Salem Falls

by Jodie Picoult

  It was after speaking to Matt Houlihan that she realized she needed to do the one thing she hadn’t: hear Jack’s side of the story, before she believed anyone else’s.

  She was terrified that he would lie to her, and that their whole time together would just have been an extension of that lie. She was equally terrified that he would tell her the truth, and then she would have to understand how God could be cruel enough to let her give her heart to a man who’d committed rape.

  “Next!”

  Addie advanced as the man before her was buzzed through a barred door. She found herself facing a correctional officer with a face as misshapen as a potato. “Name?”

  Her heart leaped beneath her light jacket. “Addie Peabody.”

  “Name of the inmate you’re here to visit.”

  “Oh. Jack St. Bride.”

  The officer scanned a list. “St. Bride’s not allowed visitors.”

  “Not allowed-”

  “He’s in solitary.” The guard glanced over her shoulder. “Next!”

  But Addie didn’t move. “How am I supposed to get in touch with him?”

  “ESP,” the officer suggested, as Addie was shoved out of the way.

  The human scalp has 100,000 hairs.

  In an average lifetime, a person will grow 590 miles of hair.

  Jack scratched at his thickening beard again, this time drawing blood. There was a rational part of him that knew he was all right, that going without a shower for a week wouldn’t kill him. And in spite of what it felt like, a colony of insects had not taken up root on his scalp. But sometimes, when he sat very still, he could feel the threads of their legs digging into his skin, could hear the buzz of their bodies.

  Insects outnumber humans 100,000,000 to one.

  He thought of these things, these useless facts, because they were so much easier to consider than other things: Would Addie come to see him? Would he remember what had happened that night? Would he, once again, be convicted?

  Suddenly, from a distance, there were footsteps. Usually, no one came down here after the janitor’s soft-soled shoes paced the length of the hall, rasping a mop in their wake. These shoes were definitive, a sure stride that stopped just outside his door.

  “I take it you’re still mulling over your decisions,” the superintendent said. “I wanted to pass along a bit of information to you. You had a visitor today, who of course was turned away, since you’re in a disciplinary lockdown.”

  A visitor? Addie?

  Just the thought of her walking into a place like this, the knowledge that she wouldn’t have had to if not for Jack, was enough to make him cry a river. Tears sluiced down his face, washing away the grime, and maybe a little bit of his pride.

  Reaching up, he scratched vigorously at his temple.

  The average person, Jack thought, accidentally eats 430 bugs in a year.

  As a defense attorney, Jordan had dealt with his share of society’s losers-all of whom were convinced they’d been given the fuzzy end of the lollipop. It wasn’t his job to judge them on the things they’d done, or even on their own misconceptions of entitlement. Never, though, had Jordan been treated to a client who was so single-mindedly hell-bent on his own destruction-and all in the alleged pursuit of justice. He pulled in his folding chair as another cavalcade of prisoners returned from the exercise yard, disrupting the meeting he was holding on the other side of the solitary cell’s metal door. “They’re clothes, Jack,” Jordan said wearily, for the tenth time in as many minutes. “Just clothes.”

  “You ever hear of the human botfly?” Jack answered, his voice thin.

  “No.”

  “It’s a bug. And what it does, see, is grab another insect-like a mosquito, for instance-and lay its eggs on the mosquito’s abdomen. Then, when the mosquito lands on you, your body heat makes those eggs fall off and burrow under your skin. As they grow, you can see them. Feel them.” He laughed humorlessly. “And the whole time, you’re thinking that the worst that’s happened is a mosquito bite.”

  A psych exam, Jordan thought, would not be out of order here. “What are you trying to tell me, Jack? You’re infested?”

  “If I put on their uniform, I become one of them. It’s not just clothing. The minute it touches me, the system’s gotten underneath my skin.”

