Chris Whitaker - We Begin at the End

He stared up with sad eyes.

“Try and eat that donut without licking your lips.”

He looked at the donut. “Too easy.”

“Go on then.”

He took a bite and licked his lips right off.

“You just licked them.”

“Did not.”

They walked back down the sidewalk, the sky covering over, those rolling clouds chasing the day so fast.

“I miss her.”

She squeezed his hand. She still hadn’t decided if she felt the same.

* * *

Thirty years in the same room, steel toilet and basin, walls dug out and scrawled. A door that slid open and closed at set times each day.

Walk stood outside Fairmont County Correctional Facility and took in the sun, high and merciless no matter the month. He glanced up at the camera, watched men in the yard, the chain links turning them into puzzle pieces that did not fit anywhere at all.

“I can never get used to the colors. Everything looks washed out.”

Cuddy laughed. “Missing your blue, Walk.”

Cuddy lit a cigarette, offered Walk one but he waved him off.

“You ever smoke?”

“Never even tried it.”

They watched men shoot hoops, bare chests, sweating. A man fell, got up and squared off but caught sight of Cuddy and squashed it quick. The game went on, the ferocity, life or death and no room for the between.

“It got to me, this one,” Cuddy said.

Walk turned but Cuddy kept his eyes on the game.

“But then I used to think some people weren’t meant for this place. When I started out, working the floor. I’d see them bring in a white collar, lawyer or banker or something and I’d think they don’t belong here. But then maybe there aren’t degrees of bad. Maybe it doesn’t matter by how much you cross the line.”

“Most people get near. At least once in their life.”

“Not you, Walk.”

“There’s still time.”

“Vincent crossed when he was fifteen. My father worked that night they brought him in. News crews were here. I remember the jury called it late.”

Walk remembered, too.

“My father said it, worst night of his life. And you can only imagine the things he saw. Booking in a kid. Watching the men, arms through bars, calling. A couple were alright, supportive even. But most, you know. Keep the noise up, welcome him that way.”

Walk clutched the fence, fingers through the diamonds, the air beyond just as hard to breathe.

“I was nineteen my first day here.” Cuddy stubbed out his cigarette and kept hold of the butt. “Four years older than Vincent. I worked his unit, on three. Shit, I used to look at him and see a kid, same as everyone. Maybe a kid from my school, maybe a little brother, whatever. I liked him right off.”

Walk smiled.

“I thought about him, at home, when I was on vacation, when I caught a movie with a girl I liked.”

“Yeah?”

“His life and mine. They aren’t all that different, save for a single mistake. And it was that. Child’s life … Jesus. Two children if you count Vincent. If he’s back here, if he came to nothing, it’s more tragic, right. More of a waste.”

Walk had tried out those same ideas.

“I was happy, when you came and got him. End one chapter, too long, start a new one. He had the time, Walk. We’re not all that old, you know.”

“I know.” Walk thought of the disease, how it twisted him into someone he was not ready to be.

“Sometimes people complained I favored him, said I gave him more time in the yard and shit. I did. I did all I could to give him it. Life … partial life, whatever. We’re not supposed to question guilt, we do our jobs, right?”

“We do.”

“I never ask this question. I never asked it, not once in thirty years here.”

“He didn’t do it, Cuddy.”

Cuddy breathed heavily, like he’d been holding that question a long time. And then he turned and opened the gate.

“I got you a room.”

“Thank you.” Walk had been dreading talking through the phones, easier to stay distant with plexiglass between them.

Cuddy led him to an office, empty of everything but a metal table and two chairs. The place for lawyer and client, lines fed, appeal and hope and which circuit to exhaust next.

Vincent filed in, Cuddy uncuffed him, looked over at Walk then left them.

“What the hell are you doing?” Walk said.

Vincent took the seat opposite and crossed his legs. “You’ve lost weight, Walk.”

Another two pounds. He ate breakfast and nothing more, just drank coffee. He had a pain in his stomach, not sharp, just heavy and constant, like his body was turning in on him again. His new pills were still doing their job, helping him stay steady, helping him stand and walk and almost take both of those things for granted.

“You want to tell me what’s going on?”

“I sent you a letter.”

“I got it. I’m sorry. ”

“I meant it.”

“And everything else in there.”

“I meant that too.”

“I won’t put the house up. Maybe after the trial, once we know the future.”

Vincent looked pained, like he’d called on a favor and found Walk all out. He’d been clear, the letter, his writing so graceful Walk read it twice. Sell the house. Take the offer, the million bucks from Dickie Darke.

“I already have the check. I just need you to take care of the paperwork.”

Walk shook his head. “Just wait and we’ll—”

“You look like shit,” Vincent said.

“I’m fine.”

They settled back to silence.

“Duchess and Ro … and the boy. The little boy.” He said the names quietly, like he wasn’t worthy of speaking them.

“You need something, Vincent. We can talk about it, we can sort something out but I think you need to take some time on it.”

“That’s something I do have.”

Walk took a stick of gum from his pocket and offered one over.

“Contraband,” Vincent said.

“Right.”

Walk stared at him, looking for something he couldn’t see. Not guilt, not remorse. He’d toyed with the idea that Vincent missed it, institutionalized. He didn’t buy it, it didn’t fit at all. Vincent looked away, all the time, never meeting his eye for longer than a blink.

“I know, Vin.”

“What do you know?”

“That you didn’t do it.”

“Guilt is decided long before the act is committed. People just don’t realize it. They think they have a choice. They look back, play it different, sliding doors, but they never really did.”

“You won’t speak because you know I’ll tie you up. You can’t keep a consistent lie.”

“That’s not—”

“If you did it where’s the gun?”

Vincent swallowed. “I do need you to instruct a lawyer for me.”

Walk breathed out, smiled and tapped the table with the flat of his hand. “Yes, good. I know a couple of guys, good trial lawyers.”

“I want Martha May.”

Walk stopped tapping. “Excuse me?”

“Martha May. I want her and no one else.”

“She works family law.”

“She’s the only lawyer I want.”

Walk let it settle a while. “What’s your angle here?”

Vincent kept his eyes down.

“What the hell is wrong with you? Thirty years I’ve been waiting for you.” Walk slammed the table with his hand. “Come on, Vincent. You weren’t … your life, it wasn’t the only one on hold.”

“You think our lives have been close to the same?”

“That’s not what I meant. It was hard on all of us. Star.”

Vincent stood.

“Wait.”

“What is it, Walk? What do you need to say?”

“Boyd and the D.A. They’re going for death.”

The word hung there.

“You tell Martha to come see me. I’ll sign papers.”