Looking for Julie

by Jackie Calhoun

  “He’s not going to get off. When he gets out of prison, we’ll be long gone from here.”

  “The defense is going to ask me if he’s the guy who grabbed me.” Her heart catapulted when she said that. “I’ll have to lie.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  She admired his bravery, and she tried to put DeWitt out of her mind when she studied, but either he or Karen or Nita always crept in and ruined her concentration.

  When she went from the dorm, feeling a sense of freedom, she found Nita in the apartment with a guy from work. He was new to the waiting staff—a senior, named Judd Jelinsky. He was tall and well built and good-looking. All the other girls at Chili Verde had the hots for him. His eyebrows, like Carmen’s, merged into one.

  He was sitting on the lumpy couch, his large hands hanging between his legs. “Hey, Sam. You live here too, huh?”

  “Yeah, I do,” she said, her gaze flitting from him to Nita.

  Nita sat down next to him. “We’re going to study together.”

  “Great.” She went to her room with an uneasy feeling in her guts. Nita had never brought a guy home.

  Later, as she sat on her bed with her learning disabilities text propped on her legs, she heard them through the thin walls. He was coming on to Nita, and Nita wasn’t putting up much resistance. When the door shut to Nita’s room, Sam’s chest hurt so much she wondered if she was having a heart attack.

  She confronted Nita when he left. “What’s going on with you and Jelinsky?”

  Nita looked bored. “We’re going out.”

  “What does that mean? You’re the one who’s been climbing into my bed at night.”

  “I’m not the way you are.”

  “Yeah? You could have fooled me.”

  “I guess I did.” Nita turned on her heel and shut her bedroom door behind her.

  Sam shouted. “You just wanted to get rid of Karen, didn’t you? You can’t tell me you didn’t like it—all that moaning and stuff.”

  Nita opened the door a foot. “I put on a good act, didn’t I?”

  Sam went to back to her bedroom and put her head in her hands. She hurt so much she considered walking out in front of a car. Then Nita would feel bad, but so would her mom and dad and Jamie and her brother and sister and Edie and Julie. Julie. She had her number. Julie had said to call if she needed her.

  She pushed in the unfamiliar digits and waited through five rings. When Julie answered, she hung up. After a moment or two, her cell rang. She opened it up without looking at the display.

  “’Lo,” she said.

  “Sam? You called me?” Julie asked.

  Her mind froze for a moment before she stumbled over her words. “I didn’t mean to bother you. I just, I always think of you when things go really bad.”

  “I’m flattered. What has gone bad?”

  She told her about Nita and then apologized again for calling and whispered, “I thought I wanted to die, but I don’t—not really. I think I’ll go home this weekend if I can get a ride.”

  “Good idea. Sam, it will get better. I know sometimes that doesn’t seem possible, but then you meet someone, and you will, and things start looking up.”

  Sam snorted. “Nita’s got a boyfriend and Karen acts like I’ve got leprosy.” She had read about leper colonies in a history text three years ago and hadn’t forgot the horror.

  “Listen. It’s a myth that these are the best years of your life. I lost my lover. For a while I lost my way. I think we all do at one time or another. I’m coming to the trial. So is Edie.”

  “Thanks for talking to me.” She was crying.

  “Stay on the phone. Let’s talk this through. Okay?”

  She threw herself on the bed and told Julie how she was afraid they’d find DeWitt not guilty or put him on parole. She said she missed Karen and hated Nita. She said she had trouble concentrating and was afraid she’d flunk out.

  Julie told her that she had been put on probation by the university and returned the next year and completed her education. That it hadn’t been the end of the world like she’d thought it was.

  Sam was silenced by surprise. Julie had been on probation and lost her lover and had not only survived, but got her doctorate in psychology? She wanted to hear the whole story.

  “I want to be just like you.”

  “And I wanted to be just like my psychologist. But whatever you choose to be, Sam, you’ll give it that intensity of yours.”

  Her tears had dried up. “I’m okay.” It dawned on her that Julie probably thought she was going to kill herself. “I won’t do anything. My mom and dad would be too sad.”

  “I think it would be a good thing if you told them about DeWitt. They would want to come to the trial.”

  “Yeah, I will.”

  “I’d like to talk to Nita if she’s there. Would that be okay?”

  Surprised, she said, “Yeah, she’s here, but why do you want to talk to her?”

  “Just for a moment.”

