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CHANGE
Of
HEART
A NOVEL
Jodi Picoult
ALSO BY JODl PICOU LT
Nineteen Minutes
The Tenth Circle
Vanishing Acts
My Sisters Keeper
Second Glance
Perfect Match
Salem Fal s
Plain Truth
Keeping Faith
The Pact
Mercy
Picture Perfect
Harvesting the Heart
Songs of the Humpback Whale
ATRIA BOOKS
NEW YORK LONDON TORONTO SYDNEY
A T R I A BOOKS
A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,
and incidents either are products of the authors
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to
actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is
entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2008 by Jodi Picoult
Al rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this
book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For
information address Atria Books Subsidiary Rights
Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY
10020
First Atria Books hardcover edition March 2008
ATRIA BOOKS and colophon are trademarks of
Simon & Schuster, Inc.
For information about special discounts for bulk purchases,
please contact Simon & Schuster Special Sales at 1-800-
456-6798 or business@simonandschuster.com.
Designed by Jaime Putorti
Manufactured in the United States of America 1 0 9 8 7 6 5
4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Picoult, Jodi, 1966-Change of heart: a novel / by Jodi
Picoult.1st Atria Books hardcover ed.
p. cm.
1. MurderersFiction. 2. Transplantation of organs,
tissues, etc.Fiction. 3.
RepentanceFiction. I. Title.
PS3566.I372C472008
813.54dc22 2007035721
ISBN-13: 978-0-7434-9674-2
ISBN-10: 0-7434-9674-4
With love, and too much admiration to fit on these pages To
my grandfather, Hal Friend, who has
always been brave enough to question what we believe…
And to my grandmother, Bess Friend,
who has never stopped believing in me.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Writing this book was its own form of miracle; its very hard
to write about religion responsibly, and that means taking
the time to find the right people to answer your questions.
For their time and their knowledge, I must thank Lori
Thompson, Rabbi Lina Zerbarini, Father Peter Duganscik,
Jon Saltzman, Katie Desmond, Claire Demarais, and
Pastor Ted Brayman. Marjorie Rose and Joan Col ison
were wil ing to theorize about religion whenever I brought it
up. Elaine Pagels is a bril iant author herself and one of the
smartest women Ive ever spoken withI chased her down
and begged her for a private tutorial on the Gnostic
Gospels, one of her academic specialties, and would hang
up the phone after each conversation with my mind buzzing
and a thousand more questions to exploresurely
something the Gnostics would have heartily endorsed.
Jennifer Sternick is stil the attorney Id want fighting for me,
no matter what, Chris Keating provides legal information for
me at blistering speed, and Chris Johnsons expertise on
the appeals process for death penalty cases was
invaluable.
Thanks to the medical team that didnt mind when I asked
how to kil someone, instead of how to save themamong
other things: Dr. Paul Kispert, Dr. Elizabeth Martin, Dr.
David Axelrod, Dr. Vijay Thadani, Dr. Jeffrey Parsonnet, Dr.
Mary Kay Wolfson, Barb Danson, James Belanger.
Jacquelyn Mitchard isnt a doc, but a wonderful writer who
gave me the nuts and bolts of LD kids.
And a special thank-you to Dr. Jenna Hirsch, who was so
generous with her knowledge of cardiac surgery.
Thanks to Sindy Buzzel , and Kurt Feuer, for their individual
expertise. Getting to death row was a significant chal enge.
My New Hampshire law enforcement contacts included
Police Chief Nick Giaccone, Captain Frank Moran, Kim
Lacasse, Unit Manager Tim Moquin, Lieutenant Chris
Shaw, and Jeff Lyons, PIO of the New Hampshire State
Prison. For finessing my trip to the Arizona State Prison
Florence, thanks to Sergeant Janice Mal aburn, Deputy
Warden Steve Gal, CO I Dwight Gaines, and Judy Frigo
(former warden). Thanks also to Rachel Gross and Dale
Baich. However, this book would not be what it was without
the prisoners who opened up to me both in person and via
mail: Robert Purtel , a former death row inmate; Samuel
Randolph, currently on death row in Pennsylvania; and
Robert Towery, currently on death row in Arizona.
Thanks to my dream team at Atria: Carolyn Reidy, Judith
Curr, David Brown, Daniel e Lynn, Mel ony Torres, Kathleen
Schmidt, Sarah Branham, Laura Stern, Gary Urda, Lisa
Keim, Christine Duplessis, and everyone else who has
worked so hard on my behalf. Thanks to Camil e McDuffie
who was so determined to make people stop asking
“Jodi Who?” and who exceeded my expectations beyond
my wildest dreams. To my favorite first reader, Jane
Picoult, who I was fortunate enough to get as a mom. To
Laura Gross, without whom Id be completely adrift. To
Emily Bestler, who is just so damn good at making me look
bril iant.
And of course, thanks to Kyle, Jake, Sammywho keep
me asking the questions that might make the world a better
placeand Tim, who makes it possible for me to do that. It
just doesnt get better than al of you, al of this.
Alice laughed. “Theres no use trying,” she said. “One cant
believe impossible things.”
“I dare say you havent had as much practice,” said the
Queen. “When I was your age I did it for half an hour a day.
Why sometimes Ive believed as many as six impossible
things before breakfast.”
Lewis Carrol , Through the Looking-Glass
CHANGE
of HEART
PROLOGUE: 1996
June
In the beginning, I believed in second chances. How else
could I account for the fact that years ago, right after the
accidentwhen the smoke cleared and the car had
stopped tumbling end over end to rest upside down in a
ditchI was stil alive; I could hear Elizabeth, my little girl,
crying? The police officer who had pul ed me out of the car
rode with me to the hospital to have my broken leg set, with
Elizabethcompletely unhurt, a miraclesitting on his lap
the whole time. Hed held my hand when I was taken to
identify my husband Jacks body. He came to the funeral.
He showed up at my door to personal y inform me when the
drunk driver who ran us off the road was arrested.
The policemans name was Kurt Nealon. Long after the trial
and the conviction, he kept coming around just to make
sure that Elizabeth and I were al right. He brought toys for
her birthday and Christmas. He fixed the clogged drain in
the upstairs bathroom.
He came over after he was off duty to mow the savannah
that had once been our lawn.
I had married Jack because he was the love of my life; I had
planned to be with him forever. But that was before the
definition of forever was changed by a man with a blood
alcohol level of .22.
I was surprised that Kurt seemed to understand that you
might never love someone as hard as you had the first time
youd fal en; I was even more surprised to learn that maybe
you could.
Five years later, when Kurt and I found out we were going to
have a baby, I almost regretted itthe same way you stand
beneath a perfect blue sky on the most glorious day of the
summer and admit to yourself that al moments from here
on in couldnt possibly measure up. Elizabeth had been two
when Jack died; Kurt was the only father shed ever known.
They had a connection so special it sometimes made me
feel I should turn away, that I was intruding.
If Elizabeth was the princess, then Kurt was her knight.
The imminent arrival of this little sister (how strange is it that
none of us ever imagined the new baby could be anything
but a girl?) energized Kurt and Elizabeth to fever pitch.
Elizabeth drew elaborate sketches of what the babys room
should look like.
Kurt hired a contractor to build the addition. But then the
builders mother had a stroke and he had to move
unexpectedly to Florida; none of the other crews had time
to fit our job into their schedules before the babys birth. We
had a hole in our wal and rain leaking through the attic
ceiling; mildew grew on the soles of our shoes.
When I was seven months pregnant, I came downstairs to
find Elizabeth playing in a pile of leaves that had blown past
the plastic sheeting into the living room. I was deciding
between crying and raking my carpet when the doorbel
rang.
He was holding a canvas rol that contained his tools,
something that never left his possession, like another man
might tote around his wal et. His hair brushed his shoulders
and was knotted.
His clothes were filthy and he smel ed of snowalthough it
wasnt the right season. Shay Bourne arrived, unexpected,
like a flyer from a summer carnival that blusters in on a
winter wind, making you wonder just where its been hiding
al this time.
He had trouble speakingthe words tangled, and he had
to stop and unravel them before he could say what he
needed to say.
“I want to … ” he began, and then started over: “Do you, is
there, because … ” The effort made a fine sweat break out
on his forehead.
“Is there anything I can do?” he final y managed, as
Elizabeth came running toward the front door.
You can leave, I thought. I started to close the door,
instinctively protecting my daughter. “I dont think so …”
Elizabeth slipped her hand into mine and blinked up at him.
“Theres a lot that needs to be fixed,” she said.
He got down to his knees then and spoke to my daughter
easilywords that had been ful of angles and edges for
him a minute before now flowed like a waterfal . “I can help,”
he replied.
Kurt was always saying people are never who you think
they are, that it was necessary to get a complete
background check on a person before you made any
promises. Id tel him he was being too suspicious, too
much the cop. After al , I had let Kurt himself into my life
simply because he had kind eyes and a good heart, and
even he couldnt argue with the results.
“Whats your name?” I asked.
“Shay. Shay Bourne.”
“Youre hired, Mr. Bourne,” I said, the beginning of the end.
S E V E N M O N T H S L A T ER
M I C HAEL
Shay Bourne was nothing like I expected.
I had prepared myself for a hulking brute of a man, one with
hammy fists and no neck and eyes narrowed into slits. This
was, after al , the crime of the centurya double murder
that had captured the attention of people from Nashua to
Dixvil e Notch; a crime that seemed al the worse because
of its victims: a little girl, and a police officer who happened
to be her stepfather. It was the kind of crime that made you
wonder if you were safe in your own house, if the people
you trusted could turn on you at any momentand maybe
because of this. New Hampshire prosecutors sought the
death penalty for the first time in fiftyeight years.
Given the media blitz, there was talk of whether twelve
jurors who hadnt formed a reaction to this crime could even
be found, but they managed to locate us. They unearthed
me in a study carrel at UNH, where I was writing a senior
honors thesis in mathematics. I hadnt had a decent meal in
a month, much less read a newspaperand so I was the
perfect candidate for Shay Bournes capital murder case.
The first time we filed out of our holding pena smal room
in the superior courthouse that would begin to feel as
familiar as my apartmentI thought maybe some bailiff had
let us into the wrong courtroom. This defendant was smal
and delicately proportionedthe kind of guy who grew up
being the punch line to high school jokes.
He wore a tweed jacket that swal owed him whole, and the
knot of his necktie squared away from him at the
perpendicular, as if it were being magnetical y repel ed. His
cuffed hands curled in his lap like smal animals; his hair
was shaved nearly to the skul . He stared down at his lap,
even when the judge spoke his name and it hissed through
the room like steam from a radiator.
The judge and the lawyers were taking care of
housekeeping details when the fly came in. I noticed this for
two reasons: in March, you dont see many flies in New
Hampshire, and I wondered how you went about swatting
one away from you when you were handcuffed and chained
at the waist. Shay Bourne stared at the insect when it
paused on the legal pad in front of him, and then in a jangle
of metal, he raised his bound hands and crashed them
down on the table to kil it.
Or so I thought, until he turned his palms upward, his fingers
opened one petal at a time, and the insect went zipping off
to bother someone else.
In that instant, he glanced at me, and I realized two things:
1. He was terrified.
2. He was approximately the same age that I was.
This double murderer, this monster, looked like the water
polo team captain who had sat next to me in an economics
seminar last semester. He resembled the deliveryman from
the pizza place that had a thin crust, the kind I liked. He
even reminded me of the boy Id seen walking in the snow
on my way to court, the one Id rol ed down my window for
and asked if he wanted a ride. In other words, he didnt look
the way I figured a kil er would look, if I ever ran across one.
He could have been any other kid in his twenties. He could
have been me.
Except for the fact that he was ten feet away, chained at the
wrists and ankles. And it was my job to decide whether or
not he deserved to live.
*
A month later, I could tel you that serving on a jury is nothing
like you see on TV. There was a lot of being paraded back
and forth between the courtroom and the jury room; there
was bad food from a local deli for lunch; there were lawyers
who liked to hear themselves talk, and trust me, the DAs
were never as hot as the girl on Law & Order: SVU.
Even after four weeks, coming into this courtroom felt like
landing in a foreign country without a guidebook … and yet,
I couldnt plead ignorant just because I was a tourist. I was
expected to speak the language fluently.
Part one of the trial was finished: we had convicted Bourne.
The prosecution presented a mountain of evidence proving
Kurt Nealon had been shot in the line of duty, attempting to
arrest Shay Bourne after hed found him with his
stepdaughter, her underwear in Bournes pocket. June
Nealon had come home from her OB appointment to find
her husband and daughter dead. The feeble argument
offered up by the defensethat Kurt had misunderstood a
verbal y paralyzed Bourne; that the gun had gone off by
accidentdidnt hold a candle to the overwhelming
evidence presented by the prosecution. Even worse.
Bourne never took the stand on his own behalfwhich
could have been because of his poor language skil s … or
because he was not only guilty as sin but such a wild card
that his own attorneys didnt trust him.
We were now nearly finished with part two of the trialthe
sentencing phaseor in other words, the part that
separated this trial from every other criminal murder trial for
the past half century in New Hampshire. Now that we knew
Bourne had committed the crime, did he deserve the death
penalty?
This part was a little like a Readers Digest condensed
version of the first one. The prosecution gave a recap of
evidence presented during the criminal trial; and then the
defense got a chance to garner sympathy for a murderer.
We learned that Bourne had been bounced around the
foster care system. That when he was sixteen, he set a fire
in his foster home and spent two years in a juvenile
detention facility.
He had untreated bipolar disorder, central auditory
processing disorder, an inability to deal with sensory
overload, and difficulties with reading, writing, and
language skil s.
We heard al this from witnesses, though. Once again. Shay
Bourne never took the stand to beg us for mercy.
Now, during closing arguments, I watched the prosecutor
smooth down his striped tie and walk forward. One big
difference between a regular trial and the sentencing phase
of a capital punishment trial is who gets the last word in
edgewise. I didnt know this myself, but Maureena real y
sweet older juror I was crushing on, in a wish-youwere-my-
grandma kind of waydidnt miss a single Law & Order
episode, and had practical y earned her JD via
Barcalounger as a result. In most trials, when it was time for
closing arguments, the prosecution spoke last… so that
whatever they said was stil buzzing in your head when you
went back to the jury room to deliberate. In a capital
punishment sentencing phase, though, the prosecution
went first, and then the defense got that final chance to
change your mind.
Because, after al , it real y was a matter of life or death.
He stopped in front of the jury box. “Its been fiftyeight years
in the history of the state of New Hampshire since a
member of my office has had to ask a jury to make a
decision as difficult and as serious as the one you twelve
citizens are going to have to make. This is not a decision
that any of us takes lightly, but it is a decision that the facts
in this case merit, and it is a decision that must be made in
order to do justice to the memories of Kurt Nealon and
Elizabeth Nealon, whose lives were taken in such a tragic
and despicable manner.”
He took a huge, eleven-by-fourteen photo of Elizabeth
Nealon and held it up right in front of me. Elizabeth had
been one of those little girls who seem to be made out of
something lighter than flesh, with their fil y legs and their
moonlight hair; the ones you think would float off the jungle
gym if not for the weight of their sneakers. But this photo
had been taken after she was shot. Blood splattered her
face and matted her hair; her eyes were stil wide open. Her
dress, hiked up when she had fal en, showed that she was
naked from the waist down. “Elizabeth Nealon wil never
learn how to do long division, or how to ride a horse, or do
a back handspring. Shel never go to sleepaway camp or
her junior prom or high school graduation. Shel never try
on her first pair of high heels or experience her first kiss.
Shel never bring a boy home to meet her mother; shel
never be walked down a wedding aisle by her stepfather;
shel never get to know her sister, Claire. She wil miss al
of these moments, and a thousand morenot because of a
tragedy like a car accident or childhood leukemiabut
because Shay Bourne made the decision that she didnt
deserve any of these things.”
He then took another photo out from behind Elizabeths and
held it up. Kurt Nealon had been shot in the stomach. His
blue uniform shirt was purpled with his blood, and
Elizabeths. During the trial wed heard that when the
paramedics reached him, he wouldnt let go of Elizabeth,
even as he was bleeding out. “Shay Bourne didnt stop at
ending Elizabeths life. He took Kurt Nealons life, as wel .
And he didnt just take away Claires father and Junes
husbandhe took away Officer Kurt Nealon of the Lynley
Police. He took away the coach of the Grafton County
championship Little League team. He took away the
founder of Bike Safety Day at Lynley Elementary School.
Shay Bourne took away a public servant who, at the time of
his death, was not just protecting his daughter… but
protecting a citizen, and a community. A community that
includes each and every one of you.”
The prosecutor placed the photos facedown on the table.
“Theres a reason that New Hampshire hasnt used the
death penalty for fiftyeight years, ladies and gentlemen.
Thats because, in spite of the many cases that come
through our doors, we hadnt seen one that merited that
sentence. However, by the same token, theres a reason
why the good people of this state have reserved the option
to use the death penalty … instead of overturning the
capital punishment statC
ute, as so many other states have done. And that reason is
sitting in this courtroom today.”
My gaze fol owed the prosecutors, coming to rest on Shay
Bourne.
“If any case in the past fiftyeight years has ever cried out for
the ultimate punishment to be imposed,” the attorney said,
“this is it.”
Col ege is a bubble. You enter it for four years and forget
there is a real world outside of your paper deadlines and
midterm exams and beerpong championships. You dont
read the newspaperyou read textbooks.
You dont watch the newsyou watch Letterman. But even
so, bits and snatches of the universe manage to leak in: a
mother who locked her children in a car and let it rol into a
lake to drown them; an estranged husband who shot his
wife in front of their kids; a serial rapist who kept a
teenager tied up in a basement for a month before he slit
her throat. The murders of Kurt and Elizabeth Nealon were
horrible, surebut were the others any less horrible?
Shay Bournes attorney stood up. “Youve found my client
guilty of two counts of capital murder, and hes not
contesting that. We accept your verdict; we respect your
verdict. At this point in time, however, the state is asking
you to wrap up this caseone that involves the death of
two peopleby taking the life of a third person.”
I felt a bead of sweat run down the val ey between my
shoulder blades.
“Youre not going to make anyone safer by kil ing Shay
Bourne.
Even if you decide not to execute him, hes not going
anywhere. Hel be serving two life sentences without
parole.” He put his hand on Bournes shoulder. “Youve
heard about Shay Bournes childhood.
Where was he supposed to learn what al the rest of you
had a chance to learn from your families? Where was he
supposed to learn right from wrong, good from bad? For
that matter, where was he even supposed to learn his
colors and his numbers? Who was supposed to read him
bedtime stories, like Elizabeth Nealons parents had?”
The attorney walked toward us. “Youve heard that Shay
Bourne has bipolar disorder, which was going untreated.
You heard that he suffers from learning disabilities, so
tasks that are simple for us become unbelievably frustrating
for him. Youve heard how hard it is for him to communicate
his thoughts. These al contributed to Shay making poor
choiceswhich you agreed with, beyond a reasonable
doubt.” He looked at each of us in turn. “Shay Bourne made
poor choices,” the attorney said. “But dont compound that
by making one of your own.”
June
It was up to the jury. Again.
Its a strange thing, putting justice in the hands of twelve
strangers.
I had spent most of the sentencing phase of the trial
watching their faces. There were a few mothers; I would
catch their eye and smile at them when I could. A few men
who looked like maybe theyd been in the military. And the
boy, the one who barely looked old enough to shave, much
less make the right decision.
I wanted to sit down with each and every one of them. I
wanted to show them the note Kurt had written me after our
first official date. I wanted them to touch the soft cotton cap
that Elizabeth had worn home from the hospital as a
newborn. I wanted to play them the answering machine
message that stil had their voices on it, the one I couldnt
bear to erase, even though it felt like I was being cut to
ribbons every time I heard it. I wanted to take them on a
field trip to see Elizabeths bedroom, with its Tinker Bel
night-light and dress-up clothes; I wanted them to bury their
faces in Kurts pil ow, breathe him in. I wanted them to live
my life, because that was the only way theyd real y know
what had been lost.
That night after the closing arguments, I nursed Claire in the
middle of the night and then fel asleep with her in my arms.
But I dreamed that she was upstairs, distant, and crying. I
climbed the stairs to the nursery, the one that stil smel ed of
virgin wood and drying paint, and opened the door. “Im
coming,” I said, and I crossed the threshold only to realize
that the room had never been built, that I had no baby, that I
was fal ing through the air.
M I CHAEL
Only certain people wind up on a jury for a trial like this.
Mothers who have kids to take care of, the accountants with
deadlines, doctors attending conferencesthey al get
excused. Whats left are retired folks, housewives, disabled
folks, and students like me, because none of us have to be
any particular place at any particular time.
Ted, our foreman, was an older man who reminded me of
my grandfather. Not in the way he looked or even the way
he spoke, but because of the gift he had of making us
measure up to a task. My grandfather had been like that,
tooyou wanted to be your best around him, not because
he demanded it, but because there was nothing like that
grin when you knew youd impressed him.
My grandfather was the reason Id been picked for this jury.
Even though I had no personal experience with murder, I
knew what it was like to lose someone you loved. You didnt
get past something like that, you got through itand for that
simple reason alone, I understood more about June Nealon
than she ever would have guessed. This past winter, four
years after my grandfathers death, someone had broken
into my dorm and stolen my computer, my bike, and the
only picture I had of my grandfather and me together.
The thief left behind the sterling silver frame, but when Id
reported the theft to the cops, it was the loss of that
photograph that hurt the most.
Ted waited for Maureen to reapply her lipstick, for Jack to
go to the bathroom, for everyone to take a moment for
themselves before we settled down to the task of acting as
a unified body. “Wel ,” he said, flat tening his hands on the
conference table. “I suppose we should just get down to
business.”
As it turned out, though, it was a lot easier to say that
someone deserved to die for what they did than it was to
take the responsibility to make that happen.
“Im just gonna come right out and say it.” Vy sighed. “I
real y have no idea what the judge told us we need to do.”
At the start of the testimony, the judge had given us nearly
an hours worth of verbal instructions. I figured thered be a
handout, too, but Id figured wrong. “I can explain it,” I said.
“Its kind of like a Chinese food menu. Theres a whole
checklist of things that make a crime punishable by death.
Basical y, we have to find one from column A, and one or
more from column B … for each of the murders to qualify
for the death penalty. If we check off one from column A, but
none from column B … then the court automatical y
sentences him to life without parole.”
“I dont understand whats in column A or B,” Maureen said.
“I never liked Chinese food,” Mark added.
I stood up in front of the white board and picked up a dry-
erase marker, COLUMN A, I wrote, PURPOSE. “The first
thing we have to decide is whether or not Bourne meant to
kil each victim.” I turned to everyone else. “I guess weve
pretty much answered that already by convicting him of
murder.”
COLUMN B. “Heres where it gets trickier. There are a
whole bunch of factors on this list.”
I began to read from the jumbled notes Id taken during the
judges instructions:
Defendant has already been convicted of murder once
before.
Defendant has been convicted of two or more different
offenses for which hes served imprisonment for more than
a yeara three-strikes rale.
Defendant has been convicted of two or more offenses
involving distribution of drugs.
In the middle of the capital murder, the defendant risked the
death of someone in addition to the victims.
The defendant committed the offense after planning and
premeditation.
The victim was vulnerable due to old age, youth, infirmity.
The defendant committed the offense in a particularly
heinous, cruel, or depraved manner that involved torture or
physical abuse to the victim.
The murder was committed for the purpose of avoiding
lawful arrest.
Ted stared at the board as I wrote down what I could
remember.
“So if we find one from column A, and one from column B,
we have to sentence him to death?”
“No,” I said. “Because theres also a column C.”
MITIGATING FACTORS. I wrote. “These are the reasons
the defense gave as excuses.”
Defendants capacity to appreciate what he was doing was
wrong, or il egal, was impaired.
Defendant was under unusual and substantial duress.
Defendant is punishable as an accomplice in the offense
which was committed by another.
Defendant was young, although not under the age of 18.
Defendant did not have a significant prior criminal record.
Defendant committed the offense under severe mental or
emotional disturbance.
Another defendant equal y culpable wil not be punished by
death.
Victim consented to the criminal conduct that resulted in
death.
Other factors in the defendants background mitigate
against the death sentence.
Underneath the columns, I wrote, in large red letters: (A +
B)-C = SENTENCE.
Marilyn threw up her hands. “I stopped helping my son with
math homework in sixth grade.”
“No, its easy,” I said. “We need to agree that Bourne
intended to kil each victim when he picked up that gun.
Thats column A. Then we need to see whether any other
aggravating factor fits from column B.
Like, the youth of the victimthat works for Elizabeth,
right?”
Around the table, people nodded.
“If weve got A and B, then we take into account the foster
care, the mental il ness, stuff like that. Its just simple math. If A + B is greater than al the things the defense said, we
sentence him to death. If A + B
is less than al the things the defense said, then we dont.” I
circled the equation. “We just need to see how things add
up.”
Put that way, it hardly had anything to do with us. It was just
plugging in variables and seeing what answer we got. Put
that way, it was a much easier task to perform.
1 : 1 2 P . M.
“Of course Bourne planned it,” Jack said. “He got a job with
them so that hed be near the girl. He picked this family on
purpose, and had access to the house.”
“Hed gone home for the day,” Jim said. “Why else would
he come back, if he didnt need to be there?”
“The tools,” Maureen answered. “He left them behind, and
they were his prized possessions. Remember what that
shrink said? Bourne stole them out of other peoples
garages, and didnt understand why that was wrong, since
he needed them, and they were pretty much just gathering
dust otherwise.”
“Maybe he left them behind on purpose,” Ted suggested. “If
they were real y so precious, wouldnt he have taken them
with him?”
There was a general assent. “Do we agree that there was
substantial planning involved?” Ted asked. “Lets see a
show of hands.”
Half the room, myself included, raised our hands. Another
few people slowly raised theirs, too. Maureen was the last,
but the minute she did, I circled that factor on the white
board.
“Thats two from column B,” Ted said.
“Speaking of which … Wheres lunch?” Jack asked. “Dont
they usual y bring it by now?”
Did he real y want to eat? What did you order off a deli
menu when you were in the process of deciding whether to
end a mans life?
Marilyn sighed. “I think we ought to talk about the fact that
this poor girl was found without her underpants on.”
“I dont think we can,” Maureen said. “Remember when we
were deliberating over the verdict, and we asked the judge
about Elizabeth being molested? He said then that since it
wasnt being charged, we couldnt use it to find him guilty. If
we couldnt bring it up then, how can we bring it up now?”
“This is different,” Vy said. “Hes already guilty.”
“The man was going to rape that little girl,” Marilyn said.
“That counts as cruel and heinous behavior to me.”
“You know, there wasnt any evidence that thats what was
happening,”
Mark said.
Marilyn raised an eyebrow. “Hel o?! The girl was found
without her panties. Seven-year-olds dont go running
around without their panties.
Plus, Bourne had the underwear in his pocket… what else
would he be doing with them?”
“Does it even matter? We already agree that Elizabeth was
young when she was kil ed. We dont need any more from
column B.” Maureen frowned. “I think Im confused.”
Alison, a doctors wife who hadnt said much during the
original deliberations, glanced at her. “When I get confused,
I think about that officer who testified, the one who said that
he heard the little girl screaming when he was running up
the stairs. Dont shoot she was begging. She begged for
her life.” Alison sighed. “That sort of makes it simple again,
doesnt it?”
As we al fel quiet, Ted asked for a show of hands in favor
of the execution of Shay Bourne.
“No,” I said. “We stil have the rest of the equation to figure
out.” I pointed to column C. “We have to consider what the
defense said.”
“The only thing I want to consider right now is where is my
lunch,”
Jack said.
The vote was 8-4, and I was in the minority.
3 : 0 6 P . M.
I looked around the room. This time, nine people had their
hands in the air. Maureen, Vy, and I were the only ones who
hadnt voted for execution.
“What is it thats keeping you from making this decision?”
Ted asked.
“His age,” Vy said. “My sons twentyfour,” she said. “And al
I can think is that he doesnt always make the best
decisions. Hes not done growing up yet.”
Jack turned toward me. “Youre the same age as Bourne.
What are you doing with your life?”
I felt my face flame. “I, um, probably Il go to graduate
school. Im not real y sure.”
“You havent kil ed anyone, have you?”
Jack got to his feet. “Lets take a bathroom break,” he
suggested, and we al jumped at the chance to separate. I
tossed the dry-erase marker on the table and walked to the
window. Outside, there were courthouse employees eating
their lunch on benches. There were clouds caught in the
twisted fingers of the trees. And there were television vans
with satel ites on their roofs, waiting to hear what wed say.
Jim sat down beside me, reading the Bible that seemed to
be an extra appendage. “You religious?”
“I went to parochial school a long time ago.” I faced him.
“Isnt there something in there about turning the other
cheek?”
Jim pursed his lips and read aloud. “If thy right eye offend
thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee; for it is profitable for
thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy
whole body should be cast into hel . When one apples
gone bad, you dont let it ruin the whole bunch.” He passed
the Bible to me. “See for yourself.”
I looked at the quote, and then closed the book. I didnt
know nearly as much as Jim did about religion, but it
seemed to me that no matter what Jesus said in that
passage, he might have taken it back after being
sentenced to death himself. In fact, it seemed to me that if
Jesus were here in this jury room, hed be having just as
hard a time doing what needed to be done as I was.
4 : 0 2 P . M.
Ted had me write Yes and No on the board, and then he
pol ed us, one by one, as I wrote our names in each of the
columns.
Jim?
Yes.
Alison?
Yes.
Marilyn?
Yes.
Vy?
No.
I hesitated, then wrote my own name beneath Vys.
“You agreed to vote for death if you had to,” Mark said.
“They asked each of us before we got picked for the jury if
we could do that.”
“I know.” I had agreed to vote for the death penalty if the
case merited it. I just hadnt realized it was going to be this
difficult to do.
Vy buried her face in her hands. “When my son used to hit
his little brother, I didnt smack him and say Dont hit. It felt
hypocritical then.
And it feels hypocritical now.”
“Vy,” Marilyn said quietly, “what if it had been your seven-
year-old who was kil ed?” She reached onto the table,
where we had piled up transcripts and evidence, and took
the same picture of Elizabeth Nealon that the prosecutor
had presented during his closing argument. She set it down
in front of Vy, smoothed its glossy surface.
After a minute, Vy stood up heavily and took the marker out
of my hand. She wiped her name off the No column and
wrote it beneath Marilyns, with the ten other jurors whod
voted Yes.
“Michael,” Ted said.
I swal owed.
“What do you need to see, to hear? We can help you find
it.” He reached for the box that held the bul ets from
bal istics, the bloody clothing, the autopsy reports. He let
photos from the crime scene spil through his hands like
ribbons. On some of them, there was so much blood, you
could barely see the victim lying beneath its sheen.
“Michael,”
Ted said, “do the math.”
I faced the white board, because I couldnt stand the heat of
their eyes on me. Next to the list of names, mine standing
alone, was the original equation Id set up for us when we
first came into this jury room: (A + B)-C = SENTENCE.
What I liked about math was that it was safe. There was
always a right answereven if it was imaginary.
This, though, was an equation where math did not hold up.
Because A + Bthe factors that had led to the deaths of
Kurt and Eliza beth Nealonwould always be greater than
C. You couldnt bring them back, and there was no sob
story in the world big enough to erase that truth.
In the space between yes and no, theres a lifetime. Its the
difference between the path you walk and one you leave
behind; its the gap between who you thought you could be
and who you real y are; its the legroom for the lies youl tel
yourself in the future.
I erased my name on the board. Then I took the pen and
rewrote it, becoming the twelfth and final juror to sentence
Shay Bourne to death.
“If Cod did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.”
-VOLTAIRE, FOR AND AGAINST
E L E V E N Y E A R S L A T E R
Lucius
I have no idea where they were keeping Shay Bourne
before they brought him to us. I knew he was an inmate
here at the state prison in ConcordI can stil remember
watching the news the day his sentence was handed down
and scrutinizing an outside world that was starting to fade in
my mind: the rough stone of the prison exterior; the golden
dome of the statehouse; even just the general shape of a
door that wasnt made of metal and wire mesh. His
conviction was the subject of great discussion on the pod
al those years agowhere do you keep an inmate whos
been sentenced to death when your state hasnt had a
death row prisoner for ages?
Rumor had it that in fact, the prison did have a pair of death
row cel snot too far from my own humble abode in the
Secure Housing Unit on I-tier. Crash Vitalewho had
something to say about everything, although no one usual y
bothered to listentold us that the old death row cel s were
stacked with the thin, plastic slabs that pass for mattresses
here.
I wondered for a while what had happened to al those extra
mattresses after Shay arrived. One things for sure, no one
offered to give them to us.
Moving cel s is routine in prison. They dont like you to
become too attached to anything. In the fifteen years Ive
been here, I have been moved eight different times. The
cel s, of course, al look alikewhats different is whos next
to you, which is why Shays arrival on I-tier was of great
interest to al of us.
This, in itself, was a rarity. The six inmates in I-tier were
radical y dif24
ferent from one another; for one man to spark curiosity in al
of us was nothing short of a miracle. Cel 1 housed Joey
Kunz, a pedophile who was at the bottom of the pecking
order. In Cel 2 was Cal oway Reece, a cardcarrying
member of the Aryan Brotherhood. Cel 3 was me, Lucius
DuFresne. Four and five were empty, so we knew the new
inmate would be put in one of themthe only question was
whether hed be closer to me, or to the guys in the last three
cel s: Texas Wridel , Pogie Simmons, and Crash, the self-
appointed leader of I-tier.
As Shay Bourne was escorted in by a phalanx of six
correctional officers wearing helmets and flak jackets and
face shields, we al came forward in our cel s. The COs
passed by the shower stal , shuffled by Joey and Cal oway,
and then paused right in front of me, so I could get a good
look.
Bourne was smal and slight, with close-cropped brown hair
and eyes like the Caribbean Sea. I knew about the
Caribbean, because it was the last vacation Id taken with
Adam. I was glad I didnt have eyes like that. I wouldnt want
to look in the mirror every day and be reminded of a place
Id never see again.
Then Shay Bourne turned to me.
Maybe now would be a good time to tel you what I look like.
My face was the reason the COs didnt look me in the eye;
it was why I sometimes preferred to be hidden inside this
cel . The sores were scarlet and purple and scaly. They
spread from my forehead to my chin.
Most people winced. Even the polite ones, like the eighty-
year-old missionary who brought us pamphlets once a
month, always did a double take, as if I looked even worse
than he remembered. But Shay just met my gaze and
nodded at me, as if I were no different than anyone else.
I heard the door of the cel beside mine slide shut, the clink
of chains as Shay stuck his hands through the trap to have
his cuffs removed. The COs left the pod, and almost
immediately Crash started in. “Hey, Death Row,” he yel ed.
There was no response from Shay Bournes cel .
“Hey, when Crash talks, you answer.”
“Leave him alone, Crash,” I sighed. “Give the poor guy five
minutes to figure out what a moron you are.”
“Ooh, Death Row, better watch it,” Cal oway said. “Lucius is
kissing up to you, and his last boyfriends six feet under.”
There was the sound of a television being turned on, and
then Shay must have plugged in the headphones that we
were al required to have, so we didnt have a volume war
with one another. I was a little surprised that a death row
prisoner would have been able to purchase a television
from the canteen, same as us. It would have been a
thirteen-inch one, special y made for us wards of the state
by Zenith, with a clear plastic shel around its guts and
cathodes, so that the COs would be able to tel if you were
extracting parts to make weapons.
While Cal oway and Crash united (as they often did) to
humiliate me, I pul ed out my own set of headphones and
turned on my television. It was five oclock, and I didnt like
to miss Oprah. But when I tried to change the channel,
nothing happened. The screen flickered, as if it were
resetting to channel 22, but channel 22 looked just like
channel 3 and channel 5 and CNN and the Food Network.
“Hey.” Crash started to pound on his door. “Yo, CO, the
cables down.
We got rights, you know …”
Sometimes headphones dont work wel enough.
I turned up the volume and watched a local news networks
coverage of a fund-raiser for a nearby childrens hospital up
near Dartmouth Col ege.
There were clowns and bal oons and even two Red Sox
players signing autographs.
The camera zeroed in on a girl with fairy-tale blond hair and
blue half-moons beneath her eyes, just the kind of child
theyd televise to get you to open up your wal et. “Claire
Nealon,” the reporters voice-over said, “is waiting for a
heart.”
Boo-hoo, I thought. Everyones got problems. I took off my
headphones.
If I couldnt listen to Oprah, I didnt want to listen at al .
Which is why I was able to hear Shay Bournes very first
word on I-tier.
“Yes,” he said, and just like that, the cable came back on.
*
You have probably noticed by now that I am a cut above
most of the cretins on I-tier, and thats because I dont real y
belong here. It was a crime of passion-the only discrepancy
is that I focused on the passion part and the courts focused
on the crime. But I ask you, what would you have done, if
the love of your life found a new love of his lifesomeone
younger, thinner, better-looking?
The irony, of course, is that no sentence imposed by a court
for homicide could trump the one thats ravaged me in
prison. My last CD4+ was taken six months ago, and I was
down to seventy-five cel s per cubic mil imeter of blood.
Someone without HIV would have a normal T cel count of a
thousand cel s or more, but the virus becomes part of these
white blood cel s. When the white blood cel s reproduce to
fight infection, the virus reproduces, too. As the immune
system gets weak, the more likely I am to get sick, or to
develop an opportunistic infection like PCP,
toxoplasmosis, or CMV. The doctors say I wont die from
AIDSIl die from pneumonia or TB or a bacterial infection
in the brain; but if you ask me, thats just semantics.
Dead is dead.
I was an artist by vocation, and now by avocationalthough
its been considerably more chal enging to get my supplies
in a place like this.
Where I had once favored Winsor Et Newton oils and red
sable brushes, linen canvases I stretched myself and
coated with gesso, I now used whatever I could get my
hands on. I had my nephews draw me pictures on card
stock in pencil that I erased so that I could use the paper
over again. I hoarded the foods that produced pigment.
Tonight I had been working on a portrait of Adam, drawn of
course from memory, because that was al I had left. I had
mixed some red ink gleaned from a Skittle with a dab of
toothpaste in the lid of a juice bottle, and coffee with a bit of
water in a second lid, and then Id combined them to get
just the right shade of his skin-a burnished, deep molasses.
I had already outlined his features in blackthe broad
brow, the strong chin, the hawks nose. Id used a shank to
shave ebony curls from a picture of a coal mine in a
National Geographic and added a dab of shampoo to
make a chalky paint. With the broken tip of a pencil, I had
transferred the color to my makeshift canvas.
God, he was beautiful.
It was after three a.m., but to be honest, I dont sleep much.
When I do, I find myself getting up to go to the bathroom-as
little as I eat these days, food passes through me at
lightning speed. I get sick to my stomach; I get headaches.
The thrush in my mouth and throat makes it hard to swal ow.
Instead, I use my insomnia to fuel my artwork.
Tonight, Id had the sweats. I was soaked through by the
time I woke up, and after I stripped off my sheets and my
scrubs, I didnt want to lie down on the mattress again.
Instead, I had pul ed out my painting and started re-creating
Adam. But I got sidetracked by the other portraits Id
finished of him, hanging on my cel wal : Adam standing in
the same pose hed first struck when he was modeling for
the col ege art class I taught; Adams face when he opened
his eyes in the morning. Adam, looking over his shoulder,
the way hed been when I shot him.
“I need to do it,” Shay Bourne said. “Its the only way.”
He had been utterly silent since this afternoons arrival on I-
tier; I wondered who he was having a conversation with at
this hour of the night.
But the pod was empty. Maybe he was having a nightmare.
“Bourne?” I whispered. “Are you okay?”
“Whos … there?”
The words were hard for him-not quite a stutter; more like
each syl able was a stone he had to bring forth. “Im Lucius.
Lucius DuFresne,” I said.
“You talking to someone?”
He hesitated. “I think Im talking to you.”
“Cant sleep?”
“I can sleep,” Shay said. “I just dont want to.”
“Youre luckier than I am, then,” I replied.
It was a joke, but he didnt take it that way. “Youre no
luckier than me, and Im no unluckier than you,” he said.
Wel , in a way, he was right. I may not have been handed
down the same sentence as Shay Bourne, but like him, I
would die within the wal s of this prison-sooner rather than
later.
“Lucius,” he said. “What are you doing?”
“Im painting.”
There was a beat of silence. “Your cel ?”
“No. A portrait.”
“Why?”
“Because Im an artist.”
“Once, in school, an art teacher said I had classic lips,”
Shay said. “I stil dont know what that means.”
“Its a reference to the ancient Greeks and Romans,” I
explained. “And the art that we see represented on”
“Lucius? Did you see on TV today… the Red Sox …”
Everyone on I-tier had a team they fol owed, myself
included. We each kept meticulous score of their league
standings, and we debated the fairness of umpire and ref
cal s as if they were law and we were Supreme Court
judges. Sometimes, like us, our teams had their hopes
dashed; other times we got to share their World Series. But
it was stil preseason; there hadnt been any televised
games today.
“Schil ing was sitting at a table,” Shay added, stil struggling
to find the right words. “And there was a little girl”
“You mean the fund-raiser? The one up at the hospital?”
“That little girl,” Shay said. “Im going to give her my heart.”
Before I could respond, there was a loud crash and the thud
of flesh smacking against the concrete floor. “Shay?” I
cal ed. “Shay?!”
I pressed my face up against the Plexiglas. I couldnt see
Shay at al , but I heard something rhythmic smacking his
cel door. “Hey!” I yel ed at the top of my lungs. “Hey, we
need help down here!”
The others started to wake up, cursing me out for disturbing
their rest, and then fal ing silent with fascination. Two
officers stormed into I-tier, stil Velcroing their flak jackets.
One of them, CO Kappaletti, was the kind of man whod
taken this job so that hed always have someone to put
down. The other, CO Smythe, had never been anything but
professional toward me. Kappaletti stopped in front of my
cel . “DuFresne, if youre crying wolf”
But Smythe was already kneeling in front of Shays cel . “I
think Bournes having a seizure.” He reached for his radio
and the electronic door slid open so that other officers
could enter.
“Is he breathing?” one said.
“Turn him over, on the count of three …”
The EMTs arrived and wheeled Shay past my cel on a
gurney-a stretcher with restraints across the shoulders,
bel y, and legs that was used to transport inmates like
Crash who were too much trouble even cuffed at the waist
and ankles; or inmates who were too sick to walk to the
infirmary.
I always assumed Id leave I-tier on one of those gurneys.
But now I realized that it looked a lot like the table Shay
would one day be strapped onto for his lethal injection.
The EMTs had pushed an oxygen mask over Shays mouth
that frosted with each breath he took. His eyes had rol ed
up in their sockets, white and blind. “Do whatever it takes to
bring him back,” CO Smythe instructed; and that was how I
learned that the state wil save a dying man just so that they
can kil him later.
There was a great deal that I loved about the Church.
Like the feeling I got when two hundred voices rose to the
rafters during Sunday Mass in prayer. Or the way my hand
stil shook when I offered the host to a parishioner. I loved
the double take on the face of a troubled teenager when he
drooled over the 1969 Triumph Trophy motorcycle Id
restoredand then found out I was a priest; that being cool
and being Catholic were not mutual y exclusive.
Even though I was clearly the junior priest at St.
Catherines, we were one of only four parishes to serve al
of Concord, New Hampshire.
There never seemed to be enough hours in the day. Father
Walter and I would alternate officiating at Mass or hearing
confession; sometimes wed be asked to drop in and teach
a class at the parochial school one town over. There were
always parishioners to visit who were il or troubled or
lonely; there were always rosaries to be said. But I looked
forward to even the humblest actsweeping the vestibule,
or rinsing the vessels from the Eucharist in the sacrarium
so that no drop of Precious Blood wound up in the Concord
sewers.
I didnt have an office at St. Catherines. Father Walter did,
but then hed been at the parish so long that he seemed as
much a part of it as the rosewood pews and the velveteen
drapes at the altar. Although he kept tel ing me hed get
around to clearing out a spot for me in one of the old
storage rooms, he tended to nap after lunch, and who was I
to wake up a man in his seventies and tel him to get a
move on? After a while, I gave up asking and instead set a
smal desk up inside a broom closet. Today, I was
supposed to be writing a homilyif I could get it down to
seven minutes, I knew the older members of the
congregation wouldnt fal asleepbut instead, my mind
kept straying to one of our youngest members. Hannah
Smythe was the first baby I baptized at St.
Catherines. Now, just one year later, the infant had been
hospitalized repeatedly. Without warning, her throat would
simply close, and her frantic parents would rush her to the
ER for intubation, where the vicious cycle would start al
over again. I offered up a quick prayer to God to lead the
doctors to cure Hannah. I was just finishing up with the sign
of the cross when a smal , silver-haired lady approached
my desk.
“Father Michael?”
“Mary Lou,” I said. “How are you doing?”
“Could I maybe talk to you for a few minutes?”
Mary Lou Huckens could talk not only for a few minutes; she
was likely to go on for nearly an hour. Father Walter and I
had an unwritten policy to rescue each other from her
effusive praise after Mass. “What can I do for you?”
“Actual y, I feel a little sil y about this,” she admitted. “I just
wanted to know if youd bless my bust.”
I smiled at her. Parishioners often asked us to offer a
prayer over a devotional item. “Sure. Have you got it with
you?”
She gave me an odd look. “Wel , of course I do.”
“Great. Lets see it.”
She crossed her hands over her chest. “I hardly think thafs
necessary!”
I felt heat flood my cheeks as I realized what she actual y
wanted me to bless. “I-Im sorry …” I stammered. “I didnt
mean …”
Her eyes fil ed with tears. “Theyre doing a lumpectomy
tomorrow.
Father, and Im terrified.”
I stood up and put my arm around her, walked her a few
yards to the closest pew, offered her Kleenex. Im sorry,”
she said. “I dont know who else to talk to. If I tel my
husband Im scared, hel get scared, too.”
“You know who to talk to,” I said gently. “And you know Hes
always listening.” I touched the crown of her head.
“Omnipotent and eternal God, the everlasting Salvation of
those who believe, hear us on behalf of Thy servant Mary
Lou, for whom we beg the aid of Thy pitying mercy, that with
her bodily health restored, she may give thanks to Thee in
Thy church. Through Christ our Lord, amen.”
“Amen,” Mary Lou whispered.
Thats the other thing I love about the Church: you never
know what to expect.
Lucius
When Shay Bourne returned to I-tier after three days in the
hospital infirmary, he was a man with a mission. Every
morning, when the officers came to pol us to see who
wanted a shower or time in the yard, Shay would ask to
speak to Warden Coyne. “Fil out a request,” he was told,
over and over, but it just didnt seem to sink in. When it was
his turn in the little caged kennel that was our exercise yard,
hed stand in the far corner, looking toward the opposite
side of the prison, where the administrative offices were
housed, and hed yel his request at the top of his lungs.
When he was brought his dinner, hed ask if the warden
had agreed to talk to him.
“You know why he was moved to I-tier?” Cal oway said one
day when Shay was bel owing in the shower for an
audience with the warden. “Because he made everyone
else on his last tier go deaf.”
“Hes a retard,” Crash answered. “Cant help how he acts.
Kinda like our own diaper sniper. Right, Joey?”
“Hes not mental y chal enged,” I said. “Hes probably got
double the IQ
that you do, Crash.”
“Shut the fuck up, fruiter,” Cal oway said. “Shut up, al of
you!” The urgency in his voice silenced us. Cal oway knelt
at the door of his cel , fishing with a braided string pul ed
out of his blanket and tied at one end to a rol ed magazine.
He cast into the center of the catwalkrisky behavior,
since the COs would be back any minute. At first we
couldnt figure out what he was doing-when we fished, it
was with one another, tangling our lines to pass along
anything from a paperback book to a Hersheys barbut
then we noticed the smal , bright oval on the floor. God only
knew why a bird would make a nest in a hel hole like this,
but one had a few months back, after flying in through the
exercise yard. One egg had fal en out and cracked; the
baby robin lay on its side, unfinished, its thin, wrinkled chest
working like a piston.
Cal oway reeled the egg in, inch by inch. “It aint gonna live,”
Crash said. “Its mama wont want it now.”
“Wel , I do,” Cal oway said.
“Put it somewhere warm,” I suggested. “Wrap it up in a
towel or something.”
“Use your T-shirt,” Joey added.
“I dont take advice from a cho-mo,” Cal oway said, but
then, a moment later: “You think a T-shirt wil work?”
While Shay yel ed for the warden, we al listened to
Cal oways playby-play: The robin was wrapped in a shirt.
The robin was tucked inside his left tennis shoe. The robin
was pinking up. The robin had opened its left eye for a half
second.
We al had forgotten what it was like to care about
something so much that you might not be able to stand
losing it. The first year I was in here, I used to pretend that
the ful moon was my pet, that it came once a month just to
me. And this past summer, Crash had taken to spreading
jam on the louvers of his vent to cultivate a colony of bees,
but that was less about husbandry than his misguided belief
that he could train them to swarm Joey in his sleep.
“Cowboys comin to lock em up,” Crash said, fair warning
that the COs were getting ready to enter the pod again. A
moment later the doors buzzed open; they stood in front of
the shower cel waiting for Shay to stick his hands through
the trap to be cuffed for the twenty-foot journey back to his
own cel .
“They dont know what it could be,” CO Smythe said.
“Theyve ruled out pulmonary problems and asthma.
Theyre saying maybe an al ergy-but theres nothing in her
room anymore, Rick, its bare as a cel .”
Sometimes the COs talked to one another in front of us.
They never spoke to inmates directly about their lives, and
that actual y was fine. We didnt want to know that the guy
strip-searching us had a son who scored the winning goal
in his soccer game last Thursday. Better to take the
humanity out of it.
“They said,” Smythe continued, “that her heart cant keep
taking this kind of stress. And neither can I. You know what
its like to see your baby with al these bags and wires
coming out of her?”
The second CO, Whitaker, was a Catholic who liked to
include, on my dinner tray, handwritten scripture verses that
denounced homosexuality.
“Father Walter led a prayer for Hannah on Sunday. He said
hed be happy to visit you at the hospital.”
“Theres nothing a priest can say that I want to hear,”
Smythe muttered.
“What kind of God would do this to a baby?”
Shays hands slipped through the trap of the shower cel to
be cuffed, and then the door was opened. “Did the warden
say hed meet with me?”
“Yeah,” Smythe said, leading Shay toward his cel . “He
wants you to come for high friggin tea.”
“I just need five minutes with him”
“Youre not the only one with problems,” Smythe snapped.
“Fil out a request.”
“I cant,” Shay replied.
I cleared my throat. “Officer? Could I have a request form,
too, please?”
He finished locking Shay up, then took one out of his
pocket and stuffed it into the trap of my cel .
Just as the officers exited the tier, there was a smal , feeble
chirp.
“Shay?” I asked. “Why not just fil out the request slip?”
“I cant get my words to come out right.”
“Im sure the warden doesnt care about grammar.”
“No, its when I write. When I start, the letters al get
tangled.”
“Then tel me, and Il write the note.”
There was a silence. “Youd do that for me?”
“Wil you two cut the soap opera?” Crash said. “Youre
making me sick.”
“Tel the warden,” Shay dictated, “that I want to donate my
heart, after he kil s me. I want to give it to a girl who needs it
more than I do.”
I leaned the ticket up against the wal of the cel and wrote in
pencil, signed Shays name. I tied the note to the end of my
own fishing line and swung it beneath the narrow opening of
his cel door. “Give this to the officer who makes rounds
tomorrow morning.”
“You know, Bourne,” Crash mused, “I dont know what to
make of you.
I mean, on the one hand, youre a child-kil ing piece of shit.
You might as wel be fungus growing on Joey, for what you
done to that little girl. But on the other hand, you took down
a cop, and I for one am truly grateful theres one less pig in
the world. So how am I supposed to feel? Do I hate you, or
do I give you my respect?”
“Neither,” Shay said. “Both.”
“You know what I think? Baby kil ing beats anything good
you might have done.” Crash stood up at the front of his cel
and began to bang a metal coffee mug against the
Plexiglas. “Throw him out. Throw him out.
Throw him out!”
Joeyunused to being even one notch above low-man-on-
the-totempolewas the first to join in the singing. Then
Texas and Pogie started in, because they did whatever
Crash told them to do.
Throw him out.
Throw him out.
Whitakers voice bled through the loudspeaker. “You got a
problem, Vitale?”
“I dont got a problem. This punk-ass child kil er heres the
one with the problem. I tel you what, Officer. You let me out
for five minutes, and Il save the good taxpayers of New
Hampshire the trouble of getting rid of him-“
“Crash,” Shay said softly. “Cool off.”
I was distracted by a whistling noise coming from my tiny
sink. I had no sooner stood up to investigate than the water
burst out of the spigot.
This was remarkable on two countsnormal y, the water
pressure was no greater than a trickle, even in the showers.
And the water that was splashing over the sides of the
metal bowl was a deep, rich red.
“Fuck!” Crash yel ed. “I just got soaked!”
“Man, that looks like blood,” Pogie said, horrified. “Im not
washing up in that.”
“Its in the toilets, too,” Texas added.
We al knew our pipes were connected. The bad news
about this was that you literal y could not get away from the
shit brought down by the others around you. On the bright
side, you could actual y flush a note down the length of the
pod; it would briefly appear in the next cel s bowl before
heading through the sewage system. I turned and looked
into my toilet.
The water was as dark as rubies.
“Holy crap,” Crash said. “It aint blood. Its wine.” He started
to crow like a madman. “Taste it, ladies. Drinks are on the
house.”
I waited. I did not drink the tap water in here. As it was, I
had a feeling that my AIDS medications, which came on a
punch card, might be some government experiment done
on expendable inmates… I wasnt about to imbibe from a
water treatment system run by the same administration. But
then I heard Joey start laughing, and Cal oway slurping from
the faucet, and Texas and Pogie singing drinking songs. In
fact, the entire mood of the tier changed so radical y that
CO Whitakers voice boomed over the intercom, confused
by the visions on the monitors. “Whats going on in there?”
he asked. “Is there a water main leak?”
“You could say that,” Crash replied. “Or you could say we
got us a powerful thirst.”
“Come on in, CO,” Pogie added. “Wel buy the next round.”
Everyone seemed to find this hilarious, but then, theyd al
downed nearly a half gal on of whatever this fluid was by
now. I dipped my finger into the dark stream that was stil
running strong from my sink. It could have been iron or
manganese, but it was truethis water smel ed like sugar,
and dried sticky. I bent my head to the tap and drank
tentatively from the flow.
Adam and I had been closet sommeliers, taking trips to the
California vineyards. To that end, for my birthday that last
year, Adam had gotten me a 2001 Dominus Estate
cabernet sauvignon. We were going to drink it on New
Years Eve. Weeks later, when I came in and found them,
twisted together like jungle vines, that bottle was there, too
tipped off the nightstand and staining the bedroom
carpet, like blood that had already been spil ed.
If youve been in prison as long as I have, youve
experienced a good many innovative highs. Ive drunk
hooch distil ed from fruit juice and bread and Jol y Rancher
candies; Ive huffed spray deodorant; Ive smoked dried
banana peels rol ed up in a page of the Bible. But this was
like none of those. This was honest-to-God wine.
I laughed. But before long I began to sob, tears running
down my face for what I had lost, for what was now literal y
coursing through my fingers.
You can only miss something you remember having, and it
had been so long since creature comforts had been part of
my ordinary life. I fil ed a plastic mug with wine and drank it
down; I did this over and over again until it became easier
to forget the fact that al extraordinary things must come to
an enda lesson I could have lectured on, given my history.
By now, the COs realized that there had been some snafu
with the plumbing. Two of them came onto the tier, fuming,
and paused in front of my cel . “You,” Whitaker
commanded. “Cuffs.”
I went through the rigmarole of having my wrists bound
through the open trap so that when Whitaker had my door
buzzed open I could be secured by Smythe while he
investigated. I watched over my shoulder as Whitaker
touched a pinky to the stream of wine and held it up to his
tongue. “Lucius,” he said, “what is this?”
“At first I thought it was a cabernet, Officer,” I said. “But now
Im leaning toward a cheap merlot.”
“The water comes from the town reservoir,” Smythe said.
“Inmates cant mess with that.”
“Maybe its a miracle,” Crash sang. “You know al about
miracles, dont you, Officer Bible-thumper?”
My cel door was closed and my hands freed. Whitaker
stood on the catwalk in front of our cel s. “Who did this?” he
asked, but nobody was listening.
“Whos responsible?”
“Who cares?” Crash replied.
“So help me, if one of you doesnt fess up, Il have
maintenance turn off your water for the next week,”
Whitaker threatened.
Crash laughed. “The ACLU needs a poster child, Whit.”
As the COs stormed off the tier, we were al laughing.
Things that werent humorous became funny; I didnt even
mind listening to Crash. At some point, the wine trickled
and dried up, but by then, Pogie had already passed out
cold, Texas and Joey were singing “Danny Boy” in
harmony, and I was fading fast. In fact, the last thing I
remember is Shay asking Cal oway what he was going to
name his bird, and Cal oways answer: Batman the Robin.
And Cal oway chal enging Shay to a chugging contest, but
Shay saying he would sit that one out. That actual y, he
didnt drink.
For two days after the water on I-tier had turned into wine, a
steady stream of plumbers, scientists, and prison
administrators visited our cel s.
Apparently, we were the only unit within the prison where
this had happened, and the only reason anyone in power
even believed it was because when our cel s were tossed,
the COs confiscated the shampoo bottles and milk
containers and even plastic bags that we had al
innovatively used to store some extra wine before it had run
dry; and because swabs taken in the pipes revealed a
matching substance. Although nobody would official y give
us the results of the lab testing, rumor had it that the liquid in
question was definitely not tap water.
Our exercise and shower privileges were revoked for a
week, as if this had been our fault in the first place, and
forty-three hours passed before I was al owed a visit from
the prison nurse, Alma, who smel ed of lemons and linen;
and who had a massive coiled tower of braided hair that, I
imagined, required architectural intervention in order for her
to sleep. Normal y, she came twice a day to bring me a
card ful of pil s as bright and big as dragonflies. She also
spread cream on inmates fungal foot infections, checked
teeth that had been rotted out by crystal meth, and did
anything else that didnt require a visit to the infirmary. I
admit to faking il ness several times so that Alma would
take my temperature or blood pressure.
Sometimes, she was the only person who touched me for
weeks.
“So,” she said, as she was let into my cel by CO Smythe. “I
hear things have been pretty exciting on I-tier. You gonna
tel me what happened?”
“Would if I could,” I said, and then glanced at the officer
accompanying her. “Or maybe I wouldnt.”
“I can only think of one person who ever turned water into
wine,” she said, “and my pastor wil tel you it didnt happen
in the state prison this Monday.”
“Maybe your pastor can suggest that next time, Jesus try a
nice ful bodied Syrah.”
Alma laughed and stuck a thermometer into my mouth.
Over her back, I stared at CO Smythe. His eyes were red,
and instead of watching me to make sure I didnt do
anything stupid, like take Alma hostage, he was staring at
the wal behind my head, lost in thought.
The thermometer beeped. “Youre stil running a fever.”
“Tel me something I dont know,” I replied. I felt blood pool
under my tongue, courtesy of the sores that were part and
parcel of this horrific disease.
“You taking those meds?”
I shrugged. “You see me put them in my mouth every day,
dont you?”
Alma knew there were as many different ways for a
prisoner to kil himself as there were prisoners. “Dont you
check out on me, Jupiter,” she said, rubbing something
viscous on the red spot on my forehead that had led to this
nickname. “Who else would tel me what I miss on General
Hospital?”
“Thats a pretty paltry reason to stick around.”
“Ive heard worse.” Alma turned to CO Smythe. “Im al set
here.”
She left, and the control booth slid the door home again, the
sound of metal ic teeth gnashing shut. “Shay,” I cal ed out.
“You awake?”
“I am now.”
“Might want to cover your ears,” I offered.
Before Shay could ask me why, Cal oway let out the same
explosive run of curses he always did when Alma tried to
get within five feet of him.
“Get the fuck out, nigger,” he yel ed. “Swear to God, Il fuck
“Get the fuck out, nigger,” he yel ed. “Swear to God, Il fuck
you up if you put your hand on me”
CO Smythe pinned him against the side of his cel . “For
Christs sake, Reece,” he said. “Do we have to go through
this every single day for a goddamn Band-Aid?”
“We do if that black bitch is the one putting it on.”
Cal oway had been convicted of burning a synagogue to
the ground seven years ago. He sustained head injuries
and needed massive skin grafts on his arms, but he
considered the mission a success because the terrified
rabbi had fled town. The grafts stil needed checking; hed
had three surgeries alone in the past year.
“You know what,” Alma said, “I dont real y care if his arms
rot off.”
She didnt, that much was true. But she did care about
being cal ed a nigger. Every time Cal oway hurled that word
at her, shed stiffen. And after she visited Cal oway, she
moved a little more slowly down the pod.
I knew exactly how she felt. When youre different,
sometimes you dont see the mil ions of people who accept
you for what you are. Al you notice is the one person who
doesnt.
“I got hep C because of you,” Cal oway said, although hed
probably gotten it from the blade of the barbers razor, like
the other inmates whod contracted it in prison. “You and
your filthy nigger hands.”
Cal oway was being particularly awful today, even for
Cal oway. At first I thought he was cranky like the rest of us,
because our meager privileges had been taken away. But
then it hit meCal oway couldnt let Alma into his house,
because she might find the bird. And if she found the bird,
CO
Smythe would confiscate it.
“What do you want to do?” Smythe asked Alma.
She sighed. “Im not going to fight him.”
“Thats right,” Cal oway crowed. “You know whos boss.
Rahowal”
At his cal , short for Racial Holy War, inmates from al over
the Secure Housing Unit began to hol er. In a state as white
as New Hampshire, the Aryan Brotherhood ran the prison
population. They control ed drug deals done behind bars;
they tattooed one another with shamrocks and lightning
bolts and swastikas. To be jumped into the gang, you had
to kil someone sanctioned by the Brotherhooda black
man, a Jew, a homosexual, or anyone else whose
existence was considered an affront to your own.
The sound became deafening. Alma walked past my cel ,
Smythe fol owing.
As they passed Shay, he cal ed out to the officer, “Look
inside.”
“I know whats inside Reece,” Smythe said. “Two hundred
and twenty pounds of crap.”
As Alma and the CO left, Cal oway was stil yel ing his head
off. “For Gods sake,” I hissed at Shay. “If they find
Cal oways stupid bird theyl toss al our cel s again! You
want to lose the shower for two weeks?”
“Thats not what I meant,” Shay said.
I didnt answer. Instead I lay down on my bunk and stuffed
more wadded-up toilet paper into my ears. And stil , I could
hear Cal oway singing his white-pride anthems. Stil , I could
hear Shay when he told me a second time that he hadnt
been talking about the bird.
That night when I woke up with the sweats, my heart dril ing
through the spongy base of my throat, Shay was talking to
himself again. “They pul up the sheet,” he said.
“Shay?”
I took a piece of metal Id sawed off from the lip of the
counter in the cel it had taken months, carved with a
string of elastic from my underwear and a dab of toothpaste
with baking soda, my own diamond band saw. Ingeniously,
the triangular result doubled as both a mirror and a shank. I
slipped my hand beneath my door, angling the mirror so I
could see into Shays cel .
He was lying on his bunk with his eyes closed and his arms
crossed over his heart. His breathing had gone so shal ow
that his chest barely rose and fel . I could have sworn I
smel ed the worms in freshly turned soil. I heard the ping of
stones as they struck a grave diggers shovel.
Shay was practicing.
I had done that myself. Maybe not quite in the same way,
but Id pictured my funeral. Who would come. Who would be
wel dressed, and who would be wearing something
outrageously hideous. Who would cry. Who wouldnt.
God bless those COs; theyd moved Shay Bourne right next
door to someone else serving a death sentence.
Two weeks after Shay arrived on I-tier, six officers came to
his cel early one morning and told him to strip. “Bend over,”
I heard Whitaker say.
“Spread em. Lift em. Cough.”
“Where are we going?”
“Infirmary. Routine checkup.”
I knew the dril : they would shake out his clothes to make
sure there was no contraband hidden, then tel him to get
dressed again. Theyd march him out of I-tier and into the
great beyond of the Secure Housing Unit.
An hour later, I woke up to the sound of Shays cel door
being opened again as he returned to his cel . “Il pray for
your soul,” CO Whitaker said soberly before leaving the
tier.
“So,” I said, my voice too light and false to fool even myself.
“Are you the picture of health?”
“They didnt take me to the infirmary. We went to the
wardens office.”
I sat on my bunk, looking up at the vent through which
Shays voice carried. “He final y agreed to meet with-“
“You know why they lie?” Shay interrupted. “Because
theyre afraid youl go bal istic if they tel you the truth.”
“About what?”
“Its al mind control. And we have no choice but to be
obedient because what if this is the one time that real y-“
“Shay,” I said, “did you talk to the warden or not?”
“He talked to me. He told me my last appeal was denied by
“He talked to me. He told me my last appeal was denied by
the Supreme Court,” Shay said. “My execution date is May
twenty-third.”
I knew that before he was moved to this tier, Shay had been
on death row for eleven years; it wasnt like he hadnt seen
this coming. And yet, that date was only two and a half
months away.
“I guess they dont want to come in and say hey, were
taking you to get your death warrant read out loud. I mean,
its easier to just pretend youre going to the infirmary, so
that I wouldnt freak out. I bet they talked about how theyd
come and get me. I bet they had a meeting.”
I wondered what I would prefer, if it were my death that was
being announced like a future train departing from a
platform. Would I want the truth from an officer? Or would I
consider it a kindness to be spared knowing the inevitable,
even for those four minutes of transit?
I knew what the answer was for me.
I wondered why, considering that Id only known Shay
Bourne for two weeks, there was a lump in my throat at the
thought of his execution. “Im real y sorry.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah.”
“Po-lice,” Joey cal ed out, and a moment later, CO Smythe
walked in, fol owed by CO Whitaker. He helped Whitaker
transport Crash to the shower cel the investigation into
our bacchanal tap water had yielded nothing conclusive,
apparently, except some mold in the pipes, and we were
now al owed personal hygiene hours again. But afterward,
instead of leaving I-tier, Smythe doubled back down the
catwalk to stand in front of Shays cel .
“Listen,” Smythe said. “Last week, you said something to
me.”
“Did I?”
“You told me to look inside.” He hesitated. “My daughters
been sick.
Real y sick. Yesterday, the doctors told my wife and me to
say good-bye. It made me want to explode. So I grabbed
this stuffed bear in her crib, one wed brought from home to
make going to the hospital easier for herand I ripped it
wide open. It was fil ed with peanut shel s, and we never
thought to look there.” Smythe shook his head. “My babys
not dying; she was never even sick. Shes just al ergic,” he
said. “How did you know?”
“I didnt-“
“It doesnt matter.” Smythe dug in his pocket for a smal
square of tinfoil, unwrapping it to reveal a thick brownie. “I
brought this in from home.
My wife, she makes them. She wanted you to have it.”
“John, you cant give him contraband,” Whitakersaid,
glancing over his shoulder at the control booth.
“Its not contraband. Its just me … sharing a little bit of my
lunch.”
My mouth started to water. Brownies were not on our
canteen forms.
The closest we came was chocolate cake, offered once a
year as part of a Christmas package that also included a
stocking ful of candy and two oranges.
Smythe passed the brownie through the trap in the cel
door. He met Shays gaze and nodded, then left the tier
with CO Whitaker.
“Hey, Death Row,” Cal oway said, “Il give you three
cigarettes for half of that.”
“Il trade you a whole pack of coffee,” Joey countered.
“He aint going to waste it on you,” Cal oway said. “Il give
you coffee and four cigarettes.”
Texas and Pogie joined in. They would trade Shay a CD
player. A Playboy magazine. A rol of tape.
“A teener,” Cal oway announced. “Final offer.”
The Brotherhood made a kil ing on running the
methamphetamine trade at the New Hampshire state
prison; for Cal oway to solicit his own personal stash, he
must have truly wanted that chocolate.
As far as I knew, Shay hadnt even had a cup of coffee
since coming to I-tier. I had no idea if he smoked or got
high. “No,” Shay said. “No to al of you.”
A few minutes passed.
“For Gods sake, I can stil smel it,” Cal oway said.
Let me tel you, I am not exaggerating when I say that we
were forced to inhale that scentthat glorious scentfor
hours. At three in the morning, when I woke up as per my
usual insomnia, the scent of chocolate was so strong that
the brownie might as wel have been sitting in my cel
instead of Shays. “Why dont you just eat the damn thing,” I
murmured.
“Because,” Shay replied, as wide awake as I, “then there
wouldnt be anything to look forward to.”
Maggie
There were many reasons I loved Oliver, but first and
foremost was that my mother couldnt stand him. Hes a
mess, she said every time she came to visit. Hes
destructive. Maggie, she said, if you got rid ojhim, you
could find Someone.
Someone was a doctor, like the anesthesiologist from
Dartmouth-Hitchcock theyd set me up with once, who
asked me if I thought laws against downloading child porn
were an infringement on civil rights. Or the son of the
cantor, who actual y had been in a monogamous gay
relationship for five years but hadnt told his parents yet.
Someone was the younger partner in the accounting firm
that did my fathers taxes, who asked me on our first and
only date if Id always been a big girl.
On the other hand, Oliver knew just what I needed, and
when I needed it. Which is why, the minute I stepped on the
scale that morning, he hopped out from underneath the
bed, where he was diligently severing the cord of my alarm
clock with his teeth, and settled himself squarely on top of
my feet so that I couldnt see the digital readout.
“Nicely done,” I said, stepping off, trying not to notice the
numbers that flashed red before they disappeared. Surely
the reason there was a seven in there was because Oliver
had been on the scale, too. Besides, if I were going to be
writing a formal complaint about any of this, Id have said
that (a) size fourteen isnt real y al that big, (b) a size
fourteen here was a size sixteen in London, so in a way I
was thinner than Id be if I had been born British, and (c)
weight didnt real y matter, as long as you were healthy.
Al right, so maybe I didnt exercise al that much either. But
I would, one day, or so I told my mother the fitness queen,
as soon as al the people on whose behalf I worked
tirelessly were absolutely, unequivocal y rescued. I told her
(and anyone else whod listen) that the whole reason the
ACLU existed was to help people take a stand.
Unfortunately, the only stands my mother recognized were
pigeon pose, warrior two, and al the other staples of yoga.
I pul ed on my jeans, the ones that I admittedly didnt wash
very often because the dryer shrank them just enough that I
had to suffer half a day before the denim stretched to the
point of comfort again. I picked a sweater that didnt show
my bra rol and then turned to Oliver. “What do you think?”
He lowered his left ear, which translated to, “Why do you
even care, since youre taking it al off to put on a spa
robe?”
As usual, he was right. Its a little hard to hide your flaws
when youre wearing, wel , nothing.
He fol owed me into the kitchen, where I poured us both
bowls of rabbit food (his literal, mine Special K). Then he
hopped off to the litter box beside his cage, where hed
spend the day sleeping.
Id named my rabbit after Oliver Wendel Holmes Jr., the
famous Supreme Court Justice known as the Great
Dissenter. He once said, “Even a dog knows the difference
between being kicked and being tripped over.”
So did rabbits. And my clients, for that matter.
“Dont do anything I wouldnt do,” I warned Oliver. “That
includes chewing the legs of the kitchen stools.”
I grabbed my keys and headed out to my Prius. I had used
nearly al my savings last year on the hybridto be honest, I
didnt understand why car manufacturers charged a
premium if you were a buyer with a modicum of social
conscience. It didnt have al -wheel drive, which was a real
pain in the neck during a New Hampshire winter, but I
figured that saving the ozone layer was worth sliding off the
road occasional y.
My parents had moved to Lynleya town twenty-six miles
east of Concordseven years ago when my father took
over as rabbi at Temple Beth Or. The catch was that there
was no Temple Beth Or: his reform congregation held
Friday night services in the cafeteria of the middle school,
because the original temple had burned to the ground. The
expectation had been to raise funds for a new temple, but
my father had overestimated the size of his rural New
Hampshire congregation, and although he assured me that
they were closing in on buying land somewhere, I didnt see
it happening anytime soon. By now, anyway, his
congregation had grown used to readings from the Torah
that were routinely punctuated by the cheers of the crowd at
the basketbal game in the gymnasium down the hal .
The biggest single annual contributor to my fathers temple
fund was the ChutZpah, a wel ness retreat for the mind,
body, and soul in the heart of Lynley that was run by my
mother. Although her clientele was nondenominational,
shed garnered a word-of-mouth reputation among temple
sisterhoods, and patrons came from as far away as New
York and Connecticut and even Maryland to relax and
rejuvenate. My mother used salt from the Dead Sea for her
scrubs. Her spa cuisine was kosher. Shed been written up
in Boston magazine, the New York Times, and Luxury
SpaFinder.
The first Saturday of every month, I drove to the spa for a
free massage or facial or pedicure. The catch was that
afterward, I had to suffer through lunch with my mother. We
had it down to a routine. By the time we were served our
passion fruit iced tea, wed already covered “Why Dont
You Cal .” The salad course was “Im Going to Be Dead
Before You Make Me a Grandmother.” The entreefittingly
involved my weight.
Needless to say, we never got around to dessert.
The ChutZpah was white. Not just white, but scary, Im-
afraid-tobreathe white: white carpets, white tiles, white
robes, white slippers. I have no idea how my mother kept
the place so clean, given that when I was growing up, the
house was always comfortably cluttered.
My father says theres a God, although for me the jury is stil
out on that one. Which isnt to say that I didnt appreciate a
miracle as much as the next personsuch as when I went
up to the front desk and the re50
ceptionist told me my mother was going to have to miss our
lunch because of a lastminute meeting with a wholesale
orchid salesman. “But she said you should stil have your
treatment,” the receptionist said.
“DeeDees going to be your aesthetician, and youve got
locker number two twenty.”
I took the robe and slippers she handed me. Locker 220
was in a bank with fifty others, and several toned middle-
aged women were stripping out of their yoga clothes. I
breezed into another section of lockers, one that was
blissful y empty, and changed into my robe. If someone
complained because I was using locker 664 instead, I
didnt think my mother would disown me. I punched in my
key code2358, for ACLUtook a bracing breath, and
tried not to glance in the mirror as I walked by.
There wasnt very much that I liked about the outside of me.
I had curves, but to me, they were in al the wrong places.
My hair was an explosion of dark curls, which could have
been sexy if I didnt have to work so hard to keep them frizz-
free. Id read that stylists on the Oprah show would
straighten the hair of guests with hair like mine, because
curls added ten pounds to the camerawhich meant that
even my hair made objects like me look bigger than they
appeared. My eyes were okaythey were mud-colored on
an average day and green if I felt like embel ishingbut
most of al , they showed the part of me I was proud of: my
intel igence. I might never be a cover girl, but I was a girl
who could cover it al .
The problem was, you never heard anyone say, “Wow,
check out the brain on that babe.”
My father had always made me feel special, but I couldnt
even look at my mother without wondering why I hadnt
inherited her tiny waist and sleek hair. As a kid I had only
wanted to be just like her; as an adult, Id stopped trying.
Sighing, I entered the whirlpool area: a white oasis
surrounded by white wicker benches where primarily white
women waited for their white-coated therapists to cal their
name.
DeeDee appeared in her immaculate jacket, smiling. “You
must be Maggie,” she said. “You look just like your mother
described you.”
I wasnt about to take that bait. “Nice to meet you.” I never
quite figured out the protocol for this part of the experience
you said hel o and then disrobed immediately so that a
total stranger could lay their hands on you … and you paid
for this privilege. Was it just me, or was there a great deal
that spa treatments had in common with prostitution?
“You looking forward to your Song of Solomon Wrap?”
“Id rather be getting a root canal.”
DeeDee grinned. “Your mom told me youd say something
like that, too.”
If you havent had a body wrap, its a singular experience.
Youre lying on a cushy table covered by a giant piece of
Saran Wrap and youre naked. Total y, completely naked.
