A Past That Breathes

by Noel Obiora

  “No, ma’am. I was in the area to eat.”

  “You told the officers the night you were arrested that you left the club and went home, isn’t that true?”

  “Yes, ma’am, I left the club when I was done there and went to an all-night food place on the Westside before going home.”

  “But that’s not what you told the officers who came to your house on Friday night—” Amy started to say. Omar objected that Amy was being argumentative, and Judge Barney overruled the objection.

  “Mr. Jackson, you told the officers that you left the club at closing, which you expected them to interpret as closing time for the club, but as soon as you realized they had your ATM receipt for the Santa Monica transaction, you decided to say you meant something else, isn’t that true?”

  “No, ma’am,” Paul said.

  “The officers misunderstood you? Is that what you’re saying? You told Officer Fritz you never went near Ms. Silberberg’s apartment, but the bank is near Ms. Silberberg’s apartment, isn’t it?”

  “No, ma’am, the bank is two miles from Ms. Silberberg’s apartment. That’s not near.”

  Amy brought out an aerial photo of the West Los Angeles area with large “X” marks indicating the bank and Goldie’s apartment.

  “Relative to the club, Cool Jo’s Café, and your house, Mr. Jackson, this bank is not near Ms. Silberberg’s apartment?”

  “I didn’t tell the officers that I was measuring the distance relative to anything.”

  There were many inconsistencies between Paul’s testimony and what he had told the police when they came to his house, but Paul made the differences seem inconsequential to him. He testified that he took a taxi to the bank close to Goldie’s apartment, when he told the police that he had driven his Mercedes. Asked why he lied to the police, he said he was not trying to lie, but just didn’t think of what he was saying because of the way they barged into his apartment. He simply told them what he would usually have done, rather than spend time to think back to exactly what he had done. The clothes he wore in the ATM picture were never found, but he testified that they were in his laundry bag, when he told police he did not know where they were if they were not in his wardrobe. He said he was under a lot of stress at the time. Paul seemed completely unperturbed by the inconsistencies Amy was uncovering and did not seem to make any effort to deny that such inconsistencies existed. This attitude of his became Kenneth’s most memorable element of his testimony. Yet, Amy seemed at her best with him. At times, it seemed to Kenneth that she was trying something she had not planned at all and it still came out as though it was well rehearsed.

  Noon came quickly. Still Amy could not say she had convinced anyone that Paul Jackson was guilty, and the defense could not say that Paul’s decision to testify was a good idea. The jurors stretched and turned their heads to relieve their necks, as if they had been sitting all day rather than an hour. Kate told Amy not to get impatient with Paul.

  When the court reconvened after lunch, Amy served notice that she might have Paul Jackson for the rest of the day and part of Tuesday. She resumed the afternoon session by playing messages from Paul Jackson’s answering machine the night Goldie Silberberg died. Twenty-nine calls went unanswered from one in the morning to seven o’clock the following night. Big made four of the calls.

  “Why was Mr. Stone calling you if he just saw you in the office?”

  “I don’t know, ma’am. You would have to ask him.”

  “And how about all the other calls? Are you trying to tell us that you were at home and didn’t answer the calls?”

  “I don’t know what it was about that day, I just didn’t wanna be bothered.”

  “Why didn’t you want to be bothered, because you killed someone?” Amy asked, as though she were reflecting on the comment.

  “Objection,” Omar shouted angrily.

  “Sustained,” Judge Barney said like one awakened from sleep. “Counsel will refrain from such comments.”

  “Did you count how many calls there were on that answering machine?”

  “No, ma’am. This is the first time I’m hearing the messages. The police took the machine.”

  “There were twenty-nine calls,” Amy said. “How old was Goldie Silberberg, Mr. Jackson?” Amy asked. Again, Omar rose to object, and Judge Barney overruled the objection.

  “She was twenty-nine,” Paul answered.

  Amy asked Paul what he had argued with Goldie about when Ms. Ola saw them together, and Paul said they had not argued. He was trying to tell her that Mr. Pare and Rachel were using and exploiting her. He said Monsieur Arnot was a shady Russian not French and he actually financed Goldie’s record before a record company agreed to pick her up. Didi was lying. That man would own everything, and Goldie would have to tour like crazy to make any money for herself.

  Amy uncovered the letter sent after Goldie died, which stated that the writer could not get over Goldie.

  “This note was found in Ms. Silberberg’s unopened mail after she died. Did you write this note?” Amy asked.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “To Ms. Silberberg?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was this a warning to her?”

  Omar rose again to make another objection and seemed surprised when Judge Barney sustained the objection.

  “I want to answer it, your Honor,” Paul volunteered. Omar, who was still standing, looked at Kenneth and Cassandra. Judge Barney appeared to be considering Paul’s request.

  “We will withdraw the objection,” Omar said, as he slowly sat down.

  “No,” Judge Barney said finally. “Counsel, you may rephrase the question.”

  “Why did you write this letter, Mr. Jackson?”

  “It’s not a letter. It’s a song.”

