Grisham's Juror

by Timothy Braatz

  -There’s a green Honda back that way. An old hatchback.

  -That’s it. Thank you. Wait, can I ask you something? Is Roya a Persian name?

  -Yes. How did you know?

  -I don’t know. I have Persian students in my classes, so maybe….

  Okay, my ex-girlfriend told me, but I’m not a stalker, I swear.

  -It means sweet dream.

  Of course it does. Of course it does.

  -That’s really nice.

  She smiled. A real smile.

  -Where do you teach?

  -Dana Hills High.

  -Oh, that’s right. You said that during….

  -During jury selection.

  -Yeah. I thought you said your dog died.

  -What?

  Great. Crash and burn.

  -The other day you told me your dog died, and today you told the judge—

  -I just…I didn’t want the whole world to know.

  I don’t want to overstate the case or jump to conclusions, I don’t want to speculate, I’m no expert witness, but when Roya looked at me and held my gaze, and I didn’t quickly look away or make a joke about how my dog had faked his death for the insurance money, I think she saw me, the real me, not the nervous dork, not the asshole in court. She saw the math teacher who wants his students to succeed. She saw the guy on the paddleboard with tears in his eyes because dolphins are so beautiful. She saw Guillam Fletcher.

  -Why don’t you hop in. I’ll take you to your car.

  Guillam Fletcher is sitting in Roya’s car! I can smell her perfume. I’m inches away from her and I can’t think of a single clever thing to say and it doesn’t matter. She likes me. She trusts me. She noticed the book I was holding.

  -What are you reading?

  -Oh, it’s just a Grisham. Something to pass the time. I don’t normally—

  -Look who’s there.

  She was pointing to several cars leaving the parking lot.

  -What?

  -The defense attorney.

  -Where?

  -In that Lexus.

  6

  The stratagem always works—that’s the other thing I’d come to expect in a Grisham. There will be an elaborate and clever plan, meticulously crafted, which the reader only gradually comes to understand as Grisham reveals it with little twists and turns, and it will go off without a hitch, with no unexpected consequences, no big surprises for the plotter, who has it all laid out from the get-go, he knows what he’s doing. Like Patrick Lanigan. Anticipating his eventual capture, before he fled the country Lanigan recorded conversations and acquired documents implicating his law partners, the federal whistleblower, and a US senator in the embezzlement scheme that had produced the ninety million in the first place, and once he was under arrest in federal custody, it went like clockwork. With the incriminating evidence as leverage against his pursuers, Lanigan offered to return the money plus a little interest to its rightful owner, the federal government, if the charges against him were dropped. He would still walk away with over twenty million—craftily hidden by Eva—thanks to careful investing and frugal living while on the lam. The deal was struck, and Lanigan flew to France, a free man, just as he had scripted it. In fact, Lanigan had been so confident of his ultimate absolution that he had allowed himself to be captured just to get it over with.

  Is Roya part of Richard Wilhite’s plan? Richard gets Sigrid to get Marissa to get me to vote not guilty, and I convince Gramma Jamma and maybe a few other followers, but Cowboy Kevin is a tougher nut to crack. Which is where Roya comes in. With Marissa’s encouragement, I befriend the pretty dental hygienist, help her find her way to not guilty, and the male jurors, Cowboy Kev included, come trailing along in her perfumed wake. That’s it: I persuade the women, Roya wins over the men, Bud Jack goes free, and Richard laughs all the way to the bank, though how he profits from Bud Jack’s release still eluded me.

  My thesis had gaping holes, it’s true, but just because I’d been reading too much Grisham doesn’t mean there wasn’t something going on. Too many odd coincidences were popping up. Like on my drive home. As an experiment, I stayed far to the right, in the slow lane, and when traffic opened up, I kept it at sixty—just like I had telepathically promised Judge Silverson. It was relaxing, actually, not feeling hurried, not worrying about switching lanes or getting past slower vehicles or making a phone call without going off the road. I tuned the radio to the classical music station and basked in the glow of Roya. I could still hear her bubbly laugh after I had thanked her for finding my car.

