by Owen Thomas
“A diary?” I ask incredulously.
“Yeah, smartass. A diary. Never seen a diary?”
“In old movies. It’s 2005.”
“My sister cut off Brittany’s computer privileges for a month.”
“May I?” asks Glenda, holding out her hand again and cutting me a look.
“No, you may not.”
“I’m entitled to inspect.”
“Not until he’s charged.”
“He is charged.”
“For drug possession. Brittany is still an open investigation.”
“Then send me a copy.”
“All in good time. I’ll read to you the things that concern me.”
Glenda looks at me, leaning back in the chair, which groans a little. “I’m all ears.”
North opens the pink book and flips through the pages.
“Okay, where are we? Here. Monday the 12th, three days before your misadventure at Billy Rocks. She writes: ‘Mr. Johns is way cute. David Johns. David, David, Daaaaaavid. Hey! DJ!’ Exclamation point ‘LOL.’ Double exclamation point. ‘No wonder he’s hot. Tight little butt. Those lips, yum, yum, yum, those lips.’” North looks up from the book. “Your lips rate no fewer than three exclamation points, Dave.”
“Just read it, Chuck,” says Glenda.
“Right. ‘God those lips. Eyes totally undressing me in class. Totally wants it, it, IT.’ Exclamation point.”
North furrows his brow as he turns the pages, trying to make out the handwriting.
“And then there’s some stuff about clothing and homework and how unreasonable her mother is, locking her out of the computer, and what a hero her scumbag dad is, although that’s just me editorializing, and then this: ‘Wicked primo P, C and X,’ which I will wager a very low salary stands for pot, coke and ecstasy, and then ‘DJ scores.’ Exclamation point. ‘New i.d.’s totally real. Party time.’ Exclamation point.”
“That’s the new evidence? This kid was an aspiring recreational user with a crush on her history teacher?”
“Hold on. Hold on.” North is flipping pages. “Nothing. Nothing. Okay. Thursday the 15th. The day of Billy Rocks. ‘English sucks. History hot. Nice package on that one. He keeps looking and I keep showing. DJ waited after 6th period and gave me a ride. No bus for Brittany. Wahoo.’ Exclamation point. ‘Work it girl friend.’ Double exclamation point. ‘Totally wants to make out but I’m making him squirm. Dropped me at corner so mom-bitch doesn’t see. She would totally flip. Would call Uncle Chuck. Boys my own age blah, blah, blah. My body, my choice. And I will so totally tell her that.’ And then there is a bunch of doodling and she picks it up again with a different pen, obviously sometime later. ‘DJ drove off with my violin. My other precious V. Oh well, no practice for Brittany. Wahoo.’ Exclamation point. ‘Tonight B. Rocks. B. Rocks ROCKS!’ All caps, exclamation point. ‘DJ will definitely be there and will bring my V. Wants to trade my V for you know what. For my little v, that’s what. Party hardy don’t be tardy.’
North looks up, first at Glenda and then at me. I can feel my stomach go weak and my blood pressure start to climb.
“I’m not impressed, Chuck,” says Glenda dismissively, although even I know it’s an act. North holds up a hand.
“Not done yet counsel. One more entry I find interesting. Same date, obviously written that night. ‘Mr. J dances like a geek. Totally made out with me in the hallway. OMG. I thought he was going to do me right there!!!’ Triple exclamation point. ‘Mr. S made us leave. He’s cool, but fuck S. And I will totally fuck Mr. J.’ The word ‘totally’ is underlined and in all caps, by the way, indicating, I think, great enthusiasm at the prospect. ‘Mr. J has the stash. Wants to meet me and Carm. 4515 N. Orville Dr.’ Now, if I remember correctly, that’s your address, right Dave?”
I am numb and do not answer.
“Yeah, I thought so. Anyway, she concludes with ‘DJ 2 am’ and another ‘Party hardy don’t be tardy’.
