by Randis, K. L
Mr. Solak didn’t even have the patience to object. Instead he fired off another question; one he thought would corner me for sure. “Miss Nolan, if this was going on for so long, why didn’t you tell anyone?”
Be truthful.
“I thought I was protecting my brothers and sister.” For the first time I made eye contact with the jury. “I thought that if I let him hurt me, he wouldn’t hurt them. But I wasn’t protecting them, I was protecting him. I thought that what happened in my house was normal, I didn’t know anything else, it was all I knew. But when I found out…” I shook my head, still in disbelief that I actually thought this happened in every household. “When I knew that my house was different, I knew it had to stop.”
“And what is it you’d like to see happen to David?”
Be yourself.
He wanted me to show a malicious side, Rob told me earlier. The truth was it didn’t matter to me if Earl ended up in jail. I didn’t care if he strutted around in anklets and never saw the outside world again. It wasn’t about that, this was not revenge. I didn’t have a mean bone in my body, even after everything he’d put me through. There was really only one response I could give.
“I just want to make sure that he can never hurt anybody ever again. It doesn’t matter what happens, I just don’t want to see other people get hurt.”
“No further questions, your Honor,” said Mr. Solak. He waddled over to his table and huffed as he sat down.
Rob had one more point to prove. “Brooke, you testified earlier that the reason why your grades were so high was because you studied a lot?”
“Yes.”
“So when Mr. Nolan was trashing the house, or abusing your brothers or sister, you coped by distracting yourself…with studying?”
“Yes.” The tone in his voice was disbelief. I got uneasy about what he was trying to say. Wasn’t he supposed to be my lawyer? Wasn’t he on my side?
“You can tunnel your stress, your worry, and forget about everything else except what you’re trying to memorize?”
“Yea.”
“Brooke could you please empty the contents of your pocket for the jury?”
“Objection your honor, relevance?” Mr. Solak didn’t want any more surprises. He shook his head at Rob and waited for the judge to make a call.
The judge looked as surprised as I was.
“I assure you, Your Honor, the relevance will be revealed momentarily.”
The judge eyed Rob. “I’ll allow it.” She leaned forward on her bench to get a closer look.
Three index cards fell out of my pocket and onto the stand in front of me. I realized where Rob was going with this and grinned.
“Brooke, please tell the jury, what the contents of your pocket are.”
I picked up the note cards and turned them over in my hands. “They’re chemical reactions, for my organic chemistry class. I have an exam in two days.”
“You’re here today to testify against your father for raping you, and you have organic chemistry equations stuffed in your pockets?” His grin was ear to ear.
“Yes.”
My explanation resonated with the jury. I had testified for over three hours for the defense. Every direction he tried to pull me in I changed it around. I hated that I cried so many times in front of strangers, but as I took my place in one of the wooden chairs outside the courtroom when I was finished I realized I wasn’t ashamed anymore. I was hurt and I was betrayed, but I was not ashamed.
The trial lasted two days, just like the first one. Both lawyers gave their closing arguments, and the judge charged the jury with what they needed to do to come back with a verdict beyond a reasonable doubt.
“What does that even mean, beyond a reasonable doubt?” I asked Heather.
“Just means that we have the burden of proving he did it, he doesn’t have the burden of proving he didn’t do it. They need to believe, all of them, that without a doubt based on what we told them, he’s guilty.”
I thought that since there was only verbal testimony as evidence for both sides, automatically there would be doubt. The pub we frequented to wait just like last time was just getting ready for dinner hour as I crammed in next to my Aunt Jean and Gina. Rob loosened his tie and heather replayed some of Earl’s testimony that she could remember.
“So David says, As soon as Brooke mentioned sexual abuse, Aunt Jean just took it and blew it out of proportion so Rob says She blew the sex abuse…out of proportion? And David says Yes.”
Aunt Jean gasped, “I absolutely did not…”
Heather held up a finger. “Hold on it gets worse. So Rob says So she made the sex thing a big thing? David says, A really big thing. Rob turns to the jury with a look of surprise and goes That should have been kept small I guess? I never heard a lawyer call out objection so fast!” Heather shook her head as she laughed.
“Yea, well there are a lot of charges against him. It would carry out a heavy sentence, so the longer they deliberate the better it looks for us.” Rob bit into a corned beef sandwich as his phone rang. “Excuse me, probably my wife.”
“How you doing, you doing okay?” Gina stroked my head, “Can I order some wine? I need a drink.”
“No time.” Rob shut his phone and pushed his plate away in disgust. “The jury came back. They have a verdict.”
“Already?” Heather sounded panicked. “It’s been forty five minutes Rob.”
“I know.” He grabbed his briefcase and we shuffled out of the booth.
Everyone tried to keep their composure as we scanned through security in the lobby but there was an undeniable sinister cloud that followed us down into the court room. Since the jury came back so soon, we could only assume that they did not decide on a guilty verdict.
We were the last ones to file into the courtroom and I slid into a bench closest to the door. When the jury walked in and took their place, the room slowed like a movie scene as the judge asked the foreman, the bald black man, if the jury had reached a verdict.
