Small Great Things

by Jodi Picoult

  James Batson was an African American man who was tried for burglary in Kentucky by an all-white jury. During the voir dire phase of the trial, when the jurors were being selected, the prosecutor used peremptory strikes against six potential jurors--four of whom were black. The defense tried to discharge the jury on the grounds that Batson was not being tried by a representative sample of the community, but the judge denied it, and Batson wound up being convicted. In 1986, the Supreme Court ruled in Batson's favor, stating that a prosecutor's use of peremptory strikes in a criminal case could not be based solely on race.

  Since then, any time a black person gets bounced from a jury, any defense attorney worth his or her salt will cry Batson.

  "Your Honor," I continue, "the Sixth Amendment guarantees the right of a defendant to be tried by a jury of his or her peers."

  "Thank you, Ms. McQuarrie, I know very well what the Sixth Amendment says."

  "I didn't mean to imply otherwise. New Haven is a very diverse county, and the jury needs to reflect that diversity, and right now this gentleman is the only black juror in this pool of fourteen."

  "You have got to be kidding," Odette says. "You're saying I'm racist?"

  "No, I'm saying that it's a lot easier for you to stack a jury in the State's favor without being called on it because of your race."

  The judge turns to Odette. "What's your reason for exercising your peremptory strike, Counselor?"

  "I found him argumentative," she says.

  "This is the first group of jurors," Judge Thunder warns me. "Don't get your knickers in a twist."

  Maybe it's the fact that he is so blatantly favoring the prosecution right now. Maybe it is that I want to show Ruth I am going to bat for her. Maybe it's just because he used the word knickers and it made me remember my steroid rant against him. For whatever reason, or maybe all of them, I straighten my spine and take this opportunity to unbalance Odette before we even get started. "I want a hearing on this," I demand. "I want Odette to produce her notes. We had other argumentative people on this panel, and I want to know if she documented that characteristic for the other jurors."

  Rolling her eyes, Odette climbs into the witness box. I have to admit, there's enough public defender pride in me to love seeing a prosecutor in there, effectively caged. She glares at me as I approach. "You indicated that juror number two was argumentative. Did you listen to the responses of juror number seven?"

  "Of course I did."

  "How did you find his demeanor?" I ask.

  "I found him friendly."

  I look down at Howard's excellent notes. "Even when you asked him about African Americans and crime and he came out of his seat and said you were implying he was a racist? Is that not argumentative?"

  Odette shrugs. "His tone was different than juror number two's."

  "Coincidentally, so was his skin color," I say. "Tell me, did you make any notes about juror number eleven being argumentative?"

  She glances down at her chart. "We were moving quickly. I didn't write down everything I was thinking, because it wasn't important."

  "Because it wasn't important," I clarify, "or because that juror was white?" I turn to the judge. "Thank you, Your Honor."

  Judge Thunder turns to the prosecutor. "I'm not going to allow the peremptory challenge. You're not getting me into a Batson situation this early in the game, Ms. Lawton. Juror number two remains on the panel."

  I slide into my seat beside Ruth, pretty damn pumped. Howard is blinking at me like I'm a goddess. It's not every day you get to school a prosecutor. Suddenly Ruth passes a note to me. I unfold it, read the two simple words: Thank you.

  --

  WHEN THE JUDGE dismisses us for the day, I tell Howard to go home and get some sleep. Ruth and I leave the courthouse together; I peek outside first to make sure that the coast is clear of media. It is--but I know that will change as soon as we start the trial.

  When we reach the parking lot, however, neither one of us seems to be in a great hurry to leave. Ruth keeps her head ducked, and I know her well enough by now to know that something's on her mind. "You want to go grab a glass of wine? Or do you have to get back to Edison?"

  She shakes her head. "He's out more than I am these days."

  "You don't sound thrilled about that."

  "Right now I'm not exactly his role model," Ruth says.

  We walk around the corner to a bar that I've been to many times before, celebrating victory or drowning defeat. It's full of lawyers I know, so I squirrel us into a booth way in the back. We both order pinot noir, and when the glasses arrive, I toast. "Here's to an acquittal."

