Read Online No One Tells Everything by Rae Meadows - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Rae Meadows
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last the lawyer leads you to a chair, and then the other man, the one in the wrinkled suit who looks at you with contempt and waves his long fingers around when he talks, gets up. His voice is a yell.
“He planned to kidnap and murder Sarah Shafer,” he says, but you close your eyes and tuck your brain deep inside to keep from hearing any more. He is the Assistant District Attorney, the one who hates you, the one who thinks you are a killer. That is not what it was at all.
Count one: Murder in the first degree.
You are nineteen years old. The boy you once were was overtaken by someone you despised even more. You can hear your father saying, “I just don’t understand this,” and in your head you answer, Neither do I, Dad. You don’t understand why you were the one that was different, why you were the one that everyone decided was the odd man out.
Count two: Murder in the first degree.
Your lawyer tried to explain why there was more than one count for the same charge but you tuned out his words as they tumbled from his shiny lips. You are on suicide watch and the District Attorney could seek the death penalty. You laugh as you think of this now but you don’t explain why you are laughing to your lawyer, who winces and then smiles a little, hoping to make what appears to be your craziness more understandable. If I am crazy now, you want to tell him, then I’ve been crazy for a very long time. But you seem to have lost the connection between your thoughts and your ability to speak. When you open your mouth, all you can hear is the sound of saliva sticking to your tongue and the roof of your mouth. You used to be able to control the messiness better, but somewhere along the line it got harder and harder to keep at bay.
Count three: second-degree murder.
You found blood in the most unexpected places. A smear on the dashboard. Soaked into the tip of your shoelace. On the box of Tide.
Count four: second-degree murder.
Crusted in your ear.
Count five: second-degree murder.
You liked to hear her say your name.
Count six: second-degree murder.
Okay, you feel like screaming, okay, okay, okay. You are trembling. The judge’s words sound like they are elliptical and warbling on a tape stuck in an answering machine. You wonder if you will ever go home again, ever leave the state of New York. But then again you don’t really want to go back to Ohio, do you?
Count seven: first-degree kidnapping
Now that they are wrong about. She was not a child.
Count eight: first-degree attempted sexual abuse.
No. Not that either. Abuse is something you do to inflict pain.
“It was the most disturbing murder scene I have been to in my twenty-five years,” the Assistant District Attorney says.
This you hear, the words chiseled as if out of a block of ice. That makes you, according to this man, pacing and jerking his hands around, the murderer. You wonder what he means by the murder scene. Does he mean the room? There was only blood left there.
Your lawyer touches your shoulder again and you wonder if this is his attempt to be reassuring. You don’t tell him that nothing will help. You don’t say, “I know you are being paid by my father so you have to try to be nice but you really don’t have to.” The chain around your waist is digging into your spine against the back of the chair. You can feel it and you can’t feel it at the same time. Your head itches but you know not to attempt to raise your hands. Even though you are not listening, your body senses that the proceedings are coming to a close. Voices are coming into focus. The judge laces his fingers in a teepee. He is what—perplexed, sad, tired? Maybe he is just bored.
You hear the rustling now of other people in the room, a cough, a foot tapping, a pen clicking. It is getting too hot to breathe.
All sharp objects are kept from you so your fingernails are long and dirty. You want nothing more at this moment than to bite them. You ball your shackled hands into
“He planned to kidnap and murder Sarah Shafer,” he says, but you close your eyes and tuck your brain deep inside to keep from hearing any more. He is the Assistant District Attorney, the one who hates you, the one who thinks you are a killer. That is not what it was at all.
Count one: Murder in the first degree.
You are nineteen years old. The boy you once were was overtaken by someone you despised even more. You can hear your father saying, “I just don’t understand this,” and in your head you answer, Neither do I, Dad. You don’t understand why you were the one that was different, why you were the one that everyone decided was the odd man out.
Count two: Murder in the first degree.
Your lawyer tried to explain why there was more than one count for the same charge but you tuned out his words as they tumbled from his shiny lips. You are on suicide watch and the District Attorney could seek the death penalty. You laugh as you think of this now but you don’t explain why you are laughing to your lawyer, who winces and then smiles a little, hoping to make what appears to be your craziness more understandable. If I am crazy now, you want to tell him, then I’ve been crazy for a very long time. But you seem to have lost the connection between your thoughts and your ability to speak. When you open your mouth, all you can hear is the sound of saliva sticking to your tongue and the roof of your mouth. You used to be able to control the messiness better, but somewhere along the line it got harder and harder to keep at bay.
Count three: second-degree murder.
You found blood in the most unexpected places. A smear on the dashboard. Soaked into the tip of your shoelace. On the box of Tide.
Count four: second-degree murder.
Crusted in your ear.
Count five: second-degree murder.
You liked to hear her say your name.
Count six: second-degree murder.
Okay, you feel like screaming, okay, okay, okay. You are trembling. The judge’s words sound like they are elliptical and warbling on a tape stuck in an answering machine. You wonder if you will ever go home again, ever leave the state of New York. But then again you don’t really want to go back to Ohio, do you?
Count seven: first-degree kidnapping
Now that they are wrong about. She was not a child.
Count eight: first-degree attempted sexual abuse.
No. Not that either. Abuse is something you do to inflict pain.
“It was the most disturbing murder scene I have been to in my twenty-five years,” the Assistant District Attorney says.
This you hear, the words chiseled as if out of a block of ice. That makes you, according to this man, pacing and jerking his hands around, the murderer. You wonder what he means by the murder scene. Does he mean the room? There was only blood left there.
Your lawyer touches your shoulder again and you wonder if this is his attempt to be reassuring. You don’t tell him that nothing will help. You don’t say, “I know you are being paid by my father so you have to try to be nice but you really don’t have to.” The chain around your waist is digging into your spine against the back of the chair. You can feel it and you can’t feel it at the same time. Your head itches but you know not to attempt to raise your hands. Even though you are not listening, your body senses that the proceedings are coming to a close. Voices are coming into focus. The judge laces his fingers in a teepee. He is what—perplexed, sad, tired? Maybe he is just bored.
You hear the rustling now of other people in the room, a cough, a foot tapping, a pen clicking. It is getting too hot to breathe.
All sharp objects are kept from you so your fingernails are long and dirty. You want nothing more at this moment than to bite them. You ball your shackled hands into
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