Shad nodded. “I’ll wait right here.”
As he watched Vic stroll into a hallway to the right side of the room, Shad felt a tremor of apprehension. After what happened to him yesterday, he only now realized that his discussion with Charissa would probably be conducted in private. Before yesterday evening that event wouldn’t have caused him any concern, but now dread crept upon him as Shad wondered if the old adversary would surface again.
Vic returned in less than half a minute. “She’s asleep. I’ll take you to Charissa.”
“Thank you,” Shad muttered.
He followed Vic down a hallway to the left side of the room. More pictures and shelves adorned the walls. Three doors broke up the pattern of the decorations, and all were ajar. Vic stopped at the last one and softly rapped on the painted trim.
“Charissa? Sweetheart? Mr. Delaney is here to talk to you.”
Shad didn’t hear Charissa’s response but Vic nudged the door wider and stepped into the room. When Shad followed him in he saw the girl curled in a sitting position on the floor at the foot of her twin-sized bed. She wore green jersey shorts and a light green tee shirt with a print of a kitten on the front. Charissa had a picture book opened on her lap, and other books as well as toys were scattered around her on the bed and on the floor. She watched them with a somber expression that didn’t change.
“Hello, Charissa.” Shad smiled although he still felt crowded. Charissa’s room was disheveled as kids’ rooms often were, but the sheer volume of toys and furniture and decorations on the walls seemed to close in on him. It was as though that mild agoraphobia of his was now reacting to objects.
The most toys Shad ever had as a child was when Wally lived with them, and even then he never had this many. After Wally left, all of Shad’s toys were thrown away, or those that could bring money were sold by one of the boyfriends so he could buy more cigarettes. When Shad moved in with the Delaneys he mostly “inherited” the same few classic toys that had been kept around the house for generations.
Charissa looked from him to Vic and back again. “I wondered if you’d really come,” she said in a voice that matched her expression.
Shad almost felt that knife-to-the-heart sensation. “I said I’d be here. And I really do wish we could’ve talked yesterday.”
Charissa stared at him but didn’t answer.
“I’ll let you two get down to business.” Vic shrugged and slipped behind Shad to step out of the room. “Should I close the door?”
“No,” Shad immediately replied as a flash of panic shot through him.
“I don’t want it left open,” Charissa stated bluntly as she continued to gaze at Shad.
“Why not?” His question was genuine.
“I don’t want them to listen.” Charissa looked down at the book in her lap. “Especially not Mom.”
Shad blew out a long exhale and glanced at Vic. “Leave it ajar.”
“You’re the boss.” Vic shrugged and pulled the door until only a crack of light was left between it and the frame.
As Shad’s attention returned to Charissa he fervently hoped the brewing terror inside him would overcome any other physiological response he might have. When the malady had haunted him years ago, an opportunity like this had never presented itself before either naturally or through Shad’s orchestration. Although he didn’t question his ability to control his conduct, Shad also didn’t want to encourage this disorder to continue reestablishing itself.
A few seconds of silence passed before Charissa spoke. “You’re not really fired, are you?”
A twang of guilt added to his discomfort. “Not legally, no.” Shad wasn’t comforted with the thought that the more he practiced law the better he got at dodging around the truth. “I was ... sort of playing a game. I wanted you to feel better. So I let you dismiss me even though ... your mom is the one with the ultimate authority to do that. Legally.”
Charissa looked down at the book again. “I would hear Mom talking with Uncle Eliot and Aunt Tess. They talk about you a lot, about things you’re gonna do.”
Shad wondered if the adults were discussing this openly in front of Charissa or if she was eavesdropping on what they believed was a private conversation. “I’m sorry. I thought it would help you to feel better. I know things are hard for you right now, and I’m just trying to make some of it a little easier.”
Charissa’s gaze returned to his face. “Did you mean it when you said you’re my lawyer?”