  She knocked on Nita’s door and opened it. Nita was lying on the bed, studying. She looked up and said, “What?” in an annoyed tone.

  “Here. Dr. Julie Decker wants to talk to you.” She thrust the phone at Nita, who looked puzzled.

  Sam stood by the bed and listened.

  “Hi,” Nita said. “Yes, this is she.” She was quiet then, her eyes flitting to Sam and away. “Okay, I’ll do that right away. Yes, I’ll tell him.” She scribbled on the margin of the text.

  Sam saw it was a number but couldn’t read the digits. It had something to do with her, though. She took the phone back and walked out of the room and into her own. “I’m going to study now, try to catch up on things.”

  She was still on the phone with Julie when Jamie opened the bedroom door. She looked up in amazement and things fell into place. Jamie was here to make sure she didn’t off herself. “Jamie’s here. Do you want to talk to him?” She handed him the phone.

  “Hey,” he said breathlessly. “I ran most of the way.”

  Julie said something that made him laugh and he handed Sam the phone.

  “I’ll see you soon,” Julie said. “Take care.”

  She was in awe. Julie cared enough to keep her on the phone till her best friend came to make sure she was all right.

  “You wouldn’t do anything to yourself, would you? I mean, how would you do it anyway? You don’t even own a gun.”

  “Shut up, Jamie. Don’t even talk about it.” Nita was standing in the doorway.

  She did go home on Friday and tell her parents about DeWitt. Her mom about popped a blood vessel. She was hurt because Sam hadn’t told her what was going on. “You would have made me come home for good,” Sam said.

  Her mom had no answer to that, and her dad said, “We want to be at the trial.”

  She gave them the date in April. She was messing around with Buddy. The dog was mouthing her hand and mock growling.

  Her fifteen-year-old brother and seventeen-year-old sister came into the kitchen after school and were surprised to see her there. Her brother ate a peanut butter sandwich and some cookies and said he was going to meet friends and go to the basketball game.

  He punched her on the arm. “Don’t they have basketball games there?”

  She grabbed him by the head and tousled his hair. “On Saturdays, you beast.”

  Her sister stuck around and asked her about the university. She had applied and been accepted. “I have to stay in a dorm,” she said, making a bored face.

  “Yeah, well then you don’t have to cook or shop for food. You’re better off.”

  “Maybe you’ll still be around and I can room with you my sophomore year.”

  Unlike Sam in high school, her younger sister had tons of friends. Sam was a little teary eyed because she wanted to room with her. “Maybe,” she said.

  The day of the trial, she and Jamie were sequestered in the same room with two other people, who, Jamie thought, were there to keep an eye on them. After what seemed an int
erminable time, someone opened the door and asked for Jamie. The man who had been in the room with them went with him. Sam was so nervous she had to pee every five minutes. The woman in the room went with her and waited outside the bathroom.

  Jamie didn’t come back, and the woman explained that he would be allowed to stay in the courtroom after his testimony. When it was her turn, she tried to turn off her mind. Nervously, she glanced around the courtroom. Jamie was sitting with his parents and Edie. She saw her parents and Julie Decker. Not far from Jamie she noticed Nita. In the top row Karen sat alone. As promised, Dana Talmadge was there with Jim Delacourt.

  The ringing in her ears got louder as she was sworn in and took the witness chair. From there she could see DeWitt. He looked small in the orange jumper he wore. His hair was kind of long and greasy. She had already decided she would identify him. There was no doubt that he was the guy. He’d been caught with the tire iron. Jamie’s arm was taking forever to heal.

  It would help if she could hear DeWitt’s voice, though. She had told the prosecuting attorney that she would know his voice anywhere. That prosecutor was now asking her to tell her story. She cleared her throat and leaned toward the microphone and repeated the tale of how DeWitt had terrified her. Hearing her voice maximized by the mike made it shake a little.

  “Can you identify this person?” she was asked.

  She pointed at DeWitt and said, “That’s him over there in the orange outfit.”

  DeWitt jumped to his feet and yelled, “You lie, you bitch!”

  The judge banged his gavel and reprimanded the defense attorney for not controlling his client.

  The attorney apologized.

  Sam barely heard what they said. She knew now that he was the man who had terrified them. “It’s him,” she said again with more confidence. “He said he’d come back and finish what he started when he dragged me off the porch. If you let him go, he’ll probably kill us.”

