An Open Letter to The President

This short story contains sexual violence against a minor, substance abuse, and unsafe abortion.

Dear Mr. President,

My name is Theo and I am thirteen years old and I live in Arkansas. My girlfriend's name is Rose. A week ago, Rose came to me crying before class and told me what happened to her two months ago during winter break. Something very, very bad happened to her. I won't go into detail but her uncle came over to her house and did something terrible, and now she was in a tough situation. SI was really sad and wanted to help her, but she didn't want her parents to know. She said that since it happened she hasn't had her period, and she's worried she's pregnant. We are in eighth grade. We haven't done anything besides kissing, so we knew it wasn't mine. I felt horrible, and really angry, and I got so angry it kind of scared me. I wanted to find her uncle and beat him up, or even kill him.

But that wasn't what Rose needed. She needed me to be there for her. So I was.

We went to CVS and I bought a pregnancy test during our lunch break, as well as Red Bull because I hadn't slept the previous night worried about her. She went to the single-stall bathroom back at school and took the test. When I heard her start to cry, I knocked on the door and she let me in.

She showed me the positive test and started crying harder, harder than I think I've ever seen anyone cry. I just held her, and we sat on the floor for what felt like hours but I think was just thirty minutes. I was in shock.

I guess we both thought maybe it was just a coincidence she hadn't gotten her period in two months, but she really was pregnant. I didn't know what to do.

Eventually her crying lessened, and she washed her face so she wasn't too messy. I asked her what she was going to do, because after a while she wouldn't be able to hide it. She said, "I won't let it get that far".

I looked it up and as of January 8th this year, Arkansas (as well as a few other states) put a full ban on abortion. I started breathing fast and scared then because she was only thirteen and she couldn't raise a baby on her own, and her uncle wouldn't help, and I didn't have any money to help either. And her parents would realize after a while, and they probably wouldn't believe her when she would tell them it was her uncle's fault.

So I called Rose, and I told her abortion was illegal in our state, and she said she knew. I said it was legal if she wanted to report what her uncle did, but she just sighed and told me how she didn't want her parents to kick her out. Her parents are very religious. They probably wouldn't believe her, and if they did, they wouldn't let her get an abortion anyway. It was a very sad and difficult phone call, but I needed to respect her boundaries.

I asked her what she was going to do and she said she had a plan, but she needed more of my help.

"What is it?" I asked, but I heard her start to tear up on the other side so I said, "It's okay. You don't have to tell me. What should I do?"

Rose said she needed me to get as many bottles of vodka as possible. I was going to ask why vodka but she kept going, and I decided it might be better if I didn't know. She asked me when my parents would next be out of the house and I said Saturday from 5-11pm. We made a plan for her to get there at 6pm in case they left late.

My dad had a lot of vodka stored in the basement fridge that he never used, so I got three bottles and put them in a bag I hid under my bed. I didn't know what Rose was planning to do, and I was really scared because it sounded dangerous, but she told me not to tell anyone so I didn't.

I wish I had told someone.

On Saturday, Rose came over and her eyes looked like she wasn't really there. Like she was hollow, and her soul or consciousness or something was somewhere else. There were bags under her eyes, deeper than even mine, and they looked like bruises. I don't think she'd slept in a week.

She asked for some coffee, so I made both of us a cup, and we sat in silence while we waited for the beans to be ground up and the water to boil. The air was thick with words we might say but there was no point in saying them. I finally cleared my throat after making our coffees, with a lot of milk in mine and a splash in hers and two sugars in mine and five in hers. I don't know why I'm telling you this, Mr. President, but I think it'll help paint a picture of how we're just normal people like you. Except we're kids. And you're a billionaire.

"How are you feeling?"

"Okay." She shrugged, but we both knew she wasn't okay. And we both knew that the other knew. And there was no point in acknowledging it just like there was no point in talking while I was making the coffee.

After we finished, I rinsed our mugs and put them in the sink. I led her upstairs. She'd been in my house a million times before- we'd been best friends since preschool, way before we dated, and she used to come over after school every day. I thought about how many times we'd walked these stairs, and how different this time was. And how different we were. And how one day our grandkids, or my grandkids if we broke up, would also walk these stairs. And how one day it would be different when they walked up the stairs because one of them would've just lost their childhood like Rose did, and how I think I did when she told me what happened. Maybe our childhoods ended a while ago, when you became president.

"Where do you want to go?"

"Your bedroom," she said. Her voice had been soft but not in an innocent way. In a numb, traumatized way. I guess that made sense.

When we got into my bedroom, she sat down on my mattress. I grabbed the bag under the bed, then I sat next to her and we held hands and kept sitting in silence. Eventually, she took the bag from where it lay on the duvet and opened it.

"Is it enough? I can try and get more." My voice was soft too, same as hers, just a little bit in the innocent way to try and make her feel comfortable. After so much silence, I didn't want to startle her with loudness. She just shook her head.

"It's enough." She paused then, considering something. "Could you... put on something to watch? A show, or a YouTube video?" I nodded, and grabbed my laptop. She scooched back against the bedrest, bringing the bag with her, and I sat next to her again. I propped the computer up a bit higher with a pillow. Everything was slow, like syrup, like a daze.