“We have, your Honor.”
“Very well. On the count of rape by forcible compulsion, how do you find the defendant?”
Gina fell to the floor in sobs as the foreman read out the first guilty.
“On the count of incest how do you find the defendant?”
“Guilty.”
“On the count of corruption of a minor, how do you find the defendant?”
“Guilty.”
Cries of joy and pain rose from the benches where I sat. Gina, Mom, Heather, Aunt Jean, all trying to squeeze me as I hung my head, relief washing over me like the parade of guilty verdicts.
“On the charge of indecent assault without consent how do you find the defendant?”
“Guilty.”
Judge Wilkin interrupted the verdict process and pointed to a bailiff. “Could someone please remove that woman?”
Gina refused to hold back her sobs. “Oh you did it, Brooke. You did it.” The bailiff approached and Gina stood up voluntarily. “I’ll go, I’m sorry, I’ll go.”
“Now then.” Judge Wilkin cleared her throat. “If we can continue. On the count of endangering the welfare of a child, how do you find the defendant?”
“Guilty.”
In total, when the foreman sat down, they had found him guilty of nine felonies and twelve misdemeanors. Twenty one charges in all, found guilty on every single one of them.
Not one time did Earl flinch, yell out, or otherwise change his expression. I watched him stare straight at Judge Wilkin as if she were telling him his shoe laces were untied. Unfazed, somber even, he must have realized that he had been caught. His secret was out, and the jury had believed me.
It was over.
Judge Wilkin thanked the jury and spoke to Earl as the officers bound him in handcuffs. Chaotic chatter filled the elevator and Rob smiled and nodded to me. “No, no don’t thank me. She’s the one who blew this thing out of the water. I’ve seen grown men crack under the pressure that defense attorney put on you
.” He winked at me. “You’re gonna be just fine.”
While everyone crowded around Heather’s office, I reached for another tissue. “Mom, I need to go home. I need to tell Thomas.” I paused until Gina looked at me. “And Adam, and Kat. They need to know he’s not coming back.”
“Me and you kiddo, we did it!” Gina rocked all over the car as we sped away from the courthouse. “Oh, I am so happy for you. Thank the Lord, thank God you got the justice you deserve.”
I pushed a C.D into my stereo system and sounds of the Dixie Chicks filled the car. Gina turned it up when she realized what song it was and started to sing along, “Cause Earl had to die na na na na naaaa naaa naaa.”
Lights disappeared behind us on the highway as we approached the county jail just off the main interstate. It would be Earl’s new home away from home. I beamed at Gina and stuck my hand out the window as we passed, passionately giving the jail the middle finger.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Court was over but I still had to wait two months to find out how long of a sentence he would get. Each charge carried a minimum and maximum amount of time and since there were twenty one counts, the time could greatly vary.
“You, everyone in your family, anyone who knows your character should write an impact statement.” Heather’s voice broke up as I walked across campus so I pressed my phone to my ear.
“What are they for? Like what should they say?”
“Victim impact statements are just letters written by anyone who knows you well about what they think should happen to David, based on what they know of the situation. The judge takes them into consideration for sentencing. You get a lot of people to vouch for you and insist he be put away a long time, it’ll just be better for you. It doesn’t mean it will definitely help, but we encourage people to write them. You need to write one too.”
“All right. I’ll let everyone know.”
Over the next few weeks I collected more than twenty five impact statements. Mine was the last to be added to the pile. Exams and projects piled up as the end of my sophomore semester came to a close. Jason offered to go grocery shopping so I could get my letter done. Two hours later, I sat cross legged on my bed to re-read what I wrote:
I do not think of myself as being heroic for telling on my father. I did not tell with the intent of making our lives harder. I simply wanted him out of our lives so we could live, and grow, like children are supposed to. Not in fear. I don’t think it’s fair that I lost my virginity to my father.
I thumped my pen anxiously on the paper and looked away. Even after two years of court, that thought still screamed in my head.
I also do not think it’s fair that my siblings and I had to grow as much as we did not knowing a father’s love. Without him in the home, a drastic change has occurred. We never stop laughing with each other and we joke around and are loud and carefree, not nervous and timid.
It was not until I got my very first boyfriend that my attitude started to change. At his house, there was no yelling or screaming. I remember on an occasion where his little brother spilled a glass of milk at dinner, and I gasped and jumped from the table. Everyone looked at me so weird, because I expected his father to go into a rage like mine would have done. But he never did, and it was unusual behavior to me, and the more I was surrounded by it, the more I realized that it was MY house that was unusual.
My mind flashed to how many times my brothers had flinched at the sight of Earl’s hand being raised, even if it was just to stick a fork full of food in his bearded mouth at the dinner table.
Who knew that Adam could tell such hysterically funny jokes instead of being so quiet? And that Kat wanted to be a cheerleader instead of hiding in her bedroom closet, etching new scars across her wrists? The first time Kat showed me her scars, she was almost proud of them. “I wish they would just…go away,” she would mumble now, rubbing her pink polished fingers over the damage.
