But none of it worked, because Owen stepped forward.
He took my hand and faced the crowd, his voice leaving no room for argument.
"It doesn't matter whether Sally is telling the truth or not. All that matters is that I choose her, that she becomes my wife. That's enough."
And then he said more.
"Arlene, you don't have to rush to prove yourself. If you ran to a doctor every time some stranger called you impure, you'd spend your whole life doing nothing but sitting in a clinic."
I was so moved I could hardly speak. We were married without a single hitch.
But it wasn't until our wedding night that I learned every bit of it had been Owen's performance.
He never even crossed the threshold of the bridal room. He just stood in the doorway, looking at me with open disgust, as if I were a filthy rag someone had thrown in a gutter.
At the time I didn't understand why he'd turned on me so fast.
I told myself the crowd had laughed at him and wounded his pride, so the next morning I set out for the clinic, determined to clear my name.
Max and Marilyn didn't stop me. They didn't curse me either. They only told me to finish a bowl of stew first.
I finished that bowl of stew, and I never walked out of the Fleming house again.
It wasn't until after I was dead that I learned the truth was nothing as simple as I'd thought.
The Flemings weren't just the lead actors in this play. They were its directors. And the whole reason they did it was the few hundred dollars in dowry my parents had left me, and a clear seat at the State Theater Company for Sally to take in my place.
I was still lost in it.
Still picturing the faces of everyone who'd later called my death a shamed suicide. But Owen couldn't hold back any longer.
He just didn't know what his lines should be.
So he only stared at Sally.
"What kind of nonsense are you spouting here?"
"Don't think I can't see it. You're jealous that Arlene's going to perform at the State Theater Company. You couldn't get the part yourself, so you want to destroy her with rumors!"
"Let me tell you, Arlene and I have been close since we were children. I know her character better than anyone."
"Even if she really did eat one extra dinner roll, that's only because the cook admires her. Arlene would never do something like that over a dinner roll!"
"I believe in her completely!"
The moment the words were out, Max and Marilyn beat their chests in fury, while the friends and relatives who'd come for the wedding began praising Owen for being a good man, a man who stood by his woman, saying a whore like me wasn't fit for him, egging him on to call off the engagement.
Owen took my hand, exactly as he had in my last life.
"Arlene, say something."
"Just tell me it isn't true, and I'll believe you!"
It was only then that I looked at Sally, like someone waking from a dream.
"Sally, first you say the cook assaulted me, then you say I seduced him. Those aren't the same thing at all, are they?"
Right.
The crowd caught on too.
Assaulted meant forced. Seduced meant I'd thrown myself away by choice.
Sally hadn't expected me to ask that. She also knew I'd always kept myself clean, so she changed her story at once.
"It was assault."
"The cook tricked you with a dinner roll, lured you back to the dorm, and assaulted you there. It's true. I saw it with my own eyes!"
I still didn't argue.
I only nodded, as if turning something over in my mind.
"If you saw it with your own eyes, why didn't you save me?"
Sally grew more flustered.
"I—"
I didn't give her the chance to speak. I kept on, my face puzzled.
"I don't want to deny what you've described. After all, even if I did, no one would believe you'd make up a story about me being assaulted out of thin air!"
