Vernon God Little

'I can't speak for the defense, but I'll keep it brief,' says the prosecutor. 'Just tell us, please – if you could characterize the defendant in a word, what would it be?'

'Psychopath.'

'Objection!' shouts Brian.

'Sustained – the jury will ignore both question and answer.' The judge rotates a hard eye to the prosecutor. 'And Counsel will remember a young man could well be executed as a result of these proceedings.'

The prosecutor gestures to the jury like his hands are being tied, but the judge quickly scowls him out of it. He skulks back to Lally. 'Perhaps you'll tell the court, Mr Ledesma – did the defendant say anything to you, privately, about the school tragedy?'

Lally draws his lips tight, the way your best buddy does when he has to tell his mom you ate the last cookie. 'Not as such,' he says.

'Did anything he do suggest his involvement?'

Lally takes a deep breath. He looks at me with black, swollen eyes, and shakes his head. 'He talked in his sleep some nights.' His bottom lip starts to bounce. 'Growled in his sleep, more like it -"Boom," he would say. "Take that – booom…"' A sob breaks free from his throat. Deathly hush spreads over the world.

The prosecutor bows his head, and waits a respectful moment. Then he says, 'I'm sorry to put you through this…'

Lally raises a trembling hand, cuts him short. 'Anything to bring peace upon those wretched souls.'

Sniffles break out in court. There ain't a trace of hoosh about the prosecutor anymore, not within a hundred miles of him. After eight centuries, he just asks, 'Did you also see the defendant kill Officer Barry Gurie?'

'From the ground where I lay, injured, I saw the defendant run towards Officer Gurie. I heard a scuffle, then three shots…'

The prosecutor nods, then turns to my attorney. 'Your witness.'

Brian straightens his tie, and steps up to the box. Silence crunches like lizard bones.

'Mr Ledesma – how long have you been a TV journalist?'

'Almost fifteen years now.'

'Practicing where?'

' New York mostly, and Chicago.'

'Not Nacogdoches?'

Lally frowns. 'No-ho,' he hooshes a little powerdime-booster.

'Ever visit?'

'No-ho.'

Brian shoots him a knowing smile. 'Ever told a lie, Mr Ledesma?'

'Tch…'

'Yes or no.'

'No-h-ho.'

My attorney nods and turns to the jury. He holds up a calling card. 'Ladies and gentlemen, I am about to show the witness a calling card. It reads, "Eulalio Ledesma Gutierrez, President & Service Technician-In-Chief, Care Media Nacogdoches."' He glides it through the air to Lally's face. 'Mr Ledesma – is this your business card?'

'Oh p-lease,' hooshes Lally. He's like an ole-fashion train all of a sudden.

Brian gives him his hardest stare. 'A witness will testify that you presented this card as your own. I ask again – is this your card?'

'I said no.'

'Your honor, if I may be allowed to append a witness to this examination, for the purpose of identification…?'

'Go ahead,' says the judge.

My attorney nods to the back of the court. The double doors creak open, and two orderlies guide a little ole Mexican lady into the room. Brian waits until she's tottering at the top of the stairs, then he closes in on Lally.

'Mr Ledesma – is this your mother?'

'Don't be ridiculous,' growls Lally.

'Lally! My Lalo!' cries the lady. She breaks free of the orderlies, but her foot catches a railing in the aisle, and she tumbles to the ground. The judge rises out of his seat, frowning as the lady is helped to her feet. She bawls, and tries to pinpoint Lally's voice. He stays quiet. His cheeks pucker double-time.

Brian lets the hush return before calling to the ole lady. 'Mrs Gutierrez, please tell the court – is this your son?'

'It's him.'

She pulls her helpers down the aisle, then her foot misses another step, and she dangles suspended in their arms. The judge pulls back his lips like he just stepped on a spleen. He squints at the ole woman, then shakes his head.

'Ma'am – can you point to your son?'

Breathing is canceled across the world. 'Lalo?' she calls. 'Eu-lalio?' He doesn't answer. Just then, one of the attorneys folds his arms, and at that nano-rustle of his sleeves, the ole woman flinches and points to the prosecutor. 'Lally!'

The prosecutor throws out his arms in despair. The judge's eyes fall to my attorney. 'Time out – am I to understand this witness is visually impaired?'

'Every woman knows her child's voice, your honor.'

'Lalo?' sniffs the woman, now reaching for the stainographer.

The judge sighs. 'Just how in God's name did you figure to get a positive identification?'

'Your honor,' starts Brian, but the judge slams down his glasses and spreads his hands wide.

'Counsel – the good lady can't see.'

A good night's sleep doesn't happen for me tonight. I twist and buck with the horrors of Jesus, knowing I'm in a lottery to join him in the flesh. When I'm locked in my zoo cage next morning, everybody's attention hangs on me. Sure, Brian gets up and argues, says it's entrapment and all. But you get the feeling everybody kind of knows Lally's was the final nail. Subtle changes in the room tell you they know; the stainographer's head sits back an extra notch, for instance.

While all this happens I feel a vibe from Jesus. It says to cut my losses, forget about my family secrets – it says I've been loyal above and beyond the call of duty, I just have to let them find the gun. It says to tell them about the bowel movement I had outside school that day. I mean, shit must carry a lot of evidence about a guy. Probably you could clone whole other guys from it, then just ask them why they did it. One of my fingers touches the green button in the cage, feels its surface. Cameras whirr close. You just know crowds on the street, people in airports, folks in the comfort of their own smell at home, men in barber shops in Japan, kids skipping classes in Italy, are tuned in, holding their damn breath. You sense a billion cumulative hours of human life just got shortened by raging blood-pressure. Power, boy. I purse my lips, and trace a gentle line around the buzzer, toying with it, pretending to have hefty options. The sudden hush in the room makes Brian spin around. When he sees my hand over the buzzer he scrambles my way, but the judge hisses behind him.

'Leave him be!'

I don't hit the buzzer to change my story. I hit it because my story ain't getting told. I get an enlightenment about the ten years it feels like I've been listening to this whole crowd of powerdime spinners, with their industry of carpet-fiber experts, and shrinks and all, who finish me off with their goddam blah, blah, blah. And you just know the State ain't flying any experts down for me. What I learned is you need that industry, big-time. Because, although you ain't allowed to say it, and I hope I ain't doing The Devil's Work by saying it myself – Reasonable Doubt just don't apply anymore. Not in practice, don't try and tell me it does. Maybe if your cat bit the neighbor's hamster, like with Judge Judy or something. But once they ship in extra patrol cars, and build a zoo cage in court, forget it. You have to come up with simple, honest-to-goodness proof of innocence, that anybody can tell just by watching TV. Otherwise they hammer through nine centuries of technical evidence, like a millennium of back-to-back math classes, and it's up in there that they wipe out Reasonable Doubt.

With nothing to really lose, I hit the buzzer. It makes a sound like a xylophone dropped from an airplane, and I'm suddenly blinded by a firestorm of camera flashes. The last thing I see is Brian Dennehy's mouth drop open.

'Judge,' I say.

'Shhh!' chokes Brian.

'Go ahead, son,' says the judge. 'Shall we activate the recant procedure?'