Dying Declaration

by Randy Singer

  To complicate matters, Denita had managed to keep her views on the volatile issue of abortion secret throughout her legal career. Charles suspected that was one of the reasons both sides had settled on her as a compromise candidate. Only Charles knew the truth. She not only favored abortion rights, she had a personal history that would make it impossible for her to remain objective.

  Charles also knew that this fact, if it ever seeped out in the press, would disqualify her immediately. The president would never stand for it. Senator Crafton would desert her in a second, throwing his weight behind some other female African American lawyer. And so it all came down to Charles and his decision whether to betray his ex-wife or imperil the future of so many unborn children.

  Denita claimed she had changed. But one thing had not changed, could never change. He would be reminded of it later this afternoon, after he talked with Denita, when he visited a small plot in a Richmond cemetery he had purchased a few days after he learned about the abortion. “Baby Arnold,” the marker said. It had been a little over a year since he had been there. He tried to make a pilgrimage every year, on the anniversary of the date Denita said she had induced the abortion. But this year he was a couple of weeks late.

  When he arrived at the law firm of Pope and Pollard, Denita’s secretary told him that she was in Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court, putting in a few pro bono hours representing youthful offenders. Her people, Charles thought as he drove down to Richmond J&DR court. He wondered how long she had been doing this public service. Probably started as soon as she learned about the possible nomination.

  He found her in Courtroom No. 4 in the massive Richmond Judicial Center and was surprised at how comfortable she looked seated at the defense counsel table and whispering to the brooding young man sitting next to her, challenging the prosecutor’s claim of a parole violation. Charles watched her for about fifteen minutes before she turned and gazed in his direction. Her eyes popped wide; she raised an eyebrow and then shrugged her shoulders—a “why are you here?” look.

  A few minutes later Denita had talked the judge into a quick break. She watched the deputies haul the defendant away to lockup, then immediately made her way back to Charles.

  “Quite a surprise,” she said, placing a gentle hand on his arm. “What’s the occasion?”

  “Our conversation the other night.”

  “Okay,” she said tentatively, removing her hand. She somehow sensed that a personal visit was not a good sign. “Can you stick around for lunch?”

  Charles shook his head. He glanced around to make sure there were no eavesdroppers. “I’ve given this a lot of thought, Denita. Prayed about it.” He paused. This was harder than he thought. “I think you need to tell the senator.”

  He heard the wind come out of her even as it brushed lightly across his face. Her strong frame suddenly looked so frail; the shoulders sagged for a moment but then straightened. She started nodding her head a little, as if she knew this was coming, then looked him in the eye.

  Charles felt his throat constrict, his mouth go dry under her intense gaze. “If you tell him,” Charles continued, “I won’t say anything to anybody else. You and the senator will have my pledge of silence. He may not yank the nomination, but at least he’ll know.” Charles watched her expression carefully as she weighed this proposal. Her face grew tight, the lips forming a thin line of rejection. “I will have done my part,” he said, “and I’ll be able to sleep at night.”

  “It won’t work,” Denita told him without a moment’s hesitation. “The senator would disown me in a heartbeat.” She took a half step closer, and her eyes drilled down deeper into his. “You can’t pass this off on me, Charles. I’m not saying anything about it. I’ve already decided. If you can’t live with that, then do what you have to do.” She sighed as if she had been drawn into an argument she didn’t want. “I’ve made my decision, Charles. It’s none of the senator’s business.”

  She glanced over her shoulder toward the front of the courtroom, raising a hand toward a prosecutor who was looking impatient. “Just a second,” Denita called out. As the prosecutor nodded her assent, Denita turned back to Charles. “Thanks for coming all this way,” she said tersely. “I’m sorry you can’t accept the fact that I’ve changed.”

  “Denita—”

  But before he could explain himself, she turned and walked away.

