The Silence of Murder (31 page)

Only now, they don’t sound right. They don’t ring true in this courtroom.
The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth
.

I have to keep going. “My brother didn’t kill John Johnson. He was protecting someone he thought did, someone he loves.” As I say this, I’m meaning for them to understand that Rita did it, that Jeremy didn’t. This is what I’ve rehearsed, what I’ve believed. And yet, something nags at me inside. The air I’m breathing swirls in my head, making me dizzy—death, fathers, sons, baseball, and Chase running. Why was he running toward the sun, away from the barn? He said he hadn’t gone near the barn that morning. Why would he lie?

“She’s right!” Rita stands up at the back of the courtroom. “I did it. It was me!”

The courtroom goes crazy.
The judge bangs her gavel and tries to get order.

I stare back at Rita, and I know that this is the best thing she’s ever done. And in that same instant, I also know she’s not telling the truth. Rita’s best moment, and it’s a lie.

Because of Chase. Because he lied about being there.

Because I keep seeing Chase’s name crossed out. Because I can’t get the crime scene photos out of my head. A crumpled long strip of paper beside the body in at least one crime photo. I’ve seen those long, narrow papers before. And then I see them again, in my mind, on Coach’s desk, in his drawer. Rosters. And I see the name crossed off:
Chase Wells
.

Not wanting to see the truth I know I’ll see, I turn and look at Chase. He’s staring back this time, and the truth is all there on his face, his gorgeous face, and in those eyes. “Why?” I whisper it, but it feels louder than the commotion going on all around me. I think everybody in the courtroom
may be going crazy, declared insane, everybody except Jeremy.

But it feels like Chase and I are the only ones here. We’re three feet apart, separated by a table, a railing, and people passing between us. But all I see is Chase. Chase and the dozens of images in my head of us together.

“I’m so sorry,” he says. “I never meant for Jeremy to be blamed.”

Behind us, Sheriff Wells’s booming voice rises over the courtroom. “You better adjourn this trial, Judge! This whole thing’s out of order. You want me to take the kid’s mother into custody?”

“Hope,” Chase continues, as if I’m the only one here, “you have to know I wouldn’t have let Jeremy go to prison. I’d have—”

The sheriff wheels around and is on Chase in two strides. “Shut up! Don’t say another word!”

Chase flinches as if he’s been slapped. “You knew, didn’t you?”

I don’t know which face shows more pain, Chase’s or his father’s.

“That’s why you tried to scare Hope off the case, to keep us apart.” Without taking his gaze from his dad’s face, Chase says, “You knew all along that Jeremy didn’t kill Coach … and that I did.”

His words take away what’s left of my breath.

“I said, shut up!” Sheriff Wells cries. His face is cartoon red, like faces in those animated shows Jeremy loves to watch. “I told you not to try to dig up trouble, but you wouldn’t
listen. Everything would have been okay if you’d just listened to me! I had it all under control.”

Crime scene photos are flashing through my brain. I knew all along something was wrong with them. And now I see it. The photos of Coach with the stuff from his pockets spread out on the ground—the picture I saw in the sheriff’s crime scene file had a long strip of paper that wasn’t in Raymond’s photo. I didn’t know what the paper was then, but I do now. The roster. Probably the roster Coach had posted at the ballpark that day … with Chase’s name crossed out, just like it had been on Coach’s copy, the one he kept on his desk. That roster wasn’t in the photo they gave Raymond … because Sheriff Wells took it away. He must have seen it and figured out everything right then and there.

Chase turns his back on his dad and stares at me. “I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t—please, Hope?”

I don’t know what he wants from me. Arguments leap like flames around us, but they don’t reach me. My head shakes back and forth as I stare at Chase,
my
Chase. I’m piecing together the lies. I still feel the air, full around us, slicing apart, then coming together, like air through vents. “I don’t understand.”

“We’re not saying another word!” Sheriff Wells shouts.

“
I
am.” Keeping his gaze on me, Chase grips the rail and gets to his feet. His voice is loud enough for the judge and everyone else to hear him. The crowd quiets as if their volume has been turned off, like the night crickets Chase and I listened to a million years ago.

Still looking only at me, he says, “I didn’t mean to do it.
You have to believe me. And I didn’t plan for Jeremy to get arrested for the murder. I wouldn’t have let them send Jeremy to prison. I just thought—or at least I convinced myself at first—he’d be better off wherever they put mental patients, and I wouldn’t have to go to jail for something I didn’t mean to do.”