  “The system,” Jordan repeated. “You want me to tell you about the system, Jack? The system says that as soon as Superintendent Warcroft decides he needs your little cell for someone else, he’s gonna ship you over to the State Pen’s secure housing unit. And if you think being stuck here is no picnic, believe me, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Down in Concord, in the SHU, the COs wear full body armor-shields and helmets with face masks and steel-toed boots. They escort you everywhere, anytime you have to leave your little pod, which is next to never. And oh, yeah, the pods are arranged around a bulletproof control booth, where the COs sit and watch every move you make. They watch you eat, they watch you sleep, they watch you shit. They watch you breathe, Jack. You and the other three assholes who share your cell, and who probably got sent there for doing something far more violent than refusing to wear a jumpsuit.”

  “I won’t go to the State Pen.”

  “They don’t fucking ask your permission!” Jordan yelled. “Don’t you understand that? You are here. Deal with it. Because every minute I spend worrying whether you’re behaving yourself is time taken away from your case, Jack.”

  For a while, there was no noise from inside the cell. Jordan placed his palm against the door. Then a voice came back, quiet, broken. “They’re trying to make me into someone I’m not. This shirt . . . these pants . . . they’re the only things I have left of the person I know I am. And I need to keep seeing them, Jordan, so I don’t start to believe what they’re saying.”

  “What should they be saying, Jack?” Jordan pressed. “What really happened?”

  “I can’t remember!”

  “Then how the hell do you know for sure you didn’t rape her?” Jordan argued. He fought for control, shaking his head at the door separating him from his client. He wasn’t going to fall for a sob story. If his client was intent on getting shipped off to Concord . . . well, the court would pay Jordan for mileage incurred. “I filed a motion for a speedy trial, and the prosecutor already signed off on a subpoena ducef tecum,” he said briskly, changing the subject. “We should be receiving Gillian Duncan’s psychiatric records shortly.”

  “She’s crazy. I knew it.”

  “These come from when she was a child and might have no bearing on this case.”

  “What else have you got?” Jack asked.

  “You.”

  “That’s all?”

  “That’s got to be enough.” Jordan leaned his forehead against the metal. “Now do you see why I need you to shape up?”

  “Okay.”

  The consent came so softly, Jordan frowned, certain he’d misheard. “What?”

  “I said I’ll do it. I’ll put on the jumpsuit. But you have to do me a favor.”

  Jordan felt anger bubbling inside him once more. “I don’t have to do you any favors. You, on the other hand-”

  “A pen, for Christ’s sake. That’s all I want.”

  A pen. Jordan stared at the Rollerball in his hand. Jack’s change of heart had been too hasty. He imagined his client taking the pen and jamming it into his jugular.

  “I don’t think so . . .”

  “Please,” Jack said quietly. “A pen.”

  Slowly, Jordan slipped the pen through the slot in the metal door. A few seconds later it came back, wrapped tight with a pale blue scroll. T-shirt, Jordan realized. Jack had ripped off a piece of his goddamn precious T-shirt to write something.

  “Can you get that to Addie Peabody?” Jack asked.

  Jordan unrolled it. A single word was written on the cloth, a word that might have been meant as praise or accusation. “Why should I help you?” he asked. “You aren’t doing anything to help me.”

  “I will,
” Jack swore, and for just a moment-the time it took the attorney to remember to whom he was talking-Jordan actually believed him.

  “Jesus, Thomas.” Jordan winced as the door slammed shut. “Do you have to be so damn loud?”

  Thomas stopped at the sight of his father, sprawled on the couch with a washcloth covering his forehead. Selena touched him on the shoulder. “Poor baby had to work today,” she clucked. “He’s cranky.”

  “He can hear you talking about him, and he has a headache the size of Montana,” Jordan scowled.

  “More accurately, the size of Jack St. Bride,” Selena murmured.

  Thomas walked into the kitchen and took a carton of milk from the refrigerator. After swilling a long gulp, he wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Lovely,” Selena said.

  “I learned it all from my role model of a dad.” Thomas set the milk on the counter. “What’s the problem with the guy, anyway? He seemed nice enough at the diner.”

