Christopher Hacker - The Morels

I told them about the lying game Will learned at school and had us play around the table during our Thanksgiving meal. I told them about the pranks Will boasted of once we’d gotten to know each other. The bumper prank, wherein while crouching he would slap the rear bumper of a car trying to parallel park and when the car stopped would lie prone in the street; the driver, horrified, would emerge from the car, and Will would jump up and run away. Or the overcoat prank, wherein Will would stand just beyond the edge of a restaurant’s street-facing window with an old overcoat, each sleeve stuffed with a heavy sweater, and toss the coat in a high steep arc so that it would plummet right down in front of horrified diners, looking for all the world like a falling body. I told them about our marathon session of prank calls, and the prank calls I heard later on the Morels’ own answering machine.

Benji wondered aloud why Will might prank call his own house but had to withdraw the question, as the prosecution objected on grounds the judged sustained. Benji asked, “Have you known Will to deceive on any other occasion?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Would you mind describing that occasion for the jury now?”

I looked down at Arthur, who looked steadily back, betraying nothing. I looked up to see Penelope watching me, too. Was she trying to communicate something to me with her eyes? If so, I couldn’t tell. Then I looked over at the jury box and told them what Will had confessed to me. As I was telling it, however, I sensed several members recoil. They did not want to believe me. They wanted to believe Will. They wanted to believe that Arthur was guilty. And who could blame them? If what I was saying were true, then this whole trial was, as Benji had put it, a farce. A morbid farce.

The prosecutor, when she rose to question me, helped the jurors out. She gave them every reason to suspect my testimony. I was a bully, intimidating an eleven-year-old boy. Further, I was making a documentary about the accused, which spoke of my financial interest in securing his freedom. I was currently living with the accused in his parents’ house. I was a longtime friend, had known the accused for fourteen years, which spoke of my emotional interest in securing his freedom. When she was done with me, the judge thanked me, and I stepped down on rubbery legs. On my way back to the witness room, I passed Doc, who gave me a wink.

When I returned, taking my seat next to Suriyaarachchi, Benji was at the defense table, scribbling on a yellow pad and whispering in Arthur’s ear. The judge called the court back to order, and the jury returned. The bailiff escorted Arthur to the witness box and closed him in. The clerk asked Arthur to raise his right hand and swear that the testimony he was about to give would be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and Arthur did. Benji asked the court’s indulgence to allow him to establish in unequivocal terms his feelings about his son. The judge allowed it, and so Benji asked him if he loved his son. Yes, Arthur said. Benji asked if he harbored any sexual feelings for the boy, if he’d ever sexually molested him, or if the book was a confession — and Arthur answered firmly no to these questions.

“Why then,” Benji asked, “would you write such a thing?”

Arthur seemed annoyed to have been asked the question. And, as he started answering, it became clear why — why Benji’s legal team didn’t want me explaining it and why I’d been puzzling over it this past month and a half: the answers just didn’t make any sense. If Arthur was able in his living room to conjure the rhetorical flair necessary to convince me, that advantage wasn’t available to him under the cold glare of the overhead fluorescents and the dozen perplexed-looking jurors in this room. Here, it sounded like the rantings of a crazy person.

When Arthur was done, Benji took a seat at the defense table and murmured that he had no further questions.

“Mr. Morel,” the prosecutor began, rising, “have you yourself ever been sexually molested?”

“Yes,” Arthur said. “Of course.”

The words hung in the air a moment like an epiphany. Yes, of course . I might be projecting a little when I report this, but there seemed to follow a kind of shocked silence in the courtroom. Even the prosecutor, who’d asked the question, seemed caught off guard by the answer. How was it that I never thought to ask? In Penelope’s hours of relentless interrogation, that I bore witness to, how was it that she not once had thought to ask? At Thanksgiving, why hadn’t the Wrights thought to ask? Had nobody asked? How could this be? The obviousness of his answer made it seem inconceivable. I craned to see Penelope’s face but couldn’t from where I was sitting.

Arthur went on. “In that place, it was inevitable. Except those I lived with wouldn’t have thought of it in such moralistic terms. Early sexual experience . What could be more natural? Man is a sexual being, after all. Children are sexual beings. Read Freud, he’ll tell you all about it.”

“By whom?” The prosecutor was suddenly motioning to an assistant, scrawling notes. “Who molested you?”

Arthur offered a dismissive wave. “Oh, I can’t remember. I’ve long ago stopped trying to figure it out. That mystery is locked away inside me somewhere, inaccessible. There were any number of candidates.”

“Your father?”

“No, not him. It wasn’t his — thing.”

“Your mother?”

“No. I told you I don’t remember.”

“Then who?”

Something registered in his face. He said again that he didn’t remember, but this time it was less convincing.

“Have you ever performed an act of child sexual abuse?”

“Yes,” Arthur said. Now it was Benji’s turn to begin scribbling furious notes, motioning to his assistant.

“Would you please describe the circumstances of this incident for the court?”

“Incidents,” Arthur said. “Plural.” He took a deep breath. And then another. “Okay,” he said. “At school. The only formal school I’d known thus far in my life. A music school, on Saturdays. In practice rooms, this was where. Sometimes bathrooms. Okay. My first was a boy my own age. Eight, maybe nine. More than touching. The use of mouths and hands and I — enjoyed — the acts, the acts I performed, we performed together. I wanted more, more touching with mouths and hands. I didn’t know him, he didn’t know me. This place was different from a weekday school. One didn’t know one’s cohort. I didn’t know his name. Where to look for him again. But I wanted — more.” He took another deep breath. Another. “Okay. I found another boy, same age. My same age. Another practice room. This boy, too, was — willing, a willing participant.” Deep breath. “Okay. I found many willing participants. It wasn’t difficult.” The prosecutor pressed Arthur to clarify, and he was forced to utter the words penis and anus , the words stimulation and penetration . “It was a virus, okay? I was spreading a virus throughout school. The virus of sexual knowledge. Learned at too young an age. I was set loose on the young boys at that school. It’s such a — such a shameful business. Oh, God! Eight, nine, ten. Okay? I was there eight years. Eight years, dozens and dozens of children. Boys, I should say. Only boys. Girls were not the same. It wasn’t that I didn’t desire them. They were just — so much more complicated. They required talking to. A code I didn’t understand. Boys were always at the ready. Curious. Willing to perform.”

“When did you stop,” the prosecutor asked, “molesting other children?”

“Once I began to learn the language of girls. Sixteen. High school. Once I moved in with my brother.”