by Mary Hogan
“Fine, Isaac. How are you?”
“Good. Paul is out to lunch at the moment.”
I nearly scoffed and said, “He certainly is.” Instead, I adopted a Brenda sort of tone. “I was wondering, Isaac, have you noticed any changes in Paul lately?”
Before I confessed, I needed to know what Paul’s work wife knew. Livelihoods were at stake. Convictions could be overturned.
He paused. “Like what?”
That pause spoke volumes. It was the sort of pause no one wanted to (not) hear. Like the Grand Canyon of air that would rush into a gap between “Do you love me?” and “Yes.” I knew Isaac. He was a by-the-book type of guy. Chain of command and all that. As an officer of the court, it was his duty to make sure his boss was fit for the bench. A judge without sound judgment would have to be reported.
“He’s on a new medication,” I lied. “Nothing serious. But it has a few side effects. I’ve noticed a little—” I stopped. What could I say? He’s mean, childish, clumsy? He swears?
“I’m sure he’s fine.” Isaac’s tone was curt.
“So you haven’t noticed anything?”
It was shorter this time, but I heard it nonetheless. The sound of silence. He said, “A muddy ruling here and there. Nothing reversible.”
“He doesn’t need a doctor, then? You know, to adjust his meds.”
“I can cover for him.”
Cover?
“Sorry, Fay, but I have to go. Big case.”
I knew when someone was cutting me off. I’d used all possible methods with Brenda. Isaac didn’t say anything more, and I didn’t, either.
IT’S IMPOSSIBLE NOT to question the inequities in the criminal justice system when you push through the revolving door of New York City’s criminal courthouse on Centre Street. The line to the metal detectors is filled with people of color; their attorneys upstairs are nearly all white.
“Real estate,” Paul once told me, by way of explanation. “White crime occurs inside, behind closed doors and curtained windows. Street criminals are out in the open.”
“Remind me again: when’s the last time the police raided a warehouse rave in Brooklyn?”
“I believe the term ‘rave’ is passé, sweetheart.”
I’d laughed. “When is the last time the police raided an Ecstasy-fueled dance party full of white kids?”
“Duly noted.” Despite its frustrations and flaws, Judge Paul Agarra believed in the color-blind rule of law. He understood the near impossibility of a kid rising out of poverty and despair when his parents—or single parent, or widowed grandmother—were too exhausted or indifferent to check homework. When dinner was microwaved mac and cheese, when teachers were forced to be cops, when cops were expected to be superhuman, when textbooks were so old there was no mention of 9/11 or Osama bin Laden or Guantánamo or Trump or the upside-down world in which we all now lived. Paul factored in the whole gnarled picture. He was known as the judge both sides wanted.
I decided to take a subway downtown and see for myself.
On the tenth floor, the elevator rocked to a stop. The doors opened onto a marble corridor dappled in sunlight. A woman, a mom, a grandmother, sat glumly on the long bench below the wall of windows.
“Always the moms,” Paul often said, as if the fathers of the defendants hadn’t the patience or loyalty to sit through a trial.
This high up, Tribeca was a checkerboard of beige rooftops. The windows were a thousand waffle squares. My hair could use a comb. My lipstick was faded. Still, I hurried past the mom and the restroom on my way to the far end of the hallway, hearing my boots clack on the shiny floor. Paul’s courtroom was the last in the line, behind two sets of double doors: the first, painted black metal; the second, natural courtroom oak.
“So, you were wearing a metallic jacket that night? The night of February fourth?”
Recess was over.
“Yes,” the defendant said. At least I assumed he was the defendant. He wore a purple pin-striped dress shirt on the stand, open at the neck, freshly pressed. A lawyer sort of shirt.
“Purple? Are you kidding me, man?” I imagined the protest when his attorneys brought him clothes for trial. They, too, wore purple. Their ties. It was the modern color of defense. Not suggestive of a Blood or a Crip or a Latin King, not offensive to blue Democrats or red Republicans. The color of mourning or royalty in some cultures was now the American shade of presumed innocence.
“The same metallic jacket you’re wearing in this video? People’s exhibit 468 B?”
“Yes.”
