(1.)
Seriously. That was his name. I found him in the Flint Yellow Pages, nearly faded to parchment, hanging on the stained wall by the phone in the holding area. I had to squint at the number in the dimness without my glasses. The consensus of those still conscious in the holding area was to plead out innocent and hire a lawyer. Telling them guilty because you were sick and probably guilty didn’t always get you out of there. First offence, you could get released on your own recognizance. It would cost you later, of course. So I had Wineglass’s number even before the bailiff returned my keys and wallet. I made an appointment for a week later. My preliminary hearing would be in two weeks.
For early June, it was a blazing hot and humid day. I didn’t know what the protocol was, so we dressed up—I in a tacky JC Penney suit my parents bought me for high school Commencement. Since then, I wore it for the christening of my son, Wes, six months later. The lapels were all wrong. Leisure suits were just making their debut. Doris looked decent. She was fitting into her old wardrobe again, this one a sleeveless white dress I recognized from when we were dating. Riding a bicycle around the block and chasing the newly mobile Wesley around the apartment had trimmed the last of her maternity weight.
Doris carried a white handbag, the size of a beach tote filled with what we thought might be useful evidence. She wore the Jackie Kennedy wig that she used for waiting on tables. At that time no one could convince her that it didn’t look nearly as good as her own hair. I couldn’t see any thinning, another side-effect, she claimed, of pregnancy. Her feline eyeglasses were a fashion accent about to slip into the realm of ironic artifacts. I looked as though I should be holding a pitchfork for a send-up of American Gothic. We waited in the foyer of Wineglass and Liebowitz, Attorneys-at-Law.
The Wineglass who escorted us into a small, windowless office turned out not to be the Wineglass whose name was stenciled on the entrance and on the bronze placard out front. That was the Senior Partner, Wineglass. We got Aaron Wineglass, Jr. of the recent second-try bar exam squeaker. He was just coming to work, for maybe the second or third time.
“You’re Mr. Callander, am I right. So that would make you Mrs. Callander? Or maybe not, under the circumstances? Just a joke, kids! C’mon in,” Wineglass pattered over his shoulder. We did not shake hands because he strode ahead of us into the frigid AC, pushing doors open with his feet. One handheld a new leather briefcase while the other gripped a take-out coffee. We followed him down a wrong corner from which he wheeled abruptly. “It can’t be much further!”
“Uh, right, Mr. Wineglass. I’m Ladd Callander and this is Doris.”
“A little dogleg to the right, here Ladd and Doris. No more than a sand-wedge from here.”
Wineglass Jr. had a nicely assembled wardrobe, if not caseload. His lightweight summer Armani made an impression on me, even if his desk and the tops of his file cabinets were bare. His unframed diploma was propped in the chrome branches of a clothing tree. The office was dominated by a monumental desk, captain’s chairs hoping for clients, and a felt putting mat. There was a high-tech putter leaning in the corner next to an umbrella. Mounted on a pedestal, it might have been mistaken for an impressionist sculpture.
He urged us to sit. He adjusted the fat knot of his tie. His sandy hair was blow dried to televangelist perfection. Wineglass had the build of a golfer, or a televangelist—just a slight patina of over-ripe adolescent fat on his neck and jowls. He was not a swimmer. I couldn’t picture him playing squash in the darkest months of winter, but if he did, Wineglass would be dreaming of Myrtle Beach. His clubs were surely out in the trunk of his vehicle. He took an air-guitar tee shot before moving behind his desk.
“So, what have we got here, Ladd?” Wineglass made himself comfortable in his own swivel chair. Doris handed me a brown lunch sack out of her tote. I placed it on the desk. The bag was filled with prescription and over-the-counter remedies in various vials. It tipped over and spilled before Wineglass could fish out a sample.
“Well, the only defense I can come up with is that I was taking a lot of stuff. I’ve got asthma and I had a bronchial infection. See…”
“Yes, Ladd. I see where you’re headed!” Wineglass seemed genuinely enthused with my lame rationalization. “First, though, let me reassure you about the matter of the known prostitute who the County alleges was your passenger on the evening in question. To my mind, it’s a non-issue. If anything, they owe you gratitude for driving the poor thing home so late at night. She’s off the streets because of your Samaritan gesture. Anyway, they’ve got nothing in that regard, no witnessed exchange of money or services. Your lovely wife believes you or she wouldn’t be here, am I right?”