Glenda is scribbling on a notepad. She writes an entire page of indecipherable scribble and flips the pad upside down. Finally, she looks up at North and opens her hands. “What else?”
“You want more? His address is in the last entry of the victim’s personal diary.”
“What victim? Has she turned up injured or dead?”
“No.”
“Then you have no victim. And you have no case, Chuck. Have you talked to this Carmen kid?”
“Of course we have. Haven’t you?”
“She’s not real interested in talking with me, Chuck.” I feel a pulse of surprise in my chest. Glenda is either lying or she has actually been investigating. “Her mother suggested I talk to you.”
“Well, I’m not sharing my notes with you counsel.”
“You know damn well I’m entitled to those notes.”
“Not yet you’re not. And if it comes to the point that I’m required to share my notes, that would mean your boy here is headed for trial, which would mean that we found Brittany in some form or another, living or not, and you can have all the notes you want. I will tell you that the last Carmen saw of her friend she was making out with your client. Look, I don’t care about Carmen right now. I care about DJ over there. If he can explain all of this,” he wags the glossy pink diary in the air, “then I’m all ears.”
“He doesn’t have to explain anything to you.”
“No, but it’s going to be a whole lot easier on him if he just cooperates and tell us what he knows.”
“He’s already done that. You already know about the dancing and the kiss. You know about the drugs.”
“Sure didn’t know about that ride home from school, or that late night rendezvous or holding her violin hostage for a little underage action.”
“None of that happened!” I am startled to hear my own voice and at how alien it sounds in distress. I brace myself to be backhanded by my lawyer but it never comes. Glenda reaches out and clasps her hand over mine.
“It’s okay, Dave,” she says. “I know that.”
“I sure don’t know that,” says North. “The diary is pretty worrisome, Dave.”
“The diary is shit, Chuck.”
“Then explain it to me, counsel, because I can’t explain it and Brittany’s mother certainly can’t explain it without getting a real bad feeling about your client here. And if I find this poor little kid in a shallow…”
“Oh please. Spare me the drama. And all girls lie to their diaries.”
“The voice of experience?”
“Absofuckinlutely. I liked to pretend I was a nice person. But hey, if I’m wrong then your niece is a really a slutty piece of work, Chuck. And your sister should think more about how her daughter is being raised than searching for a scapegoat.”
“Careful, counsel.” North’s face is suddenly hard and brutal and I realize that most of our conversation has been a piece of theater. His earnestness is of an entirely different quality. “Insulting my family or the character of a missing teenage girl will not help your client in the least, but it will succeed in making me very angry.” They glare at each other in an apparent stalemate. North is the first to blink. “Alright?”
“Fine.”
“Now, the only explanation I can come up with for these journal entries is that your client has …”
“Has what, Chuck? Killed her? Is this a homicide investigation?”
“Not yet.”
“Is anyone complaining of rape?”
“Not yet.”
“Torture?”
“No.”
“Bad grades.”
“Look…”
“Well then let’s not jump to ridiculous conclusions.”
“I take it, then, that he is not cooperating.”
“There is nothing more for him to say. Yes, he wanted to meet with these girls. At school the next day, Chuck. Not for sex, but to discuss their inappropriate behavior and his decision to advise their parents about it.”
“At school. The next day.”
&nbs
p; “Yes.”
North leans in to Glenda. “Then why am I reading his home address?”
Glenda obviously does not have an answer. “I dunno, Chuck. What the hell do you want from him?”
“I want him to tell me what he knows. I want to know what happened after Billy Rocks. I want to know where Brittany is. I can promise real flexibility on the dope charge. A misdemeanor. No time.”
“He’s told you all he knows.”
North gives up with Glenda and looks directly at me.
“Will you at least confirm the obvious? You met, you had a joint, you did some ecstasy, you had sex.”
“I…”
“David.” Glenda’s voice is like a loaded gun.
