It Happens All the Time: A Novel

I couldn’t believe that I’d actually pulled the trigger. That moment, the entire night, had taken on a dreamlike quality, viewed through blurry eyes and filled with strange and shadowy scenes. When I’d left Vanessa’s office that day back in September, trying to think of a way to make Tyler pay other than reporting him to the police and hoping for the best, I never believed that this was where I’d end up. I’d thought that the threat of the weapon would be enough to get him to confess; I never imagined that I’d have to shoot him.

But even now, after watching him bleed and cry, after hearing the words I’d hoped would help ease my pain, nothing had changed. My body still felt his assault and my mind was still an exhausted mess of confusion, anger, and grief. I looked at him and saw not only my attacker, but the boy who’d held my hand while I lay in a hospital bed, fighting for my life. I saw the awkward teenager who’d grown into a strong and capable man; I saw someone for whom I felt as much love as I did hate. That, I realized, was the crux of my despair; this connection between rapist and friend, two labels that described Tyler—two words that would forever ring discordant in my ears.

“Come on,” I finally said, blowing out the one kerosene lantern I’d lit when we arrived. “We need to get you to a hospital.”

He nodded, grimacing as he got to his feet. We stepped outside into the cold midmorning air, and I breathed in the sweet, fresh scent of damp earth and pine, looking up to the tall evergreens in the forest around us. Long, curved branches swayed in a gentle wind, moving like a conductor’s arms leading his musicians through a slow and beautiful symphony. I carried the first aid kit up the hill to the truck, opening the passenger side door for Tyler, who staggered slowly behind me, his left hand still pressing on his now-wrapped wound. I knew he had to be in agony, but I took less pleasure from this than I’d thought I would. Don’t go soft now, I thought. After all of this, don’t let him think that he doesn’t have to follow through.

It took well over an hour to drive up over the logging road and get back on the highway that would lead us into the town of Monroe, where I knew the closest emergency room would be. My parents had taken me there one summer, years before we had even met Tyler and his family, when we’d gone to the cabin and I’d slipped on the rocks in the river and broken my arm. I was half-tempted to make him wait until we got back to Bellingham, where I could take him to St. Joseph’s and the police could come and hear him confess from his hospital bed. I was afraid if I waited, if I let him think too long, he might go back on his word and the entire night would have been for nothing. But as I glanced at the sloppy bandage I’d wrapped around his wound, I could see that, despite the special gauze, it was already soaked through with a large spot of bright-red blood. He needed a doctor, and I was too afraid of what would happen if I didn’t get him to one. However much I hated Tyler, however much I wanted him to pay, I didn’t actually want him dead. I wanted him alive and able to suffer the consequences of his crime. I wanted him to feel every minute of humiliation and loss that his confession would bring.

Tyler didn’t speak during the drive; he only rested his head against the window, eyes closed, continuing to clutch his injured shoulder with his one good hand. He was pale, his breathing was rapid, and his skin was clammy. When I finally pulled up in front of the emergency room entrance and turned off the engine, it was me who broke the silence. “Are you going to tell them I shot you?” My heart raced inside my chest. I kept my eyes forward, unable to look at him as I waited for his reply.

“It was an accident,” he said, and I could tell from the staggered pace of the words that he was in a great deal of pain. “You didn’t know it was loaded.” He must have sensed my hesitance, because he spoke again. “Don’t worry. I know what to say.”

I bobbed my head, still unsure whether I could trust him, and jumped out of the truck, quickly making my way into the ER. “My friend’s been shot,” I said. My voice trembled, and the woman at the front desk gave me a suspicious look, as though she was trying to decide whether to call for a doctor or security. I held my breath until she nodded and picked up the phone. A moment later, a man and a woman dressed in mint-green scrubs appeared with a gurney. “This way,” I said, leading them out to the truck, where Tyler was slumped against the passenger door.

“What happened?” the man asked, as the two of them carefully extracted Tyler from the front seat.

I kept my eyes on Tyler, my muscles tensed, wondering how he might respond. He could easily turn the tables, I thought. He could tell them I kidnapped and shot him, and then every bit of this night, every moment I’d suffered, would be pointless. I could end up going to jail instead of him.

“We were looking at her dad’s gun up at their cabin,” Tyler said through clenched teeth, groaning a bit as they moved him. “We didn’t know it was loaded,” he said. “It was an accident.”

I let loose a quiet sigh of relief.

“Is that true?” the woman asked, skeptically.

I swallowed hard, wondering if she could tell that he was lying. Did she wonder if he’d tried to attack me and I’d shot him in self-defense? Did she think that maybe I’d shot him outright? “Yes,” I said, and despite my exhaustion and frayed nerves, I managed to keep my tone calm and my expression neutral.

“We’ll have to report it,” the man said, as they pushed the gurney back inside, me trailing a few feet behind them. “Reception likely already called the police. It’s protocol.”

