“Yes, but I thought it was just going to be for fun. Once he had me tied up, he hurt me.”
“What exactly did he do to you once he had you bound?”
“He cut me in tiny places with a knife. He spit on me. When I said no, he raped me, anally. I bled for days. But before he let me go, he used the bathroom on me.”
“How do you mean?”
“He peed on me.”
“After sodomizing you and lacerating you with a knife blade, Adam Lee degraded you by spitting on you and urinating on you while you were defenseless.”
“That’s right.”
“Why didn’t you report this to the police?”
“Because I knew I couldn’t prove it. We had been having sex together for a long time. I could hardly believe it myself. I thought I knew Adam. I didn’t know he was capable of . . . I just didn’t know he was capable.”
THIRTY-NINE
I wait for Monty in the interview room. Today, like every other day, the trial did not go well for us. Monty made small victories, but they were Pyrrhic. We lost more ground than we gained. There is much criticism in the press. Criticism of my brother’s handling of my case. They say it is a weak defense he has mounted on my behalf. I read with interest the coverage of Anne Hunter. She has been particularly unmerciful in her writings of every aspect of the trial. In the paper today, the Hunter woman continues her tirade. She slants her story toward the “weird sex acts” that transpired between me and Violet, and the “buried rage” that drove me to torture and degradation. She is, of course, quite right in her assessment. She criticizes Monty for not prefiguring the disastrous consequences of a line of questioning that opens the door to sexual histories. Again, she is correct in her assessment. Monty is performing poorly. There is, however, a certain line in her article that reverberates in my mind. A legal analyst, when referring to Monty’s ineptitude, says, “it is almost as if he wants his brother to be caught.” The words echo in my mind, picking up speed, and I find myself thinking of a time when we were boys. Of a girl I cared for. Of sexual awakenings. Of sexual cruelties.
Monty enters the interview cell, his face a mask of despondency. He has not contacted me since our last disastrous day in court. I wait for him to speak.
“Well, I won’t lie to you. I mean, we blew the Perkins woman’s credibility all to hell. Made her look like the slut she is. But what was that shit about you tying her up and peeing on her?”
“It was lies.”
“Well, it sounded like lies. I hope it sounded like lies to the jury. Like she was desperate to make you look bad. But that old woman hurt us. Hurt us bad. Jesus, did you really say that? That Rachel was dead?”
“I wasn’t myself. It was a joke. I didn’t mean it.”
“Believe me, you don’t come across as the joking type. That old woman is going to sink us. How the fuck did they find that old bat? Jesus, I should never have called that bastard Leo.”
“No, I would say that was a mistake. One of several.” This is the first time I have commented on his performance in a negative light. Indeed, it is the first time I have ever dared criticize my brother.
“What are you trying to say? If you’re trying to say something, just fucking say it.”
“I’m trying to say that several mistakes have been made.”
“Yeah, taking some tramp for a weekend of S&M and water sports, that was a mistake. Running around to the geriatric twins and bragging about how your wife was dead and it didn’t really matter because she was a real bitch anyway, that was a mistake. Thinking a jury is gonna believe you if you get on the stand and tell them how you cleaned every microdrop of blood off Albert and washed all of his clothes before the police got to the crime scene, that was a mistake. And you know what else was a mistake, Adam? Killing your wife, that was a mistake.”
“It sounds like I need a new lawyer. No wonder you can’t convince anybody I’m innocent; you don’t believe it yourself.”
“What do you expect, Adam? You sure as hell look guilty.”
“I expect my lawyer to make me look not guilty.”
“Okay, okay. I’m sorry. It’s just that the case is going so badly. I guess I’d rather believe you’re guilty than believe I might lose the case. That you might go to prison. Or worse. Because of me. Because I failed.”
The moment has passed. Neither of us likes this sort of tension. We assume our old roles of weak and strong. “I have faith in you,” I tell him. “It will be because of you that I am set free.”
