The Rough Cut

by Douglas Corleone

  ‘No-o-o-o-o,’ he said. ‘We’re taking a limo.’

  THIRTY-FIVE

  In the editing room, I consider whether to show the footage we shot at Ala Moana or jump straight to the aftermath. The Ala Moana footage is shaky and shrunken to phone-mode, like those clips outside LA nightclubs you see on TMZ. Because Brody and I hadn’t anticipated wanting to record our picking out, trying on and purchasing of new clothes. But then, Nicholas Church made even the most mundane events unpredictable. And, OK, yeah, more than a little fun.

  Although I had my sights set on Neiman Marcus, Church insisted we first visit the fourth floor of the mall. Squarely in its center sat a large bar and grill, where physically fortunate young women in matching tight summer dresses delivered cocktails and dishes to a largely male crowd watching UH women’s volleyball on the flatscreens overhead.

  ‘Hungry?’ Church said.

  Brody’s gaze followed a tray carried by a chick who could have easily stepped off the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. He said, ‘I could eat.’

  With the slip of some cash, we bypassed the lengthy line of people waiting for a table, which made me feel a bit pompous and elegant at the same time. As we entered, I apologized to the people in line who paid us no mind, and turned my nose up at the wretched peasants with the audacity to give us the stink-eye.

  Once we sat, we ordered food, and lots of it, as usual. Church also insisted we order mai tais, which were as tall and as strong as any I’d had outside of the Royal Hawaiian. Raising toasts to each of the forty-eight prospective jurors, we were on our fifth round before I realized I was in danger of tipping over and falling out of my armless chair.

  What happened following our hours at Mai Tai Bar is as blurry in my head as it is on film. Recording on his phone, Brody first follows Church to a kiosk where Church purchases a $600 Panama hat without trying it on. Next, Cartier watches for the three of us. ‘We’re a team,’ Church said, ‘we need to be synchronized.’

  Then on to Mont Blanc where Church purchases four pens for roughly 2,000 dollars. Then into Long’s Drugs where he picks up two dozen Bic pens for two dollars because, ‘This is the only shit I’ll use.’ Then back upstairs for shots of bourbon. Then back down to buy out the inventory at Victoria’s Secret, because ‘Marissa looks incredible in lingerie’. Then back upstairs to Mai Tai Bar because last time we were there, Church left the bag with the pens behind. ‘The Bic and the Mont Blanc,’ he slurred.

  Onscreen, Church finally leads us through the Store that Shall Remain Nameless (because they won’t, to this day, sign a location release), randomly grabbing big-ticket dresses off racks and tossing them at me.

  ‘I don’t need all these,’ I protest.

  ‘It’s a week-long trial, at least.’

  ‘None of these are even my size,’ I say.

  A concerned saleswoman impedes Church’s progress in the center of the store as I eye the exorbitant prices on the clothes Church has thrown at me.

  ‘May I help you, sir?’

  ‘Not unless you’re on my jury,’ he says, studying her. ‘Are you on my jury?’

  She glances at me, baffled. I shrug my shoulders because I don’t know what else to do. Church steps past her.

  ‘Riles,’ he calls over his shoulder, ‘we need shoes. And not those Crocs or whatever you’ve been wearing.’

  ‘I’ve never worn Crocs in my life,’ I say, loud enough so that everyone who heard Church hears me as well.

  Church spins around. ‘BQ, what are you doing?’

  ‘Grabbing some footage.’

  Church pulls out his wallet. ‘BQ, here’s a fifty. Shut off the camera and go grab yourself a Supercuts while I pick out a few dresses for Riles and Marissa.’

  ‘Sir—’ the woman starts again, at which point Church removes an Amex Black card from his wallet and frisbees it in the general direction of the cash register.

  ‘Ring up as much damage as you think I can do to this store,’ Church says. ‘If you come within a thousand dollars, I’ll take you out for drinks tonight.’

  The saleswoman gracefully picks up the card but says thanks but no thanks to the drinks.

