Jury of One

32

Shelly left her apartment and went down to the building’s front door to allow Ronnie Masters in. She was no longer comfortable using her buzzer to blindly open the front door. She was relatively sure she was safe now, but she would take no chances.

Ronnie was hopping in place. The temperatures were below freezing and he was only wearing that hooded sweatshirt.

“Is that warm enough, Ron?” she said as she ushered him in.

He shook himself out. “I’m fine.”

She immediately regretted the comment. Asking him about the sufficiency of his clothing was tantamount to highlighting his lack of financial resources. Of course he would prefer something warmer, but he could not afford it.

She showed him inside and quickly made some hot chocolate. She brought two steaming mugs into the living room-this was what she called the room that was not the kitchen or the bedroom, a small space with a couch and chair, a fireplace and mantel.

“Thanks.” Ronnie sipped the cocoa and nodded at the photographs on the mantel. There were two plaques Shelly had received for outstanding public advocacy, a photo of her with the rest of the CAP staff, some law school graduation photos of Shelly with her grandmother.

“Your grandma’s who you stayed with,” he said.

“Yes.” Alex had apparently informed Ronnie of the details. When she had become pregnant at age sixteen, Shelly had moved from her house in Haley to Otter Lake, where her Grandma Jeannie (her mother’s mother) lived as a widow. The stated purpose for leaving Haley was that people could be cruel, and Shelly would have a lot to deal with as it was, without the comments from her fellow students. Sure. Shelly would attend high school in Otter Lake, get a tutor when she became “too pregnant,” and have the baby down there. There would be an excuse given-her grandmother was ailing, and Shelly, who was closest to Jeannie, wanted to stay with her to assist. No mention of Shelly’s pregnancy.

It was, of course, pure nonsense to believe that the ruse would hold. It would only take a single leak and the news would spread throughout the small town of Haley. No one would believe that Shelly went down to Otter Lake in the middle of her high school career-where she was on pace to be valedictorian and one of the state’s top tennis players-just to look out for her grandmother.

No. Shelly was not sent to Otter Lake to make life easier for her.

She never knew if the secret got out, because she never went back. She remained at Otter Lake after she had the baby and graduated with the rather small class down there. She obtained a scholarship to the state university and went to college, returning only sparingly, and then almost always to Otter Lake.

She had some fear of this whole ordeal coming to light when her father ran for attorney general four years later. She assumed that his opposition discovered the secret, but what could be done with such information? His daughter had become pregnant and given up the baby for adoption? Was that not precisely what a pro-life candidate like Langdon Trotter would support? What, exactly, could they accuse of him of-being consistent? And how ugly would the Democrats look, picking on the daughter?

“That must have been hard,” said Ronnie.

Shelly felt a wound open inside her. When that happened, periodically over the years, she would do as she did now: take a deep breath and plow through it. “You deal with it,” she said.

“This whole thing.” Ronnie waved his arm. “Kinda brings it all back.”

“Don’t worry about that.”

“Are you, like-” Ronnie’s eyes dropped.

“Am I what?”

“Ashamed or something, like, I don’t know.” He rubbed at a stain on his blue jeans. “Forget it.”

She watched this boy struggle, and it came to her what he meant, exactly.

“I’m not ashamed of Alex, Ronnie. I may be ashamed of certain aspects of my own behavior, but I am absolutely not ashamed of Alex.”

Ronnie managed a peek at Shelly but did not confront her. “I mean, ’cause of how it happened.”

“Because of how it happened?” She recognized the heightened volume of her voice but made no adjustment. “You mean that I was raped? You think I blame Alex for that? He was just an innocent little b-” Her throat closed on the words. She felt the heat in her face. She got up from the chair to give herself some space.

Did she, on an unconscious level, blame this child? Was she punishing the rapist by punishing the offspring? No. It was inconceivable. No. But then-why hadn’t she ever looked for this boy? She was consumed suddenly, overcome, with shame and guilt.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” Ronnie said.

She held out a hand but she was not prepared to speak. She could see what was happening. Alex and Ronnie had been talking. Alex had reported that Shelly was keeping a distance-more of a distance than when they had simply been friends. The revelation of her motherhood had opened a chasm between them. Shelly knew this to be true. She couldn’t explain why and, really, had made little attempt to. She was doing the same thing now as she had her whole life, wasn’t she? She was hiding.

“I can’t blame Alex for this,” she said simply. “Alex is the victim. The greatest victim of all. His only crime is that he wanted to find his real-”

The worst part was that she could not see the finish line. She didn’t know if or when she would feel maternal love for Alex. And Alex could sense her struggle, she knew.

“Maybe,” said Ronnie, “it would have been better if he hadn’t looked for you.”

“Is that what he thinks?” It was her first acknowledgment of her suspicion that Ronnie was speaking for Alex now, that he was interceding to discuss a topic on which Alex and Shelly could not personally converse. She found her way back to her seat, across from Ronnie on the couch. “I need time, that’s all,” she decided. “I don’t mean to make Alex feel worse about this. This is-this is just not an easy situation for anybody.”

“No.”

“I know I let Alex down-”

“Join the club.”

That stopped her. “How did you let him down?”

He shrugged. “I didn’t keep a close enough eye on him.”

She smiled. This kid thought he had to be Alex’s brother and father, at the same time. “That’s not your job, Ron. And I can tell you that Alex doesn’t see it that way.”

He waved that off.

“You saved his life, he told me.”

Ronnie rolled his eyes.

“Alex told me,” she said. “He got himself into a jam a couple years back. He was a stupid freshman who hot-wired the wrong kid’s car. He said you saved him.”

“Yeah, I’m a real hero. How am I helping him now?”

“Well, that’s why I asked you over, actually.” She was moving now to an issue that was at least as serious and important as the prior one. She had left Officer Julio Sanchez feeling that her client had been deceiving her. “I have some reason to believe that Alex may have been working with Officer Miroballi, but not in the way that had been explained to me.”

Ronnie opened his hands. She detected little from his expression. She had spent years giving hard truths to young people, mostly male, and she had challenged them many times. If her experience were any guide, Ronnie was not hiding anything from her.

“I’m wondering if Alex was working for Miroballi as his informant.”

Ronnie paused a beat, as if he were waiting for more, then grunted a chuckle. “C’mon.”

“It’s not exactly a flying leap, Ronnie. He was the feds’ informant. They caught him and flipped him. There’s no reason why Miroballi couldn’t have done the same thing.”

“No.” He shook his head. “I don’t know where you’re getting that kind of bull-”

“I got it from Miroballi’s partner.”

“No.” Ronnie would not be moved. “That’s nuts. What the hell’s Alex gonna tell this cop, anyway? It’s not like he’s some big-time dealer or something. He doesn’t have the kind of information a cop would be looking for.”

“No?”

“No.” Ronnie reached for his sweatshirt and got to his feet. “You’re taking a cop’s word over Alex’s? You think this guy wouldn’t bullshit you, Shelly? Are you that big a fan of cops all of a sudden?”

It was like he had punched her in the throat. She looked at him, the breath temporarily whisked from her lungs. He left on that note, triumphant in his closing remark. She listened to the door close behind him, and it was a long time before she could leave the chair.