we’d known. That’s what brainwashing is for. We sat in church for six hours on Sunday. The preacher spent a lot of time telling us how special we were.” I roll my eyes, although my nonchalance is forced. Two years isn’t all that long, and part of me still believes some of the things I was taught.
That’s the part I can’t explain to outsiders. Everything our Divine Pastor ever said was a big load of bullshit. But some of it was really appealing bullshit. I’ll never go back, and I don’t miss the place at all. But I liked hearing that I was part of a special mission from God, with a unique purpose in the world.
Say what you will, but it was easier living in a world where I knew the rules. Even if I didn’t always follow them.
“How did you eventually decide to run away from this special, special place?” Rickie measures me with his serious eyes.
“Now there’s a story.” I let out an uncomfortable laugh. “When I was sixteen, I got in some trouble. I got into the back of a car with a boy.”
“You hussy!” Rickie snorts. He’s kidding, but I get tense anyway. Because the boy and I got caught, and the things they called me afterward were so much worse.
“He got thrown out,” I say.
“Out of the car?” Rickie sips his cider.
“No–out of the compound.”
Rickie stares. “Forever?”
“Of course. The sons can’t ever be alone with the daughters. It’s forbidden. But I, um, wanted to know what all the fuss was about. When they preach at you every Sunday about sin…”
I don’t think I can finish the sentence. My face heats just from the memory of sitting in that garage, kissing Zachariah. His hand had been on my bare thigh. I’d really wanted him to take it further. And then? Disaster.
“Sin has always yelled my name, too,” Rickie says with a smile. “Every stupid thing. I did it.”
I can’t help but smile back at him. I take a big gulp of the steaming cider. The rum gives it a sharpness I’m not used to, but I kind of like it.
“So what happened to you? After you kissed the boy?”
“Oh.” I set the mug down.
This part of the story isn’t much fun. After several blissful minutes, we’d been discovered by the worst possible person—my vindictive uncle Jeptha. There had been no chance of him brushing it under the rug. He’d summoned the elders…
“We were punished,” I say, and it comes out as a squeak.
“Shit, Chastity,” says Rickie. “I’m sorry to bring up something painful.”
“Oh, it’s fine,” I say, but my ragged voice makes me a liar. I take a gulp of my cider. “I didn’t see Zach again for three years. The worst part was wondering if he was still alive.” Every night I’d lay in bed trying to imagine what a homeless Zach would do. “I knew nothing of the outside world, so I pictured things I knew from the bible—beggars at the side of the road trying to fill their bellies.”
Rickie’s eyes are round. “What did he do?”
“Oh—he hitchhiked to Vermont. You know the Shipley’s neighbors, Leah and Isaac? He knew where they’d run away together, and it wasn’t too hard for him to find them.” But at the time I hadn’t known this—I’d thought he was dead. “Zach says getting kicked out was the best thing that ever happened to him. And now he’s one of the happiest people I know.”
“Uh-huh. But what about you,” Rickie asks. “They didn’t throw you out?”
I give my head a slow shake. “I got a beating. They had to make an example out of me. If you get into the back of a car with a boy, you’ll be beaten until you bleed. There were at least ten men taking turns with the strap. I didn’t sit down for a week, my ass was so sore.”
Rickie’s eyes bulge. “Jesus Christ.”
But I can’t bear to tell Rickie the worst part—that I’d been naked for the beating. That was the real punishment, I think. The toxic cocktail of pain and total humiliation. I don’t mind telling Rickie how badly they hurt my skin, but I can’t talk about the sound of their laughter. Slattern, they’d called me. Harlot. Whore. I will never stop hearing those voices.
“I still have the scars,” I say with forced cheer.
“And so you ran away after that?”
“Nope. I hadn’t figured out that I could. But when I turned seventeen, nobody wanted me for a wife,