I Have Some Questions For You

by Rebecca Makkai

It was the one where she was young enough and white enough and pretty enough and rich enough that people paid attention.

What could be more romantic? What’s as perfect as a girl stopped dead, midformation? Girl as blank slate. Girl as reflection of your desires, unmarred by her own. Girl as sacrifice to the idea of girl. Girl as a series of childhood photographs, all marked with the aura of girl who will die young, as if even the third grade portrait photographer should have seen it written on her face, that this was a girl who would only ever be a girl.

But it was simply part of a broader habit: I collected information about my peers the way some people hoard newspapers. I hoped this would help me become more like them, less like myself—less poor, less clueless, less provincial, less vulnerable.

This doesn’t make me special, and I knew that then, too. I’m only saying it by way of explanation: I cared about details. Not because they were something I could control, but because they were something I could own. And there was so little that was mine.

For a teenager, being seen a certain way is as good as being that way—and soon your vision became part of my self-image.

I don’t believe in soul mates, and that’s made life easier; we were simply good together.

The one where the men finally told about the priests, decades later, and everyone lauded their bravery. The one where the women came forward after five years, and everyone asked why they hadn’t spoken sooner.

Just because you can’t picture someone doing something doesn’t mean they aren’t capable of it.

the way every girl was just a body to be used, to be discarded—the way that if you had a body, they could grab you—if you had a body, they could destroy you—

To be absolutely clear: I’m not saying What a fine young man, let’s not ruin his future. I’m saying, I looked at him and knew I was looking at, among other things, a murderer. And the chill I felt, I expected it. But I didn’t expect to feel like a killer myself, like someone reaching out to end something.

Of course, we’d be different if we were growing up now. We’d still be idiots, still naïve. We’d be more stressed. Maybe we’d have ulcers. But we might have put up with less. And that would be something.