Doris nodded without enthusiasm. She recrossed her legs. One dangling white pump began to flick. She had recently begun to question certain premises of our marriage, complaining of some stagnation—not an unwelcome evolution for my addled schemes. But I wished Wineglass hadn’t reminded her that I had already pushed hard on the fidelity envelope.
“So, not to worry about that.” Wineglass looked at his watch and again at our file which was the only thing on his desk in his briefcase. “However, in the matter of erratic driving and blowing a .12 of blood alcohol…I was going to explain that the 1st Offense, Driving Under the Influence can almost always be bargained down to Impaired Driving. If, you haven’t killed anyone. But the Prosecutor likes to hear some kind of mitigating circumstance, no matter how contrived—why you felt compelled to be on the road in that condition. These medicinal effects are a very good start.”
“See, what I’m saying is that I was impaired before I was impaired,” I offered.
Wineglass began reading prescription labels. He wrote down drug names and dosages on a clean, yellow pad. When he took the pad from his desk, the top drawer rattled in its tracks as though it was empty.
“The alcohol was sorta incidental,” I added.
“It’s a decent contrivance, Ladd. We play that, along with some remorse, verifiable employment, your lack of a previous record… And, a haircut, please. A fine and court costs, alright, but you’ll get to keep your license for going to work. Maybe you’ve gotta attend a few AA meetings. Just let me jot these down. I have to tell you, my stomach is churning just thinking about these mixed with anything but water.”
He finished writing then picked up his phone. He dialed a single number. I could see that Doris wanted to smoke. I saw her shiver then take a light sweater from her tote.
“Oh, is that you, April? Did I screw that up?” he asked. “Okay, I’ll get this figured out. Would you be so kind as to hook me up with the Old Man? Thank you, sweetheart.” He waited; we waited. He winked at one of us. “Hi, Papa. Yeah, it’s going along smooth….Right. File for a continuance. Mapleschantz, right. Listen, though. What am I getting for this DUI, 1st Offense? Yeah, yeah, I know from $8 hundred, but I need to know the up-front. The deposit. Okay, sorry. The retainer. Yeah, I’m with the young man and his lovely wife at this moment…Yeah, I’m free by 4:30… Foursome with who? Well, sure. I’ll make time. Mmm-hmm. Bye.””
Wineglass made more notes while I began to imagine just how inexperienced he might be. Could he possibly screw up a drunk-driving plea bargain? I guess we didn’t bolt because we were so naïve about the process ourselves. Concern about the cost of his services outweighed all others.
“Right, then, Ladd. So, here’s out timetable,” Wineglass announced, giving the pad a final jab with his pen. “The scenario, if you will. First, I try to reschedule the pretrial hearing with the Prosecutor’s people. When this finally occurs, you dress up sharp and attend with me. You’re the soul of contrition. At that time, we’ll agree to an appropriate plea. Next step, I file for another delay while we wait for the right judge to sit. I hear Mapleschantz, maybe. Grapevine says he’s the way to go. Follow?”
I followed. He must have done an internship of pro bono work for the illiterate. Wasn’t it in my file somewhere that I was a part-time college student?”
“So, I’m thinking—sometime in January. Plenty of time to line up all of our ducks in the famous row.” Wineglass rose abruptly and consulted his Paddock-Phillipe. “Mr. Callander, believe it or not, I have a late breakfast with that very same Assistant D.A. Time to schmooze a bit. So, if there are no questions, I’ll let you kids be on your way. There’s only the matter of a…retainer, which is half of the fee up front. $400. April in Reception will give you a receipt.” He could not have been in the building for more than 20 minutes. His coffee was probably still hot.
We waited in the hall while he switched off the lamp. He emerged with the briefcase and the coffee. The putter was tucked under one arm. We followed him back out through the labyrinth of hallways. Then, halfway out, by my dead reckoning, he stopped and turned to speak: “Now there is just one other matter I should mention Ladd, so it shouldn’t come as a shock. The guy we want, Mapleschantz, Judge Gerhardt P..…let me just say in so many words…he has a rather informal judicial presence. He’ll accept our deal, okay. But I hear the man will probably want to lecture you and I mean lecture with some malice. Rip you a new one, in the man’s own vocabulary. Dumbass is the least offensive but don’t rule out thoughtless, dumb fuck, pardon my French. He’s very creative.”
