“What a terrible blow to you,” Sue gushed, feigning concern for Marilee although she clearly was enjoying every minute of her colleague’s pain.
“Oh, far from it! You know I wanted more faculty support in the Clinic, Sue, given how many students we have to turn away every semester. This fall we had twenty-one disappointed third years.” Marilee faux-smiled. “Now we can add another full section.”
“We’re not expanding the Clinic! I thought I made that clear to you when I told you we wouldn’t support your little proposal for Clinic work at the detention center. But good for you, what a brave way to look at being passed over for the Chair, Marilee. Keep it up. You’ll need that kind of spunk once you’re home with two little ones.” She looked at Marilee’s bulging belly and grimaced. “Thank goodness Dwight’s here now, taking care of things. We’re just so thrilled he accepted our offer.”
Marilee was in dire need of moral support. She scanned the room for her sister, but Dede’s back was to her as she talked with Dean Larkin. Dede stood like the dancer she was, her feet in third position, her hips slightly thrust forward, her right hand on her hip. Marilee would have to cross the entire room and talk to one professor after another about Dwight and the Chair just to get her attention, so she tried to imagine what Dede would say to Sue, what perfect zinger of a response. But she was too upset to think, much less to channel Dede’s biting tongue.
Enough was enough. Marilee had been cordial as long as she could. She had to leave the moot courtroom before the tears pressing against her eyes caused her head to explode, right there, all over Sue and the moot courtroom bench.
Marilee hadn’t used the stairs to her fourth-floor office in months due to the extra weight she carried, but they were her only hope for dodging the other faculty members and nursing her wounds in private. As she dragged herself up the first flight of stairs, she let her frustration, disappointment, and anger loose with a few minutes of full-throttled crying. The event that was supposed to mark the end of the year from hell had just made her life exponentially worse. Wasn’t there some limit on how many terrible things could happen to a person in one year?
When she reached the second-floor landing, she heard someone above her breathing loudly and shallowly. Marilee gulped back her tears and walked slowly up the next few steps, peering upward, ready to run back down and escape out the second-floor door if necessary. But she had no reason to worry. Standing on the third-floor landing was Larry Lee Hallowell, his body pressed flat against the wall, as though he wanted to render himself invisible. How long he’d been there was anyone’s guess.
Mr. Hallowell, a Clinic client in his late thirties, never took the elevators due to panic attacks coupled with mild obsessive-compulsive disorder. Climbing the stairs sometimes took him close to an hour, depending on how many people interrupted his progress, as Marilee just had.
Marilee wiped her face as she approached him and thought about trying to explain her tears, but didn’t think it appropriate or necessarily helpful. “Mr. Hallowell,” she said, careful to resist the natural impulse to shake his hand. “How are you today?”
He wiped his hands nervously on his T-shirt, then looked down at his feet, the top of his buzz cut pointing at her. “Fine,” he mumbled. At least, that’s what it sounded like he said.
“I’m sure your student lawyers are looking forward to seeing you.” Of course, she didn’t know whether Lance and Paula, his student lawyers, would still be waiting for him by the time he reached the Clinic offices. His appointment could have been hours ago, or he might have dropped by without an appointment, as some of the Clinic clients did.
“Thank you.” His voice trembled as he raised his head just enough to see her, his eyes full of pain, most likely because she was in his space. He rolled his flip-flops nervously, bending them under his toes, then under his heel.
Although Marilee appreciated the climbing break, she forced her right leg to take the next step, then her left leg. Bend at knee, place foot, heave self (and baby) up.
Larry Lee Hallowell once had a job and a family, but mental illness had robbed him of that life. His symptoms had appeared slowly over several years’ time, beginning with his refusal to take elevators or shake hands, ending with his inability to leave his apartment sometimes for hours, sometimes days. As the symptoms multiplied, he’d lost his job at the auto factory, and his wife had left him, taking their three children with her. Finally, his wife had remarried and left the State of Alabama. Mr. Hallowell had come to the Clinic in September because after two years without his children he desperately wanted to see them again.
