What No One Else Can Hear (12 page)

Tears were rolling down my cheeks now, but I made a motion for her to keep going.

“Dr. Brown finally suggested we just sedate him while he sat at the door, since we were going to for the exam anyway. It took Drew and Hank holding him down and Dottie holding his arm still to get the sedative in him, but he finally just collapsed, and Drew picked him up and took him to his room.” She paused and rubbed my arm in an attempt to soothe me. “It took the approved doctor another half hour to arrive, then perform the test. Of course, no signs of any kind of abuse were evident.”

“I could have told them that,” I spat out. “No, wait—I did tell them that.”

Sara managed a sad smile. “I know. I did too.”

I realized I was barking at the wrong person. I wasn’t angry at Sara. I calmed myself down, though it took a good bit of effort. I was glad that Stevie had a good support system.

“I was hoping I’d see him in the forest last night.”

“Dr. Brown gave him more sedative to help him sleep through the night.”

“Yeah, I don’t think he can make it to the forest when he’s sedated.”

She nodded, and right about that time, her lawyer friend showed up. He said the first thing we had to do was to get me out on bail at the hearing later that morning. He hoped that since I was a low flight risk with no priors at all, the bail would be low, so I didn’t have to stay in jail one more minute than absolutely necessary. What was more worrying, though, was that Mr. Liston had taken out a restraining order in case I
did
get out on bail. Even freed, I wouldn’t be able to see Stevie until this got straightened out.

Kyle, the lawyer, said that could take anywhere from a month—a very optimistic estimate and not at all likely—to a year.

I had never felt so helpless in all my life. Even with all those years of searching for Stevie, knowing he was out in the world, needing my help, even with those last several weeks before I found him when the situation was becoming so desperate, not once had I felt this helpless. At those times I was at least doing all I could to remedy the situation, even if I wasn’t having much success. I wasn’t even sure how I had gotten
into
this situation, let alone how to get out. I was letting Stevie down, and there wasn’t one damned thing I could do about it.

T
HE
TIME
finally came, and I was trotted into the courtroom for my bail hearing. Dottie was there as moral support, and Sara represented the center. Drew was working, staying with Stevie, or he would have been sitting beside me. Of course my lawyer was present as well. I almost fainted when the judge set bail at $25,000 cash or $50,000 in property. I didn’t have anywhere
near
that kind of money, and the only property I owned was a beat-up Chevrolet… not the kind of property the judge was talking about, but it was all I had.

Dottie didn’t even blink. She immediately said, “I have a house worth more than $50,000. How do I put that up as bail?”

I was shocked. “Dottie, I can’t let you do that.”

“Jesse, as I understand it, the only way I’d actually
lose
my house would be if you didn’t show up for your court date. Are you thinking of running?”

“Well, no, but….” I looked at Kyle. “Is that true? She won’t actually lose her house?”

“Only if you ran. And… if you violated the restraining order, it could get a little hairy… depending.”

I had no plans for running, though I had thought of sneaking on campus to talk to Stevie. It looked like it came down to two choices. Did I accept a friend’s offer and get out of jail, but not be able to see Stevie? Or stay in jail and
still
not get to see Stevie? No real choice, I guessed.

I nodded my acceptance of Dottie’s offer and the judge explained where she should bring the deed to turn it in as bail. They took me back to jail until she returned with the deed, but at least I was free. What I should do with my freedom if it didn’t let me help Stevie, I wasn’t at all sure.

Kyle was with me when they finally let me go, and he went over the terms of the restraining order with me. Obviously I couldn’t see Stevie, but I also wasn’t allowed to call him or even talk to him if he called me. I couldn’t send him video of me, a tape with my voice on it, a letter, or even a text. All of those could be considered contact with him and could theoretically be used in an attempt to coerce him into saying I didn’t do anything to him, or to threaten him, or something. It was all so screwed up.

By this time it was late afternoon. I had an appointment with my lawyer at four thirty, giving him enough time to go over the “evidence” the prosecution had. He had gone against his standard practices and taken my case without knowing the specifics, just on Sara’s say-so. I was glad I had friends with connections. Even so, I didn’t know how I was going to pay for Kyle’s services. He had told me we’d work it out later, so I tried not to worry.