  -Maybe you should get a GPA.

  -A what?

  -One of those things that tell you where you are.

  -Oh, you mean a GPS. Good idea.

  A shiny black SUV rode up my tail, then cut in front of me and took the next exit, a gas-guzzling maneuver that must have saved the driver all of six seconds. The one-fingered salute as he passed didn’t bother me. The poor guy was stressed, he was the one with the problem, not me, and anyhow my mind was still in Roya’s passenger seat, admiring the handsome contrast between her dark eyes and creamy skin. Maybe I will get a GPS, show her that I take her seriously. When I checked my rear-view mirror, another impatient driver was on my bumper. All these harried people, rushing to work, rushing home, and slowly dying inside. The driver flicked her headlights on and off and raised both hands to signal exasperation and personal affront. Apparently sixty in the slow lane is a public nuisance. Somehow I made it as far as Irvine without inciting a road-rage shooting, stopped at a gas station, and was filling my tank when my phone rang. Marissa. We hadn’t talked since our double date with the Wilhites. Maybe she would let me stop by her house on my way home, I was only a few minutes away.

  -No, I’m kind of busy. I just wanted to hear how it went today. Any new evidence?

  -Not really. Then how about dinner later?

  -I have plans.

  -Oh.

  Plans. Could she be any more vague? Why not just tell me what she’s doing?

  -Were there any new witnesses?

  -I’ll call you later.

  -Are you upset?

  -No, I—

  -Fletcher.

  -I have to go. Someone’s approaching me.

  -What? Who?

  -This black guy.

  I had first noticed him coming out of the convenience store next door. No big deal, just another guy in dark shades, until he started heading my way, looking at me kind of sideways. He was carrying something—a rolled up magazine, I think—I didn’t look too closely, didn’t want to invite an unwanted encounter. Trying to stay cool, I put the phone in my pocket, removed the gas nozzle from my car, and now he was standing five feet away.

  -How’s that trial coming?

  I knew the voice. The Sophist!

  -Hey, how you doing?

  The soulful handshake: two hip dudes meeting on the street.

  -You taking care of my man?

  My phone rang. I dug it out of my pocket. Marissa, again.

  -Are you okay? Fletcher?

  -Yeah.

  -Who was it? Who was—?

  -I’ll tell you later.

  Back to The Sophist, now checking out the gas pump.

  -Sorry about that. My girlfriend.

  -No worries. Price of gas is insane. Three fifty-nine for the regular.

  -No kidding.

  -For the regular! What kind of mileage you get? You get thirty?

  -I don’t know.

  -That new Prius gets fifty.

  -I heard they’re pretty expensive.

  -Pay for themselves. Fifty miles per gallon. Still got that all-white jury?

  -Yeah. You were right about that.

  -Course I was. You gonna convict the brother?

  -I…I don’t know.

  -My man ain’t got a chance, right?

  -I’m really not supposed to discuss it.

  He tightened his mouth and narrowed his eyebrows.

  -Alright, you take care.

  -You too.
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  Halfway back to the convenience store, he stopped.

  -Hey. I’m still counting on you.

  We sit next to each other during jury selection, he gets dismissed, I get selected, when I get to the courthouse parking lot he’s still there, says justice is up to you, baby, and four days later—what are the chances?—we run into each other at some random gas station off a freeway exit. Hmm? In a small town, no big deal. In endless sprawling Orange County, one in a million. That’s what Pete said when I called him.

  -Yeah, one in a million. Same as the chance of coming around a blind curve when two skater punks decide to play chicken.

  -What?

  -The little shits.

  -Pete, what are you talking about?

  -Two tons of assault vehicle, dude, doing forty-five.

  What he was talking about was that while I was playing court jester, two kids on skateboards tried a mad dash across Pacific Coast Highway, and Pete, too late to brake, swerved left and barely missed them, but with his shoulder still feeling the fall from Sigrid’s tree, he couldn’t swerve back in time to avoid the oncoming pickup truck which clipped his back end, spun him around, and set him up square for the Hummer, which obliterated the back half of his minivan.

