Outlaws

by Tim Green

  Madison knew two things about her ex-husband. First, he was crafty, and he only had to leam something once, then he never forgot it. Joe had learned the hard way how the legal system worked. Going through the divorce and custody proceedings the first time, she had run circles around him. He'd skimped on an attorney, and she'd gotten the best her firm had to offer. Joe would not make the same mistakes again,- he would try to use the strategies she'd used against him to his own advantage. Second, Madison knew that Joe was a ferocious competitor who possessed an inordinate amount of pride Joe had been programmed--or bom--to win. He wanted more than anything :o take Madison back to court on her own ground and beat her at her own g. Imc.

  It was obvious from her recent encounter with Joe that he had studied carefully, or consulted with someone who knew, just how far he could go without infringing on anyone's legal rights. When he followed her and Marty by the river, it was creepy and embarrassing, but there was nothing illegal about it. She was certain that Joe had learned where to draw the line. He had been careful to humiliate Marty without doing anything that resembled a threat. He hadn't raised a fist or even his voice, but his words had been worse than a fist to Marty's face.

  "I don't think it's very nice, Marty," Joe had said. 'You were supposed to be my friend, that's what you said when Maddy introduced me to you, didn't you? Didn't you say that when the time came, when things went bad for me, all the other agents would look away, but you'd still be there? Didn't you say that was the advantage of having an agent who was more of a friend? I think you did. Now I find you together with my wife, kissing her."

  Madison saw Marty shaking with fear. The Joe Thurwood they both knew was capable of ripping him open with his bare hands.

  'Tm not your wife, Joe," she had interjected venomously.

  Joe looked at her longingly for a moment, and then in the moonlight. She watched the longing transform into barely controlled hatred, a loathing from the pit of his soul. Madison was afraid, and she knew that Joe knew she was afraid, because he smiled in a way that seemed to suggest he was enjoying her fear, and that this was somehow only the beginning.

  Madison shuddered, then got up to use the bathroom. She dressed and went downstairs to let Abby, their yellow Lab, out in the backyard before waking Jo-Jo. The house was a large split-level. Only the master bedroom was upstairs, so Madison had to simply walk down the hall past the kitchen to reach her son's room. Jo-Jo woke with a broad smile on his face, remembering how only last night he had seen his father. Madison was sure that it hadn't mattered to Jo-Jo that his father had gotten fat or that his hair and beard were long. He was still Joe Thurwood, the star of the Outlaws. People said there hadn't been a fullback quite so good since his father's retirement, and Jo-Jo doubted there ever would be.

  Jo-Jo's room was covered with NFL posters. Most of them had something to do with the Outlaws. His bookshelf was jam-packed with books and game balls awarded to his father during his playing days. In the comer was an elaborate computer system. Jo-Jo was smart, and he could run through the various programs in his computer almost as well as Madison, but he would be a football player too when he grew up. He told everyone that, even if they didn't ask. Madison wanted nothing of the kind. She felt that the vicious world of football did nothing but turn boys too quickly into men and men too quickly into animals. She said nothing, though. She knew better. She loved Jo-Jo too much to squelch his spirit. Instead she used his fervor for sports to prompt him in his schoolwork. For all her indulgence, Madison made it clear that if he didn't do extremely well in school, the sports thing wouldn't happen. She held his body hostage to his mind without the slightest moral reservation. In fact she was proud of it.

  "Huny, Jo-Jo," Madison said with a warm smile. "I've got to drop you off a little early today."

  "Mom?" he said, swinging his feet out from under the covers.

  "Yes."

  "Can I see dad again today?"

  Madison was ready for this.

  "Yes, Jo-Jo, you can."

  "Wow, that's great!" Jo-Jo exclaimed, running over to hug her waist.

  "Dad said you'd never say yes, but I told him you would. 1 told him you're the greatest!"

  Madison smiled. 'Thank you, Jo-Jo," she said, kissing him on the head. "Now huny. Breakfast in ten minutes."