Shad didn’t feel right gazing so far down at the child. “I meant it.” He lowered himself to the floor and sat with his legs crisscross. “The reason I’m working for your mom is because I wanna be sure you’re gonna be taken care of.”
“Then you have to stop the divorce.”
Shad wished he was more adept at reading expressions. “Why?”
Charissa looked at the book again. “If you really want to do what’s best for me, you’ll stop the divorce.”
Shad stared at her as Charissa continued to gaze downward. It was natural for children to resist divorce. They didn’t want to see their family, which was their world, torn apart. They didn’t want to feel abandoned by a parent. They didn’t want to feel guilty because they suspected they were the cause of the breakup. Charissa was completely powerless to stop her mom from dying, so why wouldn’t she grasp at one thing where she might be able to exert some control? Why wouldn’t she try to get rid of the attorney who had initiated those proceedings?
Shad’s gut stirred.
There was something he was missing. Shad’s experience had made him sensitive to abuse upon others, but apparently his formal training was unable to identify and name what was prickling at his conscience right now.
“I’ve told you why I believe the divorce is in your best interests.” Shad studied Charissa’s face in the hope he might be able to ascertain something in her expression. “Now you need to tell me why you believe it isn’t.”
Charissa stared at the book on her lap. “People aren’t supposed to get divorced.”
“I agree.” Shad noticed that her statement seemed to settle into his subconscious as though it were another ingredient added to the simmering pot of his limited intuition.
“Then why are you a divorce lawyer?”
Shad’s smirk was entirely involuntary. “I’m not a divorce lawyer. Most of what I do has nothing to do with divorce. And when I do take on a case like that, it’s only when I need to make sure that the kids don’t pay the full price.”
Charissa frowned. “Whaduya mean, full price?”
“Sometimes ... one parent is so mad at the other one, they ... forget that as a parent they’re supposed to put their kids’ needs ahead of their own wants. My goal is to make it less hard on the kids.”
“But if you believe people shouldn’t get divorced, why don’t you just, you know, stop it?”
“I don’t have that power.” Shad wanted to spend less time explaining himself and more listening to Charissa, but he had to use his words to finish building this bridge between them. “Even God allows for divorce when someone breaks the covenant of marriage, and He Himself established that covenant.”
Charissa frowned as she looked at him. “God doesn’t like divorce.”
“I agree.” Again her statement lingered in his subconscious. “But God gave us free will, and due to the hardness of our hearts he gave us a way to escape a broken covenant.”
Charissa’s frown melted slightly into a more quizzical expression. “I don’t get it.”
“I don’t blame you.” Shad drew a deep breath as he tried to distill what his family had taught him. “You see, if we all followed God’s law, there would be no need for things like jail or even divorce. But God gave us the freedom to make choices, and some people choose to do what feels good at the moment instead of what God would want them to do. Some people choose to break their marriage vows and refuse to stop breaking the vows, which makes it actually better for their spouses to be away from them than t
o stay married to them. You see, the covenant is already broken. The divorce just makes it final, or at least that’s the way it’s supposed to be.”
Charissa’s gaze seemed to be directed at the door behind him. Several seconds passed before she responded.
“Who broke it?”
“What?”
Her gaze redirected to Shad. “Was it Mom or Dad who broke the coven-tent?”
Shad stared at her. He didn’t want to answer the question. Although he unequivocally placed the responsibility upon Demetri, Shad also didn’t want to alienate Charissa from her father. As cruel as the man could be, Demetri also exhibited warmth that Charissa could benefit from. If she had supervised visits with her father, Charissa would at least experience the best Demetri had to offer. Children needed fathers.
“It doesn’t matter,” Shad finally replied. “All that matters is that we’re gonna take care of you.”
Charissa’s gaze drifted back to the book but she didn’t really look at it. When she spoke, even Shad could recognize the sorrow in her voice.
“I know why you don’t wanna tell me. It’s why Mom’s dying, isn’t it?”
