Small Great Things

by Jodi Picoult

  "Twenty."

  "At what level is a newborn considered hypoglycemic?"

  "Forty."

  "So Davis Bauer's blood sugar was dangerously low?"

  "Yes."

  "Would it have been enough to cause a child with untreated, undiagnosed MCADD to go into respiratory failure?"

  "I can't say for sure. But it's possible."

  Kennedy lifts a file. "I'd like to enter this as exhibit forty-two," she says. "It's the newborn screening result of Davis Bauer, which was subpoenaed by the defense."

  Odette stands like a shot. "Your Honor, what is this stunt? Defense hasn't shared this with the prosecution--"

  "That's because I received these results just days ago. They were conveniently missing from the discovery, however, for months," Kennedy replies. "Which I could claim as obstruction of justice..."

  "Approach." The judge calls both lawyers to the bench. A machine is turned on so that I cannot hear what they're saying, and neither can the jury. When they finish, though, it's after much hand waving and a dark flush on Kennedy's face. But the record is handed to the clerk to be entered as evidence.

  "Dr. Atkins, can you tell us what you're looking at?" Kennedy asks.

  "It's a newborn screening test result," the pediatrician says, sifting through the pages. Then she stops. "Oh, my God."

  "Is there any particular finding of interest in the results, Dr. Atkins? The results that didn't get processed because the state lab was closed all weekend? The results you didn't receive until after the death of Davis Bauer?"

  The pediatrician looks up. "Yes. Davis Bauer screened positive for MCADD."

  --

  KENNEDY IS HIGH on herself when court is dismissed that first day. She's talking fast, like she's had four big cups of coffee, and she seems to feel like we won our case, even though the prosecution has only just begun and we haven't started the defense. She tells me I should drink a big glass of wine to celebrate a phenomenal day of testimony, but honestly, all I want to do is go home and crawl into bed.

  My head is aching with images of Davis Bauer, and with the look on Dr. Atkins's face when she realized what the test results said. True, Kennedy had shared them with me two nights ago, but this was even more devastating. To see someone else from the hospital--someone I liked and trusted--silently thinking, If only...It recentered me a little.

  Yes, this is a trial against me.

  Yes, I was blamed for something I shouldn't have been blamed for.

  But at the end of the day, there's still a dead baby. There's still a mama who doesn't get to watch him grow up. I could be acquitted; I could become a shining light for Wallace Mercy's message; I could sue in civil court for damages and get a payout that makes my nerves about Edison's college bills disappear--and still, I would know that nobody had really won this case.

  Because you can't erase the colossal, tragic loss of a life at its very beginning.

  That's what's running through my mind as I wait for the hallways to clear, so that Edison and I can go home without attracting attention. He is waiting for me on a bench outside the conference room. "Where's your aunt?"

  He shrugs. "She said she wanted to get home before the snow really started."

  I glance out the window, where flakes are falling. I've been turned inward so much, I hadn't even noticed an oncoming storm. "Let me just use the restroom," I tell Edison, and I walk down the empty hall.

  I go into the stall and do my business, flush, and come out to wash my hands. Standing at the sink is Odette Lawton. She glances at me in the mirror, puts the cap on her lipstick. "Your lawyer had a good first day," she concedes.

  I don't know what to say, so I just let the hot water run over my wrists.

  "But if I were you, I wouldn't get too complacent. You may be able to convince Kennedy McQuarrie you're Clara Barton, but I know what you were thinking after that racist put you in your place. And they were not healing thoughts."

  It is too much. Something bubbles up inside me, a geyser, a realization. I shut the faucet, dry my hands, and face her. "You know, I have spent my life doing everything right. I have studied hard and smiled pretty and played by the rules to get where I am. And I know you have too. So it is really hard for me to understand why an intelligent, professional African American woman would go out of her way to put down another intelligent, professional African American woman."

  There is a flicker in Odette's eyes, like a breath on a flame. Just as quickly, it's gone, replaced by a steel stare. "This has nothing to do with race. I'm just doing my job."