  It wrenched her to concede so easily to Joe's manipulation. She dug her nails into her palms as she left her son's room. It was so blatant. It was so wrong. She thought of all the things she could do to him, slap a temporary restraining order on him for violating the court-ordered visitation rules, maybe file a complaint with the police for unlawful entry or harassment. There were things she could do with the law. She could manipulate the system and bring it crashing down on Joe Thurwood's head. That was her world, the justice system. He wasn't supposed to be able to just pop into her house. And how did he get in? He broke in, that was breaking and entering. Madison's heart raced as she considered all the things she would have to do to set the machinery in motion against him.

  Then she stopped. She would do none of it. Joe would ultimately get out of any bind she could entangle him in. There would be publicity, too. It was easy to shelter a five- or six-year-old from an ugly divorce, even if it involved drug use and physical abuse, even if it was in the papers. With a boy of eight, it was an entirely different matter. More damage would be done to Jo-Jo than anyone. Joe knew that, and again she suspected he knew that she knew it ac well.

  Madison walked into the kitchen and apologized to Lucia for her ranting the night before. Lucia was outwardly relieved, and that made Madison feel better. She let Abby in, then poured herself a glass of orange juice. Lucia set breakfast out on the table while Madison quietly considered her strategy for the hearing as she waited for Jo-Jo to come to the table. They ate without saying too much, and that was okay. That was how it was most mornings. Most of their conversations took place at night, when the day was over.

  Madison dropped Jo-Jo off at school with a kiss and a wave and made her way into the city for the hearing. The judge was a woman named Iris OuBose. Judge DuBose was a late-middle-aged woman with white hair who wore steel- rimmed bifocals. Most people assumed that a female judge in any case would be more sympathetic to a woman plaintiffs viewpoint. But Madison found quite the opposite to be true. In a world that was consistently gender biased, women had been so mentally battered that often when they did finally get into a position where they could turn things the other way, they often used their power to further the status quo. It seemed to Madison that women judges were so afraid of not being fair to male parties that they compensated by being more sympathetic.

  In their divorce two years ago, the judge had been Garrison Peele. Judge Peele was an elderly southern gentleman who had no sympathy for a strong young man who was involved in extensive drug use and who had hit his wife.

  Madison supposed that if Judge Peele had had his way, Madison would not only have been given exclusive custody of Jo-Jo and a highly favorable financial arrangement, but Big Joe would have been drawn and quartered in front of the courthouse. Of course, sometimes in law a judgment that is too favorable can come back later like a wounded grizzly to bite you. If a ruling of any kind was way out of line with the norms of the time, it was an easy target for someone to challenge later on down the road. That was the case today.

  Despite what Joe had done in the past and despite the original ruling, he had rights as the father of Jo-Jo. As bizarre as it seemed, he also had rights as Madison's ex-husband. With the passing of the days when men worked and women baked cakes and had babies went the days of women cashing in on divorce settlements. Today, women were subject to the same financial perils as their counterparts.

  A woman like Madison, who made well over two hundred fifty thousand dollars a year and had completed her law degree and established a practice during the years of her marriage, would have to fight for an equitable property division upon divorce. Forget that Big Joe had earned almost a million dollars a year and that he had m
anaged to squander not only that, but much of what Madison made as well. All those things happened while they were married, and so any losses and any gains were losses and gains to them both. No one partner in a marriage ever took the sole credit or blame for financial earnings or indiscretions.

  So Joe's reappearance and his demand for a whole new settlement annoyed Madison, but at the same time it let her know that he was getting some good advice, much better than he'd gotten the first time around. Of course, then Joe was a crazed lunatic strung out on heroin. One day in the courtroom, old Peele actually had to have him physically restrained.

