The Choice

by Robert Whitlow

  “Ms. Lincoln, please sit down.”

  Sandy sat in the same chair she’d used at the previous meeting. Dr. Vale stood beside his desk and leaned against it.

  “I’ll be brief,” the administrator said. “Did you take Maria Alverez to meet with the lawyer who sent this letter?”

  “Yes. She was concerned—”

  Dr. Vale held up his hand. “This is not a formal inquiry. I’ll send the letter to the school board’s attorney and refer your involvement in this matter to the personnel committee. You can return to your classroom.”

  Sandy was already in trouble and wasn’t going to leave the office without making sure the counselor was on notice to cancel the trip to Atlanta.

  “Will you give Ms. Ramsey a copy?”

  “Yes,” Dr. Vale replied curtly.

  “Thank you.”

  Sandy left. When she reached the hallway she took a breath. She wasn’t sure how long it had been since her last one. One of the doors at the main entrance opened, and Carol came in. She saw Sandy, and a smug expression crept across her face. Sandy looked at her with pity. This wasn’t about beating Carol; it was about helping Maria do the right thing.

  “Good morning, Sandy,” Carol said as she passed by.

  “Hey, Carol.”

  Sandy doubted Carol would be as stoic as Dr. Vale when she read the letter. Students passed by her classroom door on their way to homeroom. Sandy called Jeremy’s office. No one answered, so she left a message.

  “Please let me know if there’s anything else I should do,” Sandy said as she ended the call. “Thanks again for your help.”

  The rest of the day passed uneventfully. During first and second periods, Sandy frequently looked out the window at Carol’s car. It didn’t move. By the time second period was over, she knew there was no way Carol and Maria could make it to Atlanta in time for an 11:00 a.m. appointment at the women’s clinic. In between each class, Sandy expected Maria to show up, but the Hispanic girl never appeared. Even though Maria had been spared a trip to the abortion clinic in Atlanta, a cloud hung over Sandy’s head.

  At cheerleading practice, the satisfaction Sandy usually experienced working with the girls was absent.

  “Ms. Lincoln, are you feeling okay?” Candace asked toward the end of practice.

  “Yes, just distracted by a personal matter. Thanks for asking.”

  At eight-thirty that evening, her cell phone beeped. It was from an unknown caller.

  “Hello,” Sandy said.

  “Ms. Lincoln, it’s Maria.”

  “Are you okay?” Sandy asked quickly.

  “I went to Atlanta with Ms. Ramsey.”

  “Atlanta?” Sandy asked in shock. “Why? The reason the lawyer wrote the letter to Ms. Ramsey and Dr. Vale was to stop the trip.”

  “That’s not what Ms. Ramsey told me. She said the appointment had been scheduled with the doctor, and it would be wrong not to go.”

  “When did you leave school? I saw Ms. Ramsey’s car in the parking lot all day.”

  “A woman named Ms. Sullivan drove us.”

  Maria was so easily influenced by any authority figure.

  “What happened at the doctor’s office?”

  Maria spoke in Spanish. “A woman talked to me about keeping the baby, letting someone else raise it, or having it taken out of my body while it is not a real baby. A nurse showed me a movie about girls who had done each one of those things and how they felt about it. The movie was in Spanish. Then the doctor talked to me. He spoke Spanish too. He said having the baby taken out of my body would hurt less now than if I waited until it’s bigger.”

  Maria stopped. Sandy’s heart sank. The most likely reason why Maria was so late getting back to Rutland would be the recovery time following an abortion.

  “Did you let him take out—” she started.

  “No,” Maria replied. “He wanted to, but I told him my mother was dead, and I needed to talk to you.”

  “Thank God.” Sandy sighed with relief. “Was Ms. Ramsey there when you said that to the doctor?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Nothing. She stayed to talk to the doctor after a nurse took me into another room where she examined me to see how I was doing. The nurse said I was very healthy.”

  “That’s good. Why were you so late getting home?”

