A Minor Fall

by Price Ainsworth

  Because Sullivan was not going, the return trip to Kentucky was on a commercial airline and took the better part of a day. We changed planes in Cincinnati and rented a car in Lexington. Beth pecked at her laptop for most of the plane trip while I slept and caught up on reading professional “magazines” like The Texas Bar Journal and The Texas Supreme Court Digests. Eileen would collect the materials for me and hand me a folder whenever I flew out of town. Reading the Bar Journal meant looking first through the names of attorneys who had been disbarred or disciplined to see if I knew anybody, scanning the memorial death paragraphs, and examining the article titles to see if any pertained to my practice. I usually held my breath as I read the Digests hoping, often unsuccessfully, that the Texas Supreme Court had done as little as possible to destroy the plaintiff’s personal injury practice that month.

  When we got to Lexington, I drove the rental car. I remember the stark contrast between the lush, rolling horse farms around Lexington and the granite crags of eastern Kentucky. Still, the Daniel Boone Parkway was a nice drive, and I enjoyed the silence. It was dark when we checked into the Paintsville Inn.

  A depressing mildew smell that emanated from the heated indoor pool on the first floor permeated the box-shaped hotel. Beth and I took our keys from the young woman at the front desk, and we set out with our luggage to find our rooms, which were next door to each other on the third floor. My room had two queen-sized beds with worn, red bedspreads and thin, gold blankets that looked like they had been sliced from a large wheel of polyurethane cheese. I threw my bag in the closet area, designated by the hanging rod, and turned on the television to ESPN. I opened the door from my room to Beth’s and knocked on the door that opened to her side. After a moment, I heard her slide the bolt and saw her door open.

  “Well, it’s not the Windsor Court,” she said, smiling. I agreed, and suggested we try to find some place to eat, but she had already called the front desk and determined that the best place in town was a Dairy Queen a few blocks away. We decided to take the car, and she went back into her room to get her purse. I felt like my boss had banished me to Siberia. My wife was so mad at me that she would only speak to me in short, declarative sentences. It was nice to be able to talk to somebody. As we walked past the pool on our way to the lobby, Beth asked me if I had remembered to bring my swimsuit.

  4

  IT’S FUNNY HOW YOU CAN THINK SOMETHING and how you can know something. And I don’t mean how you learn something you feel like you should’ve known all along. I mean there have been times when I suddenly knew things would happen that before I had only assumed would happen. It can work in reverse also. There have been times when I know things will happen that I assumed would never happen. For example, growing up I always thought that Jonathan and I would go to work for Dad’s law firm. Even when it became clear in Jonathan’s third year of law school that Jonathan was going to do something else, I still convinced myself I was going to go to work for Dad. I thought that Dad would need me to help keep him organized and to keep his cases moving through discovery. I thought I could inform him on developments in the law. I thought that is what he wanted me to do. It wasn’t until I saw him interact with Davy at Easter brunch at Brennan’s during our second year of law school that I knew that it was Davy who would be going to work for Dad and not me.

  We were seated at a large, round table upstairs in the garden room with the white trellises. My mother, Amy, my dad’s mother, Zela, and I had been to Tootsie’s earlier that week and bought hats to match the spring outfits we intended to wear to brunch. It’s not easy to find a hat for sale, much less one that will coordinate with a dress you’d already bought, but Tootsie’s on Westheimer was ready for our occasion—or at least for the Kentucky Derby. Mom, Grandmother Zela, and I had a lot of fun trying on the hats in the store, although I admit that I was a little self-conscious when it actually came time to put the hat on and go to brunch. The straw brim on mine was so large that it was difficult to sit in the back seat of Dad’s Mercedes with Grandmother on one side and Jonathan between us. You had to sit up very straight so that the back of the hat wasn’t crushed against the seat, and you didn’t want to lean too far to the middle when Dad turned the car or you might put Jonathan’s eye out.