  The judge's chambers for family court were in the basement of the courthouse. High on the wall were small rectangular windows through which Madison could see the ankles of passersby outside. The hearing took place at what looked like an old cafeteria table. It was a far cry from the offices upstairs where Madison tried criminal cases against the state of Texas. There the judge's chambers were paneled with richly stained wood. The trim around the bookshelves, doors, and windows was ornate and spoke of a time when criminals were hung by the neck for stealing horses. Today the courts spent more time regulating how many hours a delinquent father could spend with his child and how Christmas vacation would be divided rather than deciding between life or death for a thief and murderer. Madison supposed it was appropriate that such business was carried on in the basement.

  Despite the shabby setting, Madison, like every attorney, knew that a judge was a judge whether the floor of their chambers was covered with marble or linoleum, and that all judges demanded respect. After all, if there was no respect, then how could people be expected to adhere to the authority of the decisions meted out? Respect required everyone to dress as though they were just stopping by on their way to church and that all the formal nuances of lawyering be observed. The most correctly enunciated Latin legal terms and the most extravagant mix of conjunctions, adjectives, and verbs could always be found in the shabbiest judges chambers. Judges tended to be egotistical as a rule, and so they were particularly sensitive to weak symbols of their power, and almost always determined to make up for it with formality.

  Glen Westman, the best divorce lawyer in Madison's enormous firm, already sitting at the table, as was Joe's lawyer, Paul Gleason, a highly competent attorney who had his own small but successful practice. Madison knew a battle between these two lawyers could be like a fight between two champion rottweilers. Judge DuBose sat at the head of the table, looking through a file on the case. Madison said hello to everyone and sat down quietly. She and Glen had mapped out their strategy extensively the day before, and there was nothing more to discuss between them until Joe and his attorney put at least some of their cards on the table.

  When Joe walked into the room, Madison had to do a double take. He was clean-shaven and his hair, although long, was pulled back into a tight, neat ponytail. He wore an expensive suit that had been tailored to make his large gut look like the prosperous girth of a tycoon rather that the sloppy bulk of a derelict. Despite his size, Joe looked good. He not only gave off an aura of power, but his demeanor and facial expressions denoted composure and even a slight hint of condescension. Madison tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry. Joe was going to create real problems for her. She had been counting all along on his ragged appearance and his volatile personality to help her maintain the bulk of what she'd won two years ago.

  "Your honor," Joe said, taking a moment to shake Judge DuBose's hand before sitting down.

  "Well," Judge DuBose began without wasting any time, "now that we're all here, I'd like to remind you, Mr. Gleason, and you, Mr. Thurwood, that this matter has already been litigated fully and formally, so I am highly averse to changing what for two years has proven to be an effective arrangement in regards to the best interests of the child. Of course my feelings are the same regarding the distribution of the marital property. This court, like any other, is loathe to adjudicate things twice. Ms. McCall's movement for summary judgment is quite in order ..."

  The judge let her words hang in the air. Madison had to bite the inside of her mouth to keep the smile from creeping out onto her face. These words were the proper ones. They reflected her position on this matter almost verbatim. Her sentiments would surely result in the summary judgment, throwing the matter out of the court with only the slim chance of renewal based on some constitutional appeal. Regardless of what most people thought, once a decision was reached at the trial-court level by the judge hearing the facts, it was rare that any decision would be overturned at the appellate level.

  "However..."

  With that single word, Madison's stomach fell. "However" was one word that every lawyer dreaded. It meant there was more to come, all of it bad.

  "... in light of the fluctuating nature of this particular body of the law in the state of Texas, and in light of the assertions filed in the complaint, I am inclined to reevaluate the situation on its merits."

  Even Joe, the only nonlawyer in the room, knew what the judge's words meant. A slow, evil grin spread from his lips to his cheeks, and he gazed malevolently at Madison. Then it was gone, and Madison wondered if it had only been her imagination. Joe cleared his throat, and suddenly Madison saw nothing more harmful than a two-hundred-ninety-pound choirboy. But this was an act she had seen before. It was the Joe Thurwood she fell in love with nine years ago, when she was a naive law student.

