A problem. Her words, not his. His cool stoicism, although it had indeed caused difficulties in their later years, was also what had attracted Rebecca to him in the first place. For all the so-called damage his phlegmatic disposition had caused his wife, hadn’t it also boosted her strength and happiness, especially when Rebecca was a fiery young woman in the early 1970s? Of course. She had taken great pleasure in marrying such a steady man—kind, intelligent and calm—who had had absolutely no reservations about her independence and abilities and right to do whatever she wanted, and who had expected, and even demanded through his unyielding detachment, that she take full responsibility for her own emotional well-being. In the balance of their relationship, his benevolent distance must have been more of a comfort than an irritant. It had signaled his intrinsic trust. It had gelled with her second-wave feminist aspirations, offered her hope, bolstered her confidence, and encouraged her self-realization. Surely Rebecca would have understood why Rodney hadn’t cried at her funeral; she would have understood why he was not capable of crying over a dying cat while standing in the vet’s office with Cindy Chin.
And yet he had cried earlier in chambers. Over nothing. Sobbed. What of that?
Stone’s breathing abruptly halted. Dr. Vry removed the syringe and pulled away from the table. After an interminable moment of silence, she suggested that Rodney and Cindy step outside so she could take care of the cat’s body.
In the waiting room, Cindy wiped her nose, smiled at her boss, and scoured his face, no doubt for some sign of the emotion that she had witnessed earlier, that bizarre hiccup in chambers—so distant now, altogether inaccessible. Imagine: torrential tears, for a pet, of all things! Rodney tucked his hands together before him, as he did when meeting foreign dignitaries or the High Justices of other nations’ courts, and bowed his head slightly.
“Ms. Chin, I cannot thank you enough for your company this afternoon. You’ve helped me immensely through a difficult experience. But you do not have to sacrifice your entire evening for me.”
“I don’t mind. Really.”
“I live only a few blocks away.”
Cindy nodded somberly. “If I were you, Justice Sykes, I’d be careful about going home right now to an empty apartment. That’s when the loss will hit you hardest.”
Rodney couldn’t help but smile at the innocence of this young woman shuffling on the linoleum.
He should say something generous, less cold. His usual formality suddenly felt like a comic exaggeration. With Cassandra he often behaved with this same dignity. No matter how much he planned for lightness and ease, formal grammar and measured sentences always emerged from his lips. But that restraint was due to Cassandra’s seething anger and obvious unhappiness, which had gotten so much worse this past year. Cassandra made him nervous. Cindy did not.
“I can see you want to be alone.” Cindy took her car keys out of her purse.
Rodney laid his hand on his clerk’s shoulder. “On the contrary, I’d be delighted to treat you to dinner. You’ve been so kind. I know an excellent Italian place on Wisconsin.”
Cindy shook her head. “I don’t want to go to a restaurant like it’s a celebration. Why don’t I come and make you dinner? It’ll keep you from spending too long in your apartment alone. I mean, without Stone.”
“Oh, I couldn’t possibly—”
“I’d prefer it, Justice Sykes. I’m an insanely good cook and it relaxes me. Please, let me do this for you.”
Rodney grinned; he was unable to hide it. But he was allowed to enjoy her quite extraordinary consideration, wasn’t he? A blurring of professional and personal boundaries did not have to be a travesty, just so long as he was careful and avoided all discussion of his earlier breakdown.
The clerk, who was proving quite adept at reading his physical clues, patted her squirming boss on the arm as if he were a friend, and as if the culture of formality that he had so strictly enforced had once again been rendered irrelevant by one small show of his emotion. It was really a wonder how young people these days, even serious ones like Cindy Chin, were so readily casual with their superiors.
“Great! It’s all settled then.”
Cindy offered to buy groceries while he returned home. Rodney forced $60 into her hands, despite her repeated claims that the money was unnecessary, and parted ways with his chipper clerk. He paid the vet’s exorbitant bill and patiently acknowledged Dr. Vry’s sincere condolences. As Rodney ambled south on Connecticut toward his apartment building, he was surprised by his own happiness. The sky was bright and cloudless, the air warm and fresh, two storefronts displayed freshly cut dogwood blossoms. Soon he would have a lovely dinner with Cindy Chin, not taken in from Giordino’s, but freshly prepared in his own kitchen, and they would discuss their recent cases and her term on the Court, and it would all be a delightful departure from routine.
