Waiting to Be Heard: A Memoir by Amanda Knox Read Free Book Online

arm outstretched to passersby who didn’t acknowledge that I was at the other end of the four-inch-by-five-inch sheet of colored paper, I was always relieved when my stack of flyers dwindled, and I could leave.
    But no matter how many flyers I gave out, Le Chic wasn’t catching on. Meredith came to visit me there a few times so I wouldn’t be bored or alone, and once, she brought her girlfriends. But I could see why they didn’t come back. Le Chic didn’t get a lot of foot traffic, so the dance floor was usually empty. The bar felt forlorn—not exactly a recipe for a good time. Patrick was jovial and did his best to make it welcoming, but it was still noisy and dark inside and attracted a crowd of older men—often friends of Patrick’s—and not students.
    There was nothing truly dangerous about Le Chic, but its seediness did hint at Perugia’s dark side. What I didn’t know when I arrived was that the city had the highest concentration of heroin addicts in Italy. I never heard about the high level of trafficking and drug use until I was in prison, bunking with drug dealers. During my trial, the prosecution and the media seemed to take for granted that our neighborhood was bad and our little villa a deathtrap.
    Even without knowing this, my mom worried about my safety—a lot. One day, while I was e-mailing back and forth with her at the Internet café, she asked, “Who should I call if I can’t reach you?”
    “We don’t have a home phone, but I can give you Laura’s number,” I wrote. “But honestly, Mom, I think I’m safer here than in Seattle. My friend Juve walks me home from work most nights, and Perugia is much smaller than Seattle. I’ve really made a lot of friends.”
    “Okay,” Mom wrote back. “I feel better.”
    I believed what I said—not because I had reason to but because I was in love with the city’s many charms. And I didn’t pick up on some obvious clues.
    One night, when Le Chic was closing and Juve couldn’t walk me home, I saw an acquaintance of Meredith’s. I didn’t know his real name, only that Meredith and her girlfriends had nicknamed him Shaky because of the way he danced. He offered me a ride home on his scooter. I figured a friend of a friend was close enough to trust. I figured wrong.
    We whizzed through the narrow streets. As we approached the intersection where the villa was, he slowed and yelled over his shoulder, “Would you like a cupcake? I know the best bakery in Perugia, and it’s open all night.”
    “No. I’m tired. I just want to go home.”
    “Come on. It’s nearby.”
    “No, thanks,” I said, just as we passed my house.
    We went to the bakery, where I refused to get anything. “I don’t even like cupcakes,” I said. “Now home.”
    “My home,” he said.
    “No!” I glared.
    “Just for a minute. I have to pick something up.”
    “Okay,” I said, feeling that it was not okay at all. But I had no idea where I was and no other way to get where I was going.
    Shaky’s apartment was tiny and cramped with people. He took me to his bedroom to wait while he went off to do something. After a few minutes, he came back with a beer for me.
    I said, “If you don’t take me home right now I’m going to walk.” Luckily for me, since it was an empty threat, he shrugged, turned around, and we left. When we got to my driveway I climbed off the scooter without saying good-bye and stormed inside.
    I was angry, and bursting to tell Meredith. She sighed. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “He tried to do the same thing with my friend Sophie. But he was so responsible the night our friend was sick, I still really trust him.”
    After that, Meredith came up with a plan. She always went out with a group of girlfriends, so she felt protected by the pack. But knowing I was often on my own, she said, “If you come back to the villa at night and I’m not here, make sure to text me to say you’ve gotten home safely.”
    It was comforting to know that if she