Where the River Ends - Charles Martin [128]
Nervy stood up. The judge dropped the papers in front of him and folded his hands across his desk. “Nervy, I thought I told you I didn’t want to ever see you in my courtroom again.”
Nervy smiled. “I missed yo’ comp’ny, Yo’ Honuh.”
Judge Ferguson looked down at his desk, then back at the kid. “Looks like you’re still cooking in your backyard.”
Nervy shook his head. “No suh.” He pointed at the large man who’d flushed his head in the urinal. “He be.”
The judge frowned. “Then what’s that crap on your face.”
Nervy shrugged. “Skin cancer?”
“You’re trying to tell me that those leper-looking sores on your face were caused by the sun?” Nervy nodded enthusiastically.
The judge sat back. “And let me guess. You’re innocent.”
Nervy smiled. “Abso-frickin-one-hunrid-percen-lutely.”
“Is that your plea?”
He pointed at the big man. “He guilty. Not me. I was minding my own bit’ness. Watching TV. American Idol. Thinkin’ ’bout trying out, when—”
“Nervy, have you been to the city morgue lately?”
Urinal man to my left whispered beneath his breath in a voice that rivaled James Earl Jones, “No, but he keep dis up and he be going real soon.”
Nervy’s eyes grew wide. “Judge, um…Yo’ Honor, he be threatenin’ me.”
Judge Ferguson leaned across his bench. “It’s full of kids just like you. My patience has run out.” The judge rolled his eyes and turned to the bailiff. “Set a date, get him an attorney. Bail is set at twenty thousand.”
Nervy sat down, nodded his head and smirked. “He in a good mood.”
The bailiff said, “The court calls Stephen Doss Michaels.”
I stood.
Judge Ferguson looked at me, chewed on his lip then spit whatever it was off the end of his tongue and out across his bench. Nervy leaned forward. “He do that sometime when he be thinkin’.”
I tried to find my voice. “Yes, sir.”
He leaned back, his chair squeaking, and rocked a minute. “Looks like they finally caught up with you.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Must be hard to outrun the television. What with all the helicopters.” I made no response. He tapped himself in the chest. “I, like most every other person in this country, have been following your story. CNN. Fox. All the biggies.” He paused. “Where’d they catch you?”
Good question. “At the end, sir.”
“You being smart with me?”
I shook my head. “Sir?”
He frowned. “Do you understand the charges made against you?”
“I’m sorry, sir?”
“Do you understand why you’re standing in my courtroom on a beautiful Sunday morning while six-foot swells spill gently across North Jax Beach?”
Nervy nodded, legs bouncing. “Oh, he be pissed now.”
The judge reached behind him and clicked on an oscillating fan that circulated out across the room. I suppose it was his way of fending off the smell of us. Mr. Windsor Knot–no-shoe-wet-pants had started to hiccup. He gagged once and we all heard it coming. He leaned forward, hiccuped one last time and blew last night’s party all over the judge’s floor. The judge shook his head and motioned to one of the four officers sitting in the courtroom. While the man wiped his face with his tie, something he’d done repeatedly over the last few hours, the officer led him from the courtroom.
The fan blew gently, wafted the fragrance under my nose and carried me to the court reporter. She was maybe mid-fifties, her fingers tapping almost as fast as Nervy’s legs.
I stared at the reporter, but my mind sitting on a bench in Central Park and asking, What is the name of that perfume?
Judge Ferguson pounded his gavel, and raising his voice, said, “Excuse me, Mr. Michaels. Am I keeping you from something?” He sat back, eyes narrowing. “We’ll just wait until you’re ready.”
Nervy sat back and scooted away from me. “Oh, you don’ did it. He be really pissed now.”
The cuff on my left hand was tight, and my fingers tingled. My hand felt stiff from the caked blood. The edge of the cuff was rubbing off red flakes embedded in my wrist. I opened my hand and stared at the four busted blisters. He pounded his gavel again.
“I’m sorry,