Mothers and Other Liars

by Amy Bourret

  A uniformed agent runs interference inside the secured area, but once they cross through to the main terminal, they are on their own. John leans over Ruby like an umbrella, trying to protect her from pelting questions. “Keep your head down and your mouth shut,” he hisses over the din.

  Ruby stares at the carpet fibers sliding under her feet, trying to ignore the microphones waving around by her ear. Shoes. Lots of shoes. Down-in-the-heels Hush Puppies, shiny loafers. And a pair of black-and-white Barbie heels. She recognizes these shoes; in her peripheral vision she sees a slash of tight crimson skirt—Little Miss Red Suit. John whisks Ruby down an escalator, past merry-go-rounds carrying baggage instead of horses, and out the door into a furnace of Dallas air. He waves to a taxicab parked at the curb, and when it pulls forward, hustles her inside.

  In the backseat of the cab, she leans her head against cracked vinyl, closes her eyes and breathes the pine-in-a-can air, in out in out. Beside her, John sputters an apology, says his “soon-to-be-latest ex-receptionist” must have given out their flight information to a cunning caller. Up front, a scrawny dark-faced driver shouts into a cell phone in a gutteral language, competing with the crackles and squeals from a CB radio and the pulsing bass from the dashboard radio.

  Ruby tunes out all of it. She scrunches her eyes against the spectacle etched on her lids and breathes.

  FIFTY-THREE

  The court house conference room is icebox cold. The cramped space smells of sweat and fear and anger. Ruby sits on a scarred wooden chair at a scarred wooden table. Across from her, John reemphasizes points about the hearing to come, talking in the comforting tones of her obstetrician just before he puts her feet in the stirrups. But all Ruby can concentrate on is why her precious daughter has not come through the door.

  John’s words are hard to hear through the tick of the clock in Ruby’s head. He gripes about having to relinquish his cell phone at the metal detector, looks at his watch. “This is ridiculous. They’re playing games.” He stands. “It’s a bit like running to Daddy, which can be trouble in someone else’s jurisdiction, but I’ll go check with the judge’s clerk.”

  Ruby puts her head down on the table. And waits.

  She jerks up at the click of the door handle, turns to receive John’s update. Instead she sees five and a half feet of slickness, a too-shiny suit, a bad comb-over, a self-important sneer. The Tinsdales’ civil lawyer, she guesses, the bulldog street fighter with his eye on a slice of political pie. Then Lark rushes past him and into her arms.

  Ruby hugs her daughter, still her daughter, always her daughter, sinks her face into Lark’s hair. She runs her hands down arms, across hips, wanting to touch every molecule of her child. Behind Lark, John reenters the room, glares at the short stack of smugness. “Let’s give them some privacy.” John practically shoves the other lawyer into the hall and closes the door behind them.

  The miracle in front of her requires all of Ruby’s focus. She lays her hands on Lark’s pale cheeks, winces at the charcoal smudges beneath Saint Bernard eyes. “Oh, baby,” Ruby says, “Oh, my sweet baby bird.”

  Lark’s eyes brim, but the tears don’t spill over. Ruby pulls Lark’s head onto her chest, presses her daughter’s forehead against her own breaking heart. They stay like this for several minutes until Ruby catches movement from the corner of her eye. On the other side of the gritty window, a matronly court clerk, a stack of manila file folders wedged in the crook of her arm, gestures to John, points down the corridor.

  The door opens and John steps in. “I’m sorry,” he says. “We have to go. Now.”

  Mr. Smug sidesteps his squat form past the clerk, around John, tugs at Lark’s shoulder. Lark raises her head from Ruby’s chest; her noodle arms drop to her side. She inches her face closer to Ruby’s until they are almost nose to nose. And Ruby looks into those same soulful eyes that stared out at her from that rest stop trash barrel almost a decade ago. Those same eyes, peeling away the layers of Ruby’s soul, begging her not to disappoint them. Again. “Do something,” Lark whispers before she shakes off Mr. Smug’s meaty hand, turns, and walks out the door.