“Oh, come on, DJ. DJ with the cute butt and lips to die for. At least cop to the sex. We all know at least that much. You did it, she got scared and threatened to tell someone…finish the story, Dave.”
I cross my arms and stare back at him like a child refusing to eat his peas. I see in his eyes that he knows his efforts are in vain.
“Look, you’re the history teacher. You’ll just look like an idiot denying it.” He raises his right hand, placing his left on the cup of nuts. “I did not have sexual relations with that woman.”
The impression is good. He’s obviously done it before. I am prepared to remain silent, but Dick is glaring at me from across the room and I cannot help matching impression for impression.
“Go fuck yourself,” I say out of the side of my mouth. Glenda snorts.
“Fine.” North stands and removes a pair of handcuffs from his belt. He walks around to my side of the table and pulls me up sharply by the arm. “Let’s go hot lips.”
“This is a bullshit charge, Chuck,” says Glenda.
“The state of Ohio takes the war on drugs seriously, counsel.” He snaps on the handcuffs and marches me past George and Dick to the door. As I pass Glenda she pats me on the arm.
“Buck-up kiddo. You have any dinner plans?”
“No.”
“See you tonight.”
* * *
It’s just after nine when they finish processing my release. I exit the police station with two things I have never had before: cuff burns and an arraignment date. But the heavy sense of futility and barely suppressed rage are just as I remember them.
Glenda Leveau, in all of her purple mountainous majesty, is leaning up against the flagpole smoking a cigarette.
“Well, if it ain’t Jessee James, fresh outta the pokey.”
“Funny.”
“Enough paperwork for you?”
“My fingers are cramping. There’s an Eighth Amendment issue there someplace. You should look into that.”
“Cigarette?”
“I don’t smoke.”
Glenda raises her eyebrows and drops her chin towards the slope of her lavender chest giving me a dubious look.
“Okay, I don’t smoke those, thank you very much.”
We walk several blocks over to Buckeye Hawk’s where a scrubby-faced manchild takes us to a booth in the back. Before he can escape, we order beers and salads and steaks. We sit, awkwardly at first, making small talk and ignoring the ugliness that has brought us together. We rather quickly take the award for most unlikely and perplexing couple in the history of the establishment. I look almost exactly like I have just been released from prison. Glenda looks like a Mary Kay mogul on her way to Mardi Gras.
Buckeye Hawk’s is mostly a sports bar known for it’s burgers and its seat-to-television ratio, which is rapidly approaching one-to-one. Silent flat screen panels hang from the ceiling in every direction. It’s like eating dinner in the Sears electronics department. There is a television directly behind me that diverts Glenda’s attention every few minutes. I take these moments to chew and watch the television behind Glenda rather than talk. I can see in the far mirror that she has a funniest-video clip show on her screen. My screen shows an endless loop of Ohio State Buckeye highlights. I find myself thinking of my father. I end up mostly watching Glenda’s screen in the mirror.
In between these diversions, Glenda polishes off two beers for my one and gives me a primer on how the formal arraignment process works. She promises she will be there and do all the talking and this provides some relief. I ask about publicity. I am strangely more concerned about what other people will think of me than what will actually happen to me. She tells me that she has no control over the media but is convincing in her assurance that I am not a very important person.
I offer her my lay legal opinion that I have no chance in beating the drug charge since I was, after all, in possess…
“Don’t start with all of that gloom-n-doom shit, sweet cheeks,” she says, reaching out and clasping my hand. “We’ll figure all of that out. Try to be more optimistic.”
She gives my hand a squeeze and then goes back to sawing her meat. In the mirror I see a man ride his bicycle into a parked car. He ends up splayed all over the hood. The children inside the car are either laughing or screaming. Glenda is laughing.
“A drug conviction will end my teaching career,” I say.
She looks down from the television and her mirth gives way to something more sober. “Yeah, I know. The timing of all of this leaves a lot to be desired.”
“Timing? A drug conviction ends my career no matter when it happens.”