While I was waiting for the appointment, I went home with Dottie and hung out with her in the main part of the house she had jeopardized to get me out of jail.

She called over to the center to check on Stevie for me. He wasn’t doing so well. He refused to leave his room. Anytime anyone tried to coax him out, he’d start screaming and throwing things. Drew had brought him breakfast, and he’d thrown it across the room. He tried again with lunch but just asked him if he wanted it instead of leaving the tray to be thrown. Everyone kept checking from time to time to see if he was hungry, but the doctor said he had a healthy weight going into this, so a few missed meals shouldn’t hurt him in the long run. Fortunately it didn’t sound like he was having any major problems with his empathy yet. Stevie was just ticked off and was letting everyone know about it. That was actually better than I had expected by this point, so even though the news was terrible, I was somewhat reassured.

“Try not to worry about Stevie too much right now, Jesse,” Drew told me when I took the phone from Dottie. “You showed us what he responds to. We’re going to do our best to help him out. Concentrate on building your case.”

“Drew, I just don’t understand. Why the hell is this happening?” I knew it was probably Chuck’s doing, but this seemed extreme even for someone like him. “Why, Drew?”

“Ah, Jess.” His voice softened. “I wish I knew. I’d put money on it being Chuck behind all this, but why he chose this particular tactic, I have no idea.” He paused, then all but whispered into the phone. “Jess, I don’t know what to do any more than you do. I wish I could help.”

“You are, though, Drew. Taking care of Stevie when I can’t. Letting me know someone is there for him when I’m not—someone he’s comfortable with and responds well to. Keeping me posted on how he’s doing. That’s the best way to help.”

“I can do that, Jess.” I heard such compassion in his voice, I almost cried. “And I’ll be off work before you go to the lawyer’s. I want to go with you, if you don’t mind. I know you want someone here with Stevie, and Dottie will spit nails if she doesn’t get to go, but Stacy and Hank are both going to be here, and Stevie’s good with them too. Do you think I can come with you?”

“I’d love it, Drew. Thanks. Ask Stevie, though. Make sure he’s okay with it. I know you’ll officially be off and could leave anyway, but—”

“But you know me well enough to realize I’m not going to leave Stevie if he needs me, whether I’m getting paid or not. Right?”

I spared a little chuckle. “Right.”

“I’ll ask him. But if he’s okay with it, I’m coming with you.”

I was more grateful than I could express, so I just said, “Okay.”

F
INALLY
IT
came time to go to the lawyer’s appointment. Drew had Stevie’s blessing to go with me, so he met Dottie and me at her house and we drove together. Sara met me at Kyle’s office. I found it comforting to have the moral support of good friends as I pushed open the door labeled “Kyle Williams: Attorney-at-Law.” Even so I wasn’t prepared for the greeting I received.

“You, sit the hell down.” Kyle started immediately, talking to me. Then he said to Sara, “What the
shit
did you get me into?”

All three of us were wearing matching goldfish expressions. What had caused this change? Kyle had been so supportive earlier in the day.

“Kyle—” Sara found her voice first. “—I told you what was going on. Jesse’s being framed for this, probably by Chuck Tyler, who was just fired from the center two weeks ago.”

“The evidence doesn’t look like anyone is being framed here, Sara.” Kyle was still livid.

“What?” Articulate in stressful situations I obviously was not.

“Kyle, just take us through the evidence, okay? I’m sure this is a mistake. I can’t imagine anything that would actually prove Jesse did anything to hurt Stevie.” Sara managed to keep a calm tone.

“Fine. I have copies. Let’s look at it, shall we?” Then to me he said, “Are you sure you want them to stay here for this?”

That ticked me off. He had decided I was guilty and had something to hide. “Yes, I want them to stay. There is absolutely nothing in existence that could prove I did anything to Stevie, and if
that
seems to suggest I did, then it’s either completely fabricated or misleading.”

Kyle looked at me, measuring me up. He must have decided I was either innocent, deluded enough to
think
I was innocent when I wasn’t, or just plain stupid enough to let my supporters see all this evidence. Either way he calmed a little, sat down, and opened the file. He started taking things from the top of the file, one by one, and tossing them on the table.

