sofa, half asleep with his books unopened and watching junk on TV, reminded her of every man around the neighborhood whom she wanted nothing to do with. And yet she hadnât built up the heart to push Rob forward from this event the way Jackie was pushing herself forward. Usually, she simplydropped on the sofa next to him and watched whatever he was watching. Whenever she felt sorry for herself, she tried to think of Skeet, seven miles away, alone in a cell. Whenever she felt really sorry for herself, she thought of the Moore sisters.
Then she was in the school principalâs office, with Rob sitting hunched beside her, his blood still hot, muttering breathy little resignations to himself, âI donât care if they kick me out, that boyâs a fool.â
In the winter of first grade, Rob had had his first fistfight, on the front steps outside Oakdale Elementary. Fights werenât uncommon, and the faculty didnât treat them very seriously. But theyâd still called Jackie at work. To her chagrin, no one at the school asked for a disciplinary meeting. So Jackie demanded one herself, left work, and walked to Lincoln Avenue. Throughout the curt discussion that followed (she felt the administrators were humoring her so they could go home), she visualized the scene: two seven-year-old bodies in winter coats tumbling down the concrete steps into dirtied snowbanks, arms flailing and profanity in play, while fellow students and young male passersby from the surrounding neighborhood chanted encouragement (âCâmon, liâl man, kick his ass!â). They were two little boys pretending to be men.
On the walk home, after chewing him out, she thought to ask why heâd thrown the first punch. This wasnât an act of the boy she knew.
âHe called me a nerd,â her son informed her.
âYou keep going like this,â she said, âand youâve got nothing but disappointment coming to you . . .â She went on, but a part of her heart was pleased. Members of her family had been called a lot of things over the generations, but she was pretty sure ânerdâ had never been one.
Rob ultimately expressed the appropriate sentiments to project shame. She sensed that he, like the principal, was humoring her so that she would leave him alone, and then he could wait for his father to call from jail, so he could tell the man how heâd won the fight. The other boy had come away with a black eye. Rob had only a bruise on his shoulder from hitting the steps.
A fter his arrest , Skeet was assigned a public defender. Their initial meetings did not involve the events of August 8 at all but rather Skeetâs finances. The lawyer filed a plea of not guilty, but that was his only legal motion over the course of the fall; in January 1988, the public defenderâs office wrote Skeet in prison to say that they were denying him representation, due to his failure to prove indigency. They referred to the house he owned on Pierson Street, which according to âreliable real estate brokers in the areaâ had a value of between $70,000 and $110,000. The letter also cited a pending civil action, from a car accident Skeet had been in years earlier, in which he still had an expectation of financial recovery (the insurance claim for damages and lost work was $3,174). Skeet began appearing in court without representation, and the judge advised him that if he truly could not afford a lawyer, he could appeal the public defenderâs decision. This process took almost a year, a year of nearly cosmic miscommunications and misunderstandings between Skeet, the public defenderâs office, and the appellate courtâand a year in which the defendant remained lawyerless, his witnesses uninterviewed. The public defenderâs office accused Skeet of intentionally mailing the wrong forms and failing to read the case studies they had cited; Skeet accused them of misinformation and
Then she was in the school principalâs office, with Rob sitting hunched beside her, his blood still hot, muttering breathy little resignations to himself, âI donât care if they kick me out, that boyâs a fool.â
In the winter of first grade, Rob had had his first fistfight, on the front steps outside Oakdale Elementary. Fights werenât uncommon, and the faculty didnât treat them very seriously. But theyâd still called Jackie at work. To her chagrin, no one at the school asked for a disciplinary meeting. So Jackie demanded one herself, left work, and walked to Lincoln Avenue. Throughout the curt discussion that followed (she felt the administrators were humoring her so they could go home), she visualized the scene: two seven-year-old bodies in winter coats tumbling down the concrete steps into dirtied snowbanks, arms flailing and profanity in play, while fellow students and young male passersby from the surrounding neighborhood chanted encouragement (âCâmon, liâl man, kick his ass!â). They were two little boys pretending to be men.
On the walk home, after chewing him out, she thought to ask why heâd thrown the first punch. This wasnât an act of the boy she knew.
âHe called me a nerd,â her son informed her.
âYou keep going like this,â she said, âand youâve got nothing but disappointment coming to you . . .â She went on, but a part of her heart was pleased. Members of her family had been called a lot of things over the generations, but she was pretty sure ânerdâ had never been one.
Rob ultimately expressed the appropriate sentiments to project shame. She sensed that he, like the principal, was humoring her so that she would leave him alone, and then he could wait for his father to call from jail, so he could tell the man how heâd won the fight. The other boy had come away with a black eye. Rob had only a bruise on his shoulder from hitting the steps.
A fter his arrest , Skeet was assigned a public defender. Their initial meetings did not involve the events of August 8 at all but rather Skeetâs finances. The lawyer filed a plea of not guilty, but that was his only legal motion over the course of the fall; in January 1988, the public defenderâs office wrote Skeet in prison to say that they were denying him representation, due to his failure to prove indigency. They referred to the house he owned on Pierson Street, which according to âreliable real estate brokers in the areaâ had a value of between $70,000 and $110,000. The letter also cited a pending civil action, from a car accident Skeet had been in years earlier, in which he still had an expectation of financial recovery (the insurance claim for damages and lost work was $3,174). Skeet began appearing in court without representation, and the judge advised him that if he truly could not afford a lawyer, he could appeal the public defenderâs decision. This process took almost a year, a year of nearly cosmic miscommunications and misunderstandings between Skeet, the public defenderâs office, and the appellate courtâand a year in which the defendant remained lawyerless, his witnesses uninterviewed. The public defenderâs office accused Skeet of intentionally mailing the wrong forms and failing to read the case studies they had cited; Skeet accused them of misinformation and
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