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In the Center of a Storm
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Bea listened. She hadn’t spoken to him since the summer. Her neck was sore; she always seemed to crook it when she was on the phone. And her fingers were sore. They were sore before she even picked up the phone. It probably wasn’t arthritis, just too much computer work.
It was also difficult for her to hear about Bill’s pain. She usually detached such primitive feelings by taking such calls on the speaker phone. But she didn’t know Larry well enough. She feared he’d be insulted.
“How soon do you think there’ll be a resolution of all of this?” Larry asked.
Bea believed he wanted to feel comfortable with the legal process. “Well, up to now, we’ve purposely stalled on the criminal front until the divorce was resolved. To keep the assistant DA cooperating with us, we gave him everything that was favorable to Bill: medical records, DeSegonzac’s stuff, transcripts of testimony, Goldblatt’s findings. All as a disincentive to rush ahead.” She stopped to put a cigarette in her mouth. Maybe I don’t need to light it. Just keep it in there. “Sorry,” she said, “I’m struggling with a dirty habit called smoking.”
She could feel the end getting wet. “Anyway, it worked. The assistant DA was even going to give me a copy of the records from Denise’s therapist, Ruth Stanton. I’ve been trying to get those ever since I heard of her.” She lit up. The stress wasn’t helping. “God, I’ve got to quit. Can’t. Been trying, though,” she struggled to say as she exhaled.
“But around Thanksgiving, Demos—he was the assistant DA—left the DA’s office to go into private practice and Arline Fogarty, a member of TKO’s—the DA’s—sex-abuse team, took over the case. I’ve heard she’s a real witch.”
“Have you met her?” Larry asked.
“No, but we tried. Bill and I walked over to the DA’s office to introduce ourselves. She was there, but she wouldn’t come out, and we were denied access to TKO himself.
“We then walked over to the newspaper to get some lowdown on TKO. A reporter told us the paper had been trying to get rid of him for years because he wouldn’t let go of a case, even when he knew it was a weak one.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Because TKO knew he could always count on getting at least a plea to a lesser charge. It gave him a wonderful conviction rate for re-election.” She took a puff and coughed.
“We were bummed out. We’d been hoping that Demos—actually the DA—would dismiss the charges on the basis of Goldblatt’s report. But, obviously, Demos’ recommendation to dismiss the case has been shunted aside. So all the warm and fuzzy stuff we had with Demos went to waste. So nothing will be settled on the criminal side by Christmas. That must be what’s upsetting him. What can I tell you?”
“Well, the holiday is a major concern for him,” said Larry.
“I know. All too well, unfortunately, but the most I can probably get him for Christmas is a time slot for visiting with the child.”
“Well, what’s happening with the divorce? He told me about the findings. He was really up about something finally happening in his favor.”
“Sure, why not? It cost him a bloody fortune—for me, psych testing, the experts to sit and listen and testify at trial—but it paid off. We got terrific findings. When Judge Fessenden reviewed Goldblatt’s findings, he tried to force a settlement: give Denise custody and Bill unsupervised visits. ‘Let’s restore normality to this family,’ Fessenden said.
“Bill would have agreed in a heartbeat, but Denise was against unsupervised visits and her lawyer kept on yelling that the criminal case was still pending, which was true.
“So Fessenden sent the case back to Goldblatt to make definitive findings on the custody and assets issues. I was delighted because criminal case or not, Goldblatt didn’t believe abuse or rape of the child had occurred. But on the other hand, let’s face it, I knew Goldblatt had to deal with reality, that a rape-of-child charge was pending.
“The end result was that Goldblatt agreed to put a hold on the custody issue—the property issue too—until after the criminal case was resolved.
“I think he really doesn’t want to give permanent custody to Denise. In the meantime, though, he wants to begin resolving the visitation issues: where, when, how often, supervised or not supervised.
“Goldblatt said he’d appoint a psychologist—if Denise’s lawyer and I can’t agree on one—to observe Chloe and Bill together. The psychologist’s to do a further evaluation and come up with a way the visits could change from supervised into unsupervised ones.”
Larry said, “Bill called me about that last week. He found a guy from Tufts who’s done evals for custody cases involving sex abuse.”
“Right. But what we don’t know is whether Denise will find him acceptable. Therein lies the hang-up. Is the woman sick or just malicious? That’s the question.” Bea relit her cigarette.