  Dad and Jonathan had gone along with the theme, each wearing something that suggested they might have just gotten back from Louisville. Dad wore a blue and white, seersucker Haspel suit with a madras tie, and tan and white wingtip shoes that he called his “spectators.” I only saw him wear those shoes on Easter Sunday, but he would wear the suit to church in the summer. I don’t think he ever wore that suit to the office. Jonathan wore a double-breasted, navy blazer with tight, white jeans and loafers without socks.

  William Drummond, a golfing buddy of Daddy’s, and Davy were waiting for us when we went upstairs to the table. Davy had on his usual navy blazer, but he hadn’t yet graduated to the grey slacks he would wear almost every work day after law school. He was still in his khaki phase, and, even though he had on a starched white button-down and a Brooks Brothers repp-striped tie, he looked a little wrinkled, and the tie was slightly askew. I’m sure he was nervous. He and I had been dating for awhile and Davy had known Jonathan since college, but Davy hadn’t been around my parents very much. I had invited him to come to Houston for Easter brunch and told him that Mom said he was welcome to stay at my parents’ house. But Davy opted to stay at a friend’s apartment and to meet us at the restaurant. William had come in his own car, and judging by the redness in his cheeks, he might have had a Bloody Mary or two downstairs before the rest of us got there. He was also wearing a navy blazer but with an open-collared polo and ridiculous plaid pants. The men shook hands, and then Dad went around the table and pulled out chairs for each woman in our party. Since Jonathan had not brought a date, other than Grandmother Zela, and William was solo, it was impossible to sit boy–girl, etc. Dad seated us so that I was next to Grandmother. Davy was between Dad and me.

  We had barely taken our seats when the milk punch started flowing. Brennan’s serves a brandy and milk concoction that tastes like ice cream. That’s the “milk” part. The “punch” part is what it will do to you if you start drinking it at ten thirty in the morning. We each had a glass while we considered the menu. Well, everyone but William had one. When the waiter got to William, he held up one hand and said, “Podzy,” which is an affectionate term for “partner” in Houston slang. “If you don’t mind, I’d just as soon have another one of those bloodies that Whiskers was making downstairs for me.” Mom and Jonathan were already discussing his summer plans, and Grandmother was asking me about what classes I was taking and trying to recall if Dad had done well in those classes. I was trying to be polite and to respond to her questions, but I was also trying to listen to what Dad and Davy were saying to each other. Dad seemed to be absorbed in what he and Davy were discussing.

  I couldn’t hear all of it, but Davy was telling Dad about being on the U.T. mock trial team and their upcoming competition. I knew the “case” they would try had something to do with slander; an employee was accused of stealing something from a coworker’s locker. I understood that Davy and his partner had to be prepared to present either side of the case depending on their assignment in each round. Dad nodded when Davy told him about using Othello and Will Rogers’ quotes on “reputation” in closing. But what really got Dad’s attention was Davy’s answer to his question about how in the world people judge these competitions.

  “It’s all about style and procedure,” Davy said frowning and shaking his head. “Did you make the proper objection at the proper time? Did you get a ruling from the judge before you moved on to the next question? Did you lay the proper predicate for admitting the evidence? Easy stuff. When there are two experienced teams, it usually comes down to which team the judges like the best. What they ought to do is go down to the workforce commission, hire three jurors for each round, and ask them to decide the case—not on how well the mock trial lawyer ti
ed his tie, or how confident he sounded in his objections, but on how well he presented the facts of the case.”

  Jonathan must also have been listening to Dad and Davy because he interjected, “Wouldn’t each round then be decided on how fairly the packet of information on the ‘case’ was drafted? If the facts, as set out in the packet, favor one side, then the coin flip that determines which team will be plaintiff and which team will be defendant will decide the case.”

  “But isn’t that how it is in real cases?” Davy asked, turning to Dad. “Doesn’t one side or the other usually have the better side of the facts, and it’s up to the lawyers to persuade the jury to see the facts differently . . . in a way the jury might not have without the lawyer’s presentation?” He turned back to Jonathan.

