House Rules (52 page)

You can‘t possibly be old enough to remember
Wayne‘s World.
And regardless, I‘m not the one who‘s the defendant. I‘m totally serious, Jacob. If you pull another stunt like that, the prosecution is going to throw your ass in jail or else declare a mistrial, and that means doing this all over again.

You promised that we‘d adjourn at four o‘clock.

You‘re right. But in a courtroom the judge is God, and God wanted to stay late. So I don‘t care if we‘re here till four in the morning, or if Judge Cuttings announces that we‘re all going to get up and do the hokey pokey. You are going to park your butt in that chair next to me and not say a damn thing.

Will you tell the jury why I did it? Jacob asks.

Why
did
you do it?

I know better than to ask that. But at this point I am not thinking of perjury. I am thinking that Jacob and I need to be on the same page once and for all.

Because I couldn‘t leave her, he says, as if this should be obvious.

My jaw drops. Before I can ask another question
Did she spurn you? Did you try
to kiss her, and did she struggle too much? Did you hold her too close, and suffocate her
accidentally?
a bailiff comes into the holding cell area. They‘re ready for you.

I motion to the bailiff to open the cell. We are the last ones into the courtroom, with the exception of the judge and jury. Emma‘s eyes go straight to her son. Is everything okay?

But before I can fill her in, the jury files in and the judge returns. Counsel, he says, settling himself on the bench. Approach. Helen and I move closer. Mr. Bond, have you spoken with your client?

Yes, Your Honor, and there will be no further outbursts.

I can hardly contain myself, Judge Cuttings says. You may continue, then.

Knowing what I know now, that insanity defense is looking stronger and stronger. I just hope the jury got that message, loud and clear. The defense rests, I announce.

What? Jacob explodes behind me. No it
doesn‘t
!

I close my eyes and start to count to ten, because I‘m pretty sure it‘s not a good idea to kill your client in front of an entire jury, and then a paper airplane sails over my shoulder. It‘s one of Jacob‘s notes, which I unfold:

I WANT TO TALK.

I turn around. Absolutely not.

Is there a problem, Mr. Bond? the judge asks.

No, Your Honor, I reply, at the same moment Jacob says Yes.

Scrambling, I face the judge again. We need a sensory break.

We‘ve been in session for ten seconds! Helen argues.

Do you rest, Mr. Bond? asks Judge Cuttings. Or is there more?

There‘s more, Jacob says. It‘s my turn to talk. And if I want to take the stand, you have to let me.

You‘re not taking the stand, Emma insists.

You, Ms. Hunt, do not have leave to speak! Am I the only person here who knows we‘re in a court of law? Judge Cuttings roars. Mr. Bond, put on your final witness.

I‘d like a brief recess

I bet you would. I‘d like to be in Nevis instead of here, but neither one of us is going to get what we want, the judge snaps.

Shaking my head, I walk Jacob to the witness stand. I am so angry I can barely see straight. Jacob will tell the jury the truth, like he‘s told me, and dig his own grave. If not with the substance of what he says then with the style: no matter what‘s been said up to this point, no matter what‘s been said by the witnesses, all the jury is going to remember is this awkward boy who speaks in bursts of words and fidgets and doesn‘t register appropriate emotion and can‘t look them in the eye all traditional expressions of guilt. It doesn‘t matter what Jacob says; his demeanor will convict him before he even opens his mouth.

I open the gate for him so that he can step inside. It‘s your funeral, I murmur.

No, Jacob says. It‘s my trial.

I can tell the moment he realizes that this wasn‘t such a great idea. He‘s been sworn in, and he swallows hard. His eyes are wide and dart all over the courtroom.

Tell me what happens when you get nervous, Jacob, I say.

He licks his lips. I walk on my toes, or bounce. Sometimes I flap or talk too fast or laugh even though it‘s not funny.

Are you nervous now?

Yes.

Why?

He pulls his lips back in a smile. Because everyone‘s looking at me.

Is that all?

Also the lights are too bright. And I don‘t know what you‘re going to say next.

Whose goddamn fault is
that? I think. Jacob, you told the court that you wanted to talk.

Yes.

What do you want to tell this jury?

Jacob hesitates. The truth, he says.