  I throw my paper towel into the trash, put my hand on the door handle. "Aren't you lucky?" I say. "No one told you you couldn't."

  --

  THAT NIGHT I am sitting at the kitchen table, just lost in my thoughts, when Edison brings me a cup of tea. "What's this for, baby?" I say, smiling.

  "I thought you could use it," he tells me. "You look tired."

  "I am," I confess. "I am so damn tired."

  We both know I'm not talking about the first two days of testimony, either.

  Edison sits down beside me, and I squeeze his hand. "It's exhausting, isn't it? Trying so hard to prove that you're better than they expect you to be?"

  He nods, and I know he understands what I'm saying. "Court's different than I thought it would be, from what I've seen on TV."

  "Longer," I say, at the same time he says, "Boring."

  We both laugh.

  "I was talking a little to that Howard dude, during one of the recesses," Edison says. "It's pretty cool, his job. And Kennedy's. You know, the whole idea that everyone has the right to a good attorney, even if they can't pay for it." He looks at me, a question wreathed around his features. "You think I'd be a good lawyer, Mama?"

  "Well, you're smarter than me, and Lord knows you know how to argue," I tease. "But, Edison, you'll be a star at whatever you choose to do."

  "It's funny," he says. "I'd want to do what they do--work for people who can't afford legal representation. But it's kind of like my whole life has prepared me for the other side, instead--the prosecution."

  "How do you mean?"

  He shrugs. "The State's got the burden of proof," Edison says. "Kind of like we do, every day."

  --

  THE SNOW FALLS hard and fast that night, so that the plows can't keep up, and the world becomes completely white. I wear my winter boots with the same skirt I've worn all week--I've been changing up the blouse--and stuff my dress shoes into a Stop & Shop bag. The radio is full of school closings, and the bus Edison and I have been taking breaks down, so we have to hurry to a different line and transfer twice. As a result, we reach the courthouse five minutes late. I've texted Kennedy, and know we don't have time to sneak in through the back. Instead, she meets me on the steps of the courthouse, where immediately microphones are shoved at me and people call me a killer. Edison's arm comes around me and I duck against his chest, letting him form a barrier.

  "If we're lucky Judge Thunder had trouble digging his car out today," she mutters.

  "It was the public transport sys--"

  "I don't care. You don't give the court any extra reasons to dislike you."

  We race into the courtroom, where Odette is sitting smugly at the prosecution table, looking like she arrived at 6:00 A.M. For all I know, she sleeps here. Judge Thunder enters, bent at the waist, and we all rise. "I was rear-ended by a cretin on the way to work, and as a result, my back is officially out," he says. "My apologies for the delay."

  "Are you all right, Your Honor?" Kennedy says. "Do you need to call a doctor?"

  "As much as I appreciate your display of sympathy, Ms. McQuarrie, I imagine you'd prefer I was incapacitated somewhere in a hospital. Preferably without painkillers available. Ms. Lawton, call your witness before I forgo this judicial bravery and take a Vicodin."

  The first witness for the prosecution today is the detective who interviewed me after my arrest. "Detective MacDougall," Odette begins, after walking him through hi
s name and address, "where are you employed?"

  "In the town of East End, Connecticut."

  "How did you become involved in the case we're examining today?"

  He leans back. He seems to spill over the chair, to fill the entire witness stand. "I got a call from Mr. Bauer, and I told him to come down to the station so I could take his complaint. He was pretty distraught at the time. He believed that the nurse who had been taking care of his son had intentionally withheld emergency care, which led to the baby's death. I interviewed the medical personnel involved in the case, and had several meetings with the medical examiner...and with you, ma'am."

  "Did you interview the defendant?"

  "Yes. After securing an arrest warrant, we went to Ms. Jefferson's house and knocked on the door--loudly--but she didn't come."

  At that, I nearly rise out of my chair. Howard and Kennedy each put a hand on my shoulder, holding me down. It was 3:00 A.M. They did not knock, they pounded until the doorjamb was busted. They held me at gunpoint.

  I lean toward Kennedy, my nostrils flaring. "This is a lie. He is lying on the stand," I whisper.

  "Ssh," she says.

