Lucy Greenwell

But at the same time, it hurt your feelings.

when they rejected you from unfriended you.

For some months, whenever Jess and I speak, she's upset.

Those months of phone calls are hard.

Jess is upset.

And I'm part of the reason things have deteriorated with Jennifer's family.

She imagines them all condemning her, and she hates it.

She feels like they think she's gone rogue.

I tell her I get where they're coming from, because going public with something this private must feel like a betrayal to them.

And that's why Jennifer's family, her parents, her siblings, have closed ranks around her.

Whatever confusion or embarrassment they feel about how Jennifer's handled things, however baffled they are by how she's reacted to Jess, she's still theirs.

Jess has been cut loose.

Again.

For her whole life, Jess's story has belonged to other people.

To the police who investigated.

To the journalists who wrote about her.

The social workers who placed her with the family.

And crucially, to Jennifer, who buried the story.

Now, Jess, by speaking publicly, is the one who's deciding what gets said and when.

It feels to me like an ongoing battle for control over her own story.