“Hey, hey, what happened? It’ll be okay,” I said quickly.
“I need to talk to you,” June sniffled. “Are you busy?” There was a pause and I could hear her blowing her nose.
“Not really.” I looked down at my watch. “I was supposed to meet Marlene but I can cancel. Where are you?”
“I’m at…at ho-ho-home,” June sniffled and sobbed. “Please, just come over whenever you can.”
I licked my lips. “I’ll be there soon, just hold tight, okay?”
We hung up and
I broke into a run as I ran into the parking garage and climbed behind the wheel of my Porsche. Thankfully, rush-hour traffic hadn’t taken full effect yet, and I was able to navigate from Manhattan to Brooklyn with relative ease. Still, it was a long way to Crown Heights and the sky was darkening by the time I pulled up in front of June’s building.
The elevator was broken so I raced up the stairs, pounding on the door until it swung open. June was curled up on the couch, wearing yoga pants and a stained t-shirt. Her face was red and streaked with tears. When she saw me, her chin crumpled and she started to cry again.
“June, what’s going on?” I shut the door and flew over to the couch where I pulled her into my arms and rocked her back and forth. For the first time, I noticed how small, how fragile June’s body was. I could feel the knots in her spine through the thin skin of her back, and she sobbed so viciously that for a moment, I was almost frightened.
“Baby, you have to talk to me,” I said, smoothing June’s sweaty black hair away from her forehead. “Come on, June, just tell me the truth.”
June sniffed. “Something bad happened at school,” she said after a long moment.
“Oh, shit,” I said. My heart sank. “Was it Brett? Did he get in trouble again? Goddamnit,” I added. “I’m so sorry, June.”
“No…” June trailed off. “Nothing like that.” She bit her lip. “I work with this guy named Andy. He asked me out before and I said no, but then…” She blushed hotly and buried her face in my neck. “I felt so guilty that I asked him for coffee.”
“Okay,” I said nervously. “I don’t like where this is going.”
June sighed, her small body filling with frustrated air. “I know,” she said flatly. “Anyway, we had coffee. Just once. And then I saw your assistant, what was her name? Heidi?”
“Hannah.”
“Yeah, Hannah.” June sniffled and wiped her nose on her sleeve, leaving behind a sticky iridescent trail of snot. “Anyway, she came over and she was like…really interested to see us together, she kept talking about it. It made me really uncomfortable, so I left.”
“When was this?”
June shrugged. “A few weeks ago,” she said. “Before I went out with you for the first time. You hadn’t asked me out yet,” she added, as if that would somehow make everything right.
“I see.”
“And Andy wouldn’t leave me alone after that,” June wailed in frustration. “He asked me out again – he threatened me, even when I said I was busy or that I didn’t have time – so eventually I said yes, but I didn’t actually intend to meet him. Then you asked me to dinner on the same night, and obviously, I went with you instead.”
“I see.”
“And then last week, when I was coming home from school, he grabbed me and dragged me into an alley.” June sniffed. A single tear ran down her porcelain cheek and I brushed it away with the back of my hand.
“What?” My jaw dropped. “June, why the hell didn’t you tell me about this?”
June bit her lip and trembled. “Because I thought you’d be mad.”
“I am mad, but I’m not mad at you,” I said quickly. “And you called the cops, right?”
June nodded. “Yeah,” she said. “But they didn’t care. They said it was my fault, because I’d asked him out once before.”
Rage and anger flowed through my body and I balled my hands into fists, shoving them under my lap so June wouldn’t see.
“I’m so sorry, that’s awful,” I said. “First thing in the morning, I’m going to call Sandy – he’s my lawyer, he’s great. We’ll get you out of this.”
June collapsed into sobs and I held her close.