Isolated Judgment

by Jonathan Watkins

  “I haven’t been on a swing in years,” he said to nobody in particular, and wandered off in that direction.

  “This is freaking me out,” Rebecca said after watching him depart. “You guys are seriously freaking me out.”

  “We need to talk about Daniel Prosner,” Issabella said. “If you can. If you’ll trust me enough to do that.”

  * * *

  Big Tuck rolled his window down and leaned his head out as Darren strolled up to the limo.

  “We done?” the driver said. “I’ve got plans, Fletcher. We’re already running overtime here, you know?”

  Darren stuffed two more folded bills into the startled man’s hands and said, “Whatever this buys me... I’m not as big a fan of swings as I used to be,” and climbed into the back of the idling limo. He stretched out on his back across the leather seat across from Theresa. He was quiet for a while, his hands cupped behind his head, content to watch his friend as she examined one little unicorn after another. After a while she looked up from her new acquisitions.

  “Where’s Izzy? Ain’t you supposed to be working with her?”

  “She’s handling something delicate,” he mumbled. “I’m mostly just avoiding the inevitable, really.”

  “Uh-huh. Like what?”

  Darren leaned forward and reached behind his back with his right arm. He fidgeted under his wrinkled suit coat, gripping the gun.

  “Like this,” he said, bringing his arm back around and ejecting the gun’s magazine.

  Theresa watched him as he thumbed the bullets out of the clip. They landed with muted thuds on the carpeted floor between them. When the magazine was empty, he fed it back into the gun, racked the chamber and the last bullet plunked down amid the others.

  “You carry that since when?”

  Darren looked at her, then at the gun in his hand.

  “Since I got kidnapped. Well, no. I got a concealed carry permit after that happened. But I don’t carry it around normally. I grabbed it out of my closet before we got the limo.”

  “What’re you gonna do with an unloaded gun, Fletcher?”

  “Have a conversation,” he said, “with someone who maybe won’t like what we’re going to talk about.”

  “You know,” she mused, and leaned forward to scoop the bullets up in one hand, “most lawyers use a phone for that.”

  Darren smiled and opened the door with his free hand. Sunlight poured over him so that he was half-bathed in it, his other half still cloaked in the limo’s shadowed interior. His eyes narrowed with grim intent.

  “I’m not that kind of lawyer,” he said, and slipped out into the sunlight. He leaned down to see her shrug and pour the bullets into her bag of unicorns.

  “I totally sold that line, didn’t I? And the exit. Right?”

  “It wasn’t bad. You should’ve held the gun up, like close to your face, when you said it.”

  “But it was still totally movie. ‘I’m not that kind of lawyer.’ Totally movie.”

  “Yep. Totally.”

  “If Izzy comes back and asks, don’t tell her about the gun, okay?”

  “See, now you killed the action-lawyer thing.”

  “Okay, but don’t tell her. She’ll freak.”

  “‘Bye, Fletcher,” she said, and rolled the window up on him.

  Chapter Twelve

  The bonfire was Rebecca’s most exact, wholly realized memory of that night. The medieval fair’s cast members mostly stayed in the campground a couple miles south of the fairground when the fair was in session. The bonfire was a nightly event, a way to unwind and celebrate after long hours stuffed inside heavy, constricting period dress.

  “That actually sounds fun,” Issabella said.

  “Oh God, it totally is.” Rebecca nodded. “I mean, some of those guys are fascinating. They travel all over the country doing these festivals. They’ve got a million stories, you know? And one guy, Devin—I love that name, by the way—he was really good with a lute. Like, professional. And he’d play that at the bonfire once everyone was buzzed or stoned, and this other girl named Lizzie would sing these old, like, ballads. And she could really sing. It was magical. The first year I did the fair, I thought I’d found this secret group of the most interesting people in the world, you know? I was all, Fuck yeah, free spirits. It’s silly, now. But I was just out of high school and those guys were amazing to me. I’d have joined up and done the circuit with them, but my Dad’s got MS, so I knew I needed to stay close for him.”

