by Randis, K. L
“I can’t do this again!” I cried. I buried my face. “This can’t be happening, I can’t go through all this again.”
It had been well over a year since I went to the police. I’ve had to stand in front of countless strangers, time and time again, to tell them intimate details about my body and what happened to me. It never got easier, the same words still stuck to the roof of my mouth when I tried to say them, the pain was always full torque.
“You can.” Heather grabbed my shoulders and held back her own tears. “You can because you’re such a strong person. I’ve never seen someone testify the way you do.”
“Miss Heather, we have an issue out here?” The secretary from the front room pointed toward the front of the building as she walked into the office.
“Not now Melinda.”
“Miss but it’s important. It’s the jury. They’re outside the courthouse. They want to talk to Brooke.”
Heather met Melinda’s gaze. “They want to what?”
As I approached the double doors leading to the front of the courthouse I could hear Heather behind me. “My word, in the fifteen years I’ve been here, I’ve never seen anything like this.”
When I stepped outside, I was surrounded and hugged by twelve complete strangers. The women were crying, the men were crying, and they all took turns shaking my hand. “You are the bravest girl we’ve ever met,” said a curly blonde woman.
“Don’t think for one second we didn’t believe you.” A latino man crossed his arms in front of his chest. “We believed you, okay?”
An older man with white hair and a beard to match knelt on the ground in front of me and took my hand in his. “I am so sorry, please forgive me. I had so many questions, and the jury can’t ask questions.” He looked at the other eleven people above him. “I was the one they couldn’t convince. I’m so sorry.”
“I don’t understand.” If they believed me, why didn’t they convict him? Why were they here?
“We’re going to help. We want to meet with the D.A’s office so next time, there’s no questions, no doubt in any jurors mind that that monster is guilty.”
Heathers mouth dropped. “Really?”
Two women pushed to the front of the crowd. “Really. We want to be there when he’s put away. We’ll meet with the lawyer as early as tomorrow if you need us.”
“Wow. Okay, well let’s get your names and numbers then.”
A woman who smelled like jasmine touched my shoulder. “I knew from the second I heard you speak that he was guilty, there was no way I was going to let anyone sway me. I’m sorry we had to put you through that. I was trying to make eye contact with you without coming off as too obvious, to let you know I believed you.”
“I was too,” said the curly haired lady.
“Would explain the stares I was getting,” I confessed. “It kinda looked like you were mad or something though.”
She shook her head. “I’m Dawn, by the way. And don’t worry. Next time, we’ll get him.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
A trial was rescheduled for three months later, should I choose to testify again. I stopped answering my phone and spent the next few days hidden beneath the darkness of my comforter. Calls from my boss went to voicemail and Cristin stopped sending texts after the fifth day.
Over a year was a long time to fight, to constantly have your guard up. The nightmares diminished a bit since I moved out but they came back full force after the hung jury.
“Brooke, you failed your algebra class? Didn’t you go up to pre-calc in high school?” Jason read over the sheet of paper in his hand.
I eyed the print out of my grades sitting on the floor of the bedroom and muffled my response into a pillow. “Apparently some professors have attendance rules. Don’t show up so many times and they fail you.”
“Why didn’t you give him the letters from Heather, she wrote your excuse letters right?”
“I can’t do this anymore.”
I felt Jason’s weight next to me on the bed, but I didn’t look up. He rubbed the top of the comforter that I hid beneath. “What can’t you do?”
“Everything.”
“What’s everything?”
“College, apparently. Court. My family. You.”
“Me?”
I ignored the hurt in his voice. “I can’t do this anymore. It’s too much.”
“You think it would be easier if I wasn’t here?”
“I think it would be easier if I didn’t have to worry about anyone but myself. I screw everything up. Everything is just happening so fast. It’s so hard, all the time. When does it end?”
“You don’t have to worry about me, I’m not going anywhere.” His hand stroked my face and I knew he meant it. “And you didn’t screw anything up. This wasn’t your fault.”
“Really? What’s not my fault?”
Midge told me I would get to a point where I would feel real anger, a fury so deep about everything that I wouldn’t know where it came from. It wasn’t like me to be like that, so I never believed her. Suddenly it was very plausible.
“My mom can barely survive. She’s got four kids living in her house now that she’s struggling to feed because of me. She’s so money hungry all the time she’s sacrificing the relationships she has with her own children just to make a buck. My older brother is in complete denial of everything that has ever happened in our life. Did I tell you that he told me he wouldn’t believe the accusations I was making until a jury decided? He still keeps in contact with Earl, can you believe that? Not to mention that he’s eating himself into a coma. My own siblings don’t even believe me because he’s their father, and it didn’t happen to them, so they can’t even imagine something like that going on right under their nose.”
“You can’t help how they are,” Jason replied.
“Kat has started to cut herself. She told my mom it makes her feel good. And Thomas is in his second juvenile detention center in less than two years. I’m eighteen and engaged but there have been so many times I’ve cried to you, cried to you, over Paul and I don’t even know why.”