Sure, the aesthetician tosses a washcloth the size of a
gauze square over your privates when shes scrubbing you
down, and shes got a poker face that never belies whether
shes calculating your body mass index under her palms
but stil , youre painful y aware of your physique, if only
because someones experiencing it firsthand with you.
I forced myself to close my eyes and remember that being
washed beneath a Vichy shower by someone else was
supposed to make me feel like a queen and not a
hospitalized invalid.
“So, DeeDee,” I said. “How long have you been doing
this?”
She unrol ed a towel and held it like a screen as I rol ed
onto my back. “Ive been working at spas for six years, but I
just got hired on here.”
“You must be good,” I said. “My mother doesnt sweat
amateurs.”
She shrugged. “I like meeting new people.”
I like meeting new people, too, but when theyre ful y
clothed.
“What do you do for work?” DeeDee asked.
“My mother didnt tel you?”
“No … she just said” Suddenly she broke off, silent.
“She said what.”
“She, um, told me to treat you to an extra helping of
seaweed scrub.”
“You mean she told you Id need twice as much.”
“She didnt”
“Did she use the word zaftig?” I asked. When DeeDee
didnt answerwiselyI blinked up at the hazy light in the
didnt answerwiselyI blinked up at the hazy light in the
ceiling, listened to Yannis canned piano for a few beats,
and then sighed. “Im an ACLU lawyer.”
“For real?” DeeDees hands stil ed on my feet. “Do you
ever take on cases, like, for free?”
“Thats al I do.”
“Then you must know about the guy on death row … Shay
Bourne?
Ive been writing to him for ten years, ever since I was in
eighth grade and I started as part of an assignment for my
social studies class. His last appeal just got rejected by the
Supreme Court.”
“I know,” I said. “Ive filed briefs on his behalf.”
DeeDees eyes widened. “So youre his lawyer?”
“Wel … no.” I hadnt even been living in New Hampshire
when Bourne was convicted, but it was the job of the ACLU
to file amicus briefs for death row prisoners. Amicus was
Latin for friend of the court; when you had a position on a
particular case but werent directly a party involved in it, the
court would let you legal y spel out your feelings if it might
be beneficial to the decision-making process. My amicus
briefs il ustrated how hideous the death penalty was;
defined it as cruel and unusual punishment, as
unconstitutional. Im quite sure the judge looked at my hard
work and promptly tossed it aside.
“Cant you do something else to help him?” DeeDee
asked.
The truth was, if Bournes last appeal had been rejected by
the Supreme Court, there wasnt much any lawyer could do
to save him now.
“Tel you what,” I promised. “Il look into it.”
DeeDee smiled and covered me with heated blankets until
I was trussed tight as a burrito. Then she sat down behind
me and wove her fingers into my hair. As she massaged
my scalp, my eyes drifted shut.
“They say its painless,” DeeDee murmured. “Lethal
injection.”
They: the establishment, the lawmakers, the ones
assuaging their guilt over their own actions with rhetoric.
“Thats because no one ever comes back to tel them
otherwise,” I said. I thought of Shay Bourne being given the
news of his own impending death. I thought of lying on a
table like this one, being put to sleep.
Suddenly I couldnt breathe. The blankets were too hot, the
cream on my skin too thick. I wanted out of the layers and
began to fight my way free.
“Whoa,” DeeDee said. “Hang on, let me help you.” She
pul ed and peeled and handed me a towel. “Your mother
didnt tel me you were claustrophobic.”
I sat up, drawing great gasps of air into my lungs. Of course
she didnt, I thought. Because shes the one whos
suffocating me.
Lucius
It was late afternoon, almost time for the shift change, and I-
tier was relatively quiet. Me, Id been sick al day, hazing in
and out of sleep brought on by fever. Cal oway, who usual y
played chess with me, was playing with Shay instead.
“Bishop takes a6,” Cal oway cal ed out. He was a racist
bigot, but Cal oway was also the best chess player Id ever
met.
During the day, Batman the Robin resided in his breast
pocket, a smal lump no bigger than a pack of Starburst
candies. Sometimes it crawled onto his shoulder and
pecked at the scars on his scalp. At other times, he kept
Batman in a paperback copy of The Stand that had been
doctored as a hiding placestarting on chapter six, a
square had been cut out of the pages of the thick book with
a pilfered razor blade, creating a little hol ow that Cal oway
lined with tissues to make a bed. The robin ate mashed
potatoes; Cal oway traded precious masking tape and
twine and even a homemade handcuff key for extra
portions.
“Hey,” Cal oway said. “We havent made a wager on this
game.”
Crash laughed. “Even Bourne aint dumb enough to bet you
when hes losing.”
“What have you got that I want?” Cal oway mused.
“Intel igence?” I suggested. “Common sense?”
“Keep out of this, homo.” Cal oway thought for a moment.
“The brownie. I want the damn brownie.”
By now, the brownie was two days old. I doubted that
Cal oway would even be able to swal ow it. What hed
enjoy, mostly, was the act of taking it away from Shay.
“Okay,” Shay said. “Knight to g6.”
I sat up on my bunk. “Okay? Shay, hes beating the pants
off you.”
“How come youre too sick to play, DuFresne, but you dont
mind sticking your two cents into every conversation?”
Cal oway said. “This is between me and Bourne.”
“What if I win?” Shay asked. “What do I get?”
Cal oway laughed. “It wont happen.”
“The bird.”
“Im not giving you Batman”
“Then Im not giving you the brownie.” There was a beat of
silence.
“Fine,” Cal oway said. “You win, you get the bird. But youre
not going to win, because my bishop takes d3. Consider
yourself official y screwed.”
“Queen to h7,” Shay replied. “Checkmate.”
“What?” Cal oway cried. I scrutinized the mental
chessboard Id been trackingShays queen had come out
of nowhere, screened by his knight.
There was nowhere left for Cal oway to go.
At that moment the door to I-tier opened, admitting a pair of
officers in flak jackets and helmets. They marched to
Cal oways cel and brought him onto the catwalk, securing
his handcuffs to a metal railing along the far wal .
There was nothing worse than having your cel searched. In
here, al we had were our belongings, and having them
pored over was a gross invasion of privacy. Not to mention
the fact that when it happened, you had an excel ent chance
of losing your best stash, be that drugs or hooch or
chocolate or art supplies or the stinger rigged from paper
clips to heat up your instant coffee.
They came in with flashlights and long-handled mirrors and
worked systematical y. Theyd check the seams of the
wal s, the vents, the plumbing.
Theyd rol deodorant sticks al the way out to make sure
nothing was hidden underneath. Theyd shake containers of
powder to hear what might be inside. Theyd sniff shampoo
bottles, open envelopes, and take out the letters inside.
Theyd rip off your bedsheets and run their hands over the
mattresses, looking for tears or ripped seams.
Meanwhile, you were forced to watch.
I could not see what was going on in Cal oways cel , but I
had a pretty good idea based on his reactions. He rol ed
his eyes as his blanket was checked for unraveled threads;
his jaw tensed when a postage stamp was peeled off an
envelope, revealing the black tar heroin underneath. But
when his bookshelf was inspected, Cal oway flinched. I
looked for the smal bulge in his breast pocket that would
have been the bird and realized that Batman the Robin was
somewhere inside that cel .
One of the officers held up the copy of The Stand. The
pages were riffled, the spine snapped, the book tossed
against the cel wal . “Whats this?” an officer asked,
focusing not on the bird that had been whipped across the
cel but on the baby-blue tissues that fluttered down over his
boots.
“Nothing,” Cal oway said, but the officer wasnt about to
take his word for it. He picked through the tissues, and
when he didnt find anything, he confiscated the book with
its carved hidey-hole.
Whitaker said something about a write-up, but Cal oway
wasnt listening.
I could not remember ever seeing him quite so unraveled.
As soon as he was released back into his cel , he ran to the
rear corner where the bird had been flung.
The sound that Cal oway Reece made was primordial; but
then maybe that was always the case when a grown man
with no heart started to cry.
There was a crash, and a sickening crunch. A whirlwind of
destruction as Cal oway fought back against what couldnt
be fixed. Final y spent, Cal oway sank down to the floor of
his cel , cradling the dead bird. “Motherfucker.
Motherfucker.”
“Reece,” Shay interrupted, “I want my prize.”
My head snapped around. Surely Shay wasnt stupid
enough to antagonize Cal oway.
“What?” Cal oway breathed. “What did you say?”
“My prize. I won the chess game.”
“Not now,” I hissed.
“Yes, now,” Shay said. “A deals a deal.”
In here, you were only as good as your word, and Cal oway
with his Aryan Brotherhood sensibilitieswould have
known that better than anyone else. “You better make sure
youre always behind those bars,” Cal oway vowed,
“because the next time I get the chance, Im going to mess
you up so bad your own mama wouldnt know you.” But
even as he threatened Shay, Cal oway gently wrapped the
dead bird in a tissue and attached the smal , slight bundle
to the end of his fishing line.
When the robin reached me, I drew it under the three-inch
gap beneath the door of my cel . It stil looked half cooked,
its closed eye translucent blue. One wing was bent at a
severe backward angle; its neck lol ed sideways.
Shay sent out his own line of string, with a weight made of a
regulation comb on one end. I saw his hands gently slide
the robin, wrapped in tissue, into his cel . The lights on the
catwalk flickered.
Ive often imagined what happened next. With an artists
eye, I like to picture Shay sitting on his bunk, cupping his
palms around the tiny bird. I imagine the touch of someone
who loves you so much, he cannot bear to watch you sleep;
and so you wake up with his hand on your heart. In the long
run, though, it hardly matters how Shay did it. What matters
is the result: that we al heard the piccolo tril of that robin;
that Shay pushed the risen bird beneath his cel door onto
the catwalk, where it hopped, like broken punctuation,
toward Cal oways outstretched hand.
June
If youre a mother, you can look into the face of your grown
child and see, instead, the one that peeked up at you from
the folds of a baby blanket. You can watch your eleven-
year-old daughter painting her nails with glitter polish and
remember how she used to reach for you when she wanted
to cross the street. You can hear the doctor say that the real
danger is adolescence, because you dont know how the
heart wil respond to growth spurtsand you can pretend
thats ages away.
“Best two out of three,” Claire said, and from the folds of
her hospital johnny she raised her fist again.
I lifted my hand, too. Rock, paper, scissors, shoot.
“Paper.” Claire grinned. “I win.”
“You total y do not,” I said. “Hel o? Scissors?”
“What I forgot to tel you is that its raining, and the scissors
got rusty, and so you slip the paper underneath them and
carry them away.”
I laughed. Claire shifted slightly, careful not to dislodge al
the tubes and the wires. “Whol feed Dudley?” she asked.
Dudley was our doga thirteen-year-old springer spaniel
who, along with me, was one of the only pieces of continuity
between Claire and her late sister. Claire may never have
met Elizabeth, but they had both grown up draping faux
pearls around Dudleys neck, dressing him up like the
sibling they never had.
“Dont worry about Dudley,” I said. “Il cal Mrs. Morrissey if I
have to.”
Claire nodded and glanced at the clock. “I thought theyd be
back already.”
“I know, baby.”
“What do you thinks taking so long?”
There were a hundred answers to that, but the one that
floated to the top of my mind was that in some other
hospital, two counties away, another mother had to say
good-bye to her child so that I would have a chance to keep
mine.
The technical name for Claires il ness was pediatric
dilated cardiomyopathy. It affected twelve mil ion kids a
year, and it meant that her heart cavity was enlarged and
stretched, that her heart couldnt pump blood out efficiently.
You couldnt fix it or reverse it; if you were lucky you could
live with it. If you werent, you died of congestive heart
failure. In kids, 79 percent of the cases came from an
unknown origin. There was a camp that attributed its onset
to myocarditis and other viral infections during infancy; and
another that claimed it was inherited through a parent who
was a carrier of the defective gene. I had always assumed
the latter was the case with Claire. After al , surely a child
who grew out of grief would be born with a heavy heart.
At first, I didnt know she had it. She got tired more easily
than other infants, but I was stil moving in slow motion
myself and did not notice. It wasnt until she was five,
hospitalized with a flu she could not shake, that she was
diagnosed. Dr. Wu said that Claire had a slight arrhythmia
that might improve and might not; he put her on Captopril,
Lasix, Lanoxin. He said that wed have to wait and see.
On the first day of fifth grade, Claire told me it felt like she
had swal owed a hummingbird. I assumed it was nerves
about starting classes, but hours laterwhen she stood up
to solve a math problem at the chalkboardshe passed
out cold. Progressive arrhythmias made the heart beat like
a bag of wormsit wouldnt eject any blood. Those
basketbal players who seemed so healthy and then
dropped dead on the court? That was ventricular fibril ation,
and it was happening to Claire. She had surgery to implant
an AICDan automatic implantable cardioverter-
defibril ator, or, in simpler terms, a tiny, internal ER resting
right on her heart, which would fix future arrhythmias by
administering an electric shock. She was put on the list for
a transplant.
The transplant game was a tricky oneonce you received
a heart, the clock started ticking, and it wasnt the happy
ending everyone thought it was. You didnt want to wait so
long for a transplant that the rest of the bodily systems
began to shut down. But even a transplant wasnt a miracle:
most recipients could only tolerate a heart for ten or fifteen
years before complications ensued, or there was outright
rejection. Stil , as Dr. Wu said, fifteen years from now, we
might be able to buy a heart off a shelf and have it instal ed
at Best B u y … the idea was to keep Claire alive long
enough to let medical innovation catch up to her.
This morning, the beeper we carried at al times had gone
off.
We have a heart, Dr. Wu had said when I cal ed. Il meet
you at the hospital.
For the past six hours, Claire had been poked, pricked,
scrubbed, and prepped so that the minute the miracle
organ arrived in its little Igloo cooler, she could go straight
into surgery.
This was the moment Id waited for, and dreaded, her
whole life.
What if… I could not even let myself say the words.
Instead, I reached for Claires hand and threaded our
fingers together. Paper and scissors, I thought. We are
between a rock and a hard place. I looked at the fan of her
angel hair on the pil ow, the faint blue cast of her skin, the
fairy-light bones of a girl whose body was stil too much for
her to handle. Sometimes, when I looked at her, I didnt see
her at al ; instead, I pretended that she was“What do you
think shes like?”
I blinked, startled. “Who?”
“The girl. The one who died.”
“Claire,” I said. “Lets not talk about this.”
“Why not? Dont you think we should know al about her if
shes going to be a part of me?”
I touched my hand to her head. “We dont even know its a
girl.”
“Of course its a girl,” Claire said. “It would be total y gross
to have a boys heart.”
“I dont think thats a qualification for a match.”
She shuddered. “It should be.” Claire struggled to push
herself upright so that she was sitting higher in the hospital
bed. “Do you think Il be different?”
I leaned down and kissed her. “You,” I pronounced, “wil
wake up and stil be the same kid who cannot be bothered
to clean her room or walk Dudley or turn out the lights when
she goes downstairs.”
Thats what I said to Claire, anyway. But al I heard were the
first four words: You wil wake up.
A nurse came into the room. “We just got word that the
harvests begun,” she said. “We should have more
information shortly; Dr. Wus on the phone with the team
thats on-site.”
After she left, Claire and I sat in silence. Suddenly, this was
realthe surgeons were going to open up Claires chest,
stop her heart, and sew in a new one. We had both heard
numerous doctors explain the risks and the rewards; we
knew how infrequently pediatric donors came about. Claire
shrank down in the bed, her covers sliding up to her nose.
“If I die,” Claire said, “do you think Il get to be a saint?”
“You wont die.”
“Yeah, I wil . And so wil you. I just might do it a little sooner.”
I couldnt help it; I felt tears wel ing up in my eyes. I wiped
them on the edge of the hospital sheets. Claire fisted her
hand in my hair, the way she used to when she was little. “I
bet Id like it,”
Claire said. “Being a saint.”
Claire had her nose in a book constantly, and recently, her
Joan of Arc fascination had bloomed into al things
martyred.
“You arent going to be a saint.”
“You dont know that for sure,” Claire said.
“Youre not Catholic, for one thing. And besides, they al
died horrible deaths.”
“Thats not always true. You can be kil ed while youre being
good, and that counts. St. Maria Goretti was my age when
she fought off a guy who was raping her and was kil ed and
she got to be one.”
“Thats atrocious,” I said.
“St. Barbara had her eyebal s cut out. And did you know
theres a patron saint of heart patients? John of God?”
“The question is, why do you know theres a patron saint of
heart patients?”
“Duh,” Claire said. “I read about it. Its al you let me do.”
She settled back against the pil ows. “I bet a saint can play
softbal .”
“So can a girl with a heart transplant.”
But Claire wasnt listening; she knew that hope was just
smoke and mirrors; shed learned by watching me. She
looked up at the clock. “I think Il be a saint,” she said, as if
it were entirely up to her. “That way no one forgets you when
youre gone.”
The funeral of a police officer is a breathtaking thing.
Officers and firemen and public officials wil come from
every town in the state and some even farther away. There
is a procession of police cruisers that precedes the hearse;
they blanket the highway like snow.
It took me a long time to remember Kurts funeral, because
I was working so hard at the time to pretend it wasnt
happening.
The police chief, Irv, rode with me to the graveside service.
There were townspeople lining the streets of Lynley, with
handmade signs that read PROTECT AND SERVE, and
THE ULTIMATE SACRIFICE.
It was summertime, and the asphalt sank beneath the heels
of my shoes where I stood. I was surrounded by other
policemen whod worked with Kurt, and hundreds who
didnt, a sea of dress blue.
My back hurt, and my feet were swol en. I found myself
concentrating on a lilac tree that shuddered in the breeze,
petals fal ing like rain.
The police chief had arranged for a twenty-one-gun salute,
and as it finished, five fighter jets rose over the distant violet
mountains. They sliced the sky in paral el lines, and then,
just as they flew overhead, the plane on the far right broke
off like a splinter, soaring east.
When the priest stopped speakingI didnt listen to a word
of it; what could he tel me about Kurt that I didnt already
know?Robbie and Vic stepped forward. They were
Kurts closest friends in the department. Like the rest of the
Lynley force, they had covered their badges with black
fabric. They reached for the flag that draped Kurts coffin
and began to fold it. Their gloved hands moved so fastI
thought of Mickey Mouse, of Donald Duck, with their
oversized white fists. Robbie was the one who put the
triangle into my arms, something to hold on to, something to
take Kurts place.
Through the radios of the other policemen came the voice
of the dispatcher: Al units stand by for a broadcast.
Final cal for Officer Kurt Nealon, number 144.
144, report to 360 West Main for one last assignment.
It was the address of the cemetery.
You wil be in the best of hands. You wil be deeply missed.
244, 20-7. The radio code for end of shift.
I have been told that afterward, I walked up to Kurts coffin. It
was so highly polished I could see my own reflection,
pinched and unfamiliar. It had been special y made, wider
than normal, to accommodate Elizabeth, too.
She was, at seven, stil afraid of the dark. Kurt would lie
down beside her, an elephant perched among pink pil ows
and satin blankets, until she fel asleep; then hed creep out
of the room and turn off the light. Sometimes, she woke up
at midnight shrieking.
You turned it off, shed sob into my shoulder, as if I had
broken her heart.
The funeral director had let me see them. Kurts arms were
wrapped tight around my daughter; Elizabeth rested her
head on his chest. They looked the way they looked on
nights when Kurt fel asleep waiting for Elizabeth to do that
very thing. They looked the way I wished I could: smooth
and clear and peaceful, a pond with a stone unthrown. It
was supposed to be comforting that they would be
together. It was supposed to make up for the fact that I
couldnt go with them.
“Take care of her,” I whispered to Kurt, my breath blowing a
kiss against the gleaming wood. “Take care of my baby.”
As if Id summoned her, Claire moved inside me then: a
slow tumble of butterfly limbs, a memory of why I had to stay
behind.
There was a time when I prayed to saints. What I liked
about them were their humble beginnings: they were
human, once, and so you knew that they just got it in a way
Jesus never would. They understood what it meant to have
your hopes dashed or your promises broken or your
feelings hurt. St.
Therese was my favoritethe one who believed you could
be perfectly ordinary, but that great love could somehow
transport you. However, this was al a long time ago. Life
has a way of pointing out, with great sweeping signs, that
you are looking at the wrong things, doesnt it? It was when I
started to admit to myself that Id rather be dead that I was
given a child who had to fight to stay alive.
In the past month, Claires arrhythmias had worsened. Her
AICD was going off six times a day. Id been told that when
it fired, it felt like an electric current running through the
body. It restarted your heart, but it hurt like hel . Once a
month would be devastating; once a day would be
debilitating. And then there was Claires frequency.
There were support groups for adults who had to live with
AICDs; there were stories of those who preferred the risk of
dying from an arrhythmia to the sure knowledge that they
would be shocked by the device sooner or later. Last week,
I had found Claire in her room reading the Guinness Book
of World Records.
“Roy Sul ivan was struck by lightning seven times over
thirty-six years,” shed said. “Final y, he kil ed himself.” She
lifted her shirt, staring down at the scar on her chest.
“Mom,” she begged, “please make them turn it off.”
I did not know how long I would be able to convince Claire
to stay with me, if this was the way she had to do it.
Claire and I both turned immediately when the hospital door
opened. We were expecting the nurse, but it was Dr. Wu.
He sat down on the edge of the bed and spoke directly to
Claire, as if she were my age instead of eleven. “The heart
we had in mind for you had something wrong with it. The
team didnt know until they got inside … but the right
ventricle is dilated. If it isnt functioning now, chances are it
wil only get worse by the time the hearts transplanted.”
“So … I cant have it?” Claire asked.
“No. When I give you a new heart, I want it to be the
healthiest heart possible,” the doctor explained.
My body felt stiff. “I dontI dont understand.”
Dr. Wu turned. “Im sorry, June. Todays not going to be the
day.”
“But it could take years to find another donor,” I said. I didnt
add the rest of my sentence, because I knew Wu could hear
it anyway: Claire cant last that long.
“Wel just hope for the best,” he said.
After he left, we sat in stunned silence for a few moments.
Had I done this? Had the fear Id tried to quashthe one
that Claire wouldnt survive this operationsomehow bled
into reality?
Claire began to pul the cardiac monitors off her chest.
“Wel ,”
she said, but I could hear the hitch in her voice as she
struggled not to cry. “What a total waste of a Saturday.”
“You know,” I said, forcing the words to unrol evenly, “you
were named for a saint.”
“For real?”
I nodded. “She founded a group of nuns cal ed the Poor
Clares.”
She glanced at me. “Why did you pick her?”
Because, on the day you were born, the nurse who handed
you to me shook her head and said, “Now theres a sight
for sore eyes.” And you were. And she is the patron saint of
that very thing. And I wanted you protected, from the very
first moment I spoke your name.
“I liked the way it sounded,” I lied, and I held up Claires shirt
so that she could shimmy into it.
We would leave this hospital, maybe go get chocolate
Fribbles at Friendlys and rent a movie with a happy
ending. Wed take Dudley for a walk and feed him. Wed
act like this was an ordinary day. And after she went to
sleep, I would bury my face in my pil ow and let myself feel
everything I wasnt letting myself feel right now: shame over
knowing that Ive had five more years in Claires company
than I did with Elizabeth, guilt over being reC
lieved this transplant did not happen, since it might just as
easily kil Claire as save her.
Claire stuffed her feet into her pink Converse high-tops.
“Maybe Il join the Poor Clares.”
“You stil cant be a saint,” I said. And added silently,
Because I wil not let you die.
Lucius
Shortly after Shay brought Batman the Robin back to life,
Crash Vitale lit himself on fire.
Hed created a makeshift match the way we al doby
pul ing the fluorescent bulb out of its cradle and holding the
metal tines just far enough away from the socket to have the
electricity arc to meet it. Stick a piece of paper in the gap,
and it becomes a torch. Crash had crumpled up pages of a
magazine and set them around himself in a circle. By the
time Texas started screaming for help, smoke was fil ing
the pod. The COs held the fire hose at ful spray as they
opened his cel door; we could hear Crash being knocked
against the far wal by the stream. Dripping wet, he was
strapped onto a gurney to be transported, his hair a matted
mess, his eyes wild. “Hey, Green Mile,” he yel ed as he was
wheeled off the tier, “how come you didnt save me?”
“Because I like the bird,” Shay murmured.
I was the first one to laugh, then Texas snickered. Joey, too-
but only because Crash wasnt present to shut him up.
“Bourne,” Cal oway said, the first words any of us had heard
from him since the bird had hopped back to his cel .
“Thanks.”
There was a beat of silence. “It deserved another chance,”
Shay said.
The pod door buzzed open, and this time CO Smythe
walked in with the nurse, doing her evening rounds. Alma
came to my cel first, holding out my card of pil s. “Smel s
like someone had a barbecue in here and forgot to invite
me,” she said. She waited for me to put the pil s in my
mouth, take a swal ow of water. “You sleep wel , Lucius.”
As she left, I walked to the front of the cel . Rivulets of water
ran down the cement catwalk. But instead of leaving the
tier, Alma stopped in front of Cal oways cel . “Inmate
Reece, are you going to let me take a look at that arm?”
Cal oway hunched over, protecting the bird he held in his
hand. We al knew he was holding Batman; we al held our
col ective breath. What if Alma saw the bird? Would she rat
him out?
I should have known Cal oway would never let that happen
hed be offensive enough to scare her off before she got
too close. But before he could speak, we heard a fluted
chirpnot from Cal oways cel but from Shays.
There was an answering cal -the robin looking for its own
kind. “What the hel s that?” CO Smythe asked, looking
around. “Wheres it coming from?”
Suddenly, a twitter rose from Joeys cel , and then a higher
cheep from Pogies. To my surprise, I even heard a tweet
come from the vicinity of my own bunk. I wheeled around,
tracing it to the louvers of the vent. Was there a whole
colony of robins in here? Or was it Shay, a ventriloquist in
addition to a magician, this time throwing his voice?
Smythe moved down the tier, hands covering his ears as
he peered at the skylight and into the shower cel to find the
source of the noise. “Smythe?”
an officer said over the control booth intercom. “What the
hel s going on?”
A place like this wears down everything, and tolerance is
no exception.
In here, coexistence passes for forgiveness. You do not
learn to like something you abhor; you come to live with it.
Its why we submit when we are told to strip; its why we
deign to play chess with a child molester; its why we quit
crying ourselves to sleep. You live and let live, and
eventual y that becomes enough.
Which maybe explains why Cal oways muscled arm
snaked through the open trap of his door, his “Anita Bryant”
patch shadowing his biceps.
Alma blinked, surprised.
“I wont hurt you,” she murmured, peering at the new skin
growing where it had been grafted, stil pink and evolving.
She took a pair of latex gloves out of her pocket and
snapped them on, making her hands just as lily-white as
Cal oways. And wouldnt you know itthe moment Alma
touched him, al of that crazy noise fel dead silent.
M I CHAEL
A priest has to say Mass every day, even if no one shows
up, although this was rarely the case. In a city as large as
Concord there were usual y at least a handful of
parishioners, already praying the rosary by the time I came
out in my vestments.
I was just at the part of the Mass where miracles occurred.
“For this is my body, which wil be given up for you,” I said
aloud, then genuflected and lifted the host.
Next to “How the heck is one God also a Holy Trinity?” the
most common question I got asked as a priest by non-
Catholics was about transubstantiation: the belief that at
consecration, the elements of bread and wine truly became
the Body and Blood of Christ. I could see why people were
baffledif this was true, wasnt Holy Communion
cannibalistic? And if a change real y occurred, why couldnt
you see it?
When I went to church as a kid, long before I came back to
it, I received Holy Communion like everyone else, but I
didnt real y give much thought to what I received. It looked,
to me, like a cracker and a cup of wine … before and after
the priest consecrated it. I can tel you now that it stil looks
like a cracker and a cup of wine. The miracle part comes
down to philosophy. It isnt the accidents of an object that
make it what it is … its the essential parts. Wed stil be
human even if we didnt have limbs or teeth or hair; but if we
suddenly stopped being mammals, that wouldnt be the
case. When I consecrated the host and the wine at Mass,
the very substance of the elements changed; it was the
other propertiesthe shape, the taste, the sizethat
remained the same. Just like John the Baptist saw a man
and knew, right away, that he was looking at God; just like
the wise men came upon a baby and knew He was our
Savior … every day I held what looked like crackers and
wine but actual y was Jesus.
For this very reason, from this point on in the Mass, my
fingers and thumb would be kept pinched together until
washed after the Sacrament of the Eucharist. Not even the
tiniest particle of the consecrated host could be lost; we
went to great pains to make sure of this when disposing of
the leftovers from Holy Communion. But just as I was
thinking this, the wafer slipped out of my hand.
I felt the way I had when, in third grade, during the Little
League play-offs, Id watched a pop fly come into my corner
of left field too fast and too highknotted with the need to
catch it, sick with the knowledge that I wouldnt. Frozen, I
watched the host tumble, safely, into the bel y of the chalice
of wine.
“Five-second rule,” I murmured, and I reached into the
chalice and snagged it.
The wine had already begun to soak into the wafer. I
watched, amazed, as a jaw took shape, an ear, an
eyebrow.
Father Walter had visions. He said that the reason he
became a priest in the first place was because, as an altar
boy, a statue of Jesus had reached for his robe and
tugged, tel ing him to stay the course.
More recently, Mary had appeared to him in the rectory
kitchen when he was frying trout, and suddenly they began
leaping in the pan. Dont let a single one fal to the floor,
shed warned, and then disappeared.
There were hundreds of priests who excel ed at their cal ing
but never received this sort of divine intercessionand yet,
I didnt want to fal among their ranks. Like the teens I
worked with, I understood the need for miraclesthey kept
reality from paralyzing you. So I stared at the wafer, hoping
the wine-sketched features would solidify into a portrait of
Jesus … and instead I found myself looking at something
else entirely. The shaggy dark hair that looked more like a
grunge-band drummer than a priest, the nose broken while
wrestling in junior high.
the razor stubble. Engraved onto the surface of the host,
with a printmakers delicacy, was a picture of me.
What is my head doing on the body of Christ? I thought as I
placed the host on the paten, plum-stained and dissolving
already. I lifted the chalice. “This is my blood,” I said.
June
When Shay Bourne was working at our house as a
carpenter, he gave Elizabeth a birthday present. Made of
scrap wood and crafted after hours wherever he went when
he left our house, it was a smal , hinged chest. He had
carved it intricately, so that each face portrayed a different
fairy, dressed in the trappings of the seasons.
Summer had bright peony wings, and a crown made of the
sun. Spring was covered in climbing vines, and a bridal
train of flowers swept beneath her. Autumn wore the jewel
tones of sugar maples and aspen trees, the cap of an
acorn balanced on her head.
And Winter skated across a frozen lake, leaving a trail of
silver frost in her wake. The cover was a painted picture of
the moon, rising through a field of stars with its arms
outstretched toward a sun that was just out of reach.
Elizabeth loved that box. The night that Shay gave it to her,
she lined it with blankets and slept inside. When Kurt and I
told her she couldnt do that againwhat if the top fel on
her while she was sleeping?she turned it into a cradle for
her dol s, then a toy chest. She named the fairies.
Sometimes I heard her talking to them.
After Elizabeth died, I took the box out to the yard, planning
to destroy it. There I was, eight months pregnant and
grieving, swinging Kurts axe, and at the last minute, I could
not do it. It was what Elizabeth had treasured; how could I
stand to lose that, too? I put the box in the attic, where it
remained for years.
knew it was there, buried behind our luggage and old
toddler clothes and paintings with broken frames. When
Claire was about ten, I found her trying to lug the box
downstairs. “Its so pretty,”
she said, winded with the effort. “And no ones using it.” I
snapped at her and told her to go lie down and rest.
But Claire kept asking about it, and eventual y I brought the
box to her room, where it sat at the end of her bed, just like
it had for Elizabeth. I never told her whod carved it. And yet
sometimes, when Claire was at school, I found myself
peeking inside. I wondered if Pandora, too, wished she had
scrutinized the contents firstheartache, cleverly disguised
as a gift.
Lucius
It had been said, among those on I-tier, that I had achieved
Bassmaster status when it came to fishing. My equipment
was a sturdy line made from yarn Id stored up over the
years, tempered by weighta comb, or a deck of cards,
depending on what I was angling for. I was known for my
ability to fish from my cel into Crashs, at the far end of the
tier; and then down to the shower cel at the other end. I
suppose this was why, when Shay cast out his own line, I
found myself watching out of curiosity.
It was after One Life to Live but before Oprah, the time of
day when most of the guys napped. I myself was not feeling
so wel . The sores in my mouth made it difficult to speak; I
had to keep using the toilet. The skin around my eyes,
stained by Kaposis sarcoma, had swol en to the point
where I could barely see. Then suddenly, Shays fishing line
whizzed into the narrow space beneath my cel door. “Want
some?” he asked.
When we fish, its to get something. We trade magazines;
we barter food; we pay for drugs. But Shay didnt want
anything, except to give.
Wired to the end of his line was a piece of Bazooka bubble
gum.
Its contraband. Gum can be used as putty to build al sorts
of things, and to tamper with locks. God only knew where
Shay had come across this bountyand, even more
astounding, why he wouldnt just hoard it.
I swal owed, and my throat nearly split along a fault line. “No
thanks,”
I rasped.
I sat up on my bunk and peeled the sheet off the plastic
mattress. One of the seams had been careful y doctored by
me. The thread, laced like a footbal , could be loosened
enough for me to rummage around inside the foam
padding. I jammed my forefinger inside, scooping out my
stash.
There were the 3TC pil sEpivirand the Sustiva.
Retrovir. Lomotil for my diarrhea. Al the medications that,
for weeks, Alma had watched me place on my tongue and
apparently swal owwhen in fact they were tucked up high
in the purse of my cheek.
I had not yet made up my mind whether I would use these to
kil myself … or if Id just continue to save them instead of
ingest them: a slower but stil sure suicide.
Its funny how when you are dying, you stil fight for the upper
hand.
You want to pick the terms; you want to choose the date.
Youl tel yourself anything you have to, to pretend that
youre stil the one in control.
“Joey,” Shay said. “Want some?” He cast again, his line
arcing over the catwalk.
“For real?” Joey asked. Most of us just pretended Joey
wasnt around; it was safer for him. No one went out of their
way to acknowledge him, much less offer him something as
precious as a piece of gum.
“I want some,” Cal oway demanded. He must have seen the
bounty going by, since his cel was between Shays and
Joeys.
“Me, too,” Crash said.
Shay waited for Joey to take the gum, and then pul ed his
line gently closer, until it was within reach of Cal oway.
“Theres plenty.”
“How many pieces you got?” Crash asked.
“Just the one.”
Now, youve seen a piece of Bazooka gum. Maybe you can
split it with a friend. But to divvy up one single piece among
seven greedy men?
Shays fishing line whipped to the left, past my cel en route
to Crashs.
“Take some and pass it on,” Shay said.
“Maybe I want the whole thing.”
“Maybe you do.”
“Fuck,” Crash said. “Im taking it al .”
“If thats what you need,” Shay replied.
I stood up, unsteady, and crouched down as Shays fishing
line reached Pogies cel . “Have some,” Shay offered.
“But Crash took the whole piece”
“Have some.”
I could hear paper being unwrapped, the ful ness of Pogie
speaking around the bounty softening in his mouth. “I aint
had chewing gum since 2001.”
By now, I could smel it. The pinkness, the sugar. I began to
salivate.
“Oh, man,” Texas breathed, and then everyone chewed in
silence, except for me.
Shays fishing line swung between my own feet. “Try it,” he
urged.
I reached for the packet on the end of the line. Since six
other men had already done the same, I expected to see
only a fragment remaining, a smidgen of gum, if anything at
al yet, to my surprise, the piece of Bazooka was intact. I
ripped the gum in half and put a piece into my mouth.
The rest I wrapped up, and then I tugged on Shays line. I
watched it zip away, back to his own cel .
At first I could barely stand itthe sweetness against the
sores in my mouth, the sharp edges of the gum before it
softened. It brought tears to my eyes to so badly want
something that I knew would cause great pain. I held up my
hand, ready to spit the gum out, when the most remarkable
thing happened: my mouth, my throat, they stopped aching,
as if there were an anesthetic in the gum, as if I were no
longer an AIDS patient but an ordinary man whod picked
up this treat at the gas station counter after fil ing his tank in
preparation for driving far, far away. My jaw moved,
rhythmic. I sat down on the floor of my cel , crying as I
chewednot because it hurt, but because it didnt.
We were silent for so long that CO Whitaker came in to see
what we were up to; and what he found, of course, was not
what he had expected.
Seven men, imagining childhoods that we al wished wed
had. Seven men, blowing bubbles as bright as the moon.
For the first time in nearly six months, I slept through the
night. I woke up rested and relaxed, without any of the
stomach knotting that usual y con78
sumed me for the first two hours of every day. I walked to
the basin, squeezed toothpaste onto the stubby brush they
gave us, and glanced up at the wavy sheet of metal that
passed for a mirror.
Something was different.
The sores, the Kaposis sarcoma that had spotted my
cheeks and inflamed my eyelids for a year now, were gone.
My skin was clear as a river.
I leaned forward for a better look. I opened up my mouth,
tugged my lower lip, searching in vain for the blisters and
cankers that had kept me from eating.
“Lucius,” I heard, a voice spil ing from the vent over my
head. “Good morning.”
I glanced up. “It is, Shay. God, yes, it is.”
In the end, I didnt have to cal for a medical consult. Officer
Whitaker was shocked enough at my improved
appearance to cal Alma himself. I was taken into the
attorney-client cel so that she could draw my blood, and an
hour later, she came back to my own cel to tel me what I
already knew.
“Your CD4+ is 1250,” Alma said. “And your viral loads
undetectable.”
“Thats good, right?”
“Its normal. Its what someone who doesnt have AIDS
would look like if we drew his blood.” She shook her head.
“Looks to me like your drug regimens kicked in in a big
way”
“Alma,” I said, and I glanced behind her at Officer Whitaker
before peeling the sheet off my mattress and ripping open
my hiding place for pil s. I brought them to her, spil ed
several dozen into her hand. “I havent been taking my
meds for months.”
Color rose in her cheeks. “Then this isnt possible.”
“Its not probable,” I corrected. “Anythings possible.”
She stuffed the pil s into her pocket. “Im sure theres a
medical explanation”
“Its Shay.”
“Inmate Bourne?”
“He did this,” I said, wel aware of how insane it sounded,
and yet desperate to make her understand. “I saw him bring
a dead bird back to life.
And take one piece of gum and turn it into enough for al of
us. He made wine come out of our faucets the first night he
was here …”
“Okey-dokey. Officer Whitaker, let me see if we can get a
psych consult for-“
“Im not crazy, Alma; Imwel , Im healed.” I reached for her
hand.
“Havent you ever seen something with your own eyes that
you never imagined possible?”
She darted a glance at Cal oway Reece, who had
submitted to her ministrations now for seven days straight.
“He did that, too,” I whispered. “I know it.”
Alma walked out of my cel and stood in front of Shays. He
was listening to his television, wearing headphones.
“Bourne,” Whitaker barked.
“Cuffs.”
After his wrists were secured, the door to his cel was
opened. Alma stood in the gap with her arms crossed.
“What do you know about Inmate DuFresnes condition?”
Shay didnt respond.
“Inmate Bourne?”
“He cant sleep much,” Shay said quietly. “It hurts him to
eat.”
“Hes got AIDS. But suddenly, this morning, thats al
changed,” Alma said. “And for some reason, Inmate
DuFresne thinks you had something to do with it.”
“I didnt do anything.”
Alma turned to the CO. “Did you see any of this?”
Traces of alcohol were found in the plumbing on I-tier,”
Whitaker admitted.
“And believe me, it was combed for a leak, but nothing
conclusive was found. And yeah, I saw them al chewing
gum. But Bournes cel s been tossed religiouslyand
weve never found any contraband.”
“I didnt do anything,” Shay repeated. “It was them.”
Suddenly, he stepped toward Alma, animated. “Are you
here for my heart?”
“What?”
“My heart. I want to donate it, after I die.” I heard him
rummaging around in his box of possessions. “Here,” he
said, giving Alma a piece of paper. “This is the girl who
needs it. Lucius wrote her name down for me.”
“I dont know anything about that…”
“But you can find out, right? You can talk to the right
people?”
Alma hesitated, and then her voice went soft, the flannel-
bound way she used to speak to me when the pain was so
great that I could not see past it. “I can talk,” she said.
It is an odd thing to be watching television and know that in
reality, it is happening right outside your door. Crowds had
flooded the parking lot of the prison. Camping out on the
stairs of the parole office entrance were folks in
wheelchairs, elderly women with walkers, mothers clutching
sick infants to their chests. There were gay couples, mostly
one man supporting another frail, il partner; and crackpots
holding up signs with scriptural references about the end of
the world. Lining the street that led past the cemetery and
downtown were the news vanslocal affiliates, and even a
crew from FOX in Boston.
Right now, a reporter from ABC 22 was interviewing a
young mother whose son had been born with severe
neurological damage. She stood beside the boy, in his
motorized wheelchair, one hand resting on his forehead.
“What would I like?” she said, repeating the reporters
question. “Id like to know that he knows me.” She smiled
faintly. “Thats not too greedy, is it?”
The reporter faced the camera. “Bob, so far theres been
no confirmation or denial from the administration that any
miraculous behavior has in fact taken place within the
Concord state prison. We have been told, however, by an
unnamed source, that these occurrences stemmed from the
desire of New Hampshires sole death row inmate, Shay
Bourne, to donate his organs post-execution.”
I yanked my headphones down to my neck. “Shay,” I cal ed
out. “Are you listening to this?”
“We got us our own celebrity,” Crash said.
The brouhaha began to upset Shay. “Im who Ive always
been,” he said, his voice escalating. “Im who Il always be.”
Just then two officers arrived, escorting someone we rarely
saw: Warden Coyne. A burly man with a flattop on which
you could have served dinner, he stood beside the cel
while Officer Whitaker told Shay to strip.
His scrubs were shaken out, and then he was al owed to
dress again before he was shackled to the wal across from
our cel s.
The officers started to toss Shays house-upending the
meal he hadnt finished, yanking his headphones out of the
television, overturning his smal box of property. They
ripped his mattress, bal ed up his sheets. They ran their
hands along the edges of his sink, his toilet, his bunk.
“You got any idea, Bourne, whats going on outside?” the
warden said, but Shay just stood with his head tucked into
his shoulder, like Cal oways robin did when he slept “You
care to tel me what youre trying to prove?”
At Shays pronounced silence, the warden began to walk
the length of our tier. “What about you?” he cal ed out to the
rest of us. “And I wil inform you that those who cooperate
with me wil not be punished. I cant promise anything for
the rest of you.”
Nobody spoke.
Warden Coyne turned to Shay. “Where did you get the
gum?”
“There was only one piece,” Joey Kunz blurted, the snitch.
“But it was enough for al of us.”
“You some kind of magician, son?” the warden said, his
face inches away from Shays. “Or did you hypnotize them
into believing they were getting something they werent? I
know about mind control, Bourne.”
“I didnt do anything,” Shay murmured.
Officer Whitaker stepped closer. “Warden Coyne, theres
nothing in his cel . Not even in his mattress. His blankets
intact-if hes been fishing with it, then he managed to weave
the strings back together when he was done.”
I stared at Shay. Of course hed fished with his blanket; Id
seen the line hed made with my own eyes. Id untied the
bubble gum from the braided blue strand.
“Im watching you, Bourne,” the warden hissed. “I know what
youre up to. You know damn wel your heart isnt going to
be worth anything once its pumped ful of potassium
chloride in a death chamber. Youre doing this because
youve got no appeals left, but even if you get Barbara
freaking Walters to do an interview with you, the sympathy
votes not going to change your execution date.”
The warden stalked off I-tier. Officer Whitaker released
Shays handcuffs from the bar where he was tethered and
led him back to his cel .
“Listen, Bourne. Im Catholic.”
“Good for you,” Shay replied.
“I thought Catholics were against the death penalty,” Crash
said.
“Yeah, dont do him any favors,” Texas added.
Whitaker glanced down the tier, where the warden stood
outside the soundproof glass, talking to another officer.
“The thing i s … if you want…
I could ask one of the priests from St. Catherines to visit.”
He paused.
“Maybe he can help with the whole heart thing.”
Shay stared at him. “Why would you do that for me?”
The officer fished inside the neck of his shirt, pul ing out a
length of chain and the crucifix that was attached to the end
of it. He brought it to his lips, then let it fal beneath his
uniform again. “He that believeth on me,” Whitaker
murmured, “believeth not on me, but on him that sent me.”
I did not know the New Testament, but I recognized a
biblical passage when I heard oneand it didnt take a
rocket scientist to realize that he was suggesting Shays
antics, or whatever you wanted to cal them, were heaven-
sent. I realized then that even though Shay was a prisoner,
he had a certain power over Whitaker. He had a certain
power over al of us. Shay Bourne had done what no brute
force or power play or gang threat had been able to do al
the years Id been on I-tier: hed brought us together.
Next door, Shay was slowly putting his cel to rights. The
news pro gram was wrapping up with another birds-eye
view of the state prison.
From the helicopter footage, you could see how many
people had gathered, how many more were heading this
way.
I sat down on my bunk. It wasnt possible, was it?
My own words to Alma came back to me: Its not probable.
Anythings possible.
I pul ed my art supplies out of my hiding spot in the
mattress, riffling through my sketches for the one Id done of
Shay being wheeled off the tier after his seizure. Id drawn
him on the gurney, arms spread and tied down, legs
banded together, eyes raised to the ceiling. I turned the
paper ninety degrees. This way, it didnt look like Shay was
lying down. It looked like he was being crucified.
People were always “finding” Jesus in jail. What if he was
already here?
“I dont want to achieve immortality through my work; I want
to achieve immortality through not dying.”
-WOODY ALLEN, QUOTED IN WOODY ALLEN AND HIS
COMEDY, BY ERIC LAX
Maggie
There were many things I was grateful for, including the fact
that I was no longer in high school. Lets just say it wasnt a
walk in the park for a girl who didnt fit into the smorgasbord
of clothing at the Gap, and who tried to become invisible so
she wouldnt be noticed for her size. Today, I was in a
different school and it was ten years later, but I was stil
suffering from a flashback anxiety attack. It didnt matter
that I was wearing my Jones New York Im-going-to-court
suit; it didnt matter that I was old enough to be mistaken for
a teacher instead of a studentI stil expected a footbal
jock to turn the corner, at any moment, and make a fat joke.
Topher Renfrew, the boy who was sitting beside me in the
lobby of the high school, was dressed in black jeans and a
frayed T-shirt with an anarchy symbol, a guitar pick strung
around his neck on a leather lanyard.
Cut him, and hed bleed antiestablishment. His iPod
earphones hung down the front of his shirt like a doctors
stethoscope; and as he read the decision handed down by
the court just an hour before, his lips mouthed the words.
“So, what does al this bul shit mean?” he asked.
“That you won,” I explained. “If you dont want to say the
Pledge of Al egiance, you dont have to.”
“What about Karshank?”
His homeroom teacher, a Korean War veteran, had sent
Topher to detention every time he refused to say the
Pledge. It had led to a letterwriting campaign by my office
(wel , me) and then wed gone to court to protect his civil
liberties.
Topher handed me back the decision. “Sweet,” he said.
“Any chance you can get pot legalized?”
“Uh, not my area of expertise. Sorry.” I shook Tophers
hand, congratulated him, and headed out of the school.
It was a day for celebrationI unrol ed the windows of the
Prius, even though it was cold outside, and turned up
Aretha on the CD player.
Mostly, my cases got shot down by the courts; I spent more
time fighting than I did getting a response. As one of three
ACLU attorneys in New Hampshire, I was a champion of
the First Amendmentfreedom of speech, freedom of
religion, freedom to organize. In other words, I looked real y
great on paper, but in reality, it meant I had become an
expert letter writer. I wrote on behalf of the teenagers who
wanted to wear their Hooters shirts to school, or the gay kid
who wanted to bring his boyfriend to the prom; I wrote to
take the cops to task for enforcing DWBdriving while
blackwhen statistics showed they corral ed more
minorities than whites for routine traffic stops. I spent
countless hours at community meetings, negotiating with
local agencies, the AGs office, the police departments, the
schools. I was the splinter they couldnt get rid of, the thorn
in their side, their conscience.
I took out my cel phone and dialed my mothers number at
the spa.
“Guess what,” I said when she picked up. “I won.”
“Maggie, thats fantastic. Im so proud of you.” There was
the slightest beat. “What did you win?”
“My case! The one I was tel ing you about last weekend at
dinner?”
“The one against the community col ege whose mascot is
an Indian?”
“Native American. And no,” I said. “I lost that one, actual y. I
was talking about the Pledge case. And”I pul ed out my
trump card“I think Im going to be on the news tonight.
There were cameras al over the courthouse.”
I listened to my mother drop the phone, yel ing to her staff
about her famous daughter. Grinning, I hung up, only to
have the cel ring against my palm again. “What were you
wearing?” my mother asked.
“My Jones New York suit.”
My mother hesitated. “Not the pin-striped one?”
“Whats that supposed to mean?”
“Im just asking.”
“Yes, the pin-striped one,” I said. “Whats wrong with it?”
“Did I say there was anything wrong with it?”
“You didnt have to.” I swerved to avoid a slowing car. “I
have to go,”
I said, and I hung up, tears stinging.
It rang again. “Your mothers crying,” my father said.
“Wel , that makes two of us. Why cant she just be happy for
me?”
“She is, honey. She thinks youre too critical.”
Tin too critical? Are you kidding?”
“I bet Marcia Clarks mother asked her what she was
wearing to the O.J. trial,” my father said.
“I bet Marcia Clarks mother doesnt get her daughter
exercise videos for Chanukah.”
“I bet Marcia Clarks mother doesnt get her anything for
Chanukah,”
my father said, laughing. “Her Christmas stocking, though
… I hear its ful of The Firm DVDs.”
A smile twitched at the corners of my mouth. In the
background, I could hear the rising strains of a crying baby.
“Where are you?”
“At a bris,” my father said. “And Id better go, because the
mohels giving me dirty looks, and believe me, I dont want
to upset him before he does a circumcision. Cal me later
and tel me every last detail. Your mothers going to TiVo the
news for us.”
I hung up and tossed my phone into the passenger seat. My
father, who had made a living out of studying Jewish law,
was always good at seeing the gray areas between the
black-and-white letters. My mother, on the other hand, had
a remarkable talent for taking a celebratory day and ruining
it. I pul ed into my driveway and headed into my house,
where Oliver met me at the front door. “I need a drink,” I told
him, and he cocked an ear, because after al it was only
11:45 a.m. I went straight to the refrigeratorin spite of
what my mother likely imagined, the only food inside of it
was ketchup, a jar of pimientos, Ol ies carrots, and yogurt
with an expiration date from Bil Clintons administration
and poured myself a glass of Yel ow Tail chardonnay I
wanted to be pleasantly buzzed before I turned on the
television set, where no doubt my fifteen minutes of fame
was now going to be marred by a suit with stripes that
made my already plus-size butt look positively planetary.
Oliver and I settled onto the couch just as the theme song
for the midday news spil ed into my living room. The anchor,
a woman with a blond helmet head, smiled into the camera.
Behind her was a graphic of an American flag with a line
through it, and the caption NO PLEDGE? “In todays top
story, a winning decision was handed down in the case of
the high school student who refused to say the Pledge of
Al egiance.” The screen fil ed with a video of the courthouse
steps, where you could see my face with a bouquet of
microphones thrust under my nose.
Dammit, I did look fat in this suit.
“In a stunning victory for individual civil liberties,” I began
onscreen, and then a bright blue BREAKING NEWS
banner obliterated my face. The picture switched to a live
feed in front of the state prison, where there were squatters
with tents and people holding placards and … was that a
chorus line of wheelchairs?
The reporters hair was being whipped into a frenzy by the
wind. “Im Janice Lee, reporting live from the New
Hampshire State Prison for Men in Concord, which houses
the man other inmates are cal ing the Death Row Messiah.”
I picked up Oliver and sat down, cross-legged, in front of
the television.
Behind the reporter were dozens of peopleI couldnt tel if
they were picketing or protesting. Some stuck out from the
crowd: the man with the sandwich board that read JOHN
3:16, the mother clutching a limp child, the smal knot of
nuns praying the rosary.
“This is a fol ow-up to our initial report,” the reporter said, “in
which we chronicled the inexplicable events that have
occurred since inmate Shay BourneNew Hampshires
only death row inhabitantexpressed his desire to donate
his organs post-execution. Today there might be scientific
proof that these incidents arent magic … but something
more.”
The screen fil ed with a uniformed officers face
Correctional Officer Rick Whitaker, according to the
caption beneath him. “The first one was the tap water,” he
said. “One night, when I was on duty, the inmates got
intoxicated, and sure enough the pipes tested positive for
alcohol residue one day, although the water source tested
perfectly normal. Some of the inmates have mentioned a
bird being brought back to life, although I didnt witness that
myself. But Id have to say the most dramatic change
involved Inmate DuFresne.”
The reporter again: “According to sources, inmate Lucius
DuFresnean AIDS patient in the final stages of the
diseasehas been miraculously cured. On tonights six
oclock report, wel talk to physicians at Dartmouth-
Hitchcock Medical Center about whether this can be
explained medical y … but for the newly converted fol owers
of this Death Row Messiah,” the reporter said, gesturing to
the crowds behind her, “anythings possible. This is Janice
Lee, reporting from Concord.”
Then I saw a familiar face in the crowd behind the reporter
DeeDee, the spa technician whod given me my body
wrap. I remembered tel ing her that Id look into Shay
Bournes case.
I picked up the phone and dialed my boss at the office. “Are
you watching the news?”
Rufus Urqhart, the head of the ACLU in New Hampshire,
had two televisions on his desk that he kept tuned to
different channels so that he didnt miss a thing. “Yeah,” he
said. “I thought you were supposed to be on.”
“I got preempted by the Death Row Messiah.”
“Cant beat divinity,” Rufus said.
“Exactly,” I replied. “Rufus, I want to work on his behalf.”.
“Wake up, sweetheart, you already are. At least, you were
supposed to be filing amicus briefs,” Rufus said.
“NoI mean, I want to take him on as a client. Give me a
week,” I begged.
“Listen, Maggie, this guys already been through the state
court, the first circuit of the federal court, and the Supreme
Court. If I remember correctly, they punted last year and
denied cert. Bournes exhausted al his appeals … I dont
real y see how we can reopen the door.”
“If he thinks hes the Messiah,” I said, “he just gave us a
crowbar.”
The Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act
of 2000 didnt actual y come into play until five years later,
when the Supreme Court upheld the decision in the case of
Cutter v. Wilkinson, where a bunch of Ohio prisoners who
were Satanists sued the state for not accommodating their
religious needs. As long as a prison guaranteed the right to
practice religionwithout forcing religion on those who
didnt want to practice itthe law was constitutional.
“Satanists?” my mother said, putting down her knife and
fork. “Thats what this guy is?”
I was at their house, having dinner, like I did every Friday
night before they went to Shabbat services. My mother
would invite me on Monday, and Id tel her Id have to wait
and see whether anything came uplike a date, or
Armageddon, both of which had the same likelihood of
occurring in my life. And then, of course, by Friday, Id find
myself passing the roasted potatoes and listening to my
father say the kiddush over the wine.
“I have no idea,” I told her. “I havent met with him.”
“Do Satanists have messiahs?” my father asked.
“Youre missing the point, both of you. Legal y, theres a
statute that says that even prisoners have a right to practice
their religion as long as it doesnt interfere with the running
of the prison.” I shrugged. “Besides, what if he is the
Messiah? Arent we moral y obligated to save his life if hes
here to save the world?”
My father cut a slice of his brisket. “Hes not the Messiah.”
“And you know this because … ?”
“He isnt a warrior. He hasnt maintained the sovereign
state of Israel.
He hasnt ushered in world peace. And okay, so maybe
hes brought something dead back to life, but if he was the
Messiah he would have resurrected everyone. And if that
was the case, your grandparents would be here right now
asking if there was more gravy.”
“Theres a difference between a Jewish messiah, Dad, and
… wel …
the other one.”
“What makes you think that there might be more than one?”
he asked.
“What makes you think there might not?” I shot back.
My mother threw her napkin down. “Im getting a Tylenol,”
she said, and left the table.
My father grinned at me. “You would have made such a
good rabbi, Mags.”
“Yeah, if only that pesky religion thing didnt keep getting in
the way.”
I had, of course, been raised Jewish. I would sit through
Friday night services and listen to the soaring, rich voice of
the cantor; I would watch my father reverently carry the
Torah and it would remind me of how he looked in my baby
pictures when he held me. But Id also grow so bored that
Id find myself memorizing the names of who begat whom in
Numbers.
The more I learned about Jewish law the more I felt that, as
a girl, I was bound to be considered unclean or limited or
lacking. I had my bat mitzvah, like my parents wanted; and
the day after I read from the Torah and celebrated my
transition into adulthood, I told my parents I was never going
to temple again.
Why? my father had asked when I told him.
Because I dont think God real y cares whether or not Im
sitting there every Friday night. Because I dont buy into a
religion thats based on what thou shalt not do, instead of
what thou ought to be doing for the greater good. Because I
dont know what I believe.
I didnt have the heart to tel him the truth: that I was much
closer to an atheist than an agnostic, that I doubted there
was a God at al . In my line of work, Id seen too much
injustice in the world to buy into the belief that a merciful, al -
powerful deity would continue to al ow such atrocities to
exist; and I downright detested the party line that there was
some divine grand plan for humanitys bumbling existence.
It was a little like a parent watching her children playing with
hre and thinking, Wel , let them burn. Thatl teach em.
Once, when I was in high school, I asked my father about
religions that were, with the passage of time, considered to
be false. The Greeks and Romans, with al their gods,
thought they were making sacrifices and praying at temples
in order to receive favor from their deities; but today, pious
people would scoff. How do you know, Id asked my father,
that five hundred years from now, some alien master race
wont be picking over the artifacts of your Torah and their
crucifix and wondering how you could be so naive?
My father, who was the first to take a controversial situation
and say “Lets think about that,” had been speechless.
Because, hed said final y, a religion doesnt last two
thousand years if its based on a lie.
Heres my take on it: I dont think religions are based on
lies, but I dont think theyre based on truths, either. I think
they come about because of what people need at the time
that they need them. Like the World Series player who
wont take off his lucky socks, or the mother of the sick child
who believes that her baby can sleep only if shes sitting by
the cribbelievers need, by definition, something to
believe in.
“So whats your plan?” my father asked, bringing my
attention back.
I glanced up. “Im going to save him.”
“Maybe youre the Messiah,” he mused.
My mother sat down again, popped two pil s into her mouth,
and swal owed them dry. “What if hes creating this whole
to-do so that somebody like you wil come out of the
woodwork and keep him from being executed?”
Wel , Id already considered that. “It doesnt matter if its al
a big ruse,” I said. “As long as I can get the court to buy it,
its stil a blow against the death penalty.” I imagined myself
being interviewed by Stone Phil ips. Who, when the
cameras cut, would ask me out to dinner.
“Promise me you wont be one of these lawyers who fal s
for the criminal and marries him in the prison …”
“Mom!”
“Wel , it happens, Maggie. Felons are very persuasive
people.”
“And you know this because youve personal y spent so
much time in prison?”
She held up her hands. “Im just saying.”
“Rachel, I think Maggies got this under control,” my father
said.
“Why dont we get ready to go?”
My mother started clearing the dishes, and I fol owed her
into the kitchen. We fel into a familiar routine: Id load the
dishwasher and rinse off the big platters; shed dry. “I can
finish,” I said, like I did every week.
“You dont want to be late for temple.”
She shrugged. “They cant start without your father.” I
passed her a dripping serving bowl, but she set it on the
counter and examined my hand instead. “Look at your nails,
Maggie.”
I pul ed away. “Ive got more important things to do than
make sure my cuticles are trimmed, Ma.”
“Its not about the manicure,” she said. “Its about taking
forty-five minutes where the most important thing in the
world is not someone else … but you.”
That was the thing about my mother: just when I thought I
was ready to kil her, shed say something that made me
want to cry. I tried to curl my hands into fists, but she
threaded our fingers together. “Come to the spa next week.
Wel have a nice afternoon, just the two of us.”
A dozen comments sprang to the back of my tongue: Some
of us have to work for a living. It wont be a nice afternoon if
its just the two of us. I may be a glutton, but not for
punishment. Instead, I nodded, even though we both knew I
had no intention of showing up.
When I was tiny, my mother would have spa days in the
kitchen, just for me. Shed concoct hair conditioners out of
papaya and banana; shed rub coconut oil into the skin of
my shoulders and arms; shed lay slices of cucumber on my
eyes and sing Sonny & Cher songs to me. Afterward, she
would hold a hand mirror up to my face. Look at my
beautiful girl, she would say, and for the longest time, I
believed her.
“Come to temple,” my mother said. “Just tonight. It would
make your father so happy.”
“Maybe next time,” I answered.
I walked them out to their car. My father turned the ignition
and unrol ed his window. “You know,” he said. “When I was
in col ege, there was a homeless guy who used to hang out
near the subway. He had a pet mouse that used to sit on
his shoulder and nibble at the col ar of his coat, and he
never took that coat off, not even when it was ninety-five
degrees out. He knew the entire first chapter of Moby-Dick
by heart. I always gave him a quarter when I passed by.”
A neighbors car zoomed pastsomeone from my fathers
congregation, who honked a hel o.
My father smiled. “The word Messiah isnt in the Old
Testament …
just the Hebrew word for anointed. Hes not a savior; hes a
king or a priest with a special purpose. But the Midrash
wel , it mentions the moshiach a lot, and he looks different
every time. Sometimes hes a soldier, sometimes hes a
politician, sometimes hes got supernatural powers. And
sometimes hes dressed like a vagrant. The reason I gave
that bum a quarter,”
he said, “is because you never know.”
Then he put the car in reverse and pul ed out of the
driveway. I stood there until I couldnt see them anymore,
until there was nothing left to do but go home.
M I CHAEL
Before you can go into a prison, youre stripped of the
trappings that make you you. Take off your shoes, your belt.
Remove your wal et, your watch, your saints medal. Loose
change in your pockets, cel phone, even the crucifix pin on
your lapel. Hand over your drivers license to the uniformed
officer, and in return, you become one of the faceless
people who has entered a place the residents arent
al owed to leave.
“Father?” an officer said. “Are you okay?”
I tried to smile and nod, imagining what he saw: a big tough
guy who was shaking at the thought of entering this prison.
Sure, I rode a Triumph Trophy, volunteered to work with
gang youth, and broke the stereotype of a priest any
chance I gotbut inside here was the man whose life I had
voted to end.
And yet.
Ever since I had taken my vows and asked God to help me
offset what I had done to one man with what I might yet be
able to do for othersI knew this would happen one day. I
knew Id wind up face-toface with Shay Bourne.
Would he recognize me?
Would I recognize hurt?
I walked through the metal detector, holding my breath, as if
I had something to hide. And I suppose I did, but my secrets
wouldnt set off those alarms. I started to weave my belt into
the loops of my trousers again, to tie the laces of my
Converse sneakers. My hands were stil trembling. “Father
Michael?” I glanced up to find another officer waiting for
me. “Warden Coynes expecting you.”
“Right.” I fol owed the officer through dul gray hal ways.
When we passed inmates, the officer pivoted his body so
that he stood between usa shield.
I was delivered to an administrative office that overlooked
the interior courtyard of the state prison. A conga line of
prisoners was walking from one building to another. Behind
them was a double line of fencing, capped with razor wire.
“Father.”
The warden was a stocky man with silver hair who offered a
handshake and a grimace that was supposed to pass for a
smile. “Warden Coyne. Nice to meet you.”
He led me into his private office, a surprisingly modem, airy
space with no deskjust a long, spare steel table with files
and notes spread across it. As soon as he sat down, he
unwrapped a piece of gum. “Nicorette,”
he explained. “My wifes making me quit smoking and to be
honest, Id rather cut off my left arm.” He opened a file with
a number on its sideShay Bourne had been stripped of
his name in here as wel . “I do appreciate you coming.
Were a little short on chaplains right now.”
The prison had one ful -time chaplain, an Episcopal priest
who had flown to Australia to be with his dying father. Which
meant that if an inmate requested to speak to a clergyman,
one of the locals would be cal ed in.
“Its my pleasure,” I lied, and mental y marked the rosary Id
say later as penance.
He pushed the file toward me. “Shay Bourne. You know
him?”
I hesitated. “Who doesnt?”
“Yeah, the news coverage is a bitch, pardon my French. I
could do without al the attention. Bottom line is the inmate
wants to donate his organs after execution.”
“Catholics support organ donation, as long as the patient is
braindead and no longer breathing by himself,” I said.
Apparently, it was the wrong answer. Coyne lifted up a
tissue.
frowned, and spit his gum into it. “Yeah, great, I get it. Thats
the party line. But the reality of the situation is that this guys
at the twenty-third hour. Hes a convicted murderer, two
times over. You think hes suddenly developed a
humanitarian streak … or is it more likely that hes trying to
gain public sympathy and stop his execution?”
“Maybe he just wants something good to come out of his
death…”
“Lethal injection is designed to stop the inmates heart,”
Coyne said flatly.
I had helped a parishioner earlier this year when she made
the decision to donate her sons organs after a motorcycle
accident that had left him braindead. Brain death, the
doctor had explained, was different from cardiac death. Her
son was stil irrevocably gonehe would not eventual y
recover, like people in a comabut thanks to the
respirator, his heart was stil beating. If cardiac death had
occurred, the organs wouldnt be viable for transplant.
I sat back in the chair. “Warden Coyne, I was under the
impression that Inmate Bourne had requested a spiritual
advisor …”
“He did. And wed like you to advise him against this crazy
idea.”
The warden sighed. “Look, I know what this must sound like
to you.
But Bournes going to be executed by the state. Thats a
fact. Either it can become a sideshow … or it can be done
with discretion.” He stared at me. “Are we clear on what you
need to do?”
“Crystal,” I said quietly.
I had once before let myself be led by others, because I
assumed they knew more than me. Jim, another juror, had
used the “eye for an eye” line from Jesuss Sermon on the
Mount to convince me that repaying a death with a death
was just. But now, I understood that Jesus had actual y
been saying the oppositecriticizing those who let the
punishment compound the crime.
No way was I going to let Warden Coyne tel me how to
advise Shay Bourne.
In that instant, I realized that if Bourne didnt recognize me, I
wasnt going to tel him Id met him before. This wasnt
about my salvation; it was about his. And even if Id been
instrumental in ruining his life, nowas a priestit was my
job to redeem him.
“Id like to meet Mr. Bourne,” I said.
The warden nodded. “I figured.” He stood up and led me
back through the administrative offices. We took a turn and
came to a control booth, a set of double-barred doors. The
warden raised his hand and the officer inside unlocked the
first steel door with a buzz and a sound of metal scraping
metal. We stepped into the midchamber, and that same
door automatical y sealed.
So this was what it felt like to be locked in.
Before I could begin to panic, the interior door buzzed
open, and we walked along another corridor. “You ever
been in here?” the warden asked.
“No.”
“You get used to it.”
I looked around at the cinder-block wal s, the rusting
catwalks. “I doubt that.”
We stepped through a fire door marked I-TIER. “This is
where we keep the most hard-core inmates,” Coyne said. “I
cant promise theyl be on their best behavior.”
In the center of the room was a control tower. A young
officer sat there, watching a television monitor that seemed
to have a birds-eye view of the inside of the pod. It was
quiet, or maybe the door that led inside was soundproof.
I walked up to the door and peered inside. There was an
empty shower stal closest to me, then eight cel s. I could
not see the faces of the men and wasnt sure which one
was Bourne. “This is Father Michael,”
the warden said. “Hes come to speak with Inmate Bourne.”
He reached into a bin and handed me a flak jacket and
protective goggles, as if I were going to war instead of
death row.
“You cant go in unless youve got the right equipment,” the
warden said.
“Go in?”
“Wel , whered you think you were going to meet Inmate
Bourne, Father? Starbucks?”
I had thought there would be some kind of … room, I guess.
Or the chapel. Til be alone with him? In a cel ?”
“Hel , no,” Warden Coyne said. “You stand out on the
catwalk and talk through the door.”
Taking a deep breath, I slipped the jacket on over my
clothes and fitted the goggles to my face. Then I winged a
quick prayer and nodded.
“Open up,” Warden Coyne said to the young officer.
“Yes, sir,” the kid said, clearly flustered to be under Coynes
regard.
He glanced down at the control panel before him, a myriad
display of buttons and lights, and pushed one near his left
hand, only to realize at the last minute it was the wrong
choice. The doors of al eight cel s opened at once.
“Ohmygod,” the boy said, his eyes wide as saucers, as the
warden shoved me out of the way and began punching a
series of levers and buttons on the control panel.
“Get him out of here,” the warden yel ed, jerking his head in
my direction.
Over the loudspeaker came his radio cal : Multiple inmates
released on I-tier; need officer assistance immediately.
I stood, riveted, as the inmates spil ed out of their
respective cel s like poison. And then … wel … al hel
broke loose.
Lucius
When the doors released in unison, like al the strings
tuning up in an orchestra and magical y hitting the right note
the first time the bow was raised, I didnt run out of the cel
like the others. I stopped for a beat, paralyzed by freedom.
I quickly tucked my painting beneath the mattress of the
bunk and stashed my ink in a rol of dirty laundry. I could
hear Warden Coynes voice on the loudspeakers, cal ing
over the radio for the SWAT team. This had happened only
once before when I was in prison; a new officer screwed up
and two cel s were opened simultaneously. The inmate
whod been accidental y freed rushed into the others cel
and cracked his skul open against the sink, a gang hit that
had been waiting for years to come to pass.
Crash was the first one out of his cel . He ran past mine with
his fist curled around a shank, making a beeline for Joey
Kunza child molester was fair game for anyone. Pogie
and Texas fol owed him like the dogs they were. “Grab him,
boys,” Crash hol ered. “Lets just cut it right off.”
Joeys voice escalated as he was cornered. “For Gods
sake, someone help!”
There was the sound of a fist hitting flesh, of Cal oway
swearing. By now, he was in Joeys cel , too.
“Lucius?” I heard, a slow ribbon of a voice, as if it had come
from underwater, and I remembered that Joey wasnt the
only one on the tier whod hurt a child. If Joey was Crashs
first victim, Shay could very wel be the second.
There were people outside the prison praying to Shay;
there were reli gious pundits on TV who promised hel and
damnation to those who worshipped a false messiah. I
didnt know what Shay was or wasnt, but I credited him for
my health one hundred percent. And there was something
about him that just didnt fit in here, that made you stop and
look twice, as if youd come across an orchid growing in a
ghetto.
“Stay where you are,” I cal ed out. “Shay, you hear me?”
But he didnt answer. I stood at the threshold of my cel ,
trembling. I stared at that invisible line between here and
now, no and yes, if and when.
With one deep breath, I stepped outside.
Shay was not in his cel ; he was moving slowly toward
Joeys. Through the door of I-tier, I could see the officers
suiting up in flak jackets and shields and masks. There was
someone else, tooa priest Id never seen before.
I reached for Shays arm to stop him. Thats al , just that
smal heat, and it nearly brought me to my knees. Here in
prison we did not touch; we were not touched. I could have
held on to Shay, at the innocent crook of his elbow, forever.
But Shay turned, and I remembered the first unwritten rule
of being in prison: you did not invade someones space. I
let go. “Its okay,” Shay said softly, and he took another step
toward Joeys cel .
Joey was spread-eagled on the floor, sobbing, his pants
pul ed down.
His head was twisted away, and blood streamed from his
nose. Pogie had one of his arms, Texas the other;
Cal oway sat on his fighting feet. From this angle, they were
obscured from the view of the officers who were mobilizing
to subdue everyone. “You heard of Save the Children?”
Crash said, brandishing his homemade blade. “Im here to
make a donation.”
Just then, Shay sneezed.
“God bless,” Crash said automatical y.
Shay wiped his nose on his sleeve. “Thanks.”
The interruption made Crash lose some of his momentum.
He glanced out at the army on the other side of the door,
screaming commands we couldnt hear. He rocked back
on his heels and surveyed Joey, shivering against the
cement floor.
“Let him go,” Crash said.
“Let him … ?” Cal oway echoed.
“You heard me. Al of you. Go back.”
Pogie and Texas listened; they always did what Crash
said. Cal oway was slower to leave. “We aint done here,”
he said to Joey, but then he left.
“What the fuck are you waiting for?” Crash said to me, and I
hurried back to my own cel , forgetting entirely anyone
elses welfare except my own.
I do not know what it was that led to Crashs change of
plan-if it was knowing that the officers would storm the tier
and punish him; if it was Shays wel -timed sneeze; if it was
a prayer God blesson the lips of a sinner like Crash.
But by the time the SWAT team entered seconds later, al
seven of us were sitting in our cel s even though the doors
were stil wide open, as if we were angels, as if we had
nothing to hide.
Theres a flower I can see from the exercise yard. Wel , I
cant realiy see itI have to sort of hook my fingers on the
ledge of the only window and spider-walk up the cement
wal , but I can glimpse it then before I fal back down. Its a
dandelion, which you might think is a weed, but it can be
put into salads or soups. The root can be ground up and
used as a coffee substitute.
The juices can get rid of warts or be used as an insect
repel ent. I learned al this from a Mother Earth News
magazine piece that I keep wrapped around my treasures
my shank, my Q-tips, the tiny Visine bottles where I keep
the ink I manufacture. I read the article every time I take my
supplies out for inventory, which is daily. I keep my cache
behind a loosened cinder block beneath my cot, refil ing the
mortar with Metamucil and toothpaste, mixed, so that the
officers dont get suspicious when they toss the cel .
I never gave it much thought before I came in here, but I
wish I knew more about horticulture. I wish Id taken the time
to learn what makes things grow. Hel , if I had, maybe I
could have started a water melon plant from a seedling.
Maybe Id have vines hanging al over the place by now.
Adam had the green thumb in our household. I used to find
him outside at the crack of dawn, rooting around in the dirt
between our daylilies and sedums. The weeds shal inherit
the earth, he had said.
Meek, Id corrected. The meek shal inherit it.
No way, Adam had said, and laughed. The weeds wil blow
right by them.
He used to say that if you picked a dandelion, two would
grow back in its place. I guess they are the botanical
equivalent of the men in this prison. Take one of us off the
street, and more wil sprout up in his wake.
With Crash back in solitary, and Joey in the infirmary, I-tier
was oddly quiet. In the wake of Joeys beating, our
privileges had been suspended, so al showers and
exercise yard visits were canceled for the day. Shay was
pacing. Earlier, hed been complaining that his teeth were
vibrating with the air-conditioning unit; sometimes sounds
got to be too much for himusual y when he was agitated.
“Lucius,” he said. “Did you see that priest today?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you think he came for me?”
I didnt want to give him false hope. “I dont know, Shay.
Maybe someone was dying on another tier and needed last
rites.”
“The dead arent alive, and the living dont die.”
I laughed. “Thanks for that, Yoda.”
“Whos Yoda?”
He was talking crazy, the way Crash had a year ago when
hed started to peel the lead paint from the cinder blocks
and eat it, hoping it would serve as a hal ucinogen. “Wel , if
there is a heaven, I bet its ful of dandelions.”
(Actual y, I think heavens ful of guys who look like
Wentworth Mil er from Prison Break, but for right now, I was
only talking landscaping.) “Heavens not a place.”
“I didnt say it had map coordinates …”
“If it was in the sky, then birds would get there before you. If
it was under the sea, fish would be first.”
“Then where is it?” I asked.
“Its inside you,” Shay said, “and outside, too.”
If he wasnt eating the lead paint, then hed been making
hooch I didnt know about. “If this is heaven, Il take a rain
check.”
“You cant wait for it, because its already here.”
“Wel , youre the only one of us who got rose-colored
glasses when he was booked, I guess.”
Shay was silent for a while. “Lucius,” he asked final y. “Why
did Crash go after Joey instead of me?”
I didnt know. Crash was a convicted murderer; I had no
doubt he could and would kil again if given the opportunity.
Technical y, both Joey and Shay had sinned equal y in
Crashs code of justice; they had harmed children.
