Another Rhymer hypothetical. The backstory is somewhat darker than usual, but just as long as is typical.
Today’s tale is about Zöe, a rising college sophomore in an expensive private school. With a mother who stocks groceries for a living, half a dozen younger siblings, and a father who’s a rolling stone, Zöe could not possibly afford this school without a scholarship, and even then it’s a struggle. Nor is that the least of her problems. Zöe’s mother is ill and requires expensive medical treatment, which her insurance company is not willing to pay for.
Of her classmates, Zöe is particularly close to two fellow scholarship students. One is her girlfriend, Roxanne, who is extremely politically active on campus; the other is Roxanne’s older brother, Ash. A month before the end of the semester, Roxanne and Ash approach Zöe. Both highly agitated, tells Zoe that he needs to speak with her in private, and they adjourn to the girls’ dorm room.
Roxanne immediately takes Zöe’s hand, while Ash spends a few minutes pacing. Finally he tells his story. For the few days, he has noticed few of his dorm mates suddenly ending conversations when he comes around. Eventually he did a little eavesdropping. He overheard two guys talking about a politically active lesbian on campus who got “put in her place” in at a recent party in the women’s dorm; said lesson was recorded on video. Immediately Ash was upset, as he feared his sister was the lesbian in question, but when he asked Roxanne about it, she says that she was not even on campus the night of the party in question. Unfortunately the same is not true of Zöe. The two of them did some detective work and found a copy of the video, which they think Zöe needs to know about, Roxanne, in particular, thinks she is better off not watching it. She’s been crying all this time.
Zöe watches. Immediately she regrets it, as this video would have made her ill even if she could not see the victim’s face. But she can, and it’s the same face that stares at her the mirror, with one man using her while half a dozen more cheer him on. Zöe also recognizes the rapist: Carl, a grad student who’s been the teaching assistant in her chemistry class. Carl comes from money; several buildings on campus have his family name on them.
Zöe remembers that Carl has always creeped her out; the fact that she’s a lesbian in a relationship has never deterred him. But she doesn’t remember the rape; she hardly remembers the party. She only remembers waking up in her own bed the next morning. Roxanne, still crying, suggests that Zöe was given a drug like Rohypnol that robbed her of her memory. She doesn’t feel traumatized exactly, but she does feel furious. They immediately make a copy of the video and take it to the police; she swears out a complaint against Carl. The detective she speaks to wonders how she and her friends got the video. Did Ash steal it? Was he perhaps involved in making it? Saying the police will have to conduct their own investigation, he cautions Zöe not to spread any rumors until there is more evidence.
For obvious reasons, Zöe finds this disturbing. But as disturbing as a visit she gets from a woman named Ms. Bellows a few days later. Ms. Bellows is an attorney who claims to represent Carl’s father. She points out that rape cases are difficult to prosecute and hell on the victim; that, Mrs. Bellows says, is why she only does civil litigation. It’s a sure bet that the prosecutor won’t pursue the case without a complaining victim, and that whoever Carl hires as his criminal attorney will attack Zöe and her friends if this case goes to trial. Ms. Bellows sugggests that Zöe take an easier way out. If Zöe drops her complaint and signs documents agreeing to stay quiet, Carl’s father will give her a cash payout sufficient to pay for the rest of her undergraduate schooling, plus well as grad school if she wishes; it’ll be enough money to allow her a comfortable middle-class lifestyle throughout her schooling. What’s more, Carl’s father will make sure that Zöe’s mother gets the medical care without any further problems from her insurance company or any further expense on her own part. But neither Zöe nor her mother gets a dime if Zöe does not drope the complaint and sign the non-disclosure agreement?
What should Zöe do? Does it matter that she still has no memory of the assault? Does the financial help being offered to her mother matter?