Jacob

There‘s blood all over the floor and she is lying in it. She doesn‘t answer even though I call her name. I know I need to move her so I lift her up and take her into the hallway and when I do there is even more blood that comes from her nose and her mouth. I try not to think about the fact that I am touching her body and she is naked; it isn‘t like in the movies where the girl is beautiful and the boy is backlit; it‘s just skin against skin and I am embarrassed for her because she doesn‘t even know she isn‘t wearing clothes. I don‘t want to get blood on the towels so I wipe her face with toilet paper and flush it.

There is underwear on the floor and a bra and sweatpants and a shirt. I put the bra on first and I know how because I watch HBO and have seen them being taken off; all I have to do is reverse it. The underwear I don‘t understand because there is writing on one side and I don‘t know if it‘s the front or the back, so I just put it on her any which way. Then the shirt and the sweatpants and finally socks and Ugg boots, which are the hardest because she cannot press down with her feet.

I pick her up over my shoulder she is heavier than I thought she would be and try to get her down the stairs. There is a turn on the landing and I trip over my feet and we both fall. I land on top of her and when I roll her over her tooth is knocked out. I know it didn‘t hurt her but it still makes me feel like I am going to be sick. The bruises and the broken nose for some reason weren‘t nearly as bad as seeing her with that missing front tooth.

I sit her up in an armchair.
Wait here,
I say, and then I laugh out loud because she can‘t hear me. Upstairs I mop up the blood with more toilet paper, the whole roll. It is still smeary and wet. In the laundry closet I find bleach and I pour it on the floor and use another roll of toilet paper to dry it all off.

It does cross my mind that I might get caught, and that is when I decide not just to clean up but to make a crime scene that leads in a different direction. I pack a bag of extra clothes and take her toothbrush. I type a note and stick it in the mailbox. I put on a pair of boots too big to be hers and walk around outside, cut the screen, put the kitchen knife in the dishwasher, and turn on the quick cycle. I want to be obvious, because Mark is not too smart.

I make sure to wipe away the footprints on the porch and the driveway.

Inside, I put the backpack on my shoulders and make sure I am not forgetting anything. I know I should leave the stools knocked over and the CDs scattered on the living room floor but I just can‘t. So I pick up the stools and the mail and then I organize the CDs the way I think she would have liked them.

I try to carry her into the woods but she gets heavier with every step so instead after a while I have to drag her. I want her to be somewhere where I know she won‘t have to sit in wind or rain or snow. I like the culvert because I can get to it from the highway, instead of going past her house.

I think about her even when I‘m not here; even when I know the police are all looking and I could so easily be distracted by tracking their progress or lack thereof. That‘s why when I come back to visit I bring my quilt. It was something I always liked and I think if she could talk she would have been really proud of me for wrapping her in it.
Good job,
Jacob,
she would have said.
You‘re thinking of someone else for a change.

Little did she know, that was
all
I was thinking about.

When I‘m done the courtroom is so quiet I can hear the pop and hiss of the radiator and the building stretching its beams. I look at Oliver, and at my mother. I expect them to be pretty pleased, because everything should make sense now. I can‘t read their faces, though, or the faces of the jury. One woman is crying; and I don‘t know if she‘s sad because I was talking about Jess or because she‘s happy to finally know what really happened.

I‘m not nervous now. If you want to know, I‘ve got so much adrenaline in my bloodstream I could probably run to Bennington and back. I mean,
holy cow,
I have just outlined how I set up a crime scene with a dead body after successfully fooling the police into believing it was a kidnapping attempt. I have connected all the dots that the State raised as evidence in this trial. It is like the best episode of
CrimeBusters
ever, and I am the star.

Mr. Bond? the judge prompts.

Oliver clears his throat. He rests one hand on the railing of the witness stand, looking away from me. All right, Jacob. You told us a lot about what you did after Jess‘s death. But you haven‘t told us about how she died.

There isn‘t much to tell, I say.

Suddenly, I realize where I‘ve seen that expression on everyone‘s face in this courtroom. It‘s the one on Mimi Scheck‘s face, and Mark Maguire‘s face, and everyone else who thinks that they have absolutely nothing in common with me.

