Order in the Court (11 page)

I promised I would, grabbed a sweater and then left, just in time to catch my mother coming in the front door. “Hey, Corey,” she said as we passed each other. I heard her say, “That smells wonderful. You cooked? What’s the occasion?” before the door closed behind her, and I was left on the porch with my breath stuck in my throat.

When I got to Brandon’s house, he asked, in lieu of a proper greeting, “Why do you look like someone stepped on your puppy?”

“My mother forgot it was her wedding anniversary today,” I said, feeling incredibly stupid for being so worked up over such a little thing. “My dad made a special dinner for her, and she’s going to ruin it for him.”

Brandon frowned and invited me in. “People forget dates all the time. I forgot my own birthday once.”

I laughed as I followed him up to his room, but I didn’t really feel much better.

“I’m glad you called, actually,” he said when I’d seated myself comfortably on his bed. It was a twin. How he managed to sleep on it without his feet hanging off the end I didn’t know. “We haven’t really spoken much lately.”

“Sorry about that,” I said, truly feeling sorry. “I’ve had a lot on my plate. I haven’t seen much of anyone.” I toyed with the fringe of a homemade blanket spread over the end of his bed to avoid looking anywhere else. I’d never been in a boy’s room before, even if it was only Brandon’s.

“I don’t doubt it, with the trial coming up, and school.” Brandon pulled a beanbag chair out of the corner and plopped it down in the center of the room. He sat on it cross-legged, and it mushroomed around him to displace the weight.

“Yeah, there’s been a lot of stuff. Spring break couldn’t have come soon enough.” I looked at Brandon critically for the first time, noticing the darkness of his skin and the ruddiness of his cheeks. He looked good. He looked healthy, well fed, tanned, and strong. “Have you gotten to play much soccer at school?”

“I joined a team.” He shrugged one shoulder. “I mean it’s just intramural, but it’s better than sitting around in my room all day studying. I needed to get out there again.” He pointed to his wall, where a shelf lined with soccer trophies was gathering dust. “If I join varsity next year, I might be able to get more of those. It’s a good team.” He sighed. “I miss the marching band, though.”

“Doesn’t your school have one?” I asked, glad for the distraction.

“It does, but everyone thinks of those guys as geeks, and I’m not sure I want to put myself in the line of fire so soon. It was cool here, to do any sort of music. There, if you’re not in a garage band or something, it’s not cool to know drums.”

“Well, that’s stupid,” I said. I climbed off Brandon’s bed and sat down on the floor, leaned my back against his bed instead. I didn’t like the feeling of towering over him. “But I get it. Starting over is rough.”

“How’s it been for you?” he asked. “Have you made any friends?”

“A couple,” I said. “There’s this girl Abby. She wants to major in criminal psychology and forensics. She’s pretty crazy, but it works for her. And this guy Sasha. He’s in the computer science program, but he’s taking psych and English on the side.” Brandon raised his eyebrows and tilted his chin down, asking the silent question. “Sasha’s gay and Abby’s not, so no, I’m not crushing on either of them.” I sighed. “You know I’m not ready.”

“You’re still in love with Kate,” Brandon said, and he uncrossed his legs in order to knock his feet against mine. I kicked him back playfully, smiling at him a little sadly. “That’s okay, you know. I’m still in love with Jessa. But we do need to move on eventually.”

“Not so soon,” I protested, kicking him a little harder the next time he tapped his foot against mine. “It hasn’t even been a year. Why does everyone expect me to get over it so fast? The girl I want is dead. I don’t want anybody else.”

I felt a stab of guilt—
Liar
. I hadn’t told Brandon about Valerie. I didn’t want him to know how epically I failed at moving on.

“I would give
anything
to have Jessa back,” Brandon said forcefully, pulling back his feet and drawing his knees to his chest. I did the same, mirroring him. “I would pay any amount of money, do any amount of work. I’d claw my own eyes out and poke my eardrums out with pencils if it would bring her back. I’d live an eternity in hell for her.”

“Then why ask?” I demanded, hugging my knees. “Why ask if I’m seeing someone new, if I like anyone, if I’ve met any pretty girls? You
know
what it feels like. You know more than anyone.”