“I pray you’re right.” He prepares to leave. He has had enough of me for one day. I sicken him. I represent his own failure. “Look, I’ve got to get to the office. I’m supposed to meet with your shrink, what’s his name, Doctor—?”
“Salinger.”
“He says he’ll tell the jury you’re not crazy and he doesn’t believe, based on his professional opinion, that you’re capable of premeditated murder.”
“Premeditated?”
“Well, that’s what you’re accused of, and Salinger won’t testify without the qualification. He says we’re all capable of murder given the right amount of rage and provocation.”
“You don’t think that it will make me look bad, the fact that I’ve consulted a psychiatrist?”
“Believe me, at this point, it’s the last of our worries. He’ll also say that your having the affair was a way for you to work through your marriage difficulties, and I’m pretty sure that we can get him to say that what you said to Mrs. Oldster was just a way of letting off steam or some such bullshit. Don’t worry. I’m thinking ahead. All is not lost. I still have hope.”
Monty clasps my shoulders and gives me a halfhearted hug. I know that in his eyes, I am already lost.
“Anyway, I’ll try to come back tonight.”
He opens his briefcase and takes out a pair of sunglasses. He puts them on and I remember. I remember the last time I saw those glasses. He was passing me in his car, on my drive-way, and the light reflected off them so that his eyes were like two holes of white light. I remember. I—
“What is it?”
“What were you doing at my house that day?”
“What? What day?”
“I passed you in the drive. The weekend Rachel died.”
“Oh. She called me over. You know. She was half crazy. Drinking. The pills. I’m sorry, but you know how she was.”
“And what exactly did she call you over for?”
“You know.”
“No, I don’t.”
“About how you wanted me to be Albert’s godfather. I dropped off the papers. You remember, the ones I refused to sign. Because I was afraid you were planning to do something crazy. Afraid you were up to something bad. And here we are.”
“You weren’t sleeping with my wife, were you, Monty? My crazy rich wife?”
“You’re talking out of your head. You know, of all people, you know how Rachel was. An affair? Come on, Adam. You’re under a lot of strain. Are you trying to say that I had something to do with Rachel’s death? Adam, you know who killed her. You cleaned the blood off your son, remember?”
“Yes, I remember. I’m just trying to get things straight in my mind.”
“Look, just try to get some rest. I was going to tell you later, but I think we’ll have to put you on the stand. It’s always a big risk, but with everything that’s happened, they’re going to have to hear it from you. They’re going to have to hear you say that you didn’t kill her.”
“Yes. They will have to hear me say that. I want something from you. I want you to call Anne Hunter. I want to talk to her. I want to tell her my story.”
“That’s a bad idea.”
“I want to do it.”
“It’s a very bad idea. These people in the press, they twist things around. They’re worse than lawyers. You’ll regret it.”
“Call her for me. It’s what I want.”
Finally, he agrees. His agreement tells me more than anything else that he believes all i
s lost. What is one more mistake in an endless series of mistakes? I nod to him as he leaves, and I think of those glasses, the circles of light, like twin summer suns. I think about that summer at the lake when we were boys and the girl we knew. I think about what happened that summer and wonder how it shaped me. I think about that summer and I wonder what my brother, my handsome, handsome brother is capable of.
FORTY
It was the last summer before our parents would die in an automobile accident, but already Monty was the focus of my life. As only a young boy can know, my love and admiration for my older brother was without bounds. He could do no wrong. His every action was, in my eyes at least, flawless. When he threw a baseball, his aim was superb and sure, the pitch almost balletic. And to be the lucky recipient in a game of catch was a privilege without peer. For him to allow me a small portion of his time that might have been more profitably spent with the older boys and their secret society was a magnanimous gesture. Whatever he touched, turned to gold. Indeed, he himself was golden. I followed him constantly, never more than a few steps behind. I had to see all that he did, witness all that he would become, all that he would allow me to become. And, in my most delightful memories, share with him the experiences of boyhood. He taught me how to smoke pilfered cigarettes, how to inhale the smoke that would cause my head to spin and my stomach to roll uneasily. He taught me how to bait a fishing hook with the eye of the minnow impaled through the hook’s sharp point. He taught me how to tie a length of thread onto the leg of a June bug and hold on giggling as it flew crazily around our heads. He taught me how to whistle, to swim, to spit, to live. And he taught me other things as well. He taught me degradation, cruelty, and spite.