“Okay,” I said, not knowing if I should stay with Tyler or wait for him by the front desk. I didn’t want to be around him any more than I had to, but I also was worried what he might tell his doctors or the police if I wasn’t standing right there. My stomach churned, as I was unable to think of anything but getting him back to Bellingham, to the police station, and making sure that he confessed.

Once Tyler was in a small room of the ER, the woman informed us that they were both nurses, and the doctor was on his way. They began running IVs, taking Tyler’s blood pressure, and removing the gauze I’d slapped on his shoulder in order to examine the bloody damage. The female nurse took down our names, writing them on a chart that hung on the end of Tyler’s bed.

I stood as far back as I could, not wanting to be in the way. A short, heavy man in light-blue scrubs arrived and introduced himself as Dr. Morris, then listened to the nurses’ assessment of Tyler’s condition.

“The bullet went through and through,” the male nurse said. “A reported accidental discharge. The police are on their way.”

Dr. Morris glanced at me, where I cowered in the corner, arms crossed over my chest. “And you are?”

“A friend,” Tyler answered for me. “We live in Bellingham, but Amber’s family has a cabin out past Index, on the Skykomish. We were up there winterizing it, and unfortunately, when she picked up the gun, it went off.”

“I didn’t know it was loaded,” I said, repeating what Tyler had already told the nurses, hoping I sounded more convincing than I felt.

“I see.” The doctor began to examine Tyler’s wound, ordering X-rays and an MRI to assess the damage. “Looks like you managed to stop the bleeding fairly quickly,” he said.

“I’m a paramedic,” Tyler said. “I had hemostatic gauze in my kit.”

“Good thing,” Dr. Morris said. “Depending on what your tests show, we might be able to avoid surgery.” He rattled off instructions to the nurses, who made note of them as he spoke, and then the doctor and the female nurse disappeared from the room.

I watched as the remaining nurse hung a bag of clear fluid from the silver pole next to Tyler’s bed and then injected something into his IV. “What are you giving him?” I asked, worried that if Tyler got too loopy from pain meds, he might start babbling about what really happened.

“Oxycodone,” the nurse said. “Just enough to take the edge off.”

“Oh,” I said, feeling the word catch in my already dry throat. It had been hours since I’d had anything to drink, and well over a day since I’d slept. My eyelids felt leaden and scratchy as I blinked. I fixed my gaze on Tyler’s face, silently willing him to keep his mouth shut.

“Don’t worry,” the nurse said. “He’ll be fine. If he doesn’t need surgery, you should be able to take him home this afternoon.”

“Thanks,” I said, and then he, too, exited the room, leaving me alone with Tyler, whose skin was as white as the sheets he lay upon. He had to be as exhausted as I was—probably more so, considering the trauma his body had endured. Again, I struggled between having compassion for the boy I used to love and wanting the man who raped me to suffer. Confronting these two opposing versions of him in my head at the same time was excruciating—maybe as much as the rape itself.

“I can feel you worrying from here,” he said, rolling his head to one side so he could look directly at me. His voice had taken on a softer edge, so I assumed the pain meds were doing their job.

“I’m not worried,” I lied, trying to sound more confident than I felt. He could still hear my thoughts before I spoke them—would anyone else ever know me so well? Could I feel as safe with another person, the way I used to feel safe with him?

“Yeah, you are,” Tyler said. “Trust me, you don’t have to.”

I took a few steps over to the sink on the opposite side of the room, grabbed a small paper cup, and filled it with water, gulping it down. I refilled the cup, drinking until my parched throat was finally quenched. I turned around, about to answer him—about to remind him that he’d stolen my ability to trust him when he held me down on that bed—but just as I opened my mouth, two uniformed police officers entered the room. I froze where I stood, the empty paper cup still in my hand.

“Amber Bryant?” one of the officers asked, looking at me. He was young, maybe even younger than me, reed-thin and tall, with closely cropped black hair and blue eyes.

“Yes,” I said, but my voice cracked on the word, so I cleared my throat and spoke again. “That’s me,” I said, then crumpled the cup and threw it in the garbage beneath the sink.

“And you’re Tyler Hicks?” asked the other officer—an older, thickly built man with salt-and-pepper hair and a full mustache.

“Yes, sir,” Tyler said.

“I’m Officer Porter,” the older cop said, and then he gestured toward the younger man, who was standing closer to me. “This is my partner, Officer Olsen.” Tyler and I both nodded, and Officer Porter continued. “Can you tell me what happened to you, Mr. Hicks?”

“Yeah, of course,” Tyler said, and again, as it had when I first entered the ER, my body tensed and I began taking shallow breaths. Everything hinged on this moment, what would come out of Tyler’s mouth next. “Amber and I went up to her parents’ cabin to winterize it,” he said, maintaining strong eye contact with the older officer. “She picked up her dad’s gun, and for whatever reason, it went off. The next thing I knew, I was on the floor and I was bleeding.”