That feeling in his gut started to scramble like a frantic animal trying to escape. “What?”
“Mom broke the coven-tent. So God’s making her die.”
A different sensation of horror began seeping through him. “No. That’s not why she’s dying.” Shad also sensed that the unknown identity of the abuse that eluded him was drawing a little nearer, but it was still like a chink in the wall the animal couldn’t quite reach. “Is that what your dad told you?”
“Dad said ... he said she’s a slutty bitch that only thinks about herself. He said she wants me back just to be mean to us. He said she wants to get a divorce because that way you’ll make more money. And she’s mad at God for making her die.”
Shad stared speechless at the girl for many seconds as a chill crept through him. Language, one of those characteristics of humanity that separated us from the animals and was part of our likeness to God, escaped him as Shad considered the power of words.
God spoke, and the world became. Many Native American tribes concealed their children’s true names so that witches couldn’t use that knowledge to conjure curses against them. Celtic peoples believed that talented “poet-seers” could wreak havoc against kings by chanting satires about them. Among the Jews gossip was considered to be the verbal equivalent of murder. And Demetri Simms, using words filled with malice, made his daughter believe that her mother was a rebellious infidel who deserved to be struck down by a vengeful god.
Many people didn’t believe that verbal abuse was true abuse. Everyone knew the rhyme about sticks and stones. But verbal abuse wasn’t the kind of banter that Karl and Jill sometimes traded. Insidious on its own, it was also the foundation for other expressions of abuse. Shad would have dared anybody to sit in the same room with him right now and deny that words had the power to maim and even kill.
“That’s not true.” Those were the only words he could finally think of.
“It has to be.” Charissa gazed at her book. “And if I don’t make you stop the divorce, something bad will happen to me, too.”
So that was it. Demetri had threatened her. He had placed adult responsibility on the small girl’s shoulders and then warned of dire consequences if she didn’t succeed. In that one statement Shad found himself beginning to understand Charissa’s behavior and other things she’d said.
He found words came more readily now. “Your dad can’t hurt you. I’ll see to it you’re never left alone with him again.”
“Not Dad.” Charissa shook her head. “God will do it. He’ll make something bad happen to me. Like how He’s making Mom die.” Her expression was somber again as she looked at Shad. “You can’t keep God away from me.”
Shad’s breath seemed to become thin as though somebody had knocked the wind out of him. He remembered something else about Demetri Simms. Monica admitted that in high school and shortly afterwards she had been a “wild child” who partied with friends because it was usually how she could get her father’s attention. When her own mother suddenly died of a bacterial infection, Monica decided to turn her life around, which included a new routine of attending church. That was where she met Demetri, and Monica believed she’d found her dream man. He was handsome, athletic, intelligent, fun-loving ... and devout. How could she go wrong with someone who was so obviously pious and still willing to overlook her former transgressions?
“I don’t want to keep God away from you,” he replied. “God is your protection, not your adversary. He isn’t gonna punish you, and He isn’t punishing your mom.”
Charissa frowned again, but sadness still lingered on her. “Dad said He is. But you can’t say why she’s dying.”
“God does things we don’t understand. But my parents taught me that when bad things happen, that gives people the chance to do something good. And every time people do something good, they’re fulfilling God’s will. And every time God’s will is fulfilled, that’s a miracle. So every time something bad happens, it gives us the chance to perform miracles.”
“Only the doctors can give Mom a miracle.”
“That’s not true.” Shad shook his head. “Your mom loves you with all her heart and soul, and so for her it’s a miracle that your Uncle Eliot and Aunt Tess are going to bring you into their home when she does finally pass away. It’s a miracle to her that somebody will take care of you when she can no longer do it herself.”
Charissa shook her head in return. “That’s not a miracle.”
“Yes, it is.” Shad leaded forward. “I’m gonna tell you a story I’ve read about. Do you remember the part in the Bible where Moses leads the Hebrews out of Egypt, and God parts the waters of the Red Sea so they can escape from Pharoah’s army?”