A juror turned his head toward me when I walked in and sat in the back row. Paul did not. When Isaac spotted me, I noted a faint look of alarm.
“A metallic jacket that’s exactly the same as the metallic jacket worn by the victim who was shot a few blocks away, right?”
“Objection.” A chair grated on the floor as one of the defense attorneys rose to his feet. “Assumes facts not in evidence.”
All heads turned to the judge. My Paul. The Honorable Judge Agarra. Silence expanded like spray-foam insulation, invading every crevice. Paul’s face was utterly blank. No affect whatsoever. His eyes stared into nothingness. My fists tightened around the strap of my purse. Had my husband had a stroke?
“Judge?” Isaac leaned close to Paul. The court reporter sat below them both with her fingers perched on the keyboard. It felt as if the square room had shifted into a rhombus. We all leaned forward. I saw Isaac subtly slide a piece of paper in front of Paul. Dear God, don’t let anyone else see that. Robotically, Paul looked down and said, “Sustained.”
The young man on the stand smirked at the jury. Attention reverted back to him. Paul seemed to come to. His demeanor was alert once more. “Don’t answer,” he instructed.
The prosecutor resumed direct examination. “Had you worn that jacket all night?”
“Whenever I was cold.”
A juror burped up a laugh. Another rolled her eyes. I’d seen this many times before. In an attempt to highlight important evidence, prosecutors beat it to death. Usually, Judge Paul Agarra urged the attorneys to move on. Today, he sat high on the bench, mute. Usually, Isaac was busy researching case law, prepping documents, assisting Paul behind the scenes. Today, he sat at his side, nearly vibrating with a readiness to leap in.
In a deliberate way, I sucked air into my lungs and forced it out through my nostrils. I didn’t trust my autonomic nervous system.
“Did you leave your apartment in the Bronx wearing that jacket?”
“I left from my girlfriend’s apartment.”
“Wearing that jacket?”
“Maybe I let her wear it. As a gentleman.”
At that moment, Paul seemed to wake up from his trance. He turned to the defense table and asked, “Will you be contending that your client did not wear a metallic jacket that night?”
“No, Your Honor.”
“Then why are we belaboring this? Move on, gentlemen.”
While the prosecutor flipped through notes, the Cheshire cat in the witness box flashed his dimples at the jury. One of the jurors smiled back. Never would Judge Agarra allow his courtroom to get so sloppy. Never would Isaac let him.
Suddenly, Paul looked up. “My wife is here!” He woke everyone up. Even the cocky defendant looked startled. Both defense attorneys stood up to object, but Paul waved them off. “Relax,” he said. “Ten-minute recess.”
Upending all protocol, Paul abruptly stood and left the bench, marching through the central aisle of the courtroom—the same aisle we’d walked down on our wedding day—to my seat in the back. In Isaac’s stricken expression, I understood that Paul may have just handed an alleged murderer grounds for appeal. Quickly, the bailiff sputtered, “All rise.”
Everyone rose. When Paul reached my pew, he sat with his black robe billowing. “You’re here,” he whispered. “I knew you’d come.”
Around us, people were in chaotic motion. The court officer stood close to the defendant, unable to handcuff
him before the jury had a chance to file out. Few sights were more prejudicial than a defendant in cuffs. Another court officer quickly shuffled the jury out a side door. They craned their necks to see us. Paul bent over to kiss my cheek. In his angelic grin, I saw that he was unaware of anyone but me. He took my hand.
“My darling,” he said, softly. “I’ve missed you so.”
Tears rose into my eyes. “I’ve missed you, too, my love.”
Vaguely, I was aware that the jury had been ferried out; the defendant was cuffed and escorted to a waiting cell, the lawyers circled into covens around their tables. Somehow, I saw it all without looking up from Paul’s hazel eyes. I fell into the sage circle around his pupil, the caramel sheen of his iris. Those were the eyes I’d melded into when I promised myself to him for life.
“Stay,” Paul said.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Tears dribbled mascara down my cheeks. Paul swiped it away with his fingertips. He gazed at me with love so pure I felt high. I pressed my palm against my chest to keep my heart from breaking into pieces.
Now I was sure. Something was terribly wrong.