He whistled a favorite Verdi aria while striding past the doorman, riding the elevator to the fourth floor, and marching down the hallway to his apartment. But when Rodney opened his front door, he halted his humming, and paused in the threshold. Acrid, ammoniacal air pervaded his airways, as if a rank cheesecloth had been pressed against his face. Had the stench been this terrible in the morning? Rodney flipped on the lights and immediately proceeded into the unused guest bathroom off the foyer, where he had stashed Stone’s litter, and which he had avoided rather religiously for several weeks. He covered his mouth with his hand, but the air still burnt his lungs.
The speckled gray plastic litter box was so full that even from the doorway he could see excrement stacked in rolling mounds like a collection of blackened, volcanic rocks. A thin coating of light blue gravel was spread over the tiles. Additional mounds of excrement laid in the room’s corner by the toilet, and tucked by the vanity’s base. Pressing his nostrils shut, Rodney investigated the bathtub. More still, dispersed across the tub’s smooth porcelain.
He left the bathroom, and closed the door behind him. Maureen, his cleaning lady, had moved to Atlanta in January, but before leaving she had pressed in his hand the phone number of her cousin LaVonne, who had cleaned bathrooms at the Department of Agriculture for 15 years. She had noticed that he was a busy man, and would he like her to call LaVonne? Rodney insisted on calling himself, but then he hadn’t done it. He had decided that adding cleaning duties to his routine would focus his attention on practical tasks and bolster his strength, as he had been feeling rather low all winter, quite low, and indeed had more time on his hands than he had ever thought possible for a Supreme Court Justice, and he had few pressing social engagements. Now he realized he had let certain responsibilities slip.
Rodney retrieved the mop and detergent, the broom and dustpan, and the dishwashing gloves from the kitchen pantry. Stone’s swampy water dish and filthy food bowl, encrusted and highly bacterial, taunted him on the floor. He had fed his cat yesterday, hadn’t he? Certainly feeding was part of his morning routine, opening the cans of chunky paste at 7:55 a.m, between his second cup of black coffee and his retreat to the walk-in closet, where he chose his shirt, tie and jacket, and executed a sturdy Windsor. But in recent days he had loitered at his kitchen counter, staring into his coffee, only rousing when the time was well advanced, and then he rushed to gather his papers and dress before his Town Car arrived to drive him to work. It was possible he had forgotten to feed Stone from time to time. There were those mornings when Rodney had awoken to mews and scratches on the side of his bed. He must admit facts: there was a distinct pattern of neglect.
And it wasn’t just the cat. He had not called Cassandra the last three appointed Sundays: January, February, and March. Today was Friday, March 30. If he failed to call her again this weekend, that would be four.
Rodney swept the foyer bathroom, gathered the litter and feces, emptied the nauseating mess into a double-ply garbage bag. He tied it tightly and whisked it out into the hallway disposal. He mopped the tiled floor briskly, while running the shower on hot to steam the room and clean the tu
b. He wiped the porcelain down with disinfectant when all else was done. At the kitchen sink, Rodney grit his teeth and scrubbed Stone’s bowls with vigor, until they shone like polished silver. He worked the vacuum across the rugs, although the ubiquitous cat hair was too sticky to remove entirely. In his own en suite bathroom, major tasks completed, he checked the knotting of his tie and the wrinkles on his shirt, deeming himself presentable, and then stood an extra moment to regard his image in the mirror, emptied of all expression: a distinguished, stoic gentleman, with a large round head that was too big for his small body, which gave him the odd appearance of an overgrown child. Gray-haired, broad-nosed, with pronounced smile lines and wide-set eyes. This was how he would look in a mug shot.
His clerk rang the bell to his apartment. Cindy entered his foyer, blushing and looking altogether out of place. She glanced around at his Italian sculpture, tapestry and art: the urns and orbs and painting of nudes with winged cherubs the Justice favored. And then the oil paintings that Rebecca had chosen, which he still found too blurry. He had done a decent job of cleaning his home in limited time. The place was tidy and smelled strongly of lemon verbena. Certainly no sign of any crimes against his cat. Cindy asked her boss for directions to his kitchen and Rodney pointed the way, interpreting her request as a sign of deference rather than an actual inquiry—the kitchen was right in front of her.
“Please, let me take your bags,” he said.