  Issabella smiled and nodded along, but she knew she had to get the girl on course. They’d been talking for ten minutes, and it had taken that long to get Rebecca to talk about the night of the bonfire a year ago. She felt lousy for needing to push the girl to speak about something so ugly.

  “Daniel was at the bonfire,” she said, and watched Rebecca’s face tighten with tension.

  “He was trying to get them to let him play a knight,” the young woman said in a half whisper, her eyes staring at her hands like they were an anchor that could keep her steady. “Everyone knew it wasn’t going to happen. He was just a hanger-on. They’d given him a role as stable boy because the guy who was doing it had to fly home for something. But none of the regular cast was planning on seeing Daniel the next year. He wanted to have the best role...I mean, the best as far as the guys are concerned, right? But he didn’t want to learn anything. He couldn’t sing and he couldn’t act. Somebody tried to teach him how to work puppets, but he gave up right away. He just seemed like some old dude who never grew up and didn’t want to work at anything. He thought knights were cool, so he was going to be a knight. Never mind knowing anything about swords, or blocking out the fight scenes, or learning an English accent. He was a pest. Michael’s a knight. He’s the best at selling the duels. That’s why he’s the Black Knight. He’s big and strong and can really pull it off.”

  “That’s how you met him?”

  “Yeah. I saw him do his eight o’clock duel and that was it. I mean, I was sold. I chased him down and we just clicked, right away.”

  Rebecca picked at her cuticles, and fanned her fingers out in front of her.

  “They don’t let us use polish when we’re in costume,” she mumbled. “They say it ‘lacks fidelity to the period.’ But I can serve Budweiser all day long. Go figure. I bet women had nail polish back then.”

  “I’m sure they did,” Issabella agreed.

  “Did Michael hurt Daniel?”

  “Did Daniel hurt you?” Issabella countered, still mindful of the agreement she’d signed with Judge Prosner. Darren, she knew, was utterly unbothered by the prospect of abandoning their professional duty to the man. She wasn’t. Not yet, at least.

  She glanced toward the swing set, where Darren had wandered off. He wasn’t there. She craned her head around in all directions, but she and Rebecca were the only two people to be seen.

  “Daniel Prosner raped me,” Rebecca said, and Issabella forgot Darren. She looked at the young woman. Rebecca was shaking. Her hands were clenched together so tightly the knuckles were turning white. She stared intently at Issabella, and in her eyes was a fury, raw and immediate.

  Issabella blinked once in the face of that wounded, seething outrage. Then she gathered herself, reached across the table and folded her hands over the stones that were Rebecca’s.

  “You don’t have to tell me,” she whispered.

  Tears welled up in Rebecca’s eyes. They ran down her cheeks, but she didn’t reach to wipe at them. She kept her eyes on Issabella.

  “I’d had too much,” she groaned. “Too much beer and weed. I fell down coming back from the bathroom, and everybody made a joke about it. I knew I’d had too much, so I went to bed in my tent.”

  “You don’t have to—”

  “I woke up with him on top of me,�
� Rebecca hissed and she crumpled, folding down over Issabella’s hands, one cheek pressed against them, her tears hot. She sobbed. “I woke up and he was in me.”

  The next thing she knew, Issabella was on her feet and walking around the table. She sat down next to Rebecca and wrapped her in her arms. She pressed the girl’s head against her chest and the two of them rocked back and forth while Rebecca sobbed and shuddered.

  “It’s okay,” she whispered, even though she knew it wasn’t. “That’s all gone now. It’s okay.”

  While she held Rebecca and felt guilty for having pressed the issue with her, part of Issabella again noted Darren’s absence. She didn’t know if a grown person could develop new instincts. She doubted the scientific validity of the idea. But she didn’t doubt the tingling apprehension that ran through the nape of her neck as she realized how long Darren had been gone.

  As Rebecca cried and held on to her, Issabella peered around and wondered how exactly Darren Fletcher was complicating things, wherever he was.