  I don’t know how much Church spent that night. I don’t want to know. Because I feel terrible for it. I should’ve declined to go with him, should’ve stopped him after the second or third mai tai, should have at least stopped him after the second or third store. But I’d had a few too many too, as had Brody. Add to that our stealing away to vape a few grams of OG Kush, and I’m surprised I remember anything from that evening. But I do remember some things – I remember more than I’d like.

  Back at Church’s suite, we continued drinking and performed some bastardized version of a blind taste test to determine whether we could tell the difference between sentences written in Bic from those in Mont Blanc. (To Church’s great chagrin, we could.)

  To display our new duds, we then held an hour-long fashion show, which could easily be edited into a hilarious three-minute montage in and of itself. Once we had run out of shoes, suits and dresses, and arrived at the lingerie, Church stood and announced that he was going to wake Marissa. But when he turned around, he found her standing menacingly in the doorway to their bedroom.

  ‘You do realize you have court first thing in the morning?’ she scolded.

  ‘We’ll hydrate him right now,’ I said, leaping off the couch and nearly losing my footing.

  ‘It’s not Nick I’m concerned about,’ Marissa said. ‘He’s a seasoned alcoholic. This is rather tame for the night before opening statements. He’ll be fine in the morning. I don’t know the same will be true of the two of you. Like it or not, since Nick and I are both participating, this film is going to be forever linked with The Prosecutor. So every one of us here has skin in this game.’

  In that moment, I wanted to hug Marissa, because she had been extremely helpful over the past several months, despite my inexplicable coolness toward her.

  ‘We’ll be OK,’ I tried to assure her. ‘I promise. We’ll drink plenty of water. And I had my molars out a couple of months ago, so if we are a bit hungover in the morning, we can just pop a few Vicodin.’

  Marissa’s eyes immediately welled over. Baring her teeth, she looked as though she could rip my tongue from my mouth. Instead, she spun and quickly retreated into the bedroom.

  Church went after her.

  ‘What the hell just happened?’ I asked Brody.

  ‘About a year ago, Marissa’s son died of an opiate overdose.’

  ‘She had a son?’

  ‘Seventeen years old.’

  ‘I didn’t know. How was I supposed to know?’

  Brody turned away from me. Muttered, ‘It’s on her Wikipedia page, for Christ’s sake.’

  THIRTY-SIX

  ‘I like being the dominant one.’

  Dr Farrockh crosses one leg over the other and asks, ‘Is that good or bad?’

  ‘I don’t know anymore. I don’t want to be my father. I don’t want to dominate my husband in the way he dominated my mom.’

  ‘Then don’t.’

  ‘Problem is, I’m not sure where the line is anymore. I don’t know whether Brody is doing something he wants to do, or doing something just to please me.’

  ‘Are these two things necessarily mutually exclusive?’

  I lean back on the camel-colored couch and exhale. Some days with Yasmin Farrockh, I feel like I’m in the middle of that maze in The Shining, and she just keeps growing hedges taller and taller.

  ‘Why not ask him?’ she adds.

  ‘Brody will just tell me what I want to hear. He’ll say it’s for him, no matter what it is.’

  ‘He’ll lie?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘He’ll tell you the truth, then?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well …’

  ‘I get it,’ I tell her. ‘If he lies about this, he’ll lie about other things.’

  ‘That’s not at all what I’m suggesting. From everything
you’ve told me about Brody, his integrity is not an issue. Except—’

  ‘Except he’ll lie to please me? By denying he’s doing something to please me?’

  Dr Farrockh sighs. ‘You said Brody will go wherever you want to go, and that he won’t resent you for it. So why haven’t you spoken about this with him yet?’

  ‘I haven’t made a decision yet.’

  ‘So you want to make the decision on your own and then tell him what it is?’

  ‘No, that doesn’t sound right.’

  She smiles (one of those fake ones), says, ‘Is it possible that you’ve already made a decision – even if it’s just returning to the mainland – and you’re afraid of presenting that decision to him?’

  I bow my head. ‘That sounds more like it.’

  ‘He’s made it clear he wants to stay in the islands?’

  ‘Abundantly. But as much as I love it here, this isn’t the best place for my career – it’s so, so remote.’

