K. Randis - Spilled Milk

“They wanted to use my journals as evidence.” I twirled a fringe of wavy hair around my finger. “But then they took it back when they realized that I probably had more damaging information in them than supportive for the defense.”

“I imagine you would have been really upset. Those are personal to you,” Midge said.

“Yea. Beyond personal. I’ve had a journal since I was what, seven?” I stared at the advocate posters littering Midge’s office walls. Coloring pages that clients had given her with rainbows and happy faces were tacked behind her desk. The bean bag chair I squished into every week was beginning to wear at the stitching and I plucked at a lose string.

“What’s bothering you, child.”

“I just can’t believe you’re really leaving.”

“No need to whisper, I’m movin’ on I aint dyin’. Besides, you moved two hours from here, maybe you need to find a counselor closer to where you living and save you some gas. I got a good opportunity to help those kids in Colorado, it’s a good thing for me.”

“I know. But the trial is next week. I thought I would have you here until it was over at least.”

“No telling how long those take. You’ve been going to court, what, well over a year now and you just gettin’ into the main arena?” Midge shook her head. “Sad I tell you. They wonder why women give up, drag them through the mill for justice and a year later still nothing?”

She leaned forward in her chair. “You got Gina, you got your knight in shining armor, and your Mom. Even though we both don’t agree with her, she still gonna be there for you. You even got Miss Heather. That’s a good support team if I ever saw one.”

“Midge, did anything ever happen to you? Is that why you counsel women?”

“Would it help you any if you knew?”

“I think so.”

Midge nodded. “Mmm Hmm, get on over here close to me so I don’t gotta talk loud about it, make myself all rattled up. Normally I don’t tell my story, but I’m movin’ on anyways.” She cleared her throat.

“I was thirteen, growin’ up on the banks of North Carolina when my older brother Jon came in my bedroom. He was a man now, just turned twenty one and had a bottle of Jack in him before dinner time that day. Mama was at work, my daddy died when I was three from heat stroke. It was just me and Jon.

He came in my room with that empty bottle and closed the door behind him. Turned my blood cold when I saw the look on his face. My pants were ripped off, shirt undone, and I screamed, oh lord did I ever scream. He raped me over twenty minutes before he stumbled off me, drunk as a skunk, and I took my chance and I ran.”

I reached out for Midge’s hand as she continued. “Ran straight through our sliding glass door I did, straight through, shattered it. All the way down to the neighbors house, about two miles. Neighbor pulled up just as I started bangin’ on the door and she about fainted when she saw the blood. Bleedin’ like a pig, she said and naked as a newborn. She wrapped me in a blanket, called the cops. They showed up, Police man Smitty, that his name. Smitty. Took them two hours to find him hiding in the fields behind our house. They found him, arrested him on the spot.”

“Good, I’m glad they got him.”

Midge held up a finger. “Over two hundred stitches to close me up. Jon spewed some story that I was in the shower, and he scared me with a Halloween mask so I ran through the glass door all on my own doing.” She shook her head. “When we went to court, he spat at me, stood up in front of that judge and told me when he got out of jail he was gonna kill me.”

“He went to jail right?”

“Sure he did. For all of eight months. See Jon was a bargaining man, and he found himself messed up in the wrong crowds of people, drug people. He gave over some names and they let him out in eight months.”

“He plea bargained and got out in less than a year?”

Midge nodded. “That ain’t even the sweetest part, child. When he done his time, Mama let that fool back into our house like nothin’ happened. For four months I slept with my dresser up against my door, waitin for him to come and kill me. But he disappeared one night, and we never saw him again.”

“Midge, I can’t believe your mom let him back in. Did you ever ask her why? Why would she do that to you?”

A hand trembled across her wet face. “Oh sure, I asked. She say Because he my son, Midge, what you want me to do? Last we heard he made his way to California, even got a woman to marry him. Wound up raping his wife’s two year old baby. Can you imagine that? They got better laws now, makin’ sure he won’t ever see the outside of those California walls again.”

“I’m so sorry Midge. I am.” I patted her hand as she grabbed a tissue. “I can’t believe your mom let him back in the house. You’re such a strong person.”

“We both are, child. And you know why? We don’t have the luxury of fallin’ apart, for someone else to come picking up the pieces. We have a gift, you and I, we feel people’s hurt and pain when we talk to someone. That’s what makes you protect your siblings like you do, without even being asked. It’s what makes me work at a place like this, to do what I can. Ain’t nobody gonna tell us it’s all right to fall apart.” She wagged a finger at me. “But you, you are somethin’ else. You got something I didn’t at your age, and I wish I did.”

“What do I have that you didn’t?”

“You have a Midge. And a Gina. You had a helping hand guide you to me, make you realize that your worst fears were real. And we supported you, didn’t we?”

I nodded, wiping my own face. “Then why do I feel so alone?”

“Because he wants you to feel like that. So you step down and you give up. But you look at me child, and you promise me, promise me, you won’t ever back down. Don’t you feel sorry for him about to sit in a jail cell the rest of his life, and don’t you feel sorry for your mama’s money problems now that he’s gone. You doing the right thing, for you , and anyone else he’ll never be able to hurt now.”

I promised Midge, and hugged her after our last session together. She was there for me when my journey started and I hoped I learned enough to see the trial through to the end without her.

I met Heather at the courthouse that weekend. “I want to give you a tour of the courtroom and explain what will happen the day of the trial. There will be a lot more people in here than you’re used to from the preliminary hearings, including a jury.”

I followed her into the elevator as she spoke. “David changed his lawyer, a woman this time. Guess he didn’t like the way the preliminary hearing turned out. Subpoenas are all out too.”

“What’s a subpoena?” I held the elevator door open for a police officer as we got off.

“It tells the person it’s addressed to that they’re being asked to serve as a witness in criminal court, so they have to be here. You and your mom get one, so did Gina and your Aunt Jean, and your mom’s friend Ellen since David called her when you guys fled to New York.”

We stopped in front of a white door with three wooden chairs lined up along the outside wall. Heather pulled a chain of keys from her pocket. “This is where you’ll wait until your name is called to testify, usually if you’re subpoenaed they don’t like you to sit in the courtroom listening to other people’s testimony.”

“Why not?”

“Everyone’s testimony needs to be their own. We don’t want people adding things to what they say based on what another person said. It happens sometimes, even if you don’t mean it to.”

“This is a big courtroom. Very white.” I said, staring around at all the empty space.