Amy Efaw

by After (v5. 0) (epub)

  Devon realizes then that she had been rude; she hadn’t taken this woman’s hand and shaken it. So much for first impressions. She opens her mouth to apologize but then quickly shuts it. Why should she apologize? She’d been taken off guard, hadn’t she? And this woman . . . Devon feels an uneasiness growing inside. What will this woman want from her anyway?

  “We have a lot to discuss today and, unfortunately, not a whole lot of time in which to do it.” The woman checks her thin watch on her wrist for emphasis. “So, we should get started right away.”

  Discuss? Devon doesn’t move.

  The woman frowns slightly, then her hand disappears behind her back, smoothing her skirt before sitting down herself. “Uh, is there a problem, Devon? You seem a little . . . confused.”

  Devon looks down at the comb in her hand, runs her thumb over its teeth. It tickles. “You’re not a man,” Devon whispers, then glances back up at her.

  Something flicks in the woman’s eyes, and her frown is replaced with a smile. “Your powers of observation are impressive.” She laughs. “This is the twenty-first century. News flash: women have been attorneys for quite a while now, Devon.” She clicks her tongue. “Wishing for a man to rescue you—not a great way to make friends.”

  Devon shifts her weight, uncertain what this woman had meant by that. Friends? Right. And wanting a man to rescue her? This has pushed a button. Devon rubs her thumb across the teeth of her comb again, hears the faint prripp, prripp it makes. She needs nobody—man or woman—to rescue her. Ever.

  The woman waves toward the stool opposite her again. “Sit. Please.”

  Devon hesitates, but then moves to seat herself. Both the table and stool are bolted to the floor. It is the same type of table, Devon realizes, that the girls sit around in the common area—to eat on, to play cards on, to watch Devon from and laugh.

  She feels itchy. She doesn’t want to be here. Not in this room or at this table. Not sitting here at this predetermined distance from the bolted-down table, either, which can’t be altered by either tipping back the stool or pulling it out a few inches. And definitely not with this strange woman, who makes dumb comments, thinking she’s so smart. Who is so unprofessional that she wants Devon to call her by her first name, like they’re “friends.” Well, she won’t.

  “Okay.” The woman lifts a brown accordion folder from the floor and drops it on the table, sounding like a slap between them.

  Devon’s eyes jerk to the folder. On it, a white label spells her last name DAVENPORT in black.

  “Let’s start at the beginning.” The woman opens a yellow legal pad, readies her pen. “Why don’t you tell me why you’re here.”

  Devon’s eyes stay on the folder. It isn’t empty; she can see that. The band around it is stretched taut. So, why the question? Doesn’t this Dom, this attorney, this female attorney, already know? It’s all right there in front of her.

  This irritates Devon. The inefficiency of it. The insincerity of it. She looks down at the comb, stares at it a moment, then pulls it through her damp hair, as if the woman isn’t even there. The shampoo Henrietta had given her was cheap and greasy. The comb meets no resistance. Bits of water sprinkle her hand.

  The silence lasts a long time. Devon finally peeks at the woman across from her. She’s exactly as Devon had last seen her, pen poised over the yellow paper, watching her. “Well, why are you here?” Devon blurts at last.

  Her voice was too loud, she thinks. Too aggressive, distrustful. She hadn’t meant to sound like that exactly; she’d merely meant to sound disinterested and bored. But there it is, and she can’t take it back.

  “Excuse me?” The woman looks surprised to have been asked a question. “Why am I here?”

  Devon looks away. “You aren’t my lawyer. You weren’t in the courtroom with me.”

  “Oh,” the woman says, drawing the word out. “I see . . .”

  Devon looks back at her.

  The woman carefully places the pen on top of her legal pad, folds her hands in front of her. “You’re thinking of Mr. Stevens. Well, he just happened to have the docket when you first appeared in court. Since then, the big guys who make the decisions at the Department of Assigned Counsel—where I work—sat down and discussed your case and basically decided that out of the, oh, eighty-plus attorneys who work there, I am best suited to represent you. But I had some input into that decision, too; I wanted your case. Does that answer your question?”