  * * *

  Michael Shore opened the door to his apartment. Darren smiled at him, declared, “Forsooth, foul varlet,” in a breathtakingly incompetent English accent, and smacked Michael across the face with his open palm.

  Michael made a surprised yelping sound and took a reflexive step backwards. Still smiling, Darren slipped into the apartment while the young man was too shocked to respond. With his heel, Darren swept the door shut behind him. With his hand, he slapped Michael a second time.

  “I’ll have your measure yet, Black Knight,” he said and raised his hand in the air again, poised to strike.

  Before the blow could land, the bearded kid in front of him gathered his wits and punched Darren in the face so hard that he didn’t realize he was lying on his back, tangled among the plastic chairs in the dining nook, until he blinked and saw Michael’s muscular shape standing over him.

  Here we go, he thought, and winced against the pain that was blossoming throughout his mouth and jaw. He swallowed, his tongue coated with the sharp copper taste of blood, and watched Michael carefully. The gun was in the pocket of his slacks, and he knew he could bring it out without much effort. He didn’t reach for it. He watched the big, muscle-bound kid.

  Michael’s hands were bunched into fists, held slightly out in front of him. He scowled down at Darren, his mouth an ugly smear of anger within the confines of his singularly strange beard.

  Jesus, Tony’s got nothing on this guy, he thought. Rubber bands in a beard? They didn’t have rubber bands in medieval times. Did they? No, they didn’t. Of course they didn’t. Lou Albano—he had those. Remember that? It was like all the good wrestler costumes were taken and he had to settle for putting office supplies in his beard.

  He watched as Michael leaned over and grabbed hold of the white plastic chair that had been overturned when Darren fell on it. Michael’s expression was severe, his eyes locked firmly on Darren’s. His nostrils flared out like a cartoon bull’s.

  “Don’t,” Darren warned weakly, imagining the chair bludgeoning him under the strength of Michael’s swings. It was a flimsy plastic chair that you’d normally see on a deck or a patio, but Darren suspected the young man was plenty strong enough to pound it into splintering shards against his body. Lying there between the dining nook’s table and the wall, there was nowhere for him to go if the chair came down. His hand inched toward the pocket where the hard edges of the gun pressed against his thigh.

  It occurred to him that this was a man who was capable of driving a sword straight down through a human being with enough force and ferocity to sink the blade in the earth under his victim. He didn’t know if the mere presence of a gun was enough to get Michael’s attention. It might not be. If it wasn’t enough, the only thing that was going to happen if Darren pulled the trigger was a clicking sound, followed by whatever sounds get made when a deck chair is used to bludgeon a man to death.

  His hand found the gun in his pocket, but he hesitated.

  “Don’t,” he repeated, louder. “Please. Don’t.” He raised his left arm up between them, as if it could ward off what was coming. Michael’s rage melted. Darren watched the bunched, angry features of Michael’s face grow slack, lifeless. Then, as if seeping in to fill a sudden void, sorrow welled in the kid’s eyes.

  “Michael?” Darren heard himself say. Nothing. The chair was still held up between them, but Michael was staring through Darren, into some bleak place. Darren couldn’t see it, but he was pretty certain he knew where it was all the same.

  “We need to talk about Daniel, Michael.”

  Michael’s eyes fluttered, and he was staring at Darren again. He sucked in a deep breath, as if calming himself. He lowered the chair, then carefully set it upright on the floor. He settled down on it, poised like a guard at Darren’s feet.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, his voice gruff and thick with emotion. “Okay? I won’t hurt you, bro.”

  “I’m going to go ahead and sit up,” Darren said, and when Michael gave no indication that he had heard, he got up into a seated his position with his back against the wall of the nook. Michael was a wide block of silence in front of him, his eyes staring at the floor.

  Behind Michael, Darren could see that the living room furniture was sagging and threadbare—the sort you pick up from yard sales or the Salvation Army. Used dishes were strewn around at the foot of the couch and on the table near it.