  “So did Ted Bundy,” Jordan muttered.

  “Ted Bundy used to work there?” Thomas said. “No shit!”

  Jordan sat up. “What are they saying in school?”

  “Everything. By fourth period there was a rumor that he’d escaped and raped some seventh grader.”

  “He hasn’t escaped, and it’s only an alleged rape.”

  “Amazing, isn’t it,” Selena mused, “how he can stick to doing his job even when the client is driving him up a tree?”

  “Not so amazing, but then again, he insists he loves me, and still, I’ve been grounded by him before.” Thomas sat down on the floor and reached for the remote control of the TV, but Jordan grabbed it first.

  “Hang on,” he said. “Tell me more.”

  Thomas sighed. “I guess some people feel bad for Gillian.”

  “And the others?”

  “They think what they’ve always thought . . . that she’s a bitch.”

  “A bitch? Gillian Duncan isn’t the homecoming queen?” Selena asked.

  Thomas burst out laughing. “She’d probably kill herself if she got elected. She thinks she’s better than all that, and she lets everyone know it. Just goes around with her little circle of friends and tries to keep them from mingling with the peons. When I first tried to talk to Chelsea-”

  “Who’s Chelsea?”

  Thomas gave him a long look. “Dad. You know.”

  “Ah, right.”

  “Well, anyway, Gillian was all over that, trying to tell Chelsea I wasn’t worth her time. I mean, you ask me, Gillian had this coming-acting better than everyone else, you’re gonna piss someone off sooner or later. But when I said that to Chelsea, she told me it wasn’t like that at all.”

  “No?”

  “She was there, when Gillian came out crying . . . afterward. And she told me Gillian could barely talk. That she’s still pretty messed up.”

  Jordan balled the damp washcloth into a knot. He exchanged a glance with Selena, then looked at his son. “Thomas,” he suggested, “find out what else Chelsea has to say.”

  The envelope was tucked between an electric bill and a flyer advertising the candidacy of George W. Bush for president. ADDIE PEABODY, it said, scrawled in block lettering she did not recognize. There was no stamp; someone had dropped this off while she was at work.

  She slit open the envelope with her finger.

  Inside was a small roll of fabric, the same blue as the T-shirt Jack had been wearing the morning of his arrest. Addie unraveled it and found, in his handwriting, one word.

  Loyal.

  She sank onto the ground at the base of the mailbox, turning the fabric over and over in her hands and trying to understand the cryptic message. Was he accusing her of not sticking up for him during the arrest? Was he begging for her support?

  The corners of her memory began to curl, like paper set on fire.

  Then again, maybe this was not an adjective at all.

  The phone startled Jordan out of a sound, deep sleep. He knocked over his clock-radio reaching for it, and dragged the base halfway across the bed. “Hello,” he said gruffly.

  “You are about to receive a collect call from Carroll County Jail,” a computerized voice said. “Are you willing to accept the charges?”

  “Oh, fuck,” Jordan muttered.

  “I’m sorry, I did not understand your-”

  “Yes,” Jordan yelled. “Yes, yes!”

  “Thank you.” The next moment, St. Bride was on the other end. “Jordan? Jordan, you there?” Jack was frantic, breathless.

  “Calm down. What’s the matter?”

  “I gotta see you.”

  “Okay. I’ll come by tomorrow.”

  “No, I’ve got to see you now.” Jack’s voice cracked on a sob. “Please. I remember. I remember now.”

  “I’m on my way,” Jordan said.

  An hour later, Jack stood before him, sweating and wired from the story he’d just told. The clock on the wall of the tiny conference room ticked like a bomb. “Let me get this straight,” Jordan said finally. “You keep seeing things hanging from the trees.”

  Jack nodded. “Tied to them.”

  “Like tinsel?”

  “No,” Jack said. “Ribbons, and little sachets. Weird shit. Like that movie . . . The Blair Witch Project.”

  Jordan folded his arms across his stomach. “So creepy twig crucifixes were hanging from the trees when you were walking past them, in the dark, in the forest where you did not encounter Gillian Duncan. This is what you woke me up for?”