  “After I saw the doctor, we went to another place. It was a big office building. I sat in a chair and waited for Ms. Ramsey and Ms. Sullivan for over two hours.”

  “Why did you go there?”

  “I don’t know. But I sat and sat. When we left there were many, many cars on the road. I did not know there were that many cars in the whole world.”

  “Rush-hour traffic doubles the time to get back to Rutland.”

  “Ms. Ramsey and Ms. Sullivan talked a lot on the phone. I was in the backseat and couldn’t understand because they turned on the radio and spoke very fast.” Maria paused. “I want you to be with me. Rosalita has to take care of her children.”

  “Be with you? What do you mean?”

  “If I decide to let the doctor take out the baby.”

  Sandy was shocked by the request. Whether Dr. Vale liked it or not, Sandy was going to tell Maria what she thought.

  “Maria, I don’t believe you should let the doctor take out the baby. Even though it’s very tiny right now, it has everything necessary to grow up into a person who can live in this world. All it needs is a safe place to be for the next seven months. Remember what we talked about with Mr. Lane?”

  “But the people at the doctor’s office explained to me that it’s different because I did not want to be with Emilio. He made me be with him in that way and now I have this big problem.”

  “That’s true,” Sandy said, then stopped. “Maria, I’d rather talk about this with you when we can look in each other’s eyes. Does that make sense to you?”

  “I think so.”

  “Did Ms. Ramsey say anything to you about going back to Atlanta?”

  “Yes, but I don’t know when.”

  “Okay. Please come to my classroom when you have a few minutes tomorrow, and we’ll set a time to get together. Will you do that?”

  “Yes.”

  Dusty Abernathy’s office in Atlanta was located north of the city near the intersection of I-75 and I-285. Clients suffering from liver damage caused by Dexadopamine didn’t want to fight their way into the center of the city to meet with a lawyer. The building had three disabled-parking spots close to the entrance, with wide doors inside the office to facilitate wheelchair access. The wisdom of Fred Lyons’s decision to open a satellite branch in the Southeast had been validated by an increasing number of new clients and resulting income. The money that ended up in Dusty’s bank account didn’t remove the sting of paying significant spousal support to Farina, but it made the pain more bearable.

  Dusty lived in a rented townhome overlooking the Chattahoochee River about ten minutes from the office. The cost of the townhome was a third of the rent for a comparable place in Los Angeles. There were scores of restaurants close by, and Dusty had joined a golf club where he’d lowered his handicap three shots. After growing up near San Francisco and attending college and law school in Chicago, Dusty found Atlanta a manageable, medium-sized city.

  However, running a solo law office was a culture shock. Dusty regularly talked with the lawyers at Jenkins and Lyons, but a conference call wasn’t the same as multiple contacts with fellow attorneys throughout the workday. The eerie quiet made him uneasy, and he missed the frenetic, noisy, argumentative environment of L.A.

  Dusty hired a secretary and paralegal the week after being admitted to the Georgia bar. The secretary lasted a month. The Southern accent Dusty found charming during the interview hid a serious lack of basic grammar skills that needed more remedial work than he was willing to provide. His new paralegal, Valerie Sanders, was a great find. Valerie had good administrative skills, but her most valuable asset wa
s the ability to establish great rapport with clients. Sick people who found a listening ear when they called the office made fewer demands on Dusty, leaving him free to focus on moving their cases through the legal system to a lucrative conclusion. After Dusty terminated the first secretary, Valerie contacted a woman she knew from a former firm who jumped at the opportunity to earn an extra $10,000 per year, even though she knew the job wasn’t permanent. Cynthia Campbell was a fast word processor familiar with the peculiar quirks of Georgia litigation practice.

  It was a clear, crisp morning. Dusty got out of his expensive sports car and looked up as a military cargo jet from nearby Dobbins Air Reserve Base flew over. The first time he saw a C-5 Galaxy overhead, he did a double take at the size of the massive airfreighter that crept slowly across the sky. Inside the office, he hung his sport coat on a hook behind the door and listened to the messages on his voice mail.