I wondered if he’d tried too, if Brandon was keeping his attempts at dating from me out of embarrassment like I was from him. I didn’t think he had. He didn’t say anything for a long moment. He looked at a spot above my head, focusing on it, the crease between his eyes appearing and deepening, a chasm on his forehead. I watched him, and I waited patiently for him to work it out.

“I keep asking,” he said slowly, as if he weren’t sure what his next words would be, “because I keep hoping you’ll say yes. If you’ve moved on… maybe I can too. If
you
haven’t, then there really isn’t any hope for me, is there?” Brandon seemed confused by his own words. Sometimes he forgets he has feelings, I think.

“Oh, Brandon,” I said, feeling instantly bad for being angry with him. “You don’t have to use me as an example. You don’t have to wait for me. If you’re ready, you’re allowed to start looking again. But only if
you
are ready. You can’t let anyone else decide that for you.”

“How will I
know
?” he asked me plaintively, and I just looked at him sadly, still hugging my knees. “I still
love
Jessa, and I can’t imagine not loving her. But she’s not the first thing I think about when I wake up in the morning anymore. Or the last thing I see when I go to sleep.”

“I think you’ll always love her,” I said. “I can’t imagine not loving them, not missing them with every fiber of my being. But one day you’ll love somebody else too. You can love more than one person at a time. Just like you can have more than one best friend.”

“That’s encouraging,” Brandon whispered, and then he stretched out his legs again. I put mine out too, all the way so that my toes touched the insides of his knees. “I’ve missed my best friends. I’ve missed you.”

“Does Robert know you’re home from school?” I asked suddenly, thinking for the first time that evening of Ricky’s beau, whom I hadn’t seen in months. “Have you talked to him at all?”

Brandon shook his head. “Not in ages. He was so quiet before everything happened, you know? Afterward he just stopped talking altogether. He clammed up. He hasn’t talked to me all year.”

“That’s not right,” I said, reaching for my phone. “He and I had a whole conversation at the funeral. He talked more afterward than I’d ever heard him say before.” I looked through my contacts only to realize that I didn’t have his number. Brandon was already ahead of me, and had his phone out too.

“Let’s invite him over,” I said as Brandon dialed Robert’s number. “First meeting of the Survivors’ Club. It’ll be like my support group, except way cooler.”

Brandon laughed for a long moment, was still laughing when Robert picked up. “Robbie,” Brandon greeted, trying to control his laughter. “I’ve missed you, man. Come over and hang out with us.” Robert must’ve asked “Us?” because Brandon said, “Yeah! Corey’s here!”

He hung up. “Well?” I asked, wanting desperately to bite my nails but knowing I’d just make them bleed again. “What’d he say?”

“He’s on his way over.” Brandon sounded stunned. I smiled brightly.

“Survivors’ Club is now in session,” I said.

“DO I
have to be in the courtroom the whole time?”

My mother turned to me at the next red light, her expression softer than I expected. “Not if you don’t want to be, sweetie. Your father can stay home with you, and I can tell you what happened when I get home.”

I didn’t like her volunteering my father like that, as if he had no say. “He can watch too if he wants. I don’t need a babysitter.” I sounded petulant but didn’t care. “I just can’t sit through another day of that. Another day, a week, however long the trial lasts.” I rubbed anxiously at the wrinkles forming on my forehead.

“It won’t be that long, sweetie,” my mother said. Two sweeties in one conversation, an unusual occurrence. She held my gaze in the rearview mirror as she pulled onto the highway. “It’s an open-and-shut case with your testimony. I see why they got you out of the way first. That’s all the jury will be thinking about during the trial, is the conviction in your voice when you said that he killed them. They’ll remember that, and nothing the defense can say will sway them now.”

“I’m not sure I want to be there either,” my dad admitted, turning around in his seat to look at me. “It’s awful. I don’t know how lawyers stand it… all the lying and the duplicity, the distrust and animosity. It would give me a heart attack inside of a week.”

“That’s because your heart’s so good, Dad,” I said, rubbing the top of his head fondly. It was the only part of him I could reach. His thick black hair was thinning at the back now, the gift of middle-age. “You’re too nice for this world.”

