In this first-person story about date rape, the boy in the story couldn’t be more endearing, according the initial description, which leads to an obvious question for your students to wrestle with: Do nice boys rape?

The writer describes the new, more outgoing and assertive self she developed when she left her leafy Queens neighborhood for a Manhattan high school, which leads to another question: Do girls have a right to grow, change, and mature, even if it means breaking up with a boy from the old neighborhood? How did her boyfriend respond? How might he have responded differently?

You can have students stop reading the story just as the writer is about to confess to her mother. Many issues are left unresolved, and make perfect starting points for discussion and writing exercises. Should the writer tell her mother? Her father? Why? How should they respond? Focus the class for a moment on what they think should be the first thing the parents should do, because that sets the tone for all that follows. Is it most important to comfort the daughter and find out how she is feeling? To take quick revenge? To go to the police? To visit a rape crisis counselor? If they press charges how will the media and the press treat the girl? (Does that differ from how the media treats mugging victims, for example?) Did she “ask” for it? If the boy isn’t punished, will he be more likely to do it again? Why did the boy rape her? Does he need help, as well as punishment? If you were the best friend of either of the young people in the story, how would you counsel them?

One question likely to be raised in your discussion is whether the girl was at fault in the rape. (After all, she willingly went into the basement and started kissing on the bed.) Many girls (as well as boys) think that girls “ask” for rape. The author of this story was taunted on the street by other girls for being a “whore,” while at the same time she was ridiculed for being “bad in bed.” Did her tormentors have any empathy? Should they have?