I hurt inside, in places I didn’t know I had. I’m aware of people moving around Chase, talking to him. I think they’re reading him his rights, like on television. Somebody’s handcuffing the sheriff, then Chase. The judge is talking to Chase, and he’s listening to her. T.J. has pushed his way in closer, and his lips are moving. But the words are floating over me, like this air, circling above me but not letting me breathe it in.

“I didn’t plan it, not any of it,” Chase continues. “I think, with time, I could have convinced myself I didn’t really do it, not even the murder—if I hadn’t spent time with you, Hope, if I hadn’t gotten to know Jeremy through you.”

“Why?” I can’t ask the things I really want to ask.
Was it all a lie? Was I totally and completely fooled? Were you spying on me the whole time? Did you ever care about me? Is everything hope-less?

Chase takes in a big breath of air, Jeremy’s air. “I went out for my jog, like I always do … even on game days.” He looks down before admitting, “I always check the roster on game day. Only I couldn’t believe it. Coach had scratched out my name and put T.J. in as starting pitcher. I wasn’t even on the roster. I’d told Dad I was starting pitcher. He’d rounded up his buddies to come and watch me pitch. He’d bought fireworks.
I’d never seen him so proud of me. For weeks, it was all he could talk about—his son was going to pitch in the biggest game in all Ohio, to hear him tell it. Coach Johnson had promised me I could pitch. And I wasn’t even going to play?”

“All this over a stupid game!” Sheriff Wells shouts.

Chase glances back at his dad. “Couldn’t disappoint you, could I, Dad? I couldn’t let you down.
I
keep my promises.”

“You’re a fool,” Sheriff Wells mutters, but he looks broken, not angry.

“I know. I’m a screwup, okay? Don’t you think I know that better than anybody? I just couldn’t stand to see that look, the look you give me when I’ve disappointed you … again.”

Chase turns back to me, as if I’m the one he’s explaining everything to, not the judge, not his dad, not the court reporter taking down every word. “I knew there had to be a mistake. I yanked down the roster and ran to the barn. Coach was always in the stable early. I found him in the back stall, brushing one of the horses. He didn’t want to come out, and when he did, he seemed tired. The sun was peeking through the clouds, making an orange glow inside the barn.

“ ‘What is it, Chase?’ he asked, like I was just another inconvenience to him. That’s me. Mr. Inconvenience.

“I shook the roster at him. ‘What’s with this?’ I demanded, trying to control my temper. I was already breathing hard from the run. All the way to the barn, I’d been imagining the scene when Dad would show up at the park and discover I wasn’t pitching. I’d gone over it in my head, over and over.

“ ‘That looks like the roster I put up this morning, Chase,’ Coach said. But he knew what I meant.

“ ‘I’m supposed to be the starting pitcher. You promised I could start the game this afternoon!’ I was shouting.

“He shook his head. ‘Maybe your dad promised you that.
I
didn’t. I thought you could get your swing under control, but you’re not there yet. This is a big game, Chase. You ought to know that by now. I want to beat Wooster.’ He was so calm. And the calmer he got, the angrier I got, like I had to turn up the heat so he’d understand how important this was.

“ ‘So you’re pitching T.J.?’ I screamed. ‘You’ve got to be kidding! He doesn’t even have a curveball.’

“ ‘Chase, you’ve got a lot of talent,’ Coach admitted, ‘and I think you’re going to be a strong pitcher. But pitchers bat in our league. You know that. And your swing has been way off.’

“I told him how hard I’d been practicing. I told him over and over.

“ ‘That’s good,’ he said. ‘You keep it up, and we’ll see.’ Just like that.

“ ‘No! You can see now!’ I told him. I’d spotted Jeremy’s bat leaning against the wall when I came in. I ran and got it. His gloves were there, so I put those on too. I took a couple of practice cuts and ran back to Coach. He was heading into the stall. ‘Wait! I want you to see. I’ve evened out the swing like you told me. I have, Coach!’

“ ‘It’s over, Chase,’ he said.

“But he’d promised. He’d
promised
me!