  On the way home he stopped at the cemetery to clear his mind and to honor the memory of Baby Arnold. He felt guilty that he had missed the anniversary of the baby’s death this year and that, if he weighed his feelings honestly, this had become more a pilgrimage of duty than something he wanted to do. In the first few years, he had felt a peace at this grave. His journeys here lessened the aching in his soul. But the last two years, kneeling to pray on the grave of his only child had just triggered more destructive emotions—resentment, frustration, a brooding questioning of God’s plan for this child. Instead of mourning, he found himself arguing with God.

  As he walked past the other familiar headstones that marked the graves of those who had lived long and full lives, he felt the sadness descend. It wasn’t just that Baby Arnold had never experienced the joys of life; it pained him equally that nobody cared even now. Other graves would be dotted with freshly cut flowers or landscaped with small plants growing around the headstone. Relatives would kneel at other headstones and say a silent prayer. But never at the forgotten grave of Baby Arnold. He would be the only visitor. Once a year. And this year he had come late and hadn’t found time to even stop for flowers.

  And so it shocked him, literally sucked his breath away, as he stared at the freshly mowed gravesite for his child. He couldn’t believe what he saw, couldn’t believe what it meant.

  Wilted flowers. Geraniums and pansies leaning against the tiny little headstone, as if they had been left there a few weeks ago. A small rosebush planted in front.

  “People change,” Denita had said. “I’ve changed. . . . Let me prove it to you.”

  Perhaps she really meant it.

  38

  IT WAS WEDNESDAY MORNING, and Nikki was running late. The alarm had worked fine, but so had the snooze button. Five times. By the time she and Stinky finally rolled out of her bed and nudged Tiger in his sleeping bag on the floor, it was already 7:15. She had to have the kids at day care by 8:00 so she could stop by the office and make it to court by 9:00. And she would require a minimum thirty minutes of primping before she could walk out the door.

  At least Tiger no longer contracted deadly diseases every morning. He seemed to like the day care a lot better than he did school. It was run by a community church of some type or another. Nikki figured that as long as the kids had to be in day care, their parents would want them in a religious one. The people taking care of the kids seemed nice enough, and the kids were making plenty of friends.

  They stopped on their way for Chick-fil-A biscuits, coffee for Nikki, and chocolate milk for the kids. Nikki had no idea how the supermoms did it—work, children, household chores, and husbands to boot. It was wearing her out, putting a hurtin’ on her efforts to stay in shape and burn a tan. She could do it for one more month if she had to, all the way through trial. But she really only planned to do it for one more day. After today’s preliminary hearing, after Charles tore into Dr. Armistead on cross-examination, Thomas and Theresa Hammond should be free to go home with their children.

  Sure, it was unusual for any judge, particularly one as careful as Silverman, to kick a case out at the preliminary hearing stage based on lack of probable cause. But it was not unheard of. And with everything they had against Armistead, the prosecution’s main witness . . . well, today just might be the day.

  The prosecution would have to establish probable cause on two elements of the crime. First, the Barracuda would have to prove that Thomas and Theresa knew or should have known that their delay in seeking medical care created an unreasonable risk to the life of Joshua. Second, the Barracuda would have to establish
that the failure to get Joshua to the hospital earlier was the cause in fact of his death. Since the Hammonds could not be forced to testify against themselves, the Barracuda would have to prove her case by the testimony of others.

  The Barracuda had not subpoenaed the children to testify at this hearing. She probably didn’t want to take an unnecessary risk on what they might say. Nikki and Charles had debated whether they should call the children as witnesses themselves, but ultimately they decided that their testimony would hurt more than help. The children would sit this one out, playing at day care while their fate hung in the balance.

  “Oops,” Tiger said from the backseat of the Sebring.

  “Oh, man,” an exasperated Nikki muttered. “What do you mean ‘oops’?”

  “I dus’ spilt my chocolate milk, dat’s all.”

  “Did it get on the car?” Nikki fought back visions of her fine leather interior stained and smelling like sour milk. Tiger was a walking, talking disaster area.