She gave the Justice a bag stuffed with vegetables, meat and jarred sauces, and followed him into the small kitchen. She seemed to relax somewhat as they started to unload the groceries.
“Make yourself at home.” Rodney knew, of course, that it would be impossible for Cindy to be truly comfortable here. “If you can’t find any pots or utensils, I’ll be happy to assist you.”
The logically organized kitchen was stocked with quality cookware and a full array of spices, none of which Rodney had touched since Rebecca’s death. Cindy found her bearings easily and was soon chopping, sizzling and boiling, scraping together small mounds of ginger and hot pepper and dried tangerine peel. Rodney perched on a stool at the counter, watching her work, wanting to speak but unable to think of anything to say. Cooking seemed to soothe her. She moved around the small space with confidence.
She was preparing an elaborate, four-dish Chinese feast. “All my grandmother’s recipes.” Cindy stirred the contents of a pan with one hand and adjusted the heat with the other. “From back in Taiwan. Except for this garlic shrimp, which I’ve updated a bit.”
A beef noodle soup boiled on a back burner, wafting scallion, soy sauce, anise. Pungent steam rose from an amaranth and mushroom stir-fry, and still more steam plumed from the pork dumplings that Cindy had pinched together with remarkable dexterity. Rodney loved Chinese food, but he had never had an authentic meal cooked in his own home. What wine did one pair with this feast? It was near the end of a stressful day, and he would welcome at least a single glass of a good red, a nightly indulgence he did not wish to forgo. Might he decant that bottle of Macchiole Messorio 2001 he had promised Samuel? Probably he shouldn’t: the smoke and depth of a great Tuscan Merlot would overwhelm the soy sauce, scallion and sesame oil. But was it even appropriate to open wine and light candles tonight, as if he were trying to seduce this young woman?
Rodney asked Cindy about her family. The clerk spoke freely of her trips to Taipei, of her grandfather’s early death and her grandmother’s circumspect life in that crowded city, of her parents’ emigration to Chicago and her mundane, all-American childhood on the North Shore. She was the hard-working second child of upwardly mobile, middle-class parents, an engineer and a nurse. Although proud of their daughter for sailing through a prestigious law school (NYU), her parents were somewhat baffled by Cindy’s post-graduate choice to clerk for a Supreme Court Justice, a job with shockingly nominal pay. Why not take one of the high-paying corporate jobs that had already been offered?
“I guess it’s kind of a typical culture shock, seeing as they’ve worked so hard to get me here, coming from nothing themselves. They just can’t imagine why I wouldn’t want to make tons of money right away. Plus, they’re suspicious about government—that’s something else. They don’t fully get how the legal system can be fair in this country, how working for the highest court might actually be a valuable and prestigious thing. They get it in theory, I think—I mean, they’re not idiots about this country—but their hearts don’t fully believe it.”
While she was speaking, Rodney decided it would be best to offer Cindy an unspecified drink. Let her decide on beer, wine or whatever.
“And what about you?” Cindy pulled her perfect dumplings off the stove and gave the mushroom-vegetables a final stir. “I mean, I know the basics, of course, but not much more. Your mother must have been thrilled to see you appointed to the Court.”
“Well, no.” Rodney finished setting Rebecca’s family’s flatware on the dining room table. “My mother passed away before I was appointed to the D.C. Circuit, so she never had an inkling that I would be anything other than a trial lawyer. I, of course, did not foresee this twist to my career.”
“She was in Oakland, right? And you had two brothers growing up?”
“Quite right. I’m sure you know our story.”
Under normal circumstances, Rodney would have deflected the probing question and changed the subject, but with Cindy now filling platters to take into the dining room table, he found his defenses disabled. He was surprised to hear himself say: “My older brother’s life has been a great tragedy. I’m only fortunate that Marshall did not manage to drag me down with him.”
Cindy set the platters on the table, sat down across from her boss and surveyed her steaming work. She sighed with satisfaction.
“Extraordinary.”
“Let’s dig in.”
“But would you like a drink? Wine, perhaps? Or beer?”
“No, I’m fine. Just hungry.”
“You must have something. I insist.”
Cindy raised her brow and shrugged. “Well, I guess if you insist, a little white wine would be okay.”
Not his first choice, but a white was better than nothing. Rodney hurried into the kitchen and returned with a bottle of Riesling. He poured two full glasses as Cindy served the soup.