  ‘You’re afraid he’ll take that as, “I’m more concerned about my career than about your feelings.”’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Then the reverse is true, too, isn’t it? Brody needs to decide if he wants to live here permanently or marry you.’

  ‘It’s just …’ I don’t want to say it aloud; it feels tantamount to an admission that I care only about myself. ‘I know this place is best for him. He needs to live at a slower pace. I see the difference in him here from the time we were in New York. He can’t fully articulate it, but he says this island’s the only place that’s ever felt like home.’

  ‘You need to discuss this with him, Riley. That’s the only fair thing to do. And know beforehand what you’re going to say and, more importantly, what you’re genuinely willing to do.’

  ‘Can Brody and I hash it out in here?’ I joke.

  ‘Of course,’ she says. Of course.

  ‘You’ve never met Brody, yet sometimes you seem to understand him better than I ever will.’

  ‘I think you understand him just fine, Riley. Now you need to understand yourself in relation to him.’

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,’ Lau said to begin opening statements, ‘I’m loath to use the word simple to describe any homicide case. But the one upon which you will be deliberating at the end of this trial cannot be described in any other way. Over the next few days, the State will prove to you beyond any reasonable doubt, that on February twenty-second of this year, the defendant Ethan Parker Jakes murdered his girlfriend Piper Kingsley, in her home, and then made some grievous errors in his attempt to cover it up.’

  Lau looked spectacular, and – ever the consummate public servant – she accomplished it in an inexpensive pants suit I’d seen at Ross.

  ‘The following facts,’ she continued, ‘are not in dispute. By the defendant’s own admission, we know he was in Piper’s home at nine p.m. that evening. We know the defendant called nine-one-one to report “an accident” at nine thirty-one p.m. We know the defendant was home during that half-hour because he attempted so sloppily to create an ali—’

  Church was out of his seat. ‘Objection, Your Honor. Ms Lau is making argument.’

  Hightower gazed down at Lau from his perch. ‘Ms Lau, you know better.’

  Lau turned back to the jury but paused before she spoke. ‘We will prove to you that the defendant was home during that half-hour by introducing evidence that he attempted to create an alibi for himself using Piper’s computer.’

  Having observed Lau become rattled by his first objection, having seen her need to push aside her annoyance before continuing her opening, Church rose from his seat with objections nearly every sixty seconds for the next twelve minutes. Although each objection was overruled, with each interruption Lau’s level of irritability seemed to rise. But just when it appeared she’d be derailed at any moment, she adapted, deftly dismissing Church’s objections until the jurors themselves grew tired of them.

  Lau said, ‘From emails he attempted to delete, we know that the defendant knew that Piper Kingsley – his girlfriend and meal ticket – had accepted a job on the mainland, which was to begin soon. We know the defendant knew that Piper was pregnant, in all likelihood with his child. We know the dire financial position the defendant would have been in once Piper left him. We know the defendant considered himself a resident in Piper’s home, we know that his name is on a lease with four other men for significantly downgraded digs in Waialua, and we know that he was two months – plus late fees – behind in rent at the time of the murder. Piper Kingsley’s leaving Oahu would have been devastating for the defendant. Not only would he be without his closest companion for the previous eight months, he would have become one of Hawaii’s unfortunates – the defendant was destined to join Oahu’s ever-growing homeless population.’

  At this, Ethan’s chin fell to his chest, his eyes watered, his neck burned bright red.

  ‘With respect to physical evidence,’ Lau said, as she strutted in front of the jury with a confidence I could only dream of, ‘we have no shortage of that either. We have the defendant’s fingerprints on a beer bottle that the defendant used to smash Piper over the head. We have enough DNA evidence at Piper’s home of Ethan’s presence that the defense has stipulated to all of it. What’s more, we have zero, zip, zilch evidence of anyone else being inside Piper’s home at the time of the murder. Not a hair, not a fiber, not so much as a print belonging to anyone but the defendant and his victim.’

  I glanced at Church, who had, since ceasing his objections, remained stoic.

  Lau stepped up to the jury rail. ‘So why are we even here, you’re no doubt asking yourselves. We’re here because it is the defendant’s right as a citizen of the United States to confront all witnesses who will testify against him. We’re here because the Constitution guarantees every criminal defendant – no matter how heinous the crime or how much evidence the State has against him – the right to a fair and honest trial. And we are here, the defense will no doubt argue, because of a single pubic hair discovered on the victim’s body.’