"Markiplier?" I asked her. We both loved video games and used to watch him as much as possible. She just nodded and didn't say anything and I put on an hour-long video of him playing some indie game that wouldn't be too scary. I didn't want to scare her.

I didn't really know what she planned to do- I was scared she would bathe in the vodka or something, like one Reddit story said, but she just opened the first bottle and, after a deep breath, took a swig.

Her face contorted and she started coughing. Her eyes were teary. I startled, concerned, and rubbed her back. Markiplier was shouting something, but I couldn't hear him. I couldn't hear anything.

"Are you okay?" I sort of yelled because I was so scared, but Rose just rubbed her eyes and wiped her mouth and tried to stop coughing. I paused the video. She took some more deep breaths before turned to look me in the eyes.

"I'm fine, it's okay. Do you, uh... have any juice or something?" I quickly ran down and grabbed a bunch of apple juice. She poured a bit into the bottle, then took a tentative sip.

"Is it better?" She nodded, coughing less than last time. I unpaused the video carefully, making sure she was ready, and she relaxed a bit- sort of cuddling me from the side. I stroked her hair and tried not to cry because everything was so surreal. Because any other day, we would be cuddling like this, and it would be sweet and romantic and nice. But now it was just painful. Just reaching for something in the dark. She kept taking small sips. In about a half hour or so, the bottle was halfway finished. She looked sick, and woozy, but also kind of... euphoric.

"You okay?"

"Hmn. Heheh." I was getting worried because she was smiling and giggling and it felt really weird considering what was happening.

"I want..." Rose slurred her words. "I want froot loops. Mm. Froooot loooooops."

In any other situation I might've laughed. I didn't, though. I just tried not to cry and grabbed my phone and used my month's allowance to Doordash her some fruit loops because my parents were very strict and didn't have any sugary cereal. I also got some Tums and Advil in case she threw up.

She did throw up.

She threw up a lot of times, and passed out after the second bottle. She didn't get through the third. She threw up while unconcious, too, and I turned her on her side so she didn't choke and die and I was screaming. I was screaming and crying because I thought she was dead. I even slapped her to wake her up but she didn't, and then I cried harder because I had hit her and you should never hit your girlfriend, not ever. Eventually I tucked her into the sweat-soaked bed and stayed awake all night making sure she was still breathing. When she woke up she groaned and threw up again. I don't know how she was able to throw up so much because I thought eventually her stomach would run out of food. Which it did. Then she just threw up bile.

She had a really bad headache and took four Advil even though the maximum allowed was two. She didn't have any Tums. She said the bubblegum flavor smell made her nauseous.

My parents didn't know she slept over because my door was locked, and they never checked on me because they thought I was asleep.

Rose stayed until around 2pm, when my parents called through the door asking if I okay and I told them I was doing homework and had slept until noon. I told them I would be down soon.

Then, she and I snuck out through the window, because my room was fairly close to the ground and there was a big tree to climb down. She was barely able to make it, she was so sick. But she did it.

And I called an Uber to her house and made sure she got home okay. Then she said thank you and went into her house and I stood in front of her door, numb and still crying a bit.

I never did stop crying.

Four days later- she skipped school Monday and Tuesday- Rose texted me and asked me to come pick her up to take her to school. I was so relieved to get a text because I was worried she died, or was in a coma, or something like that. We walked together because school was only 20 minutes away. We were silent for a while. Recently, we were silent a lot.

She spoke quietly, and numbly.

"I had to go to the hospital."

She said that, a couple hours after she came home, her mother saw her collapse. She had apparently gone into cardiac arrest. Her mom was a nurse, thank god, and did chest compressions while she called 911 and an ambulance came. She was in the hospital for two days, and they said she got really bad alcohol poisoning. I started crying then, and she hugged me and told me it wasn't my fault even though I gave her the vodka. She said it was her uncle's fault, and I had been nothing but helpful. But it didn't calm me down very much because she could've died, and I couldn't bear to think about losing her, especially if it was my fault.

Rose told me how the doctors had to tell her parents, and how she just told them she'd gone to a party. She was grounded for two months. I felt angry about that, because she shouldn't be grounded due to what happened to her. Then she told me that the previous night, she was taking a shower and started bleeding from down below. And she said it was like her period, just a bit more blood and uterine lining and, well, I guess the egg that would've soon become a fetus. And I realized that it had worked. And I was numb, because even though it worked, she got really hurt in the process. And I was angry.

That's why I'm writing this. I blame Rose's uncle, yes, but I blame you just as much. Because if it weren't for you and your supreme court electives and your rallies and your lawmakers, then Rose wouldn't have to have had alcohol poisoning. And she wouldn't have gone into cardiac arrest. And she wouldn't have to maybe get a liver transplant in the future. And she wouldn't have a bit of brain damage that made it hard for her to remember certain things. And it's your fault, Mr. President. If you had just given the anti-abortion states access to abortions, then this wouldn't have happened. If you hadn't made such a harmful legal system, Rose might be able to comfortably report what her uncle did. If you hadn't overturned Roe V. Wade, this wouldn't have happened She could've died. She could've died, and it would've been her uncle's fault and my fault but mostly your fault. And many, so many have actually died. And that's all your fault.

So do something about it.

Sincerely,

Theo Goldberg