. Stop—”
Denise’s father came over the line and said furiously, “What in God’s name is going on, Pamela?”
“Denise is fine,” I insisted. “There was an incident at The House. An intruder. Some of the girls were injured and taken to the hospital to be looked at. Denise was lucky, really. Her injuries were the most minor.”
“My God,” Mr. Andora said while Mrs. Andora buzzed around him, telling him what to say, what to ask. “What hospital?”
I repeated the address of Tallahassee Memorial for the umpteenth time that morning: 1300 Miccosukee Road. Still with me after forty-three years.