“They let him do that?”
“Just so you understand,” Wineglass slurped from his coffee. “That will be in lieu of hitting you with the maximum. This will be a learning moment for me as well. I’ve only sat in as Associate Counsel once in his court. Just keep it in mind that we’re getting everything we need out of this plea bargain.”
Somehow, walking and talking, Wineglass had gotten behind us. He managed to grip the coffee cup while holding the briefcase with the pinky of the same hand. This freed a hand to place on Doris’s back as he directed us down the home stretch. The putter was under that arm, bumping me in the back. “What I’m trying to emphasize, Ladd, is that we’ll make out like bandits compared to what the pricks could do to you. His Honor will expect the public humiliation to be gratefully borne.”
When we reached the front desk, Wineglass divested himself of all his burdens to offer a handshake. “If it’s any consolation,” he added, “there won’t be more than ten people in the place, tops.”
“I won’t even blink, Mr. Wineglass,” I assured him. He was already going out the doors with the fancy calligraphy. Tee time.
Doris took out the white Credit Union envelope—our life’s savings to date. Stumbling around in the tank without my glasses, trying to keep my pants up without a belt, finally having my turn to retch in the seatless commode—these humiliations were not public enough, I supposed, to satisfy the state’s need for retribution. Perhaps my case required that Mapleschantz put an embarrassing icing cake. Doris tucked April’s receipt safely into her tote.
(2.)
Many slips between the cup and the lip. My Grandmother used to say that. It meant that nothing ever goes according to plan. Though I eventually raised that cup of just desserts to my lips, it was with some difficulty. Those slips, of summer and especially autumn, before I ever went for my Day in Court, were unusual events indeed.
I met Wineglass at the so-called discovery conference. We sat down with the assistant lackey of the Assistant Prosecutor. I still don’t know what that was about except for the guy discovering personal stuff that didn’t seem relevant. This suit never looked at me. He read some papers that Wineglass dealt across the table to him, including a signed affidavit from the same allergist who’d helped me get a draft deferment. They exchanged pleasantries about their handicaps and their favorite holes at Warwick Hills. Then we left.
“Now, Ladd. When they give me a date, I’ll send you a certified letter.” He patted me on the shoulder of my shiny suit as though there might be vermin scurrying in the synthetic fabric. “The District Court will notify you also.”
A warm drizzle was irrigating the tarry parking lot of the Genesee County Court Complex where my dinged and battered Maverick stewed in its own juices. I was putting a lot of miles on her between work in Pontiac and school in Flint. Wineglass had only to ignore a Don’t Walk signal to get back to his office across Saginaw Avenue. I hoped moisture had not yet gummed up my salvage yard ignition system during the meeting.
“Have a terrific summer and behave yourself.” He popped open his umbrella, which bore a PGA Official’s logo and strutted away. “My best regards to your lovely wife!” He called over his shoulder.
I went an entire parched month without a single cold beer—a record. But it was a hot August, and I still had too many young friends—persons still living with parents or in squalid arrangements with other singles. They showed up every weekend with six-packs to share. With my second summer session safely completed (Tenets of Revolution; Europe in 1848) there was no impediment to having a cold one behind the wheel; too and from work. Doris refrained from having her first affair until after Labor Day.
Well, Presidents and despots of all stripes had been toppling recently. The once unassailable records of dead, white athletes were being broken with regularity. Hemingway and Columbus were in disrepute. Even the Israeli Defense Forces had gotten their asses kicked for a few hours on Yom Kippur. The whole world seemed to be in transition. I became aware of the terms postindustrial and postmodern. If we were going to be postmodern, why shouldn’t Doris have a taste of some newly acceptable hedonism? Didn’t I owe her a hall pass?