  Devon doesn’t say anything, she just stares back at the woman. Her voice is so cool, calm, measured. Not like Devon’s own—so stumbling and emotive. And what the woman had just said, that she’d wanted her case. Why? And even that word: case. Like Devon is something to be studied. Something to be discussed and decided upon.

  “I’ll take that as a yes.” The woman picks up her pen and taps it on her yellow legal pad. “Now. Do you understand what happened yesterday? In court, I mean.”

  Yesterday? Was that only yesterday? Devon closes her eyes. Her memory of those few minutes in the courtroom is disjointed. The judge. The attorneys. The impressive-sounding words. Her jumpsuit darkening with her own leaked milk. Her humiliating tears, right there in front of everyone.

  The woman waits a respectful amount of time, then launches in. “Well, you were there for an arraignment. English translation: to have the charges against you formally read. But the focus quickly changed because the prosecution—the lawyers representing the interests of the county, the ones trying to put you in jail—”

  “I know what prosecution means,” Devon whispers. She looks over at Dom quickly, guiltily. Why had she said that? So rude.

  “Well, good. Then you must also know that the prosecution filed a motion requesting a hearing to determine whether you should be tried as a juvenile or as an adult. It’s called a declination hearing, because the juvenile court would then be declining jurisdiction over your case. These hearings are actually mandatory with cases like yours. Class A felonies, that is. Now, the purpose for this hearing—”

  Class A felonies. Devon turns away. She doesn’t want to hear any of this. The criminals on TV deal with felonies, not her. She fixes her eyes on the wall to her left. White painted cinder block, like every other wall in this place.

  “—is to determine your rehabilitative potential. But before we go into all that, I think we need to talk about your charges. Do you understand, and I mean really understand, what you’re being charged with?”

  Devon keeps her eyes on the wall. How many coats of paint did they have to slather on it for it to look so smooth and glossy? A lot, she decides. Cinder block is pretty rough.

  “All righty then. I’ll take that as a no.” Out of the corner of her eye, Devon sees the woman reach for the brown DAVENPORT folder.

  Were the walls always painted white? Had they ever tried a different color? Like fluorescent green, for instance, just to see how it looked? Because, if it were Devon’s choice, she’d try fluorescent green. One of her keeper jerseys is that color. It always makes her stand out on the field, draws the ball toward her.

  Her keeper jersey; she thinks of it now. The number 1 on its back. A lonely number. Only one goalkeeper on the field. Only one player who guards the net. Only one who stands strong and alone behind the other ten players on the field. No place to hide, no way to disappear.

  The woman pulls off the rubber band holding the DAVENPORT folder together. It expands as the woman opens it, displaying pocket after pocket, papers tucked into each. The woman pulls out a sheet, looks it over briefly, then slides it across the table toward Devon.

  Devon’s eyes are disloyal; they shift from the wall to the paper all on their own. The woman’s hand is holding it there, her slim fingers with short neat nails. The polish matches her lipstick. Something Devon’s mom would have approved of. Something Devon couldn’t care less about. Keepers’ hands are meant to catch balls, not look pretty.

  The woman pulls her hand away, leaving the paper, stark and white, before Devon. “This
is called a charge sheet. And on it, your charges.”

  Devon directs her eyes back to the wall.

  “Devon,” she says sharply. “Look at me.”

  Devon presses her lips together, slowly turns her eyes toward the woman. Devon realizes now that she’s sitting on her own hands, death-gripping the sides of the plastic seat under her thighs. The comb is gone, dropped. She hadn’t heard it fall. Sweat dampens her armpits, even though the room is cool.

  The woman’s eyes are locked with Devon’s. “Your charges,” she says again. “Attempted Murder in the First Degree.”

  Devon feels her thighs tighten, quiver. Somehow she had managed to avoid hearing any of this in the courtroom.

  “Abandonment of a Dependent Person in the Second Degree.” She pauses, gauging Devon’s reaction. “Criminal Mistreatment in the Second Degree, and Assault in the Third Degree. That makes four charges, total.”