“How long will Goldblatt wait to hear from the other side?”
“Don’t know,” she said.
“No wonder he says he’s on an emotional roller coaster, a never-ending one.”
“Oh, he’s right. The accusation has taken on a life of its own.”
“Well, at least he’s seeing the child.”
“I really don’t ask him much about that. I usually just ask whether he’s seen her, but almost never ask the details because there’s not much I can do about them anyway. But at some point—depending how far off the criminal trial is—I’m going to have to know what to expect from the child.”
“Well, I ask.”
Bea laughed, “Thank goodness he has you.” She took one more puff and crushed the cigarette in the ashtray. “What has he told you?”
“Oh, apparently his relationship with Chloe has been improving. She’s affectionate. He keeps on saying ‘Wonderful! Wonderful.’”
“Well, the pressure is off her now... for a while. The first trial is at least over and the next one isn’t yet in sight.”
“I see it that way too. But talking about her never fails to bring on a bout of tears, even when he’s happy. He’s just so wound up. The other night, he told me how they sing and dance together. ‘It’s fun,’ he said. But he kept on crying... even while he was telling me how nice the visit was.
“His perception, though, is they’re easier for him now that he’s seeing her at the Center instead of home. He says the people are okay, friendly. They don’t intrude. And he doesn’t have to deal with Denise. They have two hours outside, not in a room.
“He says he also feels less guilty now that his father doesn’t have to go with him. It was hard for his dad just to sit there and not do or say anything while they were in the house because Denise didn’t want him there.”
“How’s his mother?”
“She’s home now with a nurse. And she no longer has to use a walker. Apparently, she’s less anxious and more responsive than she was. The meds are better, Bill said. And his father’s going to a support group at the hospital.”
“What was the mother’s diagnosis?”
“She had a water-intoxication problem in the past. She’s not allowed to drink water.”
“Sonofagun. Never heard of such a thing.” Bea resisted the impulse to light up again. “Is he still seeing his girlfriend?”
“Kate? Yes. They were off for a few weeks. She’s been reluctant to return the ‘I love yous,’ etcetera.
They’ve talked about intimacy, which he says is nice, but it’s scary for them. They don’t know what’ll happen to them if the criminal case doesn’t get dismissed or if he’s found guilty.”
“It’s got to be rough. They’re all in the center of a storm: Bill, Chloe, Kate.”
“I’ll leave you with the thought he left me with the other night: ‘But not everything is on hold. I got my black belt.’”
One More Unethical SOB
Bea was shocked. While discussing the selection of a psychologist, Bea learned from Aguilar that Dr. Frechette had written a report. Not only had Aguilar not acknowledged during the divorce trial that Frechette had been appointed as a replacement guardian ad litem after Maryellen Murphy had been removed, but Frechette himself had not contacted Bea or Bill despite Bea’s attempts to contact him and his professional obligation to interview Bill.
Still one more close-minded unprofessional professional. Because of the rejuvenated criminal case, Bea wrote Aguilar for a copy.
He refused, saying it would violate the attorney-client privilege. Bea was outraged. Frechette wasn’t an attorney. His report should’ve been available to both parties. If it was available only to one, it was not unbiased.
Unethical SOBs, both of them: Aguilar and Frechette.
Then Aguilar had the nerve to consider Frechette as a possible psychologist: “I suggest that we go with an independent psychiatrist or psychologist appointed by Judge Goldblatt or with Dr. Frechette.
I believe if you research the doctor’s credentials, you will find he is excellent, fair, and very independent.”
Bea had never before used the swear words going through her head when she read that.
Meet a Piranha
After the New Year, Bea received a return call from Demos’s replacement, Arline Fogarty, who was trying to get a copy of Chloe’s testimony in the divorce case.
“I don’t have a copy,” Bea told her. “Goldblatt said he was going to seal it. I’d have loved a copy of it myself.”
“Well, I’ll call the judge then,” Fogarty said abruptly and hung up.
Where does she get off calling the judge? Bea thought. This is a pending case. How dare she!
A little while later, Bea called Fogarty.
“Yes, I spoke to the judge,” Fogarty said. “He said he’d be dropping the transcript off at the court today.”
Bea exercised control. She didn’t want to jeopardize any prospects for dismissal of the charges. She couldn’t win anything by confronting her now about contacting the judge while the case was still pending. Feel her out, Bea.