Maybe Crash figured Joey would be easier to kil . Maybe
Shay had gained a modicum of respect through his
miracles. Maybe hed just gotten lucky.
Maybe even Crash thought there was something special
about Shay.
“Hes not any different than Joey…” Shay said.
“Teensy suggestion? Dont let Crash hear you say that.”
“… and were not any different than Crash,” he finished.
“You dont know what would make you do what Crash did,
just like you didnt know what would make you kil Adam,
until it happened.”
I drew in my breath. No one in prison talked about another
persons crime, even if you secretly believed they were
guilty. But I had kil ed Adam.
It was my hand holding the gun; it was his blood on my
clothes. It wasnt what had been done that was at issue for
me in court; it was why.
“Its okay to not know something,” Shay said. “Thats what
makes us human.”
No matter what Mr. Philosopher Next Door thought, there
were things I knew for sure: That I had been loved, once,
and had loved back.
That a person could find hope in the way a weed grew. That
the sum of a mans life was not where he wound up but in
the details that brought him there.
That we made mistakes.
I closed my eyes, sick of the riddles, and to my surprise al I
could see were dandelionsas if they had been painted on
the fields of my imagination, a hundred thousand suns. And
I remembered something else that makes us human: faith,
the only weapon in our arsenal to battle doubt.
June
They say God wont give you any more than you can handle,
but that begs a more important question: why would God let
you surfer in the first place?
“No comment,” I said into the phone, and I slammed down
the receiver loud enough that Claireon the couch with her
iPod onsat up and took notice. I reached beneath the
table and yanked out the cord completely so that I would not
have to hear the phone ring.
They had been cal ing al morning; they had set up camp
outside my home. How does it feel to know that there are
protesters outside the prison, hoping to free the man who
murdered your child and your husband?
Do you think Shay Bournes request to be an organ donor
is a way to make up for what hes done?
What I thought was that nothing Shay Bourne could do or
say would ever make up for the lives of Elizabeth and Kurt. I
knew firsthand how wel he could lie and what might come
of itthis was nothing more than some publicity stunt to
make everyone feel badly for him, because after a decade,
who even remembered feeling badly for that police officer,
that little girl?
Idid.
There are people who say that the death penalty isnt just
because it takes so long to execute a man. That its
inhumane to have to wait eleven years or more for
punishment. That at least for Elizabeth and Kurt, death
came quickly.
Let me tel you whats wrong with that line of reasoning: it
assumes that Elizabeth and Kurt were the only victims. It
leaves out me; it leaves out Claire. And I can promise you
that every day for the last eleven years Ive thought of what I
lost at the hands of Shay Bourne. Ive been anticipating his
death just as long as he has.
I heard voices coming from the living room and realized that
Claire had turned on the television. A grainy photograph of
Shay Bourne fil ed the screen. It was the same photo that
had been used in the newspapers, although Claire would
not have seen those, since Id thrown them out immediately.
Bournes hair was cut short now, and there were
parenthetical lines around his mouth and fanning from the
corners of his eyes, but he otherwise did not look any
different.
“Thats him, isnt it?” Claire asked.
God, Complex? read the caption beneath the photograph.
“Yes.” I walked toward the television, intentional y blocking
her view, and turned it off.
Claire looked up at me. “I remember him,” she said.
I sighed. “Honey, you werent even bom yet.”
She unfolded the afghan that sat on the couch and wrapped
it around her shoulders, as if shed suddenly taken a chil . “I
remember him,” Claire repeated.
M I CHAEL
I would have had to be living under a rock to not know what
was being said about Shay Bourne, but I was the last
person in the world who would ever have believed him to be
messianic. As far as I was concerned, there was one Son
of God, and I knew who He was. As for Bournes
showmanshipwel , Id seen David Blaine make an
elephant disappear on Fifth Avenue in New York City, but
that wasnt a miracle, either. Plain and simple: my job here
wasnt to feed into Shay Bournes delusional beliefs … only
to help him accept Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior
before his execution so that hed wind up in the Kingdom of
Heaven.
And if I could help him donate his heart somewhere along
the way, so be it.
Two days after the incident at I-tier had occurred, I parked
my Trophy outside the prison. My mind kept tripping over a
verse from Matthew where Jesus spoke to his disciples: I
was a stranger, and you took me in; naked, and you clothed
me; I was sick, and you visited me; I was in prison, and you
came unto me. The discipleswho were, to be brutal y
honest, a thick bunchwere confused. They couldnt
remember Jesus being lost or naked or sick or imprisoned.
And Jesus told them: Inasmuch as you have done it unto
one of the least of my brethren, you have done it unto me.
Inside, I was handed a flak jacket and goggles again. The
door to I-tier opened, and I was led down the hal way to
Shay Bournes cel .
It wasnt al that different from being in the confessional. The
same Swiss-cheese holes perforated the metal door of the
cel , so I could get a glimpse of Shay. Although we were the
same age, he looked like hed aged a lifetime. Now gray at
the temples, he stil was slight and wiry. I hesitated, silent,
waiting to see if his eyes would go wide with recognition, if
he would start banging on the door and demand to get
away from the person whod set the wheels of his execution
in motion.
But a funny thing happens when youre in clerical dress: you
arent a man. Youre somehow more than one, and also
less. Ive had secrets whispered in front of me; Ive had
women hike up their skirts to fix their panty hose. Like a
physician, a priest is supposed to be unflappable, an
observer, a fly on the wal . Ask ten people who meet me
what I look like, and eight of them wont be able to tel you
the color of my eyes. They simply dont look past the col ar.
Shay walked directly up to the door of the cel and started to
grin.
“You came,” he said.
I swal owed. “Shay, Im Father Michael.”
He flattened his palms against the door of the cel . I
remembered a photograph from the crime evidence, those
fingers dark with a little girls blood. I had changed so much
in the past eleven years, but what about Shay Bourne? Was
he remorseful? Had he matured? Did he wish, like me, that
he could erase his mistakes?
“Hey, Father,” a voice yel ed outI would later learn it was
Cal oway Reece“you got any of those wafers? Im near
starving.”
I ignored him and focused on Shay. “So … I understand
youre Catholic?”
“A foster mother had me baptized,” Shay said. “A thousand
years ago.” He glanced at me. “They could put you in the
conference room, the one they use for lawyers.”
“The warden said wed have to talk here, at your cel .”
Shay shrugged. “I dont have anything to hide.”
Do you? I heard, although he hadnt said it.
“Anyway, thats where they give us hep C,” Shay said.
“Give you hep C?”
“On haircut day. Every other Wednesday. We go to the
conference room and they buzz us. Number two blade,
even if you want it longer for winter. They dont make it this
hot in here in the winter. Its freezing from November on.”
He turned to me. “How come they cant make it hot in
November and freezing now?”
“I dont know.”
“Its on the blades.”
“Pardon?”
“Blood,” Shay said. “On the razor blades. Someone gets
nicked, someone else gets hep C.”
Fol owing his conversation was like watching a SuperBal
bounce.
“Did that happen to you?”
“It happened to other people, so sure, it happened to me.”
Inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of my
brethren, you have done it unto me.
My head was swimming; I hoped it was Shays nonlinear
speech, and not a panic attack coming on. Id been
suffering those for eleven years now, ever since the day
wed sentenced Shay. “But for the most part, youre al
right?”
After I said it, I wanted to kick myself. You didnt ask a dying
man how he was feeling. Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, I
thought, how was the play?
“I get lonely,” Shay answered.
Automatical y, I replied, “Gods with you.”
“Wel ,” Shay said, “hes lousy at checkers.”
“Do you believe in God?”
“Why do you believe in God?” He leaned forward, suddenly
intense.
“Did they tel you I want to donate my heart?”
“Thats what I came to talk about. Shay.”
“Good. No one else wants to help.”
“What about your lawyer?”
“I fired him.” Shay shrugged. “He lost al the appeals, and
then he started talking about going to the governor. The
governors not even from New Hampshire, did you know
that? He was born in Mississippi. I always wanted to see
that river, take one of those gambling boats down it like
some kind of cardsharp. Or maybe thats shark. Do they
have those in rivers?”
“Your lawyer …”
“He wanted the governor to commute my sentence to life,
but thats just another death sentence. So I fired him.”
I thought about Warden Coyne, how sure he was that this
was al just a ploy to get Shay Bournes execution cal ed off.
Could he have been wrong? “Are you saying that you want
to die. Shay?”
“I want to live,” he said. “So I have to die.”
Final y, something I could latch onto. “You wil live,” I said. “In
the Kingdom of the Father. No matter what happens here.
Shay. And no matter whether or not you can donate your
organs.”
Suddenly his face went dark. “What do you mean, whether
or not?”
“Wel , its complicated …”
“I have to give her my heart. I have to.”
“Who?”
“Claire Nealon.”
My jaw dropped. This specific part of Shays request had
not made it to the broadcast news. “Nealon? Is she related
to Elizabeth?” Too late I realized that the average person
one who hadnt been on Shays jurymight not recognize
that name and identify it as quickly. But Shay was too
agitated to notice.
“Shes the sister of the girl who was kil ed. She has a heart
problem; I saw it on TV. Whats inside me is going to save
me,” Shay said.
“If I dont bring it forward, its going to kil me.”
We were making the same mistake. Shay and I. We both
believed that you could right a former wrong by doing a
good deed later on. But giving Claire Nealon his heart
wasnt going to bring her sister back to life. And being Shay
Bournes spiritual advisor wasnt going to erase the fact
that I was part of the reason he was here.
“You cant get salvation by donating your organs. Shay. The
only way to find salvation is to admit your guilt and seek
absolution through Jesus.”
“What happened then doesnt matter now.”
“You dont have to be afraid to take responsibility; God
loves us, even when we screw up.”
“I couldnt stop it,” Shay said. “But this time, I can fix it.”
“Leave that to God,” I suggested. Tel Him youre sorry for
what you did, and Hel forgive you.”
“No matter what?”
“No matter what.”
“Then why do you have to say youre sorry first?”
I hesitated, trying to find a better way to explain sin and
salvation to Shay. It was a bargain: you made an
admission, you got redemption in return. In Shays
economy of salvation, you gave away a piece of yourself
and somehow found yourself whole again.
Were the two ideas real y so different?
I shook my head to clear it.
“Lucius is an atheist,” Shay said. “Right, Lucius?”
From next door, Lucius mumbled, “Mm-hmm.”
“And he didnt die. He was sick, and he got better.”
The AIDS patient; Id heard about him on the news. “Did
you have something to do with it?”
“I didnt do anything.”
“Lucius, do you believe that, too?”
I leaned back so that I could make eye contact with this
other inmate, a slim man with a shock of white hair. “I think
Shay had everything to do with it,” he said.
“Lucius should believe whatever he needs to,” Shay said.
“What about the miracles?” Lucius added.
“What miracles?” Shay said.
Two facts struck me: Shay Bourne was not claiming to be
the Messiah, or Jesus, or anyone but himself. And through
some misguided belief, he truly felt that he wouldnt rest in
peace unless he could donate his heart to Claire Nealon.
“Look,” Lucius said. “Are you or are you not going to help
him?”
Maybe none of us could compensate for what wed done
wrong in the past, but that didnt mean we couldnt make
our futures matter more. I closed my eyes and imagined
being the last person Shay Bourne spoke with before he
was executed by the State of New Hampshire. I imagined
picking a section of the Bible that would resonate with him,
a balm of prayer during those last few minutes. I could do
this for him. I could be who he needed me to be now,
because I hadnt been who he needed me to be back then.
“Shay,” I said, “knowing that your heart is beating in some
other person isnt salvation. Its altruism. Salvation is
coming home. Its understanding that you dont have to
prove yourself to God.”
“Oh, for Christs sake,” Lucius snorted. “Dont listen to him.
Shay.”
I turned to him. “Do you mind?” Then I shifted position, so
that I blocked Lucius from my sight, focusing on Shay. “God
loves youwhether or not you give up your organs, whether
or not youve made mistakes in the past. And the day of
your execution, hel be waiting for you. Christ can save you.
Shay.”
“Christ cant give Claire Nealon a heart.” Suddenly Shays
gaze was piercing and lucid. “I dont need to find God. I
dont want catechism,”
he said. “Al I want to know is whether, after Im kil ed, I can
save a little girl.”
“No,” I said bluntly. “Not if youre given a lethal injection. The
drugs are meant specifical y to stop your heart, and after
that, its worthless for donation.”
The light in his eyes dimmed, and I drew in my breath. “Im
sorry.
Shay. I know you were hoping to hear something different,
and your intentions are good … but you need to channel
those good intentions to make peace with God another
way. And that is something I can make happen.”
Just then a young woman burst onto I-tier. She had a
cascade of black curls tumbling down her back, and
peeking out from her flak jacket was the ugliest striped suit
Id ever seen. “Shay Bourne?” she said. “I know a way you
can donate your organs.”
Maggie
Some people may find it tough to break out of prison, but
for me, it was equal y as hard to get in. Okay, so I wasnt
official y Shay Bournes attorneybut the prison officials
didnt know that. I could argue the technicality with Bourne
himself, if and when I reached him.
I hadnt counted on how difficult it would be to get through
the throng outside the prison. Its one thing to shove your
way past a group of col ege kids smoking pot in a tent, their
MAKE PEACE NOT MIRACLES signs littering the muddy
ground; its another thing entirely to explain to a mother and
her smooth-scalped, cancer-stricken toddler why you
deserved to cut their place in line. In the end, the only way I
could edge forward was by explaining to those whod been
waiting (in some cases, for days) that I was Shay Bournes
legal advisor and that I would pass along their pleas: from
the elderly couple with knotted hands, whose twin
diagnosesbreast cancer and lymphatic cancercame
within a week of each other; to the father who carried
pictures of the eight children he couldnt support since
losing his job; to the daughter pushing her mothers
wheelchair, wishing for just one more lucid moment in the
fog of Alzheimers so that she could say she was sorry for a
transgression that had happened years earlier. There is so
much pain in this world, I thought, how do any of us manage
to get up in the morning?
When I reached the front gate, I announced that I had come
to see Shay Bourne, and the officer laughed at me. “You
and the rest of the free world.”
“Im his lawyer.”
He looked at me for a long moment, and then spoke into
his radio. A moment later, a second officer arrived and
escorted me past the blockade.
As I left, a cheer went up from the crowd.
Stunned, I turned around, waved hesitantly, and then hurried
to catch up.
I had never been to the state prison. It was a large, old brick
building; its courtyard stretched out behind the razor-wire
fencing. I was told to sign in on a clipboard and to take off
my jacket before I went through the metal detector.
“Wait here,” the officer said, and he left me sitting in a smal
anteroom.
There was an inmate mopping the floor who did not make
eye contact with me. He was wearing white tennis shoes
that squelched every time he stepped forward. I watched
his hands on the mop and wondered if theyd been part of a
murder, a rape, a robbery.
There was a reason I didnt become a criminal defense
attorney: this setting freaked me out. I had been to the
county jail to meet with clients, but those were smal -
potatoes crimes: picketing outside a ral y for a political
candidate, flag burning, civil disobedience. None of my
clients had ever kil ed anyone before, much less a child and
a police officer. I found myself considering what it would be
like to be locked in here forever.
What if my dress clothes and day clothes and pajamas
were al the same orange scrubs? What if I was told when
to shower, when to eat, when to go to bed? Given that my
career was about maintaining personal freedoms, it was
hard to imagine a world where theyd al been stripped
away.
As I watched the inmate mop beneath a bank of seats, I
wondered what would be the hardest luxury to leave behind.
There were the trivial things: losing chocolate practical y
qualified as cruel and unusual punishment; I couldnt
sacrifice my contact lenses; Id sooner die than relinquish
the Ouidad Climate Control gel that kept my hair from
becoming a frizzy rats nest. But what about the rest
missing the dizzying choice of al the cereals in the grocery
store aisle, for example? Not being able to receive a phone
cal ? Granted, it had been so long since I was intimate with
a man that I had spiderwebs between my legs, but what
would it be like to give up being touched casual y, even a
handshake?
I bet Id even miss fighting with my mother.
Suddenly a pair of boots appeared on the floor before me.
“Youre out of luck. Hes got his spiritual advisor with him,”
the officer said. “Bournes pretty popular today.”
“Thats fine,” I bluffed. “The spiritual advisor can join us
during our meeting.” I saw the slightest flicker of uncertainty
on the face of the officer.
Not al owing an inmate to see his attorney was a big no-no,
and I was planning to capitalize on that.
The officer shrugged and led me down a hal way. He
nodded to a man in a control booth, and a door scraped
open. We stepped into a smal metal midroom, and I
sucked in my breath as the steel door slid home. “Im a little
claustrophobic,” I said.
The officer smiled. “Too bad.”
The inner door buzzed, and we entered the prison. “Its
quiet in here,” I remarked.
“Thats because its a good day.” He handed me a flak
jacket and goggles and waited for me to put them on. For
one brief moment, I panickedwhat if a mans jacket like
this didnt zip shut on me? How embarrassing would that
be? But there were Velcro straps and it wasnt an issue,
and as soon as I was outfitted, the door to a long tier
opened.
“Have fun,” the officer said, and that was when I realized I
was supposed to go in alone.
Wel . I wasnt going to convince Shay Bourne I was brave
enough to save his life if I couldnt muster the courage to
walk through that door.
There were whoops and catcal s. Leave it to me to find my
only appreciative audience in the maximum-security tier of
the state prison.
“Baby, you here for me?” one guy said, and another pul ed
down his scrubs so that I could see his boxer shorts, as if
Id been waiting for that kind of peep show al my life. I kept
my eyes focused on the priest who was standing outside
one of the cel s.
I should have introduced myself. I should have explained
why I had lied my way into this prison. But I was so flustered
that nothing came out the way it should have. “Shay
Bourne?” I said. “I know a way that you can donate your
organs.”
The priest frowned at me. “Who are you?”
“His lawyer.”
He turned to Shay. “I thought you said you didnt have a
lawyer.”
Shay tilted his head. He looked at me as if he were sifting
through the grains of my thoughts, separating the wheat
from the chaff. “Let her talk,” he said.
My streak of bravery widened after that: leaving the priest
with Shay, I went back to the officers and demanded a
private attorney-client conference room. I explained that
legal y, they had to provide one and that due to the nature of
our conversation, the priest should be al owed into the
meeting. Then the priest and I were taken into a smal
cubicle from one side, while Shay was escorted through a
different entrance by two officers.
When the door was closed, he backed up to it, slipping his
hands through the trap to have his handcuffs removed.
“Al right,” the priest said. “Whats going on?”
I ignored him and faced Shay. “My name is Maggie Bloom.
Im an attorney for the ACLU, and I think I know a way to
save you from being executed.”
“Thanks,” he said, “but thats not what Im looking for.”
I stared at him. “What?”
“I dont need you to save al of me. Only my heart.”
” I … I dont understand,” I said slowly.
“What Shay means,” the priest said, “is that hes resigned
to his execution.
He just wants to be an organ donor, afterward.”
“Who are you, exactly?” I asked.
“Father Michael Wright.”
“And youre his spiritual advisor?”
“Yes.”
“Since when?”
“Since ten minutes before you became his lawyer,” the
priest said.
I turned back to Shay. “Tel me what you want.”
“To give my heart to Claire Nealon.”
Who the hel was Claire Nealon? “Does she want your
heart?”
I looked at Shay, and then I looked at Michael, and I
realized that I had just asked the one question no one had
considered up til this point.
“I dont know if she wants it,” Shay said, “but she needs it.”
“Wel , has anyone talked to her?” I turned to Father Michael.
“Isnt that your job?”
“Look,” the priest said, “the state has to execute him by
lethal injection.
And if that happens, organ donation isnt viable.”
“Not necessarily,” I said slowly.
A lawyer cant care more about the case than the client
does. If I couldnt convince Shay to enter a courtroom
hoping for his life to be spared, then it would be foolish for
me to take this on. However, if his mission to donate his
heart dovetailed with mineto strike down the death
penaltythen why not use the same loophole law to get
what we both wanted? I could fight for him to die on his own
termsdonate his organsand in the process, raise
enough awareness about the death penalty to make more
people take a stand against it.
I glanced up at my new client and smiled.
M I C HAEL
The crazy woman whod barged in on our little pastoral
counseling session was now promising Shay Bourne happy
endings she could not deliver. “I need to do a little
research,” she explained. Im going to come back to see
you in a few days.”
Shay, for what it was worth, was staring at her as if she had
just handed him the moon. “But you think … you think Il be
able to donate my heart to her?”
“Yes,” she said. “Maybe.”
Yes. Maybe. Mixed signals, thats what she was giving him.
As opposed to my message: God. Jesus. One true course.
She knocked on the window, in just as big a hurry to get out
of the conference room as shed been to enter it. As an
officer buzzed open the door, I grasped her upper arm.
“Dont get his hopes up,” I whispered.
She raised a brow. “Dont cut them down.”
The door closed behind Maggie Bloom, and I watched her
walk away through the oblong window in the conference
room. In the faint reflection, I could see Shay watching, too.
“I like her,” he announced.
“Wel ,” I sighed. “Good.”
“Did you ever notice how sometimes its a mirror, and
sometimes its glass?”
It took me a moment to realize that he was talking about the
reflection.
“Its the way the light hits,” I explained.
“Theres light inside a man of light,” Shay murmured. “It can
light up the whole world.” He met my gaze. “So, what were
you saying is impossible?”
*
My grandmother had been so fervently Catholic that she
was on the committee of women who would come to scrub
down the church, sometimes taking me along. Id sit in the
back, setting up a traffic jam of Matchbox cars on the
kneeler. Id watch her rub Murphy Oil Soap into the scarred
wooden pews and sweep down the aisle with a broom; and
on Sunday when we went to Mass shed look aroundfrom
the entryway to the arched ceilings to the flickering candles
and nod with satisfaction. On the other hand, my
grandfather never went to church.
Instead, on Sundays, he fished. In the summer, he went out
flyfishing for bass; in the winter, he cut a hole in the ice and
waited, drinking from his thermos of coffee, with steam
wreathing his head like a halo.
It wasnt until I was twelve that I was al owed to skip a
Sunday Mass to tag along with my grandfather. My
grandmother sent me off with a bag lunch and an old
basebal hat to keep the sun off my face.
“Maybe you can talk some sense into him,” she said. I had
heard enough sermons to understand what happened to
those who didnt truly believe, so I climbed into his little
aluminum boat and waited until we had stopped underneath
the reaching arm of a wil ow tree along the shoreline. He
took out a fly rod and handed it to me, and then started
casting with his own ancient bamboo rod.
One two three, one two three. There was a rhythm to
flyfishing, like a bal room dance. I waited until we had both
unspooled the long tongue of line over the lake, until the
flies that my grandfather laboriously tied in his basement
had lightly come to rest on the surface.
“Grandpa,” I asked, “you dont want to go to hel , do you?”
“Aw, Christ,” he had answered. “Did your grandmother put
you up to this?”
“No,” I lied. “I just dont understand why you never go to
Mass with us.”
“I have my own Mass,” he had said. “I dont need some guy
in a col ar and a dress tel ing me what I should and
shouldnt believe.”
Maybe if Id been older, or smarter, I would have left it alone
at that. Instead, I squinted into the sun, up at my
grandfather. “But you got married by a priest.”
He sighed. “Yeah, and I even went to parochial school, like
you.”
“What made you stop?”
Before he could answer, I felt that tug on my line that always
felt like Christmas, the moment before you opened the
biggest box under the tree. I reeled in, fighting the whistle
and snap of the fish on the other end, certain that Id never
caught anything quite like this before.
Final y, it burst out of the water, as if it were being born
again.
“A salmon!” my grandfather crowed. “Ten pounds, easy …
imagine al the ladders it had to climb to make its way back
here from the ocean to spawn.” He held the fish aloft,
grinning. “I havent seen one in this lake since the sixties!”
I looked down at the fish, stil on my line, thrashing in
splendor. It was silver and gold and crimson al at once.
My grandfather held the salmon, stil ing it enough to unhook
the fly, and set the fish back into the lake. We watched the
flag of its tail, the ruddy back as it swam away. “Who says
that if you want to find God on a Sunday morning, you ought
to be looking in church?” my grandfather murmured.
For a long time after that, I believed my grandfather had it
right: God was in the details. But that was before I learned
that the requirements of a true believer included Mass
every Sunday and holy day of obligation, receiving the
Eucharist, reconciliation once a year, giving money to the
poor, observing Lent. Or in other wordsjust because you
say youre Catholic, if you dont walk the walk, youre not.
Back when I was at seminary, I imagined I heard my
grandfathers voice: I thought God was supposed to love
you unconditional y Those sure sound like a lot of
conditions to me.
The truth is, I stopped listening.
*
By the time I left the prison, the crowd outside had doubled
in size.
There were the il , the feeble, the old and the hungry, but
there was also a smal cadre of nuns from a convent up in
Maine, and a choir singing “Holy Holy Holy.” I was surprised
at how hearsay about a socal ed miracle could produce so
many converts, so quickly.
“You see?” I heard a woman say, pointing to me. “Even
Father Michaels here.”
She was a parishioner, and her son had cystic fibrosis. He
was here, too, in a wheelchair being pushed by his father.
“Is it true, then?” the man asked. “Can this guy real y work
miracles?”
aGod can,” I said, heading that question off at the pass. I
put my hand on the boys forehead. “Dear St. John of God,
patron saint of those who are il , I ask for your intercession
that the Lord wil have mercy on this child and return him to
health. I ask this in Jesuss name.”
Not Shay Bournes, I thought.
“Amen,” the parents murmured.
“If youl excuse me,” I said, turning away.
The chances of Shay Bourne being Jesus were about as
likely as me being God. These people, these falsely faithful,
didnt know Shay Bournetheyd never met Shay Bourne.
They were imposing the face of our Savior on a man with a
tendency to talk to himself; a man whose hands had been
covered with the blood of two innocent people. They were
confusing showmanship and inexplicable events with
divinity. A miracle was a miracle only until it could be
proved otherwise.
I started pushing through the mob, moving in the opposite
direction, away from the prison gates, a man on a mission.
Maggie Bloom wasnt the only one who could do research.
Maggie
In retrospect, it would have been much simpler to place a
phone cal to a medical professional who might lecture me
on the ins and outs of organ donation.
But it could take a week for a busy doctor to cal me back,
and my route home from the prison skirted the grounds of
the Concord hospital, and I was stil buzzing with righteous
legal fervor. These are the only grounds I can offer for why I
decided to stop in the emergency room. The faster I could
speak to an expert, the faster I could start building Shays
case.
However, the triage nursea large graying woman who
looked like a battleshipcompressed her mouth into a flat
line when I asked to talk to a doctor. “Whats the problem?”
she asked.
“Ive got a few questions”
“So does everyone else in that waiting room, but youl stil
have to explain the nature of the il ness to me.”
“Oh, Im not sick …”
She glanced around me. “Then wheres the patient?”
“At the state prison.”
The nurse shook her head. “The patient has to be present
for registration.”
I found that hard to believe. Surely someone knocked
unconscious in a car accident wasnt left waiting in the hal
until he came to and could recite his Blue Cross group
number.
“Were busy,” the nurse said. “When the patient arrives,
sign in again.”
“But Im a lawyer”
“Then sue me,” the nurse replied.
I walked back to the waiting room and sat down next to a
col ege-age boy with a bloody washcloth wrapped around
his hand. “I did that once,”
I said. “Cutting a bagel.”
He turned to me. “I put my hand through a plate-glass
window because my girlfriend was screwing my
roommate.”
A nurse appeared. “Whit Romano?” she said, and the boy
stood up.
“Good luck with that,” I cal ed after him, and I speared my
fingers through my hair, thinking hard. Leaving a message
with the nurse didnt guarantee a doctor would see it
anytime in the next mil enniumI had to find another way in.
Five minutes later I was standing in front of the battleship
again.
“The patients arrived?” she asked.
“Wel . Yes. Its me.”
She put down her pen. “Youre sick now. You werent sick
before.”
I shrugged. “Im thinking appendicitis …”
The nurse pursed her lips. “You know youl be charged a
hundred and fifty dol ars for an emergency room visit, even
a fabricated one.”
“You mean insurance doesnt”
“Nope.”
I thought of Shay, of the sound the steel doors made when
they scraped shut in prison. “Its my abdomen. Sharp
pains.”
“Which side?”
“My left… ?” The nurse narrowed her eyes. “I meant my
other left.”
“Take a seat,” she said.
I settled in the waiting room again and read two issues of
People nearly as old as I was before being cal ed into an
exam room. A nurseyounger, wearing pink scrubstook
my blood pressure and temperature.
She wrote down my health history, while I mental y reviewed
whether you could be brought up on criminal charges for
falsifying your own medical records.
I was lying on the exam table, staring at a Wheres Waldo?
poster on the ceiling, when the doctor came in.
“Ms. Bloom?” he said.
Okay, Im just going to come out and say ithe was
stunning. He had black hair and eyes the color of the
blueberries that grew in my parents
gardenalmost purple in a certain light, and translucent the
next moment.
He could have sliced me wide open with his smile. He was
wearing a white coat and a denim col ared shirt with a tie
that had Barbie dol s al over it.
He probably had a real live one of those at home, tooa
38-22-36 fiancee who had double-majored in law and
medicine, or astrophysics and political science.
Our whole relationship was over, and I hadnt even said a
word to him.
“You are Ms. Bloom?”
How had I not noticed that British accent? “Yes,” I said,
wishing I was anyone but.
“Im Dr. Gal agher,” he said, sitting down on a stool. “Why
dont you tel me whats been going on?”
“Wel ,” I began. “Actual y, Im fine.”
“For the record, appendicitis rates as pretty il .”
I I. I loved that. I bet he said things like flat and loo and lift,
too.
“Lets just check you out,” he said. He stood and hooked
his stethoscope into his ears, then settled it under my shirt. I
couldnt remember the last time a guy had slipped his hand
under my shirt. “Just breathe,”
he said.
Yeah, right.
“Real y,” I said. “Im not sick.”
“If you could just lie back … ?”
That was enough to bring me crashing down to reality. Not
only would he realize, the moment he palpated my stomach,
that I didnt have appendicitis … hed also probably be able
to tel that I had the twodonut combo at Dunkin Donuts for
breakfast, when everyone knows they take three days
eachto digest.
“I dont have appendicitis,” I blurted out. “I just told the nurse
I did because I wanted to talk to a doctor for a few minutes
”
“Al right,” he said gently. “Im just going to cal in Dr.
Tawasaka. Im sure shel talk to you al you like … ” He
stuck his head out the door.
“Sue? Page psych …”
Oh, excel ent, now he thought I had a mental health
problem. “I dont need a psychiatrist,” I said. “Im an attorney
and I need a medical consultation about a client.”
I hesitated, expecting him to cal in security, but instead he
sat down and folded his arms. “Go on.”
“Do you know anything about heart transplants?”
“A bit. But I can tel you right now that if your client requires
one, hel have to register with UNOS and get in line like
everyone else …”
“He doesnt need a heart. He wants to donate one.”
I watched his face transform as he realized that my client
had to be the death row inmate. There just werent a lot of
prisoners in New Hampshire clamoring to be organ donors
these days. “Hes going to be executed,”
Dr. Gal agher said.
“Yes. By lethal injection.”
“Then he wont be able to donate his heart. A heart donor
has to be braindead; lethal injection causes cardiac death.
In other words, once your clients heart stops beating during
that execution, its not going to work in someone else.”
I knew this; Father Michael had told me this, but I hadnt
wanted to believe it.
“You know whats interesting?” the doctor said. “I believe
its potassium thats used in lethal injectionthe chemical
that stops the heart. Thats the same chemical we use in
cardioplegia solution, which is perfused into the donor
heart just prior to sewing it into the patient. It keeps the
heart arrested while its not receiving a normal blood flow,
until al the suturings finished.” He looked up at me. “I dont
suppose the prison would agree to a surgical cardiectomy
a heart removalas a method of execution?”
I shook my head. “The execution has to happen within the
wal s of the prison.”
He shrugged. “I cannot believe Im saying this, but its too
bad that they dont use a firing squad anymore. A wel -
placed shot could leave an inmate a perfect organ donor.
Even hanging would work, if one could hook up a respirator
after brain death was confirmed.” He shuddered.
“Pardon me. Im used to saving patients, not theoretical y
kil ing them.”
“I understand.”
“Then again, even if he could donate his heart, chances are
it would be too large for a childs body. Has anyone
addressed that yet?”
I shook my head, feeling even worse about Shays odds.
The doctor glanced up. “The bad news, Im afraid, is that
your client is out of luck.”
“Is there any good news?”
“Of course.” Dr. Gal agher grinned. “You dont have
appendicitis, Ms.
Bloom.”
“Heres the thing,” I said to Oliver when I had gotten us
enough Chinese takeout to feed a family of four (you could
keep the leftovers, and Oliver real y did like vegetable moo
shu, even if my mother said that rabbits didnt eat real
food). “Its been sixty-nine years since anyones been
executed in the state of New Hampshire. Were assuming
that lethal injection is the only method, but that doesnt
mean were right.”
I picked up the carton of lo mein and spooled the noodles
into my mouth. “I know its here somewhere,” I muttered as
the rabbit hopped across another stack of legal texts
scattered on the floor of the living room. I was not in the
habit of reading the New Hampshire Criminal Code; going
through the sections and subsections was like navigating
through molasses. Id turn back a page, and the spot Id
been reading a moment before would disappear in the run
of text.
Death.
Death penalty.
Capital murder.
Injection, lethal.
630:5 (XXl l). When the penalty of death is imposed, the
sentence shal be that the defendant is imprisoned in the
state prison at Concord until the day appointed for his
execution, which shal not be within one year from the day
sentence is passed.
Or in Shays case, eleven years.
The punishment of death shal be inflicted by continuous,
intravenous administration of a lethal quantity of an ultra-
short-acting barbiturate in combination with a chemical
paralytic agent until death is pronounced by a licensed
physician according to accepted standards of medical
practice.
Everything I knew about the death penalty I had learned at
the ACLU. Prior to working there, I hadnt given the death
penalty much thought, beyond when someone was
executed and the media made a huge story out of it. Now I
knew the names of those who were kil ed. I heard about
their lastminute appeals. I knew that, after death, some
inmates were found to be innocent.
Lethal injection was supposed to be like putting a dog to
sleepa drowsiness overcame you, and then you just
never woke up. No pain, no stress. It was a cocktail of three
drugs: Sodium Pentothal, a sedative to put the inmate to
sleep; Pavulon, to paralyze the muscular system and stop
breathing; and potassium chloride, to stop the heart. The
Sodium Pentothal was ultra-short-actingwhich meant that
you could recover quickly from its effects. It also meant that
a subject might have feeling in his nerves, yet be just
sedated enough to be unable to communicate or move.
The British medical journal the Lancet published a 2005
study of the toxicology reports of forty-nine executed
inmates in four U.S. states; forty-three of the inmates had a
level of anesthesia lower than required Anesthesiologists
say that if a person were conscious at the time potassium
chloride is administered, it would feel like boiling oil in the
veins.
An inmate might feel as if he were being burned alive from
the inside, but be unable to move or speak because of the
muscle paralysis and minimal sedation caused by the other
two drugs. The Supreme Court had even had its doubts:
although they stil ruled that capital punishment was
constitutional, theyd halted executions of two inmates on a
narrower issue: whether the excessive pain caused by
lethal injection was a civil rights infraction that could be
argued in a lower court.
Orto put it simplylethal injection might not be as
humane as everyone wanted to believe.
630:5 (XIV). The commissioner of corrections or his
designee shal determine the substance or substances to
be used and the procedures to be used in any execution,
provided, however, that if for any reason the commissioner
finds it to be impractical to carry out the punishment of
death by administration of the required lethal substance or
substances, the sentence of death may be carried out by
hanging under the provisions of law for the death penalty by
hanging in effect on December 31,1986.
Oliver settled on my lap as I read the words again.
Shay didnt have to be executed by lethal injection, if I could
make the commissioneror a courtfind it impractical. If
you coupled that with the RLUIPAthe law that said a
prisoners religious freedoms had to be protected in prison
and if I could prove that part of Shays belief system for
redemption included organ donation, then lethal injection
was impractical.
In which case, Shay would be hanged.
Andhere was the real miracleaccording to Dr.
Gal agher, that meant Shay Bourne could donate his heart.
Lucius
The day the priest returned, I was working on pigments. My
favorite substance was teait made a stain you could vary
in intensity from an almost white to a yel owish brown.
MEtMs were vibrant, but they were the hardest to work
with-you had to moisten a Q-tip and rub it over the surface
of the MftM, you couldnt just soak off the pigment like I was
doing this morning with Skittles.
I set my jar lid on the table and added about fifteen drops of
warm water. The green Skittle went in next, and I rol ed it
around with my finger, watching the food dye coating come
off. The trick here was to pul the candy out just as I started
to see the white sugar beneath the coatingif the sugar
melted into the paint, it wouldnt work as wel .
I popped the bleached button of candy into my mouthI
could do that these days, now that the thrush was gone. As I
sucked on it, I poured the contents of the lid (green, like the
grass I had not walked on with my bare feet in years; like
the color of a jungle; like Adams eyes) into an aspirin bottle
for safekeeping. Later, I could vary the pigment with a dab
of white toothpaste, diluted with water to make the right
hue.
It was a laborious process, but then again … I had time.
I was just about to repeat the endeavor with a yel ow
jawbreaker-the yield of paint was four times as much as a
Skittlewhen Shays priest walked up to my cel door in his
flak jacket. I had, of course, seen the priest briefly the day
he first visited Shay, but only at a distance. Now, with him
directly in front of my cel door, I could see that he was
younger than I would have expected, with hair that seemed
decidedly un-priestlike and eyes as soft as gray flannel.
“Shays getting his hair cut,” I said, because it was barber
day, and thats where he had been taken about ten minutes
before.
“I know, Lucius,” the priest said. “Thats why I was hoping to
talk to you.”
Let me tel you, the last thing I wanted to do was chat with a
priest. I hadnt asked for one, certainly, and in my previous
experience, the clergy only wanted to give a lecture on how
being gay was a choice, and how God loved me (but not
my pesky habit of fal ing in love with other men). Just
because Shay had come back to his cel convinced that his
new teamsome lawyer girl and this priestwere going to
move mountains for him didnt mean that I shared his
enthusiasm. In spite of the fact that hed been incarcerated
for eleven years, Shay was stil the most naive inmate Id
ever met. Just last night, for example, hed had a fight with
the correctional officers because it was laundry day and
theyd brought new sheets, which Shay refused to put on
the bed. He said he could feel the bleach, and instead
insisted on sleeping on the floor of the cel .
“I appreciate you seeing me, Lucius,” the priest said. “Im
happy to hear youre feeling better these days.”
I stared at him, wary.
“How long have you known Shay?”
I shrugged. “Since he was put in the cel next to me a few
weeks ago.”
“Was he talking about organ donation then?”
“Not at first,” I said. “Then he had a seizure and got
transferred to the infirmary. When he came back, donating
his heart was al he could talk about.”
“He had a seizure?” the priest repeated, and I could tel this
was news to him. “Has he had any more since then?”
“Why dont you just ask Shay these questions?”
“I wanted to hear what you had to say.”
“What you want,” I corrected, “is for me to tel you whether or
not hes real y performing miracles.”
The priest nodded slowly. “I guess thats true.”
Some had already been leaked to the press; I imagined the
rest would be brought to light sooner or later. I told him what
Id seen with my own eyes, and by the time I was finished,
Father Michael was frowning slightly.
“Does he go around saying hes God?”
“No,” I joked. “That would be Crash.”
“Lucius,” the priest asked, “do you believe Shay is God?”
“You need to back up, Father, because I dont believe in
God. I quit around the same time one of your esteemed
col eagues told me that AIDS
was my punishment for sinning.” To be honest, I had split
religion along the seam of secular and nonsecular;
choosing to concentrate on the beauty of a Caravaggio
without noticing the Madonna and child; or finding the best
lamb recipe for a lavish Easter dinner, without thinking
about the Passion.
Religion gave hope to people who knew the end wasnt
going to be pretty. It was why inmates started praying in
prison and why patients started praying when the doctors
said terminal. Religion was supposed to be a blanket
drawn up to your chin to keep you warm, a promise that
when it came to the end, you wouldnt die alonebut it
could just as easily leave you shivering out in the cold, if
what you believed became more important than the fact
that you believed.
I stared at him. “I dont believe in God. But I do believe in
Shay.”
“Thank you for your time, Lucius,” the priest said softly, and
he walked down the tier.
He may have been a priest, but he was looking for his
miracles in the wrong place. That day with the gum, for
example. I had seen the coverage on the newsit was
reported that Shay had somehow taken one tiny rectangle
of Bazooka gum and multiplied it. But ask someone whod
been therelike me, or Crash, or Texasand youd know
there werent suddenly seven pieces of bubble gum. It was
more like this: when the piece was fished underneath our
cel doors, instead of taking as much as we could, we
made do with less instead.
The gum was magical y replicated. But wethe blatantly
greedybalanced the needs of the other seven guys and in
that instant found them just as worthy as our own.
Which, if you asked me, was an even greater miracle.
The Holy Father has an entire office at the Vatican devoted
to analyzing al eged miracles and passing judgment on
their authenticity. They scrutinize statues and busts, scrape
Crisco out of the corners of supposedly bleeding eyes,
track scented oil on wal s that emit the smel of roses. I was
nowhere as experienced as those priests, but then again,
there was a crowd of nearly five hundred people outside the
state prison cal ing Shay Bourne a saviorand I wasnt
going to let people give up on Jesus that easily.
To that end, I was now ensconced in a lab on the Dartmouth
campus, with a graduate student named Ahmed who was
trying to explain to me the results of the test hed run on the
soil sample taken from the vicinity of the pipes that ran into
I-tier. “The reason the prison couldnt get a conclusive
explanation is because they were looking in the pipes, not
outside them,” Ahmed said. “So the water tested positive
for something that looked like alcohol, but only in certain
pipes. And youl never guess whats growing near those
pipes: rye.”
“Rye? Like the grain?”
“Yeah,” Ahmed said. “Which accounts for the concentration
of ergot into the water. Its a fungal disease of rye. Im not
sure what brings it onIm not a botanistbut I bet it had
something to do with the amount of rain weve had, and
there was a hairline crack in the piping they found when
they first investigated, which accounts for the transmission
in the first place. Ergot was the first kind of chemical
warfare. The Assyrians used it in the seventh century B.C.
to poison water supplies.” He smiled. “I double-majored in
chemistry and ancient history.”
“Its deadly?”
Ahmed shrugged. “In repeated doses. But at first, its a
hal ucinogen thats related to LSD.”
“So, the prisoners on I-tier might not have been drunk …” I
said careful y.
“Right,” Ahmed replied. “Just tripping.”
I turned over the vial with the soil sample. “You think the
water got contaminated?”
“That would be my bet.”
But Shay Bourne, in prison, would not have been able to
know that there was a fungus growing near the pipes that
led into I-tier, would he?
I suddenly remembered something else: the fol owing
morning, those same inmates on I-tier had ingested the
same water and had not acted out of the ordinary. “So how
did it get uncontaminated?”
“Now that,” Ahmed said, “I havent quite figured out.”
“There are a number of reasons that an advanced AIDS
patient with a particularly low CD4 count and high viral load
might suddenly appear to get better,” Dr. Perego said. An
autoimmune disease specialist at Dartmouth-Hitchcock
Medical Center, he also served as the doctor for HIV/AIDS
patients at the state prison and knew al about Lucius and
his recovery. He didnt have time for a formal talk, but was
perfectly wil ing to chat if I wanted to walk with him from his
office to a meeting at the other end of the hospitalas long
as I realized that he couldnt violate doctor-patient
confidentiality. “If a patient is hoarding meds, for example,
and suddenly decides to start taking them, sores wil
disappear and health wil improve. Although we draw blood
every three months from AIDS patients, sometimes wel
get a guy who refuses to have his blood drawnand again,
what looks like sudden improvement is actual y a slow turn
for the better.”
“Alma, the nurse at the prison, told me Lucius hasnt had his
blood drawn in over six months,” I said.
“Which means we cant be quite sure what his recent viral
count was.” We had reached the conference room. Doctors
in white coats mil ed into the room, taking their seats. Im
not sure what you wanted to hear,” Dr. Perego said, smiling
rueful y. “That hes special… or that hes not.”
Im not sure either,” I admitted, and I shook his hand.
“Thanks for your time.”
The doctor slipped into the meeting, and I started back
down the hal toward the parking garage. I was waiting at
the elevator, grinning down at a baby in a strol er with a
patch over her right eye, when I felt a hand on my shoulder.
Dr. Perego was standing there. Im glad I caught you,” he
said. “Have you got a moment?”
I watched the babys mother push the strol er onto the
yawning elevator.
“Sure.”
“This is what I didnt tel you,” Dr. Perego said. “And you
didnt hear it from me.”
I nodded, understanding.
“HIV causes cognitive impairmenta permanent loss of
memory and concentration. We can literal y see this on an
MRI, and DuFresnes brain scan showed irreparable
damage when he first entered the state prison. However,
another MRI brain scan was done on him yesterdayand it
shows a reversal of that atrophy.” He looked at me, waiting
for this to sink in. “Theres no physical evidence of
dementia anymore.”
“What could cause that?”
Dr. Perego shook his head. “Absolutely nothing,” he
admitted.
The second time I went to meet with Shay Bourne, he was
lying on his bunk, asleep. Not wanting to disturb him, I
started to back away, but he spoke to me without opening
his eyes. Im awake,” he said. “Are you?”
“Last time I checked,” I answered.
C He sat up, swinging his legs over the side of his bunk.
“Wow. I dreamed that I was struck by lightning, and al of a
sudden I had the power to locate anyone in the world,
anytime. So the government cut a deal with mefind bin
Laden, and youre free.”
“I used to dream that I had a watch, and turning the hands
could take you backward in time,” I said. “I always wanted
to be a pirate, or a Viking.”
“Sounds pretty bloodthirsty for a priest.”
“Wel , I wasnt born with a col ar on.”
He looked me in the eye. “If I could turn back time, Id go out
flyfishing with my grandfather.”
I glanced up. “I used to do that with my grandfather, too.”
I wondered how two boyslike Shay and mecould begin
our lives at the same point and somehow take turns that
would lead us to be such different men. “My grandfathers
been gone a long time, and I stil miss him,” I admitted.
“I never met mine,” Shay said. “But I must have had one,
right?”
I looked at him quizzical y. What kind of life had he suffered,
I looked at him quizzical y. What kind of life had he suffered,
to have to craft memories from his imagination? “Where
did you grow up.
Shay?” I asked.
“The light,” Shay replied, ignoring my question. “How does
a fish know where it is? I mean, things shift around on the
floor of the ocean, right? So if you come back and
everythings changed, how can it real y be the place you
were before?”
The door to the tier buzzed, and one of the officers came
down the catwalk, carrying a metal stool. “Here you go.
Father,” he said, settling it in front of Shays cel door. “Just
in case you want to stay awhile.”
I recognized him as the man who had sought me out the
last time Id been here, talking to Lucius. His baby daughter
had been critical y il ; he credited Shay with her recovery. I
thanked him, but waited until hed left to talk to Shay again.
“Did you ever feel like that fish?”
Shay looked at me as if I were the one who couldnt fol ow a
linear conversation. “What fish?” he said.
“Like you cant find your way back home?”
I knew where I was heading with this topicstraight to true
salvationbut Shay took us off course. “I had a bunch of
houses, but only one home.”
Hed been in the foster care system; I remembered that
much from the trial. “Which place was that?”
“The one where my sister was with me. I havent seen her
since I was sixteen. Since I got sent to prison.”
I remembered hed been sent to a juvenile detention center
for arson, but I hadnt remembered anything about a sister.
“Why didnt she come to your trial?” I asked, and realized
too late that I had made a grave mistakethat there was
no reason for me to know that, unless I had been there.
But Shay didnt notice. “I told her to stay away. I didnt want
her to tel anyone what Id done.” He hesitated. “I want to
talk to her.”
“Your sister?”
“No. She wont listen. The other one. Shel hear me, after I
die.
Every time her daughter speaks.” Shay looked up at me.
“You know how you said youd ask her if she wants the
heart? What if I asked her myself?”
Getting June Nealon to come visit Shay in prison would be
like moving Mt. Everest to Columbus, Ohio. “I dont know if
it wil work…”
But then again, maybe seeing June face-to-face would
make Shay see the difference between personal
forgiveness and divine forgiveness.
Maybe putting the heart of a kil er into the chest of a child
would showliteral yhow good might blossom from bad.
And the beat of Claires pulse would bring June more
peace than any prayer I could offer.
Maybe Shay did know more about redemption than I.
He was standing in front of the cinder-block wal now,
trailing his fingertips over the cement, as if he could read
the history of the men whod lived there before him.
Til try,” I said.
There was a part of me that knew I should tel Maggie
Bloom that I had been on the jury that convicted Shay
Bourne. It was one thing to keep the truth from Shay; it was
another to compromise whatever legal case Maggie was
weaving together. On the other hand, it was up to me to
make sure that Shay found peace with God before his
death. The minute I told Maggie about my past involvement
with Shay, I knew shed tel me to get lost, and would find
him another spiritual advisor the judge couldnt find fault
with. I had prayed long and hard about this, and for now, I
was keeping my secret. God wanted me to help Shay, or
so I told myself, because it kept me from admitting that I
wanted to help Shay, too, after failing him the first time.
The ACLU office was above a printing shop and smel ed
like fresh ink and toner. It was fil ed with plants in various
stages of dying, and filing cabinets took up most of the floor
space. A paralegal sat at a reception desk, typing so
furiously that I almost expected her computer screen to
detonate. “How can I help,” she said, not bothering to look
up.
Im here to see Maggie Bloom.”
The paralegal lifted her right hand, stil typing with her left,
and hooked a thumb overhead and to the left. I wound down
the hal way, stepping over boxes of files and stacks of
newspapers, and found Maggie sitting at her desk,
scribbling on a legal pad. When she saw me, she smiled.
“Listen,” she said, as if we were old friends. “I have some
fantastic news. I think Shay can be hanged.” Then she
blanched. “I didnt mean fantastic news, real y. I meant…
wel , you know what I meant.”
“Why would he want to do that?”
“Because then he can donate his heart.” Maggie frowned.
“But first we need to get the prison to agree to send him for
tests, to make sure I drew in my breath. “Look. We need to
talk.”
“Its not often I get a priest who wants to confess.”
She didnt know the half of it. This is not about you, I
reminded myself, and firmly settled Shay in the front of my
mind. “Shay wants to be the one to ask June Nealon if shel
take his heart. Unfortunately, visiting him is not on her top-
ten list of things to do. I want to know if theres some kind of
court-ordered mediation we can ask for.”
Maggie raised a brow. “Do you real y think hes the best
person to relay this information to her? I dont see how that
wil help our case…”
“Look, I know youre doing your job,” I said, “but Im doing
mine, too. And saving Shays soul may not be important to
you, but its critical to me. Right now. Shay thinks that
donating his heart is the only way to save himselfbut
theres a big difference between mercy and salvation.”
Maggie folded her hands on her desk. “Which is?”
“Wel , June can forgive Shay. But only God can redeem him
and it has nothing to do with giving up his heart. Yes,
organ donation would be a beautiful, selfless final act on
earthbut its not going to cancel out his debt with the
victims family, and its not necessary to get him special
brownie points with God. Salvations not a personal
responsibility.
You dont have to get salvation. Youre given it, by Jesus.”
You dont have to get salvation. Youre given it, by Jesus.”
“So,” she said. “I guess you dont think hes the Messiah.”
“No, I think thats a pretty rash judgment.”
“Youre preaching to the choir. I was raised Jewish.”
My cheeks flamed. “I didnt mean to suggest”
“But now Im an atheist.”
I opened my mouth, snapped it shut.
“Believe me,” Maggie said, “Im the last person in the world
to buy into the belief that Shay Bourne is Jesus incarnate
”
“Wel , of course not-“
“but not because a messiah wouldnt inhabit a criminal,”
she qualified. “I can tel you right now that there are plenty of
innocent people on death row in this country.”
I wasnt about to tel her that I knew Shay Bourne was guilty.
I had studied the evidence; I had heard the testimony; I had
convicted him.
“Its not that.”
“Then how can you be so sure hes not who everyone thinks
he is?” Maggie asked.
“Because,” I replied, “God only had one son to give us.”
“Right. Andcorrect me if Im wronghe was a thirty-three-
yearold carpenter with a death sentence on his head, who
was performing miracles left and right. Nah, youre right.
Thats nothing like Shay Bourne.”
I thought of what Id heard from Ahmed and Dr. Perego and
the correctional officers. Shay Bournes socal ed miracles
were nothing like Jesuss … or were they? Water into wine.
Feeding many with virtual y nothing. Healing the sick.
Making the blindor in Cal oways case, the prejudiced
see.
Like Shay, Jesus didnt take credit for his miracles. Like
Shay, Jesus had known he was going to die. And the Bible
even said Jesus was supposed to be returning. But
although the New Testament is very clear about this coming
to pass, it is a bit muddier on the details: the when, the why,
the how.
“Hes not Jesus.”
“Okey-dokey.”
“Hes not.” I pressed.
Maggie held up her hands. “Got it.”
“If he was Jesus … if this was the Second Coming … wel ,
thered be rapture and destruction and resurrections and
we wouldnt be sitting here having a normal conversation.”
Then again, there was nothing in the Bible that said before
the Second Coming, Jesus wouldnt pop in to see how
things were going here on earth.
I suppose in that case, it would make sense to be incognito
to pose as the least likely person anyone would ever
assume to be the Messiah.
For the love of God, what was I thinking? I shook my head,
clearing it. “Let him meet with June Nealon once before you
petition for organ donation, thats al Im asking. I want the
same things you doShays voice to be heard, a little girl
to be saved, and capital punishment to be put in the hot
seat. I just also want to make sure that if and when Shay
does donate his heart, he does it for al the right reasons.
And that means untangling Shays spiritual health from the
whole legal component of this mess.”
“I cant do that,” Maggie said. “Its the crux of my case.
Look, it doesnt matter to me whether you think Shay is
Jesus or Shay thinks Shay is Jesus or if hes just plain off
his rocker. What does matter is that Shays rights dont get
shuffled aside in the grand mechanism of capital
punishmentand if I have to use the fact that other people
seem to think hes God to do it, I wil .”
I raised a brow. “Youre using Shay to spotlight an issue you
find reprehensible, in the hopes that you can change it.”
“Wel ,” Maggie said, coloring, “I guess thats true.”
“Then how can you criticize me for having an agenda
because of what I believe in?”
Maggie raised her gaze and sighed. “Theres something
cal ed restorative justice,” she said. “I dont know if the
prison wil even al ow it, much less Shay or the Nealons. But
it would let Shay sit down in a room with the family of his
victims and ask for forgiveness.”
I exhaled the breath I had not even realized I was holding.
“Thank you,” I said.
Maggie picked up her pen and began to write on the legal
pad again.
“Dont thank me. Thank June Nealonif you get her to
agree to it.”
Motivated, I started out of the ACLU office, then paused.
“Its the right thing to do.”
Maggie didnt look up. “If June wont meet with him,” she
said, “Im stil filing the suit.”
June
At first, when the victims assistance advocate asked me if
Id attend a restorative justice meeting with Shay Bourne, I
started to laugh. “Yeah,” I said. “And maybe after that, I
could get dunked in boiling oil or drawn and quartered.”
But she was serious, and I was just as serious when I
refused.
The last thing in the world I wanted to do was sit down with
that monster to make him feel better about himself so that
he could die at peace.
Kurt didnt. Elizabeth didnt. Why should he?
I thought that was that, until one morning when there was a
knock on the door. Claire was lying on the couch with
Dudley curled over her feet, watching the Game Show
Network. Our days were spent waiting for a heart with the
shades drawn, both of us pretending there was nowhere we
wanted to go, when in reality, neither of us could stand
seeing how even the smal est trips exhausted Claire. “Il
get it,” she cal ed out, although we both knew she couldnt
and wouldnt. I put down the knife I was using to chop celery
in the kitchen and wiped my hands on my jeans.
“I bet its that creepy guy who was sel ing magazines,”
Claire said as I passed her.
“I bet its not.” Hed been a corn-fed Utah boy, pitching
subscriptions to benefit the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-Day Saints. Id been upstairs in the shower; Claire
had been talking to him through the screen doorfor which
Id read her the riot act. It was that word Saints that had
intrigued her; she didnt know it was a fancy word for
Mormon. I had suggested that he try a town where there
hadnt been a double murder committed by a young man
whod come around door to door looking for work, and after
he left, Id cal ed the police.
No, I was sure it wasnt the same guy.
To my surprise, though, a priest was standing on my porch.
His motorcycle was parked in my driveway. I opened the
door and tried to smile politely. “I think you have the wrong
house.”
“Im sure I dont, Ms. Nealon,” I replied. “Im Father Michael,
from St. Catherines. I was hoping I could speak to you for a
few minutes.”
“Im sorry … do I know you?”
He hesitated. “No,” he said. “But I was hoping to change
that.”
My natural inclination was to slam the door. (Was that a
mortal sin? Did it matter, if you didnt even believe in mortal
sins?) I could tel you the exact moment I had given up on
religion.
Kurt and I had been raised Catholic. Wed had Elizabeth
baptized, and a priest presided over their burials. After that,
I had promised myself I would never set foot in a church
again, that there was nothing God could do for me that
would make up for what Id lost. However, this priest was a
stranger. For al I knew, though, this was not about saving
my soul but about saving Claires life. What if this priest
knew of a heart that UNOS
didnt?
“The house is a mess,” I said, but I opened the door so that
he could walk inside. He stopped as we passed the living
room, where Claire was stil watching television. She
turned, her thin, pale face rising like a moon over the back
of the sofa. “This is my daughter,” I said as I turned to him,
and falteredhe was looking at Claire as if she were
already a ghost.
I was just about to throw him out when Claire said hel o and
propped her elbows on the back of the sofa. “Do you know
anything about saints?”
“Claire!”
She rol ed her eyes. “Im just asking, Mom.”
“I do,” the priest said. “Ive always sort of liked St. Ulric.
Hes the patron saint who keeps moles away.”
“Get out.”
“Have you ever had a mole in here?”
“No.”
“Then I guess hes doing his job,” he said, and grinned.
Because hed made Claire smile, I decided to let him in
and give him the benefit of the doubt. He fol owed me into
the kitchen, where I knew we could talk without Claire
overhearing. “Sorry about the third degree,” I said. “Claire
reads a lot. Saints are her latest obsession. Six months
ago, it was blacksmithing.” I gestured to the table, offering
him a seat.
“About Claire,” he said. “I know shes sick. Thats why Im
here.”
Although Id hoped for this, my own heart stil leapfrogged.
“Can you help her?”
“Possibly,” the priest said. “But I need you to agree to
something first.”
I would have become a nun; I would have walked over
burning coals. “Anything,” I vowed.
“I know the prosecutors office already asked you about
restorative justice”
“Get out of my house,” I said abruptly, but Father Michael
didnt move.
My face flamedwith anger, and with shame that I had not
connected the dots: Shay Bourne wanted to donate his
organs; I was actively searching for a heart for Claire. In
spite of al the news coverage from the prison, I had never
linked them. I wondered whether I had been naive, or
whether, even subconsciously, Id been trying to protect my
daughter.
It took al my strength to lift my gaze to the priests. “What
makes you think I would want a part of that man stil walking
around on this earth, much less inside my child?”
“Juneplease, just listen to me. Im Shays spiritual
advisor. I talk to him. And I think you should talk to him, too.”
“Why? Because it rubs your conscience the wrong way to
give sympathy to a murderer? Because you cant sleep at
night?”
“Because I think a good person can do bad things.
Because God forgives, and I cant do any less.”
Do you know how, when you are on the verge of a
breakdown, the world pounds in your earsa rush of blood,
of consequence?
Do you know how it feels when the truth cuts your tongue to
ribbons, and stil you have to speak it? “Nothing he says to
me could make any difference.”
“Youre absolutely right,” Father Michael said. “But what you
say to him might.”
There was one variable that the priest had left out of this
equation: I owed Shay Bourne nothing. It already felt like a
second, searing death to watch the broadcasts each night,
to hear the voices of supporters camping out near the
prison, who brought their sick children and their dying
partners along to be healed. You fools, I wanted to shout to
them. Dont you know hes conned you, just like he conned
me? Dont you know that he kil ed my love, my little girl?
“Name one person John Wayne Gacy kil ed,” I demanded.
” I … I dont know,” Father Michael said.
“Jeffrey Dahmer?”
He shook his head.
“But you remember their names, dont you?”
He got out of his chair and walked toward me slowly. “June,
people can change.”
My mouth twisted. “Yeah. Like a mild-mannered, homeless
carpenter who becomes a psychopath?”
Or a silver-haired fairy of a girl whose chest, in a heartbeat,
blooms with a peony of blood. Or a mother who turns into a
woman she never imagined being: bitter, empty, broken.
I knew why this priest wanted me to meet with Shay Bourne.
I knew what Jesus had said: Dont pay back in kind, pay
back in kindness.
If someone does wrong to you, do right by them.
Il tel you this: Jesus never buried his own child.
I turned away, because I didnt want to give him the
satisfaction of seeing me cry, but he put his arm around me
and led me to a chair. He handed me a tissue. And then his
voice, a murmur, clotted into individual words.
“Dear St. Felicity, patron saint of those whove suffered the
death of a child, I ask for your intercession that the Lord wil
help this woman find peace …”
With more strength than I knew I had, I shoved him away.
“Dont you dare,” I said, my voice trembling. “Dont you pray
for me. Because if Gods listening now, hes about eleven
years too late.” I walked toward the refrigerator, where the
only decoration was a picture of Kurt and Elizabeth, held up
by a magnet Claire had made in kindergarten. I had
fingered the photo so often that the edges had rounded; the
color had bled onto my hands. “When it happened,
everyone said that Kurt and Elizabeth were at peace.
That theyd gone someplace better. But you know what?
They didnt go anywhere. They were taken. I was robbed.”
“Dont blame God for that, June,” Father Michael said. “He
didnt take your husband and your daughter.”
“No,” I said flatly. “That was Shay Bourne.” I stared up at him
coldly. “Id like you to leave now.”
I walked him to the door, because I didnt want him saying
another word to Clairewho twisted around on the couch
to see what was going on but must have picked up enough
nonverbal cues from my stiff spine to know better than to
make a peep. At the threshold, Father Michael paused. “It
may not be when we want, or how we want, but eventual y
God evens the score,” he said. “You dont have to be the
one to seek revenge.”
I stared at him. “Its not revenge,” I said. “Its justice.”
After the priest left, I was so cold that I could not stop
shivering. I put on a sweater and then another, and
wrapped a blanket around myself, but theres no way of
warming up a body whose insides have turned to stone.
Shay Bourne wanted to donate his heart to Claire so that
shed live.
What kind of mother would I be if I let that happen?
And what kind of mother would I be if I turned him down?
Father Michael said Shay Bourne wanted to balance the
scales: give me one daughters life because he had taken
anothers. But Claire wouldnt replace Elizabeth; I should
have had them both.
And yet, this was the simplest of equations: You can have
one, or you can have neither. What do you choose?
I was the one who hated BourneClaire had never met
him. If I did not take the heart, was I making that choice
because of what I thought was best for Claire … or what I
could withstand myself?
I imagined Dr. Wu removing Bournes heart from an Igloo
cooler. There it was, a withered nut, a crystal black as coal.
Put one drop of poison into the purest water, and what
happens to the rest?
If I didnt take Bournes heart, Claire would most likely die.
If I did, it would be like saying I could somehow be
compensated for the death of my husband and daughter.
And I couldntnot ever.
I believe a good person can do bad things, Father Michael
had said.
Like make the wrong decision for the right reasons. Sign
your daughters life away, because she cant have a
murderers heart.
Forgive me, Claire, I thought, and suddenly I wasnt cold
anymore.
I was burning, seared by the tears on my cheeks.
I couldnt trust Shay Bournes sudden altruistic turnaround;
and maybe that meant he had won: I had gone just as bitter
and rotten as he was. But that only made me more certain
that I had the stamina to tel him, face-to-face, what
balancing the scales real y meant. It wasnt giving me a
heart for Claire; it wasnt offering a future that might ease
the weight of the past. It was knowing that Shay Bourne
badly wanted something, and that this time, Id be the one
to take his dream away.
Maggie
Stunned, I hung up the phone and stared at the receiver
again. I was tempted to *69 the cal , just to make sure it
hadnt been some kind of prank.
Wel , maybe miracles did happen.
But before I could mul over this change of events, I heard
footsteps heading toward my desk. Father Michael turned
the corner, looking like hed just been through Dantes
Inferno. “June Nealon wants nothing to do with Shay.”
“Thats interesting,” I said, “since June Nealon just got off
the phone with me, agreeing to a restorative justice
meeting.”
Father Michael blanched. “Youve got to cal her back. This
isnt a good idea.”
“Youre the one who came up with it.”
“That was before I spoke to her. If she goes to that meeting,
its not because she wants to hear what Shay has to say.
Its because she wants to run him through before the state
finishes him off.”
“Did you real y think that whatever Shay has to say to her is
going to be any less painful than what she says to him?”
“I dont know … I thought that maybe if they saw each other
…”
He sank down into a chair in front of my desk. “I dont know
what Im doing. I guess there are just some things you cant
make amends for.”
I sighed. “Youre trying. Thats the best any of us can do.
Look, its not like I fight death penalty cases al the time
but my boss used to. He worked down in Virginia before he
came up north. Theyre emotional minefieldsyou get to
know the inmate, and you excuse some heinous crime with
a lousy childhood or alcoholism or an emotional upheaval
or drugs, until you see the victims family and a whole
different level of suffering.
And suddenly you start to feel a little ashamed of being in
the defendants camp.”
I walked to a smal cooler next to a file cabinet and took out
a bottle of water for the priest. “Shays guilty, Father. A
court already told us that.
June knows it. I know it. Everyone knows that its wrong to
execute an innocent man. The real question is whether its
stil wrong to execute someone whos guilty.”
“But youre trying to get him hanged,” Father Michael said.
“Im not trying to get him hanged,” I corrected. “I want to
champion his civil liberties, and at the same time, bring
front and center whats wrong with the death penalty in this
country The only way to do both is to find a way for him to
die the way he wants to. Thats the difference between you
and me. Youre trying to find a way for him to die the way
you want him to.”
“Youre the one who said Shays heart might not be a viable
match.
And even if it is, June Nealon wil never agree to taking it,”
the priest said.
That was, of course, entirely possible. What Father Michael
had conveniently put out of his mind when he dreamed up a
meeting between June and Shay was that in order to
forgive, you have to remember how you were hurt in the first
place. And that in order to forget, you had to accept your
role in what had happened.
“If we dont want Shay to lose hope,” I said, “then wed
better not lose it either.”
M I C H A EL
Every day when I wasnt running the noon Mass, I went to
visit Shay.
Sometimes we talked about television shows wed seen
we were both pretty upset with Meredith on Greys
Anatomy, and thought the girls on The Bachelor were hot
but dumb as bricks. Sometimes we talked about carpentry,
how a piece of wood would tel him what it needed to be,
how I could say the same of a parishioner in need.
Sometimes we talked about his casethe appeals hed
lost, the lawyers hed had over the years. And sometimes,
he was less lucid. Hed run around his cel like a caged
animal; hed rock back and forth; hed swing from topic to
topic as if it was the only way to cross the jungle of his
thoughts.
One day. Shay asked me what was being said about him
outside.
“You know,” I told him. “You watch the news.”
“They think I can save them,” Shay said.
“Wel . Yeah.”
“Thats pretty fucking selfish, isnt it? Or is it selfish of me if I dont try?”
“I cant answer that for you. Shay,” I said.
He sighed. “Im tired of waiting to die,” he said. “Eleven
years is a long time.”
I pressed my stool up close to the cel door; it was more
private that way. It had taken me a week, but I had
managed to separate out the way I felt about Shays case
from the way that he felt. I had been stunned to learn that
Shay believed he was innocentalthough Warden Coyne
told me that everyone in prison believed they were
innocent, regardless of the conviction. I wondered if his
memory of the events, over time, had blurredme, I could
stil remember that awful evidence as if it had been
presented to me yesterday. When I pushed a
bitencouraged him to tel me more about his wrongful
conviction, suggested that Maggie might be able to use the
information in court, asked him why he was wil ing to go
along with an execution so passively if he wasnt guiltyhe
shut down. Hed say, over and over, that what had
happened then didnt matter now. I began to understand
that proclaiming his innocence had a lot less to do with the
reality of his case and more to do with the fragile
connection between us. I was becoming his confidantand
he wanted me to think the best of him.
“What do you think is easier?” Shay asked. “Knowing
youre going to die on a certain date and time, or knowing it
might happen any moment when you least expect it?”
A thought swam through my mind like a minnow: Did you
ask Elizabeth that? “Id rather not know,” I said. “Live every
day like its your last, and al that. But I think if you do know
youre going to die, Christ showed the way to do it with
grace.”
Shay smirked. “Just think. It took you a whole forty-two
minutes to bring up good ol Jesus today.”
“Sorry. Professional hazard,” I said. “When He says, in
Gethsemane, 0 my Father, if it be possible, let this cup
pass from me… Hes wrestling with destiny… but
ultimately. He accepts Gods wil .”
“Sucks for him,” Shay said.
“Wel , sure. I bet His legs felt like Jel -0 when He was
carrying the Cross. He was human, after al . You can be
brave, but that doesnt keep your stomach from doing
somersaults.”
I finished speaking to find Shay staring at me. “Did you ever
wonder if youre dead wrong?”
“About what?”
“Al of it. What Jesus said. What Jesus meant. I mean, he
didnt even write the Bible, did he? In fact, the people who
did write the Bible werent even alive when Jesus was.” I
must have looked absolutely stricken, because Shay
hurried to continue. “Not that Jesus wasnt a real y cool guy
great teacher, excel ent speaker, yadda yadda yadda.
But… Son of God? Wheres the proof?”
“Thats what faith is,” I said. “Believing without seeing.”
“Okay,” Shay argued. “But what about the folks who think
Al ahs the one to put your money on? Or that the right path
is the eightfold one? I mean, how can a guy who walked on
water even get baptized?”
“We know Jesus was baptized because”
“Because its in the Bible?” Shay laughed. “Someone wrote
the Bible, and it wasnt God. Just like someone wrote the
Quran, and the Talmud. And he must have made decisions
about what went in and what didnt. Its like when you write a
letter, and you put in al the stuff you did during vacation but
you leave out the part where your wal et got stolen and you
got food poisoning.”
“Do you real y need to know if Jesus got food poisoning?” I
asked.
“Youre missing the point. You cant take Matthew 26:39 or
Luke 500:43 or whatever and read it as fact.”
“See, Shay, thats where youre wrong. I can take Matthew
26:39
and know its the word of God. Or Luke 500:43, if it went up
that high.”
By now, other inmates on the pod were eavesdropping.
Some of themlike Joey Kunz, who was Greek Orthodox,
and Pogie, who was Southern Baptistliked to listen when
I visited Shay and read scripture; a few of them had even
asked if Id stop by and pray with them when I came in to
see Shay. “Shut your piehole. Bourne,” Pogie yel ed out.
“Youre going to hel as soon as they push that needle in
your arm.”
“Im not saying Im right,” Shay said, his voice escalating.
“Im just saying that if youre right, it stil doesnt mean Im
wrong.”
“Shay,” I said, “you have to stop shouting, or theyre going
to ask me to leave.”
He walked toward me, flattening his hands on the other
side of the steel mesh door. “What if it didnt matter if you
were a Christian or a Jew or a Buddhist or a Wiccan or a
… a transcendentalist? What if al those roads led to the
same place?”
“Religion brings people together,” I said.
“Yeah, right. You can track every polarizing issue in this
country to religion. Stem cel research, the war in Iraq, the
right to die, gay marriage, abortion, evolution, even the
death penaltywhats the fault line? That Bible of yours.”
Shay shrugged. “You real y think Jesus would be happy with
the way the worlds turned out?”
I thought of suicide bombers, of the radicals who stormed
into Planned Parenthood clinics. I thought of the news
footage of the Middle East. “I think God would be horrified
by some of the things that are done in His name,” I
admitted. “I think there are places His message has been
distorted. Which is why I think its even more important to
spread the one He meant to give.”
Shay pushed away from the cel door. “You look at a guy
like Cal oway”
“Fuck you. Bourne,” Reece cal ed out. “I dont want to be
part of your speech. I dont even want your filthy-ass mouth
speaking my name”
“an AB guy, who burned down a temple”
“Youre dead. Bourne,” Reece said. “D-E-A-D.”
“or the CO who walks you to the shower and knows he
cant look you in the eye, because if his life had gone just a
little different, he might be the one wearing the cuffs. Or the
politicians who think that they can take someone they dont
real y want in society anymore and lock him away”
At this, the other inmates began to cheer. Texas and Pogie
picked up their dinner trays and began to bang them
against the steel doors of their cel s. On the intercom, an
officers voice rang through. “Whats going on in there?”
Shay was standing at the front of his house now, preaching
to his congregation, disconnected from linear thought and
everything but his moment of grandstanding. “And the ones
who are real y monsters, the ones they dont ever want
walking around near their wives and children againthe
ones like mewel , those they get to dispose of. Because
its easier than admitting there isnt much difference
between them and me.”
There were catcal s; there were cheers. Shay backed up as
if he were on a stage, bent at the waist, bowed. Then he
came back for his encore.
“The jokes on them. One little hypodermic wont be
enough. Split a piece of wood, and theyl find me. Lift up a
stone, and theyl find me.
Look in the mirror, and theyl find me.” Shay gazed
squarely at me. “If you real y want to know what makes
someone a kil er,” he said, “ask vourself what would make
you do it.”
My hands tightened on the Bible I always brought when I
came to visit Shay. As it turned out. Shay wasnt railing
about nothing. He wasnt disconnected from reality.
That would have been me.
Because, as Shay was suggesting, we werent as different
as I would have liked to think. We were both murderers.
The only distinction was that the death Id caused had yet to
happen.
Maggie
That week, when I showed up at the ChutZpah for lunch with
my mother, she was too busy to see me. “Maggie,” she
said when I was standing at the threshold of her office door.
“What are you doing here?”
It was the same day, the same time, we met for our habitual
lunchthe same lunch I never wanted to go to. But today, I
was actual y looking forward to zoning out while my cuticles
were being cut and shaped. Ever since Father Michael had
barreled into my office talking about a meeting between
Shay and June Nealon, Id been doubting myself and my
intentions.
By trying to make it possible for Shay to donate his heart,
was I carrying out what was in his best interests, or my
own? Sure, it would be a media boon for the anti-death
penalty movement if Shays last act on earth was as
selfless as organ donation … but wasnt it moral y wrong to
try to legal y hasten a mans execution, even if it was what
hed asked for?
After three sleepless nights, al I wanted was to close my
eyes, soak my hands in warm water, and think of anything
but Shay Bourne.
My mother was wearing a cream-colored skirt so tiny it
might as wel have come from the American Girl dol store,
and her hair was twisted up in a chignon. “I have an investor
coming in,” she said. “Remember?”
What I remembered was her vague mention of adding
another wing to the ChutZpah. And that there was some
very rich lady from Woodbury, New York, who wanted to talk
about financing it.
“You never told me it was going to be today,” I said, and I
sank down in one of the chairs opposite her desk.
“Youre crushing the pil ows,” my mother said. “And I did tel
you. I cal ed you at work, and you were typing, like you
always do when I cal even though you think I cant hear it in
the background. And I told you I had to postpone lunch til
Thursday, and you yessed me and said you were real y
busy, and did I have to cal you at work?”
My face flushed. “I dont type while Im on the phone with
you.”
Okay, I do. But its my mother. And she cal s for the most
ridiculous reasons: Is it okay if she makes Chanukah dinner
on Saturday, December 16, never mind that its currently
March? Do I remember the name of the librarian in my
elementary school, because she thinks she ran into her at
the grocery store? In other words, my mother phones for
reasons that are completely trivial compared to writing up a
brief to save the life of a man whos going to be executed.