  I’d seen the two of them argue over stuff like this for hours. If they had been as effective at arguing with other debate teams in college as they were at arguing with each other, they probably would have won some tournaments. “Are we supposed to be learning how to look like we are winning, or are we supposed to be learning how to win?” Davy asked.

  Before Jonathan could answer, Dad reached over, straightened Davy’s tie, and said, “Both.” Jonathan and Davy laughed, and smiling, Dad turned to Mom and asked if we were about ready to order.

  I knew the second I saw Dad adjust Davy’s tie that it would be Davy, not Jonathan or I, who would eventually go to work for Dad. I can’t say what it was about Davy that Dad found appealing. Maybe he saw himself in Davy, a young, bright guy of modest means who thought he wanted to do trial work and assumed that he would be good at it. Maybe he liked Davy’s attitude about winning. Maybe he could see that I was falling in love with Davy, and that he might as well try to get along with him.

  Another thing happened that day at lunch. Sometime, after the milk punch, or maybe after the turtle soup with a splash of dry sherry, and probably before the pecan-crusted snapper and ice-cold Far Niente chardonnay that Dad had ordered for us, and certainly before the bread pudding with bourbon sauce when Grandmother Zela seemed to doze off (dipping the front brim of her hat into the cup of her chicory-infused coffee), I knew that I was going to marry Davy. He might have thought at the time that he was going to marry me. But I knew at that point that we would eventually get married.

  After lunch, we went downstairs and waited on the valet to bring all of the cars around. Dad decided that he would go out to Marmion with William, and that Jonathan would drive us home. “Marmion” is an exclusive, all-male golf club out north of town near Bush Intercontinental Airport. It is supposed to be nice, but being a female, I’ve never actually seen it. Dad says that Marmion is not all male by design; it’s just that membership was limited to four hundred people and the first four hundred who signed up were all males. His golf club was sort of like his law firm. So far, both were all male. Davy was going to follow us to my parents’ house in his car. I hoped he was okay to drive because I was feeling a little bit drunk.

  When we got to Mom and Dad’s house in River Oaks, a building that expressed a Houston architect’s vision of a French chateaux, Mom said that she would take Grandmother home, and Jonathan left in his car without saying where he was going. Mom told him to be careful as she walked around and got into the driver’s seat of the Mercedes. Grandmother Zela was asleep in the backseat. They left just as Davy pulled up. What had a few minutes before been a large, family gathering was now a private meeting at a large house. I was worried what Davy would think about the house. It is a little bit over the top, but he didn’t say much. Just, “Nice place” or something to that effect.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Let me show you around.”

  I took him through the garage and walked past my room and Jonathan’s room, without my pointing out either to Davy, to a set of stairs just past the front entry. Davy followed me quietly up the stairs and down a hall to one of the guest rooms. “Where are we going?” Davy finally asked. “Is this your room?”

  “No.” I replied. “This is one of my favorite rooms in the house. My room has twin trundle beds. Great for sleepovers in high school. But we’re not in high school, anymore are we?”

  I sat down on the bed in the middle of the room, and Davy walked over to me but he didn’t sit down. A bedspread of colored squares of silk cloth covered the bed. The four-inch squares were olive green, burgundy, gold, and purple and in the center of each was an artificial stone of turquoise, ruby, topaz, or amethyst. I ran my open palm across the bedspread. I couldn’t remember if Mom had bought the bedspread in Morocco or Taos. Davy stood facing me. “Are we the only ones here?” he whispered.

  I nodded and leaned back on my elbows. I took off my hat and “Frisbeed” it onto the floor. “We don’t ever have sex in my bed do we?”

  “No,” he said. “We are usually on that gold couch in your apartment. This is like being in some French hotel.”

  “La Colombe d’Or,” I said, but I could tell that he didn’t recognize the reference. I could also tell that he was getting excited. I pulled him toward me and began undoing his belt and khakis. “I think I’m going to have just one more shot of milk punch,” I said, and we both laughed. “And then perhaps I can interest you in another bite of snapper.”