Charissa nodded slightly.
“As the people of Israel are walking between the two walls of water on either side of them, they gaze at those walls in amazement – except for two men. Those two men keep looking down at the mud they’re walking through, and complaining to each other how it reminds them of the mud they used to make into bricks while they were slaves in Egypt. There they are in the middle of perhaps the most famous miracle ever known, and they don’t see it. Miracles are no different today. We’ve just got to see them.” Shad leveled his gaze on her. “People who love you want to take care of you. That in itself is always a miracle.”
Charissa shook her head. “That’s the way things are supposed to be.”
Shad stared at her. “You’re exactly right. But the way things are supposed to be is not always the way things are. We broke the world and now it’s up to us to repair it. We have to put things back the way they’re supposed to be.”
“But only babies are supposed to be adopted.”
“That’s not true. I was eleven years old before I was adopted.”
It was Charissa’s turn to stare at Shad, and when she spoke her tone was almost hushed. “You’re adopted?”
“When I was even older than you. And still I didn’t wind up with three heads and seven eyeballs.”
Charissa almost smiled. But then her lips pursed downward and she lowered her attention to the book in her lap.
“I don’t know when I can believe you.”
Her words hit Shad like a right cross from out of the blue. “I’m sorry about the firing thing. I wasn’t trying to lie. I was just trying to help you feel better.”
“Dad’s lied to me, too.”
His analytical side couldn’t leave that statement untouched. “How?”
“He promised me we would go to a special park where I could go on a pony ride. A real live pony. He said we would go after lunch. Lunch was over, and he wasn’t ready to go. He kept working on his sound system. I asked him when we would go and he kept saying later. Then he got mad and said if I didn’t stop asking, we wouldn’t go at all. I stopped asking.” Charissa’s fingers lightly tapped the pages of th
e book. “We still never went.”
Shad was thoroughly familiar with that type of episode. “I’m sorry that happened to you. I know it was very disappointing.”
“At bedtime I asked him if we could go the next day. He got mad again. He said ... he said I was acting like Mom. Always wanting stuff. That if I didn’t stop acting like her I was gonna wind up dead, just like her....” Charissa’s voice trailed off.
A few memories tried to clamor to the surface of his thoughts, but Shad pushed them back into the depths. “That’s not gonna happen. You’re a very special person. And your Mom is very nice.” The analytical ego still hadn’t retreated. “Your Dad usually says things like that whenever he gets mad, doesn’t he?”
“I don’t like it when he’s mad.” Charissa’s voice was beginning to squeak. “I try to be good. I really do. But I just can’t be good enough –” Her voice cracked.
Shad felt himself leaning toward her. “It’s not your fault.”
“If I could be good enough – he won’t get mad anymore.”
“You’re good enough, Charissa. You’re very good. He’s the one who’s broken, not you. Nobody can ever be good enough to keep him from getting mad.”
“And if you don’t stop the divorce –” Charissa’s voice cracked again. “– I wasn’t good –”
A sound like a strangled hiccup erupted from her, and Charissa’s hands flew to her face as soft sobs shook her shoulders. Before Shad even realized what he’d done he scrambled across the room, pushed a pile of dolls and stuffed animals out of the way, and sat beside Charissa as he placed his left hand on her back between her shoulder blades.
“It’s alright,” Shad muttered as he gently patted her with outspread fingers. “You’re gonna be okay.”
Charissa shook her head slightly as she continued to weep into her hands.
“You’re a good kid and nothing bad’s gonna happen to you. You’re going through tough times right now, I know, and that’s bad enough. But nothing really bad is gonna happen to you.”
She began to sniffle and wipe at her nose. Shad removed his hand from her back and pulled a folded, plain white handkerchief from his left slacks pocket. He silently thanked Pap for having ingrained the habit in him to always carry a handkerchief and a pocket knife.
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