“You know, Maggie, I realize that nothing I do here could
possibly be as important as what you do, but it does hurt
me to know that you dont even listen when I talk *o vou.”
Her eyes were tearing up. “I cant believe you came here to
upset me before I have to sit down with Alicia Goldman-
Hirsch.”
“I didnt come here to upset you! I came here because I
always come here the second Tuesday of every month! You
cant blame me because of a stupid phone conversation
we probably had six months ago!”
“A stupid phone conversation,” my mother said quietly.
“Wel , its good to know what you real y think of our
relationship, Maggie.”
I held up my hands. “I cant win here,” I said. “I hope your
meeting goes wel .” Then I stormed out of her office, past
the white secretarys desk with the white computer and the
nearly albino receptionist, al the way to my car in the
parking lot, where I tried to tel myself that the reason I was
crying had nothing to do with the fact that even when I
wasnt trying, al I did was let people down.
I found my father in his officea rental space in a strip mal ,
since he was a rabbi without a templewriting his sermon
for Shabbat. As soon as I walked in, he smiled, then lifted a
finger to beg a moments time to finish whatever bril iant
thought he was scribbling down. I wandered around, trailing
my fingers over the spines of books written in Hebrew and
Greek, Old Testaments and New Testaments, books on
theurgy and theology and philosophy. I palmed an old
paperweight Id made him in nursery schoola rock
painted to look like a crab, although now it seemed to more
closely resemble an amoeba, and then took down one of
my baby photos, tucked in an acrylic frame.
I had fat cheeks, even then.
My father closed his laptop. “To what do I owe this
surprise?”
I set the photo back on the mahogany shelf. “Did you ever
wonder if the person in the picture is the same one you see
when you look in the mirror?”
He laughed. “Thats the eternal question, isnt it? Are we
born who we are, or do we make ourselves that way?” He
stood up and came around his desk, kissed my cheek.
“Did you come here to argue philosophy with your old
man?”
“No, I came here because … I dont know why I came here.”
That was the truth; my car had sort of pointed itself in the
direction of his office, and even when I realized where it
was headed I didnt correct my course. Everyone else
came to my father when they were troubled or wanted
counseling, why shouldnt I? I sank down onto the old
leather couch that hed had for as long as I could
remember. “Do you think God forgives murderers?”
My father sat down next to me. “Isnt your client Catholic?”
“I was talking about me.”
“Wel , gosh, Mags. I hope you got rid of the weapon.”
I sighed. “Daddy, I dont know what to do. Shay Bourne
doesnt want to become the poster child against capital
punishment, he wants to die. And yeah, I can tel myself a
dozen times that we can both have our cake and eat it, too
Shay gets to die on his own terms; I get the death penalty
put under a microscope and maybe even repealed by the
Supreme Courtbut it doesnt cancel out the fact that at
the end of the day, Shay wil be dead, and Il be just as
responsible as the state that signed the warrant in the first
place. Maybe I should be trying to convince Shay to get his
conviction overturned, to fight for his life, instead of his
death.”
“I dont think hed want that,” my father said. “Youre not
murdering him, Maggie. Youre fulfil ing his last wishesto
help him make amends for what hes done wrong.”
“Repentance through organ donation?”
“More like teshuvah.”
I stared at him.
“Oh, right,” he smirked. “I forgot about the post-Hebrew
School amnesia.
For Jews, repentance is about conductyou realize youve
done something wrong, you resolve to change it in the
future. But teshuvah means return. Inside each of us is
some spark of Godthe real us. Its there whether youre
the most pious Jew or the most marginal. Sin, evil, murder
al those things have the ability to cover up our true
selves.
Teshuvah means turning back to the part of God thats
gotten concealed.
When you repent, usual y, you feel sadbecause of the
regret that led you there. But when you talk about teshuvah,
about making that connection with God againwel , it
makes you happy,” my father said. “Happier even than you
were before, because your sins separated you from God …
and distance always makes the heart grow fonder, right?”
He walked toward the baby picture Id put back on the shelf.
“I know Shays not Jewish, but maybe thats whats at the
root of this desire to die, and to give up his heart. Teshuvah
is al about reaching for something divinesomething
beyond the limitations of a body.” He glanced at me.
“Thats the answer to your question about the photo, by the
way. Youre a different person on the outside than you were
when this picture was snapped, but not on the inside. Not at
the core. And not only is that part of you the same as it was
when you were six months old … its also the same as me
and your mother and Shay Bourne and everyone else in this
world. Its the part of us thats connected to God, and at that
level, were al identical.”
I shook my head. “Thanks, but that didnt real y make me
feel any better. I want to save him, Daddy, and hehe
doesnt want that at al .”
“Restitution is one of the steps a person has to take for
teshuvah,” my father said. “Shay has apparently taken a
very literal interpretation of thishe took a childs life;
therefore he owes that mother the life of a child.”
“Its not a perfect equation,” I said. “Hed have to bring
Elizabeth Nealon back for that.”
My father nodded. “Thats something rabbis have talked
about for years since the Holocaustif the victim is dead,
does the family real y have the power to forgive the kil er?
The victims are the ones with whom he has to make
amends. And those victimstheyre ashes.”
I sat up, rubbing my temples. “Its real y complicated.”
“Then ask yourself whats the right thing to do.”
“I cant even answer that much.”
“Wel ,” my father said, “then maybe you should ask Shay.”
I blinked up at him. It was that simple. I hadnt seen my
client since that first meeting in the prison; the work Id been
doing to set up a restorative justice meeting had been on
the phone. Maybe what I real y needed was to find out why
Shay Bourne was so sure hed come to the right decision,
so that I could start explaining it to myself.
I leaned over and gave him a hug. “Thanks, Daddy.”
“I didnt do anything.”
“Stil , youre a better conversationalist than Oliver.”
“Dont tel the rabbit that,” he said. “Hed scratch me twice
as hard as he already does.”
I stood up, heading for the door. “Il cal you later. Oh, and
by the way,” I said, “Moms mad at me again.”
I was sitting under the harsh fluorescent lights of the
attorney-client conference room when Shay Bourne was
brought in to meet with me. He backed up to the trap so
that his handcuffs could be removed, and he sat down
across the table. His hands were smal , I realized, maybe
even smal er than mine.
“Hows it going?” he asked.
“Fine. Hows it going with you?”
“No, I meant my lawsuit. My heart.”
“Wel , were waiting until after you speak to June Nealon
tomorrow.”
I hesitated. “Shay, I need to ask you a question, as your
lawyer.” I waited until he looked me in the eye. “Do you
real y believe that the only way to atone for what youve
done is to die?”
“I just want to give her my heart”
“I get that. But in order to do that, youve basical y agreed to
your own execution.”
He smiled faintly. “And here I thought my vote didnt count.”
“I think you know what I mean,” I said. “Your case is going to
shine a beacon on the issue of capital punishment, Shay
but youl be the sacrificial lamb.”
His head snapped up. “Who do you think I am?”
I hesitated, not quite sure what he was asking.
“Do you believe what they al believe?” he asked. “Or what
Lucius believes? Do you think I can make miracles
happen?”
“I dont believe anything I havent seen,” I said firmly.
“Most people just want to believe what someone else tel s
them,”
Shay said.
He was right. It was why, in my fathers office, Id had a
breakdown: because even as a confirmed atheist, I
sometimes found it just too frightening to think that there
might not be a God who was watching out for our greater
good. It was why a country as enlightened as the United
States could stil have a death penalty statute in place: it
was just too frightening to think about what justiceor lack
of itwould prevail if we didnt. There was comfort in facts,
so much so that we stopped questioning where those facts
had come from.
Was I trying to figure out who Shay Bourne was for myself?
Proba bly. I didnt buy the fact that he was the Son of God,
but if it was getting him media attention, then I thought he
was bril iant for encouraging that line of thought. “If you can
get June to forgive you at this meeting, Shay, maybe you
dont have to give up your heart. Maybe youl feel good
about connecting with her again, and then we can get her to
talk to the governor on your behalf to commute your
sentence to life in prison”
“If you do that,” Shay interrupted, “I wil kil myself.”
My jaw dropped. “Why?”
“Because,” he said, “I have to get out of here.”
At first I thought that he was talking about the prison, but
then I saw he was clutching his own arms, as if the
penitentiary he was referring to was his own body. And that,
of course, made me think of my father and teshuvah. Could
I truly be helping him by letting him die on his own terms?
“Lets take it one step at a time,” I conceded. “If you can get
June Nealon to understand why you want to do this, then Il
work on making a court understand it, too.”
But Shay was suddenly lost in his thoughts, wherever they
happened to be taking him. “Il see you tomorrow, Shay,” I
said, and I went to touch his shoulder to let him know I was
leaving. As soon as I stretched out my arm, though, I found
myself flat on the floor. Shay stood over me, just as
shocked by the blow hed dealt me as I was.
An officer bolted into the room, driving Shay down to the
floor with a knee in the smal of his back so that he could be
handcuffed. “You al right?” he cal ed out to me.
“Im fine … I just slipped,” I lied. I could feel a welt rising on
my left cheekbone, one that I was sure the officer would see
as wel . I swal owed the knot of fear in my throat. “Could you
just give us a couple more minutes?”
I did not tel the officer to remove Shays handcuffs; I wasnt
quite that brave. But I struggled to my feet and waited until
we were alone in the room again. “Im sorry,” Shay blurted
out. “Im sorry, I didnt mean it, I sometimes, when you …”
“Shay,” I ordered. “Sit down.”
“I didnt mean to do it. I didnt see you coming. I thought you
werewould” He broke off, choking on the words. “Im
sorry.”
I was the one whod made the mistake. A man who had
been locked up alone for a decade, whose only human
contact was having his handcuffs chained and removed,
would be completely unprepared for a smal act of
kindness. He would have instinctively seen it as a threat to
his personal space, which was how Id wound up sprawled
on the floor.
“It wont happen again,” I said.
He shook his head fiercely. “No.”
“See you tomorrow, Shay.”
“Are you mad at me?”
“No.”
“You are. I can tel .”
“Im not,” I said.
“Then wil you do something for me?”
I had been warned about this by other attorneys who
worked with inmates: they wil bleed you dry. Beg you for
stamps, for money, for food.
For phone cal s, made by you to their family, on their behalf.
They are the ultimate con artists; no matter how much
sympathy you feel for them, you have to remind yourself that
they wil take whatever they can get, because they have
nothing.
“Next time, wil you tel me what it feels like to walk barefoot
on grass?” he asked. “I used to know, but I cant remember
anymore.” He shook his head. “I just want to … I want to
know what thats like again.”
I folded my notebook beneath my arm. “Il see you
tomorrow, Shay,”
I repeated, and I motioned to the officer who would set me
free.
M I C HAEL
Shay Bourne was pacing in his cel . Every fifth rum, he
pivoted and started circling the other way. “Shay,” I said, to
calm myself down as much as him, “its going to be al
right.”
We were awaiting his transportation down to the room
where our restorative justice meeting with June Nealon
would take place, and we were both nervous.
“Talk to me,” Shay said.
“Al right,” I said. “What do you want to talk about?”
“What Im going to say. What shes going to say… the
words wont come out right, I just know it.” He looked up at
me. “Im going to fuck this up.”
“Just say what you need to. Shay. Words are hard for
everyone.”
“Wel , its worse when you know the person youre talking to
thinks youre ful of shit.”
“Jesus managed to do it,” I pointed out, “and it wasnt like
He was attending the Tuesday Toastmasters meeting in
Nineveh.” I opened my Bible to the book of Isaiah. “The
Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to
preach good news …”
“Could we just this once nor have a Bible study moment?”
Shay groaned.
“Its an example,” I said. “Jesus said that when He came
back to the synagogue where Hed grown up. Let me tel
you, that congregation had a lot of questionsafter al ,
theyd grown up with Him, and knew Him before He started
the miracle trainso before they could doubt Him, what did
He do? He gave them the words theyd been waiting to
hear. He gave them hope.” I looked at Shay. “Thats what
you need to do, with June.”
The door to I-tier opened, and six officers in flak jackets
and ful face shields entered. “Dont talk until the mediator
asks you to. And make sure you tel her why this is so
important to you,” I urged, lastminute quarterbacking.
Just then the first officer reached the cel door. “Father,” he
said, “were going to have to ask you to meet us down
there.”
I watched them move Shay down the tier. Speak from your
heart, I thought, watching him go. So that she knows ifs
worth taking.
I had already been told what they would do with him. Hed
be handcuffed and cuffed at the ankles. Both of these would
be linked to a bel y chain, so that hed shuffle along inside
the human box of officers. He would be taken to the
cafeteria, which was now set up for offender counseling.
Basical y, the warden had explained, when they needed to
have group sessions with violent offenders, they bolted
several individual metal boxes to the floorand prisoners
were put into these miniature cel s along with a counselor,
who would sit on a chair in the cafeteria with them. “Its
group therapy,” Warden Coyne had proudly explained, “but
theyre stil incarcerated.”
Maggie had lobbied for a face-to-face visit. Failing that,
she wanted to know if we could meet on opposite sides of
a glass visiting booth.
But there were too many of us, when you added in the
moderator and June, or so the administration said (never
mind Id seen families of ten cram into one of those little
noncontact booths for a visit with an inmate). Although I
like Maggiethought that we were starting at a grave
disadvantage if one of the participants was restrained and
bolted to the floor like Hannibal Lecter, this was the best we
were going to get.
The mediator was a woman named Abigail Herrick, whod
come from the attorney generals victims assistance office
and had been trained to do this kind of thing. She and June
were talking quietly on one side of the anteroom. I walked
up to June as soon as I entered.
“Thank you. This means a lot to Shay.”
“Which is the last reason Id ever do it,” June said, and she
turned back to Abigail.
I slunk across the room to the seat beside Maggie. She
was painting a run in her stocking with pink nail polish. “We
are in serious trouble,”
I said.
“Yeah? Hows he doing?”
“Hes panicked.” I squinted in the dim light as she lifted her
head.
“Howd you get that shiner?”
“In my spare time Im the welterweight champion of New
Hampshire.”
There was a buzzing, and Warden Coyne walked in.
“Everythings set.”
He led us into the cafeteria by way of the metal detector.
Maggie and I had already emptied our pockets and taken
off our jackets before June and Abigail even realized what
was going on; this is the difference between someone who
has intimate experience with a detention facility and those
who lead normal lives. An officer, stil dressed in ful riot
gear, opened a door for June, who continued to stare at
him in horror as she walked inside.
Shay was sitting in what looked like a telephone booth
permanently sealed shut with nuts and bolts and metal.
Bars vivisected his face; his eyes searched for mine as
soon as I walked into the room.
When he saw us, he stood up.
At that moment, June froze.
Abigail took her arm and led her to one of the four chairs
that were arranged in a semicircle in front of the booth.
Maggie and I fil ed in the remaining seats. Two officers
stood behind us; in the distance I could hear the sizzle of
something cooking on a gril .
“Wel . Lets get started,” Abigail said, and she introduced
herself.
“Shay, Im Abigail Herrick. Im going to be the mediator
today. Do you understand what that means?”
He hesitated. He looked like he was going to faint.
“Victim-offender mediation is a process that gives a victim
the chance to meet her offender in a safe and structured
setting,” Abigail explained. “The victim wil be able to tel the
offender about the crimes physical, emotional, and
financial impact. The victim also has the chance to receive
answers to any lingering questions about the crime, and to
be directly involved in trying to develop a plan for the
offender to pay back a debt if possibleemotional or
monetary. In return, the offender gets the opportunity to take
responsibility for his behavior and actions. Everyone with
me so far?”
I started to wonder why this wasnt used for every crime
committed.
Granted, it was labor-intensive for both the AGs office and
the prison, but wasnt it better to come face-to-face with the
opposing party, instead of having the legal system be the
intermediary?
“Now, the process is strictly voluntary. That means if June
wants to leave at any time, she should feel free to do so.
But,” Abigail added, “I also want to point out that this
meeting was initiated by Shay, which is a very good first
step.”
She glanced at me, at Maggie, and then at June, and final y
Shay.
“Right now. Shay,” Abigail said, “you need to listen to June.”
June
They say you get over your grief, but you dont real y, not
ever. Its been eleven years, and it hurts just as much as it
did that first day.
Seeing his facesliced into segments by those metal
bars, like he was some kind of Picasso portrait that
couldnt be put together againbrought it al back. That
face, his fucking face, was the last one Kurt and Elizabeth
saw.
When it first happened, I used to make bargains with
myself.
Id say that I could handle their deaths, as long asand
here Id fil in the blank. As long as they had been quick and
painless. As long as Elizabeth had died in Kurts arms. Id
be driving, and Id tel myself that if the light turned green
before I reached the intersection, surely these details were
true. I did not admit that sometimes I slowed down to stack
the odds.
The only reason I was able to drag myself out of bed at al
those first few months was because there was someone
more needy than I was. As a newborn, Claire didnt have a
choice. She had to be fed and diapered and held. She kept
me so grounded in the present that I had to let go of my
hold on the past. I credit her with saving my life. Maybe
thats why I am so determined to reciprocate.
But even having Claire to care for was not foolproof. The
smal est things would send me into a downward spiral:
while pressing seven birthday candles into her cake, Id
think of Elizabeth, who would have been fourteen. Id open
a box in the garage and breathe in the scent of the
miniature cigars Kurt liked to smoke every now and then. Id
open up a pot of Vaseline and see Elizabeths tiny
fingerprint, preserved on the surface. I would pul a book off
a shelf and a shopping list would flutter out of it, in Kurts
handwriting: thumbtacks, milk, rock salt.
What I would like to tel Shay Bourne about the impact this
crime had on my family is that it erased my family, period.
What I would like to do is bring him back to the moment
Claire, four, perched on the stairs to stare at a picture of
Elizabeth and asked where the girl who looked like her
lived. I would like him to know what it feels like to have to
run your hand up the terrain of your own body, and
underneath your nightshirt, only to realize that you cannot
surprise yourself with your own touch.
I would like to show him the spot in the room he built,
Claires old nursery, where there is a bloodstain on the
floorboards that I cannot scrub clean. Id like to tel him that
even though I carpeted the room years ago and turned it
into a guest bedroom, I stil do not walk across it, but
instead tiptoe around the perimeter when I have to go
inside.
I would like to show him the bil s that came from the hospital
every time Claire was sent there, which quickly consumed
the money we received from the insurance company after
Kurt died.
Id like him to come with me to the bank, the day I broke
down in front of the tel er and told her that I wanted to
liquidate the col ege fund of Elizabeth Nealon.
I would like to feel that moment when Elizabeth was sitting
in my lap and I was reading to her, and she went boneless
and soft, asleep in my arms. I would like to hear Kurt cal
me Red again, for my hair, and tangle his fingers in it as we
watch television in the bedroom at night. I would like to pick
up the dirty socks that Elizabeth strewed about the house, a
tiny tornado, the same reason I once yel ed at her. I would
love to fight with Kurt over the size of If they had to die, I
would have loved to have known in advance, so that I could
take each second spent with them and know to hold on to it,
instead of assuming there would be a mil ion more. If they
had to die, I would have loved to have been there, to be the
last face they saw, instead of his.
I would like to tel Shay Bourne to go to hel , because
wherever he winds up after he dies, it had better not be
anywhere close to my daughter and my husband.
M IC HAEL
“Why?” June Nealon asked. Her voice was striped with rust
and sorrow, and in her lap, her hands twisted. “Why did you
do it?” She lifted her gaze, staring at Shay. “I let you into my
home. I gave you a job. I trusted you. And you, you took
everything I had.”
Shays mouth was working silently. He moved from side to
side in his little booth, hitting his forehead sometimes. His
eyes fluttered, as if he was trying hard to organize what he
had to say. “I can fix it,” he said final y.
“You cant fix anything,” she said tightly.
“Your other little girl-“
June stiffened. “Dont you talk about her. Dont you even
breathe her name. Just tel me. Ive waited eleven years to
hear it. Tel me why you did this.”
He squeezed his eyes shut; sweat had broken out on his
brow. He was whispering, a litany meant to convince
himself, or maybe June. I leaned forward, but the noise from
the kitchen obliterated his words.
And then whatever had been sizzling was taken off the gril ,
and we al heard Shay, loud and clear: “She was better off
dead.”
June shot to her feet. Her face was so pale that I feared she
would fal over, and I rose just in case. Then blood rushed,
hot, into her cheeks. “You bastard,” she said, and she ran
outside.
Maggie tugged on my jacket. “Go,” she mouthed.
I fol owed June past the two officers and through the
anteroom.
She burst through the double doors and into the parking lot
without even bothering to pick up her drivers license at the
control booth, trad ing back her visitors pass. I was certain
she would rather go to the DMV and pay for a replacement
than set foot in this prison again.
“June,” I yel ed. “Please. Wait.”
I final y cornered her at her car, an old Ford Taurus with duct
tape around the rear bumper. She was sobbing so hard
that she couldnt get the key into the lock.
“Let me.” I opened the door and held it for her so that she
could sit down, but she didnt. “June, Im sorry”
“How could he say that? She was a little girl. A beautiful,
smart, perfect little girl.”
I gathered her into my arms and let her cry on my shoulder.
Later, she would regret doing this; later, she would feel that
I had manipulated the situation. But for right now, I held her
until she could catch her breath.
Redemption had very little to do with the big picture, and far
more to do with the particulars. Jesus might forgive Shay,
but what good was that if Shay didnt forgive himself? It was
that impetus that drove him to give up his heart, just as I
was driven to help him do it because it would cancel out my
vote to execute him in the first place. We couldnt erase our
mistakes, so we did the next best thing and tried to do
something that distracted attention from them.
“I wish I could have met your daughter,” I said softly.
June pul ed away from me. “I wish you could have, too.”
“I didnt ask you here to hurt you al over again. Shay truly
does want to make amends. He knows the one good thing
to come out of his life might be his death.” I looked at the
Constantine wire running along the top of the prison fence:
a crown of thorns for a man who wanted to be a savior.
“Hes taken away the rest of your family,” I said. “If nothing
else, let him help you keep Claire.”
June ducked into her car. She was crying again as she
lurched out of the parking spot. I watched her pause at the
exit of the prison, her blinker marking time.
Then, suddenly, her brake lights came on. She sped
backward, stopping beside me with only inches to spare.
She unrol ed the window on the drivers side. TU take his
heart,” June said, her voice thick. TU
take it, and Il watch that son of a bitch die, and we stil
wont be even.”
Too stunned to find any words, I nodded. I watched June
drive off, her tail ights winking as red as the eyes of any
devU.
Maggie
“Wel ,” I said when I saw Father Michael walking back into
the prison, dazed, “that sucked.”
At the sound of my voice, he looked up. “Shes taking the
heart.”
My mouth dropped open. “Youre kidding.”
“No. Shes taking it for al the wrong reasons … but shes
taking it.”
I could not believe it. Fol owing the debacle in the
restorative justice meeting, I would have more easily
accepted that shed gone out to buy an Uzi to exact her own
justice against Shay Bourne. My mind began to kick into
high gear: if June Nealon wanted Shays heartfor
whatever reasonthen there was a great deal I had to do.
“Il need you to write an affidavit, saying that youre Shays
spiritual advisor and that his religious beliefs include
donating his heart.”
He drew in his breath. “Maggie, I cant put my name on a
court document about Shay”
“Sure you can. Just lie,” I said, “and go to confession
afterward.
Youre not doing this for you; youre doing it for Shay. And
wel need a cardiologist to examine Shay, to see if his
hearts even a match for Claire.”
The priest closed his eyes and nodded. “Should I go in and
tel him?”
“No,” I said, smiling. “Let me.”
After a slight detour, I walked through the metal detectors
again and was taken to the attorney-client room outside I-
tier. A few minutes later, a grumbling officer showed up with
Shay. “He keeps getting moved around like this, the states
going to have to hire him a chauffeur.”
I rubbed my thumb and forefinger together, the worlds
smal est violin.
Shay ran his hands through his hair, making it stand on end;
the shirt of his prison scrubs was untucked. “Im sorry” he
said immediately.
“Im not the one who could have used the apology,” I
replied.
“I know.” He squinched his eyes shut, shook his head.
“There were eleven years of words in my head, and I
couldnt get them out the way I wanted.”
“Amazingly, June Nealon is wil ing to accept your heart for
Claire.”
A few times in my career, Id been the messenger of
information that would change a clients life: the victim of a
hate crime whose store was destroyed, receiving
reparation and damages that would al ow him to build a
bigger, better venue; the gay couple who were given the
legal stamp of approval to be listed as parents in the
elementary school directory. A smile blossomed across
Shays face, and I remembered, at that moment, that
gospel is another word for good news.
“Its not a done deal yet,” I said. “We dont know, medical y,
if this is viable. And there are a whole bunch of legal hoops
to jump through …
which is what I need to talk to you about, Shay.”
I waited until he sat down across from me at the table, and
was calm enough to stop grinning and look me in the eye. I
had gotten to this point with clients before: you drew them a
map and explained where the exit hatch was, and then you
waited to see if they understood you needed them to crawl
there on their own. That was legitimate, in law; you were not
tel ing them to alter their truth, just explaining the way the
courts worked, and hoping they would choose to massage
it themselves. “Listen careful y,” I said. “Theres a law in this
country that says the state has to let you practice your own
religion, as long as it doesnt interfere with safety in the
prison. Theres also a law in New Hampshire that says
even though the court has sentenced you to die by lethal
injection, which wouldnt al ow you to donate your heart … in
certain circumstances, death row inmates can be hanged
instead. And if youre hanged, youd be able to donate your
organs.”
It was a lot for him to take in, and I could see him ingesting
the words as if they were being fed on a conveyor.
“I might be able to convince the state to hang you,” I said, “if
I can prove to a judge in federal court that donating your
organs is part of your religion. Do you understand what Im
saying?”
He winced. “I didnt like being Catholic.”
“You dont have to say youre Catholic.”
“Tel that to Father Michael.”
“Gladly.” I laughed.
“Then what do I have to say?”
“There are a lot of people outside this prison, Shay, who
have no trouble believing that what youre doing in here has
some sort of religious basis. But I need you to believe it,
too. If this is going to work, you have to tel me donating
your organs is the only way to salvation.”
He stood up and started to pace. “My way of saving myself
may not be someone elses way.”
“Thats okay,” I said. “The court doesnt care about anyone
else. They just want to know if you think that giving your
heart to Claire Nealon is going to redeem you in Gods
eyes.”
When he stopped in front of me and caught my eye, I saw
something that surprised me. Because I had been so busy
crafting an escape hatch for Shay Bourne, I had forgotten
that sometimes the outrageous is actual y the truth. “I dont
think it,” he said. “I know it.”
“Then were in business.” I slipped my hands into my suit
pockets and suddenly remembered what else I had to tel
Shay. “Its prickly,” I said. “Like walking on a board ful of
needles. But somehow it doesnt hurt. It smel s like Sunday
morning, like a mower outside your window when youre
trying to pretend the suns not up yet.”
As I spoke, Shay closed his eyes. “I think I remember.”
“Wel ,” I said. “Just in case you dont.” I withdrew the
handfuls of grass Id torn from outside the prison grounds
and sprinkled the tufts onto the floor.
A smile broke over Shays face. He kicked off his prison-
issued tennis shoes and began to move back and forth,
barefoot, over the grass. Then he bent down to gather the
cuttings and funneled them into the breast pocket of his
scrubs, against a heart that was stil beating strong. “Im
going to save them,” he said.
“I know God wil not give me anything I cant handle.
I just wish He didnt trust me so much.”
-MOTHER TERESA
June
Everything comes with a price.
You can have the man of your dreams, but only for a few
years.
You can have the perfect family, but it turns out to be an
il usion.
You can keep your daughter alive, but only if she hosts the
heart of the person you hate most in this world.
I could not go straight home from the prison. I was shaking
so hard that at first, I couldnt even drive; and even
afterward, I missed the exit off the highway twice. I had
gone to that meeting to tel Shay Bourne we didnt want his
heart. So why had I changed my mind? Maybe because I
was angry. Maybe because I was so shocked by what Shay
Bourne had said. Maybe because if we waited for UNOS to
find Claire a heart, it could be too late.
Besides, I told myself, this was al likely a moot point. The
chance of Bourne even being a good physical match for
Claire was negligible; his heart was probably far too large
for a childs body; there could be al sorts of compromising
diseases or long-term drug use that would prohibit him from
being a donor.
And yet, there was another part of me that kept thinking: But
what if?
Could I let myself hope? And could I stand it if, once again,
that hope was shattered by Shay Bourne?
By the time I felt calm enough to drive home and face
Claire, it was late at night. I had arranged for a neighbor to
check on her hourly throughout the afternoon and evening,
but Claire flatly refused a formal babysitter. She was fast
asleep on the couch, the dog curled over her feet. Dudley
lifted his head when I walked in, a worthy sentry. Where
were you when Elizabeth was taken? I thought, not for the
first time, rubbing Dudley between the ears. For days after
the murders, I had held the puppy, staring into his eyes and
pretending he could give me the answers I so desperately
needed.
I turned off the television that was chattering to nobody and
sat down beside Claire. If she received Shay Bournes
heart, would I look at my daughter but see him staring back
at me?
Could I survive that?
And if I couldnt… would Claire survive at al ?
I fitted myself around Claires body, stretching beside her
on the couch. In her sleep, she curled against me, a puzzle
piece fitting back where it belonged. I kissed my daughters
forehead, unconsciously reading it for fever. This was my
life now, and Claires: a waiting game. Like Shay Bourne
sitting in his cel , waiting for his turn to die, we sat
imprisoned by the limitations of Claires body, waiting for
her turn to live.
So dont judge me, unless youve fal en asleep on a couch
with your il child, thinking this night might be her last.
Ask instead: would you do it?
Would you give up your vengeance against someone you
hate if it meant saving someone you love?
Would you want your dreams to come true if it meant
granting your enemys dying wish?
Maggie
In school, I was the kind of kid who crossed her ts and
dotted her is. I made sure to right-justify my papers, so that
the type didnt look ragged. Id craft elaborate coversa
tiny, two-dimensional working guil otine for my essay on A
Tale of Two Cities; a science lab on prisms with the header
rainbowed in multiple colors; a scarlet letter for … wel , you
get the picture.
To that end, putting together a letter to the commissioner of
corrections reminded me a little of my days as a student.
There were multiple parts involved: the transcript of Shay
Bourne attesting that he wanted to donate his heart to the
sister of his victim; an affidavit from Claire Nealons cardiac
surgeon, stating that she did indeed need a heart to
survive.
I had made a cal to facilitate a medical visit for Shay, to
see if he was a match for Claire; and I had spent an hour on
the phone with a UNOS coordinator, to confirm that if Shay
gave up his heart, he could pick the recipient.
I fastened al these letters together with a shiny silver
butterfly clip and then turned back to the computer to finish
my note to Commissioner Lynch.
As evidenced by the letter from the defendants spiritual
advisor, Father Michael Wright, execution by lethal injection
wil not only prevent the defendant from his intention of
donating his heart to Claire Nealonit also interferes with
his practice of religiona blatant violation of his First
Amendment rights. Therefore, under the New Hampshire
criminal code 630:5, subsection XIV, it would be
impractical for the commissioner of corrections to carry out
the punishment of death by lethal injection. A sentence of
death carried out by hanging, however, would not only he
al owed by the criminal code, but also would al ow the
defendant to practice his religion up to the moment of his
execution.
I could imagine, at this moment, the commissioners jaw
dropping as he realized that I had managed to piece
together two disparate laws in a way that would make the
next few weeks a living hel .
Furthermore, this office would be pleased to work in
conjunction with the commissioner of corrections to
facilitate what needs to be done, as there are tissue
matches and medical testing to be completed prior to the
donation, and because time is of the essence during the
organ harvest.
Not to mentionI dont trust you.
It is imperative to settle this matter swiftly, for obvious
reasons.
We dont have a lot of time to work this out. Because
neither Shay Bourne nor Claire Nealon have a lot of time
left, period.
Sincerely,
Maggie Bloom, Attorney
I printed out the letter and slipped it into a manila envelope
Id already addressed. As I licked the envelope, I thought:
Please make this work.
Who was I talking to?
I didnt believe in God. Not anymore.
I was an atheist.
Or so I told myself, even if there was a secret part of me
that hoped Id be proven wrong.
Lucius
People always think they know what theyd miss the most if
they had to trade places with me in this cel . Food, fresh air,
your favorite pair of jeans, sex-believe me, Ive heard them
al , and theyre al wrong. What you miss the most in prison
is choice. You have no free wil : your hair is cut in one style,
like everyone elses. You eat whats being served when it is
given to you. You are told when you can shower, shit, shave.
Even our conversations are prescribed: If someone bumps
into you in the real world, he says “Excuse me.” If someone
bumps into you in here, you say “What the fuck,
motherfucker” before he can even speak. If you dont do
this, you become a mark.
The reason we have no choice now is because we made a
bad one in the pastwhich is why we were al energized by
Shays attempt to die on his own terms. It was stil an
execution, but even that tiny sliver of preference was more
than we had on a daily basis. I could only imagine how my
world would change if we were given an option to choose
between orange scrubs and yel ow ones; if we were asked
whether wed like a spoon or a fork with our meal trays,
instead of the universal plastic “spork.” But the more
animated we got at the possibility of, wel , possibility… the
more depressed Shay grew.
“Maybe,” he said to me one afternoon when the air-
conditioning had broken and we were al wilting in our cel s,
“I should just let them do what they want.”
The officers, in an act of mercy, had opened the door that
led to the exercise cel . It was supposed to afford us a
breeze, but that hadnt happened.
“Why would you say that?”
“Because it feels like Ive started a war,” Shay said.
“Wel , imagine that,” Crash laughed. “Since Im over here
practicing my shooting.”
This afternoon Crash had been injecting Benadryl. Many of
the inmates here had made their own pointshomemade
hypodermics that could be sharpened every few uses by
scraping them against a matchbook. Benadryl was given
out by the prison nurse; you could accumulate a stash and
open up a capsule, then cook down the tiny beads of
medicine in a spoon over a soda-can stove. It was a speed
high, but the buffers used in the medicine would also make
you crazy.
“Whaddya say, Mistah Messiah … you want a hit?”
“He most certainly does not,” I answered.
“I dont think he was talking to you,” Shay said. And then, to
Crash: “Give it to me.”
Crash laughed. “Guess you dont know him as wel as you
think you do, Liberace. Aint that right, Death Row?”
Crash had no moral compass. He aligned himself with the
Aryan Brotherhood when it suited his needs. He talked of
terrorist attacks; hed cheered when we were watching the
news footage of the World Trade Center col apsing.
He had a list of victims, should he ever get out. He wanted
his kids to grow up to be addicts or dealers or whores, and
said he would be disappointed if they turned out to be
anything else. Once, I heard him describing a visit with his
three-year-old daughter: he told her to punch another kid at
school to make him proud, and not to come back til she
did. Now I watched him fish Shay the hype kit, hidden neatly
inside a dismantled battery, ready for a hit with the liquefied
Benadryl inside it. Shay put the needle to the crook of his
elbow, set his thumb on the plunger.
And squirted the precious drug onto the floor of the catwalk.
“What the fuck!” Crash exploded. “Gimme that back.”
“Havent you heard? Im Jesus. Im supposed to save you,”
Shay said.
“I dont want to be saved,” Crash yel ed. “I want my kit
back!”
“Come and get it,” Shay said, and he pushed the kit under
his door, so that it landed square on the catwalk. “Hey, CO,”
he yel ed. “Come see what Crash made.”
As the COs entered to confiscate the hype kitand write
him a ticket that would include a stay in solitaryCrash
slammed his hand against the metal door. “I swear, Bourne,
when you least expect i t … “
He was interrupted by the sound of Warden Coynes voice
out in the courtyard. “I just bought a goddamn death
gurney,” the warden cried, conversing with someone we
could not see. “What am I supposed to do with that?” And
then, when he stopped speaking, we al noticed something
or the lack of something. The incessant hammering and
sawing that had been going on outside for months, as the
prison built a death chamber to accommodate Shays
sentence, had fal en silent. Al we heard was a simple,
blissful quiet.
“… youre gonna wind up dead,” Crash finished, but now
we were starting to wonder if that would stil be true.
MICHAEL
The Reverend Arbogath Justus preached at the Drive-in
Church of Christ in God in Heldratch, Michigan. His
congregation arrived in their cars on Sunday mornings and
received a blue flyer with the days scripture, and a note to
tune in to AM 1620 in order to hear the good reverend
when he took the pulpitformerly the snack bar, when it
was a movie theater. I would have ridiculed this, but his
flock was six hundred strong, which led me to believe that
there were enough people in this world who wanted to tuck
their prayer requests beneath windshield wipers to be
col ected, and to receive Communion from altar girls on
rol er skates.
I suppose it wasnt a big stretch to go from the movie
screen to the smal one, which is why Reverend Justus ran
a television ministry site, too, on a cable station cal ed SOS
(Save Our Souls). Id caught it a few times, while I was
flipping through channels. It was fascinating to me, in the
same way Shark Week was fascinating on the Discovery
ChannelI was curious to learn more, but from a nice,
secure distance. Justus wore eyeliner on television, and
suits in a range of lol ipop colors. His wife played the
accordion when it came time to sing hymns. It al seemed
like a parody of what faith was supposed to bequiet and
heart-settling, not grandiose and dramaticwhich is why I
always eventual y changed the channel.
always eventual y changed the channel.
One day, when I went to visit Shay, my car was stopped in
traffic leading to the prison. Shiny, scrubbed Midwestern
faces worked their way from car to car. They were wearing
green Tshirts with the name of Justuss church on the back,
scrawled above a rudimentary drawing of a 57 Chevy
convertible. When one girl approached, I unrol ed the
window.
“God bless you!” she said, and offered me a slip of yel ow
paper.
There was a picture of Jesus, arms outstretched and palms
raised, floating in the oval of a sideview car mirror. The
caption read: OBJECTS IN
MIRROR ARE CLOSER THAN THEY APPEAR.
And then below it: Shay Bourne: A Wolf in Sheeps
Clothing? Dont Let a False Prophet Lead You Astray!
The line of cars chugged forward, final y, and I turned into
the parking lot. I had to pul my car onto the grass; it was
that crowded.
The throngs of people waiting for Shay, and the media
covering his story, had not dissipated.
However, by the time I came close to the prison, I realized
that the attention of most of these people was not held by
Shay at that moment, but by a man in a three-piece lime-
green suit, wearing a clerical col ar.
I got close enough to see the pancake makeup and the
eyeliner, and realized that Reverend Arbogath Justus had
now moved into the realm of satel ite ministries … and had
chosen the prison as his first stop.
“Miracles mean nothing,” Justus announced. “The world is
ful of false prophets. In Revelations, were told of a beast
that uses miracles to fool men into worshipping it. Do you
know what happens to that beast on Judgment Day? He
and the people who were fooled are al thrown into a lake of
fire. Is that what you want?”
A woman fel forward from the cliff-edge of the crowd. “No,”
she sobbed. “I want to go with God.”
“Jesus can hear you, sister,” Reverend Justus said.
“Because Hes here, with us. Not inside that prison, like the
false prophet Shay Bourne!”
There was a roar from his converts. But just as quickly, it
was matched by those who hadnt given up on Shay. “How
do we know youre not the false prophet?” one young man
cal ed out.
Beside me, a mother tucked her sick child into her arms
more tightly. She looked at my col ar and frowned. “Are you
with him?”
“No,” I said. “Definitely not.”
She nodded. “Wel , Im not taking advice from a man whose
church has a concession stand.”
I started to agree, but was distracted by a burly man who
grabbed the reverend from his makeshift pulpit and yanked
him into the crowd.
The cameras, of course, were al rol ing.
Without thinking twice about what I was doing, or that I was
doing it on film, I pushed forward and rescued Reverend
Arbogath Justus from the clutches of the mob. He wrapped
his arms around me, gasping, as I pul ed us both up onto a
granite ledge that ran along the edge of the parking lot.
In retrospect, I didnt know why I had chosen to play the
hero. And I real y didnt know why I said what I did next.
Philosophical y, Reverend Justus and I were on the same
teameven if we pitched religion with very different styles.
But I also knew that Shay wasmaybe for the first time in
his lifeattempting to do something honorable. He didnt
deserve to be slandered for that.
I might not believe in Shaybut I believed him.
I felt the wide, white eye of a television camera swing
toward me, and a herd of others fol owed. “Reverend Justus
came here, Im sure, because he thinks hes tel ing you the
truth. Wel , so does Shay Bourne.
He wants to do one thing in this world before he leaves it:
save the life of a child. The Jesus I know would endorse
that, I think. And,” I said, turning to the reverend, “the Jesus I
know wouldnt send people to some fiery hel if they were
trying to atone for their sins. The Jesus I know believed in
second chances.”
As Reverend Justus realized that I might have saved him
from the mob to sacrifice him al over again, his face
reddened. “Theres one true word of God,” he proclaimed
in his camera-ready voice, “and Shay Bourne isnt
speaking it.”
Wel , I couldnt argue with that. In al the time Id been with
Shay, he had never quoted the New Testament. He was far
more likely to swear or go off on a tangent about Hanta
virus and government conspiracy. “Youre absolutely right,” I
said. “Hes trying to do something thats never been done
before. Hes asking questions of the status quo. Hes trying
to suggest another waya better way.
And hes wil ing to die for it to happen.” I raised a brow.
“Come to think of it, I bet Jesus might find a lot in common
with a guy like Shay Bourne.”
I nodded, stepped down from the granite ledge, and
shoved my way through the crowd to the security partition,
where a correctional officer let me through. “Father,” he
said, shaking his head, “you got no idea how big a pile of
you-know-what you just stepped into.” And as if I needed
proof, my cel phone rang: Father Walters angry summons
back to St. Catherines, immediately.
I sat in the front pew of the church as Father Walter paced
in front of me. “What if I blamed it al on being moved by the
Holy Spirit?” I offered, and received a withering glare.
“I dont understand,” Father Walter said. “Why would you
say something like that… on live television, for the love of
God”
“I didnt mean to-“
“when you had to know that it was going to bring the heat
down on St. Catherines?” He sank down beside me and
tipped his head back, as if he were praying to the carved
statue of Jesus on the Cross that rose above us. “Michael,
seriously, what were you thinking?” he said softly. “Youre a
young, handsome, smart, straight guy. You could write your
ticket in the Churchget your own parish, wind up in Rome
… be whatever you want. And instead, I get a copy of an
affidavit from the attorney generals office, saying that as
Shay Bournes spiritual advisor you believe in salvation
through organ donation? And then I turn on the midday
news and see you on a soapbox, sounding like some kind
of… some kind of…”
“What?”
He shook his head, but stopped short of cal ing me a
heretic.
“Youve read Tertul ian,” he said.
We al had, in seminary. He was a famous orthodox
Christian historian whose text The Prescription Against
Heretics was a forerunner of the Nicene Creed. Tertul ian
had coined the idea of a deposit of faiththat we take what
Christ taught and believe it as is, without adding to or
taking away from it.
“You want to know why Catholicisms been around for two
thousand years?” Father Walter said. “Because of people
like Tertul ian, who understood that you cant mess around
with truth. People were upset with the changes of Vatican I .
The Popes even reinstated the Latin Mass.”
I took a deep breath. “I thought being a spiritual advisor
meant doing what Shay Bourne needs to face his death
with peacenot what we need him to do, as a good
Catholic.”
“Good Lord,” Father Walter said. “Hes conned you.”
I frowned. “He hasnt conned me.”
“Hes got you eating out of the palm of his hand! Look at
youyou practical y acted like his press secretary today on
the news”
“Do you think Jesus died for a reason?” I interrupted.
“Of course.”
“Then why shouldnt Shay Bourne be al owed to do the
same?”
“Because,” Father Walter said, “Shay Bourne is not dying
for anyones sins, except his own.”
I flinched. Wel , didnt I know that better than anyone else?
Father Walter sighed. “I dont agree with the death penalty,
but I understand this sentence. He murdered two people. A
police officer, and a little girl.” He shook his head. “Save his
soul, Michael. Dont try to save his life.”
I glanced up. “What do you think would have happened if
just one of the apostles had stayed awake in the garden
with Jesus? If theyd kept Him from being arrested? If theyd
tried to save His life?”
Father Walters mouth dropped open. “You dont real y think
Shay Bourne is Jesus, do you?”
I didnt.
Did I?
Father Walter sank down onto the pew and took off his
glasses. He rubbed his eyes. “Mikey,” he said, “take a
couple weeks off. Go somewhere and pray. Think about
what youre doingwhat youre saying.”
He looked up at me. “And in the meantime. I dont want you
going to the prison on behalf of St. Catherines.”
I looked around this church, which I had grown to lovewith
its polished pews and the spatter of light from the stained
glass, the whispering silk of the chalice veil, the dancing
flames on the candles lit in offering. Where your treasure is,
there your heart wil be.
“I wont go to the prison on behalf of St. Catherines,” I said,
“but I wil go on behalf of Shay.”
I walked down the aisle, past the holy water, past the
bul etin board with the information about the young boy from
Zimbabwe the congregation supported with their donations.
When I stepped outside the double doors of the church, the
world was so bright that for a moment, I couldnt see where I
was headed.
Maggie
There were four ways to hang someone. The short drop
involved a prisoner fal ing just a few inches; their body
weight and physical struggling tightened the noose and
caused death by strangulation. Suspension hanging
required the prisoner to be raised upward and strangled.
Standard drop hangingpopular in America in the late
nineteenth and twentieth centuriesmeant the prisoner fel
four to six feet, which might or might not break his neck.
Long drop hanging was a more personal execution: the
distance the prisoner fel was determined by weight and
body type. The body was stil accelerating due to gravity at
the end of the drop, but the head was restricted by the
noosewhich broke the neck and ruptured the spinal cord,
rendering instant unconsciousness, and a quick death.
Id learned that next to shooting, hanging was the worlds
most popular form of execution. It was introduced in Persia
twentyfive hundred years ago for male criminals (females
were strangled at the stake, because it was less indecent)
a nice alternative to the blood and guts of a typical
beheading, with al the same punch as any public
spectacle.
It was not, however, foolproof. In 1885, a British murderer
named Robert Goodale was hanged, but the force of the
drop decapitated him.
Most recently, Saddam Husseins half brother had suffered
the same grisly fate in Iraq. This was a legal conundrum: if
the sentence of death was to be carried out by hanging,
then the prisoner could not be decapitated, or the sentence
wasnt fulfil ed.
I had to do my homeworkwhich explained why I was
reading the Official Table of Drops and estimating Shay
Bournes weight when Father Michael came into my office.
“Oh, good,” I said, motioning to the seat across from my
desk. “If the noose is positioned righttheres something
about a brass eyeletthe fal causes an instant fracture of
the C2 vertebra.
It says here brain death occurs in six minutes, and whole-
body death within ten to fifteen minutes. That means weve
got a four-minute window to get him back on a respirator
before the heart stops beating and oh, I almost forgotI
heard back from the AGs office. They denied our request
to have Shay hanged instead of executed with lethal
injection.
They even included the original sentence, as if I havent
read it a bazil ion times, and told me if I wanted to chal enge
it, I had to file the appropriate motions. Which,” I said, “I did
five hours ago.”
Father Michael didnt even seem to hear me. “Listen,” I said
gently, “its easier if you think about this hanging business
as science … and stop connecting it personal y to Shay.”
“Im sorry,” the priest said, shaking his head. “Its justits
been a pretty bad day”
“You mean the showdown you had with the televangelist?”
“You saw that?”
“Youre the talk of the town, Father.”
He closed his eyes. “Great.”
“Im sure Shay saw it, too, if thats any consolation.”
Father Michael looked up at me. “Thanks to Shay, my
supervising priest thinks Im a heretic.”
I thought about what my father would say if a member of his
congregation came to him to ease his soul. “Do you think
youre a heretic?”
“Does any heretic?” he said. “Honestly, Im the last person
who ought to be helping you win Shays case, Maggie.”
“Hey,” I said, trying to boost his spirits. “I was just about to
go to my parents house for dinner. Its a standing
engagement on Friday nights.
Why dont you come with me?”
“I couldnt impose”
“Believe me, theres always enough food to feed a third
world country.”
“Wel , then,” the priest said, “that would be great.”
I switched off my desk lamp. “We can take my car,” I said.
“Can I leave my motorcycle parked in the lot here?”
“Youre al owed to ride a motorcycle, but you cant eat meat
on Friday?”
He stil looked as if the world had been pul ed out from
beneath him.
“I guess the Church forefathers found it easier to abstain
from beef than Harleys.”
I led him through the maze of file cabinets in the ACLU
office and headed outside. “Guess what I found out today,” I
said. “The trapdoor from the old gal ows at the state prison
is in the chaplains office.”
When I glanced at Father Michael, I was pretty sure I saw
the ghost of a smile.
June
One of the things I liked about Dr. Wus office was the wal
of pictures.
An enormous corkboard held photographs of patients who
had beaten the odds after having Dr. Wu operate on their
failing hearts.
There were babies propped up on pil ows, Christmas card
portraits, and boys wielding Little League bats. It was a
mural of success.
When Id first come to tel Dr. Wu about Shay Bournes
offer, he listened careful y and then said that in his
twentythree years of practice, he had yet to see a grown
mans heart that would be a good match for a child. Hearts
grew to fit the needs of their host bodywhich was why
every other potential organ that had been offered to Claire
for transplant had come from another child. “Il examine
him,” Dr. Wu promised, “but I dont want you to get your
hopes up.”
Now I watched Dr. Wu take a seat and flatten his palms on
the desk. I always marveled at the fact that he walked
around shaking hands and waving as if the appendages
were total y normal, instead of miraculous. Those ridiculous
celebrities who insured their breasts and their legs had
nothing on Dr. Wu and his hands.
“June…”
“Just say it quickly,” I said, ful of false cheer.
Dr. Wu met my gaze. “Hes a perfect match for Claire.”
I had already gathered the strap of my purse in my fist,
planning to thank him hastily and beat a retreat out of the
office before I started crying again over yet another lost
heart; but these words rooted me to my seat. ” I … Im
sorry?”
“They have the same blood typeB positive. The tissue
crossmatch we did of their blood was nonreactive. But
heres the remarkable parthis heart is just the right size.”
I knew they looked for a donor who was within 20 percent of
the patients weightwhich for Claire meant anyone
between sixty and a hundred pounds. Shay Bourne was a
smal man, but he was stil an adult. He had to weigh 120 or
130 pounds.
“Medical y, it doesnt make sense. Theoretical y, his heart is
too tiny to be doing the job his own body needs … and yet
he seems to be healthy as a horse.” Dr. Wu smiled. “It looks
like Claires got herself a donor.”
I stil ed. This was supposed to be wonderful newsbut I
could barely breathe. How would Claire react if she knew
the circumstances behind the donation? “You cant tel her,”
I said.
“That shes going to have a transplant?”
I shook my head. “Where it came from.”
Dr. Wu frowned. “Dont you think shel find out? This is al
over the news.”
“Organ donations are always done anonymously. Plus, she
doesnt want a boys heart. She always says that.”
“Thats not real y the issue here, is it?” The cardiologist
stared at me. “Its a muscle, June. Nothing more, and
nothing less. What makes a heart worthy for transplant has
nothing to do with the donors personality.”
I looked up at him. “What would you do, if she was your
daughter?”
“If she was my daughter,” Dr. Wu replied, “I would already
have scheduled the surgery.”
Lucius
I tried to tel Shay that he was the topic on Larry King Live
that night, but either he was asleep or he just didnt feel like
answering me. Instead, I took out my stinger from where it
was hidden behind a cement block in the wal and heated
up some water for tea. The guests that night were the
nutcase reverend that Father Michael had sparred with
outside the prison, and some stuffed-shirt academic
named Ian Fletcher. It was hard to tel who had the more
intriguing backstoryReverend Justus with his drive-in
church, or Fletcherwhod been a television atheist until
hed run across a little girl who could apparently perform
miracles and raise the dead. He wound up marrying the
girls single mother, which in my opinion, greatly diluted the
credibility of his commentary.
Stil , he was a better speaker than Reverend Justus, who
kept rising out of his seat as if he were fil ed with helium.
“Theres an old proverb, Larry,” the reverend said. “You
cant keep trouble from coming, but you dont have to make
out a place card.”
Larry King tapped his pen on the desk twice. “And by that
you mean … ?”
“Miracles dont make a man into God. Dr. Fletcher ought to
know that better than anyone.”
Unrattled, Ian Fletcher smiled. “The more you think youre
right, the likelier you are to be wrong. Thats a proverb
Reverend Justus probably hasnt encountered yet.”
“Tel us about being a television atheist,” Larry said.
“Wel , I used to do what Jerry Falwel did, except instead of
saying theres a God, I said there wasnt one. I went around
debunking claims of miracles al over the country.
Eventual y, when I found one that I couldnt discredit, I
started wondering if it was real y God I objected to … or just
the sense of entitlement that seems to be part of affiliating
with a religious group. Like the way youl hear that a person
is a good Christianwel , who says Christians corner the
market on virtue? Or when the president ends a speech
with God bless the United States of America…
why just us?”
“Are you stil an atheist?” King asked.
“Technical y, I suppose youd cal me an agnostic.”
Justus scoffed. “Splitting hairs.”
“Not true; an atheists got more in common with a Christian,
since he believes you can know whether or not God exists-
but where a Christian says absolutely, the atheist says
absolutely not. For me, and any other agnosticthe jurys
stil out. Religion is intriguing, but in a historical sense.
A man should live his life a certain way not because of
some divine authority, but because of a personal moral
obligation to himself and others.”
Larry King turned to Reverend Justus. “And you, sir, your
congregation meets in a former drive-in movie theater?
Dont you think that takes some of the pomp and
circumstance out of religion?”
“What weve found, Larry, is that for some people the
obligation of getting up and going to church is too
overwhelming. They dont like having to see or be seen by
others; they dont enjoy being indoors on a beautiful
Sunday; they prefer to worship in private. Coming to the
Drive-ln Church al ows a person to do whatever it is he
needs to do while communing with God-whether thats
wearing pajamas, or eating an Egg McMuffin, or dozing off
during my sermon.”
“Now, Shay Bourne isnt the first person to come along and
stir the pot,” King said. “Few years back, a Florida State
footbal quarterback was found lying in the street, claiming
to be God. And a fel ow in Virginia wanted his drivers
license changed to reflect that he was a resident of the
Kingdom of Heaven. What do you think it is about Shay
Bourne that makes people believe he might be the real
deal?”
“As far as I understand,” Fletcher said, “Bournes not
claiming to be the Messiah or Mary Poppins or Captain
Americaits the people supporting him who have
christened him, no pun intended. Ironical y, thats very
similar to what we see in the BibleJesus doesnt go
around claiming to be God.”
” I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man cometh unto
the Father, but by me,” Justus quoted. “John, 14:6.”
“Theres also evidence in the gospels that Jesus appeared
in different forms to different people,” Fletcher said. “The
apostle James talks about seeing Jesus standing on the
shore in the form of a child. He points it out to John, who
thinks hes nuts, because the person on the shore isnt a
child but a handsome young man. They go to investigate,
and although one sees an old, bald man, the other sees a
young guy with a beard.”
Reverend Justus frowned. “I can quote the Gospel of John
forward and backward,” he said, “and thats not in there.”
Fletcher smiled. “I never said it was from the Gospel of
John. I said it was from a gospel. A Gnostic one, cal ed the
Acts of John.”
“Theres no Acts of John in the Bible,” Justus huffed. “Hes
making this up.”
“The reverends rightits not in the Bible. And there are
dozens of others like it. Through a series of editorial
decisions, they were excludedand considered heresy by
the early Christian church.”
“Thats because the Bible is the Word of God, period,”
Justus said.
“Actual y, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John werent even
written by the apostles Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
They were written in Greek, by authors who had a modicum
of educationunlike Jesuss fishermen disciples, who
were il iterate, like ninety percent of the population. Mark is
based on the apostle Peters preaching. Matthews author
was probably a Jewish Christian from Antioch, Syria. The
Gospel of Luke was al egedly written by a doctor. And the
author of the Gospel of John never mentions his own name
… but it was the latest of the four synoptic gospels to be
written, roughly around A.D. 100. If the apostle John was
the author, he would have been extremely old.”
“Smoke and mirrors,” Reverend Justus said. “Hes using
rhetoric to distract us from the basic truth here.”
“Which is?” King asked.
“Do you truly believe that if the Lord chose to grace us with
his earthly presence againand that is a big if, in my
humble opinionhe would wil ingly choose to inhabit a
convicted murderer, two times over?”
My hot water started to boil, and I disconnected the stinger.
Then I turned off the television without hearing Fletchers
answer. Why would God choose to inhabit any of us?
What if it was the other way around … if we were the ones
who inhabited God?
M I C H A EL
During the drive to Maggies parents home, I wal owed in
various degrees of guilt. I had let down Father Walter and
St. Catherines. Id made a fool of myself on TV. And
although Id started to tel Maggie that Shay and I had some
history between us that he didnt know aboutI had
chickened out. Again.
“So heres the thing,” Maggie said, distracting me from my
thoughts as we pul ed into the driveway. “My parents are
going to be a little excited when they see you in my car.”
I glanced around at the quiet, wooded retreat. “Dont get
much company here?”
“Dont get many dates is more like it.”
“I dont want to burst your bubble, but Im not exactly
boyfriend material.”
Maggie laughed. “Yeah, thanks, but Id like to think even Im
not that desperate. Its just that my mothers got radar or
somethingshe can sniff out a Y chromosome from miles
away.”
As if Maggie had conjured her, a woman stepped out of the
house. She was petite and blond, with her hair cut into a
neat bob and pearls at her neck. Either shed just come
home from work, or she was headed outmy mother, on a
Friday night, would have been wearing one of my dads
flannel shirts with the sleeves rol ed up, and what she cal ed
her Weekend Fat Jeans. She squinted, glimpsing me
through the windshield. “Maggie!” she cried. “You didnt tel
us you were bringing a Mend for dinner.”
Just the way she said the word friend made me feel a rush
of sympathy for Maggie.
“Joel!” she cal ed into the house behind her. “Maggies
brought a guest!”
I stepped out of the car and adjusted my col ar. “Hel o,” I
said. Im Father Michael.”
Maggies mothers hand went to her throat. “Oh, God.”
“Close,” I replied, “but no cigar.”
At that moment, Maggies father came hurrying out the front
door, tucking in his dress shirt. “Mags,” he said, folding her
into a bear hug, which was when I noticed his yarmulke.
Then he turned to me and held out a hand. Im Rabbi
Bloom.”
“You could have told me your father was a rabbi,” I
whispered to Maggie.
“You didnt ask.” She looped her arm through her fathers.
“Daddy, this is Father Michael. Hes a heretic.”
“Please tel me youre not dating him,” Mrs. Bloom
murmured.
“Ma, hes a priest. Of course Im not.” Maggie laughed as
they headed toward the house. “But I bet that street
performer who asked me out is starting to look a lot more
palatable to you …”
That left two of us, men of God, standing awkwardly on the
driveway.
Rabbi Bloom led the way into the house, toward his study.
“So,”
he said. “Wheres your congregation?”
“Concord,” I said. “St. Catherines.”
“And you met my daughter how?”
Im Shay Bournes spiritual advisor.”
He glanced up. “That must be unnerving.”
“It is,” I said. “On many levels.”
“So is he or isnt he?”
“Donating his heart? Thats going to be up to your daughter,
I think.”
The rabbi shook his head. “No, no. Maggie, she could
move a mountain if she wanted to, one molecule at a time. I
meant is he or isnt he Jesus?”
I blinked. “I never figured Id hear that question from a
rabbi.”
“Jesus was a Jewish man, after al . Just look at the
evidence: he lived at home, went into his dads business,
thought his mother was a virgin, and his mother thought he
was God.” Rabbi Bloom grinned, and I started to smile.
“Wel , Shays not preaching what Jesus did.”
The rabbi laughed. “And you were around the first time to
know this for sure?”
“I know what it says in scripture.”
“I never understood peopleJewish or Christianwho
read the Bible as if it were hard evidence. Gospel means
good news. Its a way to update the story, to fit the audience
youre tel ing it to.”
“I dont know if Id say that Shay Bournes here to update
the story of Christ for the modem generation,” I replied.
“It makes you wonder, then, why so many people have
jumped on his bandwagon. Its almost like who he is
matters less than what al of them need him to be.” Rabbi
Bloom began to scour his bookshelves, final y lighting on
one dusty tome, which he skimmed through until he found a
certain page. “Jesus said to his disciples, Compare me to
someone and tel me whom I am like. Simon Peter said to
him, You are like a righteous angel. Matthew said to him,
You are like a wise philosopher.
Thomas said to him, Master, my mouth is whol y incapable
of saying whom you are like. Jesus said, I am not your
master. Because you have drunk, you have become
intoxicated from the bubbling spring which I have measured
out.”
He snapped the book shut again as I tried to place the
scripture.
“Historys always written by the winners,” Rabbi Bloom
said. “This was one of the losers.” He handed me the book
just as Maggie poked her head into the room.
“Dad, youre not trying to pawn off another copy of The Best
Jewish Knock-Knock Jokes, are you?”
“Unbelievably, Father Michael already has a signed copy. Is
dinner ready?”
“Yes.”
“Thank goodness. I was beginning to think your mother had
cremated the tilapia.” As Maggie ducked back into the
kitchen. Rabbi Bloom turned to me. “Wel , in spite of how
Maggie introduced you, you dont seem like a heretic to
me.”
“Its a long story.”
“Im sure you already know that heresy comes from the
Greek word for choice.” He shrugged. “Makes you wonder.
What if the ideas that have always been considered
sacrilegious arent sacrilegious at al just ideas we
havent come across before? Or ideas we havent been
al owed to come across?”
In my hands, the book the rabbi had given me felt as if it
were burning. “You hungry?” Bloom asked.
“Starving,” I admitted, and I let him lead the way.
June
When I was pregnant with Claire, I was told that I had
gestational diabetes. I stil dont think that was true, frankly
an hour before I had the test, Id taken Elizabeth to
McDonalds and finished her orange Hi-C drink, which is
enough to put anyone into a sugar coma. However, when
the obstetrician told me the results, I did what I had to do:
stuck to a strict diet that left me hungry al the time, got
blood drawn twice a week, held my breath at every visit
while my doctor checked the babys growth.
The silver lining? I was treated to numerous ultrasounds.
Long after most moms-to-be had gotten their twenty-week
preview of the baby inside them, I continued to get updated
portraits.
It got to be so commonplace for Kurt and I to see our baby
that he stopped coming to the weekly OB visits. Hed watch
Elizabeth while I drove to the hospital, lifted up my shirt, and
let the wand rol over my bel y, il uminating on a monitor a
foot, an elbow, the slope of this new childs nose. By then,
in my eighth month, the picture wasnt the stick-figure
skeleton you see at twenty weeksyou could see her hair,
the ridges on her thumb, the curve of her cheek. She looked
so real on the ultrasound screen that sometimes Id forget
she was stil inside me.
“Not much longer,” the technician had said to me that last
day as she wiped the gel off my bel y with a warm
washcloth.
“Easy for you to say,” I told her. “Youre not the one chasing
around a seven-year-old in your eighth month.”
“Been there done that,” she said, and she reached beneath
the screen to hand me that days printout of the babys face.
When I saw it, I drew in my breath: thats how much this new
baby looked like Kurtcompletely unlike me, unlike
Elizabeth.
This new baby had his wide-set eyes, his dimples, the point
of his chin. I folded the picture into my purse so that I could
show it to him, and then I drove home.
There were cars backed up on the street leading to mine. I
assumed it was construction; theyd been repaving the
roads around here. We sat in a line, idling, listening to the
radio. After five minutes, I started to worryKurt was on
duty today, and had taken his lunch break early so that I
could go to the ultrasound without dragging Elizabeth along.
If I didnt get home soon, hed be late for work.
“Thank God,” I said when the traffic slowly began to move.
But as I drew closer, I saw the detour signs set up at the
end of my block, the police car sprawled sideways across
the street. I felt that smal tumble in my heart, the way you do
when you see a fire engine racing toward the general
vicinity of your home.
Roger, an officer I knew only marginal y, was diverting
traffic.
I unrol ed my window. “I live here,” I said. “Im married to
Kurt Nea”
Before I could finish, his face froze, and that was how I
knew something had happened. Id seen Kurts face do the
same thing when hed told me that my first husband had
been kil ed in the car wreck.
I snapped off my seat belt and pushed my way out of the
car, ungainly and awkward in my pregnancy. “Where is
she?” I cried, the car stil running. “Wheres Elizabeth?”
“June,” Roger said as he wrapped an arm around me
firmly.
“Why dont you just come with me?”
He walked me down the road where I lived, until I could see
what I hadnt been able to from the crossroads: the glare of
police cruiser lights, blinking like a holiday. The yawning
mouths of the ambulances. The door to my house wide
open. One officer held the dog in his arms; when Dudley
saw me, he began to bark like mad.
“Elizabeth!” I yel ed, and I shoved away from Roger, running
as fast as I could given my shape and size. “Elizabeth!!”
I was intercepted by someone who knocked the breath
from methe chief of police. “June,” he said softly. “Come
with me.”
I struggled against Irvscratching, kicking, pleading. I
thought maybe if I put up a fight, it would keep me from
hearing what he was about to say. “Elizabeth?” I whispered.
“Shes been shot, June.”
I waited for him to say But shel be just fine, except he
didnt.
He shook his head. Later, I would remember that he had
been crying.
“I want to see her,” I sobbed.
“Theres something else,” Irv said, and as I watched, a
brace of paramedics wheeled Kurt out on a stretcher. His
face was white, leached of bloodal of which seemed to
be soaking the makeshift bandage around his midsection.
I reached for Kurts hand, and he turned toward me, his
eyes glassy. “Im sorry,” he choked out. “Im so sorry.”
“What happened?” I shrieked, frantic. “Sorry for what? What
happened to her!”
“Maam,” a paramedic said, “weve got to get him to a
hospital.”
Another paramedic pul ed me back. I watched them take
Kurt away from me.
As Irv led me to the steps of another ambulance, he spoke,
words that at the time felt as solid and square as bricks,
layered sentence upon sentence to build a wal between life
as Id known it and the one I would now be forced to lead.
Kurt gave us a statement…found the carpenter sexual y
abusing Elizabeth … standoff…
shots were fired … Elizabeth got in the way.
Elizabeth, I used to say, when she was fol owing me around
the tiny kitchen as I cooked dinner, Im tripping over you.
Elizabeth, your father and I are trying to have a
conversation.
Elizabeth, not now.
Never.
My legs were numb as Irv led me into a second ambulance.
“Shes the mother,” he said as one of the paramedics
came forward.
A smal form lay on a stretcher in the central cavity of the
ambulance, covered with a thick gray blanket. I reached
out, shaking, and pul ed the cloth down. As soon as I saw
Elizabeth, my knees gave out; if not for Irv, I would have
fal en.
She looked like she was sleeping. Her hands were tucked
on either side of her body; her cheeks were flushed.
Theyd made a mistake, that was al .
I leaned over the stretcher, touching her face. Her skin was
stil warm. “Elizabeth,” I whispered, the way I did on school
days to wake her. “Elizabeth, time to get up.”
But she didnt stir; she didnt hear me. I broke down over
her body, pul ing her against me. The blood on her chest
was garish. I tried to draw her closer, but I couldntthis
baby inside me was in the way. “Dont go,” I whispered.
“Please dont go.”
“June,” Irv said, touching my shoulder. “You can ride with
them if you want, but youl have to put her down.”
I did not understand the great hurry to take her to a hospital;
later, I would learn that only a doctor could pronounce
Elizabeth dead, no matter how obvious it was.
The paramedics gently strapped Elizabeth to the gurney
and offered me a seat beside it. “Wait,” I said, and I
unclasped a barrette from my hair. “She doesnt like her
bangs in her eyes,” I mur mured, and I clipped them back. I
left my hand on her forehead for a moment, a benediction.
On the interminable ride to the hospital, I looked down at
my shirt. It was stained with blood, a Rorschach of loss. But
I was not the only one who had been marked, permanently
changed. It was no surprise when a month later I gave birth
to Clairean infant who looked nothing like her father, as
she had that day at the ultrasound, but who instead was the
spitting image of the sister she would never meet.
Maggie
Oliver and I were enjoying a glass of Yel ow Tail and a
TiVod Greys Anatomy when there was a knock on the
door. Now, this was alarming on several counts:
1. It was Friday night, and no one ever stopped by on
Friday night.
2. People who ring the doorbel at ten p.m. are either a.
stranded with a dead battery in their car b. serial kil ers
c. al of the above
3. I was in my pajamas.
4. The ones with a hole on the butt, so that my underwear
showed.
I looked at the rabbit. “Lets not get it,” I said, but Oliver
hopped off my lap and began to sniff around the bottom of
the door.
“Maggie?” I heard. “I know youre in there.”
“Daddy?” I got off the couch and unlocked the door to let
him in.
“Shouldnt you be at services?”
He took off his coat and hung it on an antique rack that my
mother had given me for my birthday one year, and that I
real y hated, but that she looked for every time she came to
my house (Oh, Maggie, Im so glad youve stil got this!). “I
stayed for the important parts. Your mothers kibitzing with
Carol; Il probably make it home before she wil .”
Carol was the cantora woman with a voice that made me
think of fal ing asleep in the summertime sun: strong, steady
utterly relaxing. When she wasnt singing, she col ected
thimbles. She went to conventions as far away as Seattle to
trade them, and had one entire forty-foot wal of her house
divvied up by a contractor into minuscule display shelves.
Mom said that Carol had more than five thousand thimbles.
I didnt think I had five thousand of anything, except maybe
daily calories.
He walked into the living room and glanced at the
television. “I wish that skinny girl would just ditch
McDreamy.”
“You watch Greys AnatomyT
“Your mother watches. I absorb by osmosis.” He sat down
on the couch, while I mul ed over the fact that I actual y did
have something in common with my mother.
“I liked your friend the priest,” my father said.
“Hes not my friend. We work together.”
“I can stil like him, cant I?”
I shrugged. “Something tel s me you didnt come al the way
here to tel me how fabulous Father Michael is.”
“Wel , in part. How come you brought him over tonight?”
“Why?” I bristled. “Did Mom complain?”
“Wil you just stop with the Mom thing?” My father sighed.
“Im asking you a question.”
“He had a hard day. Being on Shays side isnt easy for
him.”
My father looked at me careful y. “How about for you?”
“You told me to ask Shay what he wanted,” I said. “He
doesnt want his life saved. He wants his death to mean
something.”
My father nodded. “A lot of Jews think you cant donate
organs, because it violates Jewish lawyoure not
supposed to mutilate the body after death; youre supposed
to bury it as soon as possible. But pikkuah nefesh takes
precedence over that. It says that the duty to save life
trumps everything. Or in other wordsa Jew is required to
break the law, if it means saving a life.”
“So its okay to commit murder in order to save someone
else?” I asked.
“Wel , Gods not stupid; He sets parameters. But if theres
any karmic pikkuah nefesh in the world”
“To mix metaphors, no less religions …”
“then the fact that you cant stop an execution is at least
balanced by the fact that youl be saving a life.”
“At what cost, Daddy? Is it okay to kil someone whos a
criminal, someone society real y doesnt want around
anymore, so that a little girl can live? What if it wasnt a little
girl who needed that heart? What if it was some other
criminal? Or what if it wasnt Shay who had to die in order
to donate his organs? What if it was me?”
“God forbid,” my father said.
“Its semantics.”
“Its morality. Youre doing good.”
“By doing bad.”
My father shook his head. “Theres something else about
pikkuah nefesh … it clears the slate of guilt. You cant feel
remorse about breaking the law, because ethical y, youre
obligated to do it.”
“See, thats where youre wrong. I can feel remorse.
Because were not talking about not fasting on Yom Kippur
since you happen to be sick …
were talking about a man dying.”
“And saving your life.”
I looked up at him. “Claires life.”
“Two birds with one stone,” my father said. “Maybe its not
literal in your case, Maggie. But this lawsuitits fired you
up. Its given you something to look forward to.” He looked
around my homethe place setting for one, the bowl of
popcorn on the table, the rabbit cage.
I suppose there was a point in my life when I wanted the
package dealthe chuppah, the husband, the kids, the
carpoolsbut somewhere along the line, Id just stopped
hoping. I had gotten used to living alone, to saving the other
half of the can of soup for the next nights dinner, to only
changing the pil owcases on my side of the bed. I had
become overly comfortable with myself, so much so that
anyone else would have felt like an intrusion.
Pretending, it turned out, took much less effort than hoping.
One of the reasons I loved my parentsand hated them
is that they stil thought I had a chance at al that. They only
wanted me to be happy; they didnt see how on earth I
could be happy by myself. Which, if you read between the
lines, meant they found me just as lacking as I did.
I could feel my eyes fil ing with tears. “Im tired,” I said. “You
should go now.”
“Maggie”
When he reached for me, I ducked away. “Good night.”
I punched buttons on the remote control until the television
went black. Oliver crept out from behind my desk to
investigate, and I scooped him up. Maybe this was why I
chose to spend my free time with a rabbit: he didnt offer
unwanted advice. “You forgot one little detail,” I said.
“Pikkuah nefesh doesnt apply to an atheist.”
My father paused in the act of taking his coat from the
worlds ugliest coat rack. He slipped it over his arm and
walked toward me. “I know it sounds strange for a rabbi,”
he said, “but its never mattered to me what you believe in,
Mags, as long as you believe in yourself as much as I do.”
He settled his hand on top of Olivers back. Our fingers
brushed, but I didnt look up at him. “And thats not
semantics.”
“Daddy”
He held up a hand to shush me and opened the door. “Il
tel your mother to get you new pajamas for your birthday,”
he said, pausing at the threshold. “Those have a hole in the
butt.”
M I C HAEL
In 1945, two brothers were digging beneath cliffs in Nag
Hammadi, Egypt, trying to find fertilizer. OneMohammed
Alistruck something hard as he dug. He unearthed a
large earthenware jug, covered with a red dish. Afraid that
a jinn would be inside it, Mohammed Ali didnt want to open
the jar. Final y, the curiosity of finding gold instead led him
to break it openonly to find thirteen papyrus books inside,
bound in gazel e leather.
Some of the books were burned for firewood. The others
made their way to religious scholars, who dated them to
have been written around A.D. 140, about thirty years after
the New Testamentand deciphered them to find the
names of gospels not found in the Bible, ful of sayings that
were in the New Testament… and many that werent. In
some, Jesus spoke in riddles; in others, the Virgin birth and
bodily resurrection were dismissed. They came to be
known as the Gnostic gospels, and even today, they are
given short shrift by the Church.
In seminary, we learned about the Gnostic gospels.
Namely, we learned that they were heresy. And let me tel
you, when a priest hands you a text and tel s you this is what
nor to believe, it colors the way you read it. Maybe I
skimmed the text, saving the careful close analysis for the
Bible. Maybe I whiffed completely and told the priest who
was teaching that course that Id done my homework when
in fact I didnt.
Whatever the excuse, that night when I cracked open Joel
Blooms book, it was as if Id never seen the words before,
and although I planned to only read the foreword by the
scholar whod compiled the textsa man named Ian
FletcherI found myself devouring the pages as if it were
the latest Stephen King novel and not a col ection of ancient
gospels.
The book had been earmarked to the Gospel of Thomas.
Any mentions of Thomas I knew from the Bible certainly
werent flattering: He doesnt believe Lazarus wil rise from
the dead. When Jesus tel s His disciples to fol ow Him,
Thomas points out that they dont know where to go. And
when Jesus rises after the crucifixion, Thomas isnt even
thereand wont believe it until he can touch the wounds
with his own hands. Hes the very definition of faithless
and the origin of the term doubting Thomas.
Yet in Rabbi Blooms book, this page began:
These are the secret words which the living Jesus spoke,
and the twin, Didymos Judas Thomas, wrote them down.
Twin? Since when did Jesus have a twin?
The rest of the “gospel” was not a narrative of Jesuss life,
like Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, but a col ection of
quotes by Jesus, al beginning with the words Jesus said.
Some were lines similar to those in the Bible. Others were
completely unfamiliar and sounded more like logic puzzles
than any scripture:
If you bring forth what is within you, what is within you wil
save you. If you dont bring forth what is within you, what is
within you wil destroy you.