Fogarty talked about her options of going for a direct indictment with Bill’s presence before the Grand Jury, cooperating with a probable cause hearing, reducing the charge from Rape of Child to Indecent Assault and Battery, and the last but most unlikely one, dismissing the case. All but the last, of course, would ruin Bill’s career. End of life. Loss of Kate... in addition to Chloe. It didn’t look good. Fogarty was no Democrates Eleutheria. She wasn’t a bitch. She was a piranha.
Is the Stain Getting to Me Too?
Larry said, “Bill’s been depressed since January. Says the whole system is a stone wall.”
“He’s reacting to the new assistant DA, Fogarty. I told you about her a few months ago, didn’t I?”
“Yes, you did.”
“Well, she’s unwilling to dismiss the charges.”
“That’s it. He says he feels totally helpless.”
“He is,” Bea muttered. “At this stage, we’re at her mercy. We’re sitting and waiting.”
“He’s dealing with a lot of anger. He feels Denise is pushing the criminal case because she’s worried about custody... and she gave Chloe his wedding ring to give to him.”
“Yes, he told me she did. Can you believe using the child like that? Did he tell you how it all came about?”
“He did,” Larry said. “He got it with a letter from Chloe.”
“M’god. Did you see the letter?”
“No, he just told me about it. He said she wrote, ‘I miss you. I wanted you to have your ring.’ He was surprised, first by the letter because it’s rare for Chloe to write him. He asked her whether she thought of sending it to him all by herself, and she said she did. But when he asked her whether her mother knew about what she was going to do, the child said Mommy knew about it.”
“Imagine that,” Bea exclaimed. “Even if the child found the ring, you’d think Denise’d tell the child Mommy would take care of it and return it to Daddy.”
“Right,” Larry said. “Where are you going to go from here? Bill told me Denise didn’t approve of still another psychologist because he was a male. Looks like he’ll have to find a woman.”
“Crazy, isn’t it? She’s an anachronism.”
“Well, is there any way the judge can help getting through the logjam?”
“He says he will,” Bea replied, “but he has to find a psychologist Denise can also afford. The judge said the two of them are to share the expense to ensure that whoever it is will not be biased in favor of one over the other. So Bill can’t expedite the process by paying Denise’s share. And she’s not going out of her way to come up with the money quickly. Frankly, I think she’s just pretending she doesn’t have it. So I’m stuck with doing a cost-benefit analysis: Is it worth going into court to subpoena bank records et cetera or just wait a while longer? I’m so sensitive to his costs. And I’m equally as sensitive to the amount of free time I can give him.
“Not to change the subject, but how’s his relationship with Kate?” Actually, Bea knew how it was going. She just wanted to change the subject.
“Good,” Larry replied. “She’s still around. He says they’re closer than ever and quite happy, apart from all of this.”
Bill had told Bea that Kate and her sister held a party on Christmas Eve. He had been looking forward to giving Kate a ring. On Christmas day, he and Kate and his sister went over to his parents’ house. Later on, he and his father delivered presents to Chloe. He brought her a new keyboard. He said being there was strange, though. Chloe apparently seemed happy to see them, but Denise didn’t talk to them directly for the entire two hours they were there.
“Anything new emotionally?” Bea asked. “He’s such an emotional cipher to me.”
“He says he’s changed. He looks back and realizes how isolated he was at the end of marriage. He was down, he said. He didn’t care how he looked. But all that’s changed now with Kate. His communication with people is better. He lets people get closer now. Even before marriage, he was more defensive. All this legal stuff forced him to communicate. He said it’s a nice feeling to connect with people. With karate he connects.”
When the call was over, Bea went to get some more coffee. She was glad she hadn’t known about the earlier communication problem—if that’s what it was—when she put DeSegonzac on the stand. As soon as she thought that, she asked herself: Is the stain getting to me, too? Is that what I am reacting to?
As soon as she got back to her chair, she lit up again. Got to get out of this business!
Professor ‘iggins
“I could have told Dawn Prakash her professor was playing Henry Higgins to Eliza Doolittle, where he was helping her rise in life,” Lester Thurow, the balding, lanky, world-renown dean of the prestigious Sloan graduate business school, admitted to Bea at his deposition. Admiring his forthrightness, she forgave him his earlier pomposity. “He supposedly persuaded Dawn to go to either law school or graduate school and was helping her improve her position in the world.”