  “A little,” Tiger admitted. “But most of it spilt on me.”

  “Thank goodness,” Nikki muttered.

  “Here’s some extra napkins,” Stinky said cheerily as she handed them over the back of the front seat. “No sense crying over spilt milk.”

  “I ain’t crying,” Tiger said. “But it looks like I tinkled in my pants.”

  Ten minutes later Miss Nikki dropped Tiger off, milk stain and all, at the Green Run Community Church day care center. She kissed him and Stinky on the cheek, something she had just started doing in the last few days, and told them to have a great day. She even reminded them to say their prayers for their mommy and daddy.

  Tiger untucked his shirt as soon as Miss Nikki turned her back to leave. It hung down almost far enough to cover the wet spot on his pants, but not quite. This could be a very, very long day.

  Tiger liked day care pretty well. It wasn’t like school—all work and no play. Here, you would have prayer time in the morning, then do what you wanted until lunch. After lunch there would be nap time, then story time—Bible stories with worksheets—and sometimes arts and crafts. Then more free time until Miss Nikki would show up to take them home.

  Tiger liked the teachers at day care, and he liked the other kids. All except Joey. Joey was Tiger’s age, but you’d never know it from looking at him. He outweighed Tiger by thirty pounds, and he had a mean streak. He had beady little eyes that seemed out of place on his moon-shaped face. And Tiger was sure that if Joey ever took off his shirt, he would already be growing hair under his arms.

  Tiger made fun of Joey when Tiger was alone with Stinky at Miss Nikki’s house—“Doughy Joey” he would call him. But at day care Tiger avoided Joey like the plague. He had already seen Joey get into two or three fights with other kids half Joey’s size, and Tiger was sure it was just a matter of time before the dough boy would turn on him. If it ever happened, Tiger’s plan was to kick Joey hard with his cowboy boots, then run like mad. It was a plan he was hoping he would never have to test.

  Today Tiger and Stinky had arrived a little late, so Miss Parsons was already fielding prayer requests from the boys and girls who sat around her in a circle. Tiger scooted into a spot on the floor a few feet away from Joey, out of reach and out of harm’s way. Tiger spread his shirttail out over his stained pants and settled in to listen to the usual emergency prayer needs.

  They had just started, so the kids were still raising their hands to voice prayer requests for their pets, who all seemed to be struck with some type of disease or another. Tiger desperately wanted a pet too—preferably a dog, but he would settle for a hamster—so that he could keep the class informed about his dog’s health and request prayer for real or imagined illnesses. Tiger was sure that all these pets couldn’t possibly have all the sicknesses they prayed about on a daily basis, but it was a surefire way to get attention and let the rest of the kids know that you were lucky enough to have a pet in the first place.

  “Yes, Heather,” Miss Parsons said, calling on a sad-looking red-haired girl about Stinky’s age.

  “Pray for Rascal, please,” Heather requested. She seemed about to cry.

  “How’s Rascal doing?” Miss Parsons seemed very concerned too.

  “Not too good. He can’t see very well anymore, and he won’t eat hardly anything. My dad says we might have to take him to the vet. I don’t want them to put him to sleep . . .” Heather’s voice trailed off melodramatically. Her bottom lip quivered. Tiger thought it was a bit much to put on such a show about the sleep habits of an old dog.

  But Miss Parsons was reassuring. “Okay, we will.” She turned to a normally quiet little girl sitting to her right, hand raised straight up. “Jenny?”

  “My cat, Slinky, is almost ready to have kittens.”

  Several of the little girls oohed and aahed at this news. Tiger did not join them. He didn’t like cats—in fact, he would always secretly open his eyes when Miss Parsons lifted up the cats in prayer. He didn’t want any part of that. Cats were fat and lazy and basically good for nothing. And he certainly wasn’t going to pray that old fat and lazy Slinky would be able to bring about a dozen more of her kind into this world. As far as Tiger was concerned, the world already had enough cats.