  I notice that Ruth doesn't lift her glass.

  "Ruth," I say gently, "I know this was the first time you've been in court. But trust me--today went really, really well."

  She swirls the wine in her glass. "My mama used to tell a story about how, once, she was pushing me in a stroller in our neighborhood in Harlem, and two black ladies passed her. One of them said to the other, She walkin' around like that her baby. That ain't her baby. I hate when nannies do that. I was light-skinned, compared to Mama. She laughed it off, because she knew the truth--I was hers, through and through. But the thing is, growing up, it wasn't the white kids who made me feel worst about myself. It was the black kids." Ruth looks up at me. "That prosecutor made it all come flooding back today. Like, she was out to get me."

  "I don't know if it's all that personal for Odette. She just likes to win."

  It strikes me that this is a conversation I have never had with someone who is African American. Usually I am so conscious of not being seen as prejudiced that I would be paralyzed by the fear of saying something that would be offensive. I've had African American clients before, but in those cases I was very clearly setting myself up to be the one with all the answers. Ruth has seen that mask slip.

  With Ruth, I know I can ask a stupid white girl question, and that she will answer me without judging my ignorance. Likewise, if I step on her toes, she'll tell me so. I think about the time she explained to me the difference between weaves and extensions; or how she asked me about sunburn, and how long it takes for blistered skin to start peeling. It's the difference between dancing along the eggshell crust of acquaintance and diving into the messy center of a relationship. It's not always perfect; it's not always pleasant--but because it is rooted in respect, it is unshakable.

  "You surprised me today," Ruth admits.

  I laugh. "Because I'm actually good at what I do?"

  "No. Because half the questions you asked were based on race." She meets my gaze. "After all this time telling me that doesn't happen in a courtroom."

  "It doesn't," I say bluntly. "Come Monday, when the trial starts, everything changes."

  "You'll still let me speak?" Ruth confirms. "Because I need to say my piece."

  "I promise." I set my wineglass down. "Ruth, you know, just because we pretend racism has nothing to do with a case doesn't mean we aren't aware of it."

  "Then why pretend?"

  "Because it's what lawyers do. I lie for a living. If I thought it was going to get you acquitted, I could tell the jury that Davis Bauer was a werewolf. And if they believe it, shame on them."

  Ruth's eyes meet mine. "It's a distraction. It's a clown waving in your face, so you don't notice the sleight of hand going on behind him."

  It's strange to hear my work described that way, but it's not entirely untrue. "Then I guess all we can do is drink to forget." I lift my glass.

  Ruth finally takes a sip of her wine. "There isn't enough pinot noir in the world."

  I run my thumb around the edge of my cocktail napkin. "Do you think there will ever be a time when racism doesn't exist?"

  "No, because that means white people would have to buy into being equal. Who'd choose to dismantle the system that makes them special?"

  Heat floods my neck. Is she talking about me? Is she suggesting that the reason I won't buck the system is because I, personally, have something to lose
?

  "But then," Ruth muses, "maybe I'm wrong."

  I lift my glass, clink it against hers. "To baby steps," I toast.

  --

  AFTER ONE MORE day of jury selection, we have our twelve plus two alternates. I spend the weekend holed up in my home office preparing for Monday's opening arguments of the trial, taking off only Sunday afternoon to meet the neonatologist. Micah met Ivan Kelly-Garcia in his freshman orgo class, when--during the midterm--Ivan rushed in with only a half hour left during the exam, dressed like a giant hot dog, grabbed an exam booklet, and aced the test. The previous night was Halloween, and he'd passed out drunk in a sorority house, and woke up to realize he was about to forgo his entire future as a doctor. Ivan not only went on to become Micah's study partner in orgo but also to go to Harvard Med and become one of the best neonatologists in the tristate area.

  He's thrilled to hear from Micah after so many years, and he's even outwardly thrilled to host his insane lawyer wife and one very crabby four-year-old who should not have been awakened from her car seat nap. Ivan lives in Westport, Connecticut, in a sedate colonial, with his wife--a woman who managed to make homemade guacamole and salsa for us after her fifteen-mile morning marathon training run. They don't have any kids yet, but they do have a giant Bernese mountain dog, which is currently either babysitting Violet or licking her to death.