As the dean was leaving the deposition, Bea congratulated him on being selected by a presidential candidate for appointment to a Cabinet post. He thanked her.
Dawn Prakash was suing not only her former boss for sexual harassment, but also the institute for not putting a stop to the harassment and for not punishing the professor in some way.
And at trial, looking straight at a jury of fourteen men and women (including two alternate jurors), Thurow, again without hesitation, admitted it.
In her closing statement to the jury, Bea explained that Professor Higgins was an aristocratic Englishman who’d made a bet with his friend he could transform a Covent Garden flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, into a woman of breeding whom everyone at a Royal ball would think was one of them.
After he won the bet, he cast Eliza from his mind, never considering the likelihood she couldn’t go back to being a street person again, a flower girl at the Garden.
Like Professor ‘iggins, the MIT professor didn’t care what happened to Dawn after she complained about his persistent pursuit of her lips. He fired her and broke his contract with her to provide him consulting services and to write a book with him. He didn’t care that she wouldn’t be able to afford graduate school. Prior to her refusing his advances, she hadn’t needed student loans or scholarships.
After Bea gave what she’d been told was an eloquent closing and the judge, Servantnick, refused to even use the words “sexual harassment” in the instructions to the jury, Bea wondered whether a fix was in. Servantnick, a perky bombette rumored to be on her third husband, had been plucked out of a major insurance-defense law firm for her recent judicial appointment by a governor who happened to be in the same party as the president and the dean.
With those important words missing from the jury instructions, the jury could return a verdict in favor of Dawn. Scandal would be averted. But the dean would leave the institute and would not get the expected post in Clinton’s Cabinet.
Go, Bea, Go
Finished with Dawn’s trial, Bea tried to elicit the help of an old friend to intercede with TKO.
“Hi, Ellen, Bea here. Long time no speak.”
After the reciprocal small talk, Bea asked, “Ellen, how well did you get to know TKO O’Shaughnessy?
“I didn’t.”
“But you worked with him for years.”
“Wrong DA. I was assistant to the DA in office prior to TKO’s election. In charge of the unnatural acts unit.”
“Well, you must have met him.”
“Not really. The two DAs weren’t fond of each other.”
Something had to work. Bea scoured the court docket sheet to check whether the clerk recorded which of the parties, Bill or the Commonwealth, asked for a continuance. If she could show a year’s worth of continuances caused by the DA’s office or the court, Bea’d move for dismissal because of the failure to give Bill a trial within a year of being arraigned: “Lack of Speedy Trial” grounds.
The record wasn’t clear, though, and Bea decided to wait another month. One more month and any ambiguities would evaporate. Even then the motion would be a long shot.
But it was worth the try in front of Robert Culp’s judicial lookalike at District Court. A widower no less! She wouldn’t want to break one of her own commandments.
Rule 1: Never compete with the dead!When’s the last time you had one? A year ago? Go, Bea! Ravish Hugh! Go, Bea, go!
Rule 2: Never compete with a man for a man.
Rule 3: Never compete with another woman.
Rule 4: Never share him.
Rule 5: Bea, call a friend and take a long lunch. Chill out. Have a large Bloody Mary.
A Man and a Woman
Three strong Bloody Marys later, Bea was flying. She’d pulled out the Greek records she’d hidden from Hugh, danced the xasapiko and tsiftitelli from starboard to port and from salon to stern. With every heart-wrenching love tune, she crooned along with each vocalist.
Sounds from a nearby slip reminded her of clinking ice. “Make sure there’s ice for Hugh,” she sang, and then checked that the trays were full.
She returned the records to the multilayered wooden tool box she’d found at some yard sale, filled with paint tubes, camel hair brushes, linseed oil, and turpentine. She reached under her peasant skirt—her tutu—for her panties, slipped them off, and threw them into the box with other 45s.
Back in the galley, she mixed another Bloody Mary for courage. Hearing “The New Faces of ‘52,” she mimicked Eartha Kitt and Robert Clary and, a cappella, sang “Comme un p’tit coqu’licot, mon âme.”
“Wrong sex, wrong sex, Bea. You don’t want to watch a woman lying half-nude in a field of wheat.”
She loved the ballad: the delivery of the chanteur was perfection.