“You’re missing the point, David. I am reasonably confident that we can beat the drug rap. No promises, you understand, but I’m cautiously optimistic there.”
“How?”
“Never mind how. Assume for working purposes that we can beat that one at trial if there is a trial. Also, they still don’t have anything solid on the Brittany thing.”
“What about the diary? Seemed pretty …”
“It’s hard enough to make a case stick with fingerprints and eye-witness testimony. They don’t even have a victim, David. Where’s Brittany? Dead or alive, where is she? The diary makes her look like a drug fiend and a tramp. Anything could have happened to that kid. Even if they had a victim and a crime – which they don’t – they need a lot more than a couple of diary entries to win the day.”
“So then why snatch me off the street and go through that whole … whatever that was? All over a missing violin?”
“It’s not about the violin. The violin thing is just to catch you in a lie. If they find the violin in your possession then that puts you with Brittany. You’ve sworn you weren’t with Brittany. If you’re lying about that … it’s enough to make you a solid target.”
“Like I’m not already.”
“They’re still looking at all the angles. North just wants to make you feel special.”
“I’m not lying, Glenda.”
“I know, Dave.”
“I was never with her outside of Billy Rocks and I have never had possession of her stupid violin. It all happened just like I told you.”
“I know, Dave. Relax. I’m on your side. Besides,” she takes a long pull on her beer, “never plead your innocence to your lawyer.”
“Why?”
“Makes you look guilty. Every guilty client I have ever had has found it necessary to sell me on his innocence. I’m no rube. Just relax.”
“I can’t believe they care about a few ounces of pot.”
“It’s not about the fuckin’ dope any more than it’s about a missing violin. It’s about following you around day after day and coming up with nothing. They’ve got a hysterical mom and a worried uncle putting inside pressure on a police force to unearth – well, hopefully not unearth – but locate this kid. They’ve got no other suspects. And you, my squeaky-clean lad, are boring them to death. So they are doing what they always do.”
“Which is?”
“Applying pressure. Making people uncomfortable.”
“Mission accomplished.”
“Not from their perspective. They’re no better off now that when they took you in. Criminal conviction is not your big problem right now, Dave.”
“It’s a concern. It’s a concern. Okay? It’s a concern. But until they find a body or a complaining victim, conviction is not our biggest worry.”
“Okay. Then what’s our biggest worry?”
“Protecting your career. The problem is that there is nothing preventing the pending criminal charge or the pending criminal investigation from influencing the deliberations by the school board over whether you get to be a teacher.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning the reasons for wanting you gone are stacking up and the board doesn’t have to be particularly careful or honest about which reason tips the scale. You can protest all you want that you’re getting a bad rap on the criminal shit, and they will assure you that your termination is based on entirely different and wholly legal grounds. They’ve got too much room to maneuver. The law requires good cause to terminate you but if they want it bad enough they can find it. So, again, you could do without all the police attention right now.”
“Principal Bob will sure know the status of things.”
“Everybody knows the status of things, David. Don’t kid yourself.”
“So what do we do?”
“We have another beer. The rest, I don’t know yet.” She drains her glass and starts looking around for our server. “The rest I don’t know. But we’ll figure it out.”
The man-child shows up and takes our plates. Glenda orders another round.
“When do we meet with the union?”
“Fuck the union. I’ve already talked with them and they’re not interested in helping. Seems you’re too hot at the moment. They’re okay with the whole academic freedom issue, but the Brittany thing’s got them spooked. They’re not going to the mat for you.”
“Don’t they have to help on a grievance? I mean…my dues.”
“Nope. The grievance rules don’t apply to contract terminations. The Bargaining Agreement just defaults to the Ohio Code. You don’t want to be relying on the union anyway. You need your own hired gun.” She gives me a shit-eating grin. “That’s me.”
“So…”
“So, we file a written demand for a hearing before a majority of the school board, we get a hearing date, we show up, we put on our evidence, and the board decides.”