“You have heard of my older brother, Marshall, and I’m sure you recall the trouble he caused me during my confirmation hearing. Those fierce questions about the Black Panther events I attended, and the article I wrote for the Berkeley student paper, and that rather awkward exchange about zebras with Senator Wexler. To be perfectly frank, I was surprised and relieved that the good senator had enough self-restraint to speak only of zebras changing their stripes and not ‘coons changing their coats.’”
Cindy guffawed and raised a hand to cover her parted lips.
“What I am certain you don’t know, however, is that my brother petitioned me directly two years after my confirmation. Marshall filed a pro se petition for habeas, on the grounds that he had received ineffective assistance of counsel during his trial and after. I don’t have to tell you, Cindy, of all people, about the strict procedural barriers to such a petition. Of course, we were under no obligation to consider the dubious merits of his case. Still, I felt his petition put me in an awkward position. Technically, yes, we retained the right to review his imprisonment. I passed the request on to Justice Van Cleve, who relieved us of the burden and handled it appropriately.”
Rodney rubbed a fingertip around the rim of his wine glass. The alcohol had warmed his chest. He was tired and relaxed, eager to talk about himself for what felt like the first time in his life.
“Do you ever visit him in prison?”
“I have, but it’s been many years. Eight or nine, perhaps more. I used to go more frequently. He’s in California, you see, at San Quentin. It’s quite difficult for both of us. Not just logistically.”
Rodney sipped his wine. Yes, it was as if the sweet Riesling had been vinted to pai
r with this spicy Taiwanese meal. He took a second sip, and then a third. Cindy, across the table, had pulled her hair back. Her cheeks were slightly flushed; her expression was open, non-judgmental, and kind.
“During my confirmation, I didn’t tell Senator Wexler or the American people the primary reason why I attended those Black Panther events back in 1969, or why I wrote that misguided opinion piece for The Daily Californian praising a political organization I had deep misgivings about even then. My brother Timothy, with whom I was very close, had been killed in Vietnam only weeks earlier. His death shook me to my core. It had been my unstated role in the family to protect Timothy, to provide some order to his life, some stability. I loved him dearly, and liked him moreover, and for the entire, grueling year that he was in Vietnam I wrote him constantly, and wished every moment I could go over there and shield him from harm, as I had always tried to do in Oakland. During our childhood, our father was not present. Our mother worked two jobs, and when she was with us, she was a disciplinarian, a police officer, strict and cold and rather severe. She wasn’t a source of affection, comfort or happiness.”
Rodney stared at the ceiling trim instead of at his attentive young guest. His chest tightened with crushing sadness, a distinct ache, a feeling he recalled quite clearly from his childhood dinner table—those silent meals with his brothers and mother, always loaded with an unidentifiable shame.
“You see, my older brother Marshall was an angry young man, cruel and rebellious from the start. I never really understood his anger. He was a dropout and a drug addict, and quite self-important as well—poor me, you understand, and all that—and he soon fell in loosely with the Panthers, although I’m sure they smelled a million miles off that he was a bad seed, and in the movement only for the drugs and sex. He had the political conscience of a rock, which is why, I’m sure, Marshall never rose above the party’s most basic membership. At any rate, when Timothy died, I was more alone than ever, so I decided I would make an attempt to bridge the gap with Marshall. I began to call him with some frequency and even smoked cannabis with him on one occasion—an absurd sight, let me tell you, me in my coat and tie, inhaling a joint passed around some dingy basement decorated with African masks and leopard skins by pseudo-soldiers in black berets—and then I attended those awkward Panther events, including that infamous rally for Huey Newton which later caused me so much trouble in my hearings, and I wrote not unfavorably about the Panthers in that opinion piece at Berkeley, hoping my words would impress my older brother, and perhaps make him like me a little bit more. Which didn’t work, of course. My frustrating reparations with Marshall ended abruptly one night when he crashed in my student dorm in the fall of 1969 and then left in the morning with the wristwatch my uncle had given me when I matriculated at Berkeley, a valuable timepiece, sentimental as well, and one that Marshall, no doubt, quickly converted into cocaine or heroin or whatever. We had a tense encounter. A full denial on Marshall’s part, and his pointed use of the term house nigger. And I, of course, realized right then and there that no amount of effort on my behalf would ever transform Marshall into Timothy, and that nothing I could do would ever bring Timothy back, and that I should really turn my full attention toward my studies and forget about Marshall altogether.”
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