  "What happened next?" asks the prosecutor.

  "No one answered the door."

  Kennedy's hand clamps tighter on my shoulder.

  "We were concerned that she might be fleeing through the back door. So I advised my team to use the battering ram to gain entrance to the home."

  "Did you in fact gain entrance and arrest Ms. Jefferson?"

  "Yes," the detective says, "but first we were confronted with a large Black subject--"

  "No," I say under my breath, and Howard kicks me under the table.

  "--whom we later determined to be Ms. Jefferson's son. We were also concerned about officer safety, so we conducted a cursory search of the bedroom, while we handcuffed Ms. Jefferson."

  They tossed aside my furniture. They broke my dishes. They pulled my clothes off hangers. They tackled my son.

  "I advised her of her rights," Detective MacDougall continues, "and read her the charges."

  "How did she react?"

  He grimaces. "She was uncooperative."

  "What happened next?"

  "We brought her to the East End station. She was fingerprinted and photographed and put in a holding cell. Then my colleague, Detective Leong, and I brought her into a conference room and again advised her she had the right to have her lawyer there, to not say anything, and that if she wanted to stop answering questions at any time she was free to do so. We told her that her responses could and would be used in court. And then I asked her if she understood all that. She initialed every paragraph, saying that she did."

  "Did the defendant request an attorney?"

  "Not at that time. She was very willing to explain her version of events. She maintained that she did not touch the infant until he started to code. She also admitted that she and Mr. Bauer did not--how did she put it?--see eye to eye."

  "Then what happened?"

  "Well, we wanted to let her know that we were looking out for her. If it was an accident, we said, just tell us, and then the judge would go easy on her and we could straighten out the mess and she could get on with raising her boy. But she clammed up and said she didn't want to talk anymore." He shrugs. "I guess it wasn't an accident."

  "Objection," Kennedy says.

  Judge Thunder winces, trying to pivot toward the court reporter. "Sustained. Strike the witness's last comment from the record."

  But it hangs in the space between us, like the glow of a neon sign after the plug has been pulled.

  I feel negative pressure on my shoulder and realize Kennedy has released me. She stands in front of the detective. "You had a warrant?"

  "Yes."

  "Did you call Ruth to tell her you'd be coming? Ask her to come voluntarily to the station?"

  "That's not what we do with murder warrants," MacDougall says.

  "What time was your warrant issued?"

  "Five P.M. or so."

  "And what time did you actually get to Ruth's house?"

  "About three A.M."

  Kennedy looks at the jury as if to say, Can you believe this? "Any particular reason for the delay?"

  "It was fully intentional. One of the tenets of law enforcement is to go when someone is least expecting you. That disarms the suspect and moves the process along."

  "When you knocked on Ruth's door, then, and she didn't immediately welcome you with a coffee cake and a big hug, is it possible that was because she was fast asleep at three in the morning?"

  "I can't speak to the defendant's sleep habits."

  "The cursory search you did...in fact didn't you actually empty the drawers and cabinets and knock over furniture and otherwise destroy Ms. Jefferson's home when she was handcuffed and unable to access any weapon?"

  "You never know when a weapon might be within someone's reach, ma'am."

  "Isn't it also true that you pushed her son to the ground and pulled his arms behind his back to subdue him?"

  "That's standard procedure for officer safety. We didn't know that was Ms. Jefferson's son. We saw a large, angry Black youth who was visibly upset."

  "Really?" Kennedy says. "Was he wearing a hoodie too?"

  --

  JUDGE THUNDER STRIKES that comment from the record, and when Kennedy sits down, she looks just as surprised by her outburst as I am. "Sorry," she murmurs. "That just slipped out." The judge, though, is furious. He calls counsel up for a sidebar. There is a noise machine again that prevents me from hearing what he says, but from the color of his face, and the full-throttle anger as he laces into my lawyer, I know he didn't ask her up there to praise her.

  "That," Kennedy tells me, a little white around the gills when she returns, "is why you don't bring up race in a courtroom."

  Judge Thunder decides that his back spasm merits adjournment for the rest of the day.