I read the line over twice and rubbed my eyes. There was
something about it that made me feel as if Id heard it
before.
Then I realized where.
Shay had said it to me the first time Id met with him, when
hed explained why he wanted to donate his heart to Claire
Nealon.
I kept reading intently, hearing Shays voice over and over
again: The dead arent alive, and the living wont die.
We come from the light.
Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone; you wil
find me there.
The first time I had gone on a rol er coaster, I felt like this
like the ground had been pul ed out from beneath my feet,
like I was going to be sick, like I needed something to grab
hold of.
If you asked a dozen people on the street if theyd ever
heard of the Gnostic gospels, eleven would look at you as if
you were crazy. In fact most people today couldnt even
recite the Ten Commandments. Shay Bournes religious
training had been minimal and fragmented; the only thing Id
ever seen him “read” was the Sports Il ustrated Swimsuit
Issue.
He couldnt write; he could barely fol ow a thought through to
the end of one sentence. His formal schooling ended at a
GED hed gotten while at the juvenile detention facility.
How, then, could Shay Bourne have memorized the Gospel
of Thomas? Where would he even have stumbled across it
in his lifetime?
The only answer I could come up with was that he hadnt.
It could have been coincidence.
I could have been remembering the conversations
incorrectly.
OrmaybeI could have been wrong about him.
The past three weeks, I had pushed past the throngs of
people camped out in front of the prison. I had turned off the
television when yet another pundit suggested that Shay
might be the Messiah. After al , I knew better. I was a priest;
I had taken vows; I understood that there was one God. His
message had been recorded in the Bible, and above al
else, when Shay spoke, he did not sound like Jesus in any
of the four gospels.
But here was a fifth. A gospel that hadnt made it into the
Bible but was equal y as ancient. A gospel that espoused
the beliefs of at least some people during the birth of
Christianity. A gospel that Shay Bourne had quoted to me.
What if the Church forefathers had gotten it wrong?
What if the gospels that had been dismissed and
debunked were the real ones, and the ones that had been
picked for the New Testament were the embel ished
versions? What if Jesus had actual y said It would mean
that the al egations being made about Shay Bourne might
not be that far off the mark.
And it would explain why a Messiah might return in the
guise of a convicted murdererto see if this time, we might
get it right.
I got out of my chair, folding the book by my side, and
started to pray.
Heavenly Father, I said silently, help me understand.
The telephone rang, making me jump. I glanced at the clock
who would cal after three in the morning?
“Father Michael? This is CO Smythe, from the prison. Sorry
to disturb you at this hour, but Shay Bourne had another
seizure. We thought youd want to know.”
“Is he al right?”
“Hes in the infirmary,” Smythe said. “He asked for you.”
At this hour, the vigilant masses outside the prison were
tucked into their sleeping bags and tents, underneath the
artificial day created by the enormous spotlights that
flooded the front of the building. I had to be buzzed in; when
I entered the receiving area, CO Smythe was waiting for
me. “What happened?”
“No one knows,” the officer said. “It was Inmate DuFresne
who alerted us again. We couldnt see what happened on
the security cameras.”
We entered the infirmary. In a distant, dark corner of the
room.
Shay was propped up in a bed, a nurse beside him. He
held a cup of juice that he sipped through a straw; his other
hand was cuffed to the beds railing. There were wires
coming out from beneath his medical johnny. “How is he?” I
asked.
“Hel live,” the nurse said, and then, realizing her mistake,
blushed fiercely. “We hooked him up to monitor his heart.
So far, so good.”
I sat down on a chair beside Shay and looked up at Smythe
and the “Thats about al youve got,” the nurse said. “We
just gave him something to knock him out.”
They moved to the far side of the room, and I leaned closer
to Shay.
“Are you okay?”
“You wouldnt believe it if I told you.”
“Oh, try me,” I said.
He glanced over to make sure no one else was listening. “I
was just watching TV, you know? This documentary on how
they make movie theater candy, like Dots and Milk Duds.
And I started to get tired, so I went to turn it off. But before I
could push the burton, al the light in the television, it shot
into me like electricity. I mean, I could feel those things
inside my blood moving around, what are they cal ed again,
corporals?”
“Corpuscles.”
“Yeah, right, those. I hate that word. Did you ever see that
Star Trek where those aliens are sucking the salt out of
everything? I always thought they should be cal ed
corpuscles. You say the word, and it sounds like youre
eating a lemon …”
“Shay. You were talking about the light.”
“Oh, right, yeah. Wel , it was like I started boiling inside, and
my eyes, they were going to jel y, and I tried to cal out but
my teeth were wired shut and then I woke up in here, feeling
like Id been sucked dry.” He looked up at me. “By a
corpuscle.”
“The nurse said it was a seizure. Do you remember
anything else?”
“I remember what I was thinking,” Shay said. “This was what
it would feel like.”
“What?”
“Dying.”
I took a deep breath. “Remember when you were little, a kid
and youd fal asleep in the car? And someone would
carry you out and put you into bed, so that when you woke
up in the morning, you knew automatical y you were home
again? Thats what I think its like to die.”
“That would be good,” Shay said, his voice deeper, groggy.
“Itl be nice to know what home looks like.”
A phrase Id read just an hour ago slipped into my mind like
a splinter: The Fathers kingdom is spread out upon the
earth, and people dont see it.
Although I knew it wasnt the right time, although I knew I
was supposed to be here for Shay, instead of the other way
around, I leaned closer, until my words could fal into the
shel of his ear. “Where did you find the Gospel of
Thomas?” I whispered.
Shay stared at me blankly. “Thomas who?” he said, and
then his eyes drifted shut.
As I drove away from the prison, I heard Father Walters
voice: Hes conned you. But when Id mentioned the Gospel
of Thomas, I hadnt seen even the slightest flicker of
recognition in Shays eyes, and hed been druggedit
would have been awful y hard to keep dissembling.
Was this what it had felt like for the Jews who met Jesus
and recognized him as more than just a gifted rabbi? I had
no point of comparison.
Id grown up Catholic; Id become a priest. I could not
remember a time that I hadnt believed Jesus was the
Messiah.
I knew someone, though, who could.
Rabbi Bloom didnt have a temple, because it had burned
down, but he did rent office space close to the school
where services were held. I was waiting in front of the
locked door when he arrived just before eight a.m.
“Wow,” he said, taking in the vision in front of hima red-
eyed, rumpled priest clutching a motorcycle helmet and the
Nag Hammadi texts. “I would have let you borrow it longer
than one night.”
“Why dont Jews believe Jesus was the Messiah?”
He unlocked the door to the office. “Thats going to take at
least a cup and a half of coffee,” Bloom said. “Come on in.”
He started brewing a pot and offered me a seat. His office
looked a lot like Father Walters at St. Catherines
inviting, comfortable. A place youd want to sit and talk.
Unlike Father Walters, though. Rabbi Blooms plants were
the real thing. Father Walters were plastic, bought by the
Ladies Aid, when he kept kil ing everything from a ficus to
an African violet.
“Its a wandering Jew,” the rabbi said when he saw me
checking out the flowerpot. “Maggies little idea of a joke.”
“I just got back from the prison. Shay Bourne had another
seizure.”
“Did you tel Maggie?”
“Not yet.” I looked at him. “You didnt answer my question.”
“I havent had my coffee.” He got up and poured us each a
cup, putting milk and sugar in mine without asking first.
“Jews dont think Jesus was the Messiah because he didnt
fulfil the criteria for a Jewish messiah.
Its real y pretty simple, and its al laid out by Maimonides.
A Jewish moshiach wil bring the Jews back to Israel and
set up a government in Jerusalem thats the center of
political power for the world, for both Jews and Gentiles.
Hel rebuild the Temple and reestablish Jewish law as the
governing law of the land. Hel raise the deadal of the
deadand usher in a great age of peace, when everyone
believes in God. Hel be a descendant of David, a king and
a warrior, a judge, and a great leader … but hel also be
firmly, unequivocal y human.”
Bloom set the cup down in front of me. “We believe that in
every generation, a persons born with the potential to
become the moshiach.
But if the messianic age doesnt come and that person
dies, then that person isnt him.”
“Like Jesus.”
“Personal y, Ive always seen Jesus as a great Jewish
patriot. He was a good Jew, who probably wore a yarmulke
and obeyed the Tbrah, and never planned to start a new
religion. He hated the Romans and wanted to get them out
of Jerusalem. He got charged with political rebel ion,
sentenced to execution. Yes, a Jewish high priest carried it
outCaiaphasbut most Jews back then hated Caiaphas
anyway be cause he was the henchman for the Romans.”
He looked up at me over the edge of his coffee mug. “Was
Jesus a good guy? Yeah. Great teacher? Sure. Messiah?
Dunno.”
“A lot of the Bibles predictions for the messianic era were
fulfil ed by Jesus”
“But were they the crucial ones?” Rabbi Bloom asked.
“Lets say you didnt know who I was and I asked you to
meet me. I told you Id be standing outside the Steeplegate
Mal at ten oclock wearing a Hawaiian shirt and that Id
have curly red hair and be listening to Outkast on my iPod.
And at ten oclock, you saw someone standing outside the
Steeplegate Mal who had curly red hair and was wearing a
Hawaiian shirt and listening to Outkast on an iPod… but it
was a woman. Would you stil think it was me?”
He stood up to refil his coffee. “Do you know what I heard
on NPR
on the way over here today? Another bus blew up in Israel.
Three more kids from New Hampshire died in Iraq. And the
cops just arrested some guy in Manchester who shot his
ex-wife in front of their two kids. If Jesus ushered in the
messianic era, and the world I hear about on the news is
one of peace and redemption … wel , Id rather wait for a
different moshiach.” He glanced back at me. “Now, if you
dont mind me asking you a question … whats a priest
doing at a rabbis office at eight in the morning asking
questions about the Jewish Messiah?”
I got up and began to walk around the little room. “The book
you loaned meit got me thinking.”
“And thats a bad thing?”
“Shay Bourne has said things, verbatim, that I read last
night in the Gospel of Thomas.”
“Bourne? Hes read Thomas? I thought Maggie said he”
“has no religious training to speak of, and a minimal
education.”
“Its not like the Gideons leave the Gospel of Thomas in
hotel rooms,” Rabbi Bloom said. “Where would he have”
“Exactly.”
He steepled his fingers. “Huh.”
I placed the book hed loaned me on his desk. “What would
you do if you began to second-guess everything you
believed?”
Rabbi Bloom leaned forward and riffled through his
Rolodex. “I would ask more questions,” he said. He
scribbled down something on a Post-it and handed it to
me.
Ian Fletcher. I read. 603-555-1367.
Lucius
The night Shay had his second seizure, I was awake,
gathering ink that I planned to use to give myself another
tattoo. If I do say so myself, Im rather proud of my
homemade tattoos. I had fivemy rationale being that my
body, up until three weeks ago, wasnt worth much more
than being a canvas for my art; plus the threat of getting
AIDS from a dirty needle was obviously a moot point. On
my left ankle was a clock, with the hands marking the
moment of Adams death. On my left shoulder was an
angel, and below it an African tribal design. On my right leg
was a bul , because I was a Taurus; and swimming beside
it was a fish, for Adam, who was a Pisces. I had grand
plans for this sixth one, which I planned to put right on my
chest: the word BELIEVE, in Gothic letters. Id practiced the
art in reverse multiple times in pencil and pen, until I felt
sure that I could replicate it with my tattoo gun as I worked
in the mirror.
My first gun had been confiscated by the COs, like Crashs
hype kit. It had taken me six months to amass the parts for
the new one. Making ink was hard to do, and harder to get
away withwhich was why I had chosen to work on this
during the deadest hours of the night. I had lit a plastic
spoon on fire, keeping the flame smal so I could catch the
smoke in a plastic bag. It stank horribly, and just as I was
getting certain the COs would literal y get wind of it and shut
down my operation, Shay Bourne col apsed next door.
This time, his seizure had been different. Hed screamed
so loud that he woke up the whole pod, so loud that the
finest dust of plaster drifted down from the ceilings of our
cel s. To be honest, Shay was such a mess when he was
wheeled off I-tier that none of us were sure whether or not
hed be returningwhich is why I was stunned to see him
being led back to his cel the very next day.
“Po-lice,” Joey Kunz yel ed, just in time for me to hide the
pieces of my tattoo gun underneath the mattress. The
officers locked Shay into his cel , and as soon as the door
to I-tier shut behind them, I asked Shay how he was feeling.
“My head hurts,” he said. “I have to go to sleep.”
With Crash stil off the tier after the hype kit transgression,
things were quieter. Cal oway slept most days and stayed
up nights with his bird; Texas and Pogie played virtual
poker; Joey was listening to his soaps. I waited an extra
few minutes to make sure the officers were otherwise
occupied out in the control booth and then I reached
underneath my mattress again.
I had unraveled a guitar string to its central core, a
makeshift needle.
This was inserted into a pen whose ink cartridge had been
removedand a smal piece of its tip sawed off and
attached to the other end of the needle, which was attached
to the motor shaft of a cassette player. The pen was taped
to a toothbrush bent into an L shape, which let you hold the
contraption more easily. You could adjust the needle length
by sliding the pen casing back and forth; al that was left
was plugging in the AC adapter of the cassette player, and
I had a functional tattoo gun again.
The soot Id captured the previous night had been mixed
with a few drops of shampoo to liquefy it. I stood in front of
the stainless steel panel that served as a mirror, and
scrutinized my chest. Then, gritting my teeth against the
pain, I turned on the gun. The needle moved back and forth
in an el iptical orbit, piercing me hundreds of times per
minute.
There it was, the letter B.
“Lucius?” Shays voice drifted into my house.
“Im sort of busy, Shay.”
“Whats that noise?”
“None of your business.” I lifted it to my skin again, felt the
needle working against me, a thousand arrows striking.
“Lucius? I can stil hear that noise.”
I sighed. “Its a tattoo gun, Shay, al right? Im giving myself
a tattoo.”
There was a hesitation. “Wil you give me one?”
I had done this for multiple inmates when I was housed on
different tiers-ones that had a bit more freedom than I-tier,
which offered twentythree rol icking hours of lockdown. “I
cant. I cant reach you.”
“Thats okay,” Shay said. “I can reach you.”
“Yeah, whatever,” I said. I squinted back into the mirror and
set the tattoo gun against my skin. Holding my breath, I
careful y formed the curves and flourishes around the letters
E and L
I thought I heard Shay whimpering when I started on the
letter I, and surely he cried out when I tattooed the V. My
gun must not have been helping his headache any.
Shrugging off his moans, I stepped closer to the mirror and
surveyed my handiwork.
God, it was gorgeous. The letters moved with every breath I
took; even the angry red swel ing of my skin couldnt take
away from the clean lines of the letters.
“B-believe,” Shay stammered.
I turned around, as if I could see him through the wal
between our cel s. “What did you say?”
“Its what you said,” Shay corrected. “I read it right, didnt I?”
I had not told anyone of my plans for my sixth tattoo. I hadnt
shared the prototype artwork. I knew for a fact that Shay,
from where he stood, could not have seen into my cel as I
worked.
Fumbling behind the brick that served as my safe, I took out
the shank that I used as a portable mirror. I stepped up to
the front of my cel and angled it so that I could see Shays
beaming face in the reflection. “How did you know what I
was writing?”
Shay smiled wider, and then raised his fist. He unfolded his
fingers, one at a time.
His palm was red and inflamed, and printed across it, in
Gothic script, was the same exact tattoo Id just given
myself.
Shay paced his cel in figure eights. “Did you see him?” he
asked, wildeyed.
I sank down on the stool Id dragged in from the control
booth. I was sluggish todaynot only was my head buzzing
with questions about what Id read, but I was alsofor the
first time in a yearnot officiating at this evenings midnight
Mass. “See who?” I replied, distracted.
“Sul y. The new guy. Next door.”
I glanced into the other cel . Lucius DuFresne was stil on
Shays left; on his right, the formerly empty cel now had
someone occupying it. Sul y, however, wasnt there. He was
in the rec yard, repeatedly running ful tilt across the little
square yard and leaping up against the far wal , hands
splayed, as if hitting it hard enough meant hed go right
through the metal.
“Theyre going to kil me,” Shay said.
“Maggies working on writing a motion at this very”
“Not the state,” Shay said. “One of them.”
I did not know anything about prison politics, but there was
a fine line between Shays paranoia and what might pass
for the truth. Shay was receiving more attention than any
other inmate at the prison, as a result of his lawsuit and the
media frenzy. There was every chance he might be
targeted by the general prison population.
Behind me, CO Smythe passed in his flak jacket, carrying a
broom and some cleaning supplies. Once a week, the
inmates were required to clean their own cel s. It was one-
at-a-time, supervised cleaning: after an inmate came in
from rec, the supplies would be waiting for him in his cel ,
and a CO would stand guard at the doorway until the work
was finishedclose by, because even Windex could
become a weapon in here. I watched the empty cel door
open, so that Smythe could leave the spray bottles and the
toweling and the broom; then he walked to the far end of the
tier to get the new inmate from the rec yard. Til talk to the
warden. Il make sure youre protected,” I told Shay, which
seemed to mol ify him. “So,” I said, changing the subject,
“what do you like to read?”
“What, youre Oprah now? Were having a book club?”
“No.”
“Good, because Im not reading the Bible.”
“I know that,” I said, seizing this inroad. “Why not?”
“Its lies.” Shay waved a hand, a dismissal.
“What do you read that isnt a lie?”
“I dont,” he replied. “The words get al knotted up. I have to
stare at a page for a year before I can make sense of it.”
” Theres light inside a person of light,” I quoted, ” and if
shines on the whole world.”
Shay hesitated. “Can you see it, too?” He held his hands up
in front of his face, scrutinizing his fingertips. “The light from
the televisionthe stuff that went into meits stil there. It
glows, at night.”
I sighed. “Its from the Gospel of Thomas.”
“No, Im pretty sure it came from the television …”
“The words. Shay. The ones I just said. They came from a
gospel I was reading last night. And so does a lot of stuff
youve been saying to me.”
His eyes met mine. “What do you know,” he said softly, and
I couldnt tel if it was a statement or a question.
“I dont know,” I admitted. “Thats why Im here.”
“Thats why were al here,” Shay said.
If you bring forth what is within you, what is within you wil
save you. It was one of Jesuss sayings in the Gospel of
Thomas; it was one of the first things Shay Bourne had ever
told me, when he was explaining why he needed to donate
his heart. Could it real y be this simple?
Could salvation be not a passive acceptance, like Id been
led to believe, but an active pursuit?
Maybe it was saying the rosary, for me, and receiving Holy
Communion, and serving God. Maybe for Maggies father,
it was meeting with a bunch of die-hard congregants who
wouldnt let the lack of a physical temple dissuade them
from prayer. Maybe for Maggie, it was mending whatever
kept her focused on her faults instead of her strengths.
Maybe for Shay, maybe it was offering his heartliteral y
and figurativelyto the mother whod lost hers years ago
because of him.
Then again. Shay Bourne was a kil er; his sentences curled
like a puppy chasing its tail; he thought he had something
phosphorescent coursing through his veins because a
television had zapped him in the middle of the night. He did
not sound messianicjust delusional.
Shay looked at me. “You should go,” he said, but then his
attention was distracted by the sound of the rec yard door
being opened. Officer Smythe led the new inmate back
onto I-tier.
He was an enormous tower of muscle with a swastika
tattooed on his scalp. His hair, sprouting out from a buzz
cut, grew over it like moss.
The inmates cel door was closed, and his handcuffs
removed. “You know the dril . Sul y,” the officer said. He
stood in the doorway as Sul y slowly picked up the spray
bottle and washed down his sink. I heard the squeak of
paper toweling on metal.
“Hey, Fatheryou watch the game last night?” CO Smythe
said, and then he rol ed his eyes. “Sul y, what are you
doing? You dont need to sweep the”
Suddenly the broom in Sul ys hands was no longer a
broom but a broken spear that he jutted into the officers
throat. Smythe grabbed his neck, gurgling. His eyes rol ed
back in his head; he stumbled toward Shays cel . As he fel
beside me, I clasped my hands over the wound and
screamed for help.
The tier came to life. The inmates were al clamoring to see
what had happened; CO Whitaker was suddenly there and
hauling me to my feet, taking my place as another officer
started CPR. Four more officers ran past me with pepper
spray and shot it into Sul ys face. He was dragged out of
the tier shrieking as the closest physician arriveda
psychiatrist Id seen around the prison. But by now, Smythe
had stopped moving.
No one seemed to notice that I was there; there was far too
much happening, too much at stake. The psychiatrist tried
to find a pulse in Smythes neck, but his hand came away
slick with blood. He lifted the COs wrist and, after a
moment, shook his head. “Hes gone.”
The tier had gone absolutely silent; the inmates were al
staring in shock at the body in front of them. Blood had
stopped flowing from Smythes neck; he was perfectly stil .
To my right, I could see an argument going on in the control
booththe EMTs whod arrived too late and were trying to
gain admission to the tier. They were buzzed in, stil
shrugging into their flak jackets, and knelt beside Smythes
body, repeating the same ineffective tests that the
psychiatrist had.
Behind me, I heard weeping.
I turned around to find Shay crouched on the floor of his cel .
His face was streaked with tears and blood; his hand
slipped beneath his cel door so that his fingers brushed
Smythes.
“You here for last rites?” one of the medics asked, and for
the first time, everyone seemed to realize I was stil present.
“I, uh-“
“Whats he doing here?” CO Whitaker barked.
“Who the hel is he?” another officer said. “I dont even work
this tier.”
“I can go,” I said. “Il … just go.” I glanced once more at
Shay, who was curled into a bal , whispering. If I hadnt
known better, I would have thought he was praying.
As the two EMTs got ready to move the body onto a
stretcher, I prayed over Smythe. “In the Name of God the
Father Almighty who created you … in the Name of Jesus
Christ who redeemed you; in the Name of the Holy Spirit
who sanctifies you. May your rest be this day in peace, and
your dwel ing place in the Paradise of God. Amen.”
I made the sign of the cross and started to get to my feet.
“On three,” the first EMT said.
The second one nodded, his hands on the slain officers
ankles.
“One, two … holy shir,” he cried as the dead man began to
struggle against him.
“One of the proofs of the immortality
of the soul is that myriads have believed it.
They also believed the world was flat.”
-MARK. TWAIN, NOTEBOOK
June
Claire would be cut in half, her sternum buzzed open with a
saw and held open with a metal spreader so that she could
be made, literal y, heartlessand this was not what terrified
me the most.
No, what scared me to death was the idea of cel ular
memory.
Dr. Wu had said that there was no scientific evidence that
the personality traits of heart donors transferred to their
recipients.
But science could only go so far, I figured. Id read the
books and done the research, and I didnt see why it was
such a stretch to think that living tissue might have the
ability to remember. After al , how many of us had tried to
forget something traumatic…
only to find it printed on the back of our eyelids, tattooed on
our tongues?
There were dozens of cases. The baby with a clubfoot who
drowned and gave his heart to another infant, who began to
drag her left leg. The rapper who started playing classical
music, and then learned his donor had died clutching a
violin case. The cattle rancher who received the heart of a
sixteen-year-old vegetarian, and could not eat meat again
without getting violently il .
Then there was the twenty-year-old organ donor who wrote
music in his spare time. A year after he died, his parents
found a CD of a love song hed recorded, about losing his
heart to a girl named Andi. His recipient, a twenty-year-old
girl, was named Andrea. When the boys parents played
the song for her, she could complete the chorus, without
ever having heard it.
Most of these stories were benigna strange coincidence,
an intriguing twist. Except for one: a little boy received the
heart of another boy whod been murdered. He began to
have nightmares about the man who kil ed his donorwith
details about the clothing the man wore, how hed abducted
the boy, where the murder weapon had been stashed.
Using this evidence, the police caught the kil er.
If Claire received Shay Bournes heart, it would be bad
enough if she were to harbor thoughts of murder. But what
would absolutely wreck me was if, with that heart in her, she
had to feel her own father and sister being kil ed.
In that case, better to have no heart at al .
Maggie
Today, I decided, I was going to do everything right. It was
Sunday, and I didnt have to go to work. Instead, I got up
and unearthed my One Minute Workout video (which was
not nearly as slacker as it soundsyou could add minutes
to your own liking, and no one was here to notice if I chose
the four-minute option over the more grueling eight-minute
one). I picked Focus on Abs, instead of the easier Upper
Arm. I sorted my recyclables and flossed and shaved my
legs in the shower. Downstairs, I cleaned Olivers cage and
let him have the run of the living room while I made myself
scrambled egg whites for breakfast.
With wheat germ.
Wel . I lasted forty-seven minutes, anyway, before I had to
break out the Oreos that I hid in the box with my skinny
jeans, a last-ditch attempt at utter guilt before I ripped open
the package and indulged.
I gave Oliver an Oreo, too, and was starting my third cookie
when the doorbel rang.
As soon as I saw the bright pink T-shirt of the man standing
on the porch, with the words JOYOUS FOR JESUS printed
boldly across it, I knew this was my punishment for fal ing off
the wagon into the snack foods.
“If youre not gone in the next ten seconds, Im cal ing 911,” I
said.
He grinned at me, a big platinum orthodontical y enhanced
grin.
“Im not a stranger,” he said. “Im a friend you havent met
yet.”
I rol ed my eyes. “Why dont we just cut to the chaseyou
give me the pamphlets, I politely refuse to talk to you, and
then I close the door and throw them in the trash.”
He held out his hand. “Im Tom.”
“Youre leaving,” I corrected.
“I used to be bitter, too. Id go to work in the mornings and
come home to an empty house and eat half a can of soup
and wonder why I had even been put on this earth. I thought
I had no one, but myself”
“And then you offered Jesus the rest of your soup,” I
finished. “Look, Im an atheist.”
“Its not too late to find your faith.”
“What you real y mean is that its not too late for me to find
your faith,”
I answered, scooping up Oliver as he made a mad dash for
the open door.
“You know what I believe? That religion served its historical
purposeit was a set of laws to live by, before we had a
justice system. But even when it starts out with the best of
intentions, things get screwed up, dont they? A group
bands together because they believe the same things, and
then somehow that gets perverted so that anyone who
doesnt believe those things is wrong. Honestly, even if
there was a religion founded on the principle of doing good
for other people, or helping them with their personal rights,
like I do every day, I wouldnt join … because it would stil
be a religion”
I had rendered Tom speechless. This was probably the
most heated debate hed had in months; mostly, hed have
doors closed in his face.
Inside my house, the phone began to ring.
Tom pushed a pamphlet into my hand and beat a hasty
retreat off my porch. As I closed the door behind him I
glanced down at the cover.
GOD + YOU = oo
“If theres any math to religion,” I muttered, “its division.” I
slipped the pamphlet onto the liner of newspaper beneath
Olivers cage as I hurried to the phone, which was on the
verge of rol ing over to the answering machine. “Hel o?”
The voice was unfamiliar, halting. “Is Maggie Bloom there?”
“Speaking.” I geared up for a zinger to put a telemarketer in
her place for disturbing me on a Sunday morning.
As it turned out, she wasnt a telemarketer. She was a
nurse at Concord Hospital, and she was cal ing because I
had been listed as Shay Bournes emergency contact, and
an emergency had occurred.
Lucius
You would not have believed it possible, but when CO
Smythe came back to life, things actual y got worse.
The remaining officers had to give statements to the
warden about the stabbing. We were kept in lockdown, and
the next day a team of officers who did not normal y work on
I-tier were brought in on duty. They started our one-hour
rotations on the exercise yard and the shower, and Pogie
was the first to go.
I hadnt showered since the stabbing, although the COs had
given both Shay and me a fresh set of scrubs. We had
gotten Smythes blood on us, and a quick wash in our cel
basins didnt go very far to making me feel clean. While we
were waiting for our turns in the shower, Alma showed up to
give us both blood tests. They tested anyone who came in
contact with an inmates blood, and since that included CO
Smythe, his blood apparently was only one step removed
from questionable. Shay was moved in handcuffs, ankle
cuffs, and a bel y chain to a holding room outside the tier,
where Alma was waiting.
In the middle of al this, Pogie slipped in the shower. He lay
there, moaning about his back. Two more COs dragged in
the backboard and handcuffed Pogie to it, then carried him
to a gurney so he could be transported al the way to
Medical. But because they were not used to I-tier, and
because COs are supposed to fol ow us, not lead, they did
not realize that Shay was already being brought back to the
tier at the same time Pogie was going out.
Tragedies happen in a split second in prison; thats al it
took for Pogie to use the handcuff key hed hidden to free
himself, jump off the backboard, grab it, and slam it into
Shays skul , so that he flew face-first into the brick wal .
“Weiss machtr Pogie yel ed White pridelwhich was
how I realized Crash-from where he was stil being kept in
solitary-had used his connections to order a hit on Shay in
retaliation for ratting him out and giving his hype kit to the
COs. Sul ys attack on CO Smythe had just been col ateral
damage, meant to shake up the staffing on our tier so that
part two of the plan could be carried out. And Pogiea
probatehad jumped at the chance to earn his bones by
carrying out a murder sanctioned by the Aryan
Brotherhood.
Six hours after this fiasco, Alma returned to finish drawing
my blood. I was taken to the holding cel and found her stil
shaken by what had happened, although she would not tel
me anything-except that Shay had been taken to the
hospital.
When I saw something silver winking at me, I waited until
Alma drew the needle from my arm. Then I put my head
down between my knees.
“You al right, sugar?” Alma asked.
“Just feeling a little dizzy.” I let my fingers trail along the
floor.
If magicians are the best at sleight of hand, then inmates
have to be a close second. As soon as I was back in my
cel , I pul ed my booty out of the seam in my scrubs where
Id hidden it. Pogies handcuff key was tiny, shiny, formed
from the fastener of a manila envelope.
I crawled beneath my bunk and wriggled the loose brick
that concealed my prized possessions. In a smal
cardboard box were my bottles of paint and my Q-tip
brushes. There were packets of candy, too, that I planned to
extract pigment from in the future-a half-empty pack of
M&Ms, a rol of LifeSavers, a few loose Starbursts. I
unwrapped one of the Starbursts, the orange one that
tasted like St. Joseph childrens aspirin, and kneaded the
square with my thumbs until the taffy became pliable. I
pressed the handcuff key into the center, then reshaped a
careful square and folded it into its original wrapping.
I did not like the thought of profiting in some way from an
incident that had hurt Shay so badly, but I was also a realist.
When Shay ran out of his nine lives and I was left alone, I
would need al the help I could get.
Maggie
Even if I hadnt been listed as Shay Bournes emergency
contact, I would have found him quickly enough at the
hospital: he was the only patient with armed guards
standing outside his door. I glanced at the officers, then
turned my attention to the nurse at the desk. “Is he al right?
What happened?”
Father Michael had cal ed me after the attack on CO
Smythe and told me Shay hadnt been hurt. Somewhere
between now and then, however, something must have
gone drastical y wrong. I had tried cal ing the priest now, but
he wasnt answering his cel I assumed he was on his
way, that hed been cal ed, too.
If Shay hadnt been treated at the prison hospital, whatever
had happened mustve been pretty awful. Inmates werent
moved off-site unless absolutely necessary, because of
cost and security. With the hoopla Shay had generated
outside the prison wal s, it must have been a matter of life
or death.
Then again, maybe everything was when it came to Shay.
Here I was literal y shaking over the news that hed been
seriously injured, when I had spent yesterday filing motions
that would streamline his execution.
The nurse looked up at me. “Hes just come back from
surgery.”
“Surgery?”
“Yes,” said a clipped British voice behind me. “And no, it
wasnt an appendectomy.”
When I turned around, Dr. Gal agher was standing there.
“Are you the only doctor who works here?”
“It certainly feels that way sometimes. Im happy to answer
your questions. Mr. Bourne is my patient.”
“Hes my client.”
Dr. Gal agher glanced at the nurse and at the armed
officers. “Why dont we go somewhere to talk?”
I fol owed him down the hal to a smal family waiting lounge
that was empty. When the doctor gestured for me to take a
seat, my heart sank. Doctors only made you sit down when
they delivered bad news.
“Mr. Bourne is going to be fine,” Dr. Gal agher said. “At
least in terms of this injury.”
“What injury?”
“Im sorry, I thought you knewapparently, it was an inmate
fight.
Mr. Bourne sustained a severe blow to the maxil ary sinus.”
I waited for him to translate.
“His maxil as broken,” Dr. Gal agher said, and he leaned
forward, touching my face. His fingers brushed over the
bone below my eye socket, tracing toward my mouth.
“Here,” he said, and I absolutely, positively stopped
breathing. “There was a bit of a trauma during the
operation.
As soon as we saw the injuries we knew that the
anesthesia would be intravenous, instead of inhalational.
Needless to say, when Mr. Bourne heard the
anesthesiologist say that shed begun Sodium Pentothal
drip, he grew quite agitated.” The doctor looked up at me.
“He asked if this was a dry run for the real thing.”
I tried to imagine how it would feel to be Shayhurt,
aching, and confusedwhisked away to an unfamiliar
place for what seemed to be a prelude to his own
execution. “I want to see him.”
“If you can tel him, Ms. Bloom, that if Id realized who he
waswhat his circumstances are, I meanwel , I would
never have al owed the anesthesiologist to use that drug,
much less an IV tube. Im deeply sorry for putting him
through that.”
I nodded and stood up.
“One more thing,” Dr. Gal agher said. “I real y admire you.
For doing this sort of thing.”
I was halfway to Shays room when I realized that Dr.
Gal agher had remembered my name.
It took several cel phone cal s to the prison before I was
al owed in to see Shay, and even then, the warden insisted
that the officer inside the room would have to stay. I walked
inside, acknowledged the CO, and sat down on the edge of
Shays bed. His eyes were blackened, his face bandaged.
He was asleep, and it made him look younger.
Part of what I did for a living meant championing the causes
of my clients. I was the strong arm, fighting on their behalf,
the bul horn broadcasting their voices. I could feel the angry
discomfort of the Abenaki boy whose school team was
cal ed the Redskins; I could identity with the passion of the
teacher whod been fired for being Wiccan. Shay, though,
had sent me reeling. Although this was arguably the most
important case I would ever bring to court, and although
as my father pointed outI hadnt been this motivated in
my career in ages, there was an inherent paradox. The
more I got to know him, the better chance I had of winning
his organ donation case. But the more I got to know him,
the harder it would be for me to see him executed.
I dragged my cel phone out of my purse. The officers eyes
flicked toward me. “Youre not supposed to use that in here
”
“Oh, piss off,” I snapped, and for the hundredth time I dialed
Father Michael, and reached his voice mail. “I dont know
where you are,” I said, “but cal me back immediately.”
I had left the emotional component of Shay Bournes
welfare to Father Michael, figuring (a) my talents were
better put to use in a courtroom, and (b) my interpersonal
relationship skil s had grown so rusty I needed WD-40
before employing them. But now, Father Michael was MIA,
Shay was hospitalized, and I was here, for better or for
worse.
I stared at Shays hands. They were cuffed at the wrist to
the metal bars of the hospital gurney. The nails were clean
and clipped, the tendons ropy It was hard to imagine the
fingers curled around a pistol, pul ing a trigger twice. And
yet, twelve jurors had been able to picture it.
Very slowly, I reached across the knobby cotton blanket. I
threaded my fingers with Shays, surprised at how warm his
skin was. But when I was about to pul away, his grip
tightened. His eyes slitted open, another shade of blue
amid the bruising. “Grade,” he said, in a voice that sounded
like cotton caught on thorns. “You came.”
I did not know who he thought I was. “Of course I came,” I
said, squeezing his hand. I smiled at Shay Bourne and
pretended that I was the person he needed me to be.
M I C H A E L
Dr. Vijay Choudharys office was fil ed with statues of
Ganesha, the Hindu deity with a potbel ied human body and
an elephants head. I had to move one in order to sit down,
in fact. “Mr. Smythe was extremely lucky,”
the doctor said. “A quarter inch to the left, and he wouldnt
have survived.”
“About that…” I took a deep breath. “A doctor at the prison
pronounced him dead.”
“Between you and me. Father, I wouldnt trust a psychiatrist
to find his own car in a parking lot, much less a hypotensive
victims pulse.
Reports of Mr. Smythes death were, as they say, greatly
exaggerated.”
“There was a lot of blood”
“Many structures in the neck can bleed a great deal. To a
layman, a pool of blood may look like a huge quantity, even
when its not.” He shrugged. “What I imagine happened
was a vasovagal reaction. Mr.
Smythe saw blood and passed out. The body compensates
for shock due to blood loss. Blood pressure lowers, and
vasoconstriction occurs, and both tend to stop the bleeding.
They also lead to a loss of palpable pulses in the
extremitieswhich is why the psychiatrist couldnt find one
in his wrist.”
“So,” I said, pinkening. “You dont think its possible that Mr.
Smythe was … wel … resurrected?”
“No,” he chuckled. “Now, in medical school, I saw patients
whod frozen to death, in the vernacular, come back to life
when they were warmed up. I saw a heart stop beating, and
then start up by itself again. But in neither of those cases
or in Mr. Smythesdid I consider the patient clinical y
dead before his or her recovery.”
My phone began to vibrate, as it had every ten minutes for
the past two hours. Id turned the ringer off when I came into
the hospital, as per their policy. “Nothing miraculous, then,” I
said.
“Perhaps not by your standards … but I think that Mr.
Smythes family might disagree.”
I thanked him, set the statue of Ganesha back on my chair,
and left Dr. Choudharys office. As soon as I exited the
hospital building, I turned on my cel phone to see fifty-two
messages.
Cal me right back, Maggie said on her message.
Somethings happened to Shay. Beep.
Where are you?? Beep.
Okay, I know you probably dont have your phone on but you
have to cal me back immediately. Beep.
Where the fuck are you? Beep.
I hung up and dialed her cel phone. “Maggie Bloom,” she
whispered, answering.
“What happened to Shay?”
“Hes in the hospital.”
“What?! Which hospital?”
“Concord. Where are you?”
“Standing outside the ER.”
“Then for Gods sake, get up here. Hes in room 514.”
I ran up the stairs, pushing past doctors and nurses and lab
technicians and secretaries, as if my speed now could
make up for the fact that I had not been available for Shay
when he needed me. The armed officers at the door took
one look at my col ara free pass, especial y on a Sunday
afternoonand let me inside. Maggie was curled up on the
bed, her shoes off, her feet tucked underneath her. She
was holding Shays hand, although I would have been
hardpressed to recognize the patient as the man Id talked
to just yesterday. His skin was the color of fine ash; his hair
had been shaved in one patch to accommodate stitches to
close a gash. His nosebroken, from the looks of itwas
covered with gauze, and the nostrils were plugged with
cotton.
“Dear God,” I breathed.
“From what I can understand, he came out on the short end
of a prison hit,” Maggie said.
“Thats not possible. I was there during the prison hit”
“Apparently, you left before Act Two.”
I glanced at the officer who stood like a sentry in the corner
of the hospital room. The man looked at me and nodded in
confirmation.
“I already cal ed Warden Coyne at home to give him hel ,”
Maggie said. “Hes meeting me at the prison in a half hour
to talk about additional security measures that can be put in
place to protect Shay until his executionwhen what he
real y means is What can I do to keep you from suing?”
She turned to me. “Can you sit here with Shay?”
It was a Sunday, and I was utterly, absolutely lost. I was on
an unofficial leave of absence from St. Catherines, and
although I had always known Id feel adrift without God, I
had underestimated how aimless I would feel without my
church. Usual y at this time, I would be hanging my robes
after celebrating Mass. I would go with Father Walter to
have lunch with a parishioner. Then wed head back to his
place and watch the preseason Sox game on TV, have a
couple of beers. What religion did for me went beyond
beliefit made me part of a community.
“I can stay,” I answered.
“Then Im out of here,” Maggie said. “He hasnt woken up,
not real y, anyway. And the nurse said hel probably have to
pee when he does, and that we should use this torture
device.” She pointed at a plastic jug with a long neck. “I
dont know about you, but Im not getting paid enough for
that.” She paused in the doorway. Til cal you later. Turn on
your damn phone.”
When she left, I pul ed a chair closer to Shays bed. I read
the plastic placard about how to raise and lower the
mattress, and the list of which television channels were
available. I said an entire rosary, and stil Shay didnt stir.
At the edge of the bed. Shays medical chart hung on a
metal clip. I skimmed through the language that I didnt
understandthe injury, the medications, his vital statistics.
Then I glanced at the patient name at the top of the page:
I. M. Bourne
Isaiah Matthew Bourne. We had been told this at his trial,
but I had forgotten that Shay was not his Christian name. “I.
M. Bourne,” I said aloud. “Sounds like a guy Trump would
hire.”
I am bom.
Was this a hint, another puzzle piece of evidence?
There were two ways of looking at any situation. What one
person sees as a prisoners babble, another might
recognize as words from a long-lost gospel. What one
person sees as a medical y viable stroke of luck, another
might see as a resurrection. I thought of Lucius being
healed, of the water into wine, of the fol owers who had so
easily believed in Shay. I thought of a thirty-three-yearold
man, a carpenter, facing execution. I thought of Rabbi
Blooms ideathat every generation had a person in it
capable of being the Messiah.
There is a point when you stand at the edge of the cliff of
hard evidence, look across to what lies on the other side,
and step forward.
Otherwise, you wind up going nowhere. I stared at Shay,
and maybe for the first time, I didnt see who he was. I saw
who he might be.
As if he could feel my gaze, he began to toss and turn. Only
one of his eyes could slit open; the other was swol en shut.
“Father,” he rasped in a voice stil cushioned with
medication. “Where am I?”
“You were hurt. Youre going to be al right. Shay.”
In the comer of the room, the officer was staring at us. “Do
you think we could have a minute alone? Id like to pray in
private with him.”
The officer hesitatedas wel he should have: what
clergyman isnt accustomed to praying in front of others?
Then he shrugged. “Guess a priest wouldnt do anything
funny,” he said. “Your boss is tougher than mine.”
People anthropomorphized God al the timeas a boss,
as a lifesaver, as a justice, as a father. No one ever
pictured him as a convicted murderer. But if you put aside
the physical trappings of the body something that al the
apostles had had to do after Jesus was resurrectedthen
maybe anything was possible.
As the officer backed out of the room. Shay winced. “My
face …”
He tried to lift up his hand to touch the bandages, but found
that he was handcuffed to the bed. Struggling, he began to
pul harder.
“Shay,” I said firmly, “dont.”
“It hurts. I want drugs …”
“Youre already on drugs,” I told him. “We only have a few
minutes til the officer comes back in, so we have to talk
while we can.”
“I dont want to talk.”
Ignoring him, I leaned closer. “Tel me,” I whispered. “Tel
me who you are.”
A wary hope lit Shays eyes; hed probably never expected
to be recognized as the Lord. He went very stil , never
taking his eyes off mine. “Tel me who you are.”
In the Catholic Church, there were lies of commission and
lies of omission. The first referred to tel ing an outright
falsehood, the second to withholding the truth. Both were
sins.
I had lied to Shay since before the moment we met. Hed
counted on me to help him donate his heart, but hed never
realized how black mine was. How could I expect Him to
reveal Himself when I hadnt done the same?
“Youre right,” I said quietly. “Theres something I havent
told you … about who I used to be, before I was a priest.”
“Let me guess … an altar boy.”
“I was a col ege student, majoring in math. I didnt even go
to church until after I served on the jury.”
“What jury?”
I hesitated. “The one that sentenced you to death. Shay.”
He stared at me for a long minute, and then he turned away.
“Get out.”
“Shay-“
“Get the fuck away from mel” He flailed against his
handcuffs, yanking at the bonds so that his skin rubbed raw.
The sound he made was wordless, primordial, the noise
that had surely fil ed the world before there was order and
light.
A nurse came running in, along with the two officers who
were standing outside. “What happened?” the nurse cried,
as Shay continued to thrash, his head whipping from side
to side on the pil ow. The gauze in his nose bloomed with
fresh blood.
The nurse pushed a cal button on the panel behind Shays
head, and suddenly the room was fil ed with people. A
doctor yel ed at the officers to unlock his damn hands, but
as soon as they did. Shay began swatting at everything he
could reach. An aide plunged a hypodermic into his arm.
“Get him out of here,” someone said, and an orderly pul ed
me out of the room; the last thing I saw was Shay going
boneless, sliding away from the people who were
desperately trying to save him.
June
Claire was standing in front of a ful -length mirror, naked.
Her chest was crisscrossed with black ribbon, like the
lacing on a footbal .
As I watched, she untied the bow, unraveled the ribbons,
and peeled back both halves of her chest. She unhooked a
tiny brass hinge on her rib cage and it sprang open.
Inside, the heart was beating sure and strong, a clear sign
that it wasnt hers. Claire lifted a serving spoon and began
to carve at the organ, trying to sever it from the veins and
arteries. Her cheeks went pale; her eyes were the color of
agonybut she managed to pul it free: a bloody,
misshapen mass that she placed in my outstretched hand.
“Take it back,” she said.
I woke up from the nightmare, sweat-soaked, pulse racing.
After speaking with Dr. Wu about organ compatibility, Id
realized he was rightwhat was at issue here was not
where this heart came from, but whether it came at al .
But I stil hadnt told Claire a donor heart had become
available.
We had yet to go through the legal proceedings, anyway
and although I told myself I didnt want to get her hopes up
until the judge ruled, another part of me realized that I just
didnt want to have to tel her the truth.
After al , it was her chest that would be hosting this mans
heart.
Even a long shower couldnt get the nightmare of Claire out
of my mind, and I realized that we had to have the
conversation I had been so studiously avoiding. I dressed
and hurried down254
stairs to find her eating a bowl of cereal on the couch and
watching television. “The dog needs to go out,” she said
absently.
“Claire,” I said, “I have to talk to you.”
“Let me just see the end of this show.”
I glanced at the screenit was Ful House, and Claire had
watched this episode so often that even I could have told
you Jesse came home from Japan realizing being a rock
star was not what it was cracked up to be.
“Youve seen it before,” I said, turning off the television.
Her eyes flashed, and she used the remote to turn the show
back on.
Maybe it was a lack of sleep; maybe it was just the weight
of the imminent future on my shouldersfor whatever
reason, I snapped.
I whirled around and yanked the cable feed out of the wal .
“What is wrong with you?” Claire cried. “Why are you being
such a bitch!”
Both of us fel silent, stunned by Claires language. Shed
never cal ed me that before; shed never real y even argued
with me. Take it back, I thought, and I remembered that
image of Claire, holding out her heart.
“Claire,” I said, backpedaling. “Im sorry. I didnt mean to”
I broke off as Claires eyes rol ed back in her head.
Id seen this beforetoo often. The AICD in her chest was
firing: when Claires heart skipped a beat, or several, it
automatical y defibril ated her. I caught her as she
col apsed, settling her on the couch, waiting for her heart to
restart, for Claire to come to.
Except this time, she didnt.
On the ambulance ride to the hospital, I counted al the
reasons I hated myself: For picking a fight with Claire. For
accepting Shay Bournes offer to donate his heart, without
asking her first. For turning off Ful House before the happy
ending.
Just stay with me, I begged silently, and you can watch TV
twentyfour hours a day. I wil watch it with you. Dont give up,
weve come so close.
Although the EMTs had gotten Claires heart beating again
by the time we reached the hospital, Dr. Wu had admitted
her, with the unspoken agreement that this was her new
home until a new heart arrivedor hers gave out. I watched
him check Claire, who was fast asleep in the oceanic blue
light of the darkened room.
“June,” he said, “lets talk outside.”
He closed the door behind us. “Theres no good news
here.”
I nodded, biting my lip.
“Obviously, the AICD isnt functioning correctly. But in
addition, the tests weve done show her urine output
decreasing and her creatinine levels rising. Were talking
about renal failure, June.
Its not just her heart thats giving outher whole body is
shutting down.”
I looked away, but I couldnt stop a tear from rol ing down
my cheek.
“I dont know how long its going to take to get a court to
agree to that heart donation,” the doctor said, “but Claire
cant wait around for the docket to clear.”
“Il cal the lawyer,” I said softly. “Is there anything else I can do?”
Dr. Wu touched my arm. “You should think about saying
good-bye.”
I held myself together long enough for Dr. Wu to disappear
into an elevator. Then, I rushed down the hal way and blindly
plunged into a doorway that stood ajar. I fel to my knees
and let the grief bleed out of meone great, low keening
note.
Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder. I blinked through my
tears to find the priest who was Shay Bournes al y staring
at me.
“June? Is everything al right?”
“No,” I said. “No, everything is most definitely not al right.”
I could see then what I hadnt noticed when I first came into
the roomthe gold cross on the long dais in the front of the
room, one flag with the star of David, another with a Muslim
crescent moon: this was the hospital chapel, a place to ask
for what you wanted the most.
Was it wrong to wish for someones death so that Claire
could have his heart sooner?
“Is it your daughter?” the priest asked.
I nodded, but I couldnt look him in the eye.
“Would it be al rightI mean, would you mind if I prayed for
her?”
Although I did not want his assistancehad not asked for
his assistancethis one time, I was wil ing to put aside
how I felt about God, because Claire could use al the help
she could get.
Almost imperceptibly, I nodded.
Beside me, Father Michaels voice began to move over the
hil s and val eys of the simplest of prayers: “Our Father, who
art in heaven, hal owed be thy name. Thy kingdom come,
thy wil be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
Before I realized what I was doing, my own mouth had
started to form the words, a muscle memory. And to my
surprise, instead of it feeling false or forced, it made me
relieved, as if I had just passed the baton to someone else.
“Give us this day our daily bread and lead us not into
temptation.
Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive others ivho
trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but
deliver us from evil.”
It felt like putting on flannel pajamas on a snowy night; like
turning on your blinker for the exit that you know wil take
you home.
I looked at Father Michael, and together we said “Amen.”
M I C H A EL
Ian Fletcher, former tele-atheist and current academic, lived
in New Canaan, New Hampshire, in a farmhouse on a dirt
road where the mailboxes were not numbered. I drove up
and down the street four times before turning down one
driveway and knocking on the door. When I did, no one
answered, although I could hear strains of Mozart through
the open windows.
I had left June in the hospital, stil shaken by my encounter
with Shay. Talk about irony: just when I al owed myself to
think that I might be in Gods company, after al He flatly
rejected me. The whole world felt off-kilter; it is an odd thing
to start questioning the framework thats ordered your life,
your career, your expectationsand so I had placed a
phone cal to someone whod been through it before.
I knocked again, and this time the door swung open
beneath my fist. “Hel o? Anyone home?”
“In here,” a woman cal ed out.
I stepped into the foyer, taking note of the colonial furniture,
the photo on the wal that showed a young girl shaking
hands with Bil Clinton and another of the girl smiling beside
the Dalai Lama. I fol owed the music to a room off the
kitchen, where the most intricate dol house Id ever seen
was sitting on a table, surrounded by bits of wood and
chisels and glue gun sticks. The house was made of bricks
no bigger than my thumbnail, the windows had miniature
shutters that could be louvered to let in light; there was a
porch with Corinthian columns.
“Amazing,” I murmured, and a woman stood up from behind
the dol house, where shed been hidden.
“Oh,” she said. “Thanks.” Seeing me, she did a double
take, and I realized her eyes were focused on my clerical
col ar.
“Bad parochial school flashback?”
“No … its just been a while since Ive had a priest in here.”
She stood up, wiping her hands on a white butchers apron.
Im Mariah Fletcher,” she said.
“Michael Wright.”
“Father Michael Wright.”
I grinned. “Busted.” Then I gestured to her handiwork. “Did
you make this?”
“Wel . Yeah.”
“Ive never seen anything like it.”
“Good,” Mariah said. “Thats what the clients counting on.”
I bent down, scrutinizing a tiny door knocker with the head
of a lion. “Youre quite an artist.”
“Not real y. Im just better at detail than I am at the big
picture.” She turned off the CD player that was tril ing The
Magic Flute. “Ian said I was supposed to keep an eye out
for you. And Oh, shoot.” Her eyes flew to the corner of the
room, where a stack of blocks had been abandoned.
“You didnt come across two hel ions on your way in?”
“No…”
“Thats not a good sign.” Pushing past me, she ran into the
kitchen and threw open a pantry door. TwinsI figured
them to be about four years oldwere smearing the white
linoleum with peanut butter and jel y-
“Oh, God,” Mariah sighed as their faces turned up to hers
“Oh, God,” Mariah sighed as their faces turned up to hers
like sunflowers.
“You told us we could finger-paint,” one of the boys said.
“Not on the floor; and not with food!” She glanced at me. “Id
escort you, but”
“You have to take care of a sticky situation?”
She smiled. “lans in the barn; you can just head down
there.” She lifted each boy and pointed him toward the sink.
“And you two,” she said, “are going to clean up, and then go
torture Daddy.”
I left her washing the twins hands and walked down the
path toward the barn. Having children was not in the cards
for meI knew that. A priests love for God was so al -
encompassing that it should erase the human craving for a
familymy parents, brothers, sisters, and children were al
Jesus. If the Gospel of Thomas was right, however, and we
were more like God than unlike Him, then having children
should have been mandatory for everyone. After al , God
had a son and had given Him up. Any parent whose child
had gone to col ege or gotten married or moved away
would understand this part of God more than me.
As I approached the barn, I heard the most unholy sounds
like cats being dismembered, calves being slaughtered.
Panickedwas Fletcher hurt?I threw open the door to
find him watching a teenage girl play the violin.
Real y badly.
She took the violin from her chin and settled it into the slight
curve of her hip. “I dont understand why I have to practice in
the barn.”
Fletcher removed a pair of foam earplugs. “What was
that?”
She rol ed her eyes. “Did you even hear my piece at air?”
Fletcher paused. “You know I love you, right?” The girl
nodded.
“Wel , lets just say if God was hanging around here today,
that last bit probably sent Her running for the hil s.”
Tryouts for band are tomorrow,” she said. “What am I going
to do!”
“Switch to the flute?” Fletcher suggested, but he put his arm
around the girl and hugged her as he spoke. As he turned,
he noticed me. “Ah.
You must be Michael Wright.” He shook my hand and
introduced the girl. “This is my daughter. Faith.”
Faith shook my hand, too. “Did you hear me play? Am I as
bad as he says I am?”
I hesitated, and Fletcher came to my rescue. “Honey, dont
put the priest in a position where hes going to have to lie
hel waste his whole afternoon at confession.” He grinned
at Faith. “I think its your turn to watch the demon twins from
hel .”
“No, I remember very clearly that its your turn. I was doing it
al morning while Mom worked.”
“Ten bucks,” Ian said.
“Twenty,” Faith countered.
“Done.” She put her violin back in its case. “Nice to meet
you,” she said to me, and she slipped out of the barn,
heading toward the house.
“You have a beautiful family,” I said to Fletcher.
He laughed. “Appearances can be deceiving. Spending an
afternoon with Cain and Abel is a whole new form of birth
control.”
“Their names are”
“Not real y,” Fletcher said, smiling. “But thats what I cal
them when Mariahs not listening. Come on back to my
office.”
He walked me past a generator and a snowblower, two
abandoned horse stal s, and through a pine door. Inside, to
my surprise, was a finished room with paneled wal s and
two stories of bookshelves. “I have to admit,” Fletcher said,
“I dont get very many cal s from the Catholic clergy. They
arent quite the prevalent audience for my book.”
I sat down on a leather wing chair. “I can imagine.”
“So whats a nice priest like you doing in the office of a
rabblerouser like me? Can I expect a blistering
commentary in the Catholic Advocate with your byline on
it?”
“No … this is more of a fact-finding mission.” I thought
about how much I should admit to Ian Fletcher. The
confidentiality relationship between a parishioner and a
priest was as inviolable as the one between a patient and
his doctor, but was tel ing Fletcher what Shay had said
breaking a trust if the same words were already in a gospel
that had been written two thousand years ago? “You used
to be an atheist,” I said, changing the subject.
“Yeah.” Fletcher smiled. “I was pretty gifted at it, too, if I do
say so myself.”
“What happened?”
“I met someone who made me question everything I was so
sure I knew about God.”
“That,” I said, “is why Im in the office of a rabblerouser like
you.”
“And what better place to learn more about the Gnostic
gospels,”
Fletcher said.
“Exactly.”
“Wel , then, the first thing is that you shouldnt cal them that.
It would be like cal ing someone a spic or a Hebethe
label Gnostic was made up by the same people who
rejected them. In my circles, we cal them noncanonical
gospels. Gnostic literal y means one who knowsbut the
people who coined the term considered its fol owers know-
it-al s.”
“Thats what we pretty much learn in seminary.”
Fletcher looked at me. “Let me ask you a question. Father
in your opinion, whats the purpose of religion?”
I laughed. “Wow, thank goodness you picked an easy one.”
Im serious …”
I considered this. “I think religion brings people together
over a common set of beliefs … and makes them
understand why they matter.”
Fletcher nodded, as if this was the answer hed been
expecting. “I think its there to answer the real y hard
questions that arise when the world doesnt work the way
its supposed tolike when your child dies of leukemia, or
youre fired after twenty years of hard work. When bad
things happen to good people, and good things happen to
bad people.
The real y interesting thing, to me, is that somehow religion
stopped being about trying to find honest solutions … and
started being about ritual. Instead of everyone searching for
understanding on their own, orthodox religion came along
and said, Do x, y, and zand the world wil be a better
place.”
“Wel , Catholicisms been around for thousands of years,” I
replied, “so it must be doing something right.”
“You have to admit, its done a lot wrong, too,” Fletcher
said.
Anyone whod had limited religious instruction or a
thorough col ege education knew about the Catholic Church
and its role in politics and historynot to mention the
heresies that had been squelched over the centuries. Even
sixth graders studied the Inquisition. “Its a corporation,”
I said. “And sure, there have been times when its been
staffed badly, with people who think ambition trumps faith.
But that doesnt mean you throw the baby out with the
bathwater. No matter how screwed up Gods servants are
in the Church, His message has managed to get through.”
Fletcher tilted his head. “What do you know about the birth
of Christianity?”
“Did you want me to start with the Holy Ghost visiting Mary,
or skip ahead to the star in the East…”
“Thats the birth of Jesus,” Fletcher said. “Two very different
things.
Historical y, after Jesuss death, his fol owers werent
exactly welcomed with open arms. By the second century
A.D., they were literal y dying for their beliefs. But even
though they belonged to groups that cal ed themselves
Christians, the groups werent unified, because they were
an very different from one another. One of these groups
was the socal ed Gnostics. To them, being Christian was a
good first step, but to truly reach enlightenment, you had to
receive secret knowledge, or gnosis. You started with faith,
but you developed insightand for these people. Gnostics
offered a second baptism. Ptolemy cal ed it apolutrosis
the same word used when slaves were legal y freed.”
“So how did people get this secret knowledge?”
“Theres the rub,” Fletcher said. “Unlike the church, you
couldnt be taught it. It had nothing to do with being told
what to believe, and everything to do with figuring it out on
your own. You had to reach inside yourself, understand
human nature and its destiny, and at that moment youd
know the secretthat theres divinity in you, if youre wil ing
to look for it. And the path would be different for everyone.”
“That sounds more Buddhist than Christian.”
“They cal ed themselves Christians,” Fletcher corrected.
“But Irenaeus, who was the bishop of Lyons at the time,
disagreed. He saw three huge differences between
Orthodox Christianity and Gnosticism.
In Gnostic texts, the focus wasnt on sin and repentance, but
instead on il usion and enlightenment. Unlike in the
Orthodox Church, you couldnt be a member simply by
joiningyou had to show evidence of spiritual maturity to
be accepted. Andthis was probably the biggest
stumbling block for the bishopGnostics didnt think
Jesuss resurrection was literal.
To them, Jesus was never real y humanhe just appeared
in human form. But that was just a technicality to the
Gnostics, because unlike Orthodox Christians, they didnt
see a gap between the human and the divine. To them,
Jesus wasnt a one-of-a-kind saviorhe was a guide,
helping you find your individual spiritual potential. And when
you reached it, you werent redeemed by Christyou
became a Christ.
Or in other words: you were equal to Jesus. Equal to God.”
It was easy to see why, in seminary, this had been taught as
heresy: the basis of Christianity was that there was only one
God, and He was so different from man that the only way to
reach Him was through Jesus. “The biggest heresies are
the ones that scare the Church to death.”
“Especial y when the Church is going through its own
identity crisis,” Fletcher said. “Im sure you remember how
Irenaeus decided to unify the Orthodox Christian Church
by figuring out who was a true believer, and who was
faking. Who was speaking the word of God, and who was
speaking … wel … just words?”
On a pad in front of him, Fletcher wrote GOD = WORD =
JESUS, then spun it around so I could see. “Irenaeus came
up with this little gem. He said that we cant be divine,
because Jesuss life and death were so different from that
of any manwhich became the very begin264
ning of Orthodox Christianity. What didnt fit this equation
became hereticalif you werent worshipping the right way,
you were out. It was sort of the first reality show, if you want
to think of it that way: who had the purest form of
Christianity? He condemned the folks who got creative with
faith, like Marcus and his fol owers, who spoke in
prophecies and had visions of a feminine divinity clothed in
the letters of the Greek alphabet. He condemned the
groups that swore by only one gospellike the Ebionites,
who were attached to Matthew; or the Marcionites, who
studied only Luke. Just as bad were the groups like the
Gnostics, who had too many texts. Instead, Irenaeus
decided that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John should be the
four cornerstone gospels of what to believe”
“because they al had a narrative of Christs Passion in
them…
which the Church needed, in order for the Eucharist to
mean something.”
“Exactly,” Fletcher said. “Then Irenaeus appealed to al
those people who were trying to decide which Christian
group was right for them.
Basical y, he said: We know how hard it is to figure out
whats true, and whats not. So were going to make it easy
for you, and tel you what to believe. People who did that
were true Christians. People who didnt were not. And the
things Irenaeus told people to believe became the
foundation for the Nicene Creed, years later.”
Every priest knew that what we were taught in seminary had
a Catholic spin put on ityet there was an incontrovertible
truth behind it. I had always believed that the Catholic
Church was evidence of religious survival of the fittest: the
truest, most powerful ideas were the ones that had
prevailed over time. But Fletcher was saying that the most
powerful ideas had been subjugated… because they
jeopardized the existence of the Orthodox Church. That the
reason theyd had to be crushed was becauseat one
pointtheyd been as or more popular than Orthodox
Christianity.
Or in other words, the reason the Church had survived and
flour ished was not because its ideas were the most valid,
but because it had been the worlds first bul y.
“Then the books of the New Testament were just an
editorial decision someone once had to make,” I said.
Fletcher nodded. “But what were those decisions based
on? The gospels arent the word of God. Theyre not even
the apostles firsthand accounts of the word of God. Theyre
simply the stories that best supported the creed that the
Orthodox Church wanted people to fol ow.”
“But if Irenaeus hadnt done that,” I argued, “chances are
there would be no Christianity. Irenaeus united a whole
mass of fragmented fol owers and their beliefs. When
youre in Rome in A.D. 150 and youre being arrested
because you confess Christ as your savior, you want to
make sure that the people beside you arent going to turn
around at the last minute and say they believe something
different. In fact, its stil important today to figure out whos
a believer and whos just a nutcaseread any paper and
youl see how anger, prejudice, or ego are al routinely
passed off as the Word of God, usual y with a bomb
strapped to it.”
“Orthodoxy takes the risk away,” Fletcher agreed. “We tel
you whats real and whats not, so you dont have to worry
about getting it wrong. The problem is that the minute you
do it, you start separating people into groups. Some get
favored, some dont. Some gospels get picked, others get
hidden away underground for thousands of years.”
He looked at me. “Somewhere along the line, organized
religion stopped being about faith, and started being about
who had the power to keep that faith.” Fletcher ripped off
the sheet of paper with Irenaeuss equation, leaving a clear,
blank slate beneath. He crumpled the paper, tossed it into
his trash can. “You said that the purpose of religion was to
bring people together. But does it, real y? Or does it
knowingly, purposeful y, and intentional ybreak them
apart?”
I took a deep breath. And then I told him everything I knew
about Shay Bourne.
Lucius
None of us were getting any sleep, but it wasnt for lack of
trying.
Crowds have their own pH, and the remarkable thing is that
they can change in an instant. The people who had been
camping out outside the prisonwho were featured in a
countdown every night on the local news (MR. MESSIAH:
DAY 23)-had somehow gotten word that Shay had been
hospitalized for an injury. But now, in addition to the camp
that was holding a prayer vigil for Shay, there was a very
vocal group of people who felt that this was a sign, that the
reason Shay had been hurt so badly was because God
decided he had it coming to him.
They got louder, for some reason, after dark. Insults were
hurled, fights were picked, punches were thrown. Someone
sent the National Guard down to patrol the perimeter of the
prison and keep the peace, but no one could shut them up.
Shays supporters would sing gospel to drown out the
chants of the disbelievers (“Jesus lives! Bourne dies!”).
Even with headphones on, I could stil hear them, a
headache that wouldnt go away.
Watching the eleven oclock news that night was surreal. To
see the prison and hear the resonant shouts of the mob
outside echoing the broadcast on my television-wel , it was
like deja vu, except it was happening now.
Theres only one God, people shouted.
They carried signs: JESUS IS MY HOMEBOY-NOT
SATAN.
LET HIM DIE FOR HIS SINS.
NO CROWN OF THORNS FOR SHAY BOURNE.
They were separated from the Shay loyalists by armed
guards toting guns, who walked the fault line of public
opinion between them.
“As you can see,” the reporter said, “sentiment in support of
Shay Bourne and his unprecedented case to donate his
heart is waning in the wake of his hospitalization. A recent
pol done by WNRK news shows only thirty-four percent of
New Hampshire residents stil convinced that the courts
should al ow Bourne to be an organ donor; and even less
than thatsixteen percentagree that his miracles are
divinely inspired. Which means that an overwhelming
eighty-four percent of the state agrees with Reverend
Arbogath Justus, whos joining us again this evening.
Reverend, you and the members of your church have been
here for nearly a week now and have been instrumental in
turning the tide of public opinion. Whats your take on the
Bourne hospitalization?”
The Reverend Justus was stil wearing that green suit.
“Ninety-nine percent of the state thinks you should burn that
outfit,” I said out loud.
“Janice,” the reverend replied, “we at the Drive-ln Church of
Christ in God have of course been praying for Shay
Bournes speedy and ful recovery in the wake of the prison
attack. However, when we pray, we pray to the one and only
Lord: Jesus Christ.”
“Is there any message you have for those who stil dont
agree with you?”
“Why, yes.” He leaned closer to the camera. “I told you so.”
The reporter took back the microphone. “Weve been told
that Bourne wil be released from the hospital in the next
few hours, but doctors havent commented on his condition
… ” Suddenly, a roar went up from both sides of the crowd,
and the reporter covered her earpiece with one hand. “This
is unconfirmed,” she said over the din, “but apparently an
ambulance has just driven into the rear entrance of the
prison …”
On the screen, the camera swung past her to catch a man
decking a woman in a purple caftan. The armed guards
stepped in, but by then other fights had broken out between
the camps. The line separating the two bled, until the
the camps. The line separating the two bled, until the
guards had to cal in reinforcements. The cameras
captured a teenager being trampled, a man being
smacked in the head by the butt of a guards rifle and
col apsing.
“Lights-out,” a CO said over the loudspeaker. Lights-out
never real y meant lights-outthere was always some
residual bulb shining somewhere in the prison. But I pul ed
off my headphones, lay down on my bunkand listened to
the riot going on outside the brick wal s of the prison.
This is what it always comes down to, I realized. There are
the ones who believe, and the ones who dont, and caught
in the space between them are guns.
Apparently, I wasnt the only one being disturbed. Batman
the Robin began to squawk, in spite of Cal oways efforts to
hush him.
“Shut that freaking bird up already!” Texas yel ed.
“You shut up,” Cal oway said. “Fucking Bourne. Wish hed
never come onto this fucking tier.”
As if hed been summoned, the door to I-tier opened, and in
the halflight, Shay moved toward his cel , escorted by a
flock of six officers. He had a bandage on his face, and two
black eyes. Part of his scalp had been shaved. He did not
look at any of us as he passed. “Hey,” I murmured as he
walked by my cel , but Shay didnt respond. He moved like
a zombie, like someone in a sci-fi film whose frontal lobe
has been removed by the mad scientist.
Five of the officers left. The sixth stood outside Shays cel
door, his own personal security guard. The presence of the
CO prevented me from talking to Shay. In fact, the
presence of the CO prevented any of us from talking,
period.
I guess we were al so focused on his return that it took us
several moments to realize that the quiet wasnt just a lack
of conversation. Batman the Robin had fal en asleep in
Cal oways breast pocket. And outside, that dinthat god-
awful dinhad gone spectacularly, blissful y silent.
Maggie
America was founded on religious freedom, on the
separation of church and state, and yet I wil be the first to
tel you that were not much better off than those Puritans
were in the 1770s over in England. Religion and politics get
into bed with each other al the time: the first thing we do in
a courtroom is swear on a Bible; public school classes
begin with the Pledge of Al egiance, which declares us one
nation under God; even our currency is stamped with the
words In God We Trust. Youd think that of al people, a
lawyer like me from the ACLU would be violently opposed
to this on principle, but no. I had spent thirty minutes in the
shower and another twenty driving downtown to the federal
courthouse trying to figure out the best way to drag religion
smack into the middle of a courtroom.
I was just determined to do it without offending the personal
beliefs of the judge.
In the parking lot, I cal ed the ChutZpah and reached my
mother on the first try.
“What kind of name is Haig?”
“You mean like the general?”
“Yeah.”
“Sounds German, maybe,” she mused. “I dont know. Why?”
“I was talking religious affiliation.”
“Is that what you think I do?” my mother said. “Judge people
on their last names?”
“Does everything have to be an accusation? I just need to
know before I go into chambers, so that I can tailor what I
say to the justice sitting on the case.”
“I thought the whole point of being a judge was being
impartial.”
“Right. Just like the whole point of being crowned Miss
America is to promote world peace.”
“I cant remember if Alexander Haig is Jewish. I know your
father liked him because he supported Israel …”
“Wel , even if he is, that doesnt mean that my judge is. Haig
isnt quite as easy to figure out as someone named
OMal ey or Hershkowitz.”
“Your father once dated a Jewish girl named Barbara
OMal ey, for your information,” my mother said.
“Hopeful y before he married you …”
“Very funny. Im just saying that your theory isnt airtight.”
“Wel , you dont meet many Jewish OMal eys.”
My mother hesitated. “I think her grandparents had their
surname legal y changed from Meyer.”
I rol ed my eyes. “Ive got to go. No matter what his religion
is, no judge likes a lawyer whos late.”
I had received a cal from my secretary when I was meeting
with Warden Coyne about Shays protection in the prison
Judge Haig wanted to see counsel in federal court the very
next morning, a mere four days after Id filed my complaint
there. I should have realized things were going to move
blisteringly fast. Shay already had an execution date
scheduled, so the court had put us on an expedited trial
calendar.
As I turned the corner, I saw the AAG from the appel ate
division, Gordon Greenleaf, already waiting. I nodded at
him, and then felt my cel phone vibrating in my purse with a
text message.
GOOGLED HAIG-ROM CATI1. XO MOM
I snapped the phone shut as the clerk arrived to lead us into
Judge Haigs chambers.
The judge had thinning gray hair and a distance-runners
body. I peered at the col ar of his shirt, but he was wearing
a tie: for al I knew, he might be wearing a crucifix, a star of
David, or even a rope of garlic to ward off vampires. “Al
right, boys and girls,” he said, “who can tel us why were
here today?”
“Your Honor,” I answered, “Im suing the commissioner of
corrections of the State of New Hampshire on behalf of my
client, Shay Bourne.”
“Yes, thank you, Ms. Bloom, I already breathlessly read your
complaint from cover to cover. What I meant was that Mr.
Bournes impending execution is already a zoo. Why is the
ACLU turning it into a bigger one?”
Gordon Greenleaf cleared his throat. He had always
reminded me of Bozo the Clown, with his tufted red hair
and al ergies that left his nose red more often than not.
“Hes a death row inmate trying to delay the inevitable, Your
Honor.”
“Hes not trying to delay anything,” I argued. “Hes just trying
to make amends for his sins, and he believes this is the
way he needs to die in order to reach salvation. Hed be the
first to tel you you can execute him tomorrow, as long as
its by hanging.”
“This is 2008, Ms. Bloom. We execute people by lethal
injection.
Were not going back to a more archaic form of execution,”
Judge Haig said.
I nodded. “But, Judge, with al due respect, if the
Department of Corrections finds lethal injection impractical,
the sentence may be carried out by hanging.”
“The Department of Corrections doesnt have a problem
with lethal injection!” Greenleaf said.
“It does when Mr. Bournes First Amendment rights are
being violated.
He has the right to practice his religious beliefs, even in a
prison settingup to and including during the moment of
his execution.”
“What are you talking about?” Greenleaf exploded. “No
religion insists on organ donation. Just because one
individual gets some crazy set of rules into his head to live
or dieby, that doesnt qualify it as a religious belief.”
“Gee, Gordon,” I said. “Who died and left you God?”
“Counselors, back to your corners,” Judge Haig said. He
pursed his lips, deep in thought. “There are some factual
issues here that need to be fleshed out,” he began, “but the
first of these is, Mr. Greenleaf, whether the state wil agree
to hang Mr. Bourne in lieu of giving him a lethal injection.”
“Absolutely not, Judge. Preparations are already in place
for the method of execution that was specified at his
sentencing.”
Judge Haig nodded. “Then wel set this down for trial.
Given the very real deadline were working under, it wil be
an expedited hearing.
Were going to pretend that theres no such thing as federal
discovery; were going to pretend that theres no such thing
as summary judgment motionswe dont have time for
them. Instead, I want witness lists on my desk in a week,
and I want you prepared to go straight to trial in two weeks.”
Gordon and I gathered our belongings and stepped outside
chambers.
“Do you have any idea how much money the taxpayers of
New Hampshire have spent on that death chamber?”
“Take it up with the governor, Gordon,” I said. “If the rich
towns in New Hampshire have to pay for public education,
maybe the poor towns can cough up the funds for future
death row inmates.”
He folded his arms. “Whats the ACLUs game here,
Maggie? You cant get the death penalty declared
unconstitutional, so you use religion as a fal back position?”
I smiled at him. “You do if it helps you get the death penalty
declared unconstitutional. See you in two weeks, Gordon,” I
said, and I walked off, leaving him staring after me.
Three times, I picked up the phone and dialed. Three times,
I hung up just as the line connected.
I couldnt do this.
But I had to. I had two weeks to get the facts; and if I was
going to fight on Shays behalf to donate his heart, I needed
to understand exactly how this was going to workand be
able to explain that in court.
When the hospital switchboard connected, I asked to
speak to Dr.
Gal aghers office. I left my name and number with a
secretary, ful y anticipating the fact that it would take some
time before he returned my cal , during which I might
actual y develop the courage to speak to him. So when the
phone rang almost as soon as I put down the receiver, I
was shocked to hear his voice. “Ms. Bloom,” he said. “What
can I do for you?”
“You werent supposed to cal back this fast,” I blurted out.
“Ah, Im sorry. I real y should be less punctual with my
patients.”
“Im not your patient.”
“Right. You were only masquerading as one.” He was silent,
and then said, “I believe you cal ed me?”
“Yes. Yes, I did. I was wondering if you might be wil ing to
meet with meprofessional y, of course”
“Of course.”
“to talk about hanging and organ donation.”
“If only I had a dime for every time Ive been asked to do
that,” Dr.
Gal agher said. “Id be delighted to meet with you.
Professional y, of course.”
“Of course,” I said, deflated. “The catch is, I have to meet
you fairly soon. My clients trial starts in two weeks.”
“Wel , then, Ms. Bloom, Il pick you up at seven.”
“Ohyou dont have to do that. I can meet you at the
hospital.”
“Yes, but I real y prefer to not eat the cafeteria Jel -O on my
days off.”
“Its your day off?” He cal ed me back on his day off? “Wel ,
we can do it some other time …”
“Didnt you just tel me this was something that needed to
be done quickly?”
“Wel ,” I said. “Yeah.”
“Then seven oclock it is.”