  FIFTY-FOUR

  The U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Texas looks like a television star—tall, trim body, a face a sculptor would love. His eyes burn with the fervor of a man on a mission; unfortunately this particular mission is to slay Ruby on his way to being elected the state’s attorney general. John warned her about this, that the chief prosecutor would first-chair this media-ripe trial instead of handing off the case to one of his assistants. Even his name, Stanwick Noble, is marquee material.

  He plays this day to a full house. Every bench in the room is crammed with reporters, some with sketch pads, some with note pads, all rapt in anticipation of the spectacle. Thankfully, because this is a federal proceeding, cameras are prohibited in the courtroom, which itself looks like the set of a television drama—rich, gleaming woods, polished marble, a crisp American flag that has never suffered the indignities of sun and rain and wind. In the marble behind the judge’s platform, four words are etched. In God we trust. God, her lawyer, a supposedly merciful judge, the superpowered crystal that Zara, the woo-woo salon receptionist gave her, which Ruby stashed in her bra for good measure. Ruby will put her trust in any of them, all of them, if only she had enough trust to spread around.

  A young woman walks through the low swinging door from the gallery, a box crammed with notebooks and files banging against her suit skirt. She hefts the box on the table next to Noble, sorts its contents into stacks, takes the seat beside him. His second chair; John told her to expect this, too. The one who does all the work while Noble reaps the spotlight and the glory.

  Ruby steals a glance to the seats behind the young prosecutor. A fortyish blonde, tousled hair bigger than she is, sits next to an older man, sixty maybe, silver hair slicked back from a tan forehead. He looks like an ex-quarterback for whom exercise, and appearances, are religion. His arm encircles the woman’s shoulders as if she is his property. The Tinsdales.

  The archived newspaper articles reported their ages, but the difference, here in front of her, is striking. The couple is flanked by a younger blonde, a sister perhaps, and an older woman with dyed-brown hair, shiny face-lift skin, and daytime pearls. Ruby sees nothing of Lark, her Lark, in any of these people. Before Ruby turns back, Darla Tinsdale looks toward her. Her expression is hazy, unreadable.

  “Oyez, oyez. All rise.”

  John grasps Ruby’s elbow as the bailiff speaks, steadies her to standing as the judge enters with all the pomp she expected the first time. The judge is gray-haired and ruddy complected. The charges against her—kidnapping, the lesser included offense of transporting a minor across state lines, possession of fraudulent identification documentation—barrel out of the bailiff’s mouth, bounce around the chamber. Ruby still can’t quite believe that she is the person this clerk is talking about. It all sounds so, well, criminal.

  At John’s nudging, she enters her plea. “Not guilty.”

  “You may be seated.” The judge’s voice sounds younger than he looks; perhaps being a federal judge, like the American president, ages a person in fast-forward. He greets the lawyers, then raises a palm. “Before we bring in the potential jurors, I see that the room is full of our dear friends from the media. Let me make one thing perfectly clear: I will not allow my courtroom to devolve into a circus. I’m not going to clear the courtroom, because I don’t believe it is warranted. Yet. But I remind you that there is a young child, an innocent child, involved here, and I will brook no nonsense, absolutely none. Have I made myself clear?”

  Both John and the prosecutor stand. “Yes, Your Honor,” they say in unison.

  The judge leans over his tabletop, picks up a pen. “Okay, then. Let’s get on with this.”

  And at that precise moment, it hits Ruby. All that she has lost, all that she has at stake. She thought that she could—that she needed—to do this alone. But she wishes she hadn’t made Chaz and th
e Ms promise to stay in Santa Fe as the echoes of loss and doubt and fear, Ruby’s own and all those defendants who came before her, ricochet off the marble walls.

  FIFTY-FIVE

  The rest of the morning passes in a blur of John and the prosecutor taking turns questioning members of the jury pool, moving to strike certain prospects, telling the judge that this one or that one is acceptable to his side. Throughout, Ruby sits, hands clasped on top of the defense table. So much hate and violence and fear and intimidation is embedded in the grain beneath her palms, so much bitterness that even she couldn’t give this miserable wood a new happy life. She tries to shutter her discomfort, radiate innocence and goodness in her body language, on her face, for the jurors who study her as if she were an extraterrestrial species, as if they could never imagine themselves in this chair.

