The Good Listener

by B. M. Hardin

  “Try to enjoy your night.”

  “Yeah; because it’s going to be my last night as a free woman. What am I going to do in prison?

  What would I do behind bars with real murderers, and everything else in between? How am I supposed to survive something like that? I’m not going to make it. I’m not going to prison.”

  “Hannah, there are a thousand things that I could say to try to make you feel better, but the reality is that twelve people have your fate in their hands, and all we can do is hope that they rule in our favor.”

  “But they won’t. You and I both know that they won’t. They are going to convict me. They are going to try to send me to jail, but I’m not going. I swear to you that I’m not going.”

  “Everything is going to be fine,” he lied.

  “Thank you, Calvin. For everything that you have done for me. For stepping in with no questions asked and believing me from the very beginning. I’ll make sure that you have your check for all of your hard work in the morning.”

  “You don’t owe me anything. I owed your father for a favor he’d done for me back in the day. Consider it my debt paid.”

  I attempted to smile and walked away from my lawyer as Joel pulled up in the car.

  I wasn’t going to prison.

  I wouldn’t last a day behind bars, and there was just no way that I was going.

  Especially for something that I didn’t do.

  “Did you do it? Did you do something to Summer? It doesn’t really matter. Everyone believes that I did it. All of the evidence says that I did something to her. I just want to know the truth from you. Did you get rid of her because she was pregnant Joel?”

  Of course, he’d heard that part during the trial, but we hadn't discussed it.

  He took a while to respond.

  “No. I didn’t do anything to her. If she was pregnant, it wasn’t mine.”

  “You don’t have to lie anymore.”

  “Sure. I lied about the affair. Yes, I lied about the vasectomy. It was only because of my childhood. It was so many kids and never enough. You just never know what life will throw your way and having a lot of kids just made things harder. So, I’d always told myself that I didn’t want any. Even before you, that’s how I felt. And I couldn’t tell you that because you’d already stated that you wanted kids eventually, so I got a vasectomy without telling you. But then something happened to me, deep within my heart, and I started to want them, so I had it reversed. I thought a child was what we needed. And then I started doing what I was doing with Summer and changed my mind again, but I never had sex with her without protection. I wouldn’t have done that to you. I wouldn’t have had a baby with another woman.”

  “But you would sleep with another woman?”

  “That’s different.”

  “No. It’s just as bad.”

  “But having a baby with another woman would have been much worse. If she was pregnant, I knew nothing about it. And if she was, it was not my baby Hannah.”

  “Then where is she? If you didn’t do anything to her where is she Joel? Where is she!”

  I screamed with all of my might and started to cry.

  This just had to be a dream.

  This wasn’t happening to me.

  “I don’t know Hannah.”

  I wanted to hit him.

  And so I did.

  He tried to shield himself as he drove but I couldn’t control myself.

  I didn’t care if he wrecked and killed us both.

  At least he would be getting what he deserved for getting me into this mess and at least I wouldn’t be headed to prison.

  “I hate you! I hate you!”

  I screamed and cried.

  “This is your fault, and I hate you!”

  There was no point in pretending to like him anymore to get information out of him.

  I hadn't gotten anything anyway.

  “I know. I hate myself too. If it hadn't been for my affair, you wouldn’t be a suspect in her disappearance. I’m sorry Hannah.”

  But even so, what about all of the other evidence?

  Either way, it would have looked like I did something to her. The only difference would be that they would be scrambling to figure out a motive.

  Since I wanted to spend my last night at home, we headed in that direction.

  We’d been at the hotel for weeks in hopes of having some kind of privacy, but now it didn’t matter.

  I just wanted to go home.

  I wanted to go to the house that I’d designed and watched them build from the ground up for over a year; the house that I thought that I was going to raise a family in and grow old in.

  Arriving, there were news vans parked all over the place.

  It was as though they’d figured that I would want to come home and spend my last night there too.

  “Let’s just go.”

  “No.”

  I got out of the car and stood there.

  The van doors opened, and at least a dozen reporters headed in my direction.

  This was my last attempt to tell my side without lawyers jumping all over me and trying to change my words around.

  “Dr. Lewis where is Summer Waters?”

  “Did you kill her?”

  “Was she pregnant by your husband?”

  “How long did they have an affair?”

  “Dr. Lewis…”

  I covered my ears and screamed as loud as I could.

  “Quiet!”

  Abruptly all of the chattering stopped as Joel joined me at my side.

  I allowed tears to fall from my eyes as the cameras shined in my face, and the mics stretched toward my mouth.

  “The only thing that I am guilty of is being an angry wife who was betrayed by her husband and her friend. I did not kill Summer Waters, and I do not know where she is. I didn’t do anything to anyone. I don’t know why everything looks as though I did it. The only thing I can think of is that I am being framed. And I’m begging the jurors tomorrow not to send an innocent woman to prison. I don’t deserve to go to prison. I don’t deserve any of this. I’m innocent.”