“Excel ent,” I said in my finest courtroom voice. “I look
forward to it.”
“Ms. Bloom.”
“Yes?”
I held my breath, waiting for him to lay down the parameters
of this meeting. Do not expect this to be any more than it is
on the surface: two professionals doing business. Do not
forget that you could have asked any number of doctors,
even ones who dont have eyes the color of a moonless
night and an accent that tugs like a fishing hook. Do not
delude yourself into pretending this is a real date.
“I dont know where you live.”
Whoever said that black makes you look thinner obviously
did not have the same clothes that were hanging in my
closet. First I tried on my favorite black pants, which were
no longer my favorite because they only buttoned if I
stopped breathing and didnt intend to sit at al during the
meal. The black turtleneck that stil had tags on it made me
look like I had a double chin, and the black crochet shrug
that had looked so cute in the catalog showed every inch of
bra rol . Red, I thought. Il be bold and make a statement. I
tried on a crimson silk camisole, but the only statement I
seemed to be sending was Fredericks of Hol ywood. I
sifted through wraps and cardigans and shel s and blazers,
A-line skirts and pleated ones and cocktail dresses,
tossing them off one by one onto the floor as Oliver hopped
away in vain, trying not to get trapped underneath.
I tried on every single pair of trousers in my possession and
decided that my ass was wel on its way to being declared
one of Saturns moons. Then I marched myself to the
bathroom mirror. “Heres the thing,” I said to myself. “You
dont have to look like Jennifer Aniston to discuss the best
way to execute someone.”
Although, I imagined, it probably helped.
Final y I decided on my favorite pair of jeans, and a flowing
pale green tunic that Id found for five dol ars at an Asian
boutique, so I always felt good about wearing it, even when
I didnt look perfect. I twisted my hair up and stabbed it with
a hair stick, hoping it looked artful and Grecian instead of
just messy and out of time.
At exactly seven, the doorbel rang. I took one last look at
myself in the mirrorthe outfit clearly said casual, together,
not trying too hardand opened the door to find Dr.
Gal agher wearing a coat and tie.
“I can change,” I said quickly. “I didnt know we were going
somewhere nice. Not that I wouldnt expect you to take me
somewhere nice.
Or that youre taking me. I mean, Im taking myself. And
youre taking you. Were just going in the same car.”
“You look lovely,” he said. “This is how I dress al the time.”
“On your day off?”
“Wel , I am British,” he replied, an explanation; but he
hooked his finger in his col ar and slipped the tie from his
shirt. He draped it over the inside knob of the front door.
“When I was in col ege and someone did that it meant” I
broke off, remembering what it did mean: dont enter,
because your roommate is getting lucky. “It meant that, um,
you were busy studying for a test.”
“Real y?” Dr. Gal agher said. “How strange. At Oxford it
meant your roommate was inside having sex.”
“Maybe we should go,” I said quickly, hoping he didnt
notice that I was blushing fiercely, or that I lived alone with a
rabbit, or that my hips were so big that they probably
wouldnt fit into the seat of the little sports car hed parked
in my driveway.
He opened the car door for me and didnt turn the ignition
until my seat belt was fastened. As he sped off, he cleared
his throat. “Theres something Id like to get out of the way
before we go any further,” he said. “Im Christian.”
I stared at him. Was he some kind of fundamentalist who
limited his extracurricular conversations to people of the
same faith? Did he think that I harbored some secret desire
to elope, and was he giving me the lay Wel , whatever. Id
been eating, sleeping, breathing religion with Shays case; I
was even more sensitive now about religious tolerance
than Id been before I took up this mantle. And if religion
was so vital y important to Gal agher that he had to bring it
up as the first point of conversation, I could give as good as
I got. “Im an atheist,” I said, “but you might as wel know
right now that my fathers a rabbi, and if you have a problem
with that Im sure I can find another physician to talk to me,
and Id real y appreciate it if you didnt make a joke right
now about Jewish doctors.”
I exhaled.
“Wel ,” he said, and glanced at me. “Perhaps youd rather
cal me Chris?”
I was pretty sure Emily Post wouldnt have covered this
topic, but it seemed more discreet to wait until after we
were served our main course to start talking about how to
kil a man.
The restaurant was inside an old colonial home in Orford,
with floorboards that rol ed like the seas beneath my feet
and a bustling kitchen off to one side. The hostess had a
husky, mel ifluous voice and greeted the doctor by name.
Christian.
The room we were sitting in had only six tables, covered
with mismatched linen and dishes and glasses; candles
burned in recycled wine bottles. On the wal were mirrors in
every shape and sizemy own personal version of the
ninth circle of hel but I hardly even noticed them.
Instead, I drank water and wine and pretended that I did not
want to spoil my appetite by eating the freshly baked bread
theyd served us along with dipping oilor by talking about
Shays execution.
Christian smiled at me. “Ive always imagined one day Id
be forced to consider how one went about losing ones
heart, but I must admit, I didnt think it would be quite so
literal.”
The waiter arrived with our plates. The menu had been ful
of the most delectable cuisine: Vietnamese bouil abaisse,
escargot tortel ini, chorizo dumplings. Even the descriptions
of the entrees made me salivate: Handmade to order, fresh
Italian parsley pasta fil ed with fresh artichoke hearts,
roasted eggplant, a medley of cheeses, and sweet roasted
red and yel ow pepper, tossed with a sun-dried tomato
cream sauce. Slices of boneless chicken lined with thin
slices of prosciutto fil ed with fresh spinach, Asiago
cheese, and sweet onion rol ed and served with fresh
fettuccine and a tomato marsala wine reduction. Boneless
breast of duck roasted, thinly sliced, served with a sun-
dried cherry sauce and a wild rice pancake.
In the wild hope that I might fool Christian into thinking my
waist size was not what it seemed to be, Id swal owed hard
and ordered an appetizer.
Id fervently wished that Christian would order the braised
leg of lamb or the steak frites so that I could beg a taste, but
when I explained I wasnt al that hungry (a colossal lie), he
said an appetizer was al he real y wanted, too.
“From what I imagine,” Christian said, “the inmate would be
hanged in such a way that the spine would be fractured at
C2/C3, which would arrest al spontaneous respiration.”
I was trying very hard to fol ow along. “You mean hed break
his neck and stop breathing?”
“Right.”
“So then hes braindead?”
A couple at the next table glanced at me, and I realized Id
been talking too loudly. That some people didnt like to mix
death with dinner.
“Wel , not quite. It takes some time for anoxic changes to
the brain to result in a loss of reflexes … which is how you
test for brain-stem function.
The problem is that you cant leave your man hanging for a
great period of time, or his heart wil stop, and that
disqualifies him as a donor.”
“So what has to happen?”
“The state needs to agree that the fact that respirations
ceased is enough to justify taking the body down from the
noose on likely suspi cion of death, then intubate him so
that the heart is protected, and then test for brain death.”
“Intubating him isnt the same as resuscitating him, then?”
“No. Its the equivalent of someone braindead being on a
ventilator.
It preserves the organs, but there wont be any brain
function once that spinal cord is severed and hypoxia sets
in, no matter how much oxygen you pump into his system.”
I nodded. “So how do you determine brain death?”
“There are multiple ways. You can do a physical exam first
check to make sure there are no corneal reflexes, no
spontaneous respirations, no gag reflexand then repeat it
twelve hours later. But since time is of the essence, Id
recommend a transcranial Doppler test, which uses
ultrasound to measure blood flow through the carotid
arteries at the base of the brain. If theres no blood flow for
ten minutes, you can legal y declare brain death.”
I imagined Shay Bournewho could barely string together
a coherent sentence, who bit his fingernails to the quick
being led to a gal ows.
I pictured the noose being drawn tight around his neck and
felt the hair stand up on the back of my own.
“Its brutal,” I said softly, and put down my fork.
Christian was quiet for a moment. “I was a resident in
Philadelphia the first time I had to tel a mother her child had
died. He was the victim of a gang shootingeight years
old. Hed gone to the corner store to get a quart of milk, and
was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I wil never forget
the look in her eyes when I told her we werent able to save
her son. When a child is kil ed, two people die, I think. The
only difference is that his mother stil had to suffer a
heartbeat.” He looked up at me. “It wil be brutal for Mr.
Bourne. But it was brutal for June Nealon first.”
I sat back in my chair. This, then, was the catch. You meet a
wel educated, intensely gorgeous, charming Oxford-
educated man, and he turns out to be so right-wing hes
nearly pointed backward. “Then youre in favor of capital
punishment?” I asked, trying to keep my voice level.
“I think its easy to take the moral high road when its al
theory,”
Christian said. “As a physician, do I think its right to kil
someone? No.
But then again, I dont have children yet. And Id be lying if I
said that when I do, this issue wil stil seem crystal clear to
me.”
I didnt have children yet, either; at the rate I was going, I
might never have them. And the only time Id seen June
Nealon, face-to-face, wed been at the restorative justice
meeting and she had been so fil ed with righteous anger
that I found it hard to look at her. I didnt know what it felt like to carry a child underneath my heart for nine months, to feel
my body give way to make room for hers. I didnt know what
it felt like to hold an infant and rock her to sleep, to find a
lul aby in her breathing. But I knew what it was like to be the
daughter.
My mother and I hadnt always argued. I could stil
remember wishing that I was as glamorous as she was
trying on her highheeled shoes, pul ing her sheer satin slips
up to my armpits as if they were strapless dresses, diving
into the wondrous mystery of her makeup bag. She had, at
one point, been the person I wanted to grow up to be.
It was so damn hard to find love in this world, to locate
someone who could make you feel that there was a reason
youd been put on this earth. A child, I imagined, was the
purest form of that. A child was the love you didnt have to
look for, didnt have to prove anything to, didnt have to
worry about losing.
Which is why, when it happened, it hurt so badly.
Suddenly, I wanted to cal my mother. I wanted to cal June
Nealon. I was on my first date since the dinosaurs had
roamed the planet, a date that was real y just a business
dinner, and I felt like bursting into tears.
“Maggie?” Christian leaned forward. “Are you al right?”
And then he put his hand on top of mine.
Arrest al spontaneous respiration, he had said.
The waiter appeared at the side of the table. “I hope youve
left room for dessert.”
I had nothing but room; my appetizer had been a crab cake
the size of my thumbnail. But I could feel the warmth of
Christians skin on mine, and it was like heat at the tip of a
candleonly a matter of time before the rest of me melted,
too. “Oh, I couldnt,” I said. “Im stuffed.”
“Right,” Christian said, and he slipped his hand away from
mine. “I guess just the bil , then.”
Something had changed in his featuresand there was a
chil to his voice that hadnt been there a moment before.
“Whats the matter?” I asked. He shook his head,
dismissive, but I knew what it was: the death penalty “You
think Im on the wrong side.”
“I dont think there are sides,” Christian said, “but thats not
it.”
“Then what did I do wrong?”
The waiter sidled over with the bil , tucked into a leather
folder.
Christian reached for it. “My last steady girlfriend was a
principal dancer for the Boston Bal et.”
“Oh,” I said feebly. “She must have been …” Beautiful.
Graceful. Skinny.
Everything I wasnt.
“Every time we went out for a meal I felt like some sort of…
glutton… because I had an appetite, and she never ate a
damn thing. I suppose I thoughtwel , hopedthat youd
be different.”
“But I love chocolate,” I blurted out. “And apple fritters and
pumpkin pie and mousse and tiramisu and I probably would
have eaten everything on this menu if I didnt think it would
make me look like a pig. I was trying to be …” My voice
trailed off.
“… what you thought I was looking for?”
I focused my attention on the napkin on my lap. Leave it to
me to ruin a date that wasnt even real y one.
“What if al I was looking for,” Christian asked, “was you?”
I lifted my head slowly as Christian summoned back our
waiter. “Tel us about dessert,” he said.
“We have a creme brulee, a fresh blueberry tart, warm
peach puff pastries with homemade ice cream and
caramel sauce, and my personal favorite,” the waiter said.
“Chocolate French toast with a thin pecan crust, served with
mint ice cream, and our own raspberry sauce.”
“What shal we try?” Christian asked.
I turned to the waiter. “Maybe we could skip back to the
main course first,” I said, and smiled.
This is my simple religion.
There is no need for temples;
no need for complicated philosophy.
Our own brain, our own heart is our temple;
the philosophy is kindness.”
-HIS HOLINESS THE 14TH DALAI LAMA
June
As it turned out, in spite of the deathbed promises, I didnt
tel Claire about her potential new heart when she first
awakened after the episode that had brought us back to
this hospital. Instead, I made a hundred excuses: When she
wasnt running a temperature.
When she had a little more energy. When we knew for sure
that a judge was going to al ow the donation to happen. The
longer I put off the conversation, the more I was able to
convince myself that Claire would have another hour, day,
week with me in which to have it.
And in the meantime, Claire was failing. Not just her body,
but her spirit. Dr. Wu told me every day that she was stable,
but I saw changes. She didnt want me to read from Teen
People. She didnt want to watch television. She lay on her
side, staring at a blank wal .
“Claire,” I said one afternoon, “want to play cards?”
“No.”
“How about Scrabble.”
“No thanks.” She turned away. “Im tired.”
I smoothed her hair back from her face. “I know, baby.”
“No,” she said. “I mean Im tired, Mom. I dont want to do
this anymore.”
“Wel , we can take a walkI mean, I can take a walk and
push you in a wheelchair. You dont have to stay in bed”
“Im going to die in here. You and I both know it. Why cant I
just go home and do it there, instead of hooked up to al of
this stuff?”
I stared at her. Where was the child in that sentence, the
one who had believed in fairies and ghosts and al sorts of
impossible things? But were so close to fixing that, I
started to say, and then I realized that if I did, I would have
to tel her about the heart that might or might not be coming.
And whose it was.
“I want to sleep in my own bed,” Claire said, “instead of one
with stupid plastic sheets and a pil ow that crackles every
time I move my head. I want to eat meat loaf, instead of
chicken soup in a blue plastic cup and Jel -O”
“You hate when I serve meat loaf.”
“I know, and I want to get mad at you for cooking it again.”
She flopped onto her back and looked at me. “I want to
drink from the orange juice container. I want to throw a
tennis bal for my dog.”
I hesitated. “Maybe I can talk to Dr. Wu,” I said. “We can get
your own sheets and pil ow, I b e t … “
Something in Claires eyes dimmed. “Just forget it,” she
said, and that was how I realized shed already begun to
die, before I had a chance to save her.
As soon as Claire fel asleep that afternoon, I left her in the
capable hands of the nursing staff and exited the hospital
for the first time in a week. I was stunned to see how much
the world had changed.
There was a nip in the air that whispered of winter; the trees
had begun to turn color, sugar maples first, their bright
heads like torches that would light the rest of the woods on
fire. My car felt unfamiliar, as if I were driving a rental. And
most shockingthe road that led past the state prison had
been rerouted with policemen on traffic detail. I inched
through the cones, gaping at the crowds that had been
cordoned off by police tape: SHAY BOURNE
WILL BURN IN HELL, read one sign. Another banner said
SATAN IS
ALIVE AND KICKING ON I-TIER.
Once, when Claire was tiny, shed raised the blackout
shade in her bedroom window when she woke up. At the
sight of the sunrise, with its outstretched crimson fingers,
shed gasped. Did I do that?
Now, looking at the signs, I had to wonder: Could you
believe something so fiercely that it actual y happened?
Could your thoughts change the minds of others?
Keeping my eyes on the road, I passed the prison gates
and continued toward my house. But my car had other
intentionsit turned right, and then left, and into the
cemetery where Elizabeth and Kurt were buried.
I parked and started walking to their shared grave. It was
underneath an ash tree; in the light wind, the leaves
shimmered like golden coins. I knelt on the grass and
traced my finger over the lettering on the headstone:
BELOVED DAUGHTER.
TREASURED HUSBAND.
Kurt had bought his plot after wed been married for a year.
Thats macabre, I had said, and he had just shrugged it off;
he saw the business of death and dying every day. Heres
the thing, though, he had said. Theres room for you, if you
want.
He had not wanted to impose, because he didnt know if Id
want to be buried near my first husband. Even that tiny bit of
considerationthe fact that he wanted me to choose,
instead of making an assumptionhad made me realize
why I loved him. I want to be with you, I had told him. I
wanted to be where my heart was.
After the murders, I would sleepwalk. Id find myself the next
morning in the gardening shed, holding a spade. In the
garage, with my face pressed against the metal cheek of a
shovel. In my subconscious, I was making plans to join
them; it was only when I was awake and alert and felt Claire
kicking me from within that I realized I had to stay.
Would she be the next one Id bury here? And once I did,
what would keep me from carrying things through to their
natural conclusion, from putting my family back together in
one place?
I lay down for a minute, prone on the grass. I pressed my
face into the stubbled moss at the edge of the headstone
and pretended I was cheek-to-cheek with my husband; I felt
the dandelions twine through my fingers and pretended I
was holding my daughters hand.
In the elevator of the hospital, the duffel bag started to move
itself across the floor. I crouched down, unzipped the top of
it. “Good boy,” I said, and patted the top of Dudleys head.
Id retrieved him from my neighbor, who had been kind
enough to play foster parent while Claire was sick. Dudley
had fal en asleep in the car, but now he was alert and
wondering why I had zipped him into a piece of luggage.
The doors opened and I hoisted him up, approaching the
nurses desk near Claires room. I tried to smile normal y.
“Everything al right?”
“Shes been sleeping like a baby.”
Just then, Dudley barked.
The nurses eyes flew up to mine, and I pretended to
sneeze.
“Wow,” I said, shaking my head. “Is that pol en count
something or what?”
Before she could respond, I hurried into Claires room and
closed the door behind me. Then I unzipped the bag and
Dudley shot out like a rocket. He ran a lap around the room,
nearly knocking over Claires IV pole.
There was a reason dogs werent al owed in hospitals, but
if Claire wanted normal, then she was going to get it. I
wrapped my arms around Dudley and hoisted him onto
Claires bed, where he sniffed the cotton blanket and
began to lick her hand.
Her eyes fluttered open, and when she saw the dog, a
smile split her face. “Hes not al owed in here,” she
whispered, burying her hands in the fur at his neck.
“Are you going to tel on me?”
Claire pushed herself to a sitting position and let the dog
crawl into her lap. She scratched behind his ears while he
tried to chew on the wire that ran from beneath Claires
hospital gown to the heart monitor.
“We wont have a lot of time,” I said quickly. “Someones
going to”
Just then, a nurse walked in holding a digital thermometer.
“Rise and shine, missy,” she began, and then she saw the
dog on the bed. “What is that doing in here?”
I looked at Claire, and then back at the nurse. “Visiting?” I
suggested.
“Mrs. Nealon, not even service dogs are al owed onto this
ward without a letter from the vet stating that the
vaccinations are up to date and the stools tested negative
for parasites”
“I was just trying to make Claire feel better. He wont leave
this room, I swear.”
“Il give you five minutes,” the nurse said. “But you have to
promise you wont bring him in again before the transplant.”
Claire, who had a death grip on the dog, glanced up.
Claire, who had a death grip on the dog, glanced up.
“Transplant?”
she repeated. “What transplant?”
“She was being theoretical,” I said quickly.
“Dr. Wu doesnt schedule theoretical transplants,” the nurse
said.
Claire blinked at me. “Mom?” There was a thread in her
voice that had started to unravel.
The nurse turned on her heel. “Im counting,” she said, and
left the room.
“Is it true?” Claire asked. “Theres a heart for me?”
“Were not sure. Theres a catch …”
“Theres always a catch,” Claire said. “I mean, how many
hearts have turned out to not be as great as Dr. Wu
expected?”
“Wel , this one … its not ready for transplant yet. Its sort of
stil being used.”
Claire laughed a little. “What are you planning to do? Kil
someone?”
I didnt answer.
“Is the donor real y sick, or old? How could she even be a
donor if shes sick or old?” Claire asked.
“Honey,” I said. “We have to wait for the donor to be
executed.”
Claire was not stupid. I watched her put together this new
information with what shed heard on television. Her hands
tightened on Dudley. “No way,” she said quietly. “I am not
taking a heart from the guy who kil ed my father and my
sister.”
“He wants to give it to you. He offered.”
“This is sick,” Claire said. “Youre sick.” She struggled to
get up, but she was tethered to the bed with tubes and
wires.
“Even Dr. Wu said that its an amazing match for you and
your body. I couldnt just say no.”
“What about me? Dont I get to say no?”
“Claire, baby, you know donors dont come along every
day. I had to do it.”
“Then undo it,” she demanded. “Tel them I dont want his
stupid heart.”
I sank down on the edge of the hospital bed. “Its just a
muscle.
It doesnt mean youl be like him.” I paused. “And besides,
he owes this to us.”
“He doesnt owe us anything! Why dont you get that?” Her
eyes fil ed with tears. “You cant tie the score, Mom. You just
have to start over.”
Her monitors began to sound an alert; her pulse was rising,
her heart pumping too hard. Dudley began to bark. “Claire,
you have to calm down …”
“This isnt about him,” Claire said. “This isnt even about
me.
Its about you. You need to get payment for what happened
to Elizabeth.
You need to make him pay for what he did. Where do I fit
into that?”
The nurse flew into the room like a great white heron,
fussing over Claire. “Whats going on in here?” she said,
checking the connections and tubes and drips.
“Nothing,” we both said simultaneously.
The nurse gave me a measured glance. “I highly
recommend you take that dog away and let Claire get
some rest.”
I reached for Dudley and wrestled him back into the duffel
bag. “Just think about it,” I pleaded.
Ignoring me, Claire reached into the bag and patted the
dog.
“Good-bye,” she whispered.
M I CHAEL
I had gone back to St. Catherines. I told Father Walter that I
had not been seeing clearly, and that God had opened my
eyes to the truth.
I just neglected to mention that God happened to be sitting
on I-tier about three miles away from our church, awaiting
an expedited trial that began this week.
Each night, I said three consecutive rosariespenance for
lying to Father Walterbut I had to be there. I had to do
something constructive with my time, now that I wasnt
spending it with Shay. Since Id confessed to him at the
hospital that Id served on the jury that had convicted him,
hed refused to see me.
There was a part of me that understood his reaction
imagine how it would feel to know your confidant had
betrayed youbut there was another part of me that spent
hours trying to figure out why divine forgiveness hadnt
kicked in yet. Then again, if the Gospel of Thomas was to
be believed, no matter how much time and space Shay put
between us, we were never real y separate: mankind and
divinity were flip sides of the same coin.
And so, every day at noon, I told Father Walter I was
meeting a fictional couple at their house to try to guide them
away from the path of divorce. But instead, I rode my
Trophy to the prison, burrowed through the crowds, and
went inside to try to see Shay.
CO Whitaker was cal ed to escort me to I-tier after Id
passed through the metal detectors at the visitors booth.
“Hi, Father. You here to sel Girl Scout cookies?”
“You know it,” I replied. “Anything exciting happen today?”
“Lets see. Joey Kunz got a medical visit for diarrhea.”
“Wow,” I said. “Sorry I missed that.”
As I suited up in my flak jacket, Whitaker went into I-tier to
tel Shay Id come. Again. But no more than five seconds
had passed before he returned, a sheepish look on his
face. “Not today. Father,” he said.
“Sorry.”
“Il try again,” I replied, but we both knew that wasnt
possible.
We had run out of time: Shays trial began tomorrow.
I left the prison and walked back to my motorcycle. Al
modesty aside, I was the closest thing Shay had to a
disciple; and if that was true, it meant learning from the
mistakes of history. At Jesuss crucifixion.
His fol owers had scatteredexcept for Mary Magdalene,
and his mother. So even if Shay didnt acknowledge me in
court, I would stil be there. I would bear witness for him.
For a long time, I sat on my bike in the parking lot, going
nowhere.
In fairness, it wasnt like I wanted to spring this al on
Maggie a few days before the trial. The truth of the matter
was that if Shay didnt want me as his spiritual advisor
anymore, I had no excuse for not tel ing Maggie that Id
been on the jury that convicted him. Id tried to contact her
several times over the past week, but she was either out of
her office, not at home, or not answering her cel . And then,
out of the blue, she cal ed me. “Get your ass down here,”
she said. “You have some explaining to do.”
In twenty minutes, I was sitting in her ACLU office. “I had a
meeting with Shay today,” Maggie said. “He said youd lied
to him.”
I nodded. “Did he go into detail?”
“No. He said I deserved to hear it firsthand.” She crossed
her arms.
“He also said he didnt want you testifying on his behalf.”
“Right,” I mumbled. “I dont blame him.”
“Are you real y a priest?”
I blinked at her. “Of course I am”
“Then I dont care what youre lying about,” Maggie said.
“You can unburden your soul after we win Shays case.”
“Its not that simple …”
“Yes it is. Father. You are the only character witness weve
got for Shay; youre credible because youre wearing that
col ar. I dont care if you and Shay had a fight; I dont care if
you moonlight as a drag queen; I dont care if you have
enough secrets to last a lifetime. Its dont ask, dont tel until
the trial starts, okay? Al I care about is that you wear that
col ar, get on the stand, and make Shay sound like a saint.
If you walk, the whole case goes down the toilet. Is that
simple enough for you?”
If Maggie was rightif my testimony was the only thing that
would help Shaythen how could I tel her something now
that would ruin the case? A sin of omission could be
understandable if you were helping someone by holding
back. I could not give Shay his life back, but I could make
sure his death was what he wanted.
Maybe it would be enough for him to forgive me.
“Its normal to be a little freaked out about going to court,”
Maggie said, misreading my silence.
During my testimony, I was supposed to explain in laymans
terms how donating a heart to Claire Nealon was one of
Shays spiritual beliefs.
Having a priest say this was a stroke of genius on
Maggies partwho wouldnt believe a member of the
clergy when it came to religion?
“You dont have to be worried about the cross-exam,”
Maggie continued.
“You tel the judge that while a Catholic would believe that
salvation comes solely through Jesus Christ, Shay believes
organ donations necessary for redemption. Thats perfectly
true, and I can promise you that lightning isnt going to
crash through the ceiling when you say it.”
My head snapped up. “I cant tel the court that Shay wil find
Jesus,” I said. “I think he might be Jesus.”
She blinked. “You think what?”
The words began to spil out of me, the way I always
imagined it felt to be speaking in tongues: truths that
tumbled before you even realized theyd left your mouth. “It
makes perfect sense. The age, the profession.
The fact that hes on death row. The miracles. And the heart
donationhes literal y giving himself away for our sins,
again. Hes giving the part that matters the leastthe body
in order to become whole in spirit.”
“This is way worse than having cold feet,” Maggie
murmured.
“Youre crazy.”
“Maggie, hes been quoting a gospel that was written two
hundred years after Christs deatha gospel that most
people dont even know exists. Word for word.”
Tve listened to his words, and frankly, theyre unintel igible.
Do you know what he was doing yesterday when I briefed
him on his testimony?
Playing tic-tac-toe. With himself.”
“You have to read between the lines.”
“Yeah, right. And I bet when you listen to Britney Spears
records backward, you hear Sleep with me, Im not too
young. For Gods sakeno pun intendedyoure a
Catholic priest. Whatever happened to the Father, Son,
and Holy Ghost? I dont remember Shay being part of the
Trinity.”
“What about everyone camped outside the prison? Are
they al crazy, too?”
“They want Shay to cure their kids autism or reverse their
husbands Alzheimers. Theyre in it for themselves,”
Maggie said. “The only people who think Shay Bourne is
the Messiah are so desperate that theyd be able to find
salvation beneath the lid of a two-liter bottle of Pepsi.”
“Or through a heart transplant?” I countered. “Youve worked
up a whole legal theory based on individual religious
beliefs. So how can you tel me, categorical y, that Im
wrong?”
“Because its not a matter of right or wrong. Its life or death
namely. Shays. Id say whatever I had to to win this case
for him; its my job. And it was supposed to be yours, too.
This isnt about some revelation; its not about who Shay
might have been or might be in the future. Its about who he
is right now: a convicted murderer whos going to be
executed unless I can do something about it. It doesnt
matter to me if hes a vagrant or Queen Elizabeth or Jesus
Christit just matters that we win this case for him, so that
he can die on his own terms. That means that you wil get
on that damn stand and swear on that Biblewhich, for al I
know, might not even be relevant to you now that youve
found Jesus on I-tier. And if you screw this up for Shay by
sounding like a nut job when I question you, I wil make your
life miserable.” By the time Maggie finished, she was red in
the face and breathless. This old gospel,” she said. “Word
for word?”
I nodded.
“How did you find out about it?”
“From your father,” I said.
Maggies brows rose. “Im not putting a priest and a rabbi
on the stand. The judge wil be waiting for a punch line.”
I looked up at her. “I have an idea.”
Maggie
In the client-attorney conference room outside I-tier, Shay
climbed on the chair and started talking to flies. “Go left,” he
urged as he craned his neck toward the air vent. “Come on.
You can do it.”
I looked up from my notes for a moment. “Are they pets?”
“No,” Shay said, stepping down from the chair. His hair was
matted, but only on the left side, which made him look
absentminded at best and mental y il at worst. I wondered
what I could say to convince him to let me brush it before
we went out in front of the judge tomorrow.
The flies were circling. “I have a pet rabbit,” I said.
“Last week, before I was moved to I-tier, I had pets,” Shay
said, then shook his head. “It wasnt last week. It was
yesterday. I cant remember.”
“It doesnt matter”
“Whats its name?”
“Sorry?”
“The rabbit.”
“Oliver,” I said, and took out of my pocket what Id been
holding for Shay. “I brought you a gift.”
He smiled at me, his eyes piercing and suddenly focused. “I
hope its a key.”
“Not quite.” I passed him a Snack Pack butterscotch
pudding. “I figured you dont get the good stuff in prison.”
He opened the foil top, licked it, and then careful y folded it
into his breast pocket. “Is there butter in it?”
“I dont know.”
“What about Scotch?”
I smiled. “I truly doubt it.”
“Too bad.”
I watched him take the first bite. “Tomorrows going to be a
big day,”
I said.
In the wake of Michaels crisis of faith, I had contacted the
witness he recommendedan academic named Ian
Fletcher whom I vaguely remembered from a television
show he used to host, where hed go around debunking the
claims of people who saw the Virgin Mary in their toast burn
pattern and things like that. At first, putting him on the stand
seemed to be a sure way to lose a casebut the guy had a
PhD from the Princeton Theological Seminary, and there
had to be some merit in putting a former atheist on the
stand. If Fletcher could be convinced there was a Godbe
it Jesus, Al ah, Yahweh, Shay, or none of the abovethen
surely any of us could.
Shay finished his pudding and handed the empty cup back
to me. “I need the foil, too,” I said. The last thing I wanted
was to find out a few days from now that Shay had
fashioned a shank out of the aluminum and hurt himself or
someone else. He took it out of his pocket meekly and
handed it back to me. “You do know whats happening
tomorrow, right?”
“Dont you?”
“Wel . About the trial,” I began, “al you have to do is sit
“Wel . About the trial,” I began, “al you have to do is sit
patiently and listen. A lot of what youl hear probably wont
make sense to you.”
He looked up. “Are you nervous?”
I was nervous, al rightand not just because this was a
high-profile death penalty case that might or might not have
found a constitutional loophole. I lived in a country where 85
percent of the residents cal ed themselves Christians and
about half went regularly to some form of churchreligion
was not about the individual to the average American; it
was about the community of believers, and my whole case
was about to turn that on its ear. “Shay,” I said. “You
understand that we might lose.”
Shay nodded, dismissive. “Where is she?”
“Who?”
The girl. The one who needs the heart.”
“Shes in the hospital.”
“Then we have to hurry,” he said.
I exhaled slowly. “Right. Id better go get my game face on.”
I stood up, summoning the CO to let me out of the
conference room, but Shays voice cal ed me back. “Dont
forget to say youre sorry,” he said.
“To whom?”
By then, though, Shay was standing on the chair again, his
attention focused on something else. And as I watched,
seven flies landed in quick succession on the palm of his
outstretched hand.
When I was five, al I wanted was a Christmas tree. My
friends had them, and the menorah we lit at night paled in
comparison. My father pointed out that we got eight
presents, but my friends got even more than that, if you
added up what was sitting underneath their tree. One cold
December afternoon, my mother told my father we were
heading to the movies, and instead, she drove me to the
mal . We waited in line with little girls who had ribbons in
their hair and fancy lace dresses, so that I could sit on
Santas lap and tel him I wanted My Pretty Pony. Then, with
a candy cane fisted in my hand, we walked to the
decoration display where there were fifteen Christmas
trees set upwhite ones with glass bal s, fake balsam
ones strung with red beads and bows, one that had Tinker
Bel at the top and al the Disney characters dotted as
ornaments, “like this,” my mother said, and right in the
middle of the department store we lay down at a
crossroads of the trees and gazed up at the blinking light
displays. I thought it was the most beautiful thing Id ever
seen. “I wont tel Daddy,” I promised, but she said that
didnt matter. This wasnt about another religion, my mother
explained. These were just the trappings. You could admire
the wrapping, without ever taking out what was inside the
box.
After I left Shay, I sat in my car and cal ed my mother at the
ChutZpah.
“Hi,” I said when she answered. “What are you doing?”
There was a beat of silence. “Maggie? Whats wrong?”
“Nothing. I felt like cal ing you.”
“Did something happen? Did you get hurt?”
“Cant I cal my mother just because I feel like it?”
“You can,” she said, “but you dont.”
Wel . There was just no arguing with the truth. I took a deep
breath and forged ahead. “Do you remember the time you
took me to see Santa?”
“Please dont tel me youre converting. Itl kil your father.”
“Im not converting,” I said, and my mother sighed with
relief. “I just was remembering it, thats al .”
“So you cal ed to tel me?”
“No,” I said. “I cal ed to say Im sorry.”
“For what?” My mother laughed. “You havent done
anything.”
In that moment, I remembered us lying on the floor of the
department store, gazing at the lit trees, as a security guard
loomed over us. Just gLve her another jew minutes, my
mother had begged. June Nealons face flashed before
me. Maybe this was the job of a mother: to buy time for her
child, no matter what. Even if it meant doing something
shed rather not; even if it left her flat on her back.
“Yes,” I answered. “I know.”
“Desiring religious freedom is nothing new,” I said, standing
up in front of Judge Haig at the opening of Shay Bournes
trial. “One of the most famous cases happened more than
two hundred years ago, and it didnt take place in our
countrynamely, because there was no country. A group of
people who dared to hold religious beliefs different from the
status quo found themselves being forced to adopt the
policies of the Church of Englandand instead, they chose
to strike off to an unknown place across the ocean. But the
Puritans liked religious freedom so much they kept it al to
themselvesoften persecuting people who didnt believe
what they did. This is precisely why the founders of the new
nation of the United States decided to put an end to
religious intolerance by making religious freedom a
cornerstone of this country”
This was a nonjury trial, which meant that the only person I
had to preach to was the judge; but the courtroom was stil
fil ed. There were reporters there from four networks the
judge had preapproved, there were victims rights
advocates, there were death penalty supporters and death
penalty opponents. The only party present in support of
Shayand my first witnesswas Father Michael, seated
just behind the plaintiffs table.
Beside me, Shay sat in handcuffs and ankle cuffs, linked to
a bel y chain. “Thanks to the forefathers who crafted the
Constitution, everyone in this country has the freedom to
practice his own religioneven a prisoner on death row in
New Hampshire. In fact, Congress went so far as to pass a
law about it. The Religious Land Use and Institutionalized
Persons Act guarantees an inmate the opportunity to
worship whatever he likes as long as it doesnt impede the
safety of others in the prison or affect the running of the
prison. Yet Shay Bournes constitutional right to practice his
religion has been denied by the State of New Hampshire.”
I looked up at the judge. “Shay Bourne is not a Muslim, or a
Wiccan; hes not a secular humanist or a member of the
Bahai faith. In fact, his system of beliefs may not be
familiar to any common world religion you can name off the
top of your head. But they are a system of beliefs, and they
include the fact thatto Shaysalvation depends on being
able to donate his heart after his execution to the sister of
his victim … an outcome thats not possible if the state
uses lethal injection as a method of execution.”
I walked forward. “Shay Bourne has been convicted of
possibly the most heinous crime in the history of this state.
He has appealed that conviction, and those appeals have
been deniedyet he is not contesting that decision. He
knows he is going to die, Your Honor. Al he asks is that,
again, the laws of this country be upheldin particular, the
laws that say anyone has the right to practice their religion,
wherever, whenever, however. If the state agrees to his
execution by hanging, and provides for the subsequent
donation of his organs, the safety of other inmates isnt
impeded; the running of the prison isnt affectedbut it
would offer a very significant personal outcome for Shay
Bourne: to save a little girls life, and in the process, to save
his own soul.”
I sat back down and glanced at Shay. He had a legal pad in
front of him.
On it, hed doodled a picture of a pirate with a parrot on his
shoulder.
At the defense table, Gordon Greenleaf was seated beside
the New Hampshire commissioner of corrections, a man
with both hair and complexion the color of a potato.
Greenleaf tapped his pencil twice on the desk. “Ms. Bloom
brought up the founding fathers of this country.
Thomas Jefferson, in fact, coined a phrase in a letter in
1789a wal of separation between church and state. He
was explaining the First Amendmentin particular the
clauses about religion. And his words have been used by
the Supreme Court many timesin fact, the Lemon test,
which the high court has used since 1971, says that for a
law to be constitutional, it must have a secular purpose,
must neither advance nor inhibit religion, and must not
result in excessive government entanglement with religion.
That last parts an interesting bitsince Ms. Bloom is both
crediting the forefathers of this nation with the noble
division of church and state … and yet simultaneously
asking Your Honor to join them together.”
He stood up, walking forward. “If you were to take her claim
seriously,”
Greenleaf said, “youd see that what shes real y asking for
is a legal y binding sentence to be massaged, because of
a loophole cal ed religion. Whats next? A convicted drug
dealer asking that his sentence be overturned because
heroin helps him reach nirvana? A murderer insisting that
his cel door face Mecca?” Greenleaf shook his head. “The
truth is, Judge, this petition has been filed by the ACLU not
because its a valid and troublesome concernbut
because it wil purposeful y create a three-ring circus during
the states first execution in sixty-nine years.” He waved his
arm around the crowded gal ery. “And al of you are proof
that its already working.”
Greenleaf glanced at Shay. “Nobody takes the death
penalty lightly, least of al the commissioner of corrections
in the State of New Hampshire.
The sentence in Shay Bournes case was death by lethal
injection.
Thats exactly what the state has prepared and intends to
carry outwith dignity and respect for al parties involved.
“Lets look at the facts here. No matter what Ms. Bloom
says, there is no organized religion that mandates organ
donation after death as a means of reaching the afterlife.
According to his records, Shay Bourne was raised in foster
homes, so he cant claim that he was reared in one
religious tradition that fostered organ donation. If hes
converted to some religion that is now claiming that organ
donation is part of its tenets, we submit to this court that its
pure bunk.” Greenleaf spread his hands. “We know youl
listen careful y to the testimony, Your Honor, but the reality is
that the Department of Corrections is not required to submit
to the whim of every misguided prisoner that comes
through its doorsespecial y one who has committed the
monstrous torture and murders of two New Hampshire
citizens, a child and a police officer. Dont let Ms.
Bloom and the ACLU take a grave matter and turn it into a
spectacle.
Al ow the state to impose the penalty that was set forth by
the court, in as civilized and professional a manner as
possible.”
I glanced at Shay. On his legal pad, hed added his initials,
and the logo for the band AC/DC.
The judge pushed his glasses up his nose and looked at
me. “Ms.
Bloom,” he said, “you may cal your first witness.”
M I C HAEL
As soon as I was asked to approach the witness stand, I
locked my gaze on Shays. He stared back at me, silent,
blank. The clerk approached, holding a Bible. “Do you
swear to tel the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
truth, so help you God?”
The leather cover of the book was finely grained and black,
worn smooth by the palms of thousands whod recited a
vow just like this one. I thought of al the times Id held a
Bible for comfort, a religious mans security blanket. I used
to think it contained al the answers; now I wondered
whether the right questions had even been asked. So help
me God, I thought.
Maggies hands were clasped lightly in front of her. “Can
you state your name and address for the record?”
“Michael Wright,” I said, clearing my throat. “Thirty-four
twentytwo High Street, in Concord.”
“How are you employed?”
“Im a priest at St. Catherines.”
“How does one become a priest?” Maggie asked.
“You go to seminary for a certain number of years, and then
you become a member of the transitional deaconate …
learning the ropes under the guidance of a more
experienced parish priest. Final y, you get ordained.”
“How long ago did you take your vows. Father?”
“Its been two years,” I said.
I could stil remember the ordainment ceremony, my
parents watching from the pews, their faces lit as if they had
stars caught in their throats. I had been so certain, then, of
my cal ingof serving Jesus Christ, of who Jesus Christ
was. Had I been wrong then? Or was it simply that there
was more than one kind of right?
“As part of your duties at St. Catherines, Father, have you
been a spiritual advisor for an inmate named Shay
Bourne?”
“Yes.”
“And is Shay here in the courtroom today?”
“He is.”
“In fact,” Maggie said, “hes the plaintiff in this case who
was sitting beside me at that table, isnt that correct?”
“Yes.” I smiled at Shay, who looked down at the table.
“During the course of your training to become a priest, did
you speak with parishioners about their religious beliefs?”
“Of course.”
“Is it part of your duty as a priest to help others become
familiar with God?”
“Yes.”
“How about deepening their faith in God?”
“Absolutely.”
She turned to the judge. “Im going to offer up Father
Michael as an expert on spiritual advice and religious
beliefs. Your Honor.”
The other attorney shot up. “Objection,” he said. “With al
due respect, is Father Michael an expert on Jewish
beliefs? Methodist beliefs?
Muslim ones?”
“Sustained,” the judge said. “Father Michael may not testify
as an expert on religious beliefs outside of the Catholic
faith, except in his role as a spiritual advisor.”
I had no idea what that meant, and from the looks on their
faces, neither did either attorney. “Whats the role of a
spiritual advisor in the prison?” Maggie asked.
“You meet with inmates who would like a friend to talk to, or
a voice to pray with,” I explained. “You offer them
counseling, direc306
tion, devotional materials. Basical y, youre a priest making
a house cal .”
“How was it that you were chosen to become a spiritual
advisor?”
“St. Catherinesmy parishreceived a request from the
state prison.”
“Is Shay Catholic, Father?”
“One of his foster mothers had him baptized Catholic, so in
the eyes of the Church, yes, he is. However, he does not
consider himself a practicing Catholic.”
“How does that work, then? If youre a priest and hes not
Catholic, how are you able to be his spiritual advisor?”
“Because my job isnt to preach to him, but to listen.”
“When was the first time you met with Shay?” Maggie
asked.
“March eighth of this year,” I said. “Ive seen him once or
twice a week since then.”
“At some point, did Shay discuss his desire to donate his
heart to Claire Nealon, the sister of one of his victims?”
“It was the very first conversation we had,” I replied.
“How many times since have you discussed with Shay his
feelings about this transplant?”
“Maybe twentyfive, thirty.”
Maggie nodded. “There are people here today who think
that Shays desire to become an organ donor has
everything to do with buying himself time, and nothing to do
with religion. Do you agree with that?”
“Objection,” the other attorney said. “Speculation.”
The judge shook his head. Til al ow it.”
“Hed die today, if you let him donate his heart. Its not time
he wants; its the chance to be executed in a way that would
al ow for a transplant.”
“Let me play devils advocate,” Maggie said. “We al know
donating organs is selfless … but Wheres the link between
donation and salva tion? Was there something that
convinced you this wasnt just altruism on Shays part … but
part of his faith?”
“Yes,” I said. “When Shay told me what he wanted to do, he
said it in a very striking way. It almost sounded like a weird
riddle: If I bring forth whats inside me, whats inside me wil
save me. If I dont bring forth whats inside me, whats
inside me wil destroy me. I found out later that Shays
statement wasnt original. He was quoting someone pretty
important.”
“Who, Father?”
I looked at the judge. “Jesus Christ.”
“Nothing further,” Maggie said, and she sat back down
beside Shay.
Gordon Greenleaf frowned at me. “Forgive my ignorance.
Father. Is that from the Old Testament or the New
Testament?”
“Neither,” I replied. “Its from the Gospel of Thomas.”
This stopped the attorney in his tracks. “Arent al gospels
somewhere in the Bible?”
“Objection,” Maggie cal ed out. “Father Michael cant
respond, because hes not a religious expert.”
“You offered him up as one,” Greenleaf said.
Maggie shrugged. “Then you shouldnt have objected to it.”
Til rephrase,” Greenleaf said. “So, Mr. Bourne quoted
something that is not actual y in the Bible, but youre
claiming its proof that hes motivated by religion?”
“Yes,” I said. “Exactly.”
“Wel , then, what religion does Shay practice?” Greenleaf
asked.
“He doesnt label it.”
“You said hes not a practicing Catholic. Is he a practicing
Jew, then?”
“No.”
“A Muslim?”
“No.”
“A Buddhist?”
“No,” I said.
“Is Mr. Bourne practicing any type of organized religion that
the court might be familiar with. Father?”
I hesitated. “Hes practicing a religion, but it isnt formal y
organized.”
“Like what? Bourneism?”
“Objection,” Maggie interrupted. “If Shay cant name it, why
do we have to?”
“Sustained,” Judge Haig said.
“Let me clarify,” Greenleaf said. “Shay Bourne is practicing
a religion you cant name, and quoting from a gospel thats
not in the Bible … and yet somehow his desire to be an
organ donor is grounded in the concept of religious
salvation? Does that not strike you. Father, as the slightest
bit convenient on Mr. Bournes part?”
He turned, as if he hadnt real y expected me to give an
answer, but I wasnt going to let him off that easy. “Mr.
Greenleaf,” I said, “there are al sorts of experiences that
we cant real y put a name to.”
“I beg your pardon?”
The birth of a child, for one. Or the death of a parent. Fal ing
in love. Words are like netswe hope theyl cover what we
mean, but we know they cant possibly hold that much joy,
or grief, or wonder. Finding God is like that, too. If its
happened to you, you know what it feels like. But try to
describe it to someone elseand language only takes you
so far,” I said. “Yes, it sounds convenient. And yes, hes the
only member of his religion. And no, it doesnt have a
name. But… I believe him.” I looked at Shay until he met my
gaze. “I believe.”
June
When Claire was awake, which was less and less often, we
did not talk about the heart that might be coming for her or
whether or not shed take it. She didnt want to; I was afraid
to. Instead, we talked about things that didnt matter: whod
been voted off her favorite reality TV show; how the Internet
actual y worked; if Id reminded Mrs. Wal oughby to feed
Dudley twice a day instead of three times, because he was
on a diet. When Claire was asleep, I held her hand and told
her about the future I dreamed of. I told her that wed travel
to Bali and live for a month in a hut perched over the ocean.
I told her that I would learn to water-ski barefoot while she
drove the boat, and then wed swap places. How we would
climb Mt. Katahdin, get our ears double pierced, learn how
to make chocolate from scratch. I imagined her swimming
up from the sandy bottom of unconsciousness, bursting
through the surface, wading to where I was waiting onshore.
It was during one of Claires afternoon drug-induced
marathon naps that I began to learn about elephants. That
morning, when I had gone down to the hospital cafeteria for
a cup of coffee, I passed the same three retail
establishments Id passed every day for the past two weeks
a bank, a bookstore, a travel agency. Today, though, for
the first time, I was magnetical y drawn to a poster in the
window, EXPERIENCE AFRICA, it said.
The bored col ege girl staffing the office was talking to her
boyfriend on the phone when I walked inside, and was
more than happy to send me on my way with a brochure, in
lieu of actual y tel ing me about the destination herself.
“Where were we?” I heard her say as she picked up the
phone again when I left the office, and then she giggled.
“With your teeth?”
Upstairs in Claires room, I pored over pictures of rooms
with beds as wide as the sea, covered with crisp white
linens and draped with a net of gauze. Of outside showers,
exposed to the bush, so that you were as naked as the
animals. Of Land Rovers and African rangers with
phosphorescent smiles.
And oh, the animalssleek leopards, with their Rorschach
spots; a lioness with eyes like amber; the massive monolith
of an elephant yanking a tree out of the ground.
Did you know, the brochure read, that elephants live in a
society much like ours?
That they travel in matriarchal packs, and gestatefor 22
months?
That they can communicate over a distance of 50 km?
Come track the amazing elephant in its natural habitat, the
Tuli Block…
“What are you reading?” Claire squinted at the brochure,
her voice groggy.
“Something on safaris,” I said. “I thought maybe you and I
might go on one.”
“Im not taking that stupid heart,” Claire said, and she rol ed
on her side, closing her eyes again.
I would tel Claire about the elephants when she woke up, I
decided. About a country where mothers and daughters
walked side by side for years with their aunts and sisters.
About how elephants were either right-handed or left-
handed. How they could find their way home years after
theyd left.
Here is what I wouldnt tel Claire, ever: That elephants
know when theyre close to dying, and they make their way
to a riverbed for nature to take its course. That elephants
bury their dead, and grieve. That naturalists have seen a
mother elephant carry a dead calf for miles, cradled in her
trunk, unwil ing and unable to let it go.
Mdggie
Nobody wanted Ian Fletcher to testify, including me.
When Id cal ed an emergency meeting with the judge days
earlier, asking to add Fletcher to my witness list as an
expert on the history of religion, I thought Gordon Greenleaf
would burst a blood vessel in chambers.
“Hel o?” he said. “Rule 26(c)?”
He was talking about the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure,
which said that witnesses had to be disclosed thirty days
before a trial, unless otherwise directed by the court. I was
banking on that last clause.
“Judge,” I said, “weve only had two weeks to prepare for
this trialneither of us disclosed any of our witnesses
within thirty days.”
“You dont get to sneak in an expert just because you
happened to stumble over one,” Greenleaf said.
Federal court judges were notorious for trying to keep their
cases on the straight and narrow. If Judge Haig al owed
Fletcher to testify, it opened up a whole can of worms
Greenleaf would need to prepare his cross, and would
most likely want to hire a counterexpert, which would delay
the trial … and we al knew that couldnt happen, since we
had a deadline in the strictest sense of the word. Buthere
was the crazy thingFather Michael had been right. Ian
Fletchers book dovetailed so neatly with the hook I was
using to drag Shays case to a victory that it would have
been a shame not to try. And even betterit provided the
one element Id been lacking in this case: a historical
precedent.
I had ful y convinced myself that Judge Haig would laugh in
my face anyway when I tried to include a new witness at the
last minute, but instead, he looked down at the name.
“Fletcher,” he said, testing the word in his mouth as if it
were made of sharp stones. “Ian Fletcher?”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
“Is he the one who used to have a television show?”
I sucked in my breath. “I believe so.”
“Il be damned,” the judge said. He said this in a voice that
wasnt wish-I-had-his-autograph, but more he-was-like-a-
train-wreck-I-couldntturn-away-from.
The good news was, I was al owed to bring in my expert
witness.
The bad news was that Judge Haig didnt like him very
muchand had in the forefront of his mind my witnesss
former incarnation as an atheist showboat, when I real y
wanted him to be seen as a grave and credible historian.
Greenleaf was furious that hed only had days to figure out
what tune Fletcher was singing these days; the judge
regarded him as a curiosity, and mewel , I was just
praying that my whole case didnt selfdestruct in the next
ten minutes.
“Before we begin, Ms. Bloom,” the judge said, “I have a few
questions for Dr. Fletcher.”
He nodded. “Shoot, Judge.”
“How does a man who was an atheist a decade ago
convince a court that hes an expert on religion now?”
“Your Honor,” I interjected. “Im planning on going through
Dr.
Fletchers credentials …”
“I didnt ask you, Ms. Bloom,” he said.
But Ian Fletcher wasnt rattled. “You know what they say,
Your Honor.
Sinners make the best reformed saints.” He grinned, a slow
and lazy smile that reminded me of a cat in the sunlight. “I
guess finding God is like seeing a ghostyou can be a
skeptic until you come face-to-face with what you said
doesnt exist.”
“So youre a religious man now?” the judge asked.
“Im a spiritual man,” Fletcher corrected. “And I do think
theres a dif ference. But being spiritual doesnt pay the
rent, which is why I have degrees from Princeton and
Harvard, three New York Times bestsel ing nonfiction
books, forty-two published articles on the origins of world
religions, and positions on six interfaith councils, including
one that advises the current administration.”
The judge nodded, making notes; and Greenleaf stipulated
to the list of Fletchers credentials. “I might as wel start with
where Judge Haig left off,” I said, beginning the direct
examination. “Its pretty rare for an atheist to get interested
in religion. Did you just sort of wake up one day and find
Jesus?”
“Its not like youre vacuuming under the sofa cushions and
bingo, there he is. My interest grew more from a historical
standpoint, because these days, people act like faith grows
in a vacuum. When you break down religions and look
political y and economical y and social y at what was going
on during their births, it changes the way you think.”
“Dr. Fletcher, do you have to be part of a group to be part of
a religion?”
“Not only can religion be individualizedit has been, in the
past. In 1945, a discovery was made in Egypt: fifty-two texts
that were labeled gospelsand that werent part of the
Bible. Some of them were ful of sayings that would be
familiar to anyone whos gone to Sunday school …
and some of them, to be honest, were real y bizarre. They
were scientifical y dated from the second century, roughly
thirty to eighty years younger than the gospels in the New
Testament. And they belonged to a group cal ed Gnostic
Christiansa splinter group from Orthodox Christianity,
who believed that true religious enlightenment meant
undertaking a very personal, individual quest to know
yourself, not by your socioeconomic status or profession,
but at a deeper core.”
“Hang on,” I said. “After Jesuss death, there was more than
one kind of Christian?”
“Oh, there were dozens.”
“And they had their own Bibles?”
“They had their own gospels,” Fletcher corrected. “The New
Testamentin particular, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
were the ones that the orthodoxy chose to uphold. The
Gnostic Christians preferred texts like the Gospel of
Thomas, and the Gospel of Truth, and the Gospel of Mary
Magdalene.”
“Did those gospels talk about Jesus, too?”
“Yes, except the Jesus they describe isnt the one youd
recognize from the Bible. That Jesus is very different from
the humans hes come here to save. But the Gospel of
Thomasmy personal favorite from Nag Hammadisays
Jesus is a guide to help you figure out al you have in
common with God. So if you were a Gnostic Christian, you
would have expected the road to salvation to be different
for everyone.”
“Like donating your heart to someone who needs it… ?”
“Exactly,” Fletcher said.
“Wow,” I said, playing dumb. “How come this stuff isnt
taught in Sunday school?”
“Because the Orthodox Christian Church felt threatened by
the Gnostics. They cal ed their gospels heresy, and the Nag
Hammadi texts were hidden for two thousand years.”
“Father Wright said that Shay Bourne quoted from the
Gospel of Thomas. Do you have any idea where he would
have stumbled over that text?”
“Maybe he read my book,” Fletcher said, smiling widely,
and the people in the gal ery laughed.
“In your opinion, Doctor, could a religion that only one
person believes and fol ows stil be valid?”
“An individual can have a religion,” he said. “He cant have
a religious institution. But it seems to me that Shay Bourne
is standing in a tradition similar to the ones the Gnostic
Christians did nearly two thousand years ago. Hes not the
first to say that he cant name his faith. Hes not the first to
find a path to salvation that is different from others youve
heard about. And hes certainly not the first to mistrust the
bodyto literal y want to give it away, as a means to finding
divinity inside oneself. But just because he doesnt have a
church with a white steeple over his head, or a temple with
a six-pointed star surrounding him, doesnt mean that his
beliefs are any less worthy.”
I beamed at him. Fletcher was easy to listen to, interesting,
and he didnt sound like a left-wing nutcase. Or so I thought,
until I heard Judge Haig exhale heavily and say court was
recessed until the next day.
Lucius
I was painting when Shay returned from his first day of trial,
huddled and withdrawn, as going to court made most of us.
Id been working on the portrait al day, and I was quite
pleased with the way it was turning out. I glanced up when
Shay was escorted past my cel , but didnt speak to him.
Better to let him come back to us on his own time.
Not twenty minutes afterward, a long, low keen fil ed the tier.
At first I thought Shay was crying, letting the stress of the
day bleed from him, but then I realized that the sound was
coming from Cal oway Reeces cel .
“Come on,” he moaned. He started smacking his fists
against the door of his cel . “Bourne,” he cal ed out.
“Bourne, I need your help.”
“Leave me alone,” Shay said.
“Its the bird, man. I cant get him to wake up.”
The fact that Batman the Robin had survived inside I-tier for
several weeks on crusts of toast and bits of oatmeal was a
wonder in its own right, not to mention the fact that hed
cheated death once before.
“Give him CPR,” Joey Kunz suggested.
“You cant do fucking CPR on a bird,” Cal oway snapped.
“They got beaks.”
I put down the makeshift brush I was using to painta
rol ed wad of toilet paperand angled my mirror-shank out
my door so that I could see.
In his enormous palm, Cal oway cradled the bird, which lay
on its side, unmoving.
“Shay,” he begged, “please.”
There was no response from Shays cel . “Fish him to me,” I
said, and crouched down with my line. I was worried that
the bird had grown too big to make it through the little slit at
the bottom, but Cal oway wrapped him in a handkerchief,
roped the top, and sent the slight weight in a wide arc
across the floor of the catwalk. I knotted my string with
Cal oways and gently drew the bird toward me.
I couldnt resist unwrapping the kerchief to peek. Batmans
eyelid was purple and creased, his tail feathers spread like
a fan. The tiny hooks on the ends of his claws were as
sharp as pins. When I touched them, the bird did not even
twitch. I placed my forefinger beneath the wingdid birds
have hearts where we did?-and felt nothing.
“Shay,” I said quietly. “I know youre tired. And I know youve
got your own stuff going on. But please. Just take a look.”
Five whole minutes passed, long enough for me to give up.
I wrapped the bird in the cloth again and tied him to the end
of my fishing line, cast him onto the catwalk for Cal oway to
retrieve. But before his line could tangle with mine, another
whizzed out, and Shay intercepted the bird.
In my mirror, I watched Shay take Batman from the kerchief,
hold him in his hand. He stroked the head with his finger; he
gingerly covered the body with his other hand, as if he had
caught a star between his palms. I held my breath, watching
for that flutter or feather or the faintest cheep, but after a few
moments Shay just wrapped the bird up again.
“Hey!” Cal oway had been watching, too. “You didnt do
anything!”
“Leave me alone,” Shay repeated. The air had gone bitter
as almonds; I could barely stand to breathe it. I watched him
fish back that dead bird, and al of our hopes along with it.
Maggie
When Gordon Greenleaf stood up, his knees creaked.
“Youve studied comparative world religions in the course
of your research?” he asked Fletcher.
“Yes.”
“Do different religions take a stand on organ donation?”
“Yes,” Fletcher said. “Catholics believe only in transplants
done after deathyou cant risk kil ing the donor, for
example, during the donation.
They ful y support organ donation, as do Jews and Muslims.
Buddhists and Hindus believe organ donation is a matter of
individual conscience, and they put high value on acts of
compassion.”
“Do any of those religions require you to donate organs as
a means to salvation?”
“No,” Fletcher said.
“Are there Gnostic Christians practicing today?”
“No,” Fletcher said. “The religion died out.”
“How come?”
“When you have a belief system that says you shouldnt
listen to the clergy, and that you should continual y ask
questions, instead of accepting doctrine, its hard to form a
community. On the other hand, the Orthodox Christians
were delineating the steps to being cardcarrying members
of the groupconfess the creed, accept baptism, worship,
obey the priests. Plus, their Jesus was someone the
average Joe could relate tosomeone whod been born,
had an overprotective mom, suffered, and died. That was a
much easier sel than the Gnostic Jesuswho was never
even human. The rest of the Gnostics decline,” Fletcher
said, “was political. In A.D. 312, Constantine, the Roman
emperor, saw a crucifix in the sky and converted to
Christianity. The Catholic Church became part of the Holy
Roman Empire … and having Gnostic texts and beliefs
were punishable by death.”
“So, its fair to say no ones practiced Gnostic Christianity
for fifteen hundred years?” Greenleaf said.
“Not formal y. But there are elements of Gnostic belief in
other religions that have survived. For example, Gnostics
recognized the difference between the reality of God, which
was impossible to describe with language, and the image
of God as we knew it. This sounds a lot like Jewish
mysticism, where you find God being described as streams
of energy, male and female, which pool together into a
divine source; or God as the source of al sounds at once.
And Buddhist enlightenment is very much like the Gnostic
idea that we live in a land of oblivion, but can waken
spiritual y right here while were stil part of this world.”
“But Shay Bourne cant be a fol ower of a religion that no
longer exists, isnt that true?”
He hesitated. “From what I understand, donating his heart
is Shay Bournes attempt to learn who he is, who he wants
to be, how he is connected to others. And in that very basic
sense, the Gnostics would agree that hes found the part of
him that comes closest to being divine.”
Fletcher looked up. “A Gnostic Christian would tel you that
a man on death row is more like us than unlike us. And that
as Mr. Bourne seems to be trying to suggesthe stil has
something to offer the world.”
“Yeah. Whatever.” Greenleaf raised a brow. “Have you ever
even met Shay Bourne?”
“Actual y,” Fletcher said, “no.”
“So for al you know, he doesnt have any religious beliefs
at al . This could al be some grand plan to delay his
execution, couldnt it?”
“Ive spoken with his spiritual advisor.”
The lawyer scoffed. “Youve got a guy practicing a religion
by himself that seems to hearken back to a religious sect
that died out thousands of years ago. Isnt it possible that
this is a bit too … easy? That Shay Bourne could just be
making it al up as he goes along?”
Fletcher smiled. “A lot of people thought that about Jesus.”
“Dr. Fletcher,” Greenleaf said, “are you tel ing this court that
Shay Bourne is a messiah?”
Fletcher shook his head. “Your words, not mine.”
“Then how about your stepdaughters words?” Greenleaf
asked. “Or is this some kind of family trait you al have,
running into God in state prisons and elementary schools
and Laundromats?”
“Objection,” I said. “My witness isnt on trial here.”
Greenleaf shrugged. “His ability to discuss the history of
Christianity is”
“Overruled,” Judge Haig said.
Fletcher narrowed his eyes. “What my daughter did or
didnt see has no bearing on Shay Bournes request to
donate his heart.”
“Did you believe she was a fake when you first met her?”
“The more I spoke with her, the more I”
“When youjirst met her,” Greenleaf interrupted, “did you
believe she was a fake?”
“Yes,” Fletcher admitted.
“And yet, with no personal contact, you were wil ing to testify
in a court of law that Mr. Bournes request to donate his
organs could be massaged to fit your loose definition of a
religion.” Greenleaf glanced at him.
“I guess, in your case, old habits die fairly easy.”
“Objection!”
“Withdrawn.” Greenleaf started back to his seat, but then
turned.
“Just one more question, Dr. Fletcherthis daughter of
yours. She was seven years old when she found herself at
the center of a religious media circus not unlike this one,
correct?”
“Yes.”
“Are you aware thats the same age of the little girl Shay
Bourne murdered?”
A muscle in Fletchers jaw twitched. “No. I wasnt.”
“How do you think youd feel about God if your
stepdaughter was the one whod been kil ed?”
I shot to my feet. “Objection!”
“Il al ow it,” the judge answered.
Fletcher paused. “I think that kind of tragedy would test
anyones faith.”
Gordon Greenleaf folded his arms. “Then its not faith,” he
said. “Its being a chameleon.”
M IC HAEL
During the lunch recess, I went to see Shay in his holding
cel . He was sitting on the floor, near the bars, while a U.S.
marshal sat outside on a stool. Shay held a pencil and
scrap of paper, as if he were conducting an interview.
“H,” the marshal said, and Shay shook his head. “M?”
Shay scribbled something on the paper. “Im down to your
last toe, dude.”
The marshal sucked in his breath. “K.”
Shay grinned. “I win.” He scrawled something else on the
page and passed it through the barsonly then did I notice
that it had been a game of hangman, and that this time
around. Shay was the executioner.
Scowling, the marshal stared down at the paper. “Szygszyg
isnt a real word.”
“You didnt say that it had to be real when we started
playing,”
Shay replied, and then he noticed me standing at the
threshold of the door.
Im Shays spiritual advisor,” I told the marshal. “Can we
have a minute?”
“No problem. I have to take a whiz.” He stood up, offering
me the stool he was vacating, and headed out of the room.
“How are you doing?” I said quietly.
Shay walked to the back of the cel , where he lay down on
the metal bunk and faced the wal .
“I want to talk to you. Shay.”
“Just because you want to talk doesnt mean I want to
listen.”
I sank down on the stool. “I was the last one on your jury to
vote for the death penalty,” I said. “I was the reason we
deliberated so long.
And even after Id been convinced by the rest of the jury that
this was the best sentence, I didnt feel good about it. I kept
having panic attacks.
One day, during one, I stumbled into a cathedral and
started to pray. The more I did it, the fewer panic attacks I
had.” I clasped my hands between my knees. “I thought that
was a sign from God.”
Stil with his back to me. Shay snorted.
“I stil think its a sign from God, because its brought me
back into your life.”
Shay rol ed onto his back and flung one arm over his eyes.
“Dont kid yourself,” he said. “Its brought you back into my
death.”
Ian Fletcher was already standing at a urinal when I ran into
the mens room. I had been hoping it would be empty.
Shays commentthe bald truthhad made me so sick to
my stomach that Id rushed out of the holding cel without
explanation. I pushed into a stal , fel to my knees, and got
violently il .
No matter how much I wanted to fool myselfno matter
what I said about atoning for my past sinsthe bottom line
was that for the second time in my life, my actions were
going to result in the death of Shay Bourne.
Fletcher pushed the door of the stal open and put his hand
on my shoulder. “Father? You al right?”
I wiped my mouth, slowly got to my feet. Im fine,” I said,
then shook my head. “No, actual y, Im awful.”
I walked to the sink, turned on the faucet, and splashed
water on my face as Fletcher watched. “Do you need to sit
down or something?”
I dried my face with a paper towel he passed me. And
suddenly, I wanted someone else to bear this burden. Ian
Fletcher was a man whod unraveled secrets from two
thousand years ago; surely he could keep one of mine. “I
was on his jury,” I murmured into the recycled brown paper.
Im sorry?”
No, I am. I thought. I met Fletchers gaze. “I was on the jury
that sentenced Shay Bourne to death. Before I joined the
priesthood.”
Fletcher let out a long, low whistle. “Does he know?”
“I told him a few days ago.”
“And his lawyer?”
I shook my head. “I keep thinking that this must be how
Judas felt after turning Jesus in.”
Fletchers mouth turned up at the corners. “Actual y, theres
a recently discovered Gnostic gospelthe Gospel of
Judasand theres very little in there about betrayal. In fact,
this gospel paints Judas as Jesuss confidantthe only
one he trusted to make what needed to happen, happen.”
“Even if it was an assisted suicide,” I said, Im sure Judas
felt like crap about it afterward. I mean, he kil ed himself.”
“Wel ,” Fletcher said, “there was that.”
“What would you do if you were me?” I asked. “Would you
carry through with this? Help Shay donate his heart?”
“I guess that depends on why youre helping him,” Fletcher
said slowly. “Is it to save him, like you said on the stand? Or
are you real y just trying to save yourself?” He shook his
head. “If man had the answers for questions like those,
there wouldnt be a need for religion.
Good luck. Father.”
I went back into the stal and closed the lid of the toilet, sat
down. I slipped my rosary out of my pocket and whispered
the familiar words of the prayers, sweet in my mouth like
sucking candies.
Finding Gods grace wasnt like locating missing keys or
the forgotten name of a 1940s pinup girlit was more of a
feeling: the sun breaking through an overcast morning, the
softest bed sinking under your weight. And, of course, you
couldnt find Gods grace unless you admitted you were
lost.
A bathroom stal at the federal courthouse might not be the
most likely spot to find Gods grace, but that didnt mean it
couldnt be done.
Find Gods grace.
Find Grace.
If Shay was wil ing to give up his heart, then the least I could
do was make sure hed be remembered in someone
elses. Someone whounlike mehad never condemned
him.
That was when I decided to find Shays sister.
June
It is not an easy thing to pick the clothes in which your child
wil be buried. I had been told by the funeral director, after
the murders, to think about it. He suggested something that
represented her, a beautiful girlsuch as a nice little dress,
one that opened up the back, preferably. He asked me to
bring in a picture of her so that he could use makeup to
match the blush of her cheek, the natural color of her skin,
her hairstyle.
What I had wanted to say to him was: Elizabeth hated
dresses.
She would have worn pants without buttons, because they
were frustrating, or possibly last years Hal oween costume,
or the tiny set of doctors scrubs she got for ChristmasI
had, just days before, found her “operating” on an
overgrown zucchini that was the size of a newborn. I would
have told him that Elizabeth did not have a hairstyle,
because you could not ground her long enough to brush it,
much less braid or curl. And that I did not want him putting
makeup on her face, not when I would never have that
bonding moment between a mother and daughter in a
bathroom before an elegant night on the town, when I could
let her try the eye shadow, a smudge of mascara, pink
lipstick.
The funeral director told me that it might be nice to have a
table of mementos that meant something to Elizabeth
stuffed animals or family vacation photos, chocolate chip
cookies. To play her favorite music. To let her school
friends write messages to her, which could be buried in a
silk satchel inside the coffin.
What I wanted to say to him was: Dont you realize that by
tel ing me the same things you tel everyone else about how
to make a meaningful funeral, you are making it
meaningless? That Elizabeth deserved fireworks, an angel
choir, the world turning backward on its axis.
In the end, I had dressed Elizabeth in a bal erinas tutu, one
she somehow always wanted to wear when we went
grocery shopping, and that I always made her take off
before we left. I let the funeral director put makeup on her
face for the first time. I gave her a stuffed dog, her
stepfather, and most of my heart to take with her.
It was not an open-casket funeral; but before we left for the
graveside service, the funeral director lifted the cover to
make final adjustments. At that moment, I pushed him out of
the way.
Let me, I had said.
Kurt was wearing his uniform, as befitted a police officer
kil ed in the line of duty. He looked exactly like he did every
day, except for the fine white line around his finger where
his wedding ring had been. That, I now wore on a chain
around my neck.
Elizabeth looked delicate, angelic. Her hair was tied up in
matching ribbons. Her arm was around her stepfathers
waist.
I reached into the coffin, and the moment my hand brushed
my daughters cheek I shivered, because somehow I had
stil expected it to be warmnot this fake-flesh, this cool-to-
the-touch skin. I tugged the ribbons out of her hair, gently
lifted her head, fanned her hair on both sides of her face. I
tugged the left leotard sleeve down a quarter inch, to match
the one on the right.
I hope youre pleased, the funeral director had said.
It didnt look like Elizabeth, not one bit, because she was
too perfect. My daughter would have been rumpled and
untucked, her hands dirty from chasing frogs, her socks
mismatched, her wrists ringed with bracelets shed beaded
herself.
But in a world where things happen that shouldnt, you find
yourself saying and doing things that are the complete
opposite of what you mean. So I had nodded, and watched
him seal away the two people I loved most in this world.
Now I found myself in the same position Id been in eleven
years ago, standing in the middle of my daughters
bedroom and sifting through her clothes. I sorted through
shirts and skirts and tights, jeans as soft as flannel and a
sweatshirt that stil smel ed like the apple orchard where
she last wore it. I chose a pair of flared black leggings and
a long-sleeved tee that had Tinker Bel printed on it
clothes that I had seen Claire wear on the laziest of
Sundays, when it was snowing and there was nothing to be
done but read the Sunday paper and doze with your cheek
pressed against the wal of heat thrown by the fireplace. I
picked out a pair of underwearSATURDAY, it read
across the front, but I couldnt find any other days of the
week scattered in the drawer. It was when I was looking that
I found, wrapped in a red bandanna, the photograph. In a
tiny silver oval frame, I thought at first it was one of Claires
baby picturesand then I realized it was Elizabeth.
The frame used to sit on top of the piano that nobody
played anymore, gathering dust. The fact that I never even
noticed it was missing was a testament to the fact that I
must have learned how to live again.
Which is why I col ected the clothes and put them into a
shopping bag to take to the hospital: an outfit in which I
sincerely hoped I would not bury my daughter, but instead,
bring her back home.
Lucius
These nights, I slept wel . There were no more sweats, no
diarrhea, no fevers to keep me thrashing in my bunk. Crash
Vitale was stil in solitary, so his rants didnt wake me. From
time to time, the extra officer whod been assigned to Shay
for protection would prowl through the tier, his boots a soft-
soled shuffle on the catwalk.
I had been sleeping so wel , in fact, that I was surprised I
woke up to the quiet conversation going on in the cel next
door to mine. “Wil you just let me explain?” Shay asked.
“What if theres another way?”
I waited to hear whom he was talking to, but there was no
answer.
“Shay?” I said. “Are you okay?”
“I tried to give away my heart,” I heard him say. “And look at
what it turned into.” Shay kicked at the wal ; something
heavy in his cel tumbled to the floor. “I know what you want.
But do you know what I want?”
“Shay?”
His voice was just a braid of breath. “Abba?”
“Its me. Lucius.”
There was a beat of silence. “You were listening to my
conversation.”
Was it a conversation if you were having a monologue in
your own cel ? “I didnt mean to … you woke me up.”
“Why were you asleep?” Shay asked.
“Because its three in the morning?” I replied. “Because
thats what youre supposed to be doing?”
“What Im supposed to be doing,” Shay repeated. “Right.”
There was a thud, and I realized Shay had fal en. The last
time that had happened, hed been having a seizure. I
scrabbled under neath the bunk and pul ed out the mirror-
shank. “Shay,” I cal ed out.
“Shay?”
In the reflection, I could see him. He was on his knees in the
front of the cel , with his hands spread wide. His head was
bowed, and he was bathed in sweat, whichfrom the dim
crimson light on the catwalklooked like beads of blood.
“Go away,” he said, and I withdrew the mirror from the slats
of my own door, giving him privacy.
As I hid away my makeshift mirror, I caught a glimpse of my
own reflection.
Like Shays, my skin looked scarlet. And yet even that
didnt stop me from noticing the familiar ruby sore that had
opened up once again across my foreheada scar, a
stain, a planets moving storm.
M I C H A EL
Shays last foster mother, Renata Ledoux, was a Catholic
who lived in Bethlehem, New Hampshire, and as Id
traveled up to meet with her, the irony of the name of the
town where Shay had spent his teenage years did not
escape me. I was wearing my col ar and had on my gravest
priest demeanor, because I was pul ing out al the stops. I
was going to say whatever was necessary to find out what
had happened to Grace.
As it turned out, though, it hardly took any work at al .
Renata invited me in for tea, and when I told her I had a
message for Grace from a person in my congregation, she
simply wrote out an address and handed it to me. “Were
stil in touch,” she said simply. “Gracie was a good girl.”
I couldnt help but wonder what she thought of Shay. “Didnt
she have a brother?”
“That boy,” Renata had said, “deserves to burn in hel .”
It was ludicrous to believe that Renata had not heard about
Shays death sentencethe news would have reached up
here, even in rural Bethlehem. I had thought, maybe, as his
foster mother, shed at least harbor some soft spot for him.
But then again, the boy shed raised had left her home to
go to juvenile prison, and had grown up to become a
convicted murderer. “Yes,” Id said. “Wel .”
Now, twenty minutes later, I was approaching Graces
house, and hoping for a better reception. It was the pink
one with gray shutters and the number 131 on a carved
stone at the end of the drivebut the shades were drawn,
the garage door was closed. There were no plants hanging
on the porch, no doors open for a breeze, no outgoing mail
in the boxnothing to indicate that the inhabitant was
home.
I got out of my car and rang the doorbel . Twice.
Wel , I could leave a note and ask her to cal me. It would
take more timetime Shay did not real y havebut if it
was the best I could do, then so be it.
Just then the door opened just a crack. “Yes?” a voice
inside murmured.
I tried to see into the foyer, but it was pitch-dark. “Does
Grace Bourne live here?”
A hesitation. “Thats me.”
“Im Father Michael Wright. I have a message for you, from
one of the parishioners in my congregation.”
A slender hand slipped out. “You can give it to me,” Grace
said.
“Actual y, could I just come in for a bituse your restroom?