It was with a guy who had been hitting on her at Tillotson Family Restaurant where she worked. He wasn’t a traveling salesman, no, but a modern iteration—a geological survey engineer. He was with one of those nomadic companies that roamed the country after the first energy crisis, stringing wires and poking sensor rods into the earth—an apt metaphor for their leisure needs as well. A truck crammed with seismic monitors plumbed our township and county for hidden pockets of natural gas.
I came home early one evening from my shift at Pontiac Motors. I came straight home and was relatively sober because I had an early class at Flint University. The midterm in Intro to Philosophy; The Greeks must be faced first thing in the morning, and I had already missed too many classes with hung-over exhaustion.
Pete was having coffee and some pie in our front room. It was strawberry-rhubarb, my favorite that Doris brought home from work. My piece was in the fridge. He was just lonely, was all, being on the road, away from his fifty-three-year-old wife. Guzzling coffee all evening in Tillotson Family Restaurant had left him way too awake for the mom-and-pop motel where the crew was staying, three geologists to a room. So, Doris brought him home for more coffee.
This Pete was alright, for an older guy, and despite being the other guy, as it turned out. But I had that early class and just enough time for a half-hour nap and a sandwich on the road to Pontiac Motors again. I was only going to get four hours of sleep under the best of circumstances—if Wesley slept through the night. I excused myself, had a quick shower in the rusted tub then staggered off to bed.
Her sounds woke me. The living room of our railroad flat was just on the other side of the bedroom wall. Some television light crept under the door. Her unmistakable sounds, her muted whimpers and the labored grunts I didn’t recognize could not be mistaken for the Mayberry RFD rerun she must have thought would mask them.
It didn’t go on for very long; not much longer than I could hold my breath to listen. My first reaction was that I would love to have a peek; a pleasant scene as usual; lacking only me. Should I cross the creaking, hardwood floor or begin feigning my own sleep noises?
But, just as the tryst was piquing my interest, it ended. I thought I heard ol’ Pete whisper a hoarse warning that his efforts were about to culminate. At that moment, the furnace two floors below began to wheeze loudly through the guttural ductwork. I heard nothing else until Doris’s bathwater torrent. Should I remain awake? Could I even sleep now if I tried? Maybe Doris could, at last, keep me awake with accounts of her daily routine, if this sort of thing was included. I heard the submerged eruption of her douche.
As I considered my options, it occurred to me that Doris might feel that some sort of reparation sex for me might be in order. Since she often initiated matters by rubbing that particular blossom of her anatomy over my snoring features, I rolled onto my stomach. I wasn’t ready to hear about her adventure yet, let alone participate in it, second hand. I succumbed to restless sleep before she climbed into bed.
She didn’t have another chance to confess until the following Saturday night. She came in from the restaurant and fairly bounded into the bedroom, without even looking in on Wes. She took me firmly in hand, which was another of her wake-up methods.
“Guess what I did the other night,” she began. She seemed to be primed to dive beneath the covers in the event of an angry rebuke.
“Umm, don’t tell me—the dishes?” It was a cheap shot. I knew that her life was at least as hectic as mine and that the often-full sink was just as much my fault.
“Smart ass! Nuh-uhh. It didn’t take that long.” She was in an upbeat mood, and I didn’t smell any alcohol. Had she just come from ol’ Pete? I hadn’t heard a bath running.
“I haven’t got a clue,” I sighed. She was tugging me with an authority I would not be able to ignore.
“I balled that old guy, that Pete.” She swallowed hard enough for me to hear. We were both silent for a choked moment.
“No kidding,” I finally croaked. “So how was it?”
“It was alright,” Doris replied. She sounded as though she might lose her mood if I pressed her. I wanted to leave it alone but also wanted to employ those details as she continued cupping and kneading me.
“It was just different like in that crazy book you wanted me to read.”
“Yeah? Open Marriage?” She turned that back on me quickly. “I didn’t think you bothered with it.”
“Sex is just recreation, right? Isn’t that the gist of it?”
“So, what was he like?” I couldn’t resist asking. But like a trout nibbling at the surface, she ignored the bait and disappeared beneath the bedding.
A more mature individual would not have pried; as per the tenets of that book. He would have rationed the juicy details manufactured in his imagination. Unfortunately, I was not that person. So, not long after the most pleasant lovemaking we had enjoyed in months, I became greedy. No sweetness of afterglow could keep me from seeking out those dangerous images.
