HARMONY

Part 51"Believe"

"All rise."

Claire studied the twelve men and women who held her brother's fate—the random collection of registered voters who couldn't come up with a good excuse to get out of jury duty. She tried to read them like Sophia would, looking into their faces to size them up. Sophia and I should totally sneak into the jurors' room and tell them what's up. She crossed her legs under her long skirt and wondered how she let Audra talk her into wearing it today. Her toenails looked so sadly grown up with the geranium red replacing toad green. Audra's warm hand squeezed Claire's.

The doctor's medical testimony droned on with discussion of skull fractures and blood clots. Claire watched which jurors took notes and which seemed to be counting ceiling tiles. She wanted to snap her fingers and say "Pay attention" like Ms. Snow would say to her and Sophia in AP Lit.

The D.A. showed photos of Bruce's crushed skull. He also used family pictures presenting Bruce as a high school scholar-athlete, loving brother and model son. Claire couldn't help but let out an exaggerated throat clear—met quickly with an eye dagger from her mom. Claire excused herself and stepped into the hall.

'Can u talk' she texted Sophia. A second later her phone rang.

"Oh, my, god, this is so horribly painful," Claire said as she paced the stark hallway. "We get it. Bruce is dead. Drew killed him with a fuckn' lamp to his stupid ass skull that, like, made some big ole thick blood clot so he's like all dead now—"

"Tell me you're not in the courtroom—"

"But my God that should take maaaybe two minutes not forty hours and the prick D.A. is totally trying to twist things to make the jury think Bruce is some super amazing guy when we know he's a total asshole and the crazy part is that Drew is really the amazing guy and even though he could be, like, a dick at times—"

"Girl, you knew it would go like this—"

"All the kid did was work his ass off so he could get into Stanford and be a doctor and like fix people and he shoulda never even been at that party but then he's there so he tries to like help the little retarded girl and now he's like in this stupid trial to go to jail for like, I don't know, like forever and it's so fucked up and when are you coming down here?" Claire sat a cement bench at the far end of the hall from the courtroom.

"I'm on way. Just stay outta that courtroom 'til I get there."

Claire bit her lip and nodded. She pulled her legs under her skirt and tried to like the red paint on her toes.

Michelle's pencil wove over the word drunk—darkening it on her yellow pad. It helped her to take notes during the trial. She watched every move Rosalia made in her questioning of the doctors. Rosalia focused on the amount of alcohol and marijuana in Bruce's system, but it wasn't clear to Michelle if the jury understood—Bruce was a violent, drunken heathen and Drew was just trying to help that poor girl.

She nudged Russ and pointed to the word with her pencil tip. Russ nodded, but didn't give the reaction Michelle needed. Michelle circled the word and fought the D.A.'s cross examination assaulting her—being drunk doesn't justify being murdered. The judge called for a ten minute recess. With painful precision, Michelle tried to time the exit so as to not meet with Bruce's family. Successfully passing through the doors, the uncomfortable family circle assembled with Russ debriefing the testimony.

Seeing her family, Claire walked down the corridor and entered the disjointed gathering. Facing Russ, Audra stood between Steve and Michelle. Claire aligned herself with her uncle as he fielded the questions.

"Rosalia's not trying to use Bruce's alcohol level as a justification for murder," Russ said. He jiggled the change in his suit pocket. "She's simply creating a narrative for the jury."