Paul Levine - Solomon versus Lord

“Forty-seven… forty-eight… Hey, Bobby… Brittany Spears.”

“SPINY RAT BREAST,” Bobby shot back.

“Good one,” Cece said. “Forty-nine… fifty!” She kicked off the chair into a handstand, pointed her jeweled toes toward the ceiling, lowered into a vertical push-up, then sprang into a front flip and landed on her feet.

Steve glanced at Victoria's desk. The few law books and files she'd brought with her were neatly packed in three cardboard boxes. Though he'd never been married, he imagined this is what it felt like on the verge of divorce. A piece of himself would soon be missing.

Cece grabbed a towel and roped it around Bobby's neck. “Hey, brainiac, I hear you're stuck with your uncle from now on.”

“Next year, we're going back to court and he's gonna adopt me,” Bobby said. “Then I'll call him ‘Dad' instead of ‘Uncle Steve.'”

Steve grabbed his calendar from his desk. “Cece, where are my appointments?”

“Don't got any,” she said.

“No one's called?”

“MasterCard. You've been canceled.”

“I don't get it. Where are the new clients? I just won a big murder trial.”

The door opened, and Victoria walked in.

“I mean, we just won a big murder trial,” he said. “Hey, Vic.”

“I need to talk to you,” she said.

She wore a glen plaid outfit that reminded him of something. What was it?

That first day. It's what she wore the day we were thrown in jail. And now it's the last day.

Later, when Steve would think about this moment, he would remember her face. Troubled. Eyes puffy. Hair messy. Not much sleep and maybe a crying spell. But just then, he barely noticed. He was too wrapped up in his own punctured dreams of a big-time law practice. “This doesn't make sense. We win a huge case, and this place is like a morgue.”

“That's just it,” Cece said. “You didn't win Barksdale. At least, people don't think you did. I was in the clerk's office yesterday, and everybody was saying how great it was that Pincher figured out your client was innocent, even if you couldn't. They say he's gonna run for governor as a compassionate prosecutor.”

“I don't believe this. Vic, you believe this?”

“Could we talk now? Please.”

The phone rang and Steve said, “Maybe that's a new client.”

Cece picked it up: “Solomon and Lord, Attorneys at Law…”

For a few minutes more, anyway, Steve thought.

“Civil and criminal litigation,” Cece continued. “Hablamos Espanol.”

“Steve…” Victoria said.

“Yes, Your Honor,” Cece said into the phone.

“Hang on,” Steve told Victoria, trying to listen. When a judge calls, it was usually not to compliment your lawyering skills.

“Yes, sir. I'll tell him right now, Your Honor,” Cece said, then hung up.

“What?” Steve said. “Who was that?”

“Judge Gridley himself. He's pissed 'cause you're late for the Sachses' final hearing.”

“What final hearing! You didn't put it on my calendar.”

“You expect me to keep track of all the places you're supposed to be?”

“That's your job!”

“Don't yell at me. I'm not your slave.”

“Victoria, come on. You've got to represent Harry's wife.”

“Why?”

“The Sachses' divorce. Gridley requires both parties be represented, even when it's uncontested. I'll introduce the property settlement agreement. Harry and Joanne will say they signed it, and we'll be out of there in five minutes.”

“Then we'll talk?” she asked, but Steve was already hustling her toward the door.

10. We all hold the keys to our own jail cells.

“Y'all think my dog-ass Gators can make the Final Four?” Judge Erwin Gridley asked.

“Tough region,” Steve said. “They'll be lucky to get to the Sweet Sixteen.”

The judge harrumphed, or maybe the open-jawed alligator head on his desk did. They were in the orange-and-blue chambers of the old Bull Gator himself. Steve sat on one side of the T-bone-shaped conference table, his client, Harry Sachs, alongside. As Harry was not working today-meaning he wasn't pulling one of his numerous cons-he had left the wheelchair at home. He wore jeans and a cammie jacket emblazoned with Marine battle insignia he'd bought on the Internet. Harry was admiring a miniature replica of Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, maybe wondering how much it would bring at a pawnshop. Steve made a mental note to frisk his client before they left chambers.

Directly across the table sat Joanne Sachs, a handsome woman in her mid-forties in wire-framed glasses and a gray wool dress with a white lacy collar. Steve nodded to her, thinking they were a mismatched couple. If he saw Harry and Joanne side by side on the street, he'd figure she was a librarian about to have her purse snatched.

Victoria sat next to Joanne, scanning the Property Settlement Agreement. At the side of the judge's desk, Sofia Hernandez, in a black leather mini and a white blouse, was poised over her stenograph machine. Her long, lacquered nails were emblazoned with silver hearts.

“Mr. Sachs, have you been a resident of Miami-Dade County for six months prior to filing this petition?” the judge asked.

“Yes, sir,” Harry said.

“Your marriage irretrievably broken?”

“Like Heidi Fleiss' hymen.”

“How's that?”

“He answered in the affirmative,” Steve said, giving his client a sharp look.

“Now, this Property Settlement Agreement,” Judge Gridley continued, “you agree with its terms?”

“Every word,” Harry said fervently.

“You, too, Mrs. Sachs?”

Joanne Sachs started to nod, but Victoria put a hand on her arm and said: “Your Honor, I'm not sure this agreement is entirely fair.”

Steve bolted to attention. “What are you doing?”

“Representing my client,” Victoria said.

“Your client already signed the agreement.”

“Without benefit of independent counsel.”

“Hey, Lord. Stick to the script, okay?”

“I'm not a potted plant.”

“Y'all gonna start up again?” Judge Gridley asked, with interest.

“Judge, it's not fair that Mrs. Sachs gets the eight-year-old Dodge and her husband keeps the new Lexus,” Victoria said. “Then there's his pending IRS audit. Mr. Sachs should be required to indemnify and hold his wife harmless from any penalties.”

Steve couldn't believe it. The last day of Solomon and Lord, and the woman was mucking up everything. Jesus, why didn't she just clear out already?

“Joanne, fire your lawyer,” he said.

“Don't you dare address my client,” Victoria said.

“She's not your client. You don't have clients. You have time-shares and green gourds and pretty soon you'll have little green children. I'll tell you something else, Lord. I bought you a really nice wedding present, but to hell with it, I'm giving it to Katrina.”

“You're losing it, Solomon,” Victoria said.

The judge sighed and said: “I ever tell y'all about those two beagles on my farm, always yapping at each other?”

“Yeah, Judge, you did,” Steve said.

“They finally settled it all by humping in the barn,” the judge reminded them.

“We tried that, Your Honor,” Steve said. “Even had the bales of straw.”

“Damn you!” Victoria said. “Your Honor, I move that Mr. Solomon's slanderous statement be stricken from the record.”

Sofia Hernandez typed away, a wicked smile on her crimson lips.

“It's only slander if it's false,” Steve said. “Are you denying it happened?”

“Calm down, now, both of you,” the judge ordered.

“What about my divorce?” Harry Sachs said.

“I'm gonna postpone the hearing and order counseling,” the judge said.