Shakespeares Counselor Page 0,4

insipid landscapes on the walls as a gesture toward decoration. There were women already waiting, some with canned drinks and notepads in front of them.

My almost-friend Janet Shook was there, and a woman whose face was familiar in an unpleasant way. For a moment, I had to think of her name, and then I realized the formally dressed, fortyish big-haired woman was Sandy McCorkindale, wife of the minister of Shakespeare Combined Church, known locally as SCC. Sandy and I had clashed a couple of times when I'd been hired by the church to serve refreshments at board meetings of the SCC preschool, and we'd had a difference of opinion at the Ladies' Luncheon, an annual church wingding.

Sandy was about as pleased to see me as I was to see her. On the other hand, Janet smiled broadly. Janet, in her mid-twenties, was as fit as I was, which is pretty damn muscular. She has dark brown hair that swings forward to touch her cheeks, and bangs that have a tendency to get in her eyes. Janet and I sometimes exercise together, and we are members of the same karate class. I sat down by her and we said hello to each other, and then Tamsin bustled into the room, a clipboard and a bunch of papers clutched to her big bouncy chest. She had recovered quite well, to my eyes.

"Ladies, have you all met each other?"

"All but the latest entry," drawled one of the women across the table.

She was one of three women I didn't recall having met before. Tamsin performed the honors.

"This is Carla, and this is Melanie." Tamsin indicated the woman who'd spoken up, a short, thin incredibly wrinkled woman with a smoker's cough. The younger woman beside her, Melanie, was a plump blonde with sharp eyes and an angry cast to her features. The other woman, introduced to me as Firella, was the only African American in the group. She had a haircut that made the top of her head look like the top of a battery, and she wore very serious glasses. She was wearing an African-print sleeveless dress, which looked loose and comfortable.

"Ladies, this is Lily," Tamsin said with a flourish, completing the introductions.

I got as comfortable as the chair would permit, and crossed my arms over my chest, waiting to see what would happen. Tamsin seemed to be counting us. She looked out the door and down the hall as if she expected someone else to come, frowned, and said, "All right, let's get started. Everyone got coffee, or whatever you wanted to drink? Okay, good job!" Tamsin Lynd took a deep breath. "Some of you just got raped. Some of you got raped years ago. Sometimes, people just need to know others have been through the same thing. So would each one of you tell us a little about what has happened to you?"

I cringed inside, wishing very strongly that I could evaporate and wake up at my little house, not much over a mile from here.

Somehow I knew Sandy McCorkindale would be the first to speak, and I was right.

"Ladies," she began, her voice almost as professionally warm and welcoming as her husband's was from the pulpit, "I'm Sandy McCorkindale, and my husband is the pastor of Shakespeare Combined Church."

We all nodded. Everyone knew that church.

"Well, I was hurt a long, long time ago," Sandy said with a social smile. In a galaxy far, far, away? "When I had just started college."

We waited, but Sandy didn't say anything else. She kept up the smile. Tamsin didn't act as though she was going to demand Sandy be any more forthcoming. Instead, she turned to Janet, who was sitting next to her.

"Lily and I are workout buddies," Janet told Tamsin.

"Oh, really? That's great!" Tamsin beamed.

"She knows I got raped, but not anything else," Janet said slowly. She looked at me out of the corner of her eye. She appeared to be concerned about the effect her story would have on me. Ridiculous. "I was attacked about three years ago, while I was on a date with a guy I'd known my whole life. We went out parking in the fields, you know how kids do. All of a sudden, he just wouldn't stop. He just... I never told the police. He said he'd tell them I was willing, and I didn't have a mark on me. So I never prosecuted."

"Next, ah, Carla?"

"I was shooting pool at Velvet Tables," she said hoarsely. I estimated she