That summer, the last summer our parents would ever see before their lives were snuffed out in a heap of twisted metal, I was ten, Monty fourteen. Our family was vacationing at Lake Armistead in the North Carolina mountains. There was a girl. Twelve, possibly thirteen years old. Her family rented another cabin on the lake in the summers, and, over the years, our families grew close, socialized. Her parents and ours would sit out on the covered porch and play card games long into the mountain nights. From the yard we could see their cigarettes spinning orange phantom trails in the summer dark, glow and wink out as if with some secret rhythm like fireflies mating. There were cold gin drinks and much slapping of mosquitoes and, as the hour grew late, drunken laughter. Our mother would sleep past noon after one of these nights and not fully recover until well into the next evening. The next card game, the next drink.
The girl wore braces on her legs. Cumbersome metal braces to straighten out recalcitrant legs from curving inward by God knows what childhood disease. We made fun of her. Or, rather, Monty made fun of her and I joined in, already a firm believer of my brother as hero. In my eyes, he could do no wrong. And if the teasing should go a little too far, should it border on cruelty of an adult nature, then so be it. My brother knew what he was doing. If jamming lighted matches into the crevices of her metal braces was what Monty said was the thing to do, then I did it. If deliberately tripping her so that we might make fun as she struggled to get back up was Monty’s idea of idle diversion, then that was what we did. Monty always knew the correct action to take. I had to believe that. I had to believe it then, because doubt was sacrilege. How could you doubt what you aspired to become? I had no choice but to believe it later. Later, when adolescence should have brought a sense of independence and questioning, Monty had assumed the roles of mother, father, and confessor. But for that summer, we were just boys, growing strong and lean and tan in the mountain sun.
Despite our never-ending teasing, the girl, Denise, never considered staying away from us. I didn’t blame her. I too would have borne any humiliation rather than be denied my brother’s presence. I suspect that for her as well as me, Monty was like a magnet. She just wanted to be around him, within his field of current, even if the price was her dignity. And Monty was handsome. Already his shoulders were wide and strong, his legs lean and muscled and dusted with sun-bleached hair. Puberty had blossomed him into a strikingly beautiful (there is no other word) young man. And this beauty would eventually deform his mind so that he saw women only as instruments to be used for his own pleasure. Since he could have any girl, and later, any woman he chose, why not have them all? Indeed, if his cruel taunts and constant degradation could not keep Denise from seeking out his male beauty, how must it have affected his emerging ego?
There was an incident. Our parents and Denise’s parents had gone down the mountain and into the small town for an afternoon of shopping. Monty, as the oldest, was given charge of Denise and me. We were to stay with Denise at her parents’ cabin. Our mother had given Monty and me a solemn look and told us to behave ourselves. Denise’s mother did likewise and cautioned Denise to stay away from the lake. No sooner had our parents’ car left than Monty started in on Denise.
“Hey, Denise, wanna go swimmin’? Oh, wait, that’s right, you can’t swim, you’re a fuckin’ cripple.”
She took it like always, outwardly annoyed, but inwardly, I knew, simply glad to have some degree of Monty’s attention.
“Sticks and stones, Monty Lee. Why can’t you just be nice for once?”
“I don’t wanna be nice. I like bein’ mean.” Then he added, “Especially bein’ mean to cripples like you.” He must have had some sense of his power over her.
“Oh, you’re mean all right. You should try to be more like Adam.”