Chapter Twenty
DR. FLETCHER WAS A BUSY MAN. HE MADE THAT CLEAR. “Fifteen minutes, Fay,” he stressed over the phone. “Truly. That’s all I have today.”
“That’s all I need. Thank you so much.”
On the way to his office, on the subway, I mulled over what I would say. How to frame it. I told myself not to cry. He was a busy man.
The doctor’s midtown office was a twenty-minute walk from Columbus Circle. Fifteen if you really chugged it. I arrived ten minutes early. In the waiting room, I flipped through the current issue of Architectural Digest. I listened to the swoosh of blood pulsing through my ears. I wished I had taken a Xanax.
“Fay Agarra.”
“Here.” Raising my hand like a schoolgirl, I stood up. Unlike every other physician in New York, Dr. Fletcher was fanatically on time. If you weren’t willing to respect him in the same way, the office manager would politely hand you a list of referrals on your way out.
A medical assistant escorted me down a long hallway. She smiled blandly as I blathered, “Usually it’s People in a waiting room. Or Good Housekeeping. You know, articles about brain-eating amoebas lurking in your neti pot?” I tried, but I couldn’t stop babbling. “Interior-design photos are so staged. Like, who has fresh flowers in their bathroom?”
Dr. Fletcher’s office was tucked into the corner at the end of the hall. His door was open. Following my escort’s gesture, I entered the office and sat down. I tugged my skirt over my knees.
“Yes. Good.”
He was on the phone. He nodded once at me. After the assistant silently backed out of the room, I purposefully lowered my shoulders. I positioned my head in a confident way. Chin up. The way Anita would. I settled into the down-cushioned chair. Unlike most physicians who hire a decorator to neutralize their turf with varying degrees of taupe, Dr. Fletcher’s office reflected his personality: overstuffed, bookish. A coaster sort of space.
“Okay, then.”
Abruptly, he hung up. Whatever happened to goodbye? With his hands folded neatly on the desk in front of him, Dr. Fletcher fastened a half smile to his lips. “Fay. How may I help you?”
“It’s Paul.”
“Let me stop you right there,” he said. “I can’t discuss my patients.”
“Of course. It’s just that, well—”
Impatience was etched on his face. Coolly, he said, “I was under the impression that this consultation was about you.”
“It is. Sort of. I don’t know where to turn.”
“Are you ill?”
“No. It’s Paul.”
He pressed his lips together in a prissy way. It’s why I was no longer his patient. Paul loved him because he was the best. I switched to another internist after my first appointment because I felt like a naughty child in his presence. As if my cholesterol numbers were the wrong answers on a math quiz. “Something is off with him, Dr. Fletcher.” My chin began to wobble. I clamped down on my teeth.
“Why isn’t he here?”
“He thinks he’s fine.”
“Fay—”
“You promised me fifteen minutes.” Magenta flared in my cheeks. “I am paying for fifteen minutes.”
Stone-faced, he replied, “You have ten left.”
Quickly, I plucked a tissue from the box on his desk and undaintily blew my nose. “When I ask Paul to empty the garbage, a minute later he’ll forget.”
In response to Dr. Fletcher’s “Seriously?” face, I hurriedly added, “That’s a stupid example. Garbage and husbands, I know. There are other things. Lots. Sometimes, when I talk to Paul about my day, he seems to be listening. I mean, he looks at me and nods. But then he’ll ask a question that indicates he wasn’t following the thread at all. He got lost in the park. In Spain, my God, his judgment was insane. And he’s a judge! Over the weekend he was supposed to take our dog to the vet and he just walked her. When he came home, I asked him, ‘Was it a tapeworm?’ and he said, ‘Was what a tapeworm?’ Instead of taking her back to the vet, he plops down in front of the TV! His personality has changed. Not always, only sometimes. He swears. He never swore. My head is spinning. I feel like an alien has abducted my husband. Sometimes he’s there; sometimes he’s, um, mentally meandering. Like he’s a visitor in his own life. Our mailbox is full of thank-you notes from obscure charities he gives money to. I’m worried about him on the Internet. All those scam—”
“Stop.” Dr. Fletcher held his palm up. “You’ve said enough.”