Working with people who lived at the edge of functioning society was humbling in many ways. Although some Clinic clients had been born poor or sick, many once lived productive, happy lives. Then a tragedy – a child’s death, a chronic mental or physical illness, a drug problem, a divorce or a job loss – pushed them further than their ability to cope. Marilee grabbed the solid metal rail and pulled herself up the last few stairs. It could happen to anyone, Marilee thought, including herself. And with that her tears began anew.
When she finally heaved open the fourth-floor stairwell door, she stopped short, as Dede fell into the stairway, almost knocking her over. “Where’ve you been? Are you okay?”
“I’m just great, Dede. Why wouldn’t I be?” She stifled a sob.
“Come on.” She cupped Marilee’s left elbow in her right hand and guided her down the hallway. Thankfully, no one passed them. When they stopped in front of Marilee’s office, Dede held out her hand.
Marilee fished inside the pocket of her orange dress, found the office key, and handed it to her.
Dede opened the door and gently pushed Marilee forward. “Sit.”
Marilee collapsed into her desk chair and rested her swollen ankles on the footstool she’d placed under the desk a month earlier.
Dede stood, her arms loose by her sides, palms open. “What the fuck just happened, M’lee? Jesus, of all people, Dwight Hurley?”
Marilee nodded, then shook her head, then nodded again.
“Did you even know he was under consideration?” she asked.
“Are you kidding? I didn’t even know he applied. Besides, the Dean promised I would get it. I thought I was the only one under consideration.” She tried to chuckle at her own naiveté, but the sound was closer to that made by an irritable baby than a wry, intelligent adult who could detach from a difficult situation and make light of it.
Dede sat across from her and pursed her lips. “When did you last talk to him?”
“The Dean?”
“No! Dwight.”
“Really talk? Not since we broke up, sophomore year of college.”
“Come on. Are you saying that after six years with Dwight, after thinking he was the one, after all the breaking up and making up, you never got together again for ten long years? You must at least have slept with him when you were both home for the holidays? For old time’s sake. After all, he’s very good-looking. Come on, fess up.” She leaned in, waiting for the answer she expected.
“Do we have to talk about this?” Marilee rested her head on her desk. If she could just go to sleep, maybe for a long time, she might not have to deal with any of this.
Dede picked one of the steel balls on the Newton’s Cradle desk toy and let it drop. The steel ball on the opposite side swung up. The first ball flew out again. Marilee couldn’t stand the click-clacking noise the balls made; she left the annoying toy on the desk only because one of last year’s student lawyer teams had given it to her and they dropped by regularly to check in with their beloved Clinic professor.
Marilee slowly raised her head from the desk, her eyes widening under arching eyebrows, irritated. She held up her hand. “You know I hate that thing, Dede. Please stop.”
Dede shrugged and steadied the moving metal balls.
“If you must know, we have not slept together! Not everyone sleeps with everyone they ever liked.” Marilee’s eyes narrowed. “Exc
ept maybe you.”
“I do not!” Dede insisted.
“Does that mean you and Nikolai are getting serious?” Nikolai was Dede’s on-again-off-again love, a dancer she’d met in Europe who now lived in New York City. Marilee didn’t want to discuss Dwight, and she was interested in learning whether Nikolai had something to do with Dede’s unexplained visit.
“We’re not talking about me though I’ll admit I have a healthy, active sex life, M’lee, whereas you seem to have no sex life.” She smiled her slightly crooked but sexy smile.
“How do you think I got this way, Sis?” Marilee pointed toward her belly. Sadly, this baby’s conception dated to the end of her sex life, as Dede knew.
“Fine. Okay. You haven’t slept with him. I get it. What kind of relationship do you have with him now?”
Marilee formed a zero with her thumb and index finger. “This kind. Nada. It was over the day he cheated, Dede. We haven’t talked since I caught him with Lana. I didn’t answer his calls, I tore up his letters, and I avoided him whenever he was in town.”