  “Hey, brother,” his sister, Lydia, said. “George and I are going to be coming through Atlanta from D.C. in a couple of weeks and thought we might spend the night with you on our way to the Gulf. Don’t worry; we’re going to board Buddy. Give me a call or send me an e-mail.”

  Lydia was eighteen months younger than Dusty. Her delivery had been tough on Dusty’s mother, and after she was born, their parents decided not to have any more children. The siblings bore little resemblance to each other. Lydia was fair-haired, with her father’s Roman nose and brown eyes, and her mother’s small frame. Dusty had none of those characteristics. When new acquaintances commented on the lack of common family traits for the siblings, their parents laughed and chalked it up to a large German and English gene pool.

  Lydia’s husband, George, was a bureaucrat with the U.S. Department of Commerce, and in Dusty’s opinion, a government leech. However, Dusty would put up with George for a day to see his sister. Buddy was the couple’s Jack Russell terrier. Any shoe left on the floor in a house visited by the dog was treated as a surrogate rat and fair game for vigorous chewing. Dusty sent a short e-mail to his sister asking for more specific information about the visit.

  There were three messages from existing clients and an inquiry about Dexadopamine from a potential new one. Dusty wrote down the man’s name and number and put a star beside it. It was too early to call, but at 8:30 a.m. sharp he would try to reach the prospective client. Injured people who wanted to hire a lawyer often went down a list calling multiple attorneys and leaving messages for them all. The first lawyer to return the call had a good shot at getting the case. A call back before 9:00 a.m. showed the injured person that Dusty came to work early. The fifth message in his voice mail was from Shania Dawkins.

  “Hey, Dusty. Good morning. I could have left a message on your cell, but I thought it would be nice for you to hear a friendly voice on your office machine. Dinner was great the other night, and I hope to see you again soon.”

  Shania was from Gainesville, Florida. Unlike the fired secretary, her Southern accent wasn’t a smoke screen for grammatical ignorance. She had a graduate degree from Georgetown and worked for a global nonprofit organization that focused on women’s rights nationally and internationally. The spunky young woman with dark curly hair had been in as many countries as Dusty had courtrooms. They met at a social event sponsored by the golf club and had gone out to dinner several times since. Dusty enjoyed talking with Shania as much as any woman he’d ever met. She had the ability to combine logic with emotion in a way that would have made her a terrific trial lawyer; however, she’d decided to use her skills to organize and lobby for women subjected to everything from household slavery and polygamy in third-world countries to denial of equal pay and reproductive freedom in Western societies. Shania’s goal in life was to do as much good as she could regardless of financial reward. Dusty wanted to help people too, but he liked to get paid to do it.

  Dusty logged on to his computer. He pulled up a new case he’d taken a few weeks earlier and began reading medical records obtained by Valerie. The human liver can fail for many reasons or for no known reason at all. A key aspect of every Dexadopamine case was linkage between a person’s use of the supplement and a quantifiable decline in liver function without any other intervening causes. Dusty could interpret lab reports with the expertise of a hepatologist.

  When the clock reached 8:30 a.m., he called the potential client. The man sleepily answered the phone, and they set an appointment for the following afternoon. Cynthia buzzed his office.

  “Dusty, are you in there?”

  “I’ve been here since seven.”

  “You sure are quiet.”

  “Lab reports have a way of keeping a lid on my excitement level.”

  “Maybe this will excite you,” Cynthia replied. “Shania Dawkins is on line 3.”

  Dusty pushed the button.

  “Thanks for the message,” he said. “I enjoyed dinner too.”

  “Great. Do you have a minute? I have something important to talk to you about.”

  “Sure.”

  “It’s something I’d like us to do together.”

  Dusty sat up straighter in his chair. He knew Shania liked him, but he was surprised she’d been thinking of ways to spend more time with him.

  “Yes.”

  “What is your firm’s policy on pro bono work?”

  “Uh, most of our pro bono work is used up on the contingency cases we lose.”