  When we woke up, the afternoon sun was glinting through the broad, plantation shutters, sending geometric patterns across the multicolored bedspread. I balanced my head in my palm with my elbow on a pillow, and brushed Davy’s hair out of his face. “You had a good day, didn’t you?” I asked.

  “That was fun,” he said.

  “That’s not what I meant. You get to do that pretty much every day, don’t you? I meant at brunch today. You got along well with Dad, didn’t you? I think he was very impressed. And Daddy is not easily impressed.”

  “I’m sure that he would try to get along with anybody you brought home.”

  “No. Don’t sell yourself short. I think you might have just furthered your legal career today.”

  Davy just shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t imagine it would do me much good if your dad or mom found us naked in one of their guest rooms.”

  “Okay, okay.” I said. “Let’s get dressed and put the room back together. But you watch. Today was more important than any old mock trial competition.”

  I was right, of course. A few weeks later when we were back in Austin, Dad called Jonathan to ask Davy if the two of them would be interested in clerking at the Texas Trial Lawyers Association where Dad was the incoming president. Jonathan declined, but he passed along the request to Davy who jumped at the chance. I suppose Dad called Jonathan instead of me because he didn’t want to act like he expected to find Davy at my apartment, but that is where Davy was when Jonathan called.

  That summer, Dad probably saw Davy as much as I did because I took a job clerking for a big firm in downtown Houston, and Dad would see Davy every week at TTLA in Austin. Jonathan and I both lived at home that summer since he took a job with a public-interest outfit over in the Heights.

  The next time I saw Dad and Davy at the same time was at the Peters & Sullivan firm Christmas party later that year. Frankly, it was a bit unusual for Peters & Sullivan to have a Christmas party where anybody other than the staff was invited, but that year they rented out a room at the River Oaks Country Club and invited families and friends to attend. Even Jonathan went, by himself to be sure, but he did go. I’m not certain that he left on his own. Jonathan seemed to be quite taken with a cute paralegal that might have been a few years older, and I noticed them talking to each other several times during the evening. Daddy spent most of the party talking to friends of his that he had invited from the local legal community, but he did find a moment to corner Davy and me together.

  “So what have you two been up to in Austin this semester? You only have one more semester to go. Have we made any plans?” Daddy asked.

  I knew that he was fishing for information about whether Davy and I had made any marriage plans. We hadn’t, but I couldn’t resist the opportunity t
o play with Dad a little. “As a matter of fact we have.”

  Daddy’s eyes widened and he began looking around the room for Mom. Davy raised his eyebrows at me. Daddy saw Mom, got her attention, and waved for her to come over. As she walked up, Daddy put his arm around Mom’s shoulders, and said, “Amy, Michelle and Davy here have some news they want to tell us. Isn’t that right Michelle?”

  Mom’s eyes immediately shot to my barren left ring finger, so I don’t think she was as surprised as Dad when I told them that I had decided to take a job with Miller and Shumard, the firm I had worked for the previous summer. It was a well-known firm with many lawyers practicing many different kinds of law, but they mostly represented businesses and handled big commercial real estate matters. I didn’t tell Daddy that I had called and accepted the firm’s offer before exams that semester so there would be less pressure on me to make high grades. No respectable firm ever rejected a new hire if her grades went down after she had accepted an offer.

  Dad nodded his approval and asked Davy what his plans were. “I think that I’m going to take a clerkship with Judge Collins in the Eastern District of Texas,” Davy said.

  “One year or two?” Daddy asked him.

  “I guess just one.”

  Again, Daddy nodded and began asking Davy all about Judge Collins as the two of them walked over to the open bar.

  “I thought you might be about to pass along some other news,” mom said to me, smiling.

  “That’s all for now,” I said and laughed. “I don’t suppose you know who that woman is that Jonathan has become so taken with?” I asked and indicated without pointing to the pair across the room by themselves.