“You sound like you’re still mad at him, M’lee.” Dede cocked her head to one side as though trying to read her sister’s thoughts.
Marilee sighed heavily. “I’m not mad at him for being a liar and a cheater; I’m mad he stole my endowed Chair!”
Dede stepped back from the desk a few feet, bent down, touched her palms flat to the floor, and hung there. “I’m not so sure it’s not both. Did you notice he wasn’t wearing a ring? I wanted to talk to him, check out his marital status, but I had to search for my missing sister.” She rose slowly and raised her arms over her head in a perfect fifth position oval.
“You sound just like Mama, Dede. Listen up: I’m not interested in Dwight. I’m not interested in anyone right now.”
She’d tried to make this clear since Rick had moved away, but her mother had ignored her wishes and set her up with any man she believed would be a suitable replacement, men of a certain economic and social class who didn’t panic when they heard about Marilee’s four-year-old daughter Ellie, and the baby on the way. Despite Marilee’s insistence that she wasn’t ready to date, much less begin anything serious, her mother had miraculously found bachelors all over the Southeast and arranged dates, dinners, and parties, none of which Marilee had enjoyed. At all.
“I do not sound like Mama!” Dede pirouetted to the corner of the office, then back, her eyes focused on Marilee as she made each turn. “I’m not saying you should marry him, for God’s sake. You shouldn’t marry anyone anytime soon. I don’t know if I believe in love, much less marriage. But it wouldn’t hurt for you to have someone to talk to and sleep with every now and then, especially someone so fabulous-looking!” She landed at Marilee’s desk, grinning lasciviously.
“I have my hands full with work, Ellie, and soon, the baby. Work and children are my life now.” She tried in vain to instill her words with enthusiasm.
Dede swayed slightly in rhythm as she played an imaginary violin.
“I really don’t care about Dwight, Dede, I’m just worried about how I’m going to work with him. He’s a criminal lawyer, and my Clinic only does civil law. And, the law school he’s from doesn’t teach the way I teach.” She sighed. “I can’t believe any of this is happening, really, I can’t. The Dean promised me. And he owes me an explanation.” Marilee didn’t want to confront Dean Dody, she was exhausted, but did she have a choice? Slowly, she slid her feet off the stool, pushed her chair back, and stood up.
“I’ll walk with you,” Dede said. At the Dean’s suite she took Marilee’s upper arms in her strong hands and gave her a little shake. “Give ’em hell, Sis.”
Marilee inhaled deeply, nodded, and opened the door to the Dean’s suite. Assistant Deans Scanlon and Larkin occupied the first two offices. The last door led to Dean Dody, though first you had to get past his gossipy secretary, Fran, a reliable source for the latest law school news, always delivered melodramatically.
“How are you, Professor Cooper?” Fran asked. The cadence and tone of her question made clear that she was more than ready and willing to dish about Dwight Hurley’s appointment.
“Fine,” Marilee answered, trying to instill in that one word the sense that she could not be better.
Fran, a heavy woman who wore a green suit every day, in colors ranging from lime to pine, leaned forward, crushing her ample breasts into the desktop hutch. “I was so shocked to hear about the Chair, M’lee,” she said conspiratorially. “I don’t know what they were thinking. That Chair should be yours!”
“Thanks, I appreciate it, but Dwight’s very qualified, Fran.” Marilee knew that whatever she said to Fran would be all over the law school by lunch and tempered her comments accordingly. “I’m sure he’ll be an asset to the Clinic.”
Fran looked puzzled; that wasn’t the response she’d expected.
“Is the Dean here?” Marilee asked. “I just need a minute of his time.”
“Let me buzz him.” Fran punched the intercom button on her phone. “Marilee’s here to see you, Dean Dody.” She nodded in the direction of his door.
Marilee walked in and shut the door.
Behind his massive desk, Dean Dody grimaced and his bulbous eyes showed worried concern. “Marilee, I’m glad you’re here. Will you sit down, please?”