Its been a long drive from Concord …”
She hesitatedI suppose I would, too, if a strange man
showed up at my door and I was a woman living alone,
even if he was wearing a col ar. But the door opened wide
and Grace stepped back to let me in.
Her head was ducked to the side; a long curtain of black
hair hung over her face. I caught a glimpse of long dark
lashes and a ruby of a mouth; you could tel , even at first
glance, how pretty she must be. I wondered if she was
agoraphobic, painful y shy. I wondered who had hurt her so
much that she was afraid of the rest of the world.
I wondered if it was Shay.
“Grace,” I said, reaching for her hand. “Its nice to meet
you.”
She lifted her chin then, and the screen of hair fel back. The
entire left side of Grace Bournes face was ravaged and
pitted, a lava flow of skin that had been stretched and
sewed to cover an extensive burn.
“Boo,” she said.
” I … Im sorry. I didnt mean …”
“Everyone stares,” Grace said quietly. “Even the ones who
try not to.”
There was a fire. Shay had said. I dont want to talk about it.
I m sorry.
“Yeah, you said that already. The bathrooms down the hal .”
I put a hand on her arm. There were patches of skin there,
too, that were scarred. “Grace. That messageits from
your brother.”
She took a step away from me, stunned. “You know Shay?”
“He needs to see you, Grace. Hes going to die soon.”
“What did he say about me?”
“Not a lot,” I admitted. “But youre the only family he has.”
“Do you know about the fire?” Grace asked.
“Yes. It was why he went to juvenile prison.”
“Did he tel you that our foster father died in it?”
This time, it was my turn to be surprised. A juvenile record
would be sealed, which is why I hadnt known during the
capital murder trial what Shay had been convicted of. Id
assumed, when fire had been mentioned, that it was arson.
I hadnt realized that the charges might have included
negligent homicide, or even manslaughter. And I
understood exactly why, now, Renata Ledoux might
visceral y hate Shay.
Grace was staring at me intently. “Did he ask to see me?”
“He doesnt actual y know Im here.”
She turned away, but not before I saw that she had started
to cry.
“He didnt want me at his trial.”
“He probably didnt want you to have to witness that.”
“You dont know anything.” She buried her face in her
hands.
“Grace,” I said, “come back with me. Come see him.”
“I cant,” she sobbed. “I cant. You dont understand.”
But I was beginning to: Shay had set the fire that had
disfigured her. “Thats al the more reason to meet with him.
Forgive him, before its too late.”
“Forgive him? Forgive him?” Grace parroted. “No matter
what I say, it wont change what happened. You dont get to
do your life over.” She glanced away. “I think … I just… you
should go.”
It was my dismissal. I nodded, accepting.
“The bathrooms the second door on the right.”
Rightmy ruse to get inside. I walked down the hal to a
restroom that was floral, overpowering in a scent of air
freshener and rose potpourri.
There were little crocheted toilet paper holders, a
crocheted bra for the toilet tank, and a crocheted cover for
the Kleenex box. There were roses on the shower curtain,
and art on the wal sframed prints of flowers, except for
one of a childs drawinga dragon, or maybe a lizard. The
room felt like the kind of abode for an elderly lady whod
lost count of her cats. It was stifling; slowly, Grace Bourne
was suffocating herself to death.
If Shay knew that his sister forgave him for the fire, then
maybeeven if he wasnt al owed to donate his heartit
would be enough to let him die in peace. Grace was in no
condition to be convinced right now, but I could work on her.
Id get her phone number and cal her, until Id worn down
her resistance.
I opened the sliding mirrored medicine cabinet, looking for
a prescription with Graces phone number so that I could
copy it down.
There were lotions and creams and exfoliants, toothpaste
and floss and deodorant. There was also a medicine bottle
of Ambien, with Graces phone number across the top of
the label. I wrote it on the inside of my palm with a pen and
set the pil s back on the shelf, beside a smal pewter frame.
Two tiny children sat at a table: Grace in a high chair with a
glass of milk in front of her, and Shay hunched over a
picture he was drawing. A dragon, or maybe a lizard.
He was smiling, so wide it looked like it might hurt.
Every inmate is someones child. And so is every victim.
I walked out of the bathroom. Handing Grace a card with
my name and number on it, I thanked her. “Just in case you
change your mind.”
“Mine was never the one that needed changing,” Grace
said, and closed the door behind me. Immediately I heard
the bolt slide shut, the curtain in the front window rustle. I
kept envisioning the dragon pic hire, which was careful y
matted and framed in the bathroom, TO GRACIE, it had
said in the upper left-hand corner.
I was al the way to Crawford Notch before I realized what
had been niggling in my mind about that photo of Shay as a
child. In it, hed been holding a pen in his right hand. But in
prisonwhen he ate, when he wrotehe was a lefty.
Could someone change so radical y over a lifetime? Or
could al of these changes in Shayfrom his dominant
hand to his miracles to his ability to quote the Gospel of
Thomashave come from some … possession?
It sounded like some bad science fiction movie, but that
wasnt to say it couldnt happen. If prophets could be
overtaken by the Holy Spirit, why not a murderer?
Or, maybe it was simpler than that. Maybe who we were in
the past informed who we chose to be in the future. Maybe
Shay had intentional y shifted his writing hand. Maybe he
cultivated miracles, to make up for a sin as horrible as
setting a fire that took the lives of two peopleone literal,
one metaphorical. It struck me that even in the Bible, there
was no record of Jesuss life between the ages of eight and
thirty-three. What if hed done something awful; what if his
later years were a response to that?
You could do a horrible thing, and then spend your whole
natural life trying to atone.
I knew that better than anyone.
Mdggie
The last conversation I had with Shay Bourne, before
putting him on the stand as a witness, had not gone wel . In
the holding cel , Id reminded him what was going to
happen in court. Shay didnt deal wel with curves being
thrown at him; he could just as likely become bel igerent as
curl up in a bal beneath the wooden stand. Either way, the
judge would think he was crazyand that couldnt happen.
“So after the marshal helps you into the seat,” I had
explained, “theyre going to bring you a Bible.”
“I dont need one.”
“Right. But they need you to swear on it.”
“I want to swear on a comic book,” Shay had replied. “Or a
Playboy magazine.”
“You have to swear on a Bible,” Id said, “because we have
to play by their rules before were al owed to change the
game.”
Just then, a U.S. marshal had come to tel me that court
was about to convene. “Remember,” I had said to Shay,
“focus only on me. Nothing else in that courtrooms
important. Its just us, having a chat.”
He had nodded, but I could see that he was jittery. And now,
as I watched him being brought into the courtroom,
everyone else could see it, too. He was bound at the ankles
and the wrists, with a bel y chain to link the others; the links
rattled as he shuddered into his seat beside me.
His head was ducked, and he was murmuring words no
one but I could hear. He was actual y cursing out one of the
U.S. marshals whod led him into the courtroom, but with
any luck, people who watched his mouth moving silently
would think he was praying.
As soon as I put him on the witness stand, a quiet pal fel
over the people in the gal ery. You are not like us, their
silence seemed to say. You never wil be. And there,
without me asking a single question, was my answer: no
amount of piousness could erase the stain on the hands of
a murderer.
I walked in front of Shay and waited until he caught my eye.
Focus, I mouthed, and he nodded. He gripped the front of
the witness box railing, and his chains clinked.
Dammit. Id forgotten to tel him to keep his hands in his lap.
It would be less of a reminder to the judge and the gal ery
that he was a convicted felon.
“Shay,” I asked, “why do you want to donate your heart?”
He stared right at me. Good boy. “I have to save her.”
“Who?”
“Claire Nealon.”
“Wel ,” I said, “youre not the only person in the world who
can save Claire. There are other suitable heart donors.”
“Im the one who took the most away from her,” Shay said,
just like we had practiced. “I have the most to give back to
her.”
“Is this about clearing your conscience?” I asked.
Shay shook his head. “Its about clearing the slate.”
So far, I thought, so good. He sounded rational, and clear,
and calm.
“Maggie?” Shay said just then. “Can I stop now?”
I smiled tightly. “Not quite yet, Shay. Weve got a few more
questions.”
“The questions are bul shit.”
There was a gasp in the rear of the gal eryprobably one
of the bluehaired ladies Id seen filing in with their Bibles
wrapped in protective quilted cozies, who hadnt stumbled
across a cuss word since before menopause.
“Shay,” I said, “we dont use that language in court.
Remember?”
“Why is it cal ed court?” he asked. “Its not like a tennis
court or a basketbal court, where youre playing a game.
Or maybe you are, and thats why theres a winner and a
loser, except it has nothing to do with how wel you make a
three-point shot or how fast your serve is.” He looked at
Judge Haig. “I bet you play golf.”
“Ms. Bloom,” the judge said. “Control your witness.”
If Shay didnt shut up, I was going to personal y cover his
mouth with my hand. “Shay, tel me about your religious
upbringing as a child,”
I said firmly.
“Religions a cult. You dont get to choose your own religion.
Youre what your parents tel you you are; its not upbringing
at al , just a brainwashing.
When a babys getting water poured over his head at a
christening he cant say, Hey man, Id rather be a Hindu,
can he?”
“Shay, I know this is hard for you, and I know that being here
is very distracting,” I said. “But I need you to listen to the
question Im asking, and answer it. Did you go to church
when you were a kid?”
“Part of the time. And part of the time I didnt go anywhere
at al , except hide in the closet so I wouldnt get beat up by
another kid or the foster dad, whod try to keep everyone in
line with a metal hairbrush. It kept us in line, al right, al the
way down our backs. The whole foster care system in this
country is a joke; it ought to be cal ed foster dont care,
dont give a shit except for the stipend youre getting from
the”
“Shay!” I warned him with a flash of my eyes. “Do you
believe in God?”
This question, somehow, seemed to calm him down. “I
know God,”
Shay said.
“Tel me how.”
“Everyones got a little God in them … and a little murder in
them, too. Its how your life turns out that makes you lean to
one side or the other.”
“Whats God like?”
“Math,” Shay said. “An equation. Except when you take
everything away, you get infinity, instead of zero.”
“And where does God live, Shay?”
He leaned forward, lifted his chained hands so that the
metal chinked. He pointed to his heart. “Here.”
“You said you used to go to church when you were a kid. Is
the God you believe in today the same God you were
taught about at church?”
Shay shrugged. “Whatever road you take, the view is going
to be the same.”
I was nearly a hundred percent certain Id heard that phrase
before, at the one and only Bikram yoga class Id attended,
before I decided that my body wasnt meant to bend in
certain ways. I couldnt believe Greenleaf wasnt objecting,
on the grounds that channeling the Dalai Lama wasnt the
same as answering a question. Then again, I could believe
Greenleaf wasnt objecting. The more Shay said, the
crazier he appeared.
It was hard to take someones claims about religion
seriously when he sounded delusional; Shay was digging a
grave big enough for both of us.
“If the judge orders you to die by lethal injection, Shay, and
you cant donate your heartwil that upset God?” I asked.
“Itl upset me. So yeah, itl upset God.”
“Wel , then,” I said, “what is it about giving your heart to
Claire Nealon that wil please God?”
He smiled at me thenthe sort of smile you see on the
faces of saints in frescoes, and that makes you wish you
knew their secret. “My end,”
Shay said, “is her beginning.”
I had a few more questions, but to be honest, I was terrified
of what Shay might say. He already was talking in riddles.
“Thank you,” I replied, and sat down.
“I have a question, Mr. Bourne,” Judge Haig said. “Theres
a lot of talk about odd things that have occurred at the
prison. Do you believe you can perform miracles?”
Shay looked at him. “Do youT
“Im sorry, but thats not how a courtroom works. Im not
al owed to answer your question, but you stil need to
answer mine. So,” the judge said, “do you believe you can
perform miracles?”
“I just did what I was supposed to. You can cal that
whatever you want.”
The judge shook his head. “Mr. Greenleaf, your witness.”
Suddenly, a man in the gal ery stood up. He unzipped his
jacket, revealing a T-shirt that had been emblazoned with
the numbers 3:16. He started yel ing, his voice hoarse. “For
God so loved the world that he gave his only son” By
then, two U.S. marshals had descended, hauling him out of
his seat and dragging him up the al ey, as the news
cameras swiveled to fol ow the action. “His only son!” the
man yel ed. “Only! You are going to hel once they pump
your veins ful of” The doors of the courtroom banged shut
behind him, and then it was utterly silent.
It was impressive that this man had gotten into the court in
the first placethere were checkpoints with metal
detectors and marshals in place before you entered. But
his weapon had been the fundamental fury of his
righteousness, and at that moment, I would have been
hardpressed to decide whether he or Shay had come off
looking worse.
“Yes,” Gordon Greenleaf said, getting to his feet. “Wel .” He
walked toward Shay, who rested his chained hands on the
witness stand rail again. “Youre the only person who
subscribes to your religion?”
“No.”
“No?”
“I dont belong to a religion. Religions the reason the
worlds fal ing apartdid you see that guy get carted out of
here? Thats what religion does. It points a finger. It causes
wars. It breaks apart countries. Its a petri dish for
stereotypes to grow in. Religions not about being holy,”
Shay said. “Just holier-than-thou.”
At the plaintiffs table, I closed my eyesat the very least,
Shay had surely just lost the case for himself; at the most, I
was going to wind up with a cross being burned on my
lawn. “Objection,” I said feebly. “Its not responsive.”
“Overruled,” the judge replied. “Hes not your witness now,
Ms.
Bloom.”
Shay continued muttering, more quietly now. “You know
what religion does? It draws a big fat line in the sand. It
says, If you dont do it my way youre out. “
He wasnt yel ing, he wasnt out of control. But he wasnt in
control, either. He brought his hands up to his neck, started
scratching at it as the chains jangled down his chest.
“These words,” he said, “theyre cutting my throat.”
“Judge,” I said immediately, alert to a rapidly approaching
meltdown.
“Can we take a recess?”
Shay started rocking back and forth.
“Fifteen minutes,” Judge Haig said, and the U.S. marshals
approached to remand Shay into custody. Panicking, Shay
cowered and raised his arms in defense. And we al
watched as the chains he was wearingthe ones that had
secured him at the wrists and the ankles and the waist, the
ones that had jangled throughout his testimonyfel to the
floor with a clatter, as if theyd been no more substantial
than smoke.
“Religion often gets in the way of God.”
-BONO, AT THE NATIONAL PRAYER BREAKFAST,
FEBRUARY 2, 2006
Maggie
Shay stood, his arms akimbo, looking just as surprised to
be unshackled as we were to see him that way. There was
a col ective moment of disbelief, and then chaos exploded
in the courtroom. Screams rang out from the gal ery. One
marshal dragged the judge off the bench and into his
chambers while the other drew his weapon, yel ing for Shay
to put his hands up. Shay froze, only to have the marshal
tackle and handcuff him.
“Stop!” Father Michael cried behind me. “He doesnt know
whats happening!”
As the marshal pushed Shays head against the wooden
floor, he looked up at us, terrified.
I whipped around to face the priest. “What the hel s going
on? Hes gone from being Jesus to being Houdini?”
“This is the kind of thing he does,” Father Michael said.
Was it me, or did I hear a note of satisfaction in his voice?
“I tried to tel you.”
“Let me tel you,” I shot back. “Our friend Shay just earned
himself a one-way ticket to the lethal injection gurney,
unless one of us can convince him to say something to
Judge Haig to explain what just happened.”
“Youre his lawyer,” Michael said.
“Youre his advisor.”
“Remember how I told you Shay wont talk to me?”
I rol ed my eyes. “Could we just pretend were not in seventh
grade anymore, and do our jobs?”
He let his gaze slide away, and immediately I knew that
whatever else this conversation had to hold, it wasnt going
to be pleasant.
By now, the courtroom had emptied. I had to get to Shay
and put a solitary, cohesive thought in his head, one that I
hoped he could retain long enough to take to the witness
stand. I didnt have time for Father Michaels confessions
right now.
“I was on the jury that convicted Shay,” the priest said.
My mother had a trick shed employed since I was a
teenagerif I said something that made her want to (a)
scream, (b) whack me, or (c) both, she would count to ten,
her lips moving silently, before she responded.
I could feel my mouth rounding out the syl ables of the
numbers, and with some dismay I realized that final y, I had
become my mother. “Is that al ?” I asked.
“Isnt that enough!”
“Just making sure.” My mind raced. I could get into a lot of
trouble for not tel ing Greenleaf that fact in advance. Then
again, I hadnt known in advance. “Is there a reason you
waited so long to mention this?”
“Dont ask, dont tel ,” he said, parroting my own words. “At
first I thought Id just help Shay understand redemption, and
then Id tel you the truth. But Shay wound up teaching me
about redemption, and you said my testimony was critical,
and I thought maybe it was better you didnt know. I thought
it wouldnt screw up the trial quite as much …”
I held up my hand, stopping him. “Do you support it?” I
asked. “The death penalty?”
The priest hesitated before he spoke. “I used to.”
I would have to tel Greenleaf. Even if Father Michaels
testimony was stricken from the record, though, you couldnt
make the judge forget hearing it; the damage had been
done. Right now, however, I had more important things to
do. “I have to go.”
In the holding cel , I found Shay stil distraught, his eyes
squinched shut. “Shay?” I said. “Its Maggie. Look at me.”
“I cant,” he cried. “Turn the volume down.”
The room was quiet; there was no radio playing, no sound
at al . I glanced at the marshal, who shrugged. “Shay,” I
commanded, coming up to the bars of the cel . “Open your
goddamn eyes.”
One eye squinted open a crack, then the other.
“Tel me how you did it.”
“Did what?”
“Your little magic act in there.”
He shook his head. “I didnt do anything.”
“You managed to get out of handcuffs,” I said. “What did
you do, make a key and hide it in a seam?”
“I dont have a key. I didnt unlock them.”
Wel , technical y, this was true. What Id seen were the stil -
fastened cuffs, clattering to the floor, while Shays hands
were somehow free of them. He certainly could have
unfastened the locks and snapped them shut againbut it
would have been noisy, something we al would have heard.
And we hadnt.
“I didnt do anything,” Shay repeated.
Id read somewhere of magicians who learned to dislocate
their shoulders to get out of straitjackets; maybe this had
been Shays secret.
Maybe he could double-joint his thumbs or resettle the
bones of his fingers and slide out of the metal fittings
without anyone being the wiser.
“Okay. Whatever.” I exhaled heavily. “Heres the thing, Shay.
I dont know if youre a magician, or a messiah. I dont know
very much about salvation, or miracles, or any of those
things that Father Michael and Ian Fletcher talked about. I
dont even know if I believe in God. But what I do know is
the law. And right now, everyone in that courtroom thinks
youre a raving lunatic. You have to pul it together.” I
glanced at Shay and saw him looking at me with utter
focus, his eyes clear and shrewd. “You have one chance,” I
said slowly. “One chance to speak to the man who wil
decide how you die, and whether Claire Nealon gets to live.
So what are you going to tel him?”
Once, when I was in sixth grade, I let the most popular girl in
the school cheat off my paper during a math test. “You know
what,” she said after ward, “youre not total y uncool.” She
let me sit with her at the lunch table and for one glorious
Saturday, I was invited to the mal with her Gordian knot of
friends, who spritzed perfume onto their wrists at
department stores and tried on expensive skinny jeans that
didnt even come in my size. (I told them I had my period,
and I didnt ever shop for jeans when I was bloateda total
lie, and yet one of the girls offered to show me how to make
myself throw up in the bathroom to take off that extra five.) It
was when I was getting a makeover at the Clinique counter,
with no intent of buying any of the makeup, that I looked in a
mirror and realized I did not like the girl staring back. To be
the person they wanted me to be, Id lost myself.
Watching Shay take the witness stand again, I thought
about that sixthgrade thril Id gotten when, for a moment, Id
been part of the in-crowd; Id been popular. The gal ery,
hushed, waited for another outburstbut Shay was mild-
mannered and calm, quiet to a fault. He was triple-chained,
and had to hobble to the stand, where he didnt look at
anyone and simply waited for me to address him with the
question we had practiced. I wondered whether remaking
him in the image of a viable plaintiff said more about who
he was wil ing to be, or whom I had become.
“Shay,” I said. “What do you want to tel this court?”
He looked up at the ceiling, as if he were waiting for the
words to drift down like snow. “The Spirit of the Lord is on
me, because he has anointed me to preach good news,”
he murmured.
“Amen,” said a woman in the gal ery.
Il be honest, this was not quite what I had had in mind
when I had told Shay he could make one final attempt to
sway this court. To me, religious scripture sounded just as
wacky and zealous as the diatribe Shay had given on the
nature of organized religion. But maybe Shay was smarter
than I was, because his quote made the judge purse his
lips. “Is that from the Bible, Mr. Bourne?”
“I dont know,” Shay replied. “I dont remember where it
comes from.”
A tiny paper airplane torpedoed over my shoulder to land in
my lap.
I opened it up, read Father Michaels hastily scrawled note.
“Yes, Judge,” I said quickly. “It is.”
“Marshal,” Judge Haig said, “bring me the Bible.” He began
to thumb through the onionskin pages. “Do you happen to
know where, Ms.
Bloom?”
I didnt know when or if Shay Bourne had been reading
scripture.
This quote could have come from the priest; it could have
come from God; it could have been the only line he knew in
the whole Old Testament.
But somehow, hed piqued the interest of Judge Haig, who
was no longer dismissing my client outright, but instead
tracing the pages of the Bible as if it were written in Brail e.
I stood, armed with Father Michaels citation. “Its in Isaiah,
Your Honor,” I said.
During the lunch recess, I drove to my office. Not because I
had such an inviolable work ethic (although technical y I had
sixteen other cases going at the same time as Shays, my
boss had given me his blessing to put them on the back
burner of the largest metaphorical stove ever), but because
I just needed to get away from the trial completely. The
secretary at the ACLU office blinked when I walked through
the door. “Arent you supposed to be”
“Yes,” I snapped, and I walked through the maze of filing
cabinets to my desk.
I didnt know how Shays outburst would affect the judge. I
didnt know if Id already lost this case, before the defense
had even presented its witnesses. I did know that I hadnt
slept wel in three weeks and was flat out of rabbit food for
Oliver, and I was having a real y bad hair day. I rubbed my
hands down my face, and then realized Id probably
smeared my mascara.
With a sigh, I glanced at the mountain of paperwork on my
desk that had been steadily growing without me there to act
as clearinghouse.
350 J O D I P I C O U LT
There was an appeal that had been filed in the Supreme
Court by the attorneys of a skinhead whod written the word
towelhead in white paint on the driveway of his employer, a
Pakistani convenience store owner whod fired him for
being drunk on the job; some research about why the words
under God had been added to the Pledge of Al egiance in
i954 during the McCarthy era; and a stack of mail equal y
balanced between desperate souls who wanted me to fight
on their behalf and right-wing conservatives who berated
the ACLU for making it criminal to be a white churchgoing
Christian.
One letter sifted through my hands and dropped onto my
lapa plain envelope printed with the address of the New
Hampshire State Prison, the Office of the Warden. I
opened it and found inside a pressed white sheet of paper,
stil bearing its watermark.
It was an invitation to attend the execution of Isaiah Bourne.
The guest list included the attorney general, the governor,
the lawyer who original y prosecuted Shays case, me,
Father Michael, and several other names I didnt recognize.
By law, there had to be a certain number of people present
for an execution from both the inmates and the victims
sides. In this, it was a bit like organizing a wedding. And
just like a wedding, there was a number to cal to RSVP
It was fifteen days before Shay was scheduled to die.
Clearly, I was the only one who found it remotely hilarious
that the first and only witness the defense cal edthe
commissioner of correctionswas a man named Joe
Lynch. He was a tal , thin man whose sense of humor had
apparently dissipated along with the hair on his scalp. I was
quite sure that when he took the job, hed never dreamed
that he would be faced with New Hampshires first
execution in more than half a century.
“Commissioner Lynch,” the assistant attorney general said,
“what preparations have been made for the execution of
Shay Bourne?”
“As youre aware,” Lynch said, “the State of New
Hampshire was not equipped to deal with the death
sentence handed down to Inmate Bourne. Wed hoped that
the job could be done at Terre Haute, but found out that
wasnt going to happen. To that end, weve had to construct
a lethal injection chamberwhich now occupies a good
corner of what used to be our exercise yard at the state
penitentiary.”
“Can you give us a breakdown of the costs involved?”
The commissioner began to read from a ledger. “The
architectural and construction fees for the project were
$39,100. A lethal injection gurney cost $830. The
equipment associated with lethal injection cost $684. In
addition, the human cost included meeting with staff,
training the staff, and attending hearingstotaling $48,846.
Initial supplies were $1,361, and the chemicals cost $426.
In addition to this, several physical improvements were
made to the space where the execution would occur:
vertical blinds in the witness area, a dimmer switch in the
chamber, a tinted one-way mirror, air-conditioning and an
emergency generator, a wireless microphone and amplifier
into the viewing area, a mono plug phone jack. These ran
up to $14,669.”
“Youve done the math, Commissioner. By your calculation,
what do you estimate youve spent on Shay Bournes
execution so far?”
“$105,916.”
“Commissioner,” Greenleaf asked, “does the State of New
Hampshire have a gal ows that could be used if the court
ordered Mr. Bourne to be hanged?”
“Not anymore,” Lynch replied.
“Would it be correct to assume, then, that there would be an
additional outlay for the taxpayers of New Hampshire if a
new gal ows had to be constructed?”
“Thats correct.”
“What specifications are needed to build a gal ows?”
The commissioner nodded. “A floor height of at least nine
feet, a crossbeam of nine feet, with a clearance of three
feet above the inmate being executed. The opening in the
trapdoor would have to be at least three feet to ensure
proper clearance. There would have to be a means of
releasing the trapdoor and stopping it from swinging after it
has been opened, and a fastening mechanism for the rope
with the noose.”
In a few short sentences, Gordon Greenleaf had recentered
this trial from the woo-woo touchy-feely freedom-of-religion
aspect, to the inevitability of Shays imminent death. I
glanced at Shay. He had gone white as the blank sheet of
paper framed between his chained hands.
“Youre looking at no less than seventy-five hundred for
construction and materials,” the commissioner said. “In
addition, there would be the investment of a body restraint.”
“Whats that, exactly?” Greenleaf asked.
“A waist strap with two wrist restraints, made of three-
thousandpound test nylon, and another leg restraint made
from the same materials.
Wed need a framebasical y, a human dol y that enables
the officers to transport the inmate to the gal ows in the
event of a physical col apseand a hood, and a
mechanical hangmans knot.”
“You cant just use rope?”
“Not if youre talking about a humane execution,” the
commissioner said. “This knot is made from a Delran
cylinder and has two longitudinal holes and a steel U-clamp
to fasten the rope, as wel as a noose sleeve, a rope in
thirty-foot lengths, knot lubricant…”
Even I was impressed at how much time and thought had
gone into the death of Shay Bourne. “Youve done a great
deal of research,” Greenleaf said.
Lynch shrugged. “Nobody wants to execute a man. Its my
job to do it with as much dignity as possible.”
“What would be the cost of constructing and purchasing al
this equipment, Commissioner Lynch?”
“A bit less than ten thousand.”
“And you said the State of New Hampshire has already
invested over a hundred thousand on the execution of Shay
Bourne?”
“Thats correct.”
“Would it be a burden on the penitentiary system if you
were required to construct a gal ows at this time, in order to
accommodate Mr.
Bournes socal ed religious preferences?”
The commissioner puffed out a long breath. “It would be
more than a burden. It would be damn near impossible,
given the date of the execution.”
“Why?”
“The law said we were to execute Mr. Bourne by lethal
injection, and we are ready and able to do it, after much
preparation. I wouldnt feel personal y and professional y
comfortable cutting corners to create a lastminute gal ows.”
“Maggie,” Shay whispered, “I think Im going to throw up.”
I shook my head. “Swal ow it.”
He lay his head down on the table. With any luck a few
sympathetic people would assume that he was crying.
“If you were ordered by the court to construct a gal ows,”
Greenleaf asked, “how long would it delay Mr. Bournes
execution?”
“Id say six months to a year,” the commissioner said.
“A whole year that Inmate Bourne would live past his
execution warrant date?”
“Yes.”
“Why so long?”
“Youre talking about construction going on inside a
working penitentiary system, Mr. Greenleaf. Background
checks have to be done before a crew can come to work
inside our gatestheyre bringing in tools from the outside,
which can be security threats; we have to have officers
standing guard to watch them to make sure they dont
wander into insecure areas; we have to make sure theyre
not trying to pass contraband to the inmates. It would be a
substantial burden on the correctional institution if we had
to, wel , start from scratch.”
“Thank you, Commissioner,” Greenleaf said. “Nothing
further.”
I rose from my seat and approached the commissioner.
“Your estimate for constructing the gal ows is about ten
thousand dol ars?”
“Yes.”
“So in fact, the cost to hang Shay Bourne would be one-
tenth the cost of executing him by lethal injection.”
“Actual y,” the commissioner said, “it would be a hundred
and ten percent. You cant get a lethal injection chamber at
Nordstrom with a satisfaction guarantee, Ms. Bloom. I cant
return what weve already built.”
“Wel , you needed to construct that chamber anyway, didnt
you?”
“Not if Inmate Bourne isnt going to be executed that way.”
“The Department of Corrections didnt have the lethal
injection chamber available for any other death row
prisoners, however.”
“Ms. Bloom,” the commissioner said, “New Hampshire
doesnt have any other death row prisoners.”
I couldnt very wel suggest that in the future we mightno
one wanted to entertain that option. “Would executing Shay
Bourne by hanging affect the safety of the other inmates in
the prison?”
“No. Not during the actual process.”
“Would it impinge on the safety of the officers there?”
“No.”
“And in terms of the personnelthere would be, in fact, less
manpower needed for an execution by hanging than an
execution by lethal injection, correct?”
“Yes,” the commissioner said.
“So theres no safety issue involved in changing Shays
method of execution.
Not for staff, and not for inmates. The only thing you can
point to as a burden on the Department of Corrections,
real y, is a cost of just under ten thousand dol ars to
construct a gal ows. Ten thousand lousy bucks. Is that right,
Commissioner?”
The judge caught the commissioners eye. “Do you have
that in the budget?”
“I dont know,” Lynch said. “Budgets are always tight.”
“Your Honor, I have here a copy of the budget of the
Department of Corrections, to be entered into evidence.” I
handed it to Greenleaf, to Judge Haig, and final y, to
Commissioner Lynch. “Commissioner, does this look
familiar?”
“Yes.”
“Can you read me the line thats highlighted?”
Lynch settled his spectacles on his nose. “Supplies for
capital punishment,”
he said. “Nine thousand eight hundred and eighty dol ars.”
“By supplies, what did you mean?”
“Chemicals,” the commissioner said. “And whatever else
came along.”
What he meant, I was sure, was a fudge line in the budget.
“By your own testimony, chemicals would only cost four
hundred and twenty-six dol ars.”
“We didnt know what else might be involved,” Lynch said.
“Police blocks, traffic direction, medical supplies, extra
manpower on staff…
this is our first execution in nearly seventy years. We
budgeted conservatively, so that we wouldnt find ourselves
short when it actual y came to pass.”
“If that money was going to be spent on Shay Bournes
execution no matter what, does it real y matter whether its
used to purchase Sodium Pentothal… or to construct a
gal ows?”
“Uh,” Lynch stammered. “Its stil not ten thousand dol ars.”
“No,” I admitted. “Youre a hundred and twenty dol ars short.
Tel me … is that worth the price of a mans soul?”
June
Someone once told me that when you give birth to a
daughter, youve just met the person whose hand youl be
holding the day you die. In the days after Elizabeth was
born, I would watch those minuscule fingers, the nail beds
born, I would watch those minuscule fingers, the nail beds
like tiny shel s, the surprisingly firm grip she had on my
index fingerand wonder if, years from now, Id be the one
holding on so tight.
It is unnatural to survive your child. It is like seeing an albino
butterfly, or a bloodred lake; a skyscraper tumbling down. I
had already been through it once; now I was desperate to
keep from experiencing that again.
Claire and I were playing Hearts, and dont think I didnt
appreciate the irony. The deck of cards showcased
Peanuts characters; my game strategy had nothing to do
with the suit, and everything to do with col ecting as many
Charlie Browns as I could. “Mom,” Claire said, “play like
you mean it.”
I looked up at her. “What are you talking about?”
“Youre cheating. But youre doing it so youl lose.” She
shuffled the remaining deck and turned over the top card.
“Why do you think theyre cal ed clubs?”
“I dont know.”
“Do you think its the kind you want to join? Or the kind that
you use to beat someone up?”
Behind her, on the cardiac monitor, Claires failing heart
chugged a steady rhythm. At moments like these, it was
hard to believe that she was as sick as she was. But then,
al I had to do was witness her trying to swing her legs over
the bed to go to the bathroom, see how winded she
became, to know that looks could be deceiving.
“Do you remember when you made up that secret society?”
I asked. “The one that met behind the hedge?”
Claire shook her head. “I never did that.”
“Of course you did,” I said. “You were little, thats why youve
forgotten. But you were absolutely insistent about who could
and couldnt be a member of the club. You had a stamp that
said CANCELED
and an ink padyou put it on the back of my hand, and if I
even wanted to tel you dinner was ready I had to give a
password first.”
Across the room, my cel phone began to ring in my purse. I
made a beeline for itmobile phones were strictly
verboten in the hospital, and if a nurse caught you with one,
you would be given the look of death. “Hel o?”
“June. This is Maggie Bloom.”
I stopped breathing. Last year, Claire had learned in school
that there were whole segments of the brain devoted to
involuntary acts like digesting and oxygen intake, which
was so evolutionarily clever; and yet, these systems could
be fel ed by the simplest of things: love at first sight; acts of
violence; words you did not want to hear.
“I dont have any formal news yet,” Maggie said, “but I
thought youd want to know: closing arguments start
tomorrow morning. And then, depending on how long the
judge deliberates, wel know if and when Claire wil have
the heart.” There was a crackle of silence. “Either way, the
execution wil take place in fifteen days.”
“Thank you,” I said, and closed the clamshel of the phone.
In twentyfour hours, I might know if Claire would live or die.
“Who cal ed?” Claire asked.
I slipped the phone into the pocket of my jacket. “The dry
cleaner,” I said. “Our winter coats are ready to be picked
up.”
Claire just stared at me; she knew I was lying. She
gathered up the cards, although we were not finished with
our game. “I dont want to play anymore,” she said.
“Oh. Okay.”
She rol ed onto her side, turning her face away from me. “I
never had stamps and an ink pad,” Claire murmured. “I
never had a secret club. Youre thinking of Elizabeth.”
“Im not thinking of” I said automatical y, but then I broke
off. I could clearly picture Kurt and I standing at the
bathroom sink, grinning as we scrubbed off the temporary
tattoos wed been given, wondering if our daughter would
speak to us at breakfast without that mark of faith. Claire
could not have initiated her father into her secret world; she
had never even met him.
“I told you so,” Claire said.
Lucius
Shay was not on I-tier often, but when he was, he was
transported to conference rooms and the infirmary. Hed tel
me, when he came back, about the psych tests they ran on
him; about the way they tapped at the crooks of his elbows,
checking his veins. I supposed it was important for them to
dot their is and cross their fs before the Big Event, so that
they didnt look stupid when the rest of the world was
watching.
The real reason they kept shuttling Shay around for medical
tests, though, was to get him out of the pod so that they
could have their practice runs. Theyd done a couple of
these in August. Id been in the exercise cage when the
warden led a smal group of COs to the lethal injection
chamber that was being built. I watched them in their hard
hats. “What we need to figure out, people,” Warden Coyne
had said, “is how long itl take the victims witnesses to get
from my office to the chamber. We cant have them
crossing paths with the inmates witnesses.”
Now that the chamber was finished, they had even more to
check and double-check: if the phone lines to the
governors office worked; if the straps on the gurney were
secure. Twice now, while Shay was at Medical, a group of
officersthe special ops team, who had volunteered to be
part of the executionarrived on I-tier. Id never seen any of
them before. I suppose that there is humanity in not having
the man who kil s you be the same guy who has brought you
your breakfast for the past eleven years.
And likewise: it must be easier to push the plunger on that
syringe if you havent had a conversation with the inmate
about whether the Patriots would win another Super Bowl.
This time, Shay had not wanted to go to Medical. He put up
a fight, saying that he was tired, that he didnt have any
blood left for them to draw. Not that he had a choice, of
coursethe officers would have dragged him there kicking
and screaming. Eventual y, Shay agreed to be chained so
that he could make the trip off I-tier, and fifteen minutes
after he was gone, the special ops team showed up. They
put an officer pretending to be Shay into his cel , and then
one of the other COs started a stopwatch.
“Were rol ing,” he said.
I dont know how the mistake happened, to be honest. I
mean, I suppose that was the whole point of a practice run
you were leaving room for human error. But somehow,
just as the special ops team was escorting Fake-Shay off
the pod as part of their training, the real Shay was entering
I-tier again. For a moment, they hesitated at the door,
gazing at one another.
Shay stared at his faux counterpart, until Officer Whitaker
had to drag him through the door of I-tier, and even then, he
craned his neck, trying to see where his future was
heading.
In the middle of the night, the officers came for Shay. He
was banging his head against the wal s of his cel ,
speaking in a river of gibberish. Usual y, I would have heard
al of thisI was often the first to know that Shay was upset
but I had slept through it. I woke up when the officers
arrived in their goggles and shields, swarming over him like
a clot of black cockroaches.
“Where are you taking him?” I yel ed, but the words sliced
my throat to ribbons. I thought of the run-through and
wondered if it was time for the real thing.
One of the officers turned to mea nice one, but in that
instant I could not grasp his name, although I had seen him
every week for the past six years. “Its okay, Lucius,” he
said. “Were just taking him to an observation cel , so he
doesnt hurt himself.”
When they left, I lay down on my bunk and pressed my palm
against my forehead. Fever: it was a school of fish
swimming through my veins.
Once before, Adam had cheated on me. I found a note in
his pocket when I went to take his shirts to the dry cleaner.
Gary, and a phone number.
When I asked him about it, he said it had only been one
night, after a show at the gal ery where he worked. Gary
was one of the artists, a man who created miniature cities
out of plaster of Paris. New York was currently on display.
He told me about the art-deco detail on the top of the
Chrysler Building; the individual leaves that were hand-
fastened to the trees on Park Avenue. I imagined Adam
standing with Gary, their feet planted in Central Park, their
arms around each other, monstrous as Godzil a.
It was a mistake, Adam had said. It was just so exciting, for
a minute, to know someone else was interested.
I could not imagine how people would not be interested in
Adam, with his pale green eyes, his mocha skin. I saw
heads turn al the time, gay and straight, when we walked
down the street.
It felt al wrong, he said, because it wasnt you.
I had been naive enough to believe then that you could take
something toxic and poisonous, and contain it so that youd
never be burned by it again. Youd think, after al that
happened later with Adam, I had learned my lesson. But
things like jealousy, rage, and infidelitythey dont
disappear.
They lie in wait, like a cobra, to strike you again when you
least expect it.
I looked down at my hands, at the dark blotches of Kaposis
sarcoma that had already begun to blend into one another,
turning my skin as dark as Adams, as if my punishment
were to reinvent myself in his image.
“Please dont do this,” I whispered. But I was begging to
stop something that had already started. I was praying,
although I couldnt remember to whom.
Maggie
After court had adjourned for the weekend, I took a trip to
the ladies
room. I was sitting in a stal when suddenly a microphone
snaked underneath the metal wal from the cubicle beside
mine. “Im El a Wyndhammer from FOX News,” a woman
said. “I wonder if you have a comment about the fact that
the White House has given a formal statement about the
Bourne trial and the separation of church and state?”
I hadnt been aware that the White House had given a
formal statement; there was a part of me that shivered with
a thril to know that wed attracted that much attention. Then
I considered what the statement most likely had been, and
how it probably wouldnt help my case at al . And then I
remembered that I was in the bathroom.
“Yeah, Ive got a comment,” I said, and flushed.
Because I didnt want to be ambushed by El a
Wyndhammer or any of the other hundred reporters
crawling over the steps of the courthouse like lichen, I
retreated into a foxholeokay, an attorney-client
conference roomand locked the door. I took out a legal
pad and began to write my closing for Monday, hoping that
by the time I finished, the reporters would have moved onto
a fresher kil .
It was dark when I slipped on my heels again and packed
away my notes. The lights had been turned off in the
courthouse; distantly, I could hear a custodian buffing the
floors. I walked through the lobby, past the dormant metal
detectors, took a deep breath, and opened the door.
The majority of the media had packed up for the night. In
the dis tance, though, I could see one tenacious reporter
holding his microphone.
He cal ed out my name.
I forged past him. “No comment,” I muttered, and then I
realized he wasnt a reporter, and he wasnt holding a
microphone.
“Its about time,” Christian said, and he handed me the
rose.
M I CHAEL
“Youre his spiritual advisor,” Warden Coyne said when he
phoned me at three in the morning. “Go give him some
advice.”
I had tried to explain to the warden that Shay and I werent
quite on speaking terms, but he hung up before I got the
chance. Instead, with a sigh, I dragged myself out of bed
and rode to the prison. Instead of taking me to I-tier,
however, the CO led me elsewhere. “Hes been moved,”
the officer explained.
“Why? Did someone hurt him again?”
“Nah, he was doing a good job of that on his own,” he said,
and as we stopped in front of Shays cel , I understood.
Bruises mottled most of his face. His knuckles were
scraped raw. A trickle of blood ran down his left temple. He
was chained at the wrists and ankles and bel y, even though
he was inside the cel . “Why havent you cal ed a doctor?” I
demanded.
“Hes been here three times,” the CO said. “Our boy, here,
keeps ripping off the bandages. Thats why we had to cuff
him.”
“If I promise you that hel stop doing whatever hes doing”
“Slamming his head into the wal ?”
“Right. If I give you my word, wil you take off the handcuffs?”
I turned to Shay, who was studiously avoiding me. “Shay?” I
said. “How does that sound?”
He didnt react one way or another, and I had no idea how I
was going to convince Shay to stop harming himself, but
the CO motioned him toward the cel door and removed the
cuffs from his wrists and ankles. The bel y chain, however,
stayed on. Uust in case,” he said, and left.
“Shay,” I said. “Why are you doing this?”
“Get the fuck away from me.”
“I know youre scared. And I know youre angry,” I said. “I
dont blame you.”
“Then I guess somethings changed. Because you sure did,
once.
You, and eleven other people.” Shay took a step forward.
“What was it like, in that room? Did you sit around talking
about what kind of monster would do those horrible things?
Did you ever think that you hadnt gotten the whole story?”
“Then why didnt you tel it?” I burst out. “You gave us
nothing, Shay. We had the prosecutions explanation of
what had happened; we heard from June. But you didnt
even stand up and ask us for a lenient sentence.”
“Who would believe what I had to say, over the word of a
dead cop?” he said. “My own lawyer didnt. He kept talking
about how we ought to use my troubled childhood to get me
offnot my story of what happened. He said I didnt look
like someone the jury would trust. He didnt care about me;
he just wanted to get his five seconds on the news at night.
He had a strategy. Wel , you know what his strategy was?
First he told the jury I didnt do it. Then it comes time for
sentencing and he says: Okay, he did it, but heres why you
shouldnt kil him for it. You might as wel admit that
pleading not guilty in the first place was a lie.”
I stared at him; stunned. It had never occurred to me during
the capital murder trial that al this might be whirling around
in Shays head; that the reason he did not get up and beg
for clemency during sentencing was because in order to do
that, it felt like hed also be admitting to the crime. Now that
I looked back on it, it had felt like the defense had changed
their tune between the penalty phase and the sentencing
phase of the trial. It had made it harder to believe anything
they said.
And Shay? Wel , hed been sitting right there, with his
unwashed hair and his vacant eyes. His silencewhich Id
read as pride, or shamemight only have been the
understanding that for people like him, the world did not
work the way it should. And I, like the other eleven jurors,
had judged him before any verdict was given. After al , what
kind of man gets put on trial for a double murder? What
prosecutor seeks the death penalty without good reason?
Since Id become his spiritual advisor, hed told me that
what had happened in the past didnt matter now, and Id
taken that to mean that he wouldnt accept responsibility for
what hed done. But it could also have meant that in spite of
his innocence, he knew he was stil going to die.
Id been present at that trial; Id heard al the testimony. To
think Shay might not have deserved a death sentence
seemed ridiculous, impossible.
Then again, so were miracles.
“But Shay,” I said quietly, “I heard that evidence. I saw what
you did.”
“I didnt do anything.” He ducked his head. “It was because
of the tools. I left them at the house. No one came when I
knocked on the door so I just went inside to get them …
and then I saw her.”
I felt my stomach turn over. “Elizabeth.”
“She used to play with me. A staring game. Whoever
smiled first, that was the loser. I used to get her every time,
and then one day while we were staring she lifted up my
screwdriverI didnt even know shed taken itand waved
it around like a maniac with a knife.
I burst out laughing. I got you, she said. I got you. And she
didshe had me, one hundred percent.” His face twisted. “I
never would have hurt her. When I came in that day, she
was with him. He had his pants down. And she wasshe
was crying … he was supposed to be her father.” He flung
an arm up over his face, as if he could stop himself from
seeing the memory. “She looked up at me, like it was a
staring contest, but then she smiled. Except this time, it
wasnt because she lost. It was because she knew she was
going to win. Because I was there. Because I could rescue
her. My whole life, people looked at me like I was a fuckup,
like I couldnt do anything rightbut she, it was like she
believed in me,” Shay said. “And I wanted God, I wanted
to believe her.”
He took a deep breath. “I grabbed her and ran upstairs, to
the room I was finishing. I locked the door. I told her we
would be safe there. But then there was a shot, and the
whole door was gone, and he came in and pointed his gun
at me.”
I tried to imagine what it would be like to be Shayeasily
confused and unable to communicate wel and to
suddenly have a pistol thrust in my face.
I would have panicked, too.
“There were sirens,” Shay said. “Hed cal ed them in. He
said they were coming for me and that no cop would
believe any story from a freak like me. She was screaming,
Dont shoot, dont shoot. He said, Get over here,
Elizabeth, and I grabbed the gun so he couldnt hurt her
and we were fighting and both our hands were on it and it
went off and went off again.” He swal owed. “I caught her.
The blood, it was everywhere; it was on me, it was on her.
He kept cal ing her name but she wouldnt look at him. She
stared at me, like we were playing our game; she stared at
me, except it wasnt a game … and then even though her
eyes were open, she stopped staring. And it was over even
though I didnt smile.” He choked on a sob, pressed his
hand against his mouth. “I didnt smile.”
“Shay,” I said softly.
He glanced up at me. “She was better off dead.”
My mouth went dry. I remembered Shay saying that same
sentence to June Nealon at the restorative justice meeting,
her storming out of the room in tears. But what if wed taken
Shays words out of context?
What if he truly believed Elizabeths death was a blessing,
after what shed suffered at the hands of her stepfather?
Something snagged in the back of my mind, a splinter of
memory.
“Her underpants,” I said. “You had them in your pocket.”
Shay stared at me as if I were an idiot. “Wel , thats
because she didnt have a chance to put them back on yet,
before everything else happened.”
The Shay I had grown to know was a man who could close
an open wound with a brush of his hand, yet who also might
have a breakdown if the mashed potatoes in his meal
platter were more yel ow than the day before. That Shay
would not see anything suspicious about the police finding
a little girls underwear in his possession; it would make
perfect sense to him to grab them when he grabbed
Elizabeth, for the sake of her modesty.
“Are you tel ing me the shootings were accidental?”
“I never said I was guilty,” he answered.
The pundits who downplayed Shays miracles were always
quick to point out that if God were to return to earth. He
wouldnt choose to be a murderer. But what if He hadnt?
What if the whole situation had been misunderstood; what if
Shay had not wil ful y, intentional y kil ed Elizabeth Nealon
and her stepfatherbut in fact had been trying to save her
from him?
It would mean that Shay was about to die for someone
elses sins.
Again.
“Not a good time,” Maggie said when she came to the
door.
“Its an emergency.”
Then cal the cops. Or pick up your red phone and dial God
directly.
Il give you a cal tomorrow morning.” She started to close
the door, but I stuck my foot inside.
“Is everything al right?” A man with a British accent was
suddenly standing beside Maggie, who had turned beet
red.
“Father Michael,” she said. “This is Christian Gal agher.”
He held out his hand to me. “Father. Ive heard al about
you.”
I hoped not. I mean, if Maggie was having a date, clearly
there were better topics of conversation.
“So,” Christian asked amiably. “Wheres the fire?”
I felt heat rising to the back of my neck. In the background, I
could hear soft music playing; there was half a glass of red
wine in the mans hand. There was no fire; it was already
burning, and I had just thrown a bucket of sand on it. Im
sorry. I didnt mean” I stepped backward.
“Have a nice night.”
I heard the door close behind me, but instead of walking to
my bike, I sat down on the front stoop. The first time Id met
Shay, Id told him that you cant be lonely if God is with you
al the time, but that wasnt entirely true. Hes lousy at
checkers, Shay had said. Wel , you couldnt take God out to
a movie on a Friday night, either. I knew that I could fil the
space a companion normal y would with God; and it was
more than enough. But that wasnt to say I didnt feel that
phantom limb sometimes.
The door opened, and into the slice of light stepped
Maggie. She was barefoot, and she had her power-suit
coat draped over her shoulders.
Im sorry,” I said. “I didnt mean to ruin your night.”
“Thats okay. I should have known better than to assume al
the planets had aligned for me.” She sank down beside
me. “Whats up?”
In the dark, with her face lit in profile by the moon, she was
as beautiful as any Renaissance Madonna. It struck me that
God had chosen someone just like Maggie when He
picked Mary to bear His Son: someone wil ing to take the
weight of the world on her shoulders, even when it wasnt
her own burden. “Its Shay,” I said. “I think hes innocent.”
Maggie
I was not particularly surprised to hear what Shay Bourne
had told the priest.
No, what surprised me was how fervently hed fal en for it
hook, line, and sinker.
“Its not about protecting Shays rights anymore,” Michael
said. “Or letting him die on his own terms. Were talking
about an innocent man being kil ed.”
We had moved into the living room, and Christianwel , he
was sitting on the other end of the couch pretending to do a
Sudoku puzzle in the newspaper, but actual y listening to
every word we said. Hed been the one to come outside
and invite me back into my own home. I ful y intended to
pop Father Michaels bubble of incensed righteousness
and get back to the spot Id been in before he arrived.
Which was flat on my back, with Christians hand moving
over my side, showing me where you made the incision to
remove a gal bladdersomething that, in person, was far
more exciting than it sounds.
“Hes a convicted murderer,” I said. “They learn how to lie
before they learn how to walk.”
“Maybe he never should have been convicted,” Michael
said.
“You were on the jury that found him guilty!”
Christians head snapped up. “You were?”
“Welcome to my life,” I sighed. “Father, you sat through
days of testimony.
You saw the evidence firsthand.”
“I know. But that was before he told me that he walked in on
Kurt Nealon molesting his own stepdaughter; and that the
gun went off repeatedly while he was struggling to get it out
of Kurts hand.”
At that, Christian leaned forward. “Wel . That makes him a
bit of a hero, doesnt it?”
“Not when he stil kil s the girl hes trying to rescue,” I said.
“And why, pray tel , did he not gift his defense attorney with
this information?”
“He said he tried, but the lawyer didnt think it would fly.”
“Wel , gee,” I said. “Doesnt that speak volumes?”
“Maggie, you know Shay. He doesnt look like a clean-cut
American boy, and he didnt back then, either. Plus, hed
been found with a smoking gun, and a dead cop and girl in
front of him. Even if he told the truth, who would have
listened? Whos more likely to be cast as a pedophilethe
heroic cop and consummate family man … or the sketchy
vagrant who was doing work in the house? Shay was
doomed before he ever walked into a courtroom.”
“Why would he take the blame for someone elses crime?” I
argued.
“Why not tel someoneanyonein eleven years?”
He shook his head. “I dont know the answer to that. But Id
like to keep him alive long enough to find out.” Father
Michael glanced at me.
“Youre the one who says the legal system doesnt always
work for everyone.
It was an accident. Manslaughter, not murder.”
“Correct me if Im wrong,” Christian interrupted. “But you
cant be sentenced to death for manslaughter, can you?”
I sighed. “Do we have any new evidence?”
Father Michael thought for a minute. “He told me so.”
“Do we have any evidence” I repeated.
His face lit up. “We have the security camera outside the
observation cel ,” Michael said. “Thats got to be recorded
somewhere, right?”
“Its stil just a tape of him tel ing you a story,” I explained.
“Its different if you tel me, oh, that theres semen we can
link to Kurt Nealon …”
“Youre an ACLU lawyer. You must be able to do something
…”
“Legal y, theres nothing we can do. We cant reopen his
case unless theres some fantastic forensic proof.”
“What about cal ing the governor?” Christian suggested.
Our heads both swiveled toward him.
“Wel , isnt that what always happens on TV? And in John
Grisham novels?”
“Why do you know so much about the American legal
system?” I asked.
He shrugged. “I used to have a torrid crush on the Partridge
girl from LA. Law.”
I sighed and walked to the dining room table. My purse was
slogged across it like an amoeba. I dug inside for my cel
phone, punched a number.
“This better be good,” my boss growled on the other end of
the line.
“Sorry, Rufus. I know its late”
“Cut to the chase.”
“I need to cal Flynn, on behalf of Shay Bourne,” I said.
“Flynn? As in Mark Flynn the governor? Why would you
want to waste your last appeal before you even get a
verdict back from Haig?”
“Shay Bournes spiritual advisor is under the impression
that he was falsely convicted.” I looked up to find Christian
and Michael both watching me intently.
“Do we have any new evidence?”
I closed my eyes. “Wel . No. But this is real y important,
Rufus.”
A moment later, I hung up the phone and pressed the
number Id scrawled on a paper napkin into Michaels hand.
“Its the governors cel number. Go cal him.”
“Why me?”
“Because,” I said. “Hes Catholic.”
“I have to leave,” I had told Christian. “The governor wants
us to come to his office right now.”
“If I had a quid for every time a girls used that one on me,”
he said.
And then, just as if it were the most normal thing in the
world, he kissed me.
Okay, it had been a quick kiss. And one that could have
ended a G-rated movie. And it had been performed in front
of a priest. But stil , it looked completely natural, as if
Christian and I had been kissing at the ends of sentences
for ages, while the rest of the world was stil hung up on
punctuation.
Heres where it al went wrong. “So,” I had said. “Maybe we
could get together tomorrow?”
“Im on cal for the next forty-eight hours,” hed said.
“Monday?”
But Monday I was in court again.
“Wel ,” Christian said. “Il cal .”
I was meeting Father Michael at the statehouse, because I
wanted him to go home and get clothing that was as
priestly as possiblethe jeans and button-down shirt in
which hed come to my door werent going to win us any
favors. Now, as I waited for him in the parking lot, I replayed
every last syl able of my conversation with Christian … and
began to panic. Everyone knew that when a guy said hed
cal , it real y meant that he wouldnthe just wanted a swift
escape. Maybe it had been the kiss, which was the
precursor to that whole line of conversation.
Maybe I had garlic breath. Maybe hed just spent enough
time in my company to know I wasnt what he wanted.
By the time Father Michael rode into the parking lot, Id
decided that if Shay Bourne had cost me my first shot at a
relationship since the Jews went to wander the desert, I
would execute him myself.
I was surprised that Rufus had wanted me to go to meet
Governor Flynn alone; I was even more surprised that he
thought Father Michael should be the one to finesse the
interview in the first place. But Flynn wasnt a born New
Englander; he was a transplanted southern boy, and he
apparently preferred informality to pomp and circumstance.
Hel be expecting you to come to him for a stay of
execution after the trial, Rufus had mused. So maybe
catching him off guard is the smartest thing you can do. He
suggested that instead of a lawyer putting through the cal ,
maybe a man of the cloth should do it instead. And, within
two minutes of conversation, Father Michael had
discovered that Governor Flynn had heard him preach at
last years Christmas Mass at St. Catherines.
We were let into the statehouse by a security guard, who
put us through the metal detectors and then escorted us to
the governors office. It was an odd, eerie place after hours;
our footsteps rang like gunshots as we hustled up the
steps. At the top of the landing, I turned to Michael. “Do not
do anything inflammatory,” I whispered. “We get one shot at
this.”
The governor was sitting at his desk. “Come in,” he said,
getting to his feet. “Pleasure to see you again, Father
Michael.”
“Thanks,” the priest said. “Im flattered you remembered
me.”
“Hey, you gave a sermon that didnt put me to sleepthat
puts you into a very smal category of clergymen. You run
the youth group at St.
Catherines, too, right? My col ege roommates kid was
getting into some trouble a year ago, and then he started
working with you. Joe Cacciatone?”
“Joey,” Father Michael said. “Hes a good kid.”
The governor turned to me. “And you must be … ?”
“Maggie Bloom,” I said, holding out my hand. “Shay
Bournes attorney”
I had never been this close to the governor before. I thought,
irrational y, that he looked tal er on television.
“Ah, yes,” the governor said. “The infamous Shay Bourne.”
“If youre a practicing Catholic,” Michael said to the
governor, “how can you condone an execution?”
I blinked at the priest. Hadnt I just told him not to say
anything provocative?
“Im doing my job,” Flynn said. “Theres a great deal that I
dont agree with, personal y, that I have to carry out
professional y.”
“Even if the man whos about to be kil ed is innocent?”
Flynns gaze sharpened. “Thats not what a court decided,
Father.”
“Come talk to him,” Michael said. “The penitentiaryits a
five minute drive. Come listen to him, and then tel me if he
deserves to die.”
“Governor Flynn,” I interrupted, final y finding my voice.
“During a … confession, Shay Bourne made some
revelations that indicate there are details of his case that
werent revealed at the timethat the deaths occurred
accidental y while Mr. Bourne was in fact trying to protect
Elizabeth Nealon from her fathers sexual abuse. We feel
that with a stay of execution, wel have time to gather
evidence of Bournes innocence.”
The governors face paled. “I thought priests couldnt reveal
confessions.”
“Were obligated to, if theres a law about to be broken, or if
a life is in danger. This qualifies on both counts.”
The governor folded his hands, suddenly distant. “I
appreciate your concernsboth religious and political. Il
take your request under advisement.”
I knew a dismissal when I heard one; I nodded and stood.
Father Michael looked up at me, then scrambled to his feet,
too. We shook the governors hand again and groveled our
way out of the office. We didnt speak until we were
outside, beneath a sky spread with stars. “So,” Father
Michael said. “I guess that means no.”
“It means we have to wait and see. Which probably means
no.” I dug my hands into the pockets of my suit jacket. “Wel .
Seeing as my entire evening has been shot to hel , Im just
going to cal it a night”
“You dont believe hes innocent, do you?” Michael said.
I sighed. “Not real y.”
“Then why are you wil ing to fight so hard for him?”
“On December twenty-fifth, when I was a kid, Id wake up
and it would be just another day. On Easter Sunday, my
family was the only one in the movie theater. The reason I
fight so hard for Shay,” I finished, “is because I know what
its like when the things you believe make you feel like
youre on the outside looking in.”
“I … I didnt realize …”
“How could you?” I said, smiling faintly. “The guys at the top
of the totem pole never see whats carved at the bottom.
See you Monday, Father.”
I could feel his gaze on me as I walked to my car. It felt like
a cape made of light, like the wings of the angels Id never
believed in.
My client looked like hed been run over by a truck.
Somehow, in the middle of trying to get me to save his life,
Father Michael had neglected to mention that Shay had
begun a course of self-mutilation. His face was scabbed
and bloomed with bruises; his handscuffed tightly to his
waist after last weeks fiascowere scratched. “You look
like crap,” I murmured to Shay.
“Im going to look worse after they hang me,” he whispered
back.
“We have to talk. About what you said to Father Michael”
But before I could go any further, the judge cal ed on
Gordon Greenleaf to offer his closing argument.
Gordon stood up heavily. “Your Honor, this case has been a
substantial waste of the courts time and the states money.
Shay Bourne is a convicted double murderer. He
committed the most heinous crime in the history of the state
of New Hampshire.”
I glanced at Shay beneath my lashes. If what hed said was
trueif hed seen Elizabeth being abusedthen the two
murders became manslaughter and self-defense. DNA
testing had not been in vogue when he was convicted
was it possible that there was some shred of carpet or
couch fabric left that could corroborate Shays account?
“Hes exhausted al legal remedies at every level,” Gordon
continued.
“State, first circuit, Supreme Courtand now hes
desperately trying to extend his life by filing a bogus lawsuit
that claims he believes in some bogus religion. He wants
the State of New Hampshire and its taxpayers to build him
his own special gal ows so that he can donate his heart to
the victims familya group that he suddenly has feelings
for. He certainly didnt have feelings for them the day he
murdered Kurt and Elizabeth Nealon.”
It was, of course, highly unlikely that there would stil be
evidence.
By now, even the underwear that had been found in his
pocket had been destroyed or given back to June Nealon
this was a case that had closed eleven years ago, in the
minds of the investigators. And al the eyewitnesses had
died at the sceneexcept for Shay.
“Yes, there is a law that protects the religious freedom of
inmates,”
Greenleaf said. “It exists so that Jewish inmates can wear
yarmulkes in prison, and Muslims can fast during
Ramadan. The commissioner of corrections always makes
al owances for religious activity in compliance with federal
law. But to say that this manwhos had outbursts in the
courtroom, who cant control his emotions, who cant even
tel you what the name of his religion isdeserves to be
executed in some special way to comply with federal law is
completely inappropriate, and is not what our system of
justice intended.”
Just as Greenleaf sat down, a bailiff slipped a note to me. I
glanced at it and took a deep breath.
“Ms. Bloom?” the judge prompted.
“One hundred and twenty dol ars,” I said. “You know what
you can do with one hundred and twenty dol ars? You can
get a great pair of Stuart Weitzman shoes on sale. You can
buy two tickets to a Bruins game.
You can feed a starving family in Africa. You can purchase
a cel phone contract. Or, you can help a man reach
salvationand rescue a dying child.”
I stood up. “Shay Bourne is not asking for freedom. Hes
not asking for his sentence to be overturned. Hes simply
asking to die in accordance with his religious beliefs. And if
America stands for nothing else, it stands for the right to
practice your own religion, even if you die in the custody of
the state.”
I began to walk toward the gal ery. “People stil flock to this
country because of its religious freedom. They know that in
America, you wont be told what God should look like or
sound like. You wont be told there is one right belief, and
yours isnt it. They want to speak freely about religion, and
to ask questions. Those rights were the foundation of
America four hundred years ago, and theyre stil the
foundation today. Its why, in this country, Madonna can
perform on a crucifix, and The Da Vinci Code was a
bestsel er. Its why, even after 9/11, religious freedom
flourishes in America.”
Facing the judge again, I pul ed out al the stops. “Your
Honor, were not asking you to remove the wal between
church and state by ruling in favor of Shay Bourne. We just
want the law upheldthe one that promises Shay Bourne
the right to practice his religion even in the state
penitentiary, unless theres a compel ing governmental
interest to keep him from doing so. The only governmental
interest that the stale can point to here is one hundred and
twenty dol arsand a matter of a few months.”
I walked back to my seat, slipped into it. “How do you weigh
lives and souls against two months, and a hundred and
twenty bucks?”
Once the judge returned to chambers to reach his verdict,
two marshals came to retrieve Shay. “Maggie?” he said,
getting to his feet. “Thanks.”
“Guys,” I said to the marshals, “can you give me a minute
with him in the holding cel ?”
“Make it quick,” one of them said, and I nodded.
“What do you think?” Father Michael said, stil seated in the
gal ery behind me. “Does he have a chance?”
I reached into my pocket, retrieved the note the bailiff had
passed me just before I began my closing, and handed it to
Michael. “You better hope so,” I said. “The governor denied
his stay of execution.”
He was lying on the metal bunk, his arm thrown over his
eyes, by the time I reached the holding cel . “Shay,” I said,
standing in front of the bars. “Father Michael came to talk to
me. About what happened the night of the murders.”
“It doesnt matter.”
“It does matter,” I said urgently. “The governor denied your
stay of execution, which means were up against a brick
wal . DNA evidence is used routinely now to overturn capital
punishment verdicts. There was some talk about sexual
assault during the trial, wasnt there, before that charge was
dropped? If that semen sample stil exists, we can have it
tested and matched to Kurt … I just need you to give me the
details about what happened, Shay, so that I can get the
bal rol ing.”
Shay stood up and walked toward me, resting his hands on
the bars between us. “I cant.”
“Why not?” I chal enged. “Were you lying when you told
Father Michael you were innocent?”
He glanced up at me, his eyes hot. “No.”
I cannot tel you why I believed him. Maybe I was naive,
because I hadnt been a criminal defense attorney; maybe I
just felt that a dying man had very little left to lose. But when
Shay met my gaze, I knew that he was tel ing me the truth
and that executing an innocent man was even more
devastating, if possible, than executing a guilty one. “Wel ,
then,” I said, my head already swimming with possibilities.
“You told Father Michael your first lawyer wouldnt listen to
youbut Im listening to you now. Talk to me, Shay. Tel me
something I can use to convince a judge you were wrongly
convicted. Then Il write up the request for DNA testing, you
just have to sign”
“No.”
“I cant do this alone,” I exploded. “Shay, were talking about
overturning your conviction, do you understand that? About
you walking out of here, free.”
“I know, Maggie.”
“So instead of trying, youre just going to die for a crime you
didnt commit? Youre okay with that?”
He stared at me and slowly nodded. “I told you that the first
day I met you. I didnt want you to save me. I wanted you to
save my heart.”
I was stunned. “Why?”
He struggled to get the words out. “It was stil my fault. I tried
to rescue her, and I couldnt. I wasnt there in time. I never
liked Kurt NealonI used to try to not be in the same room
as him when I was working, so I wouldnt feel him looking at
me. But June, she was so nice. She smel ed like apples
and shed make me tuna fish for lunch and let me sit at the
kitchen table like I belonged there with her and the girl. After
Elizabeth … afterward … it was bad enough that June
wouldnt have them anymore. I didnt want her to lose the
past, too.
Familys not a thing, its a place,” Shay said softly. “Its
where al the memories get kept.”
So he took the blame for Kurt Nealons crimes, in order to
al ow the grieving widow to remember him with pride,
instead of hate. How much worse would it have been for
June if DNA testing had existed back thenif the al eged
rape of Elizabeth had proved Kurt as the perpetrator?
“You go looking for evidence now, Maggie, and youl rip
her wide open again. This waywel , this is the end, and
then its over.”
I could feel my throat closing, a fist of tears. “And what if
one day June finds out the truth? And realizes that you were
executed, even though you were innocent?”
“Then,” Shay said, a smile breaking over him like daylight,
“shel remember me.”
I had gone into this case knowing that Shay and I wanted
different outcomes; I had expected to be able to convince
him that an overturned conviction was a cause for
celebration, even if living meant organ donation would have
to be put on hold for a while. But Shay was ready to die;
Shay wanted to die. He wasnt just giving Claire Nealon a
future; he was giving one to her mother, too. He wasnt
trying to save the world, like me. Just one life at a time
which is why he had a fighting chance of succeeding.
He touched my hand, where it rested on the bars. “Its okay,
Maggie.
Ive never done anything important. I didnt cure cancer or
stop global warming or win a Nobel Prize. I didnt do
anything with my life, except hurt people I loved. But dying
dying wil be different.”
“How?”
“Theyl see their lives are worth living.”
I knew that I would be haunted by Shay Bourne for a very
long time, whether or not his sentence was carried out.
“Someone who thinks like that,” I said, “does not deserve to
be executed. Please, Shay. Help me help you. You dont
have to play the hero.”
“Maggie,” he said. “Neither do you.”
June
Code blue, the nurse had said.
A stream of doctors and nurses flooded Claires room. One
began chest compressions.
I dont feel a pulse.
We need an airway.
Start chest compressions.
Can we get an IV access …
What rhythm is she in?
We need to shock her… put on the patches …
Charge to two hundred pules.
Al clear…fire!
Hold compressions …
No pulse.
Give epi. Lidocaine. Bicarb.
Check for a pulse …
Dr. Wu flew through the door. “Get the mother out of here,”
he said, and a nurse grasped my shoulders.
“You need to come with me,” she said, and I nodded, but
my feet would not move. Someone held the defibril ator to
Claires chest again. Her body jackknifed off the bed just as
I was dragged through the doorway.
I had been the one present when Claire flatlined; I was the
one whod run to the nurses desk. And I was the one sitting
with her now that shed been stabilized, now that her heart,
battered and ragged, was beating again. She was in a
monitored bed, and I stared at the screens, at the
mountainous terrain of her cardiac rhythm, sure that if I
didnt blink wed be safe.
Claire whimpered, tossing her head from side to side. The
monitors cast her skin an alien green.
“Baby,” I said, moving beside her. “Dont try to talk. Youve
stil got a tube in.”
Her eyes slitted open; she pleaded to me with her eyes and
mimed holding a pen.
I gave her the white board Dr. Wu had given me; until Claire
was extubated tomorrow morning she would have to use
this to communicate. Her writing was shaky and spiked.
WHAT HAPPENED?
“Your heart,” I said, blinking back tears. “It wasnt doing so
wel .”
MOMMY, DO SOMETHING.
“Anything, honey.”
LET GO OF ME.
I glanced down; I was not touching her.
Claire circled the words again; and this time, I understood.
Suddenly I remembered something Kurt had told me once:
you could only save someone who wanted to be saved;
otherwise, youd be dragged down for the count, too. I
looked at Claire, but she was asleep again, the marker stil
curled in her hand.
Tears slipped down my cheeks, onto the hospital blanket.
“Oh, Claire … Im so sorry,” I whispered, and I was.
For what I had done.
For what I knew I had to do.
Lucius
When I coughed it turned me inside out. I could feel the
tendons tangle on the outside of my skin and the fever in my
head steaming against the pil ow. You put ice chips on my
tongue and they vanished before I swal owed isnt it funny
how now things come back that I was so sure Id forgotten
like this moment of high school chemistry. Sublimation
thats the word the act of turning into something you never
expected to become.
The room it was so white that it hurt the backs of my
eyebal s. Your hands were like hummingbirds or butterflies
Stay with us Lucius you said but it was harder and harder to
hear you and I could only feel you instead your hummingfly
hands your butterbird fingers.
They talk about white lights and tunnels and there was a
part of me expecting to see oh Il just say it outright Shay
but none of that was true.
Instead it was Him and He was holding out His hand and
reaching for me.
He was just like I remembered coffee skin ebony eyes five
oclock shadow that dimple too deep for tears and I saw
how foolish I had been. How could I not have known it would
be Him how could I not have known that you see God every
time you look at the face of the person you love.
There were so many things I expected Him to say to me
now when it counted the most. I love you. I missed you. But
instead He smiled at me with those white teeth those white
wolfs teeth and He said I forgive you Lucius I forgive you.
Your hands pounded and pumped at me your electricity
shot through my body but you could not reclaim my heart it
already belonged to someone else. He spread the fingers
of His hand a star a beacon and I went to h i m . I am
coming I am coming.
Wait for me.
Maggie
“I wouldnt have cal ed you in here on a Sunday, normal y,”
Warden Coyne said to me, “but I thought youd want to
know … ” He closed the door to his office for privacy.
“Lucius DuFresne died last night.”
I sank down into one of the chairs across from the wardens
desk.
“How?”
“AIDS-related pneumonia.”
“Does Shay know?”
The warden shook his head. “We thought that might not be
the best course of action at this moment.”
What he meant, of course, was that Shay was already in an
observation cel for slamming his own head into a wal
they didnt need to give him even more reason to be upset.
“He could hear about it from someone else.”
“Thats true,” Coyne said. “I cant stop rumors.”
I remembered the reporters glorifying Luciuss initial cure
how would this turn the tide of public opinion against Shay
even more? If he wasnt a messiah, thenby defaulthe
was only a murderer. I glanced up at the warden. “So you
asked me here so I could break the bad news to him.”
“Thats your cal , Ms. Bloom. I asked you here to give you
this.” He reached into his desk and removed an envelope.
“It was with Luciuss personal effects.”
The manila envelope was addressed to Father Michael and
me in shaky spiderweb handwriting. “What is it?”
“I didnt open it,” the warden said.
I unhinged the clasp of the envelope and reached inside. At
first I thought I was looking at a magazine advertisement of
a paintingthe detail was that precise. But a closer look
showed that this was a piece of card stock; that the
pigment wasnt oil, but what seemed to be watercolor and
pen.
It was a copy of Raphaels Transfiguration, something I only
knew because of an art history course Id taken when I
fancied myself in love with the TA who ran the class
sessionsa tal , anemic guy with ski-slope cheekbones
who wore black, smoked clove cigarettes, and wrote
Nietzsche quotes on the back of his hand. Although I didnt
real y care about sixteenth-century art, Id gotten an A, trying
to impress himonly to discover he had a live-in lover
named Henry.
The Transfiguration was thought to be Raphaels last
painting. It was left unfinished and was completed by one of
his students. The upper part of the painting shows Jesus
floating above Mt. Tabor with Moses and Elijah. The bottom
part of the painting shows the miracle of the possessed
boy, waiting for Jesus to cure him, along with the Apostles
and the other disciples.
Luciuss version looked exactly like the painting Id seen
slides of in a darkened amphitheateruntil you looked
closely. Then you noticed that my face was superimposed
where Mosess should have been. Father Michael was
standing in for Elijah. The possessed boythere, Lucius
had drawn his self-portrait. And Shay rose in white robes
above Mt. Tabor, his face turned upward.
I slipped the painting back into the envelope careful y and
looked at the warden. “Id like to see my client,” I said.
Shay stepped into the conference room. “Did you get the
verdict?”
“Not yet. Its stil the weekend.” I took a deep breath. “Shay, I
have some bad news for you. Lucius died last night.”
The light faded from his face. “Lucius?”
“Im sorry.”
“He was … getting better.”
“I guess he wasnt, real y. It only looked that way,” I said. “I
know you thought you helped him. I know you wanted to
help him. But Shay, you couldnt have. He was dying from
the moment you met him.”
“Like me,” Shay said.
He bent over, as if the hand of grief were pushing hard on
him, and started to cryand that, I realized, was going to
be my undoing. Because when you got right down to it,
what was different between Shay and everyone else in this
world was not nearly as profound as what we had in
common. Maybe my hair was brushed, and I could string
words together to make a sentence. Maybe I hadnt been
convicted of murder. But if someone told me that the only
friend I real y had in this world had left it, Id sink to my
knees, sobbing, too.
“Shay,” I said, at a loss, approaching him. How come there
were no words for this kind of comfort?
“Dont touch me,” Shay growled, his eyes feral. I ducked at
the last moment as he swung at me, and his fist punched
through the double pane of glass that separated us from the
officer standing watch. “He wasnt supposed to die,” Shay
cried, as his hand bled down the front of his prison scrubs
like a trail of regret. A smal army of officers rushed in to
save me and secure him, and then haul him off to the
infirmary for stitches, proofas if either of us needed it
that Shay was not invincible.
One year in junior high, during a sex-ed unit, our teacher
discussed the painful y obvious fact that some of us would
not mature as quickly as our classmates. This was not a
lesson you had to teach someone like me, whose waistline
was larger than her bra size; or Cheryl Otenski, who had
gotten her period in ful view of every other sixth grader
during an assembly where she happened to be wearing
white pants. “Late bloomers,”
the teacher cal ed itthat was close enough to my last
name for me to be the butt of every joke for the remaining
week.
I had told my mother I had the bubonic plague and refused
to get out of bed for three days, spending most of it under
the covers and wishing I could just miraculously skip ahead
ten or fifteen years to when my life surely would be more
pleasant.
After seeing Shay, I was sorely tempted to pul the same
act. If I stayed in bed when the verdict was read, did that
mean the plaintiff lost by default?
Instead of driving to my house, however, I found myself
pointing in the opposite direction and turned into the
emergency entrance of the hospital. I felt as if Id been
poleaxed, which surely qualified me for medical attention
but I didnt think that even the most gifted physician could
cure a skeptic whod come to see the light: I could not
remain as emotional y unattached from my client as Id
believed. This wasnt, as Id told myself, about the death
penalty in America. It wasnt about my career as a litigator.
