September Rain

46

  -Angel

  The three judges stare at me while I watch the mirrored wall, wondering over the blank faces behind it, the ears that must be listening. I don't feel much better, but a little more unfurled.

  "Society wants us, as individuals, to think that we're so strong. But it's a lie. We're slaves to the physical elements of this world. We're impotent."

  Taking a deep breath, I look at my own pathetic reflection in the mirrored glass. "Think about this: how much does it take to knock us from our towering achievements onto our knees? A breath from the earth would do it. The slightest shift in her axis and we're all done for."

  More minutely, all it might take is a phone call. Like the one Jakes mother must have gotten. What happened to her when she heard the words, 'Jake's dead'?

  A split-second decision to go instead of stay, to chance the yellow light, to ignore the little voice in your head that says this turn might not take you where you think.

  A few words of judgment, the bang of a gavel, and just like that: instead of spending my eighteenth birthday on a California beach; I'm coming of age in lockup.

  "One wasted second, and we fall like dry leaves from a dead tree. How often do we take the time to think about that?"

  Quiet Darren leans forward, looking at the clock. "We'll pick this up tomorrow."

  +++

  I can't listen to modern music. I don't want to hear any overrated Grunge or Metal with its' thousands of sub-genres or trendy bands. I'm most comfortable with the music I grew up on. The stuff Jake hated.

  Heaven isn't too far away . . . The sound of Warrant hums from my little clock radio. The irony of the song clenches my chest and even though I have spent the better part a decade lamenting, I can't help but break when Janie Lane says that no one really cares.

  He's right. Everyone's gone. But unlike the song says, I will not keep trying. I decided before I ever got here that this case evaluation would be my last. The moment my testimony is over, I will be, too.

  But I'm not done yet. I took too long today, went too slow to finish. So, for now, I must keep breathing and close my eyes . . .

  I'm still seventeen, slow dancing with Jake inside his dark living room, in between the glass encased stereo and the wooden coffee table.

  I feel the ghost of his lips skimming their way up my neck as he talks about what heaven is really like. "It's nothing," kiss, "like what you think." Kiss, "It's better," kiss, "than you," kiss, "can imagine."

  +++

  It's after twelve when I finally get into the room with my idiot lawyer, Tight Bun Tara, and Quiet Darren. They're all waiting for me in their matching jackets. Today's color is white. Again. The lawyer is supposed to be here for me, playing on my team. So why the hell does he look so dang comfortable with opposing council?

  There's a sweating Diet Coke waiting for me, opened and waiting with a bendy straw. Right next to that is a bottle of water. I take the drinks because they help. Taking my meds without food isn't getting any easier. Makes me so dizzy I want to puke. Sometimes, I do.

  After I'm cuffed to my chair and take a few long sips of soda, I start in on my declaration, reminding everyone, once again, that what I am telling them is the way things looked to me. It is my picture, the one my mind drew up while I was navigating the maze.

  I remind them of my leaving Carlisle in early June. "I'd expected to have my first taste of real freedom. I was graduating from that shithole high school. I was turning eighteen in September. I was in love and had just gotten engaged." My eyes swell. "Before June was over, Jake was gone. By July, so was I. I don't remember September. Someone said it rained." The vague memory of a weather report whispers to me.

  It took months to get to court, but I don't remember most of it because the stress and depression had taken its' toll; I was having near-constant migraines and was literally scared shitless. I couldn't eat, sleep, or shit. That time was just a haze; with the general feeling that I didn't care. I didn't want to hold myself together. Nothing mattered.

  But one thought kept sticking to me: there was no news about Avery.

  "You've stated on several occasions that you do not recall the details of your arrest or the charges against you." Darren asks, looking to my lawyer who clears his throat. "Why do you think that is?"

  Why do they continually ask questions they know the answers to? "My memory has always had holes in it."

  Darren nods his head. "Yes, and that is often the case with persons having your diagnoses. What I'm curious about is how you can recall the most minute details of every moment you spent with Mister Haddon, but not recall the very important details of the crimes the state of Arizona saw fit to charge you with."

  My back straightens. "Ever heard of selective amnesia? Maybe I don't want to remember."

  Tight Bun Tara stretches her hand across the table, getting my attention. "We're veering off-topic. If we could continue?"

  I turn to her. "My next clear memories are the handcuffs."

  +++

  I came out of my constant daze with sudden clarity. As if I had passed through a fog that cut through time. I simply appeared there, on my feet, in a white jumpsuit.

  I found myself standing between two guards in the midst of a large, plain room filled with small round tables and caged windows high up on the cement walls. Just like a cafeteria, but smaller and less smelly. An empty visiting area, it looked like. But no one was going to visit me. Everyone hated me.

  "What's happening?"

  The guard at my left didn't meet my eyes so I turned to the one on my right and asked again. Right-side Guard removed his arm from mine only to replace it with another set of handcuffs that latched my chains to a loop molded on the underside of a table, and directed me to sit.

  "You've got a visitor," the guard said.