  “It’s a song?” Amy asked, slightly taken aback. “Like ‘Kill the police’?” Amy added, as if to recover from her surprise.

  Omar objected successfully again.

  “This was a rap song?” Amy asked looking genuinely puzzled at the absurdity of the position.

  “No, ma’am, a ballad. Would you like to hear it?” Paul added quickly.

  “Move to strike the defendant’s question as non-responsive, your Honor,” Amy said.

  “Motion granted. The court reporter will strike the second part of the witness’s answer. Mr. Jackson you must restrict yourself to answering the questions asked, and not ask any questions of your own,” Judge Barney instructed Paul.

  “Yes, your Honor,” Paul said.

  “When did you write this letter, Mr. Jackson?” Amy continued.

  “I wrote it two days before Goldie died.”

  “That would be on Wednesday?”

  “Yes, ma’am, Wednesday night to be exact.”

  “Then you saw her on Thursday afternoon, why didn’t you give it to her then?”

  “I told her about it, but—I didn’t want her manager to steal it.”

  “When did you actually put it in the mail?”

  “I didn’t,” Paul said. “I forgot all about it until it came up in this trial.”

  “You don’t know how it got in the mail?” Amy asked.

  “I do. I found out later,” Paul said.

  “You wrote this letter or song as you put it, because you were angry, didn’t you?” Amy asked.

  “I wasn’t happy with the situation, but I wouldn’t say I was angry,” Paul answered.

  “You were angry that Goldie was not returning your calls?”

  “No, ma’am. I was sad because she was not telling me what was going on with my songs,” Paul answered, showing the first sign of irritation.

  “By not returning your calls?” Amy insisted.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Paul said, more quietly.

  “In fact, between your house, your office, and a cell phone you carried, you c
alled Goldie a total of fifty-six times in the week before she died,” Amy said.

  “I don’t recall calling her that much,” Paul said.

  Amy produced phone record exhibits and placed them on the easel as she went through the phone calls and counted them.

  “You couldn’t get over her, no matter what you tried to do, right?” Amy taunted Paul.

  The last question lingered without an answer for a short moment as Paul collected his thoughts. He seemed to be losing his nonchalance.

  “Mr. Jackson,” Amy said.

  “No,” Paul said.

  “No, you couldn’t get over her no matter what you tried to do?” Amy asked.

  “No, I was just beginning to get over her. The truth about the way I write songs is that when I can write a song at all about anything or someone, it means I’ve come to terms with the situation, whether it’s someone dying or leaving me or cheating on me,” Paul said. “The song sets me free.”

  “You think the song meant you were coming to terms with losing Goldie, even though you meant what you wrote at the time?”

  “Yes, ma’am, but not losing Goldie. Letting Mr. Pare have her. I never lost her,” Paul said touching his heart.

  “What happened between the time you wrote the song on Wednesday night and the following Friday, when Goldie died, to make you snap?”

  Omar jumped up angrily to object and Judge Barney sustained the objection.

  “When was the last time you saw Ms. Silberberg before you wrote that message?”

  “Two or three months before she died.”

  “That was after she left you?”

  “We agreed to go our separate ways.”

  “But she managed to do that while you spent Wednesday night scribbling notes about how you couldn’t get over her no matter how you tried?”

  Judge Barney asked Amy to rephrase the question even before Omar could object.

  “When you met Goldie on Thursday morning, did she call you or you called her?”

  “She called me.”

  “What time did she call you?”

  “I don’t recall exactly, but I think it was about ten a.m.”

  “And what time did you get to her house?”

  “About two p.m., ma’am.”

  Amy walked over to her desk and looked at her notes and wrote on a piece of paper.

  “That was when you borrowed her car to return it that night?”

  “No, ma’am,” Paul seemed to frown on this question.

  “And what did she call you to tell you?”

  “She said she’d been in London, that’s why she couldn’t call me back. She said her record was due out in a couple of months, and she was calling it ‘Footsie’ as a tribute to us—what we started.”

  “Did you ask her why she didn’t just pick up the phone in London to return one of your numerous calls to tell you what she just told you in person?”

  Paul appeared unprepared to respond for the first time since Amy started examining him. He tilted his head as though the question Amy asked had just occurred to him, but before he could respond, Amy spoke again.

  “I’m through with this witness for now, your Honor,” Amy said and returned to her table to sit down.

  •••

  The time was 3:35 p.m. Kenneth and Cassandra wanted to take Paul off the witness stand as quickly as possible. Kenneth wrote a note to Omar saying they should not keep him on the stand too long. Omar replied, “I know now why he wanted to testify.”

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Jackson.”

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Jones.”

  “Why did you write that song?”

  “Because I wanted to get Goldie’s attention.”

  “You believed she would call you if she knew of the song in the mail?”

  “Yes, sir. I left messages, sent people, but she didn’t get back to me. Mr. Pare was brainwashing her against me, then I found out she’d gone to London,” Paul said.

  “Now, I believe earlier in the DA’s examination, you wanted to explain how the song got in the mail. Could you explain that to us, please?” Omar asked.