“It’s hard to nail it down to one particular thing. It’s a lot of little things. He’s not himself. As his wife, I know.”
“I’m sorry, Fay, but I really do have to end this meeting.”
Meeting? Wasn’t I paying for an appointment? I wiped my nose with the wad of tissue and blinked.
“I’ll talk to him at our next appointment.”
“Shouldn’t he come in earlier, Dr. Fletcher? His physical isn’t until next year. What am I supposed to—?”
In what struck me as annoyance, the doctor said, “Let me refer you to a good therapist.”
“I don’t think it’s psychological. Neurological, maybe? At first, I thought he caught some bug in Spai—”
“For you, Fay.” He wrote a name and number on a pad and tore it off with a flourish. “Thank you for stopping by.”
“Wait. What?”
“Danica?” He pushed a button on his desk phone. “Is my next patient here? Good. Send her in.”
With that, Dr. Fletcher held out the therapist’s name and stretched his lips into a fake smile. I stood up and left empty-handed, without bothering to say goodbye.
Chapter Twenty-one
JOHN DIDN’T PICK UP. SURPRISING, SINCE HIS PHONE LIVED in the palm of his hand. Nonetheless, I left a message. “It’s Fay. Call me when you have a minute, okay? Nothing dire, but important. Talk soon.”
Five minutes later, John called back. “Are you here?”
“Where?”
“Where. In Boston. Where else?”
“Why would I be in Boston? I’m in New York.”
He groaned. “New York? You’re going to miss Kate’s dinner.”
“What dinner?”
“Her award dinner. That philanthropy thing. Didn’t Dad tell you? He said you both would come. We bought tickets for you at our table.”
My head fell forward. “He didn’t tell me.”
“Ah, jeez.”
“Is there a speech? Can we catch the next flight?”
“I’m on my way there now,” John said. Then he cupped the phone. Through his hand I heard, “Shouldn’t we take Cambridge Street? Skip the turnpike altogether?”
“I feel awful,” I said. And I did.
“Sorry, Fay. Uber.”
John groaned again, but it may have been traffic related because he sounded somewhat laissez-faire when he replied, “Kate will
live.” Horns honked in a commuter symphony. With an edge to his voice, I heard him inform the driver, “I usually head south on Chestnut Hill this time of day.”
“You’re busy. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“No, no. I have a few minutes. You know how Boston rush hour is.” As if the Uber driver might squeal on him, John said in a low voice, “Between you and me, Fay, it’ll be one of those endless chicken/salmon events. Bad food, boring self-congratulations. Kate is embarrassed by the attention. I’ll tell her something last minute came up.” He stopped. “Did something come up? Is Dad okay?”
“Well—” In the same way I did a lot lately, I sucked in a full breath, held it for a moment, then blew it out audibly. Bwoo. I attempted to gather the bearings that were constantly escaping into the air around me.
John repeated, “What is it, Fay? Is Dad okay?”
“That’s why I’m calling. He’s been, um, strange lately. Not himself. Have you noticed anything?”
“Like what?”
“Forgetfulness, distraction, things like that.” I didn’t say, “He acts like a jerk sometimes, and a total baby, and he walks like a beginning ice-skater.”
John laughed. “I suppose neglecting to tell you about Kate’s award dinner is forgetful and distracted.”
“Yeah. Again, ugh.”
“Isn’t Dad in the middle of a big trial?”
“Well, yes.”
“I’m guessing that would consume a person.”
“Yes, but—”
“And, let’s face it, Fay. Dad is closing in on seventy. The wiring may be a little frayed.”
“Of course. I get that. It’s just—”
“Christ! Use your blinker, asshole! Did you see that guy? Christ!”
Even in a backseat, John experienced road rage. Paul had told him a million times, “It might help to remember that everyone else on the road is frustrated, too.” Or he used to say that, back when he had empathy.
“You know when you know a person so well, you see things others maybe can’t see?” Again, I inhaled, held it, blew it out. Bwoo. How could I tell him that his dad had morphed into an asshole? Not always, but enough to regularly piss me off. Enough to feel as though I’d been pushed down Alice’s rabbit hole.