I threw my hands up in the air. “How is that fair even to you Jason? I’m failing my classes, I can’t even get my own fiancé to touch me anymore because you’re afraid I’ll start crying or that you’ll do something to sexually trigger me in the wrong way, and I’m pretty sure at this point I don’t even have a job.”
Jason opened his mouth but I cut him off. “Ask me for a list of things I didn’t screw up next time, it’ll be shorter.”
Jason grabbed me on my upper right arm to spin me toward him and I flung myself towards him. “Don’t ever touch me there. Don’t you ever grab my arm like that.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, did I hurt you?” His voice cracked as I placed a hand over where he touched me.
The one time I tried to get away from Earl, the one window of opportunity where I actually fought back, he had grabbed me in the same spot. His grimy hands seized my arm and he was able to pin me back down on the bed like a ragdoll. Jason couldn’t have known that, but I was past any form of rational thinking at that point.
I took the ring off my finger and slammed it down on the desk next to the bed. Jason looked at it, terrified. “Baby you’re upset, I know, but-”
“But what? You’ll never understand. No one will ever understand. I don’t even understand!” I blindly searched for my car keys.
“You can’t drive like that, Brooke you stay, I’ll leave. Please.”
“I need to get out of here.”
The door slammed behind me as I pulled on a jacket. My accelerator touched the floor and I fumbled my phone out of my purse. “Gina!” I cried when she picked up. “I need you.”
***
“So, you finally got angry huh?” Gina filled my second cup of wine. “I was wondering when that was going to happen.”
“I was horrible to him, Gina. He won’t take me back. I wouldn’t take me back.” I swirled my hand and watched t
he wine flow off the sides of the glass like Lou had taught me.
“Oh, he’ll take you back. That’s not even a question. Question is do you want him back?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore.”
“You still think about Paul?”
“I have dreams about him sometimes, I’ve cried to Jason about missing Paul. Isn’t that screwed up? But Jason just tells me he understands that he realizes he was part of my life and he wouldn’t expect me to forget he existed. Then I remember how he treated me when we broke up and I just, I don’t know. Can you love two people at once?”
Gina raised an eyebrow. “You were both so young, ya know?”
I knew Gina wanted me as a daughter-in-law. She always hinted that she thought there would be a day that we would rekindle our relationship, and when we did, she would be anticipating lots of grandbabies.
“I know. I know me and Jason won’t get married anytime soon anyway, I’d lose my financial aid for college.” Gina and I were three glasses of wine in when she approached the next topic.
“You know the jurors are trying to meet with the D.A’s office this week. They can tell Rob exactly what he needs to clarify next time. There’s no way he’ll walk next time, no way.”
“How am I supposed to do that all over again? I’ve been a wreck. I can’t even remember the last time I didn’t have to schedule a day of court into my life. I throw up before going in to see him. The nightmares just won’t go away.”
“Don’t rub your face like that, you’ll get wrinkles. And you will do it again, because you have people there to support you. Would you rather him out on the streets, finding other little girls and boys to molest? I don’t think so.”
“Little boys?”
Gina silenced herself with a gulp of wine.
“What little boys?”
She looked away from me.
“Gina, tell me.”
“Oh God.” She covered her mouth. “I promised I wouldn’t say anything. It’s the wine.”
“Gina!”
“Please don’t tell anyone I told you. Please don’t. There’s a reason why the defense won’t bring up the fact that you passed out and couldn’t remember certain things. They can’t open that bag of worms.”
“I don’t get it.”
“You had a witness. Your brother, Thomas, he walked in on it.”
My mouth dropped.
“He went into your parent’s room to use their bathroom because someone was in the other one. He saw you passed out on the bed and tried to leave the room before Earl saw him. Oh, the wine.”
She pinched the bridge of her nose before continuing. “Earl ran after him, chased him into his bedroom and pinned him up against the wall, asked him if he liked what he saw.”
She waved her hand. “He was raped too. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry no one told you, we wanted him to tell you when he was ready.”
“No, Gina. Oh my God.”
She pulled my hand away from my mouth as she wrapped her arms around me. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have told you.”
“Why isn’t the D.A doing something about this?” My voice carried louder than I expected it to. “Why can’t we let Thomas testify too?”
“He’s been in and out of detention centers. He’s having trouble passing his classes and gets in trouble all the time, he’s lashing out. He’s a textbook example of what an abused child acts like.”
“Exactly!”
Gina handed me a tissue. “He doesn’t have the credibility you do. He didn’t get the help like you did. Do you really think he could sit up there and have a lawyer tell him he was making it up? Or imply that what he was saying was a lie?”
I shook my head as I blew my nose. “Thomas would jump over the stand and kill him.”
“Exactly. Your testimony alone is enough to put him away for a great length of time, Brooke. And if and when he’s ready, there is a long statute of limitations. He can be thirty when he decides to press charges. He’s not there yet.”