  “Yes, sir. You see, we run a nightclub and a recording studio, sometimes. So, we don’t receive a lot of people in our office for business. You want to talk business with me, I could say why don’t you stop by the nightclub on Thursday night or Friday night or come by the recording studio? We don’t have regular secretary or receptionist type people. We don’t need them regularly. So, we hire this girl to come three days a week, nine a.m. to three p.m. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I wrote the song on Wednesday night. Then Goldie called on Thursday to say she went to London, that’s why she couldn’t call, so it was no big deal. But I just didn’t take the envelope with the notes off my table, so the part-time girl thought it was there for her to mail out. That’s how it happened,” Paul said.

  Omar placed the note back on the easel.

  “You said the letter was a song, Mr. Jackson?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “But People will say it doesn’t look like a song.”

  “If Goldie was here, she would tell you it’s a song.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because I always hid the lyrics of new songs in letters I wrote her. And because if she were here, I’d sing it for her.”

  “Why don’t you sing it anyway?”

  Amy objected, but Judge Barney overruled the objection. There was relief on Paul’s face when Omar asked him to sing the song. It appeared to be the moment Paul had bet upon. When he cleared his voice, the look on Amy’s face was of derision, but as he began to sing, she turned to look at the jurors, all but one of whom was looking at Paul. Only one man was looking at Amy, the foreman, and the expression on his face struck Amy as saying, “How could you?” She looked at Officer Gonzalez who was simultaneously looking at her at the same time. Amy looked up the name of the juror by his position in jury box and scribbled a note for herself, “Mr. Gale!”

  Paul focused his attention upward, as though he were singing to a higher being, and he closed his eyes a lot, and his voice filled the room, rising with edge and descending with light gentle vibrato. When he was done, tears rolled down his cheeks.

  I always thought

  That I could do

  Anything, I put my mind to

  But I can’t get

  Over you

  No matter what, I try to do

  I can’t lie

  It’s not right

  I’m losing my mind over you. [Don’t make me lose my mind over you]

  “Thank you,” Omar said, offering Paul a box of tissues from the defense’s table. “We have nothing further, your Honor,” Omar said.

  Amy quickly stood up to follow up on Omar Jones’s examination. It was evident that she wanted to finish off Paul Jackson.

  “Counsel, we don’t have enough time for your further examination before we adjourn for the day,” Judge Barney told Amy.

  “I have just one question, your Honor,” Amy pleaded.

  “I stand corrected, we have more than enough time,” Judge Barney said. “I hope…” he added. A juror chuckled.

  “Mr. Jackson, can you write down the song you just sang right now? The exact lyrics just as you sang it.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Can we have some foundation as to why counsel is making my client take her notes for her?” Omar said.

  “Counsel,” Judge Barney said looking at Amy as she approached Paul carrying a notepad and pen. “The court reporter has accurately transcribed his testimony.”

  “I will provide foundation in a moment, your Honor, but can we have the defendant finish transcribing first?”

  Judge Barney agreed. Then Paul looked up to say he was done writing.

  “The lyrics are obviously very differen
t from the note he claimed was the same as the song, and they may yet be different from what the court reporter has transcribed, when he writes them down.”

  “Very well,” Judge Barney said.

  Amy requested that the lyrics Paul wrote on the stand be marked and admitted into evidence. Omar did not object, and Judge Barney granted the request. The court recessed for the day. One or two jurors smiled as their eyes swept past the defense table.

  “Thanks,” Paul said to Kenneth when he returned to the defense table. Cassandra paused to look at him as though he had just managed a rare human connection with her.

  •••

  Helen Silberberg and Rabbi Eli joined Amy at her office after adjournment to tell her that they had had enough of the trial. They were leaving that evening on the last plane to Seattle. The news felt like it punctured a pressure chamber in Amy’s veins and heart that forced all the anger, anxiety, and frustration that Amy had while examining Paul Jackson to slip out through a tiny hole that both relieved and weakened her. She sat down like she could not bear to stand and felt the tears pour down her cheeks.

  “Oh, Amy dear, you have done everything you could for me. None of this was going to bring my Goldie back, and win or lose, he will rot alive. I won’t get any kind of satisfaction from the outcome. I’m just glad we made him answer for what he did. Whatever happens to him, I’m still alone, and I have to go back and start putting myself together.” She put an arm around Amy’s shoulder.

  “You fought from the heart,” Rabbi Eli said. “Thank you.”

  Amy wiped her eyes and blew her nose.

  “I’m sorry for…This was not how I saw this trial happening.”

  “Don’t worry about it; we should go back home now,” Rabbi Eli said.

  Amy stood up and hugged Helen tightly and held on. When they finally let go, Helen, too, was wiping her eyes.

  Driving home with Alana, Amy told Alana what Helen said about having had enough of the trial. Alana could not agree more. If Amy’s recent bout of nausea checked out as nothing for Alana to worry about, Alana would return to the Bay Area in a couple of days.

  44

  An Unfinished Conversation