The part about which position they used was harmless enough. Even his impressive dimensions and prodigious finish were not too threatening. In fact, I was nearly provoked into a rare doubleheader, Doris’s descriptions laying down some kind of potency challenge. Instead, I sat up and stepped onto thin ice. I hadn’t anticipated the aftermath. I had enough images to last me a while.
“Are you planning on seeing him again?” I ventured.
Doris sighed more deeply. “Sure. Why not? If I have the right moment.” She burrowed under my arm, nuzzling my meager nipple in the dark, a new and unsettling approach. “Are you still touring your titty-bars every Friday after work?”
“C’mon,” I objected. “That’s not the same as a regular date.” I was already keeping score.
“He’s just a friend, baby,” she said. Her voice hardened. “Just another way to get off. There’s no threat to you unless you dream one up.”
In the following months, I managed to turn ol’ Pete into a threat, though Doris soon traded him out for even more variety. I cursed the open marriage scheme every time she tiptoed in late. The glitch in the theory, as I saw it, was that I was too busy with work and school to pursue the interests that would make me feel less the cuckold. The book made no provision for parity; like maybe the more active spouse should back off a little? Wouldn’t that be fair? But I was too proud to plead for quarter.
I think I had one make-out session in the back seat of a car with a forty-year-old woman celebrating her divorce. This in August, in the parking lot of a tavern on my way home from work. It was nice but she was on the verge of passing out so I delivered her back to her friends inside. Finally, the only solution I could dream up to balance the scales would require some assistance from Doris.
We’d discussed wife swapping or swinging before. Well, maybe discuss was the wrong word. I presented arguments while she shook her head in the negative. I considered the practitioners of group sex to be the sophisticated cutting edge of modernity. To have sex in the same room while your spouse enjoys a complete stranger seemed a step beyond outdated mores. When I broached the topic around Labor Day, Doris no longer spoke of the naked folks in my Hot Couples Meeting Guide as deviates.
She resisted a while longer, insisting that she shouldn’t be made responsible for my outside relationships. That semester though, with overtime at work and two more classes (including a 4-credit biology lab) in Flint, she finally conceded that I must have little time for trolling. Now, only reservations about her bit of post-natal flab remained to be overcome. My fresh rebuttal was that no less a womanizer than ol’ Pete was satisfied with her midriff and that I concurred. When I dared to bring a Polaroid out of the nightstand, she acquiesced with a smile usually reserved for the unruly children of bad tippers. She posed for me with alarming seductiveness. The most jaded connoisseur of porn would have been hard pressed to tell whether her predatory sneer was one of lust or disgust with the photographer.
(3.)
I sent the pictures to a swinger’s club in the Detroit suburb of Ferndale. We were notified within days, by phone, of our acceptance. I was so proud. We were officially involved in an alternative lifestyle. Even Doris seemed mildly interested as she spoke to the guy for several minutes. The club organizers needed to confirm that actual wives were aware of what their husbands had getting them into.
We went to three parties in total, beginning with the Deer Widow’s Weekend. Santa’s Ball was staged early in December, and the grand finale of the fornicator’s year took place on New Year’s Eve. We welcomed the Bicentennial Year, 1976. It would be our last foray, ever, into what I had mistakenly believed was the fast lane. I was made gruesomely aware in the small hours of that cold morning that Doris wasn’t having as much fun as I thought. In fact, she had been anesthetizing herself with enough alcohol that she wouldn’t remember much of it.
Metro Swingers were held in a small private home that had been commandeered, gutted, and redecorated for orgies. Attendance averaged ten to a dozen couples. The only real furniture consisted of single beds in three small bedrooms where couples could pair off in privacy. The living room was decorated in trailer park chic, with burnt orange shag carpeting and bean chairs. The walls were covered with silk-screen portraits of Kama Sutra positions illuminated by a black light.
The only light in the other rooms appeared to come from industrial strength candles. The Video Den was the brightest spot in the house. There, between couplings, swingers lounged in front of a home movie screen, waiting for flickering porn images to inspire them anew.