I start to get that burning sensation in my stomach, the one that comes when I realize too late I might have done something that actually wasn‘t such a great idea.

And then, Oliver throws me a lifeline. Jacob, are you sorry for killing Jess?

I smile widely. No, I say. That‘s what I‘ve been trying to tell you all along.

Oliver

Here‘s the bittersweet thing: Jacob has made himself look more insane than I ever could with a witness‘s testimony. Then again, he‘s also made himself look like a ruthless murderer.

Jacob is once again sitting at the defense table, holding his mother‘s hand. Emma is white as a sheet, and I can‘t blame her. After listening to Jacob‘s testimony a detailed description in his own words of how to clean up after a mess of your own making I find myself in the same position.

Ladies and gentlemen, I begin, there‘s been a lot of evidence produced here about how Jess Ogilvy died. We‘re not disputing that evidence. But if you‘ve been paying attention at this trial, you also know that you can‘t judge this book by its cover. Jacob is a young man with Asperger‘s syndrome, a neurological disorder that precludes him from having empathy for others in the same way you or I might. When he talks about what he did with Jess‘s body, and at Jess‘s residence, he doesn‘t see his involvement in a horrific murder. Instead, as you‘ve heard, he takes pride in the fact that he set up a complete crime scene, a crime scene worthy of inclusion in a journal, just like an episode of
CrimeBusters.

I‘m not going to ask you to excuse him for Jess Ogilvy‘s death we grieve with her parents for that loss, and do not seek to diminish the tragedy in any way. However, I am going to ask you to take the information you‘ve been given about Jacob and his disorder, so that when you question whether he was criminally responsible at the time of Jess‘s death whether he understood right from wrong in that moment the way you understand right from wrong you will have no choice but to answer
no.

I walk toward the jury. Asperger‘s is a tough nut to crack. You‘ve heard a lot about it these past few days … and I bet you‘ve thought,
So what?
Not being comfortable in new situations, wanting to do things the same way every day, finding it hard to make new friends these are struggles we‘ve all faced from time to time. Yet none of these traits impair
our
ability to make judgments, and none of
us
are on trial for murder. You might be thinking that Jacob doesn‘t fit your impression of a person with a diagnosable neurological disorder. He‘s smart, he doesn‘t look
crazy
in the colloquial sense of the word. So how can you be certain that Asperger‘s syndrome is a valid neurological disorder, and not just the latest label du jour for a kid with problems? How can you be sure Asperger‘s provides an explanation of his behavior at the moment a crime was committed instead of just a fancy legal excuse?

I smile. Well, I offer an example from Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart. In the fifties and sixties the Court was involved in deciding a number of obscenity cases. Since obscenity isn‘t protected under the First Amendment, they had to determine whether a series of pornographic films met the legal definition of obscenity, and so they‘d screen them. Every week, on what was known as Obscenity Tuesday, the justices watched these films and rendered decisions. It was in
Jacobellis v. Ohio
that Justice Stewart became legendary in the legal field for saying that hard-core pornography was hard to define but that and I quote ‗I know it when I see it.‘

I turn to Jacob. I know it when I see it, I repeat. You haven‘t just listened to experts and seen medical files and seen forensic evidence you‘ve also watched and heard Jacob. And based on that alone, it must be clear to you that he‘s not just a kid with a few personality quirks. He‘s a kid who doesn‘t communicate particularly well and whose thoughts are often jumbled. He talks in a monotone and doesn‘t show a great deal of emotion, even when it seems warranted. Yet he was brave enough to stand up in front of you and try to defend himself against one of the most serious charges a young man like him could ever face. What he said and how he said it might have been upsetting to you.

Shocking, even. But that‘s because a person with Asperger‘s a person like Jacob is not your typical witness.

I didn‘t want my client to testify. I‘ll be honest with you. I didn‘t think that he could do it. When you‘re a witness in a trial, you have to practice saying things in a way that works to make your case. You have to present yourself in a manner that is sympathetic to the jury. And I knew Jacob could not and would not do that. Hell, I could barely get him to wear a tie here … I certainly couldn‘t make him express remorse, or even sadness. I couldn‘t tell him what he should and shouldn‘t say in front of you. To Jacob, that would have been lying. And to Jacob, telling the truth is a rule that has to be followed.