A small prick of discomfort began to inch its way up her stomach to her heart. This was a leap of faith, to open herself up to him. She hesitated.

“Would you like to stop now? Talk about something else?”

It was that sentence, that openness, that pushed her to overcome her fears and trust him.

“First, he used both his hands to pull me closer to him. He started kissing me. I’d never been kissed before. It felt strange, his lips on my lips.”

“Strange bad, or strange good?”

That’s odd, she thought. At this point, he’s supposed to get all high horse and moralistic. He’s supposed to give me mussar, make me ashamed of myself.

“Strange good, I guess. I liked it.”

“How did it make you feel?”

Again, stranger and stranger. He was supposed to say, “What about negiah? What about kedushah and taharah?” On the one hand, she was relieved not to be scolded, but on the other, wary. He was, after all, a religious counselor, a rav, specially trained to help girls going OTD, Off the Derech. That was his job. But this rare opportunity to talk openly about her long-hidden struggle to make sense of her behavior—not just to someone else but to herself—was irresistible.

“It made me feel warm and cozy and beautiful. It made me feel loved.”

He nodded. “Go on.”

“But then, he started to do other things that made me feel not so comfortable. First, he unbuttoned the first button on my collar. The next time it was two buttons, until finally, a few weeks after we started going together, he took off my shirt altogether.”

She looked up sharply. What was that noise coming from his throat? Like a gasp … of pleasure? “Weren’t you afraid of someone seeing?”

“I was, but we were in the back of a car he’d borrowed. We went down to the beach in Far Rockaway, and sat there, talking, and then…”

“Go on!”

Now she stared. It hadn’t been her imagination. There was a sudden urgency in his tone, an insistence. His face was red, bloated with excitement, his eyes burning, He was breathing heavily.

The old fear washed over her. Nothing had changed. He was the same. Everything else had just been an act to put her at ease. It was as if he had practiced this approach and perfected it. After all, he had done this to hundreds of girls. He was an expert. She shuddered.

“I think we should stop now. I … I’m a little tired,” she said mildly. She didn’t want to make him angry. All she wanted was to leave quietly, on good terms, and never, ever come back.

But it wasn’t going to happen. He was furious. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“But isn’t my hour up?”