  And with that, I didn’t say anything else.

  I took off running for the house, let myself in, and I ran all the way to the bedroom and locked the door behind me.

  “Why! Why!”

  I screamed over and over again, and anything that I could get my hands on either became well acquainted with the bedroom floor or the walls.

  Joel banged on the door, but I ignored him.

  I continued to scream as Joel started to kick the door and throw his body up against it.

  I stopped destroying the room, and I pressed my back against the door to ensure that he couldn’t get in.

  “Hannah!”

  “Leave me alone Joel.”

  “Hannah!”

  “Just go away. Just go away.”

  “Please. Please. Open the door. I’m so sorry. I swear I’m so sorry.”

  “Yeah me too. I’m sorry that I ever married you.”

  With my words, he stopped banging and pushing against the door.

  I heard what sounded like sobbing, but what was he crying about?

  His life wasn’t over.

  Mine was.

  He wasn’t the one going to prison.

  I was.

  After some time, the front door slammed, and I came out of the room.

  I looked out the window, and I watched him back out of the driveway.

  He stopped in the middle of the road. He just sat there.

  I watched him as he placed his hands over his face and he just sat there. It wasn’t until a car pulled behind him, that he finally drove off. I stood there until I couldn’t see his car anymore.

  Sure.

  He probably felt terrible that I was in this situation because of him screwing Summer or maybe he felt guilty that he was setting me up. A blind man could see that I was being framed. I knew that I was being framed and didn’t know why or by who, but I knew t
hat I was.

  But unfortunately, no one was listening to me.

  Ensuring that the door was locked, I looked around the living room at all of the pictures of us on the wall.

  We looked so happy.

  We looked so in love.

  During most of them we were but during some of the others, we were simply pretending.

  We were pretending to be a happily married couple when really we hadn't been happy in a long time.

  This wasn’t what was supposed to happen.

  This wasn’t what life was supposed to be like.

  I grabbed one of our wedding pictures from the wall.

  It was my favorite one.

  The one that I’d always said told me everything that I’d needed to know about my marriage to Joel.

  The picture that said that he was going to love me, take care of me and do everything that he’d promised me that he would do in our vows.

  But he’d lied.

  I headed to the kitchen with the photo in my hand.

  Finding a knife, I stabbed the glass over and over again and proceeded to stab holes in Joel’s face.

  For someone who was unemployed, he was always gone.

  And he never wanted to tell me where he was going, and if I called him while he was out, he never answered.

  I thought to prove my theory and call him but there was no point.

  Laying the picture on the kitchen counter, I took the knife with me to the bathroom.

  I ran a bath as I sat on the toilet and cried.

  I cried so much, so hard and for so long that the water started to overflow, and I didn’t notice until the entire bathroom floor was soaking wet.

  I undressed.

  But I headed back to the living room and turned on TV.

  I stood there for about ten minutes, waiting for the 6 o’clock news break.

  There I was.

  The very first story.

  The headline said “The Good Listener…or the Good Killer?”

  The nerve of these people.

  I listened to myself and then I listened to the reporters’ opinions. One of them said that words didn’t mean anything. But actions and evidence told it all.

  Summer’s parents spoke and said that they just wanted justice for their daughter.

  I’d seen them during court.

  They’d testified that Summer had been troubled in her youth but that she had changed her life.

  They also felt insulted that I was being referred to as Summer’s friend and not just her boss.

  They’d said that I couldn’t have been much of a friend when Summer never bothered to bring me to meet them, and they confirmed that they’d lived in the same town the entire time.

  Why had Summer lied about where her parents lived?

  The last comment I heard was that whether my husband betrayed me or not, I still didn’t have the right to take someone’s life.

  They were right.

  I didn’t.

  Which is exactly why I hadn't done anything to her.

  I walked back to the bathroom, and I didn’t hesitate to get into the now chilled water in the bathtub.

  I sat there for a while, just to think.

  I saw my mother’s and my father’s faces as they looked at me as though they were disappointed in me.

  I’d disappointed them.

  After all, they’d done for me and all of the opportunities they’d given me I hadn't been able to make it count when it really mattered.

  I’d hired and befriended a whore.

  One patient of mine committed suicide.

  Another one had probably killed someone and was probably going to do it again.

  My husband had more than likely a murdered his pregnant mistress and set me up to take the fall.

  And tomorrow, tomorrow I was going to be sentenced to years in prison.

  I looked at the knife that I had been holding the entire time in my hand.

  I twirled it around between my fingers for a second and then I made a deep cut on my right wrist.

  The blood oozed down my right arm as I cut my left.

  I allowed the knife to hit the floor as I eased down into the tub and closed my eyes.

  I concentrated on the feeling and the tingling sensation that I was getting in my arms.

