“But if they imply that I had some knowledge of what happened, wouldn’t that mean they definitely should have questioned me back in ’95?”
“They could imply that the evidence was planted there later. Staged.”
“That makes no sense. Does it? Is that even possible?”
“All they need to do is vaguely suggest it. They’re likely to paint you as a nosy person, overinvolved, trying to make a name for yourself. Their goal is to get the judge to dislike you.”
It would be easy to do, I imagined: Just look at her smug little face, this meddling fame whore. She barely even knew these people.
Liz asked if I wanted to take a break. Yes, I did. I very much did.
10
I’d been planning to drive up to campus to see Fran, but I was physically and emotionally exhausted, so I got her to bring the boys to the hotel to swim. A decent-sized pool and a hot tub only half filled the enormous solarium space that jutted out onto the inn’s back lawn. Three walls were glass, as was the gently sloped ceiling—but a thick, green glass that filtered the light softly, trapping the humidity and warmth and the smell of chlorine around us in a blanket of false summer. Fran had bought the boys Cheetos from the vending machine, but now that they were cannonballing into the water, she and I picked at the remaining pieces, staining our fingers orange. I hadn’t had Cheetos in decades. If I let myself eat whatever I wanted, I’d have them every day.
I filled her in on my morning—no harm, since she wasn’t on the witness list—and told her about seeing Sakina and Mike last night.
“What if,” Fran said, pointing a fat Cheeto at me, “what if Mike Stiles left his wife for you and you two got married in Old Chapel?”
“My standards have gone up,” I said.
“The Choristers could sing! Your bridesmaids could wear green and gold!”
“You’re my matron of honor,” I said, “and I need you in head-to-toe green taffeta.”
One of the most delightful pieces of news I’d received in the past few years was that my Granby housemate, Oliver, had married Amber, the sweet young Latin teacher. And Oliver had landed a job at Granby. Fran passed along an invitation to a party at their place on campus the next night, Friday—a celebration of the fact that people could gather, however short this window in the pandemic might prove. It sounded like something the attorneys would object to, but I couldn’t think why. It was just a party, albeit one remarkably close to the scene of the crime.
Three other kids had joined Fran’s boys—two boys and a girl—and their mother jumped gracefully in to swim a couple of laps. She was our age, irritatingly cellulite-free.
Fran cleared her throat, looked meaningfully over my shoulder. I turned to see, across the pool, a man in blue swim trunks, his belly soft but his arms and legs muscled. I took in his face: This was Robbie Serenho. This was his lovely wife. These were his kids. He was blowing up a floatie. The wife emerged from the water, wrapped herself in a towel, grabbed a key card from him, and left.
I spent a panicked moment wondering what to do—diving under the water and staying there seemed out of the question—before I remembered the choice had already been made for me. I wasn’t allowed to talk to him. At least not about the hearing, but that was excuse enough to stay planted. I raised a tentative palm from my leg as offering. He squinted, confused, at both of us. His hairline had receded dramatically.
“I’ll go say hi,” Fran said, before I could even ask her to.
She rounded the pool, pausing to tell Jacob not to splash water in Max’s eyes.
Had I built Robbie up in the past few years into some towering, symbolic figure? Or had he lurked like that in my imagination since high school? Or was my blood pressure rocketing for other reasons: my guilt at upending his life, my fear that he hated me? There seemed to be no oxygen in the room, only gaseous chlorine.
Fran was beside him now, her hands moving as she spoke. I couldn’t make out her words through the thick air. Robbie laughed at something, she laughed at something. One of Robbie’s boys clambered out of the water, dripping, stood whining. Robbie put a hand on the boy’s head, made him wait while he talked to Fran. I remembered that I could pretend to look at my phone, so I did that until Max, clinging to the gutter, lost his kickboard; I knelt and reached over the water and sent it sailing to him, then tossed him rings to dive for.
Robbie’s voice grew loud, traveled across the pool. He’d turned in my direction. “I know I can’t talk to Bodie,” he half shouted, “but I hope you’ll tell her it’s good to see her.”
Thank God. I laughed, shrugged, waved again.
He said, to the middle of the room, “Please tell her I think she turned out pretty cool. No hard feelings. Tell her my wife’s a big fan!”
He turned his attention to the younger boy, who looked about seven. As Fran walked back to me, he picked the boy up and swung him—a giggling sack of potatoes—into the water. Robbie backed up, ran to the pool edge himself, grabbed his own legs in a cannonball, flew.
11
At 11:45, a text from Alder: Shit shit shit. I resisted answering.
At 11:47: Very not good.
11:50: Can I not even tell u why??? It’s bad. Britt still on stand, state bringing u into it on cross.
I was at Rite Aid, buying the dental floss and antacid I’d neglected to pack.
11:52: Flipping out. They’re doing the timeline of when u got involved and they’re going, was this the same week her husband was in the spotlight, was this before or after she got backlash for the following tweets. Batshit omfg
11:55: Like, they’re trying to say u did all this to get attention off u and husband?
Fucking Jerome.
If Jerome and his antics and my poor reaction ended up being the reason we lost, I’d never forgive him. Or myself.
I’d stopped in the digestive aisle, by the rows of Pepto-Bismol. I should tell Alder to stop texting, but didn’t I need to know this?
11:59: Making u sound like this desperate person. Amy objecting to like every word but judge allowing??
It was everything I’d once feared—looking like a desperate interloper—but now I cared far less about that than about what this might do to Britt’s testimony, or what it might do to my own testimony tomorrow. Omar did not deserve this.
12:20: So they’ve been in bench conference forever, I can hardly even hear anything ughghghghgh
I was at the checkout counter; I was walking down the icy sidewalk; I was drinking my bottled Frappuccino on the corner like a wino.
12:45: They got like 2 more qs out and now another bench conference
1:15: Can’t believe I’m missing class to stare at these lawyers’ backs
The call from Amy March came a little after five. I was lying on the bed in a sandpapery hotel robe, my hair wet, unable to nap because the elevator was too loud through my wall. She said, “I know you might have heard some things today. I don’t want you to worry. Listen, though, nothing’s for sure yet, but we might—we’re reevaluating if we want you on the stand.”
The smoke detector on the ceiling blinked red—a tiny, constant test-warning.
She said, “It seems their whole tack is to centralize you in all this, to cast doubts on your honesty and intentions.”