  And all the while, Lark’s voice whispers in her head. Do something.

  Just before noon, John and Noble settle on the twelve individuals who will determine Ruby’s fate, and the judge swears in and gives instructions to the jury, then dismisses them for lunch. Ruby watches as they file out, five women, seven men, five African American, five Hispanic, one Asian, and one lone Caucasian. The jury of her peers who will judge her as surely as Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates.

  Over sandwiches at a deli in the office building across from the court house, John tells Ruby he feels good about the jury panel. He had been concerned about women; while they may be sympathetic to Ruby’s motive in wanting to protect Lark, they may also be sympathetic to the Tinsdales, have suffered the loss of a child, in some form or other, themselves.

  Pieces of tuna cling to the roof of Ruby’s mouth like barnacles that the tide of her bottled water must labor to wash away. She readjusts her headband—Margaret’s contribution to the young-and-sweet package—so that it digs into a different part of her scalp. At least the throbbing behind her ears reminds her that she is alive; the rest of her feels numb, detached. John talks more about the jury, what to expect this afternoon. And Ruby struggles to hear him through the noise in her head.

  She follows John through the throngs of worker bees, out of the deli. Walking outside is like stepping into the tenth circle of Hell. Angry heat slaps against her shins, burns through the soles of the navy pumps she again borrowed from Antoinette. No wonder the sidewalks are as deserted as if under siege; summer is war in Dallas. Ruby follows John across the street, walking in someone else’s shoes, wearing someone else’s clothes, makeup. Living her own nightmare.

  FIFTY-SIX

  Back in the courtroom, Ruby can feel the press of press as the judge calls the court to order, spouts some legal stuff, procedures and mandates and timetables. Her head feels as if it has been stuffed with peanut butter. The judge’s words buzz without meaning, compete with the echo of Lark’s plea. Do something. Do something. Do something.

  She clasps both hands across her belly as if in bedtime prayer. Here is what matters, she tells herself again and again and again, her daughter-to-be. And Lark, wherever she is in this huge, overwhelming city.

  As the judge calls for opening statements, the prosecutor buttons his suit jacket, steps out from behind his table. He starts in about a heinous crime, a grave injustice. This poor, poor couple, their only child abducted in the dead of night, the anguish of not knowing her whereabouts for almost ten years. His church-choir baritone thunders with indignation, injustice.

  Ruby stiffens against the wooden seat; John places a cautioning hand on her knee. “Nine birthdays, nine Christmases. Nine years of not knowing where their child was, whether she was even alive.” Noble nods toward the jury on each “nine.” “These parents, their child, deserve the justice that we are asking, that you must mete out today.” His words hover around the courtroom like barroom smoke after he sits, until they are crowded out by the scritching and scratching and rustling from the crowd.

  The judge motions for John to make his statement. He stands beside Ruby and places a hand on her shoulder. He stays there behind the table, beside her, radiating a quiet dignity. His statement is simple: “We have every sympathy for the pain of the parents, but, with respect, Ruby Leander did not steal that car in Dallas. She rescued a baby abandoned in a trash can. Her only intent was to protect that child, and she has done so, admirably and with deepest love.”

  With love. Truly Ruby loves every inch of that child. This morning, the only sensation that penetrated the ache of losing Lark was the thrill of seeing her again. Even though that joy was tempered by the agony that after today, Ruby never may see her daughter again. Yet now she can’t even find her own pain, so consumed is she with the despair on Lark’s ashen face.

  Ruby’s focus clarifies as Philip Tinsdale is called to the stand. He strides across the floor, leaving a vapor trail of too-flowery cologne, and climbs into the mahogany witness stand, a man used to getting his way. He wears his Italian suit like as if it was made for him, which it probably was. He straightens a tasteful silk tie, unbuttons his jacket, a paragon of cool in the hot seat. The prosecutor asks him to describe the circumstances of that fateful night, and he launches into his own well-rehearsed oration, about his sweet wife driving a teething baby around and around—

  John stands, interrupts. “Objection, Your Honor. Hearsay.”