The basement was designed as a Full Orgy Room. Couples, who weren’t necessarily with their first partner of the evening, ventured down the stairs for hard-core open swinging. This was a free-for-all that might include any number of gender combinations. The floor was completely covered by some sort of velour gym mat. A gas log hissed in a fake fireplace. Speakers mounted high in the corners thumped continuous disco.
Doris gave up her wig that New Year’s Eve. That was one good thing to come out of it. I discovered her without it in the kitchen when I climbed the steps from the Full Orgy Room to get a fresh beer.
The kitchen at Metro Swingers, like the Video Den, was a place where members could catch their breaths and replenish bodily fluids. A generous buffet of cold cuts and pasta salads was supplied. My six-pack of LaBatts Blue chilled in the communal refrigerator along with wheat germ and bee pollen supplements. The sink counter was a city skyline of liquor bottles.
Doris stood nude, without the wig, in a tall window facing onto the snowy back yard. A thin woman with curly red hair, who was also quite naked, stood behind, looking over Doris’s shoulder. Doris’s right hand grasped a Manhattan glass on the windowsill. She had poured another full, amber drink—no doubt the McMaster’s and water that ol’ Pete had introduced her to. It would become her custom to adopt the favorite drink of her current lover: Drambuie neat, Amaretto Slammers, Champale. I couldn’t see where her left hand was.
The other woman had draped her left arm way around Doris’s waist. I tried not to stare. With her right hand, the redhead stroked Doris’s combed-out mass of black hair. She lifted all of that hair and shifted it over Doris’s right shoulder as if it were the reins of a prize show horse.
“It never fails,” the redhead said. She licked the nape of Doris’s neck. “The real hair is always prettier.”
“If you say so,” I heard Doris’s whisper. Candlelight reflected off the glass, framing their faces. Both sets of eyes seemed unfocused. I waited behind two other buck-naked guys for my turn to search in the chill glow of the refrigerator. Determined to stay out of her business for a change, I did not follow my wife and her new friend back down into the Full Orgy Room.
We made it home, not long before a frosty dawn. My driving was apparently passable, having consumed my six-pack over a six-hour period. Doris passed out after trying to vomit out the passenger side window of the poor Maverick without rolling it down first. I had to hoist and drag her up the stairs to our apartment. I desperately wanted sleep, myself, as I wrestled her out of the crusted new party dress then eased her into the tub. If she had still been wearing the wig, the clean-up would have been much easier. That thing would be in the trash. I shampooed the poorly chewed bits of buffet out of her real hair. I tested the rinse water like it was baby formula. She had a fat lip and I hoped she’d remember the violent heave against the car’s door glass.
In the strained atmosphere of the next few weeks, I refrained from any reference to the parties, except to reassure Doris that we wouldn’t have to go to anymore. Ol’ Pete or whoever else she might play with, I would just have to procure for myself, if I ever had time again. It would be quite a while before I dared to tactfully ask her what had happened between her and the girl with the Annie hair, and how that wig came off in the first place. But bless that stranger’s heart, Doris never wore it again. She soon came home one afternoon with a Mary Lou Retton bob.
(4.)
Wineglass, my attorney promised that our courtroom drama would be sparsely attended. When we arrived in the lobby at the appointed hour, the mob of litigants, defendants, witnesses, concerned families and court functionaries looked like a casting call for a remake of Tale of Two Cities—and not simply because I was taking a class in 19th Century English Novel for spring semester. The din of last-minute coaching of everyone’s lines had an underlying note of panic. But wasn’t that unnecessary in my case? Wasn’t it all taken care of? I became more uneasy by the minute. When would the tumbrels arrive?
We inched our way into a scene reminiscent of Les Miserables or Woodstock. There were stringy haired, bell-bottomed hippy chicks caught holding or shoplifting; stringy haired, bell-bottomed bad check artists of all genders; domestic abusers and their victims in all colors and sizes. Unfit Moms and Dads were tricked out to signify the wholesomeness requisite to regain custody of squalling children from grandparents or foster care. The floor of the lobby was awash in the slop tracked in from snowy parking lots. But only the cold discouraged some from arriving in flip-flops or barefoot. We staked out a few feet of an interior wall to lean against, beneath the solemn portraits of ancient jurists. A trash can not far from us overflowed with coffee cups and Dawn Donut boxes.