  Because of the snow, it takes us longer to get home. When Edison and I turn the corner on our block, we are damp and exhausted. A man is trying to dig out his car using only his gloved hands. Two neighborhood boys are in the thick of a snowball fight; one missile smacks against Edison's back.

  There is a car sitting in front of our house. It's a black sedan with a driver, which isn't something you see very often around here, at least not once you get off the Yale campus. As I approach, the rear door opens and a woman stands up. She is wearing a ski parka and furry boots and is buried under a layer of wool--a hat, a scarf. It takes me a moment to realize that this is Christina.

  "What are you doing here?" I ask, truly surprised. In all the years I've been in East End, Christina has not come to visit. In all the years, I haven't invited her.

  It's not that I'm ashamed of my home. I love where I live, how I live. It's that I did not think I could handle the excessive way she'd exclaim about how cute the space was, how cozy, how me.

  "I've been in court for the last two days," she admits, and I'm shocked. I've scanned that gallery. I haven't noticed her there, and Christina is very hard to overlook.

  She unzips her coat, revealing a ratty flannel shirt and baggy jeans, as far away from her couture sheaths as possible. "I wore camouflage," she says, smiling shyly. She looks over my shoulder, to Edison. "Edison! My God, I haven't seen you since you were shorter than your mother..."

  He jerks his chin, an awkward hello.

  "Edison, why don't you go inside?" I suggest, and when he does, I meet Christina's gaze. "I don't understand. If the press found out that you were here--"

  "Then I'd tell them to go screw themselves," she says firmly. "The hell with Congress. I told Larry I was coming, and that it wasn't negotiable. If anyone from the press asks, I'm just going to tell them the truth: that you and I go way back."

  "Christina," I ask again, "what are you doing here?"

  She could have texted. She could have called. She could have simply sat in the courtroom to lend moral support. But instead, she has been waiting in fr
ont of my door for God knows how long.

  "I'm your friend," she says quietly. "Believe it or not, Ruth, this is what friends do." She looks up at me, and I realize she has tears in her eyes. "What they said happened to you--the police breaking in. The handcuffs. The way they attacked Edison. I never imagined..." She falters, then gathers up the weeds of her thoughts and offers me the saddest, truest bouquet. "I didn't know."

  "Why would you?" I reply--not angry, not hurt, just stating a fact. "You'll never have to."

  Christina wipes at her eyes, smearing her mascara. "I don't know if I ever told you this story," she says. "It's about your mother. It was a long time ago, when I was in college. I was driving back home from Vassar for Thanksgiving break, and there was a hitchhiker on the side of the road on the Taconic Parkway. He was a Black man, and he had a bum leg. He was literally walking on crutches. So I pulled over and asked if he needed a ride. I took him all the way to Penn Station, so that he could get on a train to visit his family in D.C." She folds her coat more tightly around her. "When I got home, and Lou came into my room to help me unpack, I told her what I'd done. I thought she'd be proud of me, being a Good Samaritan and all. Instead, she got so angry, Ruth! I swear, I'd never seen her like that. She grabbed my arms and shook me; she couldn't even speak at first. Don't you ever, ever do that again, she told me, and I was so shocked I promised I wouldn't." Christina looks at me. "Today I sat in that courtroom and I listened to that detective talk about how he busted in your door in the middle of the night and pushed you down and held back Edison and I kept hearing Lou's voice in my head, after I told her about the Black hitchhiker. I knew your mama reacted that way to me because she was scared. But all these years, I thought she was trying to keep me safe. Now, I know she was trying to keep him safe."

  I realize that for years, I've made the assumption that Christina looks at me as someone from her past to be tolerated, an unfortunate to be helped. As children I felt like we were equals. But as we got older, as we became more aware of what was different about us, instead of what was similar, I felt a wedge drive between us. I secretly criticized her for making judgments about me and my life without asking me questions directly. She was the diva and I was the supporting player in her story. But I conveniently forgot to point out to myself that I was the one who'd cast her in that role. I'd blamed Christina for building that invisible wall without admitting I'd added a few bricks of my own.