James Grippando - The Pardon

Jack tried to scoot past her, but Agnes reached out and managed to grab him by the back of his britches as he passed. She wrapped her arms around him in an awkward embrace and mashed her lips against his cheek. “Give Mommy a big hug,” she said, stinking of her gin martini. He struggled to get out of her grip, but Agnes squeezed him tighter. “Don’t you want to give Mommy a hug?” she asked.

“No,” he grimaced. “And you’re not my mommy!”

Resentment flared within her. She pushed little Jack off her lap but held him tightly by the wrist, so he couldn’t go anywhere. “Don’t you dare talk to me that way,” she scolded. Then she slapped him across the face. The boy burst into tears as he struggled to get loose, but Agnes wouldn’t release him.

“Let me go, you’re hurting me.”

“Hurt is the only thing you understand, young man. You don’t appreciate anything else. I’m the one who changed your dirty diapers. I’m the one who. . who”-she struggled to find the words-“lost sleep with all your crying in the night. Not your mother. I did it. I’m your mother. I’m all you’ve got! ”

“You’re not my mommy. My mommy’s in heaven!”

Agnes didn’t know where the ugly words were coming from, but she couldn’t stop them. “Your mother isn’t dead, you little brat. She just didn’t want you!”

Jack’s hands trembled as he stared at his stepmother. “That’s a lie!” he cried. “A lie, lie, lie! That’s all it is! That’s-”

“. . the news at sunrise,” The anchorman’s voice drew Agnes out of her past. “From all of us at channel seven, have a great day.”

Agnes hit the off button as she returned from her memories. The governor stepped from the bathroom, dressed and ready to take his phone call at the corner of Teeth and Monroe, ready to find out the truth about Rau1 Fernandez. However, last night he’d promised his wife that he wouldn’t go without her blessing. She’d promised to sleep on it. As he stood at the foot of the bed, adjusting his necktie, she knew it was time for her to give him an answer.

“Well?” he asked.

Agnes sighed. It wasn’t an easy decision. Even taking a phone call could be dangerous. The man did have a knife. But if this was a way to ease Harry’s pain, a way to fix the rupture between her husband and her stepson, she couldn’t stand in his way.

“Don’t you dare take any chances, Harry Swyteck.”

The governor smiled appreciatively, then came to her and kissed her on the lips. “I’ll call you when it’s over. And don’t worry-I’m the original Chicken Little remember?”

Agnes nodded but without conviction. In the beginning of their marriage, when Harry had been on the police force, such assurances were offered on a daily basis. It was her knowledge of her husband’s innate bravery that worried her so much.

He pulled away, then stopped as he reached the door. “But if I don’t call by one-”

“Don’t say it, Harry,” she said, eyes glassy now with tears. “Don’t even think it.”

He nodded slowly. “I’ll call you,” he promised. Then he was out the door.

More out of an ingrained sense of obligation than passion for his work, Jack put on jeans and a polo shirt-typical summer attire at the Freedom Institute-gave Thursday a friendly pat on the rump, and headed out the door. In the car he brooded on whether he would tender his resignation. When he arrived at nine o’clock, he still hadn’t come to a decision. It was his first day back in the office in almost three weeks, since the Goss trial had begun. He stood in the foyer, taking a hard look at the place where he’d worked for the past four years. The reception area was little more than a hallway. Bright fluorescent lighting showed every stain on the indoor-outdoor carpet. A few unmatched chairs lined the bare white walls. An oversized metal desk was at the end of the hall. It belonged to the pregnant woman who served as both the Institute’s receptionist and only secretary. Behind her were four windowless offices, one for each of the lawyers. Beyond that was a vintage sixties kitchen, where the lawyers did everything from interviewing witnesses to eating their bagged lunches.

“Victory!” chorused Jack’s colleagues as he stepped into the kitchen. All three of the Institute’s other lawyers were smiling widely and assuming a celebratory stance around the Formica-topped table. There was Brian, a suntanned and sandy-haired outdoor type who moved as smoothly in court as he did on water skis. And Eve, the resident jokester who helped everyone keep sanity, the only woman Jack had ever known to smoke a pipe. And Neil Goderich, who’d lost his ponytail since establishing the Institute twenty-eight years ago, but who still wore his shirt collar unbuttoned beneath his tie-not just to be casual, but because his neck had swollen more than an inch since he last bought a new dress shirt.

The home team cheered as they broke out a six-dollar bottle of cold duck and popped the cork.

“Congratulations!” said Neil as he filled four coffee-stained mugs.

They raised their cups in unison, and Jack smiled at their celebration; although he didn’t share the festive mood, he appreciated the gesture. He considered them all friends. At his first interview four years ago he’d learned they were down-to-earth people who believed in themselves and their principles. They were honest enough to tell even the son of a prominent politician that anything “politically correct” was a walking oxymoron. It was the strength of their collective character that made it hard for Jack to leave. But suddenly, he knew the time had come.

“Excellent job!” said Neil, a sentiment echoed by the others.

“Thank you,” said Jack, hoping to stem any further backslapping. “I really appreciate this. But. . as long as everyone’s here, I might as well take this chance to tell you.” He looked at them and sighed. “Guys, Eddy Goss was my last case. I’m leaving the Institute.”

That took the fizz right out of their cold duck.

Jack placed his cup on the table, turned, and quietly headed toward his office, leaving them staring at one another. The announcement had been awkward, but he didn’t feel bike explaining. With no other job offer in hand, he was having a hard time explaining it to himself.

He spent a couple of hours packing up his things, going through old files. At eleven o’clock Neil Goderich appeared in his doorway.

“When you first came here,” Neil began, “we honestly wondered if you’d ever fit in.”

Jack picked up some books, placed them in a box. “I wondered the same thing.”

Neil smiled sadly, like a parent sending a kid off to college. He took a seat on the edge of Jack’s desk, beside a stack of packed boxes. “We never would have hired your type,” he said as he stroked his salt-and-pepper beard. “You had ‘big greedy law firm’ written all over your resume. Someone who clearly valued principal and interest over interest in one’s principles.”

“Then why’d you hire me?”

Neil smiled wryly. “Because you were the son of Harold Swyteck. And I could think of no better way to piss off the future law-and-order governor than to have his son come work for a long-haired leftover from a lost generation.”

It was Jack’s turn to smile. “So you put up with me for the same reason I put up with you.”

“I suspected that was why you were here,” he said, then turned serious. “You were tired of doing everything your old man said you should do. The Institute was as far off the beaten path as you could get.”

Jack fell silent. He and Neil had never spoken about his father, and Neil’s unflattering perception of the relationship was more than a little disturbing.