The Second Rape of Dr. Emily Pershing - C1

BJ LeCrae

This book is inspired by a true story.

Though many of the places described in this story are recognizable, some of the names of people have been changed to protect the privacy and innocence of those still living.

Cover Sculpture info:

Angel of Grief by William Wetmore Story

Protestant Cemetery, Rome, Italy

The Accounts of Mr. LeCrae -- 1

A woman snickers at the unlikely pattern formed by the random teardrops on her sweatpants as she sits in her bedroom alone when she hears her husband and children arrive at home. She rushes to the adjacent bathroom to tidy herself up. Her name is Danielle (Danni), after her grandmother, whom she never knew. Today may very well be Danni’s birthday, and like every birthday since she turned sixteen, she spent the first part of the day doing two things: one—reading old hand-written papers she’s got rolled up like a scroll and bound with a piece of thick, red string, and two—bawling like a little girl. The second part of the day she spends with the people she loves—enjoying the life which she believes, with all her heart and soul, she doesn’t deserve.

Her husband, Beau LeCrae, a simple yet understanding man, knocks at the bedroom door—he knows she’s been crying—she always does on this day. “Sweetness, are you in there?” he asks solemnly of the bedroom door. He knows this time is precious to Danni. He knows the transition from careful to carefree is slight and fragile. He knows he needs to let things happen in their own time. What he doesn’t know is… why.

You’ll have to excuse me—you see, I had planned on writing this story as a narrator, but I don’t think it’s possible to continue without letting you know what’s really going on. I’m Beau. Danni is my wife. You see, there’s a reason for all of this. I’m no writer, yet here I am. Yesterday, I was made privy to the most amazing story I’ve ever known and I have to tell someone, everyone. For years I’ve had a poem in my mind which tells of Danni’s tear-filled birthdays. I’ve never been able to write it down because I never really understood it. Now I do. It’s much bigger than a poem, and truthfully, I’ve got no business even attempting to tell the tale. At the end of it all, it’s a tribute really—a tribute to three, most courageous women—three women I’ve never met—to whom I owe everything. It’s difficult to express how this story has changed me. Of course, I realize the fact that you don’t know me; so, why should you care about anything I have to say? A lot of sacrifices were made, however, so that my family could even exist, so whether you find yourself sympathetic or apathetic toward me—toward us—I sincerely hope you will still appreciate the extraordinary weight of the information we’ve decided to share, and perhaps be inspired yourself. Yet, even if I miss my mark, I owe it to them, at the very least, to tell their tale.

This project started as... almost a knee-jerk reaction to the information, but, having done a great deal of research since then, I think the most poignant--I'll call it, profound--thing, to me, is that it is not a rare thing. I originally thought the uniqueness of the story made it extraordinary, but it's actually the frequency that's so extraordinary. The rarity is in the fact that these relatively common stories are so seldom told--and that's just a tragedy, it's an injustice.

I cannot share with you the sheer depth of the story's relevance without sharing with you at least some minor inference of how beloved my family is to me, so please accept the introduction of my wife and children—they are the reason these pages mean so very much to me, and perhaps soon, they will mean much to you as well.

Some of the story is broken at best, poorly punctuated, or quite difficult to comprehend in its original, written form. In an effort to preserve the originality, especially that of the young woman who specifically notes her effort to write the way she talks, I’ve marked some sentences with a single asterisk, indicating that I have made minor modifications, such as punctuation. Those marked with two asterisks are more severely modified for comprehension. I’ll talk with Danni about making copies of some of the originals in case people are interested in seeing them. They're really quite something to see.

Danni and I have two beautiful daughters, Kendall and Ashley. Kendall turned fifteen this year and Danni’s been promising for years that when Kendall was fifteen, Danni would share with her a secret that would change her life forever. Kendall has been nagging her for months—her birthday was a few months ago, in February—it’s been an eternity for a teenage girl with the desire to possess the knowledge of a glorious predestined secret. Danni kept telling her, “Be patient, it’ll mean more when the right day comes.”

It just so happens that yesterday was the right day. To tell you the truth, I had kind of assumed that this whole secret thing was something mothers and daughters shared, but honestly, I’d been dragged along by “the promise” for so long that I wanted to know too. I had my suspicions that this secret had to do with the scroll, but I had asked her about the scroll twice before only to have her shy away. I never asked her about it again, and now, since she promised to share it with Kendall, there was no way I would ask because I was just sure it was some kind of a “girl thing.”

