The Trial

The prison guard was an angry man, never smiling and rarely talking. He had been there for as long as Lucas could remember. Resentful and bitter he walked the corridors, giving the impression that at some point, something absolutely terrible was to happen to him. Lucas did not share his enraged aura, but he sure had the same outlook on what was to come. Whatever awaited him outside of these prison walls, Lucas was certain that it was nothing good.

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The same room had been his home since childhood. The bare walls had a gray-greenish color, the cracks gradually mending with time as the world slowly moved from disorder to order, from chaos to control. When he was a boy the window had been nothing but a gaping hole into the empty courtyard outside, and the wind had kept him up all night. Now, the glass covered almost all of the metal frame, leaving only a fine, glittering powder below, gathering strength and finding its purpose. So many years Lucas had spent staring into this ceiling, imagining the skies above it. Still, when the angry guard opened the door with a sharp “It’s time”, Lucas did not linger. The relief of leaving this place had been nesting in his stomach for months. 

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Lucas knew the path through the prison, but the moment they left the main gate and headed to the sparsely trafficked street outfront, he was on new territory. The air, ground, trees, everything seemed different here, as if color had suddenly been injected into the universe. Blinking, it took him many moments to even reflect on what was supposed to follow. He did not need much reflection, it turned out, as the guard, now joined by some of his colleagues in a hostile silence, quickly shoved him into the back of a parked van. Loudly, and without warning, Lucas kneeled on the metal floor and vomited. He could feel this evening’s cereal stroke his palette as it left. The guard gave him a look of disapproval as he wiped his mouth with his sleeve and shakingly sat up with his back against the wall.

“Motion sickness”, another guard snickered, “the boy has never been in a car before, has he?”

The door of the van slammed shut, and the engine started. 

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There were hundreds of journalists outside the courthouse and, surrounding them, a thick layer of wrath. The sound of angry voices traveled in murmuring waves towards him as he stepped out in the sun. Lucas suspected that this week’s paper had been filled with the most hideous descriptions of his persona, and he made his best effort to not make eye contact with anyone as he was escorted through the crowd. It was a strange experience, he thought, spending the very first moment basking in the light of the real world, surrounded by nothing but a yelling mob. Further, he guessed that he was to live without his medicine now. The pills that the guards served him every morning were to stop coming. He had never known exactly what those drugs did, but as the colors and sounds of the horde around him exploded in his mind, creating thousands of blinking stars shooting across his open eyes, he thought that life was likely to be much more vibrant from now on. The sounds seemed sharper. Every sensation clearer. Lucas and his entourage struggled up the stairs. Inside, the court building was brilliantly white, with a large skylight that illuminated the great entry hall. The moment the large doors closed behind them, muffling the sound from the outside, the guards stepped backwards and a new kind of custodian took their place.

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“Lucas, my name is Zaman and I am to be your lawyer throughout the day’s proceedings”

Zaman was tall, and serious looking. Lucas could not help thinking that he sounded as if he was here to offer an apology and bad excuses. Twenty four years had Lucas been locked away, and not once had he heard the name Zaman before.

“I have tried to contact you on numerous occasions through your time incarcerated”, Zaman said, “but it seemed to me and my colleagues that you preferred to have no correspondence”, he held the door open as they entered another great hall with white marble walls. Lucas felt a ray of hope glimmer faintly in his chest. Zaman continued, “I know it has been a long time behind bars for you, but you have shown great behavior throughout…”

“Will that matter?”, Lucas interrupted.

Zaman gave him a crooked, but sympathetic, smile.

“I doubt it”.

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With Zaman by his side, Lucas sat in the middle of the marble hall. In front of him was an open notebook and two feather pens. Their tips looked as if made by solid gold. Lucas wondered if he was expected to use them. He had practiced a lot of basic tasks in prison, but he was no writer. As the room around them filled with people, Zaman kept giving him reassuring looks, promising that it would all be over shortly. The six judges, all dressed in black with their dark blue caps covering the better part of their faces, were seated the moment the clock struck twelve. As soon as the last one of them had put down her briefcase on the table, the trial began.

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Lucas shivered. An echo flew through the room. Murder.

Murder.

“Murder”.

The judge farthest to the right had leaned forward and spoken.

“Ah!”, Zaman reacted quickly, collecting his papers and standing up “But who? That, my fellow citizens, is the question we are here to answer today”. He spoke in a calm and controlled manner, every now and then turning to the other side of the room to face the curious audience.

“Twenty four years is a long time”, Zaman stated while nodding seriously, “but is it long enough for us to consider the most heinous crimes?” 