  The defense attorney was on his feet. “Objection.”

  “Objection sustained,” the judge said.

  Sam glanced at the jury. She couldn’t read their minds. She was told to step down, and she joined her parents, sitting between Julie and her mother. Her mother squeezed her hand and she squeezed back.

  The judge dismissed the jury to discuss the verdict shortly after she left the stand. Sam and Jamie stood with their families in the hall, debating whether they had time to go to lunch. Edie was talking to Julie. Nita left but not before giving Sam a thumbs-up. Karen was standing by the water fountain.

  Sam slipped away and walked up to her. “Hey, thanks for coming.”

  Karen nodded. “You did a good job. I’m glad you ID’d that scum.”

  “His voice. I knew his voice.” She briefly relived him whispering in her ear, while he held her face down on the seat of that smelly car.

  “Those your parents?” Karen asked, nodding at the small crowd in the hallway.

  “Yes. Want to meet them?” Her heart began to soar. “Come on. I’ll introduce you to my shrink too.”

  It took less than forty-five minutes for the jury to find DeWitt guilty. He was taken back to jail to await sentencing. They were milling around the hall again, talking about where to go for an early dinner, having skipped lunch—Jamie’s family, Sam and her parents and Karen. Julie begged off, saying she had to head back north.

  She had a few words for Sam before she left. “I’m proud of you. It couldn’t have easy to confront him.”

  “I recognized his voice.”

  “I know. Call the office if you want an appointment.” She squeezed Sam’s shoulder.

  “Julie,” she said as Julie started to walk away. “Thanks for everything.”

  Julie waved a hand. “You bet.”

  Edie went to eat with the others before driving home. First, though, she called Pam. “I’m on my way out of town.”

  “You can’t stay?”

  “No, but I wanted to touch base.”

  They talked for a while before Edie asked her how Claire was.

  “Good. She’s different, not so snooty. That was an act, you know, a protection device, she said.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. And things are going well for you?”

  “Yes. Donna and I moved in together.”

  “I’m so glad.”

  “And you and Jennifer?”

  “Well, nothing so exciting as moving in together.”

  “But you’re a couple?” Leave it to Pam to speak her mind.

  “Sort of, yes.” She was smiling. Did going to bed together make them a couple? It certainly hadn’t made her and Claire a couple. It was different with Jennifer, though. Their friendship had been transformed.

  At home, she called Lynn to tell her about the trial, before returning Jennifer’s call.

  “How did it go today?” Jennifer asked.

  “All twelve jurors found DeWitt guilty. He’s in jail, awaiting sentencing. It was a good day.”

  “It was, it is. You must be relieved.”

  “Yes.” More than she could put into words.

  “Want some company?”

  “Don’t you have to work tomorrow?”

  “Not until nine. That gives me plenty of time. I have something to tell you.” Jennifer had been pushing for them to move in together.

  One of the problems was where they would live. Jennifer worked in Wausau. Edie could work anywhere. But Jennifer shared her house with Chip, and Edie lived alone.

  Edie took a quick shower while waiting. It was still light out when Jennifer arrived. Doves cooed and two robins pecked at the partially frozen ground.

  Jennifer let herself in. “It sounds like spring out there.”

  “I think it arrived while I was looking the other way,” Edie said. They were smiling at each other. “Would you like something to eat or drink?”

  “No, thanks.”

  Edie sat on the couch and patted the cushion next to her.

  Jennifer plopped down about a foot away. “I’ve been interviewing in Point. I can work at either Shopko or Walgreens, that is if you’ll let me live with you.”

  “Wow! Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I am telling you. You said we needed time to get to know each other. Well, we’ve had all of March to do that. Besides, I’ve known you for years.”

  Edie smiled at Jennifer and said teasingly, “As another skier.”

  Jennifer met her gaze and said without blinking or smiling, “I’m crazy about you. I’ve watched you ski for years and been too shy to ask you out. Then those damn books of yours threw me off. I thought maybe you were straight. I want to come home to you.”

  Edie tried not to laugh. “I’m set in my ways. I’ve never lived with a lover.”

  “Well, now is the time to start.”

  “Okay,” she said with a smile. “You’ve been forewarned. My house is kind of small, though.”

  “I’ll only bring myself and my clothes.” Jennifer grinned and moved closer.

  Edie laughed then. “By the way, I’m crazy about you too.”

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