My mother raised her eyebrows in the rearview mirror at me meaningfully, but I chose to ignore the sinister arches. I put my earbuds in and fiddled with my phone as if turning on music, though really I just wanted some peace and quiet for a while. I leaned my head against the cool glass of the window and watched the scenery pass by; it was the same view as always, the same calm of the long drive. Neither of my parents spoke after I had apparently tuned out.

That night, with Brandon on the phone, I relayed the events of the trial as best as I could from memory. Things felt confused in my head, one angry image merging into another. Brandon would be in town again by tomorrow, having spent some time after his exams at his maternal grandmother’s house in Pittsburgh. I wanted to see him more than anything.

“I can’t wait to be home again,” he sighed. A dog was barking on his end, an incessant yapping from something small and fluffy, by the sound of it. “I miss sleep. Phoebe is always barking. That dog and my gran’s sad eyes are driving me
crazy
. She keeps baking pies to make me feel better.”

“That’s sweet, you know,” I said, lying back on my bed and closing my eyes. “That she cares so much. She just wants you to be happy.”

The barking was getting on my nerves after five minutes on the line. I couldn’t imagine how Brandon felt if it was a common sound where he was.

“I know she does. But I’m being smothered. I miss school already, I miss my friends there. I was finally someone, you know? Someone other than Jessa’s boyfriend. “
There goes the dead girl’s boyfriend.
” He pitched his voice up, mimicking a gossipy girl. “
Isn’t it so, so sad?
”

“Don’t I know that feeling,” I sighed. “I still want you to be here. Mostly so you can go to the trial, so I won’t have to. I can’t
stand
it, Brandon.”

“What? Why?” Brandon sounded angry. “Don’t you want him to go to prison for what he did? I wish he could get the death penalty for it. I’d vote for that.”

“Of course I want him to go to prison,” I said quietly. Suddenly there were tears on the edge of my voice, and I wasn’t quite sure how they’d gotten there. “But having to see him there, sitting in a suit and tie like he deserves those things? With his mom behind him, petting his hair when he killed her daughter? It makes me sick.” I turned on my side and pulled my knees up to my chest. “And the cross-examination. It was
awful
, Brandon. You can’t even imagine. That woman treated me like
I
was the one on trial. It was physically painful to watch her go at the other witnesses afterward. She goes for the throat. It’s like a National Geographic special.”

“You make the courtroom sound like the animal kingdom,” Brandon laughed. “I wish I could have seen you testify, from the way you tell it. It sounds like you showed her up pretty good when you answered that last question.”

“I don’t know, Brandon. It felt so good at the time to make that spiteful little speech, but what if the jury sees how spiteful it was? I was supposed to look sweet and innocent. I put barrettes in my hair with little bows on them, for God’s sake. I wore a skirt and blouse. How often do you see me do that stuff?”

“Not since the funeral,” Brandon admitted. “But that prom dress of yours was pretty spectacular, if I remember correctly. It was purple, right?”

A lump formed in my throat. “Yeah. They took it as evidence, though. Not that anyone ever wears their prom dress again, but I liked it a lot. Kate helped me pick it out. She said it made my skin look amazing.” I laughed hollowly, eyes still closed. “Whatever that means.”

“You all looked so beautiful that night,” Brandon said, and it didn’t help prevent the tears welling under my closed lids. “I was the only one who got to dance with all four of you. I felt so blessed, you know? To have gotten that beautiful night with Jessa. We danced like we’d never get another chance. And then we didn’t.”

“She was talking about weddings that night,” I confessed, remembering her joke to Kate about her finding a man to settle down with. “And about what you were keeping from her in your pocket.” I hadn’t told him this when he’d shown me the small box that contained an engagement ring, a ring I never saw, because it would have been too painful. “I think she had a hunch.”

“She would have said yes,” Brandon said determinedly. “And we would have danced again at our wedding like that, like nobody was watching.” He laughed. “But not until we’d graduated college. I made a promise to her father.”

We waited awhile in silence. I wiped up my tears and sat up on my bed, holding the phone to my ear in case he said anything more. Sometimes we just did this, had “quiet calls,” no one speaking, barely breathing, but knowing the other was there.

“I’m going to have to see him at the trial tomorrow,” Brandon said after a while. I had changed into my pajamas while waiting for him to say something, alternating which hand was on the phone so it never left my ear. “Won’t I?”