It was almost eleven when he finished and the prosecutor took over. Lucas felt exhausted and drained, wanting nothing but to stand up and leave. The whispering of the onlookers made it difficult to focus, and the voices of the judges seemed distorted and slow. At some point, he was sure, someone was going to ask him a question, and he had very little to say to his defense. He felt like a scared animal clinging to the arm of Zaman, hoping that there was something this stranger could do or say to change what was about to happen.

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It was ten, and the crowd gasped.

“A child ”, the prosecutor said.

“Out of the question”, Zaman responded, “Look at him. He is nothing but a child himself”

The prosecutor’s desk was a few meters to the side, and Lucas, dizzy from the stress and the bright light, could not see her clearly. But he heard her voice, sharp and clear and bouncing from the marble in all directions. He followed it with his eyes, as the sound of her words echoed around him, traveling from wall to wall and merging with the whispering of the audience and the low rumbling from the street outside.

The crowd gasped again. Lucas could see a man close his hand over his mouth and shake his head.

“A child”, she repeated, “A boy from Houston. He is only twelve.”

The legs of a chair dragged along the floor. Steps. A halt. The prosecutor had stood up and made her way across the room. Lucas had always known that today was going to be filled with humiliation and bad news. Still, as he sat in this white room, with blue eyes watching from every direction, a sense of shock crawled up his spine. The disgust radiating from the seats around him had managed to seep through his skin, penetrating his belly and grabbing a hold of his innards. He felt it too. Disgusted.

“A child of twelve. A murder in Houston”, she said a third time, now looking directly at Lucas. The gray haired woman had a wrinkle over her eyes that made her seem troubled rather than fierce. Somewhere in her face Lucas could sense a hint of empathy. The prosecutor felt sorry for him. He swallowed the sense of surprise, having been worried that he had lost his voice in the chaotic scenes unfolding in his mind.

“Why?”, he demanded to know.

“Lunacy”, she responded softly. 

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Zaman had been correct, the trial was over quicker than it had begun. By the time the prosecutor had presented the gruesome details of the case and the audience had choked on their disgust enough times, morning was creeping up on them, and the proceedings came to an end.

Murder. A twelve year old boy.

“It could have been worse”, Zaman said while standing up and stroking his suit jacket, “Trust me, Lucas, it could have been a lot worse”.

Lucas was not sure he could stand. His voice was breaking as he asked:

“Worse than a dead child?”

Zaman attempted a smile, but it looked more like a grimace. Before he walked out he put his hand on Lucas' shoulder.

“We will stay in touch. We have things to plan and discuss”.

Lucas did not turn to look as Zaman left. Alone he sat by the desk in the middle of the room until the sky light made the walls glow in a purple morning hue. Only then a janitor approached him, with the same irritated expression once carried by a prison guard that Lucas was never to see again.

“You are free to go, son”, the janitor grunted, clearly annoyed by his presence, “How about you make use of that freedom and stop wasting space in my court?”

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Outside, the air was different again. Cold, early morning surrounded him and the silence had replaced the commotion from earlier. Whatever feelings that had been boiling outside the courthouse during the day had died down now. People had gone home. The journalists had finished. No one was there. For a brief moment, Lucas thought about the things that awaited. He would need to make friends, find his family, maybe even get a girlfriend. He sighed. He was not feeling particularly excited about any of it. Slowly, he started walking aimlessly down the empty street. He could get a nice home, maybe. A job. Life was long, and he needed to spend it somehow. He had always wanted to see the ocean, and he was sure there were people that worked and lived in places where you got to look at it every day. Maybe that would suit him. As he passed through the blocks, the houses changed in character. The impressive marble of the law was replaced by broken bricks and mud roads. This was a poor area. He could tell how the cracks in the facades were slowly healing, rubble from the street carefully moving towards the gates of people’s homes and gardens. Sadness and defeat hung in the air and embraced him as he walked. One day, he thought to himself, he would live in a neighborhood very different from this one.

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But first, there was something that needed to be done. He had spent twenty four years in prison, and time had come to pay for it. Whatever pills the guards had given him with his daily morning meal had left his system by now, and he felt a new strength entering his body. His mind was more awake than before, his hearing more attuned. He listened to the sound of his tongue moving against his teeth, enjoying the soft melody of saliva and bone. The noise seemed to come just as much from the inside of his head as from the actual physical world it belonged to. For a long time he stood still, biting his lips and licking the inside of his cheeks, enjoying the harmony it created. A rounded, silky clicking that slithered down the throat. Then he laughed to himself. No more stalling. He needed to get to Houston.