I squatted on my haunches, trying to keep the cuffs of my trousers dry. Doris did her best to preserve the integrity of the new designer jeans my contrition had provided her. She found enough dry floor to slip out of her modest heels and slide down next to me. She spotted Wineglass first, elbowing through the mob. His briefcase seemed to have filled out as his face was also doing. His hair was longer and he had added a bandito mustache. Doris nudged me at the last moment, and I looked up from my magazine.
“Greetings, Callanders! Greetings!” Wineglass exclaimed. He took one of Doris’s hands to help her up while I struggled to stand on my own. “So elated you’re gonna be when you hear my latest!”
“I could use some good news,” I said. Another layoff was in the rumor mill at work. I offered my own handshake before he could pull Doris into some kind of long-separation embrace.
“What? Apprehensions, Ladd? But, sweat not, sweat not,” he boasted. “My final parley with the Assistant Prosecutor should restore your confidence. It appears that your arresting officer is absent on vacation—a great embarrassment to the other side! And, in order to expedite, as per your right to a fair and speedy, the City of Flint will accept your plea of guilty to Careless Driving—a full three steps below the original charge! My very first exploitation of the dreaded technicalities!”
I was stunned with relief. Doris, too, gave a modest yelp of gratitude and a quick, innocuous, sidelong hug around Wineglass’s shoulders. She composed herself before quizzing him about whatever financial impalements we might still expect. Wineglass then guided us toward District Courtroom #3, across the lobby and down a less crowded hallway. I still had lingering concern about my pending verbal reaming from Judge Mapleschantz. Would he resent the circumstances by which I had slipped out of the DUI and tried to make up for it? After Wineglass made optimistic guesses for Doris about my outstanding fines, I went ahead and looked his gift horse in the mouth: “Does he still have to be a dick to me?”
“All minor, Ladd,” Wineglass said, his demeanor draining of satisfaction. He dropped his hand off my shoulder. “It’ll be over in thirty seconds. Then, no AA meetings for you. No restricted license. $300 less in fines. For that you can’t hold your nose and swallow?”
I hadn’t meant to impugn his competence. “Whatever I need to do, Counselor,” I agreed quickly. We entered the courtroom from the dim corridor. Wineglass was not lost now.
Remember me whining about all those slips between the cup and the lip? I don’t think I mentioned Murphy’s Law but District Courtroom #3 might have been Murphy’s test lab. As in the lobby, our first problem was to find a seat. Wineglass led us to a section of pew-like benches reserved for those having business, but it was a tight squeeze. We entered but had to leave Wineglass crouched at the end of our row. I was crammed in cheek-to-cheek with a tall, bony guy who reeked of Boone’s Farm. He had an angular, dust-bowl face that must have been shaved three days too soon. He wore a dark blue, wrinkled suit; a graying dress shirt with soiled white collar and no tie, probably not what his lawyer had in mind. Unless he was a lawyer.
I cringed as I observed the rest of the mob. Again, the scene struck me as Dickensian—Lord High Chancellor Mapleschantz on the bench under a white judicial wig, Madame DeFarge knitting in the court recorder’s booth, Gaspard and all the Jaques were in the gallery, ready to shout approval for every head that rolled. Before they could get at me, however, the character on my right would get his hearing. A name was called and he rose. The public defender from the previous case bid his handcuffed client farewell and rushed over to greet this next poor guy as he excused his way past our knees.
His departure made room for Wineglass to slide in, which he managed with an apologetic caress of Doris’s shoulder. Just as he was wriggling up next to her and straightening his creases, some kind of commotion flared in the front of the courtroom.
Mapleschantz had raised his voice above judicial decorum: “Well, Mr. Grieve, were you coerced into this plea or not?”
“All’s I said was ‘it don’t matter,’ Yer Honor,” the Grapes of Wrath guy mumbled.
“Your Honor, please,” the Public Defender implored. “My client was clearly confused by the wording of the…”
“No, no, no, Counsel,” Mapleschantz insisted. “I want Mr. Grieve to express his opinion freely. If there is some problem with what you’ve cooked up with the Prosecutor, then Mr. Grieve should voice his reservations.”
“Awww, geez.” Wineglass winced. “This is going to get ugly.”