Officer Porter glanced my direction, and I nodded, still anxious, every nerve I had still shot through with fear, because no matter what Tyler said, it was possible the cops wouldn’t believe him. It was possible that they’d poke and prod at our story until it fell apart.

“I don’t know how it happened,” I said. “I feel terrible.” This was true. I did feel terrible, but not because of the shooting. It was so much more complicated than that. Tears sprang to my eyes, and I hoped that the officers would view this response as a show of remorse instead of what it really was—the dizzying confusion I felt about the fact that Tyler had chosen to protect me now, despite also being the one who tore my life apart. If, when we got home, he actually confessed to the rape, we would need to withhold the truth of how he had been shot from everyone—from the authorities and our parents. I would have to trust that he would forever be the keeper of this secret.

“How far apart were you when the gun discharged?” Officer Porter asked.

“About six feet, I think?” Tyler said, looking at me. “Does that sound right?”

I nodded again, not trusting my voice, worried it might break and give us away.

“She helped me put pressure on the wound and got me here as fast as she could,” Tyler said. “We had to take the logging road, since the main road is still washed out.”

The tension inside my chest began to lessen as Tyler spoke, and it looked as though Officer Porter believed what we had said. I watched as Officer Olsen made notes on the pad he carried, and then looked at his partner, expectantly. He must be new, I thought. He’s waiting for a cue because he doesn’t know what to do next. I felt a little better knowing that we were only dealing with one experienced cop, hoping this meant that they’d be less likely to doubt our story.

“Where’s the weapon?” Officer Porter asked.

“In my truck,” Tyler said, and I was glad I’d put it inside the console when I’d gone to get the first aid kit. If I hadn’t, if I’d left it at the cabin, the cops might have thought we had something to hide.

“Did you check to see if the safety was on when you picked it up?” Officer Porter asked, turning toward me.

“No,” I said, suddenly tearful again. “I should have. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Tyler said, locking his green eyes on mine. “It was an accident. A mistake. I know you didn’t mean to do it. You’d take it back if you could.”

His words hit me hard, since I knew that he wasn’t only talking about what had happened with the gun. I started to cry then, in earnest. My shoulders shook and I put my face in my hands. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m so, so sorry.” But as I sobbed, I realized my apology wasn’t about shooting him—it was more about the loss of our friendship. In that moment, listening to him lie to the police in order to protect me, I felt connected to him the same way I used to before the rape. I remembered what it was like to be in on something with him, to know something that only the two of us knew—to trust someone implicitly—and it struck me, then, that we’d never have that same kind of closeness again. Everything I believed about him, about me, had changed.

“It’s okay,” Officer Olsen said, awkwardly patting my back.

“We’ll need to examine the gun,” Officer Porter said as he handed me a tissue from the box on the counter next to the sink. “And file a report.”

“Thank you,” I said, sniffling as I took the tissue from him. I felt Tyler’s eyes on me, too, but I couldn’t look at him, for fear that I might totally fall apart.

“Do you need anything else?” Tyler asked. “Do we need to sign something?”

“No,” Officer Porter said. “Seems clear this was an accident.” He looked at me. “Don’t beat yourself up too badly, miss. These things happen.” He paused, and frowned. “But in the future, you might want to look into some gun safety training, if you’re going to be handling a weapon.”

I bobbed my head and blew my nose, just as the male nurse reentered the room. “All right, Tyler,” he said. “Time to wheel you off for some tests.” He looked back and forth between the officers. “Did you get everything you need?”

“Yep,” Officer Olsen said. “Just need to take a look at the gun.”

“I’ll take you to the truck,” I said, feeling like now that Tyler had made an official statement to the police that the shooting was accidental, I could leave him alone and not worry about him telling the hospital staff something else. I couldn’t follow him around forever. On this one issue, I’d have to trust him—I had no choice.

Twenty minutes later, after the officers had inspected the gun and confirmed for their report that there had been only one bullet discharged, I sat in the waiting room of the ER. Except for me and one older man napping on a small couch, it was empty, which wasn’t surprising. Monroe wasn’t exactly a raging metropolis; anyone with more serious, life-endangering medical issues would likely be taken to Everett, to a bigger hospital.

As I waited, I wondered what my parents would believe had happened, and how Liz and Jason would react to Tyler’s injury. I decided that I’d better at least text my parents and let them know I was okay. I’d left a note for them before I’d gone to confront Tyler, saying that I probably wouldn’t be home that night, but there was no way I’d be able to hide the fact that Tyler had been shot, and that I’d been with him when it happened.