  -My backseat totally t-boned, and I’m like, I’m yelling, what’s the point, really, do you really need a car like that, what’s the point?

  -At who?

  -The woman in the Hummer. She’s all are you okay, I’m so sorry. I wanted to choke her. There was a real estate sign on her car door. Like she needs a Hummer to sell fucking real estate in fucking Laguna.

  -But it wasn’t her fault, right?

  -I know, I was just, I mean, total adrenaline rush. And pissed. Those little shits almost got me killed. And then I’m like, I caught myself and go, ma’am, I think you spilled my groceries. She musta thought I was insane.

  -You caught yourself?

  -Yeah, I know. But she was hot. This tight t-shirt and short shorts.

  -And driving a Hummer?

  -I’m telling you, dude, south county. She was nice too. Gave me her number.

  -No.

  -Swear to God. For the insurance stuff. Does insurance cover food? Because I had beer in the back seat and it went everywhere. First time I ever smashed a six-pack. Usually it’s the other way around. Then the cops show up and think I’m drunk.

  -Were you?

  -Give me a little credit, bro.

  -Just asking.

  -I was shopping. I tried to tell them, officer, I’m sober, it’s the van that’s been drinking. Out comes the breathalyzer, count to ten backwards, the whole obstacle course.

  -What about the skateboarders?

  -Gone. Fortunately, these two guys walking up from the beach, they saw the whole thing. Said the kids came out of nowhere, there was nothing I could do. They said it was a miracle I didn’t hit the little shits. So then the cops are like, oh, I guess you’re not drunk.

  -You saved their lives. The little shits.

  -I think I just stayed relaxed because all the drugs.

  -You told the cops that?

  -No. But fortunately there’s no Ambienalyzer.

  One shoulder throbbing in pain, doped up on sleeping pills and painkillers, bounced between a truck and a Hummer, beer and broken glass everywhere, and Pete walks away without a scratch.

  -Not even whiplash?

  -The ambulance guys wanted to take me in. There’s no way. I told them not unless you’re taking her in too. The Hummer chick. I’ll definitely hop in back with her.

  -Pete, you know what I think?

  -Let me guess—it was all a setup, the skaters, the pickup truck. Someone’s trying to kill me. Probably my ex-wife. Or that Wilhite guy. The guy wants me dead. As a warning to you.

  -Are you through?

  -By the way, I had to cut a deal. The cops overlook the fact I was stoned on Ambien, and I give up the name of the creepy guy who the lady caught trespassing in her backyard. You might want to leave the state.

  -I think you got really lucky.

  -Lucky? Bruised ribs, busted shoulder, and then my van gets totaled. Yeah, I’m having a good week. Not to mention the wasted beer. Lucky would have been if the Hummer chick wasn’t wearing a fat diamond on her finger.

  -It could have turned out worse. A lot worse.

  A pause on the phone.

  -Pete?

  -Yeah, you’re right. When that Hummer was coming at me, dude, I swear, it was lights out, game over. But it’s a Yamaguchi, isn’t it?

  The Yamaguchi Paradox—we made it up when Pete got divorced. A guy named Yamaguchi was visiting Hiroshima when the atomic bomb was dropped. He survived despite serious burns, and the next day went home. To Nagasaki. True story. When the second atomic bomb leveled Nagasaki, he survived that too. Lived sixty more years. The only person known to have survived both atomic bombs. Must be the luckiest guy in the world. Or unluckiest. He couldn’t have the incredibly good luck of surviving without the incredibly bad luck of being in both doomed cities. That’s the paradox: can you have really good luck without really bad luck?

  But that’s different than one in a million, which is about likelihood, not fortune. That was still on my mind. One in a million means I could do it all over again—drive home from the courthouse, stay in the slow lane, stop at the gas station—do it over one million times and not run into The Sophist. Pete disagreed.

  -No, dude, think about it, three hundred million people in the US, so a one-in-a-million chance occurs here, occurs in America, three hundred times. No big deal. Probably fifty in California alone. I thought you knew math.

  -What are the chances that you are one of the three hundred?