  “This isn’t a contingency case. It has to do with coercion of a mentally challenged, pregnant girl by a right-wing high school teacher.”

  Dusty hesitated. Pleasing Shania might be worth a legal detour without monetary compensation.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  As soon as first period ended, Sandy went to her car and called Jeremy’s office.

  “Deb, this is Sandy Lincoln. Is Jeremy available?”

  “No, but he should be here any second. Would you like to leave him a voice mail?”

  “Uh, could you put me on hold and let me wait? I’m between classes and need to talk to him.”

  Sandy tried to relax. She’d not seen either Dr. Vale or Carol when she arrived at the school that morning, but she knew discussions and meetings about her involvement with Maria were taking place all over Rutland.

  “Hello,” Jeremy said when he came on the line. “I got your message about delivery of the letter. What’s been the response?”

  “The counselor ignored it. She took Maria to the women’s clinic in Atlanta anyway.”

  Sandy told him what she’d learned from Maria.

  “That’s not totally unexpected,” Jeremy said when she finished. “I knew this might happen.”

  “You did?” Sandy asked in surprise. “I thought they’d have to obey your letter.”

  “The letter put the administration on notice of Maria’s right to decide what she wants to do about the pregnancy at the time I met with her. Under the law, the choice is still hers. From what you’re saying, she made a voluntary decision to go to the clinic. The letter has authority so long as it reflects Maria’s current state of mind. The issue at this point is whether, considering all the facts and circumstances, the counselor exerted improper influence on Maria.”

  “She told Maria it would be wrong to cancel the appointment. That’s not true.”

  “But does that constitute coercion?”

  “Who are you representing here?” Sandy shot back.

  Jeremy was silent for a moment.

  “Ms. Lincoln, you asked me to advise Maria about her legal rights. That’s what I’m trying to do. You’re a teacher, but you’re also a woman who cares about this girl. When I talked to Maria in my office, I tried to educate her about her options in a way that emphasized the life of the child within her. There’s value in letting the principal and counselor know someone is watching the situation and prepared to respond on her behalf.”

  Sandy was confused.

  “This isn’t how I thought it would work. I just want her to do the right thing.”

  “I know you do, but the
real battle for this baby will be fought in Maria’s mind.”

  “She’s so easily swayed.”

  “Yet neither of us thinks she needs a guardian.”

  Sandy wasn’t sure exactly what she thought about Jeremy Lane as a lawyer. He seemed to be talking in circles. She checked her watch.

  “What should I do next?”

  “Continue to find out everything you can. And ask Maria if she wants me to write another letter.”

  “Another letter?” Sandy asked in shock. “The first one didn’t do any good.”

  “With Maria’s permission, I’ll notify them to advise me of any contact they have with her.”

  Sandy checked her watch again.

  “Look, I’ve got to get to class. I’ll mention the possibility of another letter to Maria, but it sounds like a waste of time.”

  “I understand. I’m not trying to force myself into the situation.”

  “I know,” Sandy said quickly. “Sorry for venting.”

  “It’s okay. You care.”

  Care or not, Jeremy had kept his cool when she didn’t. Sandy returned to her classroom.

  Shortly before first lunch period ended, Maria came by as Sandy was finishing up with another student.

  “How are you?” Sandy asked as soon as she and Maria were alone.

  “I felt a little sick this morning, but I didn’t throw up.”

  “Good. Have you talked with Ms. Ramsey?”

  “No, but she usually finds me in the afternoon.”

  Sandy told Maria about her conversation with Jeremy Lane.

  “He can write another letter to Dr. Vale and Ms. Ramsey,” Sandy said, “but it won’t do any good unless you make Ms. Ramsey obey the letter.”

  Maria glanced down at the floor for a moment.

  “It’s hard for me. When I talk to you I feel one way, but I feel another way when I talk to her.”

  In Maria’s presence Sandy didn’t have the heart to scold her. The pregnant student was a sixteen-year-old girl with a limited education and deprived cultural background. Everyone in her world was a dominant authority figure.