I quickly typed out a text to both my mom and my dad, telling them that Tyler and I had gone up to the cabin to try to work things through. I said that I’d taken the gun from my father’s office just in case, as a way to feel safe and secure around Tyler, and that it had accidentally gone off. I felt terrible for lying to them, and guessed they might suspect that I had purposely pulled the trigger, but as long as Tyler and I told the same story, no one would be able to prove otherwise. Again, I was struck by the oddity of this new and unlikely alliance with the man who raped me. This lie would forever link us.

My phone immediately began to chime with anxious return texts from both of my parents—“Where are you? How could this happen? Are you okay?”—so I told them where we were, that the doctors were taking care of Tyler, and that I was fine. “He admitted what he did to me,” I told them. “He said he’ll tell the police.”

Knowing this would set off another litany of responses, I turned the sound off on my phone and shoved it back in my pocket. My stomach growled, but I ignored it, instead thinking about what the police in Bellingham would do when Tyler confessed. What kind of consequences he would endure. I had read enough about rape shield laws online to know that my name would be kept out of the paper unless I consented to having it made public, but Bellingham was a small town. People who knew our families were aware of how close Tyler and I were, not to mention there were other people who had attended the party and might put two and two together, remembering us making out on the dance floor, and then my abrupt departure with Mason and Gia. I need to move, I thought suddenly. I need to find a place where nobody knows me.

“Excuse me, miss?” a voice said, jerking my attention back to the waiting room.

“Yes?” I said, startling in my chair, realizing that I’d begun to doze off. I looked up to see the same male nurse who had taken Tyler for his tests standing in front of me.

“Everything looked good. He’ll need some physical therapy, but the bullet missed the joint, so there’s no need for surgery. We’re going to clean the wound and pack it, put him in a sling, and give him some antibiotics and pain meds, and then you two can be on your way.”

“Thank you,” I said, strangely relieved that Tyler’s injury hadn’t been worse. Maybe the long shadow of our friendship would always be the first filter through which I saw him. Maybe, no matter the damage he’d done or how hard I tried to fight it, there would always be part of me that cared.

•  •  •

We left the ER in Monroe around two p.m., and spent an hour and a half in silence as I drove us north—home, to Bellingham. Tyler slept most of the way, but then, just as I turned on my blinker and took the Lakeway exit off of I-5, he spoke.

“Do you want me to do it today?” he asked. His voice was dull. Defeated. “Should we go downtown right now?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We should.”

“They’ll want you to make a statement, too, I’m sure,” Tyler said. “But probably not until after I’ve made mine.”

“Okay.” I wanted to say more, but I was so tired, my brain seemed to be running out of words. “I told my parents we went up to the cabin to try and talk things out, and that I brought the gun just to help me feel safe around you. I told them it went off on its own. That it was an accident.”

“Then that’s what I’ll say, too,” he said.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him turn and look at me, but I forced myself to keep my gaze forward as I turned onto Lakeway Drive and followed it until it became West Holly, a one-way street that led downtown. “You promise you’ll tell them everything,” I said, my voice an octave higher than usual. “You’ll tell them what you did?”

“I promise,” Tyler said, without hesitation.

I drove toward Grand Street, thinking that I’d need to have one or both of my parents come pick me up at the station and take me to get my car, where I’d parked it last night when I was waiting for Tyler’s shift to end. I couldn’t believe that barely thirteen hours had passed since the moment I approached him in the parking lot. It seemed like another lifetime; I felt like I’d aged a hundred years.

As I pulled into a parking spot and turned off the truck’s engine, Tyler looked at me again. “I know this doesn’t change anything,” he said. “And I know it doesn’t help, but I really am sorry. I’d do anything to fix it.”

“Do this,” I said, keeping my voice hard, even though a small spot inside my heart ached hearing the angst threaded through his words. “Do what you promised to do.”

“And that will make things right?” he asked, with a sliver of hope.

“Nothing can do that,” I said. I wasn’t sure I’d ever feel “right” again, whatever that meant. All I knew was that the idea of his confession and the punishment that would likely follow were the only things helping me to believe I might be able to get on with my life. Those steps had to be taken before I could find a way to move on.

We sat in silence for another moment, before Tyler used his free hand to open the truck door. Carefully, he landed on his feet on the cement below, and then looked back at me. I pulled the keys out of the ignition and handed them to him, even though I knew with his shoulder in a sling he wouldn’t be able to drive. But that wasn’t my problem to solve.

“I’m sorry,” he said, again, and then I watched as he shut the door behind him and made his way up the steps to the police station’s front doors. Part of me wanted to run after him, to make sure that he recounted every moment of what he’d done, but another part of me knew that I couldn’t stand to hear it. What happened that night already played on a constant cycle inside my head; I didn’t need any help remembering the details. I didn’t need to hear them from Tyler’s point of view. All I needed was the knowledge that he was headed inside that building in order to set the record straight. He was going to tell the truth.