Kendall’s younger sister, Ashley, turns eight next month, in June, and cannot wait to get her ears pierced. If she keeps beating up the boys at her school, I’m going to do it myself. By the way, no one is allowed to refer to Ashley as Kendall’s “little sister” because—let’s just say—Ashley doesn’t take kindly to the word “little.” So, last year, “little” was forever replaced by, “younger.” Nonetheless, I knew that someday she would also be made privy to the secret, and I couldn’t help but feel a little jealous that this “secret” was going to end up being shared with everyone but me—but such is the role of the man living amongst women and their secrets.

The girls both have their mother’s beauty—a fact that I, as a father, am not thrilled about. Ashley is an unstoppable tomboy with the unending energy of a white water river, yet the pleasuring demure of a small mud puddle. Kendall is just coming out of a time in her life when—I’ll save you the trouble and just say it—she’s been a tremendous pain in the butt; and if Ashley’s going to be anything like Kendall when she’s turning thirteen, I may just have a bomb shelter installed where she can live until she’s… wait a minute… maybe I could stay in the bomb shelter. Now we’re talking! Getting a little ahead of myself… I was talking about what happened yesterday.

“Sweetness, are you in there?” I could hear Danni rustling around in the bathroom but I always give her plenty of space on this day—can’t just walk into the room.

Danni cleared her throat with a little cough and happily said, “Yeah, come on in.”

I walked in and smiled, as I always do. Danni designed--decorated, I should say--a masterpiece bedroom. I won't go into too much detail, but there is one feature that mustn't go without mention. Under our magnificent bed, and atop the laminate wood flooring which matches the wood of the bed almost perfectly, lies the most ridiculously thick, deep-shag area rug which we affectionately call, Shaggy. Its color is slightly lighter than the comforter adorning the massive bed above. Shaggy extends nearly three feet from the sides and I must admit, it makes stepping out of bed each morning delightfully soft and squishy.

It extends past the foot of the bed at least seven or eight feet toward a slate-tiled gas fireplace complete with slate hearth and mahogany mantle. The fireplace sits perfectly opposite the bed, roughly the same width and reaching to the lower height of our vaulted ceiling which peaks above our heads while capitalizing on one of the more commonplace functionalities of the bed—sleeping. Its appearance is quite majestic, but it was only this time last year when Ashley was able to climb aboard without getting a running start--an important detail, because beyond its grandeur and beauty; this bed is also quite versatile. It functions as a ship on the high seas, a precipice overhanging rivers of flowing lava, a magic carpet whisking through the skies over distant continents, and a secret hiding place when Ashley decided to scare the bejesus out of us by jumping out from under the mass of superfluous pillows one almost-intimate evening about a year ago.

Many memories have been made in here, and every one of them makes me smile every time I walk into the room, but the most priceless part of it is undoubtedly Shaggy. Every Thursday evening, Danni attacks the entire thing with a shop vac (no ordinary upright could possibly compete with the forest of abnormally lengthy pile). She undertakes this mission because she is a freakishly tidy person, and because it has become something of a tradition, on Friday or Saturday evenings, for the four of us to gather there on Shaggy, in front of the fireplace, and express to one another how utterly terrible this life is and why.

It’s like our little UN—a wonderful way of peacefully expressing and resolving our frustrations with each other... and with the troubles we face at work or at school or anywhere. We help each other find different ways of looking at our situations. The tradition started years ago when Danni and I were sitting there discussing a problem I had with a coworker. She helped me step back and see, from a different point of view, the situation that confronted me. Kendall was very young and overheard us from the doorway—she volunteered her own problems she had with a girl at school, with her teacher, with me, with her mother—we worked out a lot of hidden issues that night which Danni and I never even knew existed, and it just sort of… became a thing. This rug, Shaggy, as bizarre and impractical as it is, has created strength in our family. We can’t even imagine doing away with it. Ashley joins us now too, and our little family, unlike so many others, has no secrets… except for one.

“Sounds like you picked up the girls…” she said.