  Murder? Murder? And there were others, too. Abandonment. Mistreatment. Assault. A whole horrible list. This is what they think she’s done?

  But how? How did she do these things? She can’t remember any of it.

  “The assault charge, according to the police report, occurred once you had arrived at the hospital, when you resisted the medical personnel’s efforts to examine you.”

  Devon watches as the woman pulls other papers from a pocket in the brown folder. “I have the police reports here, along with all corresponding statements of witnesses and, of course, the statement from the victim of the assault herself, a, uh, Dr. Laura Klein.”

  Doctor. Black rectangular glasses. Blonde ponytail, wisps around the face. White lab coat. A knee comes up. A yell. People run from all directions, close in. Pin down arms, hold legs. Confusion. Flailing. A needle, sharp and cold.

  Devon is shaking. She pulls her hands from under her legs and hugs herself to stop it.

  That knee. Was that knee Devon’s knee? It’s all there now, right there; she sees it in her mind. So near and clear and vivid. She squeezes her eyes shut. The scene plays over and over. An unwanted memory. It didn’t exist before, but now it’s there. This woman, the one sitting across from her, placed it there. Pulled it out of some dark corner and dropped it in the light.

  “As I’m sure you can guess,” the woman is saying, “the attempted murder charge is categorized among the most serious of crimes, Devon, a Class A felony. The other three charges of abandonment, criminal mistreatment, and assault are all Class C felonies. My opinion? They’re charging you with abandonment and criminal mistreatment—basically the same charge just worded differently, which I think is totally bogus, by the way, but that’s something we’ll deal with later. And the assault charge? Well, that’s just really pushing it. Anyway, my feeling is that they’re charging you with those other lesser offenses so that if the attempted murder charge doesn’t stick, they can get you on something. But abandonment alone can get you up to five years in jail.”

  Five years? In jail? Devon’s breathing picks up. Faster, faster. She looks behind her, toward the door. They can’t put her in jail, can they? Not if she can’t remember . . .

  The woman continues to explain the legal definitions of abandonment and mistreatment, but Devon’s mind is stuck on those five years. She does a mental fast-forward of herself five years from now, imagining her life. Twenty years old, almost twenty-one. In college. Walking across a campus—not just any campus, but UNC’s or Santa Clara’s or even U Dub’s playing Division I soccer—a backpack over one shoulder, heading down to the field, visions of keeping for the national team dancing in her head. The World Cup and the Olympics further in the distance and still only a dream, but definitely something to work for. All gone, zapped, because of this.

  No, not because of this. Because of IT.

  But. She had heard them—hadn’t she?—all those nurses at the hospital, whispering in the hallway? The baby’s okay, they’d said. She’s here at the hospital. Getting stronger. Healthy. Pretty, even. Strange sort of irony, isn’t it? Both baby and mother in the same hospital at the very same time, but unable to see each other? Sad state of affairs. Oh yes, very sad. Very, very sad.

  A tinge of relief slips through Devon’s thoughts. The nurses called IT a “she.” That means IT is alive. Not only alive, but healthy and pretty and strong.

  So, they’ve got it all wrong. IT wasn’t abandoned, IT was found. IT wasn’t murdered; IT lived.

  Devon feels her body relax. Her hands drop to her lap. Okay. She hadn’t done anything, after all. They’ll all realize that they’d made a huge mistake. They’ll apologize, exchange the orange jumpsuit for the clothes her mom will bring for her when she finally comes, and this will all be far behind her.

  Devon turns back to look confidently at the woman across from her. She’d been discussing her ideas on the various legal issues she plans to pursue but stops when she sees the look that Devon’s given her, a look of smug triumph. “Don’t think you’re off the hook just because the baby lived, Devon.”

  The words are a slap. Devon’s hands become fists in her lap.

  “When someone attempts to commit a crime, the attempt is classified as if he or she had actually accomplished that crime. That’s the way the law looks at it; the intent is what’s important, not that some stroke of luck or act of God or whatever you want to call it made everything turn out all right in the end. Understand?”

  How had this woman read her so thoroughly? Devon was always able to hide everything so well. It’s her game face; she could pull it all in and never let it show. In the goal, or at home. She is impenetrable.