  “There was something strange going on. I thought that was patently important to my case, but pardon the hell out of me for disturbing your beauty sleep.”

  “Well, it’s not important, Jack. Important would be if you remembered someone who saw you between midnight and one-thirty. Important would be just admitting you slept with the girl.”

  “I didn’t have sex with Gillian Duncan,” Jack yelled. “Why don’t you believe me?”

  “You were drunk! What would you find easier to believe-that some guy who’s six sheets to the wind got a little too aggressive with a girl he happened across . . . or this Halloween/Scream decor in the middle of the forest you’re telling me about? Stuff, I might add, that neither the cops nor my investigator found traces of?”

  Jack flung himself into a chair. “I want a polygraph,” he said.

  Jordan closed his eyes. God save me from defendants. “Even if you took a polygraph and passed, it’s not admissable in court. You’d be doing it only for yourself, Jack.”

  “And for you. So that you know I’m telling you the truth.”

  “I already told you, I don’t care whether you committed the crime. I’m still going to defend you.”

  Jack bowed his head over his knotted hands. “If you were sitting in my seat,” he said quietly, “would that be enough?”

  Roy blinked at his daughter again, certain that what he’d heard her say had been a misunderstanding.

  It was Delilah who asked outright. “You’re telling me that you’re up and leaving Salem Falls? That this ol’ washed-up drunk is in charge?”

  “This old washed-up drunk was in charge before you were hired,” Roy scowled.

  Addie jumped into the fray. “Not in charge, Delilah. More like a foster parent.”

  “Then this little diner of yours is gonna grow up crooked, honey.”

  “I just don’t understand why you have to go off on this . . . this quest,” Roy said.

  Addie tried to ignore the small voice inside her that was asking the same thing. Ironically, it was Jack who had taught her, through Chloe, that she needed to put things to rest. Finding out that he had lied to her could not possibly be any more painful than not knowing for sure if he had done this horrible thing. “I’m not asking you to understand. I’m just asking you to help me.” Addie turned to her father. “It’ll only be for a little while.”

  Roy glanced around at the gleaming countertops, the sizzling spit of the grill. “And if I don’t want all this back?”
>
  Addie hadn’t thought of that. “I don’t know,” she said slowly. “I guess we’ll close.”

  “Close!” Delilah cried.

  Roy frowned. “Close? We haven’t closed for years. We haven’t closed since . . .”

  “Since Mom died,” Addie finished quietly. She took a deep breath. “Darla’s agreed to work my shifts. Delilah, it’s going to be the same old routine for you, except a new face is going to be handing you tickets. And Daddy, all you have to do is to take general responsibility.”

  Roy looked into his lap. “That’s not my strong point, Addie.”

  “Do you think I don’t know that? Do you think I wouldn’t be asking if this didn’t mean so much to me? All these years I’ve watched you sneak out to drink, and I pretended I didn’t see. All the times I’ve understood that sometimes a person needs to do something, and the hell with the consequences . . . why can’t you grant me the same privilege?”

  Her father leaned forward, covering Addie’s hand with his own. “Why are you doing this to yourself? When something bad happens, why do you have to pick at it until it bleeds all over again?”

  “Because!” Addie cried. “What if he didn’t do it?”

  “And what if Chloe hadn’t really died? And what if your mom walked right through those swinging doors?” Roy sighed. “You’re not going because you want to prove to yourself he’s guilty; a court is gonna do that soon enough. You’re going because you don’t want to believe the truth that’s right in front of you.”

  “You don’t even know where to start looking,” Delilah added.

  “I’ll figure it out.”

  “And if you don’t find what you’re looking for?”

  At Roy’s question, Addie looked up. “Then all I’ve lost is time.”

  It wasn’t true, and all of them knew it. But neither Roy nor Delilah, nor even Addie, wanted to admit that after a certain point, a heart with so many stress fractures would never be anything but broken.