  Without doing either, Lau somehow communicated both an eyeroll and a smirk, before adding, ‘Unfortunately, for the defense in general, and the defendant in particular, that pubic hair only strengthens the defendant’s motive. That single hair, I submit to you, proves only that the defendant had even greater reason to kill her.’

  Once the trial was underway, the media swarmed. While most major outlets continued covering the chaos in Washington, others needed a break from the nation’s capital. And this case was just the thing. It promised it all – drugs, sex, violence, quasi-celebrity, sibling rivalry – and where better to report from than Honolulu, Hawaii?

  Because of the crowd outside the courthouse, security suggested we eat lunch in the lawyers’ room downstairs. But Church refused to eat anything from the cafeteria. Security then suggested he sneak out by himself in a hat and sunglasses. But Church refused both eating alone and messing up his hair with a hat. Security finally suggested we at least go out the back door where HPD could better keep the mob away. But Church again refused, this time in a flurry of expletives about defense lawyers being treated like second-class citizens.

  We went out the front. And walked straight into an ambush. Led by Kalani Webb.

  ‘Mr Church, do you remain confident in your client’s innocence?’

  Church stopped. The mob stopped with him.

  ‘I hadn’t planned on issuing a statement today,’ he lied. ‘But since there’s tremendous interest in this case, and understandably so, I’ll take a few questions. Starting with Mr Webb’s. Yes, my client had nothing to do with his girlfriend’s murder. Ethan’s only sin was having an older brother.’

  A female reporter stepped forward. ‘Nathan Jakes has repeatedly threatened to sue you over past comments made to the press. How do you respond?’

  ‘Nathan Jakes should concern himself with one case and one case only – his own forthcoming indictm
ent for the murder of Piper Kingsley.’

  After lunch, Church smiled at his jury. ‘Prosecutor Lau turns a fine tale, doesn’t she? The yarn she’s spun fits neatly in with so many of the facts of this case. But there are problems with her story, “plot holes” as novelists like His Honor might call them.’

  Hightower beamed from the bench.

  ‘Ms Lau attempted to bury these plot holes in her opening statement. She dismissed them as mere inconveniences. She’s even trying to turn one of those massive plot holes into a positive for her case. She’s trying to say it points to motive. But it doesn’t. It points to the real killer. It points, sadly enough, to Ethan’s brother, Nathan Jakes.’

  Nathan wasn’t in the courtroom because he would be testifying for the prosecution during their case-in-chief.

  ‘A pubic hair, ladies and gentlemen. A pubic hair belonging to Nathan Jakes was discovered on the victim’s body, in her pubic region. Which tells us, indisputably, that Nathan Jakes was with her that day, and that they had sexual relations. Pull on this pubic hair, I say to you, and the state’s entire case fast begins to unravel.

  ‘Just as Ms Lau did with Ethan, we’d have to speculate about Nate’s true motive. Did Piper tell Nate that day that she had to break things off with him? Did she tell Nate that she had accepted a new job and was moving to the mainland? Did she tell him she was pregnant, and that he might well be the father? Only Nathan Jakes knows the answers.

  ‘Ms Lau also insinuated that Ethan set up the bogus Craigslist ad and email address from Piper’s computer as an alibi. She then told you that the murder occurred inside the house, even though there is absolutely zero physical evidence to support this. But for argument’s sake, let’s say the killer did murder Piper inside the house. If that is true, he left no trace, which our experts – and the prosecution’s experts – will tell you is perfectly common. Someone, anyone, can enter a house, commit a murder, and escape without leaving a trace. It doesn’t take a Houdini.

  ‘Why, you’re probably asking yourselves, did the police choose one brother over the other? I’ll explain. See, it really wasn’t a choice so much as a mistake. A mistake made by one man who was not used to making mistakes. One man who, until this point, until this night, had a long and illustrious career. But he may – and I don’t want to be ageist here, but an innocent man’s life is on the line – he may have stayed on past his time.’