There is, however, the constant fear that he will someday return to our home, and everything will be back to the way it was. I fear the day I am in a public place and see his face in a crowd. I do not want to ever feel the heart dropping dread I have for this man ever again.
I bent my head down and read the finishing words to my letter.
Your Honor, I am requesting that you serve David Nolan with the maximum amount of time allowed by law. If there is one decent thing that that man has ever done for his family, it was that he left our lives. And now that he has, please do not let him come back.
I re-read it two more times and flipped the pages over to make sure everything was perfect before tucking it into my book bag.
“Hey, how’s it coming?” Jason pushed the door open carrying a pizza box and two plates. He moved a pillow aside and put the box down between us. My stomach growled in response.
“Good. Finished.” I pulled two slices apart and handed him one. “Can I ask you something?”
Jason grunted between bites.
“I’ll take that as a yes. I know I didn’t want you to come to the trials and stuff, you know, so you didn’t have to listen to those things.”
“Yea, that’s okay. I understand.”
“I know. But can you come with me to the sentencing?”
Paul had started this journey with me. His mom offered me support the whole way through, inside and outside the courtroom.
I couldn’t imagine Jason not being there for when this chapter of my life finally came to an end, especially with how understanding and supportive he was the entire time. Jason took me back in a heartbeat after our fight, just like Gina told me he would.
He bent forward and planted a greasy kiss on my lips. “If you want me there, I’ll be there.”
***
I didn’t have to point out Earl when we entered the courtroom since he was the only one there in handcuffs. Jason never saw him before, even all the childhood pictures I had were devoid of his face due to some skillful scissor work.
“Not what I expected,” he whispered as the judge was announced into the courtroom.
“What’d you expect?” I whispered back.
“I don’t know. He just looks… normal.”
Judge Wilkin addressed the court to say why we were there. After a few formalities she spoke about the impact statements.
“There were thirty-two in all, and I read every one. But I must say.” She glanced at me sitting in the back row of the courtroom. “I find it unbelievable that a glass of spilled milk is what gave one little girl more strength and poise than I have ever seen in this courtroom.”
She shuffled papers in front of her. “With that being said, it is the court’s decision that David Nolan spend no less than eight years with a maximum of sixteen years in a correctional facility.”
Heathers mouth dropped and Rob’s head shook back and forth; disbelief portrayed on everyone’s faces. David was sentenced to the maximum amount of jail time allowed by law for his crimes.
I was tackled by almost everyone as I buried my face deep into arms, tears, and hair. Everyone was crying, and smiling, and nodding their heads. A few of the jury members looked over at me as I mouthed Thank you. A surge of relief encouraged me to smile for the first time inside the courtroom. Finally, Earl was going to a place where he couldn’t hurt anyone else.
I would be almost thirty five years old by the time he would be released if he served the maximum time. I knew parole and other factors went into what his actual release date would be, but right in that moment, my face lit up the courtroom as David was escorted away.
Jason squeezed my hand three times to say I love you, and I squeezed his back. We made our way to Heather’s office. “For the first time I am leaving this courthouse with a smile,” I said.
“I don’t believe it. It’s great, don’t get me wrong. But wow you must have made an impression.” Heather pulled me off to the side as we approached the front lobby of the courthouse. “Brooke, can you come to my office for a minute? I want to show you something.”
I looked at Jason. “Go ahead, I’ll be right there.” He kissed my cheek and followed my mom outside.
Heather pulled a file from a tall oak bookcase on the back wall of her office. She flipped through some papers and pulled one out. “I wanted you to read this. I thought you should know.”
“What is it?”
“An impact statement we got. For you.”
The letter was printed, and I didn’t recognize the name at the top.
“I’ll give you a minute.” Heather’s weak smile and quick shuffle out the door made me think I didn’t want to know what the letter said, but I started reading anyway.
Dear Honorable Judge Wilkin, it is with deep regret that I write this letter nineteen years too late. When I was twelve years old, and coming from Molly’s side of the family, I was asked to babysit Adam and Brooke Nolan from the time they were three and four years old.
I glanced up at the name again, it still didn’t look familiar.
It was great money, and I loved taking care of them. When Molly’s shift at the hospital changed, David Nolan started to drive me home from babysitting. I’ll never forget the first time he walked into the living room naked, touching himself. I was terrified. He told me that he could teach me how to feel good, but if I told anyone he would make sure that everyone knew about our secret. For eight months I was trapped. I was asked to do unimaginable things with him and to him while Brooke and Adam played in the next room. I finally told an older cousin what was going on; I wanted help. That cousin told me to never repeat what I just told him, and that it would put our family to shame if I did. My father’s relocation of a job is the only thing that saved me since we had to move away.
I never told anyone else what happened during that time in my life. I never sought counseling or help as I got older. I moved several states away, putting thousands of miles between me and my past. When I heard about what happened to Brooke, I blamed myself. I attempted suicide, and wound up in a mental health institution for over a year. I thought that if I had been a braver boy than I was, if I had told just one more person, or done something more, this never would have happened to her. I blame myself for the years of torture I am sure she had to withstand, and I can only hope that she gets the help she needs to grow into the healthy and successful woman I know she’ll be.