  “Rebecca’s with my partner,” he said after it was obvious Michael was going to stay withdrawn, staring at the floor with a look of desolation.

  At the mention of his girlfriend’s name, Michael’s eyes shot up and locked on Darren.

  “What?” he spat.

  “They’re talking,” Darren said, recognizing the undercurrent of threat in the young man’s voice. “Just talking. Down in the little playground you guys have here.”

  Michael continued to bristle at the idea of Rebecca being questioned somewhere away from him, but he quickly defused and shook his head in resignation.

  “It don’t matter, man,” he sighed. “She doesn’t know anything. She wasn’t part of any of this. It was all me. Me and my dumb fucking ideas.”

  “What kind of ideas?”

  “You going to arrest me? If so, let’s just do that. Let Rebecca go. I won’t put up a fight.”

  Darren frowned in confusion, then relaxed as he understood.

  “Michael, we’re not cops. We’re lawyers.”

  “Lawyers?”

  “We were hired by Judge Bernard Prosner to find out who killed his nephew. Which is really all the explanation needed for why I’m in your apartment. Isn’t it?”

  “You’re not cops.”

  “I think you’re lagging behind in this conversation, Mike.”

  “Then what was all that slapping bullshit?” Michael exclaimed in confusion. “Dude, you just said some crazy shit and started trying to slap my head off. What...”

  “I had a theory.”

  “About how to get your ass kicked?”

  Darren smiled and shook his head. The copper taste was still in his mouth. He wiped the back of his hand across his lips. It came away smeared with blood, but less than he would have suspected.

  “I needed to figure you out,” he said. “See, there’re two kinds of men in the world—”

  “There’s lots of kinds of people, bro.”

  “Sure. But—”

  “I mean, you’re a lawyer. You should know that.”

  “Okay,” Darren said flatly, and held a silencing hand in the air between them. “Maybe I need better metaphors. I can concede that if it lets us move on.” He waited a beat, and Michael just stared at him expectantly. “Great. So. I needed to know if I was dealing with a dog that bites once or a rabid dog that’ll keep biting. There. A better metaphor. Understan
d?”

  “You wanted to know if I’m a rabid dog?”

  “Exactly.”

  “So you walk in here slapping me.”

  “It seemed an adequate method of inquiry, yes.”

  “What the hell kind of lawyer are you, dude?”

  “There’s probably a very complicated answer to that question, Michael.”

  The door behind Michael swung open and Rebecca rushed in. She glanced around in a panicked fashion, saw Michael turning in his chair to look at her and swept down on him. She wrapped her arms around the big kid and buried her face in his chest.

  “Oh my God, I was so worried about you,” she breathed.

  Issabella appeared in the living room. As if guided by an inner alarm system attuned to him, she pivoted on her heel and stared directly at Darren without having to look around to find him. She stared at him in disbelief.

  “A gun?” she said. “You brought a gun with you?”

  Michael and Rebecca both turned to stare at Darren where he sat in the corner of the dining nook, looking deflated.

  “Well...not a loaded one,” he said.

  * * *

  Darren touched his bottom lip tenderly. It wasn’t bleeding anymore, but it had swollen considerably. His jaw still ached from the shot he’d taken, and he kept superstitiously prodding his teeth with his tongue to see if any of them seemed loose.

  From across the kitchen, Issabella turned on the tap and shot him an unsympathetic look.

  “Stop messing with it,” she said.

  “I will if you’ll stop pretending my plan didn’t make sense.”

  “You haven’t explained your plan, Darren.” She sighed, and walked out into the living room, the tap still running. Darren trailed after her, pausing a moment and straining to hear anything that might be going on in the bedroom where Michael and Rebecca had disappeared. He couldn’t hear a sound, but he knew what was being said, all the same.

  Michael had stood up, taken Rebecca’s hand and announced, “I need to explain all this. You need to hear it from me, okay? Come on, baby,” before the two of them retreated together behind the bedroom door.