Welcome to Gale City by Jennifer San Filippo

Author:Jennifer San Filippo [San Filippo, Jennifer]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Published: 2021-09-13T23:00:00+00:00

It had been highly public. A local scandal with international implications. The star researcher of Mardling Mining and Company had been found dead in her lab one morning by a fellow employee shortly after local gang leader Alberto Gonzales had been arrested carrying a gauntlet, a mysterious weapon that seemed far too capable of leaving a hand-shaped scar on its victim. The implications fueled the rest.

Alberto had been charged with murder.

Alberto pled Not Guilty.

Maria had insisted that Teo stay at her place through the whole thing. Teo did, but it felt like a betrayal. She had refused to offer counsel or pull any strings for her brother. “If he’s innocent, the system will figure that out,” she said.

Teo stayed away as much as he could.

The longer the trial went on, the more public it became, until people started recognizing Teo on the street. He tried holing himself up in his room at Maria’s but nearly broke a window. His friends had abandoned him at the first sign of trouble. He got into fist fights defending his father.

Was his father a gang leader?

Yes. Teo wasn’t stupid.

But was he a murderer?

Alberto had said he was innocent. Therefore he was.

Maria had refused to defend Alberto in the slightest, no doubt trying to salvage her political career. Teo hated her for it. She tried to keep him out of court as much as possible, but she was a councilwoman and had too much damage control to do. Shortly after, she charged Alberto with assault against her. The utter desolation of their family was tacked onto the charges like a footnote.

Teo skipped school the day of the sentence.

The jury had been in session for two days. Teo refused to go to school no matter how his aunt yelled, though he did comply with wearing a proper dress shirt and coat. A proper, done-up son could only help his father’s chances, he thought.

Teo only remembered fragments of that day: the itch of his collar as he tried to loosen the tie that Maria had knotted that morning, the roar of voices before the judge entered the courtroom, the click of cameras as Alberto was walked to his seat beside his lawyer.

He remembered watching the jury walk into the room. No one glanced in Alberto’s direction.

He remembered the head juror saying guilty. The room roared, cameras clicking wildly as the juror tried to speak through the interruption.

He remembered the judge, exhausted and clearly relieved this whole ordeal was over, announce in her slow drone: I hereby sentence you to death, to be carried out in three years’ time.

He remembered staring at the judge as she listened to Alberto’s lawyer’s request: that Alberto have a few moments to speak. In hindsight, it shouldn’t have have happened. It was an enormous breach of protocol, but the judge gave in to the pressure from the press and allowed him to address the room. Everyone sat as Alberto stood and turned around.

“I have never told anyone how I got this scar.” He raised his arm, where a web of scarring stretched out from a point on his elbow.

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