“You’re crazy and a cripple,” I said, wanting to demonstrate quite clearly that I was on Monty’s side in this and all matters. Still, I disliked talking harshly to her. Not that I was above such things as talking harshly to girls; far from it, I reveled in it on the school playground. And it was not a sense of pity for her, of that I’m sure. In truth, Denise was actually an attractive girl. Her hair was jet black and constantly clean and shiny. I sometimes daydreamed of touching it or smelling it. In her hair was hidden a lovely paradox that I thought only I could see. Her hair was so black that sometimes, in the sun’s light, the faint curls managed to somehow capture the light and refract it back in secret rainbows of color. I sometimes wondered what it might be like to kiss her. These thoughts would set off a buzzing in my head and cloud my mind for hours, wonderful hours. I of course would never admit to these feelings, because Denise was clearly a person to be scorned, beneath even my idle daydreams. Monty had unequivocally demonstrated that, had rigidly set the parameters that I must follow. She was not worthy of admiration in even an innocent boyhood crush. Yet, for all of that, could a boy be blamed for noting with delight that her breasts were just developing? Could I be blamed for thinking of the small swells beneath her cotton shirts? Thinking of these things late into the night and coveting a secret erection beneath the blankets. Can a boy be blamed for his awakening sexuality?
“You better be nice to me.”
“Or what?”
“Or else you’ll never find out.”
“Find out what?”
“My secret.”
“You haven’t got a secret,” Monty said.
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”
“What could a freak know that would be worth knowing?”
“Be nice and you’ll find out.”
“This is as nice as I get. Tell me the secret. I’m gettin’ bored.”
“It’s not a secret you tell. It’s a secret thing.”
“A secret thing?”
The pleasure in her eyes was unmistakable. She had actually gotten my brother to express interest. “Yeah. I took it from my dad.”
“Let’s see it.”
“Are you gonna be nice?”
“Just get it.”
How could she refuse? I could not have. She turned stiffly on her braces and lurched toward her bedroom. From her room, we could hear drawers opening and closing. We heard the sounds of metal fasteners unsprung. “Hurry up already,” Monty yelled to her. After a while, she was back. She came through the door wearing a
new pair of clingy cotton shorts. The braces were off her legs. There were white cross marks engraved in the flesh of her thighs where the metal braces had pressed against her pale skin. She walked with an alarming grace.
“See, my legs are normal. I’m not a cripple. I just have to wear the braces so my legs won’t grow in crooked. I have nice legs. See?”
Monty was having none of it. “Is that your secret? Big fuckin’ deal. You’ll always be a cripple to me.”
“I thought you were gonna be nice. And besides, that’s not the secret. This is the secret.” And she pulled her hand out from behind her back, and held out a nearly full bottle of gin. “I stole it from my dad. A little at a time in an empty bottle.”
“Oh, yeah?” Monty’s expression had changed from one of idle contempt to one of outright intrigue. His face clearly stated that this was truly a secret thing. And at that moment, how could Denise feel anything other than triumphant, just as I felt defeat. Something passed between them in that brief moment, and it sickened me.
“Let’s get drunk,” she said.
Monty arched his eyebrows in doubt. It was a mannerism he would use repeatedly as an adult in the courtroom to communicate his disdain silently and effectively. “You’ll get sick. You can’t drink liquor.”
“Sure I can,” Denise said, and turned the bottle up. She took a large gulp. A shudder ran through her body as the gin settled in her stomach. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and held the bottle out to Monty. I have no idea if he had ever drunk before or even wanted to, but he had no choice now. It was drink or look weak in the eyes of the outcast. He took a drink, tentative at first, but it quickly grew into a gulp. His swallow would be larger than hers had been, of that there would be no question should such issues be brought into discussion later. He winced at the bite of the alcohol but didn’t cough or choke. That would have been unthinkable, humiliating. He handed the bottle back to her, and she offered it to me. Monty waved her hand away.
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