“Yup!” I entered slowly, but spoke quickly to keep spirits high. “I ran, I ate, I picked up thuuuh…”

Danni was standing in the bathroom doorway looking more beautiful than ever, in her hand, the scroll, bound by the red string. No shoes; just socks. She was wearing a pair of those light-blue, tight, stretchy jeans that do such wonderful things to accentuate a certain curvaceous part of her anatomy. A long, white frilly blouse draped from her shoulders with tails extending down far enough to cover up what I like so much about the jeans; she hadn’t bothered buttoning it up before walking out toward me—hair down, perfect face, and between the blouse’s silken drapes, enough skin exposed to make a man forget how to breathe. She came directly at me, tossed the scroll toward the bed, and before it hit the comforter, her arms were around me in the kind of embrace that says Thank you as much as it says I love you. I held her, kissed her gently, and then held her some more.

She spoke softly, “Any chance you stopped and picked up a huge box of donuts after picking up the girls?”

“I… most certainly did… not.” I was a bit taken aback by the random question.

“Well, that’s going to have to be our first stop,” as she turned and began the dreadful buttoning. “I’ve been craving donuts since I got up this morning. I want a Boston crème, raspberry jelly-filled, and at least one more, but I’m not sure right now what it is.”

I quickly gathered my bearings. “Shall I inform the runts or should we keep it a surprise?”

“What do you think?” she asked sarcastically.

It seems a few of my bearings were yet un-gathered. The last time I told Ashley we were going to get donuts, she disappeared for half an hour until we got a call from the manager at the donut shop saying Ashley was already there waiting for us. Apparently, she couldn’t wait for us to get ready to go, so she had sneaked out the garage and ridden her bicycle three miles to the donut shop to wait for us there. Unbelievable! We all had a long chat about boundaries and communication that day.

“I think we’ll keep it on the down-low,” I said sheepishly.

“Good plan,” she said before flashing a playful smile.

“So… donuts and…?” I hinted for some insight into the day’s agenda.

“Donuts and… I’ve made a decision,” she responded coyly.

“You have?”

“I have.”

“Write it down?”

“Write it down.”

“Pen or pencil?”

“Pen.”

It was decided—when you can put it in ink, the decision stands. Now, if only I had any clue what we were talking about. This is one of those moments when a man needs to be careful. If I’m supposed to know what we’re talking about already, I need to figure it out quick! If I’m not supposed to know, then this is all just playful banter and she’ll be expecting me to play along so she doesn’t feel like an idiot.

I asked in a serious tone that could be either sincere or sarcastic, “So this is serious, then? There’s no going back, you know?”

Her tone turned as well as she walked up to me standing at the foot of the giant bed—now, I didn’t know if she was being sincere or sarcastic. “I know,” she said, “but I’ve thought about it… and this is what I want.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

I took her hands in mine and looked her squarely in the eyes. If she laughed, it would mean we were playing… and… I was in the clear. If she hugged me sincerely, it meant we were being serious… and I was in big trouble. She did neither. She just looked right back at me; and for some terrible four or five seconds, I struggled to read her—completely scrambled inside. She looked at me with soft eyes—it was as if she could see right through me. “You have no idea what I’m talking about, do you?”

“Not a clue,” I admitted.

We hadn’t moved, but it was clear now that it was she who was holding my hands. “I want you to know… everything there is to know,” she said, “I’m going to tell you everything.”

With another sweet kiss from my wife still tingling on my lips, I glanced down at good ol’ Shaggy—bearing witness to yet another pivotal moment in the LeCrae family history.

“So what’s the plan for the day? I have to imagine you have a time and a place picked out for when, ‘I want you to know everything…’ turns into, I know everything,” I probed as if it were no big deal.

“Don’t get your panties in a bunch. I’m still working out the details,” she replied.

“I could help you with that if I had some hints,” I added.

“I got it. I’ll do the planning; you do the driving.”

“Hey, whose idea was it to celebrate your birthday at midnight, huh?” I reminded her coyly.

“Whose idea was it to let the girls spend the night at their friends’ last night so we could celebrate again this morning?” she retorted.

“You… you maniacal, calculating, sexy beast!” I applauded, “you do the planning; I’ll do the driving.”

“You’re a sick bastard.”

“You have no idea,” I said slyly, “So really, I need a shower so… should I hurry?”

“No, you’re good. I’m gonna go say hi to the girls and then I’ll figure out how we’re going to play it out.”

One more smooch and she left the room, and didn’t bother putting away the scroll. She’s never, in seventeen years of marriage, left that damned scroll unattended or unsecured, but this time, she just walked away leaving it there on the bed. I thought to myself, “She really is going to tell me.”

Next chapter-- https://theprose.com/post/564097/the-second-rape-of-dr-emily-pershing-c2