  "Look at us, bro," Ivan says. "Married. Employed. Sober. Remember that time we dropped acid and I decided to climb a tree but forgot I'm scared of heights?"

  I look at Micah. "You dropped acid?"

  "You probably didn't tell her about Sweden, either," Ivan muses.

  "Sweden?" I look between the two men.

  "Cone of silence," Ivan says. "Bro code."

  The thought of Micah--who prefers his boxer shorts ironed--as a bro makes me stifle a laugh.

  "My wife's trying her first murder case," Micah segues smoothly, "so I apologize in advance if she asks you ten thousand questions."

  Under my breath I whisper, "I'm totally getting that whole story from you later." Then I smile at Ivan. "I was hoping you could explain newborn screening."

  "Well, basically, it was a game changer for infant mortality. Thanks to something called tandem mass spectrometry, which is done at the state lab, we can identify a handful of congenital diseases that can be treated or managed. I'm sure your daughter had it done, and you probably were never the wiser."

  "What kinds of diseases?" I ask.

  "Oh, a whole science nerd dictionary: biotinidase deficiency--that's when the body can't reuse and recycle enough free biotin. Congenital adrenal hyperplasia and congenital hypothyroidism, which are hormone deficiencies. Galactosemia, which prevents an infant from processing a certain sugar that's in milk, breast milk, and formula. Hemoglobinopathies, which are problems with red blood cells. Amino acid disorders, which cause amino acids to build up in the blood or the urine; and fatty acid oxidation disorders, which keep bodies from turning fat into energy; and organic aciduria disorders, which are sort of a hybrid between the two. You've probably heard of some of them, like sickle cell, which affects a lot of African Americans. Or PKU," Ivan says. "Babies who have that one can't break down certain types of amino acids, and they build up in the blood or the urine. If you don't know your kid has the disease, it leads to cognitive impairment and seizures. But if it's flagged right after birth, it can be managed with a special diet and prognosis is excellent."

  I hand him the lab results. "The lab says there was an abnormality in this patient's newborn screening."

  He flips through the first few pages. "Bingo--this kid has MCADD. You can tell by the spikes on the mass spectrometry graph here at C-six and C-eight--that's the acylcarnitine profile." Ivan looks up at us. "Oh, okay, yeah. English. Well, the acronym is short for medium-chain acyl-coenzyme A dehydrogenase deficiency. It's an autosomal recessive disorder of fatty acid oxidation. Your body needs energy to do stuff--move, function, digest, even breathe. We get our fuel from food, and store it in our tissues as fatty acids until we need it. At that point, we oxidize those fatty acids to create energy for bodily functions. But a baby with a fatty acid oxidation disorder can't do that, because he's missing a key enzyme--in this case, MCADD. That means once his energy stores are depleted, he's in trouble."

  "Meaning...?"

  He hands me back the packet. "His blood sugar will tank, and he'll be tired, sluggish."

  Those words trigger a flag in my mind. Davis Bauer's low blood sugar was blamed on his mother's gestational diabetes. But what if that wasn't the case? "Could it cause death?"

  "If it's not diagnosed early. A lot of these kids are asymptomatic until something acts like a trigger--an infection, or an immunization, or fasting. Then, you get a rapid decline that looks an awful lot like sudden infant death syndrome--basically the baby goes into arrest."

  "Could a baby who arrests still be saved, if he has MCADD?"

  "It really depends on the situation. Maybe. Maybe not."

  Maybe, I think, is an excellent word for a jury.

  Ivan looks at me. "I'm guessing, if there's a lawsuit involved, that the patient didn't make it?"

  I shake my head. "He died when he was three days old."

  "What day was the kid born?"

  "Thursday. The heel stick was done on a Friday."

  "What time was it sent off to the state lab?" Ivan asks.

  "I don't know," I admit. "Does that make a difference?"