“No.” She stopped at the chair he’d offered and rested her hands on its back facing him.
He flinched.
She rounded the chair and leaned in toward him, resting her palms on top of his desk. “Dean Dody, you said the Chair was mine. We were at the faculty retreat, and you said – ”
He raised his hand to stop her. “I know, I know. I did tell you you’d get the Chair and I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything but that’s water under the bridge now, isn’t it? I know you’re disappointed.”
“Disappointed! That’s an understatement. What’s going to happen now? I can’t work with Dwight. He’s never taught anything but criminal law, and we don’t even practice that here, and the pedagogy at Redmont is totally different. What were you all thinking?”
The Dean inhaled sharply, rested his elbows on his desk, and steepled his hands in front of him. “I don’t think you should worry about any of that, Marilee. Not when your job is on the line.” As he spoke the last few words, he pointed the steeple in her direction and she stepped back.
“What?” She stared at him with disbelief. What was he talking about? “Why?” Marilee inched closer, crossing her arms, grasping her upper arms with her hands.
“We gave you two and a half years to publish when you joined the faculty.”
“But, Dean Dody, you told me I could have an extension.”
“I know, I know. I wish I could give you one, but at the last Rank and Tenure meeting Sue read me the riot act: faculty publication is our number one priority. You know she’s head of Rank and Tenure now. She vetted Dwight. She made the big push for him. The New York Times wrote an article about his victory in the Edmunds case, and his textbook clinched the deal. We have new standards now.”
“Since when?”
“Since the trustees hired Sue to push us into the top fifty, it’s publish or perish, Marilee.” He rested his hands in his lap and smiled weakly. “You know, maybe it’s time for you to take a break, with the baby and all. You are due anytime now. I’m sure you need a rest, some time to sort things out,” he said hopefully.
She took the seat Dean Dody had offered her moments earlier. As she eased herself down the baby tried to do a somersault, a near impossible task given his or her size, and her belly moved in an undulating wave.
“Dean Dody, you know I’ve devoted myself to this Clinic and to our students. Setting up a Clinic from scratch, meeting with the students regularly, teaching seminar and going to court – that all takes a lot of time.”
“I understand that, really I do, but if you don’t publish an article before the end of the semester, my hands are tied. I can’t extend your contract.” The
Dean turned his palms up and shrugged. “I wish it hadn’t come to this, Marilee. I’m a big fan of yours and the Clinic, but Sue’s laid down the law and it’s out of my hands. Try to think about the silver lining, though.” He cradled an imaginary baby.
“There is no silver lining, Dean Dody, and don’t try to pretend there is!” She pushed herself up from the chair and rushed out of his office, passing Fran without even trying to pretend for appearance’s sake that the conversation had gone well.
The tears began to flow again as she walked slowly back to her office. Marilee thought about Mr. Hallowell and wondered: Was she poised on the edge of her own slippery slope? Or was she already in a free fall? For the first time in years, strains of Dede’s favorite Leonard Cohen song echoed in her mind – as they’d echoed throughout the house at all hours during Dede’s teen years: “Things are going to slide, slide in all directions.”
Her own slide down the slope had begun the night Rick told her he was leaving their marriage. She’d just put Ellie to bed, something Rick usually did, but he was late, after calling to say he was working with a few of his swimmers who were training extra hard for some big meet. Marilee had tiptoed out of Ellie’s room and then down the stairs to edit some of her students’ work. Rick, a big, broad-shouldered man, a former varsity swimmer, walked in the front door, and she’d looked up, happy to see him. Instead of his usual open, relaxed face, though, he’d looked tense and troubled. Marilee hugged him hello and rested her cheek on his chest. His large hand rubbed up and down her back, a comforting motion. She led him up the stairs smiling to herself. She’d been worried about their sex life then; both had been busy and it was always hard to find time alone with Ellie around, but she knew as she walked him up the stairs that her fears had been baseless. Soon they were in their bedroom making love.
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