  The woman places her hands flat on the table. “Am I getting through to you? ’Cause right now there’s a baby found in a trash can behind your apartment who’s linked to you, and the D.A. is charging you with attempted murder. That means you could conceivably go to jail . . . for life.”

  Life? A strangled sound involuntarily squeezes out of Devon’s throat. Life? She turns away, faces the wall again. She can feel her lips quiver, the muscles in her face melt, her eyes sting. Keep it under control, she tells herself. Don’t cry. Stay solid. Stay hard.

  “Look, I don’t think that’s likely to happen, Devon, I really don’t.” The woman’s voice softens somewhat. She reaches out and touches Devon lightly. “It was an attempt; no judge is likely to give the max for an attempt. Especially if you stay in the juvenile system. There’s no such thing as life imprisonment in the juvenile system. The maximum time you’d get would be to the age of twenty-one.” A slight pause. “That’s why it’s so important that we win this hearing coming up next week, so we can keep you in the juvenile system.”

  The woman’s fingers feel heavy and far too warm.

  “I just don’t want you operating under some false sense of security. I want you to know up front what we’re going against.” The woman takes a breath in, lets it out. “And I’m sorry, but I’m just not getting the impression that you are facing up to any of this appropriately. I don’t feel like you’re taking your situation seriously.”

  Devon flings off the woman’s hand, twists around to glare at her. “What, do you think I’m stupid or something?” She feels something ignite inside. “Do you think, even for one second, that I’ve ever, in my whole entire life, been in a place like this?” She narrows her eyes. “You don’t know me; you don’t know one thing about me. You don’t have the first clue about what I do or do not take seriously. So, save the lecture.” She stands up. Her voice actually shocks her, it’s so icy, so mean. But she can’t stop. “Just stick to the law part, okay? I’ll handle the consoling Devon part.”

  The woman just sits there, her eyes on Devon. Devon is trembling, but still she holds the woman’s stare. The silence between them is thick, the kind of thick that takes force to shatter, like a jackhammer.

  Finally the woman pushes off her stool and slowly leans across the table. “Go ahead, Devon. Make me your enemy.” She’s speaking quietly with those measured tones of hers, but her words have heat to them. “U
nder the law, all you’re entitled to is an adequate defense. That means the next time I technically have to see your sorry face is the next time we’re planted in front of the judge. If that’s what you want, then that will just have to be okay with me. But that’s no way to win. And guess what, Devon? I like to win.”

  Devon can almost feel the woman’s eyes searing into hers, shooting out little angry lasers.

  “If you have any dreams in that head of yours that you hope to attain. If you’ve got any kinds of plans for your life besides rotting away in a place way worse than this, then I’d think you’d like to win, too. So realize this, Devon: I Am Your Future.”

  Devon feels herself deflate. She drops her eyes to the floor. She’s not a mean, rude person. She’s never even thought of treating anybody the way she’d just treated this woman. Not even her mom, who’s more child than adult most of the time. Her mom, who still hasn’t bothered to see what’s become of her in the days that have passed. Her mom, who hasn’t come to reach out and touch her and tell her that everything will be all right because she’ll take care of it.

  But this woman, this Ms. Barcellona, this Dom, has.

  The woman straightens, starts packing her things. The yellow legal pad. The sheet with Devon’s charges written on it. The DAVENPORT accordion file.

  Devon feels a tugging. The words are right there.

  The woman—Dom—bends to lift her briefcase from off the floor.

  Devon could say nothing, just let her go. She clears her throat, mumbles, “Okay.”

  The woman stops, looks over at Devon. Her eyes are guarded. And annoyed, like she has several other more important matters to attend to and has no time for Devon and her games. “Okay? Is that what I just heard you say? ‘Okay’ what?”

  Devon looks down at the table. How can she make this right? “I understand,” Devon whispers. “You are my future. I don’t want . . .” She looks back up at her and takes a deep breath. “I don’t want to be enemies with you . . . Dom.”

  Dom considers this. “You going to cut the attitude?”