“What about it, Mr. Grieve?” Mapleschantz repeated.
“It’s jus’ a damn business,” Grieve answered, louder. “Court gets theirs ‘n’ the lawyers gets theirs. Just the way it works so y’all don’t have to be here all day.”
“And does that mean you prefer to plead guilty though you believe yourself to be innocent?” Mapleschantz was getting himself wound up with sarcasm. “I don’t think I could sleep nights if I thought we had wrongly sentenced someone just to speed the system along. Or, that you would maintain doubts about the fairness of this Court. Mr. Assistant Prosecutor, are you prepared to go to trial this morning? Is your arresting officer in the building?”
“We can find him, Your Honor.” Another suit scurried out a side door, stage left.
“So what’s it going to be, Mr. Grieve? Just a simple yes or no this time!”
Now Grieve, angered as well by years of perceived persecutions, ignored the hushed imploring of his lawyer. “Sure, Yer Honor! Let’s have us a damn trial! I gotta few things to say about these cops’s attitudes ‘n’ yer fuckin’ Breathalyzers, both. You can gimme ninety days ‘n’ stick that gavel up yer wrinkly ol’ ass, it don’t matter!”
“Bailiff, let’s get a jury in here!” Mapleschantz shouted. “Counsel for Defense, I’m warning you one time only about contempt! You make Mr. Grieve understand it or we’ll take this to a level he won’t like!”
“Yes, Your Honor,” the Public Defender groaned.
“Aww, now this I don’t believe—like we’re not there already,” Wineglass muttered. He examined his watch again as if looking for a second opinion. I wondered how many other matters were on his agenda.
At least he wouldn’t be losing his tee time. Snow had begun to fall again upon the parking structure that blocked our view, towering above the windows of Courtroom #3. A troop of citizens soon filed in through a rear entrance. They appeared to be spruced up, well rested and fed. Their faces expressed pride in fulfilling their civic duty, perhaps even with vengeance. They wouldn’t be there without a permanent address and driver’s license. I couldn’t imagine Grieve finding a jury of his peers in that bunch.
Wineglass nudged me: “Ladd, I’m gonna have to run and use the phone.”
I shrugged. He didn’t need my permission. “So, what’s the plan? Do we just wait?”
“Well, uhhh.” He allowed himself to peek at Doris. “My guess is this could take a couple hours. And they’ll want to break for lunch.’ He studied the bustle of activity up near the bench. “This hasn’t happened to me before, but I’d say we have time for lunch ourselves. Seating that jury will take an hour if the PD uses all his preremptory challenges. I know I would. Yeah, kids. Let’s go eat.” He eyed Doris for encouragement then leaned toward me again. “My write-off, Callanders.”
I wasn’t hungry. My appetite waited for the end of all this. “Nah, but you guys go ahead,” I said. “Are you hungry, hon? I’ll be alright. I wanta watch this.” I don’t think I was having any bittersweet suspicions about Doris and Wineglass, yet—like what they would have to talk about at lunch. Or plan.
“I guess I could eat something, babe,” she whispered. “My tummy’s growling.”
Mr. Grieve might be hard to watch. He put his face in his hands. A shudder went across his back, under the material of his crummy suit. It hadn’t taken long for the anger to burn off, distilled into the reality of one more screw-up. I had yet to experience one of those sinking moments of recognition that a blunder is being repeated. It would be less than a year though.
“We’ll be right back,” Wineglass said as Doris slid through in front of me. “Hold the fort.”
“I’ll bring you a coffee,” Doris whispered. Her lips brushed my forehead in passing.
They hustled out, escaping with other backlogged litigants before Mapleschantz brought matters back into order. Doris looked better than ever from behind and was dressed for maximum sympathetic effect. I couldn’t help thinking that she’d certainly gotten Wineglass’s attention. Now, I wondered: Would I soon be able to guess what his favorite drink was?
Chris Dungey is a retired auto worker in MI. He rides a mountain bike for his fupa and a Honda scooter for the planet. He follows Detroit City FC with religious fervor. More than 75 of his stories have been published in lit mags and online. Most recently in The Parallel, Mid Cult, Twin Flames Review, book of matches, Skipjack Review. Forthcoming in Bookends Review.