  "Your Honor," he began in his quiet but booming voice, "I know that it is not my place to speak right here and right now, but I am the only person here who lacks a formal education in the law, so I hope you will forgive me."

  The surprise created by this impromptu speech allowed Joe to pause and continue uninterrupted, even by the judge.

  "It's just that I have to say how much I appreciate what you're saying. I want you to know, I guess I want everyone to know," here he gave Madison the long, pitiful look of a convicted murderer who had found Jesus, "that I'm sorry for the way I was. I was sick, but now I'm well. I can't undo what I was, or what I did, but I can try to make it up to our son. I can be the father I know he needs."

  "As far as any money. Your Honor--and everyone ... "Joe glanced around at them all, "I don't want to ask for money. I'm not proud that I am. I'm ashamed of it. I am. I'm not proud that it took every resource I had to get well again. I wish it hadn't happened. But it did.

  "So I want you to know. Your Honor, that I'm fully prepared to be badmouthed and trampled on." Joe stared woelully at Glen Westman and then back to the judge. "That's part of the game. But I wanted you to know that I'm well enough now to feel ashamed of the whole thing. If I could have my way, I'd undo all of it. I would. And Maddy and Jo-Jo and I would all be together as one family, as I know we should have been, and would have been, if I hadn't gone off the deep end. I'm sorry." Joe looked ashamedly down at his thick paws that were clamped together in front of him on the cheap Formica tabletop.

  Madison looked over at Judge Iris DuBose. There weren't tears in her but Madison knew the older woman was battling them fiercely. Madison could read a judge. She could read a jury. That was what made her so good as a trial lawyer. She knew what people wanted and what they needed. Iris DuBose needed to be assured that in the great state of Texas, men were still big and tough, and that even when the modem world broke them down they could still come back, even better than they were before. Iris had a need to feel that there was an order that ultimately ruled even the most tempestuous forces in this life. Joe Thurwood had just given her a big slice of that reassurance, like a fat wedge of apple pie. Joe Thurwood had just assured her that the big hometown football hero who had once brought everyone so much glory was back. He'd been down, yes, but it wasn't for good. He was back and everything would be as it should be, if they all could only give him the chance he needed.

  The judge cleared her throat, "Well, you're right, Mr. Thurwood, your words are slightly out of order, but this is not a formal court proceeding, and I find your candor refreshing. Still, we have a
great conflict here that must be adjudicated according to the laws of Texas. So, Mr. Gleason, I'd like to hear your side of this, then, Mr. Westman, yours. My hope in all this, more than anything, is that we can reach some sort of equitable agreement that will allow both parties to coexist in a way that will serve not only justice but the child in question here."

  After pausing a moment to give weight to what she'd just said, Judge DuBose continued. "Mr. Gleason, please begin." "Thank you, your honor," Gleason said with a nod. "Your honor, let me begin by saying that we are fully aware that this divorce settlement and custody arrangement has been fully litigated and that the law does not take into account the quality of the council for any party who has previously been heard by the court, with the exception of gross malfeasance on the part of his former council. Although there is nothing for which formal charges may be brought against Mr. Thurwood's former council, I must say that without a doubt his interests were not zealously advocated to the court. Again, your honor, I know this is of no legal relevance, but I did wish to include it in what I'm saying so that the court, and Mr. Westman and his client, can fully appreciate our sentiments regarding this entire matter."

  The judge nodded. She was very satisfied with the way in which Big Joe's attorney had said in legal jargon that he'd been screwed over the first time around.

  "Also," Gleason continued, "we would like the court to know that Mr. Thurwood voluntarily entered and successfully completed a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program in his home state of Iowa, and that he has returned to Austin to be closer to his son and to use his own experience and status as a local celebrity to help the youth of this community to avoid the same pitfalls of which he himself has been a victim."

  Madison bowed her head. She could barely contain a sarcastic laugh. Joe Thurwood was now a victim. She'd heard it all.