It was about a man Id been sitting next toa man whose
scent I could recognize (Head & Shoulders shampoo and
pungent industrial soap); whose voice was familiar (rough
as sandpaper, with words dropped like stepping-stones)
who would, very shortly, be dead.
I did not know Shay Bourne wel , but that didnt mean he
would not leave a hole in my life when he exited his own.
“I need to see Dr. Gal agher,” I announced to the triage
nurse. “Im a personal…”
What?
Friend?
Girlfriend?
Stalker?
Before the nurse could rebuff me, however, I saw Christian
coming down the hal with another doctor. He noticed me
andbefore I could even make a decision to go to him
he came to me. “Whats wrong, sweetheart?”
No one except my father had ever cal ed me that. For this
reason, and a dozen others, I burst into tears.
Christian folded me into his arms. “Fol ow me,” he said,
and led me by the hand into an empty family waiting room.
“The governor denied Shays stay of execution,” I said.
“And Shays best friend died, and I was the one who had to
tel him. And hes going to die, Christian, because he wont
let me try to find new evidence to exonerate him.” I drew
away from him, wiping my eyes on my sleeve. “How do you
do it? How do you let go?”
“The first patient who died on my table,” Christian said,
“was a seventy-six-yearold woman who came in
complaining of abdominal pain after a meal at a posh
London restaurant. A half hour into the surgery, she coded,
and we couldnt bring her back.” He looked up at me.
“When I went into the family waiting area to speak with her
husband, the man just kept staring at me. Final y, I asked
him if he had any questions, and he said hed taken his wife
to dinner to celebrate their fiftieth wedding anniversary.”
Christian shook his head. “That night, I sat with her body in
the morgue. Sil y, I know, but I thought that on ones fiftieth
anniversary, one didnt deserve to spend the night alone.”
If I hadnt been swayed before by Christians charm, good
looks, or the way he cal ed the trunk of his car a boot and
the hood a bonnet, I was now completely smitten.
“Heres the thing,” Christian added. “It doesnt get any
easier, no matter how many times you go through it. And if
it doeswel , I suspect that means youve lost some part of
yourself thats critical y important.”
He reached for my hand. “Let me be the attending
physician at the execution.”
“You cant,” I said automatical y. Kil ing a man was a
violation of the Hippocratic oath; doctors were contacted
privately by the Department of Corrections, and the whole
event was kept secret. In fact, in the other executions Id
studied before Shays trial, the doctors name was never
mentionednot even on the death certificate.
“Let me worry about that,” Christian said.
I felt a fresh wave of tears rising. “You would do that for
Shay?”
He leaned forward and kissed me lightly. “I would do that for
you,”
he said.
*
If this had been a trial, here were the facts Id present to the
jury: 1. Christian had suggested that he swing by my house
after his shift, just to make sure I wasnt fal ing apart at the
seams.
2. He was the one who brought the bottle of Penfolds.
3. It would have been downright rude to refuse to have a
glass. Or three.
4. I truly could not establish the causal line between how we
went from kissing on the couch to lying on the carpet with
his hands underneath my shirt, and me worrying about
whether or not I was wearing underwear that was a step
above granny panties.
5. Other womenthose who have sex with men more often
than once during a senatorial term, for exampleprobably
have a whole set of underwear just for moments like these,
like my mother has a set of Sabbath china.
6. I was truly hammered if I had just thought of sex and my
mother in the same sentence.
Maybe the details here werent nearly as important as the
outcomeI had a man in my bed, right now, waiting for me.
He was even more beautiful without clothes on than he was
in them. And where was I?
Locked in the bathroom, so paralyzed by the thought of my
disgusting, white, fish-bel ied body being seen by him that I
couldnt open the door.
I had been discreet about itlowering my lashes and
murmuring something about changing. Im sure Christian
assumed I meant slipping into lingerie.
Me, I was thinking more along the lines of morphing into
Heidi Klum.
Bravely, I unbuttoned my blouse and stepped out of my
jeans. There I was in the mirror, in my bra and panties, just
like a bikiniexcept I wouldnt be caught dead in a bikini.
Christian sees a hundred bodies a day, I told myself. Yours
cant be any worse than those.
But. Here was the ripple of cottage cheese cel ulite that I
usual y avoided by dressing in the dark. Here was the inch
(or two) that I could pinch with my fingers, which vanished
beneath a waistband. Here was my butt, large enough to
colonize, which could so craftily be camouflaged by black
trousers. Christian would take one look at the acoustic
version of me and run screaming for the hil s.
His voice came, muffled, through the bathroom door.
“Maggie?”
Christian said. “Are you al right in there?”
“Im fine!” Fmjat.
“Are you coming out?”
I didnt answer that. I was looking inside the waistband of
my pants.
They were a twelve, but that didnt count, because this label
had resized downward so that fourteens like me could feel
better about themselves for being able to squeeze into the
brand at al . But hadnt Marilyn Monroe been a size
fourteen? Or was that back when a size fourteen was real y
an eightwhich meant that comparatively, I was a
behemoth compared to your average 1940s starlet?
Wel , hel . I was a behemoth compared to your average
2008 starlet, too.
Suddenly I heard scratching outside the door. It couldnt
have been OliverId put him in his cage when he kept
sniffing around our heads as wed rol ed across the living
room carpet having our From Here to Eternity moment. To
my horror, the locked doorknob popped open and began to
twist.
I grabbed my ratty red bathrobe from the back of the door
and wrapped it around myself just in time to see the door
swing open. Christian stood there, holding a wire hanger
with its neck straightened.
“You can pick locks, too?” I said.
Christian grinned. “I do laparoscopic surgery through bel y
buttons,”
he explained. “This isnt dramatical y different.”
He folded his arms around me and met my gaze in the
mirror. “I cant say come back to bed, because you havent
been in it yet.” His chin notched over my shoulder.
“Maggie,” he murmured, and at that moment he realized
that I was wearing a robe.
Christians eyes lit up and his hands slipped down to the
belt. Immediately, I started to tug him away. “Please. Dont.”
His hands fel to his sides, and he took a step back. The
room must have cooled twenty degrees. “Im sorry,”
Christian said, al business. “I must have misread”
“No!” I cried, facing him. “You didnt misread anything. I
want this. I want you. Im just afraid that… that… you wont
want me.”
“Are you jokingl Ive wanted you since the moment I didnt
get to examine you for appendicitis.”
“Why?”
“Because youre smart. And fierce. And funny. And so
beautiful.”
I smiled wryly. “I almost believed you, until that last part.”
Christians eyes flashed. “You truly think youre not?” In one
smooth motion, before I could stop him, he yanked the wide
shawl col ar of the robe down to my elbows, and my blouse
along with it. My arms were trapped; I stood before him in
my underwear. “Look at you, Maggie,” he said with quiet
awe. “My God.”
I could not look at myself in the mirror, so instead, I looked
at Christian.
He wasnt scrutinizing breasts that sagged or a waist that
was too thick or thighs that rubbed together when the
temperature climbed above eighty degrees. He was just
staring at me, and as he did, his hands began to shake
where they touched me.
“Let me show you what I see when I look at you,” Christian
said quietly.
His fingers were warm as they played over me, as they
coaxed me into the bedroom and under the covers, as they
traced the curves of my body like a rol er coaster, a thril
ride, a wonder. And somewhere in the middle of it al , I
stopped worrying about sucking in my stomach, or if he
could see me in the halflight of the moon, and instead
noticed how seamlessly we fit together; how when I let go of
me, there was only room for us.
*
Wow.
I woke up with the sun slicing the bed like a scalpel, and
every muscle in my body leering like Id started training for
a triathlon. Last night could effectively be classified as a
workout, and to be honest, it was the first exercise routine I
could see myself real y looking forward to on a daily basis.
I smoothed my hand over the side of the bed where
Christian had slept. In the bathroom, I heard the shower
being turned off. The door opened, and Christians head
popped out. He was wearing a towel. “Hi,”
he said. “I hope I didnt knock you up.”
“Wel . I, uh, hope so, too …” Christian frowned, confused,
and I realized that we were not speaking the same
language. “Let me guess,” I said. “Where you come from,
that doesnt mean getting a girl pregnant?”
“Good God, no! Its, you know, rousing someone from their
sleep.”
I rol ed onto my back and started laughing, and he sank
down beside me, the towel slipping dangerously low. “But
since Ive knocked you up,”
he said, leaning down to kiss me, “maybe I could try my
hand at knocking you up …”
I had morning breath and hair that felt like a rat had taken
nest in it, not to mention a courtroom verdict to attend, but I
wrapped my arms around Christians neck and kissed him
back. Which was about the same moment that a phone
began to ring.
“Bloody hel ,” Christian muttered, and he swung over the far
side of the bed to where hed folded his clothes in a neat
pile, his cel phone and pager resting on top. “Its not mine,”
he said, but by then Id wrapped his discarded towel around
me and hiked to my purse in the living room to dig out my
own.
“Ms. Bloom?” a womans voice said. “This is June Nealon.”
“June,” I said, immediately sobering. “Is everything al
right?”
“Yes,” she said, and then, “No. Oh, God. I cant answer that
question.”
There was a beat of silence. “I cant take it,” June
whispered.
“I cant imagine how difficuft al this waiting has been for
you,” I said, and I meant it. “But we should know definitively
whats going to happen by lunchtime.”
“I cant take it,” June repeated. “Give it to someone else.”
And she hung up the phone, leaving me with Shays heart.
M I CHAEL
There were only seven people attending Monday morning
Mass, and I was one of them. I wasnt officiatingit was my
day off, so Father Walter was presiding, along with a
deacon named Paul OHurley. I participated in the Lords
Prayer and the sign of peace, and I realized these were the
moments Shay had missed: when people came together to
celebrate God. You might be able to find Him on your own
spiritual journey, but it was a lonelier trip. Coming to church
felt like validation, like a family where everyone knew your
flaws, and in spite of that was stil wil ing to invite you back.
Long after Father Walter finished Mass and said his good-
byes to the congregants, I was stil sitting in a pew. I
wandered toward the votive candles, watching the tongues
of their flames wag like gossips.
“I didnt think wed see you today, with the verdict and al ,”
Father Walter said, walking up to me.
“Yeah,” I said. “Maybe thats why I needed to come.”
Father Walter hesitated. “You know, Mikey, you havent
been fooling anyone.”
I felt the hair stand up on the back of my neck. “No?”
“You dont have to be embarrassed about having a crisis of
faith,”
Father Walter said. “Thats what makes us human.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to respond. I wasnt having a
crisis of faith; I just didnt particularly think Father Walter
was any more right in his faith than Shay was.
Father Walter reached down and lit one of the candles,
murmuring a prayer. “You know how I see it? Theres
always going to be bad stuff out there. But heres the
amazing thinglight trumps darkness, every time. You stick
a candle into the dark, but you cant stick the dark into the
light.” We both watched the flame reach higher, gasping for
oxygen, before settling comfortably. “I guess from my point
of view, we can choose to be in the dark, or we can light a
candle. And for me, Christ is that candle.”
I faced him. “But its not just candles, is it? There are
flashlights and fluorescent bulbs and bonfires …”
“Christ says that there are others doing miracles in His
name,”
Father Walter agreed. “I never said there might not be a
mil ion points of light out thereI just think Jesus is the one
who strikes the match.”
He smiled. “I couldnt quite understand why you were so
surprised when you thought God had showed up, Mikey. I
mean, when hasnt He been here?”
Father Walter started to walk back down the church aisle,
and I fel into step beside him. “You got time for lunch in the
next few weeks?”
he asked.
“Cant,” I said, grinning. Til be doing a funeral.” It was a joke
between priestsyou couldnt schedule anything when your
plans were likely to be changed by the lives and deaths of
your parishioners.
Except this time, as I said it, I realized it wasnt a joke. In
days, Id be presiding over Shays funeral.
Father Walter met my gaze. “Good luck today, Mike. Il be
praying.”
Out of the blue I remembered the Latin words that had been
combined to create religion: re + ligere. I had always
assumed they translated to reconnect. It was only when I
was at seminary that I learned the correct translation was to
bind.
Back then, I hadnt seen a difference.
When I first arrived at St. Catherines, I was given the task
of hosting a heart: St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianneys, to be
precisea French priest whod died in 1859, at the age of
seventy-three. Forty-five years later, when his body was
exhumed, the priests heart had not decayed. Our parish
had been chosen as the U.S. location for the hearts
veneration; thousands of Catholics from the Northeast were
expected to view the organ.
I remembered being very stressed out, and wondering why I
had to battle police lines and roadblocks when I had turned
to the priesthood to get closer to God. I watched Catholics
file into our little church and disrupt our Mass schedule and
our confession schedule. But after the doors were locked
and the onlookers gone, Id stare down at the glass case
with the organ sealed inside. The real wonder, to me, was
the course of events that had brought this ancient relic al
the way across an ocean to be venerated. Timing was
everything. After al , if they hadnt dug up the saints body,
they never would have known about his heart, or told others.
A miracle was only a miracle if someone witnessed it, and
if the story was passed along to someone else.
Maggie sat in front of me with Shay, her back straight as a
poker, her wild mane of hair tamed into a bun at the base of
her neck. Shay was subdued, shuffling, fidgety. I glanced
down at my lap, which held a manila envelope Maggie had
passed mea piece of art left behind by Lucius DuFresne,
whod passed away over the weekend. There had also
been a note on a piece of lined paper:
June has refused the heart. Have not told Shay.
If, on a long shot, we won this casehow would we break
the news to Shay that we stil could not give him what he so
desperately wanted?
“Al rise,” a U.S. marshal cal ed.
Maggie glanced at me over her shoulder and offered a tight
smile, and the entire courtroom got to its feet while Judge
Haig entered.
It was so quiet that I could hear the tiny electronic gasps of
the video equipment as the judge began to speak. “This is
a unique case in New Hampshires history,” Haig said, “and
possibly a unique case in the federal court system. The
Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act
certainly protects the religious freedoms of a person
confined to an institution such as Mr. Bourne, but that
doesnt mean that such a person can simply claim that any
of his beliefs constitutes a true religion.
For example, imagine what would happen if a death row
inmate announced that by the tenets of his religion, he had
to die of old age.
Therefore, when balancing the religious rights of inmates
against the compel ing governmental interest of the state,
this court is mindful of more than just the monetary cost, or
even the security cost to other inmates.”
The judge folded his hands. “That being said … we are not
in the habit in this country of al owing the government to
define what a church is, or vice versa. And that puts us at a
standstil unless we can develop a litmus test for what
religion real y is. So how do we go about doing that? Wel ,
al we have to work with is history. Dr. Fletcher posed
similarities between Gnosticism and Mr. Bournes beliefs.
However, Gnosticism is not a flourishing religion in todays
world climateits not even an existing religion in todays
world climate. Although I dont presume to be the expert on
the history of Christianity that Dr. Fletcher is, it seems to me
a stretch to connect the belief system of an individual
inmate in a New Hampshire state prison to a religious sect
thats been dead for nearly two thousand years.”
Maggies hand slipped back through the slatted rails that
separated the first row of the gal ery from the plaintiffs
table. I snatched the folded note she held between her
fingers. WERE SCREWED, she had written.
“Then again,” the judge continued, “some of Mr. Bournes
observations about spirituality and divinity seem awful y
familiar. Mr. Bourne believes in one God. Mr. Bourne thinks
salvation is linked to religious practice. Mr. Boume feels
that part of the contract between man and God involves
personal sacrifice. Al of these are very familiar concepts to
the average American who is practicing a mainstream
religion.”
He cleared his throat. “One of the reasons religion doesnt
belong in a courtroom is because its a deeply personal
pursuit. Yet, ironical y, something Mr. Bourne said struck a
chord with this court.” Judge Haig turned to Shay. “I am not
a religious man. I have not attended a service for many
years. But I do believe in God. My own practice of religion,
you could say, is a nonpractice. I personal y feel that its just
as worthy on a weekend to rake the lawn of an elderly
neighbor or to climb a mountain and marvel at the beauty of
this land we live in as it is to sing hosannas or go to Mass.
In other words, I think every man finds his own churchand
not al of them have four wal s. But just because this is how I
choose to fashion my faith doesnt mean that Im ignorant
about formal religion. In fact, some of the things I learned as
a young man studying for his bar mitzvah resonate with me
even now.”
My jaw dropped. Judge Haig was Jewish?
“Theres a principle in Jewish mysticism cal ed tikkun
olam,” he said. “It means, literal y, world repair. The idea is
that God created the world by containing divine light in
vessels, some of which shattered and got scattered al
over. Its the job of humanity to help God by finding and
releasing those shards of lightthrough good deeds and
acts.
Every time we do, God becomes more perfectand we
become a little more like God.
“From what I understand, Jesus promised his believers
entry into the Kingdom of Heavenand urged them to
prepare through love and charity. The bodhisattva in
Buddhism promises to wait for liberation until al who suffer
have been freed. And apparently, even those longgone
Gnostics thought that a spark of divinity was inside al of us.
It seems to me that no matter what religion you subscribe
to, acts of kindness are the stepping-stones to making the
world a better placebecause we become better people
in it. And that sounds, to me, a bit like why Mr. Bourne
wants to donate his heart.”
Did it real y matter whether you believed that Jesus spoke
the words in the Bible or the words in the Gospel of
Thomas? Did it matter whether you found God in a
consecrated church or a penitentiary or even in yourself?
Maybe not. Maybe it only mattered that you not judge
someone else who chose a different path to find meaning
in his life.
“I find under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized
Persons Act of 2000 that Shay Bourne has a valid and
compel ing religious belief that he must donate his organs
at the time of his death,” Judge Haig pronounced. “I further
find that the State of New Hampshires plan to execute Mr.
Bourne by lethal injection imposes a substantial burden on
the ability to exercise his religious practices, and that they
therefore must comply with an alternate means of
execution, such as hanging, that wil al ow organ donation to
be medical y feasible. Courts adjourned, and I want to see
counsel in my chambers.”
The gal ery exploded in a riot of noise, as reporters tried to
get to the attorneys before they left to meet with the judge.
There were women sobbing and students punching their
fists in the air, and in the back of the room, someone had
begun to sing a psalm. Maggie reached over the bar to
embrace me, and then quickly hugged Shay. “I gotta run,”
she said, and Shay and I were left staring at each other.
“Good,” he said. “This is good.”
I nodded and reached out to him. I had never embraced
Shay before, and it was a shock to mehow strong his
heart beat against my own chest, how warm his skin was.
“You have to cal her,” he said.
“You have to tel the girl.”
How was I supposed to explain that Claire Nealon didnt
want his heart?
“I wil ,” I lied, the words staining his cheek like Judass kiss.
Maggie
Wait until I told my mother that Judge Haig was not
Catholic, like Alexander, but Jewish. No doubt it would
inspire her to give me the speech again about how, with
time and perseverance, I could be a judge, too. I had to
admit, I liked his rulingand not just because it had come
out in favor of my client. His words had been thoughtful,
unbiased, not at al what I expected.
“Al right,” Judge Haig said, “now that the cameras arent on
us, lets just cut the crap. We al know that this trial wasnt
about religion, although you found a lovely legal coatrack to
hang your complaint on, Ms.
Bloom.”
My mouth opened and closed, sputtering. So much for
thoughtful and unbiased; Judge Haigs spirituality,
apparently, was the kind that made itself present only when
the right people were there to see it.
“Your Honor, I firmly believe in my clients religious
freedoms”
“Im sure you do,” the judge interrupted. “But get off your
high horse so we can settle this business.” He turned to
Gordon Greenleaf. “Is the state real y going to appeal this
for a hundred and twenty dol ars?”
“Probably not, Judge, but Id have to check.”
“Then go make a phone cal ,” Judge Haig said, “because
theres a family out there who deserves to know whats
going to happen, and when. Are we clear on that?”
“Yes, Judge,” we both parroted.
I left Gordon in the hal way, hunched over his cel phone,
and headed downstairs to the holding cel where Shay was
most likely stil incarcerated. With each step, I moved a little
more slowly. What did you say to the man whose imminent
death youd just set in motion?
He was lying on the metal bench in the cel , facing the wal .
“Shay,” I said, “you okay?”
He rol ed toward me and grinned. “You did it.”
I swal owed. “Yeah. I guess I did.” If I had gotten my client
the verdict he wanted, why did I feel like I was going to be
sick?
“Did you tel her yet?”
He was talking about June Nealon, or Claire Nealon
which meant that Father Michael had not had the guts to tel
Shay the truth either, yet.
I pul ed up a chair and sat down outside the cel . “I spoke to
June this morning,” I said. “She said Claires not going to
be using your heart.”
“But the doctor told me I was a match.”
“Its not that she cant use it, Shay,” I said quietly. “Its that
she doesnt want to.”
“I did everything you wanted!” Shay cried. “I did what you
asked!”
“I know,” I said. “But again, this doesnt have to be the end.
We can try to see what evidence stil exists from the crime
scene and”
“I wasnt talking to you,” Shay said. “And I dont want you to
do anything for me. I dont want that evidence reviewed.
How many times do I have to tel you?”
I nodded. “Im sorry Its just … hard for me to be riding on
the coattails of your death wish.”
Shay glanced at me. “No one asked you to,” he said flatly.
He was right, wasnt he? Shay didnt ask me to take on his
case; Id swooped down like an avenging angel and
convinced him that what I wanted to do could somehow
help him do what he wanted to do. And Id been rightId
raised the profile of the nature of death penalty cases; Id
secured his right to be hanged. I just hadnt realized that
winning would feel, wel , quite so much like losing.
“The judge … hes made it possible for you to donate your
organs …
afterward. And even if Claire Nealon doesnt want them,
there are thousands of people in this country who do.”
Shay sank onto the bunk. “Just give it al away,” he
murmured. “It doesnt matter anymore.”
“Im sorry, Shay. I wish I knew why she changed her mind.”
He closed his eyes. “I wish you knew how to change it
back.”
M I CHAEL
Priests get used to the business of death, but that doesnt
make it any easier. Even now that the judge had ruled in
favor of a hanging, that stil meant there was a wil to be
written. A body to be disposed of.
As I stood in the prison waiting room, handing over my
license so that I could visit Shay, I listened to the
commotion outside. This was nothing new; the mob would
grow at leaps and bounds through the date of Shays
execution. “You dont understand,” a woman was pleading.
“I have to see him.”
“Take a number, sweetheart,” the officer said.
I looked out the open window, trying to see the womans
face. It was obscured by a black scarf; her dress reached
from ankle to wrist. I burst through the front door and stood
behind the line of correctional officers. “Grace?”
She looked up, tears in her eyes. “They wont let me in. I
have to see him.”
I reached over the human barrier of guards and pul ed her
forward.
“Shes with me.”
“Shes not on Bournes visitor list.”
“Thats because,” I said, “were going to see the warden.”
I had no idea how to get someone who had not had a
background check done into the prison, but I figured that
rules would be relaxed for a death row prisoner. And if they
werent, I was wil ing to say what I had to to convince the
warden.
In the end. Warden Coyne was more amenable than I
expected. He looked at Graces drivers license, made a
cal to the states attorneys office, and then offered me a
deal. I couldnt take Grace into the tier, but he was wil ing to
bring Shay out to an attorney-client conference room, as
long as he remained handcuffed. Im not going to let you do
this again,” he warned, but that hardly mattered. We both
knew that Shay didnt have time for that.
Graces hands shook as she emptied her pockets to go
through the metal detector. We fol owed the officer to the
conference room in silence, but as soon as the door was
closed and we were left alone, she started to speak. “I
wanted to come to the courthouse,” Grace said. “I even
drove there. I just couldnt get out of the car.” She faced me.
“What if he doesnt want to see me?”
“I dont know what frame of mind hel be in,” I said honestly.
“He won his trial, but the mother of the heart recipient
doesnt want him to be the donor anymore. Im not sure if
his attorneys told him that yet. If he refuses to see you, that
might be why.”
Only a few minutes passed before two officers brought
Shay into the room. He looked hopeful, his fists clenched
tight. He saw my face, and then turnedexpecting Maggie,
most likely. Hed probably been told there were two visitors,
and figured one of us had managed to change Junes mind.
As he saw his sister, however, he froze. “Gracie? Is that
you?”
She took a step forward. “Shay. Im sorry. Im so, so sorry.”
“Dont cry,” he whispered. He went to lift his hand to touch
her, but he was handcuffed, and instead just shook his
head. “You grew up.”
“The last time I saw you I was only fifteen.”
He smiled rueful y. “Yeah. I was fresh out of juvy jail, and you
wanted nothing to do with your loser brother. I think your
exact words were Get the hel away from me. “
“Thats because I didntI hadnt” She was sobbing hard
now. “I dont want you to die.”
“I have to, Grace, to make things right… Im okay with that.”
“Wel , Im not.” She looked up at him. “I want to tel
someone.
Shay.”
He stared at her for a long moment. “Al right,” Shay said.
“But only one person, and I get to pick. And,” he added, “I
get to do this.” He reached for the tail of the veil wrapped
around her face, which was level with his bound hands.
Tugging, he unraveled it, until it fluttered to the ground
between them.
Grace brought her hands up to cover her face. But Shay
reached up as far as he could in his chains until Grace
threaded her fingers with his. Her skin was pocked and
puckered, a whirlpool in some places, too tight in others, a
relief map of the topology of regret.
Shay ran his thumb over the spot where her eyebrow should
have been, where her lip twisted, as if he could repaint her.
The look on his face was so honest, so replete, that I felt
like I was intruding. I had seen it beforeI just couldnt
place it.
And then it came to me. A Madonna. Shay was staring at
his sister the same way Mary looked at Jesus in al the
paintings, al the sculpturesa relationship carved out of
not what they had, but what theyd been destined to lose.
June
I had never seen the woman who came into Claires
hospital room, but Id never forget her. Her face was horribly
disfiguredthe kind that youre always tel ing your kids not
to stare at in the grocery store, and yet, when push came to
shove, you found yourself doing that very thing.
“Im sorry,” I said quietly, standing up from the chair Id
pul ed beside Claires bed. “I think you must have the wrong
room.” Now that I had agreed to Claires wishes and given
up the heartnow that she was dying by degreesI kept a
vigil, 2 4 / 7 . I didnt sleep, I didnt eat, because years from
now, I knew I would miss those minutes.
“Youre June Nealon?” the woman asked, and when I
nodded, she took a step forward. “My name is Grace. Im
Shay Bournes sister.”
You know how when youre driving and skid on ice, or just
avoid hitting the deer, you find yourself with your heart
racing and your hands shaking and your blood gone to ice?
Thats what Graces words did to me. “Get out,” I said, my
jaw clenched.
“Please. Just hear me out. I want to tel you why I … why I
look this way.”
I glanced down at Claire, but who was I kidding? We could
scream at the top of our lungs and not disturb her; she was
in a medical y induced haze. “What makes you think I want
to listen?”
She continued, as if I hadnt spoken at al . “When I was thir
teen, I was in a fire. So was my whole foster family. My
foster father, he died.” She took a step forward. “I ran in to
try to get my foster father out. Shay was the one who came
to save me.”
“Sorry, but I cant quite think of your brother as a hero.”
“When the police came, Shay told them hed set the fire,”
Grace said.
I folded my arms. She hadnt said anything yet that
surprised me. I knew that Shay Bourne had been in and out
of the foster care system. I knew that hed been sent to
juvenile prison. You could throw ten thousand more excuses
for a sorry childhood on his shoulders, and in my opinion, it
stil wouldnt negate the fact that my husband, my baby, had
been kil ed.
“The thing is,” Grace said, “Shay lied.” She pushed her
hand through her hair. “Im the one who set the fire.”
“My daughter is dying,” I said tightly. “Im sorry you had such
a traumatic past. But right now, I have other things to focus
on.”
Undaunted, Grace kept speaking. “It would happen when
my foster mom went to visit her sister. Her husband would
come to my bedroom. I used to beg to leave my lights on at
night. At first, it was because I was afraid of the dark; then
later it was because I so badly wanted someone to see
what was happening.” Her voice trailed off.
“So one day, I planned it. My foster mother was gone
overnight, and Shay wasI dont know where, but not
home. I guess I didnt think about the consequences until
after I lit the matchso I ran in to try to wake my foster dad
up. But someone dragged me back outShay. And as the
sirens got closer I told him everything and he promised me
hed take care of it. I never thought he meant to take the
blamebut he wanted to, because he hadnt been able to
rescue me before.” Grace glanced up at me. “I dont know
what happened that day, with your husband, and your little
girl, and my brother.
But I bet, somehow, something went wrong. That Shay was
trying to save her, the way he couldnt save me.”
“Its not the same,” I said. “My husband would never have
hurt Elizabeth like that.”
“My foster mother said that, too.” She met my gaze. “How
would you have felt ifwhen Elizabeth diedsomeone told
you that you cant have her back, but that a part of her could
stil be somewhere in the world? You may not know that
part; you may not ever have contact with itbut youd know
it was out there, alive and wel . Would you have wanted
that?”
We were both standing on the same side of Claires bed.
Grace Bourne was almost exactly my height, my build. In
spite of her scars, it felt like looking into a mirror. “Theres
stil a heart, June,”
she said. “And its a good one.”
We pretend that we know our children, because its easier
than admitting the truthfrom the minute that cord is cut,
they are strangers. Its far easier to tel yourself your
daughter is stil a little girl than to see her in a bikini and
realize she has the curves of a young woman; its safer to
say you are a good parent who has al the right
conversations about drugs and sex than to acknowledge
there are a thousand things she would never tel you.
How long ago had Claire decided that she couldnt fight any
longer? Did she talk to a friend, a diary, Dudley, because I
didnt listen? And had I done this before: ignored another
daughter, because I was too afraid to hear what she had to
say?
Grace Bournes words kept circling around my mind: My
foster mother said that, too.
No. Kurt would never.
No. Kurt would never.
But there were other images clouding my mind, like flags
thrown on a grassy field: the pair of Elizabeths panties that
I found inside a couch cushion liner when she was too little
to know how to work a zipper. The way he often needed to
search for something in the bathroomTylenol, an Ace
bandagewhen Elizabeth was in the tub.
And I heard Elizabeth, every night, when I tucked her in.
“Leave the lights on,” shed beg, just like Grace Bourne
had.
I had thought it was a phase shed outgrow, but Kurt said
we couldnt let her give in to her fears. The compromise he
suggested was to turn off the lightand lie down with her
until she fel asleep.
What happens when Im asleep? shed asked me once.
Does everything stop?
What if that had not been the dreamy question of a seven-
yearold stil figuring out this world, but a plea from a child
who wanted to escape it?
I thought of Grace Bourne, hiding behind her scarves. I
thought of how you can look right at a person and not see
them.
I realized that I might never know what had real y happened
between themneither Kurt nor Elizabeth could tel . And
Shay Bournewel , no matter what he saw, his fingerprints
had stil been on that gun. After last time, I did not know if I
could ever bear to face him again.
She was better off dead, hed said, and Id run away from
what he was trying to tel me.
I pictured Kurt and Elizabeth together in that coffin, his arms
holding her tight, and suddenly I thought I was going to
throw up.
“Mom,” Claire said, her voice thin and wispy. “Are you
okay?”
I put my hand on her cheek, where there was a faint flush
induced by the medicineher heart was not strong enough
to put a bloom on her face. “No, Im not,” I admitted. “Im
dying.”
She smiled a little. “What a coincidence.”
But it wasnt funny. I was dying, by degrees. “I have to tel
you something,” I said, “and youre going to hate me for it.” I
reached for her hand and squeezed it tightly. “I know it isnt
fair. But youre the child, and Im the parent, and I get to
make the choice, even though the heart gets to beat in your
chest.”
Her eyes fil ed with tears. “But you saidyou promised.
Dont make me do this …”
“Claire, I cannot sit here and watch you die when I know that
theres a heart waiting for you.”
“But not just any heart.” She was crying now, her head
turned away from me. “Did you think at al what it wil be like
for me, after?”
I brushed her hair off her forehead. “Its al I think about,
baby.”
“Thats a lie,” Claire argued. “Al you ever think about is
yourself, and what you want, and what youve lost. You
know, youre not the only one who missed out on a real life.”
“Thats exactly why I cant let you throw this one away.”
Slowly, Claire turned to face me.
“I dont want to be alive because of him.”
“Then stay alive because of me.” I drew in my breath and
pul ed my deepest secret free. “See, Im not as strong as
you are, Claire. I dont think I can stand to be left behind
again.”
She closed her eyes, and I thought she had drifted back
into sleep, until she squeezed my hand. “Okay,” she said.
“But I hope you realize I may hate you for the rest of my life.”
The rest of my life. Was there any other phrase with so
much music in it? “Oh, Claire,” I said tightly. “Thats going to
be a long, long time.”
“God is dead: but considering the state Man is in, there wil
perhaps be caves, for ages yet,
in which his shadow wil be shown.”
-FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, THE CAY SCIENCE
M I C HAEL
When inmates tried to kil themselves, theyd use the vent.
They would string coaxial cables from their television sets
through the louvers, wrap a noose around their necks, and
step off the metal bunk. For this reason, one week before
Shays execution, he was transferred to an observation cel .
There was a camera monitoring his every move; an officer
was stationed outside the door. It was a suicide watch, so
that a prisoner could not kil himself before the state had its
turn.
Shay hated itit was al he talked about as I sat with him
for eight hours a day. Id read from the Bible, and from the
Gospel of Thomas, and from Sports Il ustrated. Id tel him
about the plans Id made for the youth group to host a
Fourth of July pie auction, a holiday that he would not be
around to celebrate. He would act like he was listening, but
then hed address the officer standing outside.
“Dont you think I deserve some privacy?” hed yel . “If you
only had a week left, would you want someone watching
you every time you cried? Ate? Took a piss?”
Sometimes he seemed resigned to the fact that he was
going to diehed ask me if I real y thought there was a
heaven, if you could catch stripers or rainbows or salmon
there, if fish even went to heaven in the first place, if fish
souls were just as good eating as the real kind.
Other times he sobbed so hard that he made himself sick;
hed wipe his mouth on the sleeve of his jumpsuit and lie
down on the bunk, staring up at the ceiling. The only thing
that got him through those darker times was talking about
Claire Nealon, whose mother had reclaimed Shays heart.
He had a grainy newspaper photo of Claire, and by now.
hed run his hands over it so often that the girls pale face
had become a blank white oval, features left to the
imagination.
The scaffold had been built; throughout the prison you could
smel the sap of the pine, taste the fine sawdust in the air.
Although there had indeed already been a trapdoor in the
chaplains office, it proved too costly to decimate the
cafeteria below it, which accommodated the drop. Instead,
a sturdy wooden structure went up beside the injection
chamber that had already been built. But when editorials in
the Concord Monitor and the Union Leader criticized the
barbarism of a public execution (they speculated that any
paparazzi capable of crashing Madonnas wedding in a
helicopter would also be able to get footage of the
hanging), the warden scrambled to conceal the scaffold. On
short order, their best arrangement was to purchase an old
big-top tent from a family-run Vermont circus that was going
out of business. The festive red and purple stripes took up
most of the prison courtyard. You could see its spire from
Route 93: Come one, come al . The greatest show on
earth.
It was a strange thing, knowing that I was going to see
Shays death. Although Id witnessed the passing of a
dozen parishioners; although Id stood beside the bed while
they took their last breathsthis was different. It wasnt
God who was cutting the thread of this life, but a court
order. I stopped wearing my watch and kept time by Shays
life instead. There were seventy-two hours left, forty-eight,
and then twentyfour. I stopped sleeping, like Shay,
choosing instead to stay up with him around the clock.
Grace continued to visit once a day. She would only tel me
that what had separated them before was a secret
something that had apparently been resolved after she
visited June Nealonand that she was making up for the
time shed lost with her brother. They spent hours with their
heads bent together, trading memories, but Shay was
adamant that he didnt want Grace at the executionhe did
not want that to be her last memory of him. Instead, Shays
designated witnesses would be me, Maggie, and Maggies
boss. When Grace came for her visit, Id leave her alone
with Shay. I would go to the staff cafeteria and grab a soda,
or sit and read the newspaper. Sometimes I watched the
news coverage of the upcoming executionthe American
Medical Association had begun to protest outside the
prison, with huge banners that read FIRST DO NO HARM.
Those who stil believed that Shay was, wel , more than just
a murderer began to light candles at night, thousands of
them, spel ing out a message that burned so brightly
airplane pilots departing from Manchester could read it as
they soared skyward: HAVE MERCY.
Mostly, I prayed. To God, to Shay, to anyone who was
wil ing to listen, frankly. And I hopedthat God, at the last
minute, would spare Shay. It was hard enough ministering
to a death row inmate when Id believed him to be guilty, but
it was far worse to minister to an innocent man who had
resigned himself to death. At night, I dreamed of train
wrecks. No matter how loud I shouted for someone to throw
the switch to the rail, no one understood what I was saying.
On the day before Shays execution, when Grace arrived, I
excused myself and wandered into the courtyard between
buildings, along the massive perimeter of the circus tent.
This time, however, the officers who usual y stood guard at
the front entrance were missing, and the flap that was
usual y laced shut was pinned open instead. I could hear
voices inside:
… dont want to get too close to the edge…
… thirty seconds from the rear entrance to the steps…
… two of you out in front, three in back.
I poked my head in, expecting to be yanked away by an
officerbut the smal group inside was far too busy to even
notice me. Warden Coyne stood on a wooden platform,
along with six officers. One was slightly smal er than the
rest, and wore handcuffs, ankle cuffs, and a waist chain. He
was sagging backward, a deadweight in the other officers
hands.
The gal ows itself was a massive metal upright with a
crossbeam.
set on a platform that had a set of double trapdoors. Below
the trap was an open area where youd be able to see the
body drop. Off to both the left and right of the gal ows were
smal rooms with a one-way mirror in the front, so that you
could look out, but no one could look in.
There was a ramp behind the gal ows, and two white
curtains that ran the entire length of the tentone above the
gal ows, one below it. As I watched, two of the officers
dragged the smal er one onto the gal ows platform in front
of the open curtain.
Warden Coyne pushed a button on his stopwatch. “And …
cut,” he said. Thats seven minutes, fiftyeight seconds.
Nicely done.”
The warden gestured to the wal . “Those red phones are
direct hookups to the governors office and the attorney
generalthe commissioner wil cal to make sure theres
been no stay of execution, no last minute reprieve. If thats
the case, then hel come onto the platform and say so.
When he exits, I come up and read the warrant of
execution, blah blah blah, then I ask the inmate if he has any
final words. As soon as hes finished, I walk off the platform.
The minute I cross this taped yel ow line, the upper curtain
wil close, and thats when you two secure the inmate. Now,
Im not going to close the curtains right now, but give it a
try.”
They placed a white hood over the smal er officers head
and fitted the noose around his neck. It was made of rough
rope, wrapped with leather; the loop wasnt made from a
hangmans knot, but instead passed through a brass
eyelet.
“Weve got a drop of seven feet seven inches,” Warden
Coyne explained as they finished up. “Thats the standard
for a hundred-and twenty-six-pound man. You can see the
adjusting bracket abovethat gold mark is where it should
be lined up, at the eye bolt. During the actual event, you
threeHughes, Hutchins, and Greenwaldwil be in the
chamber to the right. Youl have been placed a few hours
ahead of time, so that you arent seen coming into the tent
at al . You wil each have a button in front of you. As soon as
I enter the control chamber and close the door, you wil push
that button. Only one of the three actual y
electromagnetical y releases the trapdoor of the gal ows;
the other two are dummies. Which of the three buttons
connects wil be determined randomly by computer.”
One of the officers interrupted. “What if the inmate cant
stand up?”
“We have a col apse board outside his cel modeled after
the one used at Wal a Wal a in 94. If he cant walk, hel be
strapped onto it and wheeled up by gurney.”
They kept saying “the inmate” as if they did not know who
they were executing in twentyfour hours. I knew, though, that
the reason they would not say Shays name was that none
of them were brave enough. That would make them
accountable for murderthe very same crime for which
they were hanging a man.
Warden Coyne turned to the other booth. “Hows that work
for you?”
A door opened, and another man walked out. He put his
hand on the mock prisoners shoulder. “I beg your pardon,”
he said, and as soon as he spoke I recognized him. This
was the British man whod been at Maggies apartment
when I barged in to tel her Shay was innocent-Gal agher,
that was his name. He took the noose and readjusted it
around the smal er mans neck, but this time he tightened
the knot directly below the left ear. “You see where Ive
snugged the rope? Make sure its here, not at the base of
the skul . The force of the drop, combined with the position
of the knot, is whats meant to fracture the cervical
vertebrae and separate the spinal cord.”
Warden Coyne addressed the staff again. “The courts
ordered us to assume brain death based on the measured
drop and the fact that the inmate has stopped breathing.
Once the doctor gives us the signal, the lower curtains wil
close as wel , and the body gets cut down immediately.
Its important to remember that our job doesnt end with the
drop.” He turned to the doctor. “And then?”
“Wel intubate, to protect the heart and other organs. After
that, Il perform a brain perfusion scan to ful y confirm brain
death, and wel remove the body from the premises.”
“After the criminal investigation unit comes in and clears the
execution, the body wil go to the medical examiners staff
theyl have an unmarked white van behind the tent,” the
warden said, “and the special operations unit wil transport
the body back to the hospital, along with them.”
I noticed that the warden did not speak the doctors name,
either.
“The rest of the visitors wil be exiting from the front of the
tent,”
Warden Coyne said, pointing to the opened flaps of the
doorway and spotting me for the first time.
Everyone on the gal ows platform stared at me. I met
Christian Gal aghers gaze and he nodded imperceptibly.
Warden Coyne squinted, and as he recognized me, he
sighed. “I cant let you in here. Father,” he said, but before
the officers could escort me out, I had already slipped from
the tent and back into the building where Shay was even
now waiting to die.
That night. Shay was moved to the death tent. They had
built a single cel there, one that would be manned round
the clock. At first, it was just like any other cel … but two
hours into his stay there, the temperature began to
plummet. Shay kept shivering, no matter how many
blankets were piled upon him.
“The thermostat says its sixty-six degrees,” the officer said,
smacking the bulb with his hand. “Its May, for chris sake.”
“Wel , does it feel like sixty-six degrees to you?” I asked. My
toes were numb. There was an icicle hanging from the
bottom rung of my stool. “Can we get a heater? Another
blanket?”
The temperature continued to drop. I put on my coat and
zipped it tight. Shays entire body was racked with tremors;
his lips had started to turn blue. Frost swirled on the metal
door of the cel , like a white feathered fern.
“Its ten degrees warmer outside this building,” the officer
said. “I dont get it.” He was blowing on his hands, a smal
exclamation of breath that hovered in the air. “I could cal
maintenance …”
“Let me into the cel ,” I ordered.
The officer blinked at me. “I cant.”
“Why? Ive been searched twice over. Im not near any other
inmates.
And youre here. Its no different than a meeting in an
attorney client conference room, is it?”
“I could get fired for this …”
Til tel the warden it was my idea, and Il be on my best
behavior,”
I said. Im a priest. Would I lie to you?”
He shook his head and unlocked the cel with an enormous
Folger Adam key. I heard the tumblers click into place as
he secured me inside; as I entered Shays six-by-six world.
Shay glanced up at me, his teeth chattering.
“Move over,” I said, and sat down on the bunk beside him. I
draped a blanket over us and waited until the heat from my
body conducted through the slight space between us.
“Why … is it so … cold?” Shay whispered.
I shook my head. “Try not to think about it.”
Try not to think about the fact that it is subzero in this tiny
cel . Try not to think about the fact that it backs up to a
gal ows from which you wil swing tomorrow. Try not to think
about the sea of faces you wil see when you stand up
there, about what you wil say when you are asked to, about
your heart pounding so fast with fear that you cannot hear
the words you speak. Try not to think about that same heart
being cut from your chest, minutes later, when you are
gone.
Earlier, Alma the nurse had come to offer Shay Valium.
Hed declinedbut now I wished Id taken her up on his
behalf.
After a few minutes. Shay stopped shaking so violentlyhe
was down to an occasional tremor. “I dont want to cry up
there,” he admitted.
“I dont want to look weak.”
I turned to him. “Youve been on death row for eleven years.
Youve foughtand wonthe right to die on your own
terms. Even if you had to crawl up there tomorrow, theres
not a single person whod think of you as weak.”
“Are they al stil out there?”
By they, he meant the crowds. And they wereand were
stil coming, blocking the exits off 93 to get into Concord. In
the end, and this was the end, it did not matter whether or
not Shay was truly messianic, or just a good showman. It
mattered that al of those people had someone to believe
in.
Shay turned to me. “I want you to do me a favor.”
“Anything.”
“I want you to watch over Grace.”
I had already assumed hed ask that; an execution bound
people together much like any other massive emotional
momenta birth, an armed robbery, a marriage, a divorce.
I would be linked to the parties involved forever. “I wil .”
“And I want you to have al my things.”
I could not imagine what this entailedhis tools, maybe,
from when he was a carpenter? Td like that.” I pul ed the
blanket up a little higher. “Shay, about your funeral.”
“It real y doesnt matter.”
I had tried to get him a spot in the St. Catherines cemetery,
but the committee in charge had vetoed itthey did not
want the grave of a murderer resting beside their loved
ones. Private plots and burials were thousands of dol ars
thousands that neither Grace nor Maggie nor I had to
spend. An inmate whose family did not make alternate
plans would be buried in a tiny graveyard behind the prison,
a headstone carved only with his correctional facility
number, not his name.
“Three days,” Shay said, yawning.
“Three days?”
He smiled at me, and for the first time in hours, I actual y felt
warm to the core. “Thats when Im coming back.”
*
At nine oclock on the morning of Shays execution, a tray
was brought up from the kitchen. Sometime during the
night, the frost had broken; and with it, the cement that had
been poured for the base of the holding cel . Weeds from
the courtyard sprouted in tufts and bunches; vines climbed
up the metal wal of the cel door. Shay took off his shoes
and socks and walked across the new grass barefoot, a
big smile on his face.
I had moved back to my outside stool, so that the officer
watching over Shay would not get into trouble, but the
sergeant who arrived with the food was immediately wary.
“Who brought in the plants?”
“No one,” the officer said. “They just sort of showed up
overnight.”
The sergeant frowned. Im going to tel the warden.”
“Yeah,” the officer said. “Go on. Im sure hes got nothing
else to think about right now.”
At his sarcasm. Shay and I looked at each other and
grinned. The sergeant left, and the officer handed the tray
through the trapdoor.
Shay uncovered the items, one by one.
Mal omars. Corn dogs. Chicken nuggets.
Kettle com and cotton candy, smores.
Curly fries, ice cream crowned with a halo of maraschino
cherries.
Fry bread sprinkled with powdered sugar. A huge blue
Slurpee.
There was more than one man could ever eat. And it was
al the sort of food you got at a country fair. The sort of food
you remembered from your childhood.
If, unlike Shay, youd had one.
“I worked on a farm for a while,” Shay said absently. “I was
putting up a timber-frame barn. One day, I watched the guy
who ran it empty the whole sack of grain out into the middle
of the pasture for his steers, instead of just a scoop. I
thought that was so coollike Christmas, for them!until I
saw the butchers truck drive up. He was giving them al
they could eat, because by then, it didnt matter.”
Shay rol ed the French fry hed been holding between his
fingers, then set it back on the plate. “You want some?”
I shook my head.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “I guess Im not so hungry, either.”
Shays execution was scheduled for ten a.m. Although
death penalty sentences used to be carried out at midnight,
it felt so cloak-and dagger that now they were staggered at
al times of the day. The family of the inmate was al owed to
visit up to three hours prior to the execution, although this
was not an issue, since Shay had told Grace not to come.
The attorney of record and the spiritual advisor were
al owed to stay up to forty-five minutes prior to the
execution.
After that. Shay would be alone, except for the officer
guarding him.
After the breakfast tray was removed. Shay got diarrhea.
The officer and I turned our backs to give him privacy, then
pretended it had not happened. Shortly afterward, Maggie
arrived. Her eyes were red, and she kept wiping at them
with a crumpled Kleenex. “I brought you something,” she
said, and then she saw the cel , overrun with vegetation.
“Whats this?”
“Global warming?” I said.
“Wel . My gifts a little redundant.” Maggie emptied her
pockets, ful of grass. Queen Annes lace, ladys slippers,
Indian paintbrushes, buttercups.
She fed them to Shay through the metal mesh on the door.
“Thank you, Maggie.”
“For Gods sake, dont thank me,” Maggie said. “I wish this
wasnt the way it ended. Shay.” She hesitated. “What if I-“
“No.” Shay shook his head. “Its almost over, and then you
can go on to rescuing people who want to be rescued. Im
okay, real y. Im ready.”
Maggie opened her mouth to speak, but then pressed her
lips together and shook her head. Til stand where you can
see me.”
Shay swal owed. “Okay.”
“I cant stay. I need to make sure that Warden Coynes
talked to the hospital, so that everything happens like its
supposed to.”
Shay nodded. “Maggie,” he said, “promise me something?”
“Sure, Shay.”
He rested his head against the metal door. “Dont forget
me.”
“Not a chance,” Maggie said, and she pressed her lips
against the metal door, as if she could kiss Shay good-bye.
Suddenly, we were alone, with a half hour stretching
between us.
“How are you doing?” I asked.
“Urn,” Shay said. “Never better?”
“Right. Stupid question.” I shook my head. “Do you want to
talk?
Pray? Be by yourself?”
“No,” Shay said quickly. “Not that.”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Tel me about her again.”
I hesitated. “Shes at the playground,” I said, “pumping her
legs on a swing. When she gets to the top, and shes sure
her sneakers have actual y kicked a cloud, she jumps off
because she thinks she can fly.”
“Shes got long hair, and its like a flag behind her,” Shay
added.
“Fairy-tale hair. So blond its nearly silver.”
“A fairy tale,” Shay repeated. “A happy ending.”
“It is, for her. Youre giving her a whole new life. Shay.”
“Im saving her again. Im saving her twice. Now with my
heart, and once before she was ever born.” He looked
directly at me. “It wasnt just Elizabeth he could have hurt.
She got in the way, when the gun went off… but the other …
I had to do it.”
I glanced over my shoulder at the officer standing watch, but
he had moved to a far corner and was speaking into his
walkie-talkie. My words were thick, rubbery. “Then you did
commit capital murder.”
Shay shrugged. “Some people,” he said simply, “deserve
to die.”
I stood, speechless, as the officer approached. “Father, Im
real y sorry,” he said, “but its time for you to leave.”
At that moment, the sound of bagpipes fil ed the tent, and
an accompanying swel of voices. The people outside,
maintaining their vigil, had begun to sing:
Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound…
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now Im found.
Was blind, but now I see.
I didnt know if Shay was guilty of murder, or innocent and
misunderstood.
I didnt know if he was the Messiah, or a savant who
channeled texts hed never read. I didnt know if we were
making history, or only reliving it. But I did know what to do: I
motioned Shay forward, closed my eyes, and made the
sign of the cross on his forehead. “Almighty God,” I
murmured, “look on this your servant, lying in great
weakness, and comfort him with the promise of life
everlasting, given in the resurrection of your Son Jesus
Christ our Lord. Amen.”
I opened my eyes to find Shay smiling. “See you around.
Father,” he said.
Maggie
As soon as I left Shays cel , I stumbled out of the circus tent
thats what this was, you know, a circusand threw up on
the grass in the courtyard.
“Hey,” a voice said, “you al right?” I felt an arm steadying
me, and I glanced into the dizzying sunlight to find Warden
Coyne, looking just as unhappy to see me as I was to see
him.
“Come on,” he said. “Lets get you a glass of water.”
He led me through dark, dismal corridorscorridors far
more suited to an execution, I thought, than the beautiful
spring day outside, with its bril iant blue sky and tufted
clouds. In the empty staff cafeteria, he pul ed out a chair for
me, then went to the cooler to get me something to drink.
I finished the whole cup of water, and stil could taste the
bitterness in my throat.
“Sorry,” I said. “Didnt mean to vomit on your parade.”
He sat down in a chair beside me. “You know, Ms. Bloom,
theres a hel of a lot about me you dont know.”
“Nor do I want to,” I said, standing.
“For example,” Warden Coyne continued blithely, “I dont
real y believe in the death penalty.”
I stared at him, snapped my mouth shut, and sank back into
my chair.
“I used to, dont get me wrong. And Il perform an execution
if I have to, because its part of my job. But that doesnt
mean I condone it,”
he said. “Truth is, Ive seen plenty of inmates for whom life
in prison is just as wel served. And Ive seen inmates I wish
would be kil edthere are just some people you cannot
find the good in. But who am I to decide if someone should
be kil ed for murdering a child … instead of for murdering a
drug addict during a deal that went bad … or even if we
should be kil ing the inmate himself? Im not smart enough
to be able to say which life is worth more than the other. I
dont know if anyone is.”
“If you know its not fair, and you stil do this, how do you
sleep at night?”
Warden Coyne smiled sadly. “I dont, Ms. Bloom. The
difference between you and me is that you expect me to be
able to.” He got to his feet.
“I trust you know where you go from here?”
I was supposed to wait at the Public Information Office,
along with Father Michael, so that we could be brought to
the tent apart from the witnesses for the state and the
victim. But somehow, I knew that wasnt what Warden
Coyne had meant.
And even more surprising … I think he knew that I knew
that.
The inside of the circus tent was painted with blue sky.
Artificial clouds rose into the peaks, above the black iron of
the gal ows that had been constructed. I wondered if Shay
would look at it and pretend that he was outside.
The tent itself was divided by a line of correctional officers,
who kept the witnesses for both sides separated, like a
human dam. We had been warned about our behavior in
the letters from the Department of Corrections: any name-
cal ing or inappropriate actions would result in us being
hauled out of the tent. Beside me, Father Michael was
praying a rosary.
On my other side sat Rufus Urqhart, my boss.
I was shocked to see June Nealon sitting quietly in the front
row across from us.
Somehow Id assumed shed be with Claire, especial y
given the fact that Claire would be getting ready for her
heart transplant. When shed cal ed to tel me she wanted
Shays heart, I hadnt asked any questionsI hadnt wanted
to jinx it. Now I wished I could go over to her and ask
whether Claire was al right, if everything was on schedule
but I would run the risk of the officers thinking I was
harassing her; and truth be told, I was afraid to hear her
answer.
Somewhere behind that curtain, Christian was checking to
make sure the rope and noose were exactly as they should
be to ensure as humane a hanging as possible. I knew this
was supposed to comfort me, but to be honest, I had never
felt more alone in my life.
It was a hard thing, accepting to myself that I had
befriended someone convicted of murder. Lawyers knew
better than to become emotional y and personal y involved
with their clientsbut that didnt mean it didnt happen.
At exactly ten oclock, the curtains opened.
Shay seemed very smal on the gal ows platform. He wore
a white T-shirt, orange scrub pants, and tennis shoes, and
was flanked by two officers Id never seen before. His arms
were fastened behind him, and his legs were bound
together with what looked like a strap of leather.
He was shaking like a leaf.
Commissioner Lynch walked onto the platform. “There has
been no stay of execution,” he announced.
I thought about Christians hands checking the knot against
Shays neck. I knew the mercy of his touch; I was grateful
that Shays last physical contact with a human would be
gentle.
The warden stepped onto the platform as Lynch exited, and
he read the entire warrant aloud. The words slipped in and
out of my mind: … Whereas on the sixth day of March,
1997, Isaiah Matthew Bourne was duly and legal y
convicted of two counts of the crime of capital murder…
… said court pronounced sentence upon Isaiah Matthew
Bourne in accordance with said judgment fixing the time for
the execution for ten a.m. on Friday, the twenty-third of May,
2008 …
… command you to execute the aforesaid judgment and
sentence by hanging in a manner that produces brain death
in said Isaiah Matthew Bourne…
When the warden finished, he faced Shay. “Inmate Bourne,
do you have any final words?”
Shay squinted, until he found me in the front row. He kept
his eyes on me for a long moment, and then drifted toward
Father Michael. But then he turned to the side of the tent
where the witnesses for the victim were gathered, and he
smiled at June Nealon. “I forgive you,” he said.
Immediately afterward, a curtain was drawn. It reached only
to the floor of the gal ows, and it was a translucent white. I
didnt know if the warden had intended for us to see what
was happening behind it, but we could, in macabre
silhouette: the hood being placed over Shays head, the
noose being tightened against his neck, the two officers
whod secured him stepping backward.
“Good-bye,” I whispered.
Somewhere, a door slammed, and suddenly the trap was
open and the body plummeted, one quick firecracker snap
as the weight caught at the end of the rope. Shay slowly
turned counterclockwise with the unlikely grace of a
bal erina, an October leaf, a snowflake fal ing.
I felt Father Michaels hand on mine, conveying what there
were not words to say. “Its over,” he whispered.
I dont know what made me turn toward June Nealon, but I
did. The woman sat with her back straight as a redwood,
her hands folded so tightly in her lap that I could see the
half-moons her own nails were cutting in her skin. Her eyes
were tightly squeezed shut.
After al this, she hadnt even watched him die.
The lower curtain closed three minutes and ten seconds
after Shay had been hanged. It was opaque, and we could
not see what was happening behind it, although the fabric
fluttered with movement and activity. The officers in the tent
didnt let us linger, thoughthey hustled us out separate
doors to the courtyard. We were led out of the prison gates
and immediately inundated with the press. “This is good,”
Rufus said, pumped up with adrenaline. “This is our
moment.” I nodded, but my attention was focused on June. I
could see her only briefly, a tiny crow of a woman ducking
into a waiting car.
“Mr. Urqhart,” a reporter said, as twenty microphones were
held up to his face, a bouquet of black roses. “Do you have
any comment?”
I stepped back, watching Rufus in the limelight. I wished I
could just vanish on the spot. I knew that Rufus didnt mean
to use Shay as a pawn here, that he was only doing his job
as the head of the ACLUand yet, how did that make him
different from Warden Coyne?
“Shay Bourne is dead,” Rufus said soberly. “The first
execution in this state in sixty-nine years … in the only first
world country to stil have death penalty legislation on the
books.”
He looked out over the crowd. “Some people say that the
reason we have a death penalty in this country is because
we need to punish certain inmates. Its said to be a
deterrentbut in fact, murder rates are higher in death
penalty jurisdictions than in those without it. Its said to be
cheaper to execute a man than to keep him in prison for life
but in fact, when you factor in the cost of eleven years of
appeals, paid for with public funds, it costs about a third
more to execute a prisoner than to sentence him to life in
prison. Some people say that the death penalty exists for
the sake of the victims familythat it offers closure, so that
they can deal, final y and completely, with their grief. But
does knowing that the death tol has risen above and
beyond their family member real y offer justice? And how
do we explain the fact that a murder in a rural setting is
more likely to lead to a death sentence than one that occurs
in the city?
Or that the murder of a white victim leads to the death
penalty three and a half times more often than the murder of
a black victim? Or that women are sentenced to death only
two-thirds as often as men?”
Before I realized what I was doing, I had stepped into the
tiny circle of space that the media had afforded to Rufus.
“Maggie,” he whispered, covering the mikes, “Im working
this here.”
A reporter gave me my invitation. “Hey, werent you his
lawyer?”
“Yes,” I said. “Which I hope means Im qualified to tel you
what Im going to. I work for the ACLU. I can spout out al
the same statistics that Mr. Urqhart just did. But you know
what that speech leaves out? That I am truly sorry for June
Nealons loss, after al this time. And that today, I lost
someone I cared about. Someone whod made some
serious mistakessomeone who was a hard nut to crack
but someone Id made a place for in my life.”
“Maggie,” Rufus hissed, pul ing at my sleeve. “Save the true
confessional for your diary.”
I ignored him. “You know why I think we stil execute
people? Because, even if we dont want to say it out loud
for the real y heinous crimes, we want to know that theres a
real y heinous punishment. Simple as that. We want to bring
society closer togetherhuddle and circle our wagons
and that means getting rid of people we think are incapable
of learning a moral lesson. I guess the question is: Who
gets to identify those people? Who decides what crime is
so awful that the only answer is death? And what if, God
forbid, they get it wrong?”
The crowd was murmuring; the cameras were rol ing. “I
dont have children. I cant say Id feel the same way if one
of them was kil ed. And I dont have the answersbelieve
me, if I did, Id be a lot richerbut you know, Im starting to
think thats okay. Maybe instead of looking for answers, we
ought to be asking some questions instead. Like: Whats
the lesson were teaching here? What if its different every
time? What if justice isnt equal to due process? Because
at the end of the day, this is what were left with: a victim,
whos become a file to be dealt with, instead of a little girl,
or a husband. An inmate who doesnt want to know the
name of a correctional officers child because that makes
the relationship too personal. A warden who carries out
executions even if he doesnt think they should happen in
principle. And an ACLU lawyer whos supposed to go to
the office, close the case, and move on. What were left
with is death, with the humanity removed from it.” I hesitated
a moment. “So you tel me … did this execution real y make
you feel safer? Did it bring us al closer together? Or did it
drive us farther apart?”
I pushed past the cameras, whose heavy heads swung like
bul s to fol ow my path, and into the crowd, which carved a
canyon for me to walk through. And I cried.
God, I cried.
I turned on my windshield wipers on the way home, even
though it was not raining. But I was fal ing apart at the
seams, and sobbing, and I couldnt see; somehow I thought
this would help. I had upstaged my boss on what was
arguably the most important legal outcome for the New
Hampshire ACLU in the past fifty years; even worseI
didnt particularly care.
I would have liked to talk to Christian, but he was at the
hospital by now, supervising the harvest of Shays heart
and other organs. Hed said hed come over as soon as he
could, as soon as he had word that the transplant was
going to be a success.
Which meant that I was going home to a house with a rabbit
in it, and not much else.
I turned the corner to my street and immediately saw the car
in my driveway. My mother was waiting for me at the front
door. I wanted to ask her why she was here, instead of at
work. I wanted to ask her how shed known Id need her.
But when she wordlessly held out a blanket that I usual y
kept on the couch, one with fuzzy fleece inside, I stepped
into it and forgot al my questions. Instead, I buried my face
against her neck. “Oh, Mags,” she soothed. “Its going to be
al right.”
I shook my head. “It was awful. Every time I blink, I can see
it, like its stil happening.” I drew in a shuddering breath.
“Its stupid, isnt it?
Up til the last minute, I was expecting a miracle. Like in the
courtroom.
That hed slip out of the noose, orI dont knowfly away
or something.”
“Here, sit down,” my mother said, leading me into the
kitchen. “Real life doesnt work that way. Its like you said, to
the reporters”
“You saw me?” I glanced up.
“On television. Every channel, Maggie. Even CNN.” Her
face glowed.
“Four people already cal ed me to say you were bril iant.”
I suddenly remembered sitting in my parents kitchen when I
was in col ege, unable to decide on a career. My mother
had sat down, propped her elbows on the table. What do
you love to do? she had asked.
Read, Id told her. And argue.
She had smiled broadly. Maggie, my love, you were meant
to become a lawyer.
I buried my face in my hands. “I was an idiot. Rufus is going
to fire me.
“Why? Because you said what nobody has the guts to say?
The hardest thing in the world is believing someone can
change. Its always easier to go along with the way things
are than to admit that you might have been wrong in the first
place.”
She turned to me, holding out a steaming, fragrant bowl. I
could smel rosemary, pepper, celery. “I made you soup.
From scratch.”
“You made me soup from scratch?”
My mother rol ed her eyes. “Okay, I bought soup someone
else made from scratch.”
When I smiled a little, she touched my cheek. “Maggie,” she
said, “eat.”
Later that afternoon, while my mother did the dishes and
cleaned up in my kitchen, and with Oliver curled up at my
side, I fel asleep on the living room couch. I dreamed that I
was walking in the dark in my favorite Stuart Weitzman
heels, but they were hurting me. I glanced down to discover
I was not walking on grass, but on a ground that looked like
tempered glass after its been shattered, like the cracked,
parched landscape of a desert. My heels kept getting stuck
in the crevasses, and final y I had to stop to pul one free.
When I did, a clod of earth overturned, and beneath it was
light, the purest, most liquid lava form of it. I kicked at
another piece of the ground with my heel, and more beams
spil ed outward and upward. I poked holes, and rays shined
up. I danced, and the world became il uminated, so bright
that I had to shade my eyes; so bright that I could not keep
them from fil ing with tears.
June
This, I had told Claire, the night before the surgery, is how
theyl transplant the heart:
Youl be brought into the operating room and given general
anesthesia.
Grape, shed said. She liked it way better than bubble gum,
although the root beer wasnt bad.
Youl be prepped and draped, I told her. Your sternum wil
be opened with a saw.
Wont that hurt?
Of course not, I said. Youl be fast asleep.
I knew the procedure as wel as any cardiac resident; Id
studied it that careful y, and that long. What comes next?
Claire had asked.
Suturesstitchesget sewn into the aorta, the superior
vena cava, and the inferior vena cava. Catheters are
placed. Then youre put on the heart-lung machine.
Whats that?
It works so you dont have to. It drains blue blood from the
two cava, and returns red blood through the cannula in the
aorta.
Cannulas a cool zvord. I like how it sounds on my tongue.
I skipped over the part about how her heart would be
removed: the inferior and superior vena cava divided, then
the aorta.
Keep going.
His heart (no need to say whose) is flushed with
cardioplegia solution.
It sounds like something you use to wax a car.
Wel , youd better hope not. Its chock-ful of nutrients and
oxygen, and keeps the heart from beating as it warms up.
And after that?
Then the new heart goes to its new home, I had said, and
Id tapped her chest. First, the left atriums get sewn
together. Then the inferior vena cava, then the superior
vena cava, then the pulmonary artery, and final y, the aorta.
When al the connections are set, the cross clamp on your
aorta is removed, warm blood starts flowing into the
coronaries, and …
Wait, let me guess: the heart starts beating.
Now, hours later, Claire beamed up at me from her hospital
gurney. As the parent of a minor, I was al owed to
accompany her to the OR, gowned and suited, while she
was put under anesthesia.
I sat down on the stool provided by a nurse, amid the
gleaming instruments, the shining lights. I tried to pick out
the familiar face of the surgeon from his kind eyes, above
the mask.
“Mom,” Claire said, reaching for my hand.
“Im right here.”
“I dont hate you.”
“I know, baby.”
The anesthesiologist fitted the mask to Claires face. “I
want you to start counting for me, hon. Backward, from ten.”
“Ten,” Claire said, looking into my eyes. “Nine. Eight.”
Her lids dropped, half-mast. “Seven,” she said, but her lips
went slack on the last syl able.
“You can give her a kiss if you want. Mom,” said a nurse.
I brushed my paper mask against the soft bow of Claires
cheek. “Come back to me,” I whispered.
M | C HAEL
Three days after Shays death, and two after his funeral, I
returned to the prison cemetery. The headstones formed a
smal field, each one marked with a number. Shays grave
didnt have one yet; it was only a smal raw plot of earth.
And yet, it was the only one with a visitor. Sitting on the
ground, her legs crossed, was Grace Bourne.
I waved as she got to her feet. “Father,” she said. “Its good
to see you.”
“You, too.” I came closer, smiled.
“That was a nice service you did the other day.” She looked
down at the ground. “I know it didnt seem like I was
listening, but I was.”
At Shays funeral, I hadnt read from the Bible at al . I hadnt
read from the Gospel of Thomas, either. I had created my
own gospel, the good news about Shay Bourne, and spoke
it from the heart to the few people whod been present:
Grace, Maggie, Alma the nurse.
June Nealon had not come; she was at the hospital with her
daughter, who was recovering from the heart transplant.
Shed sent a spray of lilies to lay on Shays grave; they
were stil here, wilting.
Maggie had told me that Claires doctor had been thril ed
with the outcome of the operation, that the heart had started
beating like a jackrabbit.
Claire would be leaving the hospital by the end of the week.
“You heard about the transplant?” I said.
Grace nodded. “I know that wherever he is, hes happy
about that.”
She dusted off her skirt. “Wel , I was on my way out. I have
to get back to Maine for a seven oclock shift.”
Shay that I would look after Grace, but to be honest, I think
he wanted to be sure shed be looking after me as wel .
Somehow, Shay had known that without the Church, Id
need a family, too.
I sat down, in the same spot where Grace had been. I
sighed, leaned forward, and waited.
The problem was, I wasnt sure what I was waiting for. It had
been three days since Shays death. He had told me he
was coming backa resurrectionbut he had also told me
that hed murdered Kurt Nealon intentional y, and I couldnt
hold the two thoughts side by side in my mind.
I didnt know if I was supposed to be on the lookout for an
angel, like Mary Magdalene had seen, to tel me that Shay
had left this tomb. I didnt know if hed mailed me a letter
that I could expect to receive later that afternoon. I was
waiting, I suppose, for a sign.
I heard footsteps and saw Grace hurrying toward me again.
“I almost forgot! Im supposed to give this to you.”
It was a large shoe box, wrapped with a rubber band. The
green cardboard had begun to peel away from the corners,
and there were spots that were watermarked. “What is it?”
“My brothers things. The warden, he gave them to me. But
there was a note inside from Shay. He wanted you to have
them. I would have given it to you at the funeral, but the note
said I was supposed to give it to you today.”
“You should have these,” I said. “Youre his family.”
She looked up at me. “So were you. Father.”
When she left, I sat back down beside Shays grave. “Is this
it?” I said aloud. “Is this what I was supposed to wait for?”
Inside the box was a canvas rol of tools, and three
packages of Bazooka bubble gum.
He had one piece of gum, I heard Lucius say, and there
was enough for al of us.
The only other item inside was a smal , flat, newspaper-
wrapped package. The tape had peeled off years ago; the
paper was yel owed with age. Folded in its embrace was a
tattered photograph that made me catch my breath: I held in
my hands the picture that had been stolen from my dorm
when I was in col ege: my grandfather and I showing off our
days catch.
Why had he taken something so worthless to a stranger? I
touched my thumb to my grandfathers face and suddenly
recal ed Shay talking about the grandfather hed never had
the one hed imagined from this photo. Had he swiped it
because it was proof of what hed missed in his life? Had
he stared at it, wishing he was me?
I remembered something else: the photo had been stolen
before I was picked for Shays jury. I shook my head in
disbelief. It was possible Shay had known it was me when
he saw me sitting in the courtroom. It was possible he had
recognized me again when I first came to him in prison. It
was possible the joke had been on me al along.
I started to crumple up the newspaper that the photo had
been wrapped in, but realized it wasnt newspaper at al . It
was too thick for that, and not the right size. It was a page
torn out of a book. The Nag Hammadi Library, it read
across the top, in the tiniest of print. The Gospel of Thomas,
first published 1977. I ran a fingertip along the familiar
sayings. Jesus said: Whoever finds the interpretation of
these sayings wil not experience death.
Jesus said: The dead are not alive, and the living wil not
die.
Jesus said: Do not tel lies.
Jesus said.
And so had Shay, after having years to memorize this
page.
Frustrated, I tore it into pieces and threw them on the
ground.
I was angry at Shay; I was angry at myself. I buried my face
in my hands, and then felt a wind stir. The confetti of words
began to scatter.
I ran after them. As they caught against headstones, I
trapped them with my hands. I stuffed them into my pockets.
I untangled them from the weeds that grew at the edge of
the cemetery. I chased one fragment al the way to the
parking lot.
Sometimes we see what we want to, instead of whats in
front of us. And sometimes, we dont see clearly at al . I
took al of the bits Id col ected and dug a shal ow bowl
beneath the spray of lilies, covered them with a thin layer of
soil. I imagined the yel owed paper dissolving in the rain,
being absorbed by the earth, lying fal ow under winter snow.
I wondered what, next spring, would take root.
There are only two ways to live your life.
One is as though nothing is a miracle.
The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
-ALBERT EINSTEIN
I have been someone different now for three weeks. Its not
something you can tel by looking at me; its not even
something I can tel by looking at myself in the mirror. The
only way I can describe it, and its weird, so get ready, is
like waves: they just crash over me and suddenly, even if
Im surrounded by a dozen people, Im lonely. Even if Im
doing everything I want to, I start to cry.
My mother says that emotion doesnt get transplanted
along with the heart, that I have to stop referring to it as his
and start cal ing it mine. But thats pretty hard to do,
especial y when you add up al the stuff I have to take just to
keep my cel s from recognizing this intruder in my chest,
like that old horror movie with the woman who has an alien
inside her. Colace, Dulcolax, prednisone, Zantac, enalapril,
Cel Cept, Prograf, oxycodone, Keflex, magnesium oxide,
nystatin, Valcyte.
Its a cocktail to keep my body fooled; its anyones guess
how long this ruse might continue.
The way I see it, either my body wins and I reject the heart
or I win.
And become who he used to be.
My mother says that Im going to work through al this, and
thats why I have to take Celexa (oh, right, forgot that one)
and talk to a shrink twice a week. I nod and pretend to
believe her. Shes so happy right now but its the kind of
happy thats like an ornament made of sugar: if you brush it
the wrong way. it wil go to pieces.
Il tel you this much: its so good to be home. And to not
have a lightning bolt zapping me from inside three or four
times a day. And to not pass out and wake up wondering
what happened. And to walk up the stairsupstairs!
without having to stop halfway, or be carried.
“Claire?” my mother cal s. “Are you awake?”
Today, we have a visitor coming. Its a woman I havent
met, although apparently shes met me. Shes the sister of
the man who gave me his heart; she came to the hospital
when I was total y out of it. I am so not looking forward to
this. Shel probably break down and cry (I would if I were
her) and stare at me with an eagle eye until she finds some
shred of me that reminds her of her brother, or at least
convinces herself she has.
“Im coming,” I say. I have been standing in front of the
mirror for the past twenty minutes, without a shirt on. The
scar, which is stil healing, is the angriest red slash of a
mouth. Every time I look at it, I imagine the things it might
be yel ing.
I resettle the bandage that Im not supposed to peel off but
do when my mother isnt there to see it. Then I shrug into a
shirt and glance down at Dudley. “Hey, lazybones,” I say.
“Rise and shine.”
The thing is, my dog doesnt move.
I stand there, staring, even though I know whats happened.
My mother told me once, in her dump truck-load of fun facts
about cardiac patients, that when you do a transplant the
nerve that goes from the brain to the heart gets cut. Which
means that it takes people like me longer to respond to
situations that would normal y freak us out. We need the
adrenaline to kick in first.
You can hear this and think. Oh, how nice to stay calm.
Or you can hear this and think. Imagine what it would be like
to have a brand-new heart, and be so slow to feel.
front of the dog. Im afraid to touch him. I have been too
close to death; I dont want to go there again.
By now the tears are here; they stream down my face and
into my mouth. Loss always tastes like salt. I bend down
over my old, sweet dog.
“Dudley,” I say. “Come on.” But when I scoop him upput
my ear against his rib cagehes cold, stiff, not breathing.
“No,” I whisper, and then I shout it so loud that my mother
comes scrambling up the stairs like a storm.
She fil s my doorway, wildeyed. “Claire? Whats wrong?”
I shake my head; I cant speak. Because, in my arms, the
dog twitches. His heart starts beating again, beneath my
own two hands.
AUTHORS NOTE:
For those wishing to learn more about the topics in this
book, try these sites and texts, which were instrumental to
me during this journey.
ABOUT THE DEATH PENALTY
Death Penalty Information Center:
www.deathpenaltyinfo.org.
Death Row Support Project, PO Box 600, Liberty Mil s, IN
46946.
(Contact them if you want to write to a death row prisoner.)
Murder Victims Families for Human Rights:
www.mvfhr.org.
Murray, Robert W. Life on Death Row. Albert Publishing
Co., 2004.
Prejean, Sister Helen. Dead Man Walking. New York:
Vintage Books, 1993.
. The Death of Innocents. New York: Random House, 2005.
Rossi, Richard Michael. Waiting to Die. London: Vision
Paperbacks, 2004.
Turow, Scott. Ultimate Punishment. New York: Picador,
2003.
A B O U T T H E G N O S T I C G O S P E LS
Pagels, Elaine. Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of
Thomas. New York: Random House, 2003.
. The Gnostic Gospels. New York: Random House, 1979.
Robinson, James M., ed. The Nag Hammadi Library.
Leiden, the Netherlands: E. J. Bril , 1978.