  Hands continued to shoot up, and eventually the requests turned from pets to grandparents. Seemed like everybody’s granny or papaw was at death’s door or at least in the hopsicle for something. Tiger was tempted to pop their balloons and remind them of what little good the hopsicle had done for Joshie, but he decided against it. The sooner prayer time ended, the sooner they could get outside and play. There was no sense complicating matters.

  “Hannah?” Miss Parsons said, calling on Tiger’s sister and snapping Tiger out of his daydream. “How can we pray for you?”

  Uh-oh, Tiger thought. He never liked it when Stinky would share private details about their troubled lives.

  “My mommy and daddy are going to court today—” this was news to Tiger; where did Stinky get this information?—“and if everything goes good, my daddy might get out of jail.”

  For a moment, a fleeting moment, this pronouncement made Tiger’s heart flutter with excitement.

  “Why’s your daddy in jail?” a concerned voice asked from behind Tiger. It was one of the kids but not a voice that Tiger recognized.

  Stinky’s face went red. Tiger felt his own cheeks burning.

  “It’s not important to know the reason why he’s in jail,” Miss Parsons explained. “Let’s just pray that court goes well for him today. Okay?”

  Heads nodded, and more hands went up. But out of the corner of his eye, Tiger saw Joey slide over a few feet until he was sitting right next to him.

  “What did your dad do?” Joey whispered when Miss Parsons wasn’t looking.

  Tiger shrugged. “I can’t say,” he whispered back while looking straight ahead.

  “Is he really in jail?” Joey pried.

  Tiger nodded his head. His cheeks were still burning, and now his eyes were starting to water. This is no time to cry, he told himself.

  Joey slid back away. It was almost time to pray, and it looked like Tiger had dodged this bullet—the dough boy had lost interest. They moved on to other requests, and Tiger breathed a sigh of relief.

  The relief was short-lived, shattered by a remark that Joey made just loud enough for Tiger and the others sitting around him to hear.

  “Tiger’s dad is a jailbird,” Joey mocked. “Tweet-tweet. Tweet-tweet.”

  “Tweet-tweet,” another voice echoed, softly but within earshot of Tiger.

  “Tweet-tweet.”

  “Tweet-tweet.”

  “Let’s bow our heads and pray,” Miss Parsons said.

  39

  “NEXT CASE IS Commonwealth versus Jackson, possession with intent to distribute,” the court clerk said, stifling a yawn. “The matter is before the court on defendant’s motion to suppress.”

  Charles Arnold took his place at one counsel table; the Barracuda moved to the
other. They had not said a word to each other in the ninety minutes they had been waiting for the case to be called. Judge Silverman had concluded two other hearings and had not yet returned from a ten-minute break.

  “Bring in the defendant,” the clerk said.

  The deputies disappeared out a side door and came back with Buster Jackson in tow. He was wearing an orange jumpsuit, leg irons, and handcuffs. He was the perfect foil for Charles, who was all decked out in his favorite suit: a light beige job, custom athletic cut, with five buttons down the front.

  Buster settled in at the defense counsel table without acknowledging Charles. His sunken eyes stared straight ahead, his goateed jaw jutting out.

  “I heard you accepted Christ,” Charles whispered, leaning toward the big man.

  “True.” The big man didn’t look too happy about it.

  “Congratulations,” Charles said.

  “Who told you?”

  “Thomas.”

  “When’d you talk to him?”

  “Yesterday.”

  The big man shifted in his seat but still looked straight ahead. “Why you callin’ him and dissin’ me?” Buster asked through clenched teeth. “You don’t come by. You don’t call. You don’t do squat.”

  Charles bristled at this unexpected attack. Buster wasn’t acting like a man who’d just turned to Christ. Charles had worked too hard for this guy and was putting his own reputation on the line. This was the thanks he got? Right now, he didn’t really care how big Buster was. He’d had it up to here with his attitude.