It all made sense. Thomas was always asking when and if Earl would be coming back home. He wasn’t asking because he missed him or because he didn’t believe what I was saying. He was asking because he was petrified that he would have to live under the same roof as him again. Thomas and I shared the same nightmares.
Gina bent down beside me. “You have a chance to get justice for you and your family. You can put him away, I know you can. You’re smart and you’re ready. If you can do it one time, you can do it again and again. You won’t let him beat you, not like this.”
She was right. This fight had always been about keeping my siblings safe. I failed to do that by sacrificing myself to Earl. It was a bunch of smoke and mirrors I let myself believe that I was protecting them. He would win if I backed down now, and everything I’ve gone through up until this point would have been for nothing.
I nodded at Gina. “When can we meet with the jurors?”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Two of the jurors met with the D.A’s office for over a week. They hashed out what they thought needed clarification: Was my grandmother in the room like the defense suggested at one point? Where exactly was my mom during all of this? Why didn’t I tell anyone, and when I did, what brought me to do that? Why were my grades so high? They assured Rob that once they clearly delivered the answers to those questions to the next jury, there would be no room for reasonable doubt and a guilty verdict was imminent.
I had some questions of my own for Heather and Rob. “Who do I look at when I’m answering a question? I want to look at the person who asks but I don’t want to look at David. I can feel the jury looking at me, so I don’t know where to look.”
“Talk to the jury,” Rob said, “They’re the ones that need to understand, not myself, not David’s lawyer.”
“And you can always look at me,” Heather suggested. “I’ll be sitting with the previous jurors and family members who are supporting you.”
“Can I use words like penis and rape? Can I say that?”
“You can use whatever words you need to give the jury as much detail as you can. There’s no right or wrong way, you won’t get in trouble in that court room. Not even if you curse, or cry. It’s expected. There’s a lot of emotion,” Rob said.
“Don’t feel like you need to answer a question right away either. If you need to think about it for a few seconds, then do that. There are a lot of dates and specifics that they’ll try and confuse you with. Listen to the question carefully, ask them to repeat it if you need another minute to think.” Heather smiled. “You’ll be okay.”
“I didn’t want to do this again.”
“We know.” Rob rubbed the scruff on his face. “But we’re really glad you are.”
When I walked through the white door of the courtroom again, it wasn’t any easier. I knew what to expect though, so the stares from the jurors were not so intense and I managed to completely ignored Earl when I took my seat on the witness stand.
Rob started first, and we channeled through his questions like we were old pals catching up on each other’s lives. We established that I bought my own car and anything else I needed from working and that I wanted to sleep at my boyfriend’s house because I was scared to go home, not to be rebellious. “Brooke can you please explain to the jury, in detail, what happened during the two incidents you were raped.”
Too ashamed to make eye contact with any of the jurors, I spoke to the wall behind them. My eyes burned when I tried to explain how I was grabbed and pinned down on the bed. By the time I started to explain the second rape, an unfamiliar warmth shot across my chest. I was angry.
I gripped the edge of the witness box, the tone in my voice articulate and betrayed, not caring anymore about the tears that soaked my face. When I finished, I glanced up to make sure the jury was still there, that they had heard me. I caught sight of an older black man with a bald head. A hand covered his mouth, his brow wrinkled in fury.
I steadied myself
for the defense to start. Earl had a new lawyer, again. He struggled to get out of his seat and smoothed his jacket over his protruding belly.
“Brooke, I’m Mr. Solak.” He approached, his eyes told me he wasn’t going to let me go easily. This time, I was ready.
Okay Brooke, here we go. Be precise. Be strong. Be truthful. Be yourself.
Mr. Solak edged his way around a poster board he had on display in front of the jurors. “Brooke, on this diagram of the upstairs of your house, could you please tell me what room this is?” He pointed to my parent’s room.
Be precise.
“That’s the room I was raped in.”
He nodded at first, undoubtedly not expecting to hear that, then frowned and glanced at Rob who’s face tried not to give away that he was smirking.
“Please tell me who slept in this room.”
“Oh, my parents.”
“And what room is this alllll the way down here.” He dragged his finger to the other side of the hallway, stretching out his words as if to say ‘See how much distance is between each room?’
“The room I would hide in. My bedroom.”
The corners of his mouth dropped. “So you expect the jury to believe that Mr. Nolan carried you all the way to his bedroom?”
Be strong.
I looked down at my diminishing figure, and then up at the jury. “Yep. All 95 pounds of me.”
On cue, the jury glanced across the room at Earl, studying his stocky, more than two hundred pound body. Exhilarated that they got my point I positioned myself for more.
Mr. Solak pulled out my grades from high school and asked me to read them out loud. When I was finished he turned to the jury with a smug look. “So your grades actually increased during the time you claim to have been raped.”
It wasn’t a question, or even directed to me, but I spoke up. “Because the only time I was allowed to keep my bedroom door locked is when I was studying. So guess what I did all the time?”
I knew I didn’t fit the classification of what everyone thought a sexually abused child acted or looked like. My coping skills just happened to be funneled into productive outlets instead of destructive ones.