“Fiddler on the Roof” was playing when Hugh came aboard. Her eyes were closed as if in reverie, her head shaking, her widespread arms rocking in time to the energizing soulful music. She was attempting the exaggerated sidesteps Topol had made so famous when she heard spontaneous laughter.
Her eyes popped open, while her boobs shook proudly with inner sexual ferocity.
“Enjoying yourself, my dear?”
“Da-dee-da-da-dee-dee-dum.” The refrain rang out as she glided back to the galley, readied his drink, and handed it to him. If he switches to Bach, I’ll kill him, she thought. Tchaikovsky, I’ll let him get away with. She’d make an exception for Segovia, maybe Frenchmen, Eastern Europeans, other Russians. But she’d have to be dead before she’d listen to any German dirges, brooks, or waterfalls, or Gregorian chants. And no, absolutely no, Italian operatic tenors, or hip-fashionable music, only hip-groin music tonight.
Needing transition music, she quickly grabbed the Beatles “Love Me Do” and let it play while choosing records with abandon. She didn’t forget Bolero. Ravel was a must. Cajole him, Bea!
She mimed singing, “Love Me Do” and Hugh just grinned. While his libido was listening to the next verse, she returned to the galley and brought out the entire bottle of gin for him and the ice-filled ice bucket with tongs. She topped off his drink. She pulled off his shoes gently and rhythmically. Then his socks. Snuggled close to undo his belt, playfully, of course, and unzipped his fly and loosened his tie.
Looking a bit dubious, he kept on sipping.
She took his drink from his hand, put only a smidge more of gin and another cube into it, and placed it on the table. Then she pulled him down onto the carpet, lifted his head, brought the glass to his lips, and let him take a healthy swallow. She took the drink from him again, put it on the table, removed his cufflinks and put them on the table, then unbuttoned his shirt. As she removed it from him, she dared savor his flesh with her lips. She picked up his drink with one hand, raised his head with another, let him slug some down, and took the drink away.
She pulled off her shirt and touched his chest with her nipples, felt his pectorals, and then played with his nipples as if they were sax keys. She let their nipples brush each other as she kissed his hair, his forehead, his neck, all the while not bold enough to look into his eyes. She gave him another drink.
Hugh’s top brain didn’t seem to react. Nothing stirred. Only his lower brain’s joy stick did: it grew larger.
When she heard the beginning of “A Man and a Woman,” one of the best to-have-sex-by songs, she raised his buttocks and slid his suit pants off. She took a sip of his gin and cupped it in her tongue and kissed him. She tucked pillows under his head and shoulders, and hoping he’d watch her caress up and down each of his legs with her hands and her tongue. She wanted him to see her stroke and lick over the top of his thighs and groin, before she descended to the inside of his thigh just above the knee and switched to the inside of his other thigh.
“A Man and a Woman” played over and over and over again. It was mesmerizing. She teased the base of his organ from the south, caressed from the west, then from the east and the north. Her tongue, like Sisyphus’s rock, moved up on one side and down the other, and during each trip, the mountain grew higher. She lifted her peasant tutu and wrapped her labia around his organ, pressing tight to let her clit feel the warmth. Brushing her pleasure over his tip, she then put him inside, squeezing her sphincter muscles tight. Pulling off him, she brushed her pleasure again and pushed him inside again. She did so over and over, sucking him in deeper inside the vacuum created by her pulsating sphincters.
She fell forward, thrusting and withdrawing repeatedly. She finally turned around and, not wanting to offend him whose hands all the while remained by his side, swung her skirt between her buttocks and his face. It would be his choice if he lifted it.
Facing his feet, she rubbed her clit against his pleasure until she had no choice but to rub herself from back to front, pushing it back inside her. She straightened up, fingering her clit, and rode him until he came. She came, screaming and pulsating, and fell to the carpet, exhausted.
When she woke, she was alone in the salon. She grabbed a few crackers and some cheese. She poured the rest of the tomato juice into a glass, added some lemon juice and two cubes and retired to the stateroom. Hugh appeared to be asleep, but she could not be sure without light. Should she take a quick bath? No. If she did, she’d probably fall asleep and drown. She crawled into bed, leaned on her elbow long enough to take a few sips of juice, hugged her pillow, and thought, He never said no. She grinned and fell asleep.
Part 24 of this 41 part serial will post on Sunday, September 14th