“We have a photo, taken from a cell phone, of Mr. McKinnon dragging a naked child, whom I assumed to be Stevie, into a room… obviously against the child’s will.”

I started to say something to explain this, but Kyle shot me a look that said one word from me right now could easily make him decide not to take my case after all. I was afraid that in his current mood, he’d not only quit my side but would probably join the other one. I stayed silent and he continued.

“Here we have numerous pictures of Stevie with scratches and bruises all over his face and chest.” He then threw down a folder with several papers in it. “And an affidavit stating that Jesse spent the entire night in Stevie’s room on numerous occasions. That he repeatedly took the boy into the community by himself
without
the father’s permission. That Jesse wouldn’t allow anyone else to deal with Stevie or to be alone with him. And that the boy was—and I quote—’obviously too scared to speak to anyone without Jesse around, probably for fear of later reprisals—’”

Sara started to interrupt, but Kyle continued, throwing down another folder.

“
This
is the affidavit of a psychiatrist hired by Mr. Liston. She says the symptoms described to her sound like those of an abused child. The unwillingness to talk to anyone else, the fear of speaking without checking for permission, the flinching when touched….” He paused, obviously working up to something. “And, the most damning of all is the child’s own testimony.”

“Kyle, Stevie hasn’t spoken to anyone about—”

The lawyer interrupted Sara to continue. “
Here
”—as he slapped down another picture—“we have the child’s opinion of Jesse. The psychiatrist said because Stevie won’t draw any other person
but
Jesse, and because Jesse’s picture obviously has angry and ominous overtones, Stevie feels isolated as if Jesse is the only person of power in his world and Stevie is scared to death of him.”

It was one of the pictures Stevie had drawn just before I arrived in Lynneville. A picture of me with features slightly distorted and lightning bolts through my face. The background had black jagged lines emanating from behind my head. My expression in the drawing was neutral, but with all the lightning and all the black, the expression could easily be interpreted as angry or mean instead.

Kyle had one more thing to say. “And straight from the child himself, in living color….”

He slammed a DVD into the nearby player, and we all saw a terrified, shirtless Stevie shouting “No!” at me and then backing away, saying “No more.” as he barricaded himself behind the large table in the living room area. As I tried to talk to him, he let out a terrified scream and began to pace behind the table. As I approached him, he screamed, “Don’t touch me. Leave me alone. No more! No more touching!” and the picture went to black.

Man, no wonder Kyle was so livid. If this was all I knew about the case, I’d think I was guilty too. This stuff could only have come from Chuck, and everything made me look as guilty as sin.

We all just sat there, stunned. Again, it was Sara who found her voice first. “Kyle, this is all taken out of context. This”—she picked up the cell phone photo—“is during one of Stevie’s many sensitive periods and is well documented. We have cameras in all the calm rooms. I can easily look up this incident and get the footage for that event.”

“And what will
that
video show, Mr. McKinnon?”

Kyle still thought I was guilty. How was I going to get out of this if I couldn’t even convince my own lawyer? Drew reached over and held my hand in silent support.

“Well, Mr. Williams.” It was a good idea to be formal and respectful to anyone who looked as if they would like to see my balls ripped off and fed to me with syrup. “That tape will show me bringing Stevie into the calm room—and yes, it will no doubt look like it was against his will. When Stevie has a ‘sensitive period,’ his skin feels like it’s on fire and
any
touch makes it worse. That’s why he takes off his clothes. That’s why he’s fighting my touch in the picture. As soon as I got him in the room, I let him go and talked him down the best way I could. By the time Stacy arrived with new clothes for him, I had him calm and was holding him, rocking him to keep him that way. It seems to help, once he gets everything under control, to have physical contact with someone he trusts. And before you ask, the tape will show that my hands are on completely appropriate parts of Stevie’s body. I also helped him dress, and
that
will show that I handed him his underwear so he could put it on himself. He put on his own T-shirt and then held on to me while he put on his slacks. I helped him with the button on the fly because he was still a little shaky and was getting frustrated with it. Depending on the angle of the camera in the room, it should show that my hands only touched the button, the very top of his waistband, and nothing else.”