  -Huh?

  -One in a million. So there has to be a better explanation than we just happened to run into each other. Something’s going on.

  -Dude, you’ve got Grishamitis.

  -I never run into anybody. Not even in Laguna.

  -I don’t recommend it.

  And that’s not all. The Sophist went back into the convenience store. I mean, he’s in the store, buys a magazine, spies me at the gas station, recognizes me across the parking lot, comes over to say hi—that’s the one-in-a-million version—and then goes back into the store. Why would he go back in? Why not just hop in his car and drive away? Unless, I don’t know, he didn’t want me to see the car he’s driving. Because is it possible he’d been following me from the courthouse?

  -Grishamitis, I swear. You need to switch to Harry Potter.

  We hung up, and I continued home to Laguna, passing the turnoff to the little canyon neighborhood where Marissa was too busy for me to stop by and already had plans. No, Grishams have plans—what she has is called a date. To hell with her. After the verdict is in, I’m asking Roya out. We’ll talk about the trial, laugh about how we noticed each other during jury selection. I probably saw her first, sitting in chair six next to the black MBA with the neatly trimmed beard and…the black MBA! Home entertainment systems. USC. That’s who I saw on Sunday morning! The prospective juror who sold the stock at the wrong time. When I paddled back to shore, he was watching me—a black man in Laguna, a jacket and tie on the beach, hard not to notice. He looked familiar, but I was walking up the stairs with a twelve-foot surfboard balanced on my head, and couldn’t really try for a second look. That’s two one-in-a-millions in two days. I called Pete again—he had to hear this.

  -You’re hallucinating.

  -Pete, I’m telling you.

  -So all black men look alike to you.

  -No.

  -Then, dude, you’re about to win the lottery.

  Yeah, or something strange is going on.

  At home, I boiled macaroni, nuked a jar of pasta sauce in the microwave, cracked open a beer, and tried not to think of what Marissa might be having. Can Eddie the Easel afford Laguna’s fine dining opportunities? Probably. Probably comes from money. How else do these artsy types manage to live in Laguna? I could call her—would that be in
trusive? I told her I would call her back, so it wouldn’t be intruding, I’m simply keeping a promise. No, just leave her alone, let her have her fun. I can’t force myself onto her. I opened another beer. I dialed her number.

  -Hello?

  -It was someone from the jury. When you called before. The guy—

  -You said he was black.

  -He is.

  -On the jury?

  -He got dismissed the first day. We sat next to each other.

  -I thought you were getting mugged or something.

  -Because he was black?

  I had her. This time I had her.

  -No.

  -Come on, admit it.

  -Because you were so dramatic—Marissa, someone’s approaching me.

  -I didn’t say it like that. Just admit it, you were worried because he was black.

  -You’re the one who made it about race. Would you have told me, Marissa, it’s a white guy?

  I can’t win.

  -What’s weird is I saw this other guy, too. On Sunday. At the beach.

  -Fletcher, I need to go.

  -Wait.

  -We can talk tomorrow.

  -You asked how it went today. They said Bud Jack is a gang-banger. They said he killed him over drugs.

  I knew that would get her attention.

  -Do you believe it?

  -No. I don’t know. I did at first. Then the defense lawyer got the guy to admit there really wasn’t evidence. It’s like they can say anything.

  -That’s what I told you. But, really, I have to go.

  -Why do you care about this case anyway?

  -He’s an innocent man.

  Maybe it’s true. Maybe Marissa, apolitical and safely ensconced in Laguna, is truly concerned, maybe Sigrid really inspired her, the way those movie stars get people passionate about a guy on death row. Ha! Sharon had little use for Hollywood activists, and watching those awards shows usually set her off.

  -Darling, don’t kid yourself, it’s not like they’re going to subvert a system that’s made them fabulously wealthy, like save the Dalai Lama or whomever, good for them, then back to making titillating movies that glorify violence. Which reminds me, you know how you titillate an ocelot? You oscillate its tit a lot.

  Sharon was a hoot, I’ll give her that. And she had a philosophy.