“ ‘Go on home and tell your dad, son. It’s about time he learned how to lose too.’ Then he turned his back on me. He was breaking his promise. He shouldn’t have done that. I was
counting on that game. My dad was counting on it. Everybody would be there. He couldn’t take that away from me.

“Something went off inside me. It felt like an explosion. I swung the bat. Just like I’d been doing in the batting cages. One swing. I only wanted to show him. That’s all. He dropped to his knees, like he was praying. Then he toppled to the ground. I stared down at him. Blood poured out of his nose, his mouth. So much blood.

“I dropped the bat, and I ran. I ran fast so the whole mess got farther and farther away from me. I couldn’t believe what I’d done. Had I really killed him? It wasn’t possible. It was too horrible to be real. So maybe I hadn’t done it. When you run far enough, fast enough, all thoughts leave your head. It’s a running high. You can imagine things. Maybe I’d imagined this.

“I was all the way home before I realized I was still wearing the batting gloves. Nobody was there. I put my shoes and shorts and the gloves into a garbage bag and set it out with our trash. Then I waited for Dad to get home and arrest me.

“Only it didn’t happen. I got a phone call from one of the team mothers—all the players on the team got it.” Chase makes a move toward me, and the guard closes in, stopping him. “I didn’t even know they’d arrested Jeremy until that afternoon. I thought they’d let him go the next day. Then the next. Then it was weeks.

“At first I figured they’d see right off it wasn’t Jeremy. How could they find evidence when he didn’t do it? When they didn’t let Jeremy go, I convinced myself that he’d get off. Dad kept telling me the jury would just put Jeremy in a kind of home, that he’d be happy there.”

I remember all the questions Chase asked me about Jeremy and how surprised he’d been when I told him why a mental hospital would kill my brother. He’d wanted to believe Jeremy could live happily ever after in one of those places.

As Chase has been talking, I’ve pictured everything—Chase arguing with Coach, Chase picking up the bat, swinging.… But I’ve pictured other moments too—Chase wrapping me in a blanket, bringing me hot chocolate; Chase, his arms around me, his hand lifting my chin, his lips brushing mine.

I have two hearts. One is jumping for joy because I know my brother can come home. Everyone will know he’s not guilty, not crazy. But the other heart is broken, shattered in pieces because I think I loved Chase. “Why did you pretend to help me, to care?”

“I wasn’t pretending, Hope. Do you think I wanted to get involved? I tried to quit, to keep away from you … but I couldn’t. I wanted to help you, to be with you. Then when you talked about Jeremy, I wanted to help you get him off. Remember? Reasonable doubt?”

I want to believe him. And I don’t want to believe him. I want the truth, but it’s trapped in between horrible facts, out of reach, like air in a bottle. “Was everything a lie? You? Me?
Us?
”

“No!” he shouts. “God, no!”

God
hangs over the courtroom, echoing in the air.

“Hope?” the judge says. And for a minute, I think it’s a question:
Hope?
I burst into tears, sobs that shake the earth. I
have to lean on the defense table or I’ll fall to the floor and never get up.

Things happen fast. Reporters are shouting questions. The judge pounds her gavel. Keller agrees with Raymond about releasing Jeremy. One of the officers takes Chase by the elbow. Another one struggles with Chase’s father. T.J. and his mother come up, both offering help, friendship.

Something touches my shoulder. I know that touch. It’s my brother. His stiff fingers press something cool and hard into my palm. It’s the aspirin bottle. He’s printed on the side in tiny, curled letters:
Hope’s tears—Psalm 56:8
. When I smile up at him, he wipes the tears from my cheek.

Rita edges in close, closer than she’s been for a long, long time. I look up at Jeremy. He’s smiling at her, the lines in his face soft with relief that his mother didn’t kill his father.

Rita starts to say something to me, but she stops and turns back to Jeremy.

And then I hear it. It has been ten years since I heard that sound, but I recognize it as clearly as if I’d been listening to it just this morning. I close my eyes and take in the single note that swallows every other noise in the courtroom. It drowns out shame and anger and lies. Then it slides into more notes that mingle with the words blowing around us, in the air, filling the room.

I open my eyes and see that Chase isn’t looking at me anymore. He’s staring at Jeremy because that song, of course, is coming from Jeremy’s mouth. From his heart. His soul.

When my brother stops singing, the courtroom stays silent. We look from Jeremy to one another. Nothing will
ever be the same for anyone in this room. I think we all know that.