  "Yeah." He leans back in his chair, eyeing Violet, who is now trying to ride the dog. "The lab in Connecticut is closed on Saturday and Sunday. If the screening sample was sent out from the hospital after, say, midday on Friday, it didn't reach the lab till after the weekend." Ivan looks at me. "Which means if this kid had been born on a Monday instead, he would have had a fighting chance."

  She wanted to get at the hate of them all, to pry at it and work at it until she found a little chink, and then pull out a pebble or a stone or a brick and then a part of the wall, and, once started, the whole edifice might roar down and be done away with.

  --RAY BRADBURY, THE ILLUSTRATED MAN

  WE ALL DO IT, YOU know. Distract ourselves from noticing how time's passing. We throw ourselves into our jobs. We focus on keeping the blight off our tomato plants. We fill up our gas tanks and top off our Metro cards and do the grocery shopping so that the weeks look the same on the surface. And then one day, you turn around, and your baby is a man. One day, you look in the mirror, and see gray hair. One day, you realize there is less of your life left than what you've already lived. And you think, How did this happen so fast? It was only yesterday when I was having my first legal drink, when I was diapering him, when I was young.

  When this realization hits, you start doing the math. How much time do I have left? How much can I fit into that small space?

  Some of us let this realization guide us, I guess. We book trips to Tibet, we learn how to sculpt, we skydive. We try to pretend it's not almost over.

  But some of us just fill up our gas tanks and top off our Metro cards and do the grocery shopping, because if you only see the path that's right ahead of you, you don't obsess over when the cliff might drop off.

  Some of us never learn.

  And some of us learn earlier than others.

  --

  ON THE MORNING of the trial, I knock softly on Edison's door. "You almost ready?" I ask, and when he doesn't answer, I turn the knob and step inside. Edison is buried under a pile of quilts, his arm flung over his eyes. "Edison," I say more loudly. "Come on! We can't be late!"

  He's not asleep, I can tell by the depth of his breathing. "I'm not going," he mutters.

  Kennedy had requested that Edison miss school and attend the trial. I didn't tell her that these days, going to school has been less of a priority for him, as evidenced by the number of times I've been called about him skipping class. I've pleaded, I've argued, but getting him to listen to me has become a Herculean task. My scholar, my serious, sweet boy, is now a rebe
l--holed up in his room listening to music so loud it makes the walls shake or texting friends I did not know he had; coming home past curfew smelling of hard liquor and weed. I have fought, I have cried, and now, I am not sure what else to do. The whole train of our lives is in the process of derailing; this is only one of the cars skidding off the tracks.

  "We talked about this," I tell him.

  "No we didn't." He squints at me. "You talked at me."

  "Kennedy says that someone who's seen as maternal is harder to picture as a murderer. She says that the picture you present to the jury is sometimes more important than the evidence."

  "Kennedy says. Kennedy says. You talk like she's Jesus--"

  "She is," I interrupt. "At least, she is right now. All my prayers are going to her, because she is the only thing that stands between me and a conviction, Edison, which is why I'm asking--no, begging you to do this one thing for me."

  "I got stuff to do."

  I arch a brow. "Like what? Skip school?"

  Edison rolls away from me. "Why don't you just leave?"

  "In about a week," I snap, "your wish might just come true."

  The truth has teeth. I hold my hand over my mouth, like I could will back the words. Edison fights to blink back tears. "I didn't mean that," he mumbles.

  "I know."

  "I don't want to go to the trial because I don't think I can listen to what they say about you," he confesses.

  I put my hands on either side of his face. "Edison, you know me. They don't. No matter what you hear in that courtroom, no matter what lies they try to tell--you remember that everything I have ever done has been for you." I cup his cheek, follow the track of a tear with the pad of my thumb. "You're going to make something of yourself. People are going to know your name."

  I can hear the echo of my mama telling me the same thing. Be careful what you wish for, I think. After today, people will know my name. But not for the reasons she had hoped.

  "What happens to you matters," I tell Edison. "What happens to me doesn't."

  His hand comes up, encircling my wrist. "It matters to me."