  After a while, I tried to open my eyes, but I couldn’t.

  They were heavier than they had ever been before.

  Thoughts were racing through my head and then suddenly, there was nothing there.

  I couldn’t see anyone’s faces.

  I couldn’t even remember my own.

  I took a long deep breath, and everything was quiet.

  And for the first time, in a long time, everything was better.

  But suddenly I heard something.

  Maybe it was footsteps.

  And then I heard chatting.

  And the chatter was headed in my direction.

  I tried to make out the words, but I didn’t have time.

  I passed out…

  “Mrs. Lewis?”

  I looked up to see Officer Parks, Calvin, and a doctor.

  I felt woozy.

  I had an excruciating headache, and my arms felt heavy.

  I tried to lift them, but I noticed that one of my hands was handcuffed to the bed.

  “Mrs. Lewis, can you hear me?”

  I looked around the room and noticed that Joel wasn’t there.

  I was disappointed.

  Not by his absence.

  But because I was still alive.

  “You tried to kill yourself,” the doctor said.

  “Yeah, I know. And I couldn’t even do that right.”

  “Act of the guilty,” Officer Parks said.

  “Officer Parks, please leave the room if you don’t mind. The objective is to keep her calm,” the doctor asked.

  “Fine. But I’ll be right outside. You will make it to court tomorrow.”

  My lawyer and the doctor looked at him with disgust.

  “Where is Joel?”

  “I don’t know. I called him once the police informed me that you were here because they couldn’t reach him either. He hasn’t picked up his cell. I left him a message. Why? Why would you do something like this Hannah?”

  I shook my head.

  “Do you even have to ask? I can’t go to prison for something that I didn’t do. I just can’t.”

  “There are other options, Hannah. Killing yourself isn’t the answer.”

  “It’s the only answer that I have.”

  Being that I was a psychologist, I would have never imagined that I would have done something so extreme.

  But I had, and I didn’t regret it.

  I just wished that I had succeeded.

  “So, if you haven’t talked to him, how did I get here?”

  “911 said that they got an anonymous call saying that you, specifically, needed help. They said that you were inside, about to kill yourself and gave your address. When the ambulance and police got there, they found the front door wide open, and they found you in the bathtub, passed out and bleeding.”

  What?

  The front door was wide open?

  I was for certain that I had locked it.

  I’d checked it just before going into the kitchen to get the knife, and I’d glanced at it again on my way to the bathroom after watching the news.

  Who could have known that I was about to kill myself?

  Had someone been there the whole time?

  I didn’t say anything as Joel came running in the room.

  “What happened? What happened Hannah?”

  He looked concerned.

  He smelled like a gallon of alcohol.

  He had been drinking.

  That couldn’t be a good thing.

  “Why would you try to kill yourself, Hannah? Why would you do that?”

  “If I go to prison I may as well be dead.”

  “That was so stupid of you to do.”

  I g
lared at him.

  “What would I do if I’d lost you, Hannah?”

  “You’re about to lose me anyway. I lost you a long time ago.”

  And after I said those words, I didn’t say anything else for the rest of the night.

  I just laid there and ignored everything and everyone as I thought of ways that I could somehow make another attempt at death.

  No matter what, I wasn’t going to prison.

  Not now.

  Not tomorrow.

  Not ever.

  And somehow I was going to make sure of that.

  ~***~

  I was already crying because I already knew what the verdict was going to be.

  Calvin had managed to get the court date pushed back few days, considering that the hospital wanted to put me on a suicide watch.

  “Jury how do you find the defendant?”

  I didn’t hear anything until she said…

  “Guilty.”

  My heart dropped, and I started to scream.

  The courtroom grew loud and immediately I looked in the direction of Mr. Calvin and Joel.

  I shook my head.

  I didn’t do this!

  I didn’t do anything!

  I screamed louder and louder as the officer approached me to take me away at the judge’s request.

  “I’m innocent! Please, I’m innocent!” I yelled as the officer tried to restrain me.

  I fell to my knees, and he struggled to try to stand me back up.

  This was insane!

  They were about to put an innocent woman behind bars, and no one even cared.

  “No! Please! I didn’t do anything. I didn’t kill anybody!”

  Still, no one listened.

  Everyone seemed to be talking, but no one seemed to be listening.

  My life flashed before my eyes as I continued to try to fight off the officer, but after forcefully being pulled back up to stand on my own two feet, I gave up.

  I stopped moving and stood still as he grabbed my arm.

  I glanced at Calvin and then stared at Joel.

  He was crying too and mouthing something to me that I couldn’t make out.

  Not that I was even trying to.

  He and Calvin didn’t even wait around to see them take me away.

  Once they exited the doors, I looked at the prosecutors that had convinced my peers to put me away and then something caught my eye.

  I closed my eyes and opened them again in a hurry.

  She was still there.

  It was her.