Jodi Picoult - Small Great Things

It’s a hard call. In Ruth’s unique case, the best juror may not be one with the same color skin.

I put a question mark at the top of the survey-this is one I’ll have to consider further. Driving slowly out of the neighborhood, I wait until I see children playing outside and then pull over to the curb and call Howard’s cell. “So?” I ask when he picks up. “How’s it going?”

“Um,” he says. “I’m sort of stuck.”

“Where?”

“East Shore.”

“What’s the problem?”

“It’s a gated community. There’s a low fence and I could look over it, but I’d have to get out of the car,” Howard says.

“Then get out of the car.”

“I can’t. See, back when I was in college, I kind of made a rule for myself-don’t get out of the car unless there’s a happy, living black person in sight.” He exhales. “I’ve been waiting for forty-five minutes, but the only people in this part of New Haven are white.”

That’s not necessarily a bad thing for Ruth. “Can’t you just go peek over the wall? Make sure she doesn’t have a Trump sign on her lawn?”

“Kennedy-there are neighborhood watch signs all over the place. What do you think is going to happen if they see a black man trying to peek over a wall?”

“Oh,” I say, embarrassed. “I get it.” I look out the window to where three kids are jumping into piles of leaves; I think of the little black boy I saw streaking away from Presidential Gardens. Ed told me last week that he defended a twelve-year-old involved in a gang shooting with two seventeen-year-olds, and that the prosecution was gunning to have all three tried as adults. “Give me an hour and then meet me at 560 Theodore Street in East End. And, Howard? When you arrive, it’s safe to get out of the car,” I say. “I live there.”

–

I LIGHTLY DROP the bag of Chinese food onto the desk of my home office. “I have goodies,” I say, taking out the lo mein and laying claim to it.

“So do I,” Howard says, and he points to a stack of papers he’s printed out.

It’s 10:00 P.M., and we’ve set up camp at my home. I left Howard there all afternoon to do online research while Odette and I swapped stacks of surveys. For hours, I’ve battled traffic, sussed out more jurors by neighborhood, and scanned the plaintiff and defendant lists at the courthouse to see if any of the potential jurors have been criminally prosecuted or have relatives that were criminally prosecuted.

“I found three guys who were charged with domestics, a woman whose mother got convicted of arson, and a lovely little old lady whose grandson’s meth lab was busted last year,” Howard announces.

The screen reflects, glowing green around Howard’s face as he scans the page. “Okay,” he says, opening a plastic container of soup and drinking from the side without a spoon. “God, I’m starving. So here’s the thing: you can get some good dirt on Facebook, but it depends on privacy settings.”

“Did you try LinkedIn?”

“Yeah,” he says. “It’s a gold mine.”

He beckons me to the floor, where he’s spread out the surveys and has paper-clipped printouts to each one. “This guy? We love him,” Howard says. “He’s a social justice educator at Yale. And even better-his mother is a nurse.” I hold up my hand, he high-fives. “This is my second favorite.”

He passes me the survey. Candace White. She’s forty-eight years old, African American, a librarian, mother of three. She looks like someone who could be friends with Ruth, not just rule in favor of the defense.

Her favorite TV show is Wallace Mercy .

I may not want Reverend Mercy messed up in Ruth’s case, but the people who watch him are definitely going to have sympathy for my client.

Howard is still listing his finds. “I’ve got three ACLU memberships. And this girl ran a whole tribute to Eric Garner on her blog. A series called I Can’t Breathe Either. ”

“Nice.”

“On the other end of the spectrum,” Howard says, “this lovely gentleman is the deacon of his church and also supports Rand Paul and advocates the repeal of all civil rights laws.”

I take the survey from his hand and put a red X through the name at the top.

“Two people who posted about reducing funding for welfare,” Howard says. “I’m not sure what you want to do about that.”

“Put them in the middle pile,” I reply.

“This girl updated her status three hours ago: Jesus Christ some chink just sideswiped my car. ”

I place her survey on top of the Rand Paul advocate’s, as well as someone whose profile pic on Twitter is Glenn Beck. There are two candidates Howard has nixed because they liked Facebook pages for Skullhead and Day of the Sword. “Is that some Game of Thrones thing?” I ask, baffled.

“They’re white power bands,” Howard says, and I am pretty sure he blushes. “I found a group called Vaginal Jesus too. But none of our potential jurors listen to them.”

“Thank God for small mercies. What’s the big pile in the middle?”

“Indeterminate,” Howard explains. “I have a few pictures of people making gun gang signs, a handful of stoners, one idiot who took a video of himself shooting up heroin, and thirty selfies of people who are rocked-off-their-gourd drunk.”

“Doesn’t it just warm the cockles of your heart to know that we entrust the legal system to these folks?”

I’m joking, but Howard looks at me soberly. “To tell you the truth, today’s been a little shocking. I mean, I had no idea how people live their lives, and what they do when they think no one’s looking-” He glances at a photo of a woman brandishing a red Solo cup. “Or even when they are. ”

I spear a Peking ravioli with my chopstick. “When you start to see the seedy underbelly of America,” I say, “it makes you want to live in Canada.”

“Oh, and there’s this,” Howard says, pointing to the computer screen. “Do with it what you will.” He reaches across me for a Peking ravioli.

I frown at the Twitter handle: @WhiteMight . “Which juror is it?”

“It’s not a juror,” he says. “And I’m pretty sure Miles Standup is a fake name.” He clicks twice on the profile picture: a newborn infant.

“Why have I seen that photo before…?”

“Because it’s the same picture of Davis Bauer that people were holding up outside the courthouse before the arraignment. I checked the news footage. I think that’s Turk Bauer’s account.”

“The Internet is a beautiful thing.” I look at Howard with pride. “Well done.”

He looks at me, hopeful, over the white lip of the paper carton. “So we’re finished for the night?”

“Oh, Howard.” I laugh. “We’ve only just begun.”

–

ODETTE AND I meet the next morning at a diner to cross-check the survey numbers of the potential jurors that we each want to decline. In the rare occasion when our numbers match (the twenty-five-year-old who just got out of a psychiatric hospital; the man who was arrested last week) we agree to let them go.

I don’t know Odette very well. She is tough, no-nonsense. At legal conferences, when everyone else is getting drunk and doing karaoke, she is the one sitting in the corner drinking club soda with lime and filing away memories she can use to exploit us later. I’ve always thought of her as an uptight piece of work. But now I’m wondering: when she goes shopping, is she, like Ruth, asked to show her receipts before exiting the store? Does she mutely hand them over? Or does she ever snap and say she is the one who puts shoplifters on trial?

So, in an attempt to offer an olive branch, I smile at her. “It’s going to be quite a trial, huh?”