This is smile-worthy too. As PhD candidates and junior lecturers, Moira and I were grateful to have our work picked up by journals that paid nothing, all for the sake of exposure. We would have given our right arms for the hundreds of thousands of Australian dollars no doubt being flung in Coetzee’s direction.

“What else have you heard?”

Moira shakes her head. “You have squeezed the lemon of gossip until the pips squeak. I have nothing more for you.”

“In that case, I must go. I have to visit my father.”

* * *

Moira leaves at once. She thinks I mean right now—that I am leaving to visit my father as soon as her car pulls out of the driveway. I pick up my car keys on the way out to strengthen this illusion. After she has driven away, I put them back and settle in my chair again. The visit to my father is only on Sunday.

This is what PTSD does. It concertinas time. Sunday’s visit to my father presses up against me like an importunate lover. I can’t leave too small a gap between Moira’s visit and the visit to my father. That would be too much company in too little time. I can’t tolerate that much socialising.

They say old age turns you into a caricature of yourself. This is what rape has done to me. It has stripped me of my youthful ability to tolerate people and things. I am no longer adaptable. I can’t take life as it comes. I struggle to walk and talk at the same time. I need plenty of warning if something is going to happen. I hate spontaneity. I find refuge in routine.

When Sunday comes around, I wake up early to get ready. I put on my full-length knickers, my American tan tights, my bra and girdle, my long, thick skirt, the blouse that buttons all the way up to my chin, my cardigan. I lace my feet into flat leather shoes. I put on spectacles to shield my face.

I know what I am doing. I am making myself less rape-able. I’m falling for the old lie—that women are raped because of what they are wearing. But I can’t help myself. It feels as though I am going into battle fully prepared.

If my father’s house is the battleground, he and I are non-combatants. The ghosts of that night battle alongside us, unnoticed by my father and ignored by me.