Defending Jacob(48)
“We’re all sticking with him, Andy. That’s completely unfair! I love him too. It’s got nothing to do with that.”
“I never said you didn’t, Laurie. Did you hear me say you didn’t love him?”
“No, but you always retreat to that: I love him. Of course you love him. We both love him. I’m just saying, you can love your child and still see his flaws. You have to see his flaws, otherwise how can you help him?”
“Laurie, did you or did you not hear me say you didn’t love him?”
“Andy, that’s not what I’m saying! You’re not listening!”
“I am listening! I just don’t agree with you. You’re drawing this picture of Jacob as violent and moody and, and dangerous, based on nothing, and I just disagree. But if I disagree, you say I’m being dishonest. Or ‘unreliable.’ You’re calling me a liar.”
“I did not call you a liar! I’ve never called you a liar.”
“You didn’t use the word, no.”
“Andy, no one’s attacking you. There’s nothing wrong with admitting your son might need a little help. It doesn’t say anything about you.”
The comment bayoneted me. Because of course Laurie was talking about me. This whole thing was completely about me. I was the reason, the only reason, she thought our son might be dangerous. If he were not a Barber, no one would ever have parsed his childhood so closely for signs of trouble.
But I remained silent. What was the use? There was no defense to being a Barber.
Dr. Vogel said cautiously, “Okay, maybe we should just stop here. I’m not sure it would be productive to go on much longer. This isn’t easy for anyone, I realize. We’ve made some progress. We can try again next week.”
I looked down at my lap, avoiding Laurie’s eyes, ashamed, though for what I was not exactly sure.
“Let me just ask you both one last question. Maybe we can leave on a happier note, okay? So let’s assume for a moment that this case will go away. Assume that in a few months the case will be dismissed and Jacob will be free to go and do whatever he pleases. Just as if this case had never happened. No qualifications, no lingering shadows, nothing at all. Now, if that were to happen, where would you see your son in ten years? Laurie?”
“Wow. I can’t think that way. I’m just getting through from one day to the next, you know? Ten years is just … too hard to imagine.”
“Okay, I understand. But just as a thought exercise, try. Where do you see your son in ten years?”
Laurie considered. She shook her head. “I can’t. I don’t even like to think about it. I just can’t envision anything good. I think about Jacob’s situation constantly, Doctor, constantly, and I can’t see how this story could end happily. Poor Jacob. I just hope, you know? That’s all I can do. But if I think about when he’s older and we’re not around? I don’t know, I just hope he’s okay.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s all.”
“All right, how about you, Andy? If this case disappeared, where would you see Jacob in ten years?”
“If he walks on this case?”
“That’s right.”
“I see him happy.”
“Happy, okay.”
“Maybe with someone, a wife who makes him happy. Maybe a father. With a son.”
Laurie shifted.
“But through with all this teenage crap. All the self-pity, the narcissism. If Jacob has a weakness, it’s that he doesn’t have the kind of discipline it takes. He’s … self-indulgent. He doesn’t have the … I don’t know … the steel.”
Dr. Vogel: “The steel to do what?”
Laurie looked at me across her shoulder, curious.
We all heard the answer in our heads, I think, even Dr. Vogel: the steel to be a Barber.
“To grow up,” I said weakly. “To be an adult.”
“Like you?”
“No. Not like me. Jake’s got to do it his own way, I know that. I’m not one of those dads.”
I pulled my elbows into my lap, as if trying to squeeze through a narrow passageway.
“Jacob doesn’t have the kind of discipline you had as a kid?”
“No, he doesn’t.”
“Why does that matter, Andy? What is he steeling himself for? Or against?”
The two women shared a glance, the briefest eye-tap. They were studying me, together, understanding each other. Judging me unreliable, in Laurie’s word.
“Life,” I murmured. “Jacob’s got to steel himself against life. Same as every other kid.”
Laurie leaned forward, elbows on knees, and she took my hand.
13 | 179 Days
After the catastrophe of Jacob’s arrest, every day had an unbearable urgency. A dull, constant anxiety set in. In some ways, the weeks that followed the arrest were worse than the event itself. We were all counting the days, I think. Jacob’s trial was scheduled for October 17, and the date became an obsession. It was as if the future, which we had formerly measured by the length of our lives, as everyone does, now had a definite endpoint. Whatever lay beyond the trial, we could not imagine. Everything—the entire universe—ended on October 17. All we could do was count down the 179 days until then. This is something I did not understand when I was like you, when nothing had ever happened to me: how much easier it was to endure the big moments than the in-between times, the non-events, the waiting. The high drama of Jacob’s arrest, his arraignment in court, and so on—bad as those were, they barreled past and were gone. The real suffering came when no one was looking, during those 179 long days. The unoccupied afternoons in a quiet house, when worry silently engulfed us. The intense awareness of time, the heaviness of the passing minutes, the dizzying, trippy sense that the days were both too few and too long. In the end, we were eager for the trial if only because we could not stand the waiting. It was like a deathwatch.