Nathan Hill - The Nix

“But now you’re considering blackmail. Is that fair to say? You are threatening me with blackmail. You are threatening a judge.”

“Wait. Hold on. Note that I said nothing of the sort. You are putting incriminating words in my mouth.”

“What would you tell the press? How would you explain what happened? I would love to hear your story.”

“Well, I guess I’d tell the truth? That you were having an affair with Alice, and Faye ruined it. And you’ve been waiting all these years to get your revenge. Which is why you took the case.”

“Uh-huh. Good luck proving that.”

“If I told everyone — and I’m not saying I will tell everyone, I’m saying if, this is a hypothetical, you understand — then you’d be embarrassed in public. You’d be tried and convicted in the press. You’d be taken off the case.”

Brown smiled and rolled his eyes. “Look, I am a Cook County circuit judge. I have brunch regularly with the mayor. I was the Chicago Bar Association Man of the Year. I don’t know who the fuck you are, but I’d guess from your shitty car that you’re nobody’s man of the year.”

“What’s your point?”

“If it’s my word against yours, I feel pretty comfortable with those odds.”

“But Faye didn’t do anything to you. She shouldn’t go to prison for something she didn’t do.”

“She ruined my life. She put me in this chair.”

“She never even knew who you were.”

“I warned Faye once — never let me catch you in Chicago. That’s what I told her. I’m a man of my word. And now you have the gall to come here and tell me what to do with her? Let me explain what’s going to happen. I’m going to do everything in my power to see she’s convicted of high crimes. And I’m going to see her hang.”

“That’s insane!”

“It would be best if you didn’t try to stop me.”

“Or else what?”

“You know the penalties for threatening a judge?”

“But I never threatened you!”

“That’s not what it’ll look like. From the point of view of that security camera on my porch, it’ll look like you hid in the trees— very suspicious — until I came out of my house, at which point you approached me in a threatening manner.”

“You have a security camera?”

“I have nine security cameras.”

And at that, the man walked to his car, got in, and turned the ignition. The car’s engine thrummed quietly. Then with an electric buzz, the driver’s window came down.

“Alice was right,” the man said. “You’re a psychopath.”

“Just stay out of my way.”

Then the car rolled off, and Brown watched as it reached the end of his street, turned, and zoomed lightlessly away.

FAYE SAT SLUMPED on her couch, watching television, her eyes glassy, her face expressionless. Behind her, Samuel paced the apartment, from the kitchen to the couch and back, watching her. She flipped channels, staying between one and five seconds on any given show. Commercials she jumped away from immediately. Any other program she gave roughly a single breath to impress her. Then flip. The small television sat on the mantel of the apartment’s inoperative fireplace. Samuel could swear the TV wasn’t there on his first visit.

Outside, the midmorning sun shone brightly off Lake Michigan. Through the open windows, Samuel could hear car horns, far off. The city’s usual weekday roar. To the west, he could see the traffic on the Dan Ryan Expressway moving at its usual viscous creep. He’d come here directly from his unfortunate encounter with Judge Brown. Samuel decided he needed to warn his mother, to tell her what he now knew about the judge. He had buzzed her apartment, and then buzzed again, and then again, and was about to start throwing rocks at Faye’s third-story windows when the front door finally clicked open. He came up and found his mother like this: quiet, distracted, a little befuddled.

Faye flipped to a reality show about a couple renovating their kitchen, which seemed to hold her attention.

“This is a show ostensibly about home improvement,” she said, “but really it’s about watching these two sweep away the ashes of their dead marriage.”

The show seemed to cut between clips of the couple’s inept DIY misadventures and interviews where they independently complained about the other. The husband — too eager with his sledgehammer — put a hole in a wall that he thought was slated for demolition but, turns out, wasn’t. Cut to clip of the wife complaining about how he never listens and is constitutionally unable to take directions. Cut to clip of the husband examining the damage he’s done to the wall and proclaiming with false authority: It’ll be fine, just calm down.

“These two hate each other so much,” Faye said. “They’re using their kitchen like America used Vietnam.”

“That TV you’re watching,” Samuel said, “it wasn’t here the first time I visited. I’m pretty sure of it.”

Faye didn’t respond. She stared blankly forward. For a full minute. During which she watched a clip of the husband kicking a panel of drywall, which broke and flew across the room, and even though it landed a full ten feet from his wife, she yelled at him as if she were in mortal peril: Hey? I’m standing here? Then Faye blinked and shook her head like someone waking from a trance and looked at him and said, “Huh?”

“You seem stoned,” Samuel said. “Are you high on something right now?”

She nodded. “I took some pills this morning.”

“What pills?”

“Propranolol for blood pressure. Benzodiazepine for excitability. Aspirin. Something else that was originally developed to prevent premature ejaculation in men but is now used for anxiety and insomnia.”

“You do that a lot?”

“Not a lot. You’d be amazed how many beneficial drugs were originally developed to treat sex problems in men. They practically drive the whole pharmaceutical industry. Thank god for male sexual dysfunction.”

“Any reason you needed all that this morning?”

“Simon called. You remember Simon. My lawyer?”

“I remember.”

“He had some news. Apparently the prosecution is expanding their case against me. They added a couple of new charges today. Domestic acts of terrorism. Making terrorist threats. That kind of thing.”

“You’re kidding.”

She picked up a notepad stuck between the couch cushions and read: “Acts dangerous to human life that cause fear, terror, or intimidation, or attempt to influence the policy of a government through intimidation and coercion.”

“That seems like a stretch.”

“Judge Brown convinced the prosecutor to add the new charges. I guess he came in this morning super enthusiastic about putting me in prison for the rest of my life.”

Samuel felt his insides sort of freeze. He knew exactly what spurred the judge’s new zealotry but could not at this moment bear to tell his mom about it.

“So I’m rattled today,” Faye said, “and anxious. Hence the pills.”

“I understand.”

“By the way? Simon tells me I should not be talking to you.”

“I personally question that guy’s legal aptitude, frankly.”

“He suspects your motives.”

“Well,” Samuel said, looking at his shoes. “Thanks for letting me in.”

“I’m surprised you wanted to see me. Especially after the last time you were here. Your meeting with Simon? That couldn’t have been pleasant. I’m sorry.”

Outside, Samuel could hear the squeals of a train coming to a halt, the doors shunting open, the ding-dong warning bell and the automated train voice saying, Doors closing. Samuel realized it was the first time she’d apologized to him for anything.