  Before the judge can respond, Tinsdale interjects. “My wife is in no condition to testify. She…she’s never forgiven herself.” His voice tinkles with razors and broken glass. As if his wife actually had something to forgive; as if it were he who could not forgive her. As if maybe Mr. Cool was in fact a hothead in a Mr. Cool suit.

  The judge cautions Noble to control his witness, says he’s inclined to sustain the objection.

  “Your Honor,” Noble says, “Mrs. Tinsdale was hysterical when she called her husband that night, told him what had happened. As such, her statements to her husband are admissible under the excited utterance exception to the hearsay rule.”

  “Then, Your Honor,” John chimes in, “we would further object to this testimony on the grounds of relevance. The prosecution is not suggesting that Ms. Leander had anything to do with the carjacking incident itself, so it is irrelevant to the charges before the court.”

  Noble jumps in place as if he were goosed from behind. “Chain of custody, Your Honor. This testimony is relevant to establish that the victims lost possession of their child through no fault of their own, that they never relinquished custody to the defendant.”

  The judge pauses, sips from the glass of water beside him. “I’ll allow it.”

  The trial, Ruby thinks, is like a tennis match, spectators’ attention bouncing from lawyer to lawyer to judge. On this court, in this court, though, the ball being whacked around is Ruby.

  FIFTY-SEVEN

  She zombies out again as Noble continues to question Tinsdale. A few words here and there pierce the dense fog in her head, Darla distraught, bedridden, the agony of the unknown, unable to conceive another child, adoption agencies turning them down. A few head-shaking objections from John.

  Like Molly, Tinsdale talks with his hands; Ruby follows the shiny square of light reflected from his shiny gold watch as it bounces from the ceiling to the back of the court reporter’s head and up the wall again. He’s a lefty, Ruby notes; the watch bands his right wrist. That may be the one trait he and Lark share; she’s as left-handed as they come. Ruby can’t seem to process the words flying around her, but this she notices, this and the fact that her observations are so ludicrous.

  When Noble finishes, John stands, approaches Tinsdale. “Mr. Tinsdale, I am sorry for the ordeal you and your wife have been through. I have just a few questions for you. Do you have any reason to believe that Ms. Leander had anything at all to do with the horrific carjacking where your daughter was taken?”

  Tinsdale leans forward like a bully. “No, but—”

  “And when your daughter returned to you, was she well nourished?” Ruby doesn’t cringe when John again calls Lark their daughter; by law and DNA, Lark is th
eir child.

  “Yes.”

  “Educated appropriately for her age?”

  This time Tinsdale almost spits the “yes.”

  John shifts his body toward the jurors, makes eye contact with a few of them before turning back to Tinsdale. “So she appeared to have been well cared for, loved even?”

  Noble jumps to his feet like his football team just fumbled a ball. “Objection! Mr. Tinsdale is not a psychologist.”

  John clasps his hands, tilts his head as if humoring a petulant child. “I’m not asking for a psychiatric profile, Your Honor. Just a parent’s impressions.”

  “Overruled.” The judge scribbles on his pad. “The witness will answer the question.”

  Now Tinsdale looks like the petulant child. “I don’t recall the question.”

  John steps toward the witness stand again. “Is your impression, as a parent, that Ms. Leander took good care of the physical and emotional health of your daughter?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “That’s all, Your Honor,” John says.

  After Tinsdale glides back to his seat in the gallery, Noble attempts to call several more witnesses, neighbors, friends of the Tinsdales. Each time, John objects to the relevance, and the judge agrees. Finally, the judge admonishes the prosecutor, “Mr. Noble, this is what we call ‘piling on’ where I come from.” His voice takes on a twang that hasn’t been present before. Ruby has noticed this phenomenon in bars in Santa Fe; perhaps exasperation, like alcohol, brings out the long-buried true self in a person. “Do you have any witness who can provide new information, facts actually relevant to the case at bar?”

  Noble slides back behind his table. Ruby can almost see the idea that this was going to be his day in court sliding down his perfect suit to puddle on the floor. “Your Honor, we would offer into evidence a document marked Exhibit A, an affidavit of the superintendent of Santa Fe public schools, attesting to the fact that the child in question currently is enrolled in school in New Mexico. Since the child started out in Texas, ipso facto, she was transported across state lines—”