Poison by Galt Niederhoffer

Author:Galt Niederhoffer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

FOURTEEN

Cass types two words: family and law. She assembles a list quickly, using the simplest criteria: the one with the most pleasant-sounding name (Matthews and Jeffreys are good), the one with the highest number of stars, and the ones who look the most affordable. By ten in the morning, she has contacted four adequate options, two of them named Becker. By eleven, she has spoken to two of these people. By noon, she sits in the modest office of a young man who graduated from law school after Sam was born. His office is a space he shares with an immigration agency. As a result, it is sometimes hard to hear him above sporadic shouts in Cantonese and Mandarin. She focuses on the name on his degree. Seems convincing enough: Matthew Becker.

Marley busies the baby in the waiting room while Cass and Matthew speak in private.

“How can I help you?” Matthew asks. His skin reminds her of the kids’ Play-Doh. He wears winter snow boots with gray pinstriped pants. His accent is thick and hard to place—Massachusetts? Jersey? His office is unadorned—no photos of loved ones or children. Stacked with messy piles of paper and a large antiquated computer. He is not the lawyer she would have imagined arguing her case in a courtroom. But until today, she did not expect to be standing in a courtroom with an adversary who was, a week ago, her husband. He is not the lawyer she would have chosen for herself under normal circumstances, but nothing is normal now.

Cass summons the energy to begin, tries for the short, sweet version. Matthew puts his pen to his notepad.

“My husband is trying to get custody of our child.”

“Are you amenable to this?” he asks.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because he has lost his way, and he’s prone to violence.”

“Why do you feel this way?” asks the lawyer.

“Because he tried to kill me.”

The statement stops the lawyer, but to Cass’s surprise, he does not give her the now familiar look. “I’m sorry to ask you to do this, but I need you to start from the beginning.”

Cass summons the strength to talk. It is like scraping a bloody wound with a pick, but somehow, every time she digs, the skin underneath grows more numb. When she has finished, they sit through a long pause. The lawyer looks unnerved.

“You need to file an order of protection. And petition for sole custody.”

“I’m not sure I’m ready for that,” she says. “He needs a shrink most of all. Psychiatric intervention.”

“With all due respect, you have to do what’s best for you and your children. Not what’s best for him.”

Cass nods, then shakes her head.

“It’s going to be painful and confusing. There’s nothing I can do about that, but I can help you through the legal system. That is something I can do. We need to move quickly. We need to file a petition for custody. We need an order of protection. And we need to get the food tested.”

Cass nods. It is a relief to be with someone who recognizes the severity of the crime and wants to see it proven.

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