"I'm Alice Sebold," I said.
"Right on time."
"It's hard to oversleep on a day like this," I said. I was sunny, cheery, reliable. I wore an oxford-cloth shirt and a skirt. On my feet I wore my Pappagallo pumps. I had fretted that morning because I could not find nude hose. I had black and I had red, neither of which was an appropriate choice for the virgin coed the grand jury would expect. I borrowed a pair from my resident advisor.
In the county car, marked with the seal of Onondaga on the front doors, I rode in the front beside the detective. We made small talk about the university. He talked sports teams, which I knew nothing about, and projected that the Carrier Dome, little over a year old, would bring a lot of revenue to the area. I nodded my head and tried to contribute but I was obsessively worried about the way I looked. The way I spoke. The way I moved.
Tricia, from the Rape Crisis Center, would be my company that day. We had about an hour of waiting before the lineup to be held at the Public Safety Building jail. This time the elevator of the Public Safety Building did not stop at the floor I was familiar with, where the reassuring sight of a security door and policemen with coffee mugs met you once you stepped off. The hallways the detective, Tricia, and I walked down were full of people. Police and victims, lawyers and criminals. A policeman led a man in handcuffs down the hall past us, while he barked an amiable joke about some recent party to another policeman on the hall. There was a Latina, sitting in a plastic chair in the hallway. She stared at the floor, clutching her purse and a crumpled Kleenex in her hand.
The detective brought us into a large room in which makeshift dividers no more than four feet tall separated desks from one another. There were men-policemen-sitting at most of them. Their postures were tense and temporary; they came there to fill out reports or quickly interview a witness, or make a call before going back out on patrol or, perhaps, finally going home.
We were told to sit and wait. That they were experiencing a difficulty with the lineup. His lawyer, it was intimated, was the problem. I had yet to meet Assistant District Attorney Uebelhoer. I wanted to meet her. She was a woman, and in this all-male atmosphere, this made a difference to me. But Uebelhoer was busy with whatever was holding up the lineup.
I was worried about Madison seeing me.
"He won't be able to see you," the detective said. "We lead him in and he's behind a one-way mirror. He can't see a thing."
Tricia and I sat there. She didn't talk like Tess had talked, but she was attentive. She asked after my family and classes, told me lineups were "one of the most stressful procedures for rape victims," and inquired several times whether I wanted anything to drink.
I now think what distanced me from Tricia and from the Rape Crisis Center was their use of generalities. I did not want to be one of a group or compared with others. It somehow blindsided my sense that I was going to survive. Tricia prepared me for failure by saying that it would be okay if I failed. She did this by showing me that the odds out there were against me. But what she told me, I didn't want to hear. In the face of dismal statistics regarding arrest, prosecution, and even full recovery for the victim, I saw no choice but to ignore the statistics. I needed what gave me hope, like being assigned a female assistant district attorney, not the news that the number of rape prosecutions in Syracuse for that calendar year had been nil.
Suddenly, Tricia said, "Oh, my God!"
"What?" I asked, but I did not turn around.
"Cover yourself."
I had nothing to do this with. I bent over and put my face in my skirt. I kept my eyes open against the cloth.
Tricia was up and complaining. "Get them out of here," she said. "Get them out of here."
A hurried "Sorry" came from a policeman.
Moments later, I looked up. They were gone. There had been faulty communication about which way to lead the men in the lineup into the lineup room. I was out of breath. Had he seen me? I was sure if he had, he would find me and kill me. The treachery of my lies that night-that I would not report it to anyone, that I was too ashamed-would not be lost on him.
I looked up.
Gail Uebelhoer was standing in front of me. She held out her hand. I offered her mine. She shook it firmly.
"Well, that was a little scary," she said. "But I think they got them out in time."
Her hair was short and black, and she had an arresting smile. She was tall, nearly five ten, and had a real body. No emaciated waif, she was solid and female. And she had sparkling, intelligent eyes. The connection for me was immediate. Gail was what I wanted to be when I grew up. She was there to do a job. She wanted what I wanted: to win.
She explained that I was about to view a lineup and that afterward we would talk about the grand jury and she would tell me exactly what to expect, how the room would look when I walked in, how many civilians there would be in the room, and what kind of questions they might ask-questions, she warned, that might be hard to answer but that I must.
"Are you ready?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
Led by Gail, Tricia and I approached the open door to the viewing side of the room. Inside it was dark. There were a number of men. One I recognized, Sergeant Lorenz. I had not seen him since the night of the rape. He nodded his head. There were two uniformed men and another, the attorney for the defendant, Paquette.
"I don't know why she has to be here," he said, indicating Tricia.
"I am a representative from the Rape Crisis Center," Tricia said.
"I know who you are but I think there are too many people in here already," he said. He was small and pale, balding. He would be with me through the rest of the case.
"It's common practice," Sergeant Lorenz said.
"To my knowledge she is not an official here. She has no official connection to the case."
The argument continued. Gail got involved. Sergeant Lorenz stated again that it was becoming more and more accepted in rape cases to have a representative of Rape Crisis there.
"She has her female attorney here," Paquette said. "That's enough. I refuse to have my client involved in this lineup until she is removed."
Gail consulted with Lorenz near the front of the dark room. She returned to where I stood with Tricia.
"He won't continue," she said. "We're already behind on the lineup and I have to be in court at one."
"It's okay," I said. "I'm okay."
I was lying. I felt as if the wind had been knocked out of me.
"Are you sure, Alice?" she asked. "I want you to be sure. We can delay."
"No," I said. "I'm okay. I want to do this."
Tricia was dismissed.
The lineup procedure was explained to me. How five men would be led into the area behind the mirror, and how before they were led in, the lights in that area would be turned on.
"Since it is light on their side and dark here, they won't be able to see you," Lorenz said.
He explained that I should take my time. Could ask him to have them turn to the left or the right or to speak. He repeated that I should take my time. "When you are sure," he said, "I want you to walk over and place an X solidly in the corresponding box on the clipboard I have set up over there. Do you understand?"
"Yes," I said.
"Do you have any questions?" Gail asked.
"She said yes," Paquette said.
I felt like I had as a child. The adults were not getting along and it was up to me to be good girl enough to drain the tension from the room. That tension made my breath shallow and my heart race. I could tell Meggesto my symptoms of panic now. I was thoroughly intimidated. But I had said I was ready. It was wrong to turn back.
The room itself frightened me. I was unable to take my eyes from the one-way mirror. On television shows there was always an expanse of floor on the other side of the one-way mirror, and then a platform with a door off to the side where the suspects stepped into the room, filed up two or three stairs, and took their places. There was a reassuring distance between the victims and the suspects.