  Before I could get my hopes up, a grey-haired man walked into view, passing through a different doorway on the opposite side of the large room. A doorway that let the visitors come and go-not like the tricky door that I'd come through-which led me in but would never let me out.

  The guards posted behind me as the gray-haired man, who was a little taller and a little more plump than he looked from across the room, sat down on the opposing bench. He set a briefcase in the space beside him, then popped it open. He rested a thick accordion file on the table, and then set both his laced hands on top.

  "Are you a lawyer?"

  The man shook his head. "No, dear."

  "It's Angel."

  "Angel, my name is Doctor Bender. Do you remember me? We met once before."

  I shook my head.

  "Well, I am a psychologist. I've been appointed by the court to examine your mental health on behalf of the state of Arizona."

  "Another doctor?"

  "I have been advised of the charges against you, the incidents in the interrogation room, and have consulted with your regular physician and a doctor Elena Williams." His brow furrowed. "Doctor Williams sent over her very extensive notes with a copy of your file." His index finger plunked the top of the accordion file. "I would have followed up with you sooner, but I had to go over all the information and gather research."

  He popped off the rubber band holding the thick file folder and it sprang open, tripling in size. He removed a stack of papers and adjusted his rimless glasses.

  "I've met separately with Avery, but this time I would like to speak with the both of you at once. Would that be okay?"

  My forehead crumpled. "She's here?"

  I didn't hear any doors open but as I spoke, Avery walked in wearing the same chains as me. She was bound at the waist, wrists, and ankles. She was allowed to sit beside me-at my left. I watched her from the corner of my eye.

  Her shoulders were squared, her chin held high. "I will only speak to Doctor Williams. We had a deal."

  She twisted my direction. I refused to acknowledge her presence that felt like a weighty collar holding me back. She was so smug and demanding-I could not fathom
why she and I had ever been friends.

  The gray-haired man looked down at his papers-my file-and one corner of his mouth twisted down. "Avery, is it? I was told you might say that. So I have taken the liberty of asking Doctor Williams to join us. She should be arriving shortly."

  As if on cue, the same plain door, cordoned off by chain link fencing topped with barbed wire across the visitor's area, opened. In stepped Doctor Williams and another guard, but he stayed inside the fencing, allowing her to pass through into our chamber, filling in an opening on the opposite side of the table.

  She and Doctor Bender quickly exchanged whispers before her eyes locked on me. "I'm glad to see you, Angel. Avery."

  I couldn't respond.

  Avery screamed. "What happened to Doctor-Patient confidentiality?"

  "You are being charged with a felony. Your case has officially been passed off to Doctor David Bender. I am here as a consultant."

  "Consulting my ass." Avery spat. "You're glad to get rid of us. No more Angel. No more head-case."

  "Your specific issues are not within my scope of expertise, but they are within Doctor Benders. His opinions on your condition and this case may decide what happens to you from this point on."

  "We have to talk to him." Her voice was suddenly soft and close. Half of my face burned from her breath on my cheek. She was looking directly at me, speaking into my ear. "Remember, Angel, how I always look out for you?"

  My throat swelled with unshed tears. How could she say that?

  She paused, waiting. "Don't worry. I'll tell them."

  "One moment." Doctor Bender held out his index finger then swooped it down into his briefcase. It reemerged on the button of a compact tape recorder. He set it on top of the table, speaking into the air, aiming his voice at the recorder, stating three names: his, Doctor Williams' and mine. Then he looked to Avery. "I'm ready when you are, Avery."

  Avery mumbled, "Don't hate me." And then began in a steady voice, "We are broken, but we have value . . ."

  With those few words, I felt a sudden wave of dizziness descend upon on me. It crashed over my left shoulder, rolled me onto my back, and I swear, it carried me away to another place and time.

  I was six years old. Maybe seven. I was goofing around with Avery in the family room of whosever house I was staying in at the time. We were running, playing tag. My shoulder knocked one of the bookshelves lining the wall. I fell to the hardwood floor. A tall jar of coins that was kept up on one of the higher shelves toppled over and rolled off the edge.

  It hit the ground beside me with an ear-splitting shatter.

  I don't remember the name of the family (I wasn't with them very long), but I remember the woman I stayed with had tight curls in her brown hair. She was righteously pissed. She called me a thief, accused me of stealing from her, and then spanked me for breaking the jar. After she searched my pockets and came up empty, she told me I wasn't worth the time it took her to clean up after me and then sent me to stand in the corner.

  Avery stood beside me the whole time.

  Later, when we were alone, she . . . she whispered in my ear as I stood there, crying. "We are like that jar. We might have been broken," she rubbed the permanent bump under my hair that never went away after my accident. "But we have value. You do. You do."

  Hearing Avery repeat those words to Doctor Bender, I knew right away what she was referring to, but it was an odd memory to evoke at that moment and it made me feel so strange.

  I didn't know.

  I was completely unaware of how much I was missing, and completely alone in that ignorance.