Chapter 15

“He what!” said Valerie.

“He didn’t actually say he’d kill himself. But he made sure that I understood that he was threatening me with his intention to think about it if I tried to get him out on parole. But Val, you should not have threatened to cut him off from Jillian. That was bad, very, very bad.

“You should have given him what he wanted, and then maybe apologized, if you had to, for lying to him; but that only after he was out of prison and thinking more clearly. The man has given too much to try to set rules he had to accept and live by. That’s what he’s doing now: living by rules enforced by prison guards, sometimes cruel prison guards. How did you think he’d react for goodness sakes!” said Herb.

“I don’t know! He just makes me so frustrated—his stubbornness...” she said. “I would never try to come between him and Jillian. He had to know that. Jesus...!”

“I’ll talk to him,” said William, who’d been sitting across from the two of them since lunch. “We need to get him out of there some way.”

“Yes, we do. I am so afraid he might do the undoable,” said Herbert. The lawyer nodded.

“On another subject, you say this is Jillian’s week,” said William.

“Yes, and I didn’t say anything about it to Chase when I went up there. I was ready to if the time seemed right, but it never did, not at all! But yes, she’s graduating this coming Friday, the 6th of the month. Valerie,” he nodded toward his wife, “is worried on the one hand about not telling him, but proud of our baby on the other hand, and she being Chase’s baby too, well ... But talking to him about her after his set-to with you, Val. Well, it just didn’t seem timely.” The woman looked down.

“Maybe a letter letting him know after the big day?” said William.

“Yes, yes, that’s a good idea. Try not to appear to be keeping him in the dark about her. Yes,” said Herbert. “Val you gotta write it, and I’ll check whatever you say to preclude any more misunderstanding. I just hope he doesn’t cut us off from all communication as he threatened to do when I saw him.”

“Yes,” said Valerie. “I don’t know what it is, but every time I talk to Chase I screw up.”

“Okay, but at any rate, a letter is a very good idea; and we must make sure that misunderstandings are not happening, or ongoing,” said William.

“Herb, letting him know that she’s graduating, even in a letter, I mean after I essentially told him he had to accept being an and-to daddy, or no daddy at all...” she started.

“What are you getting at,” said Herbert.

“Well, he’s going to realize that you will be there supporting her on her day, being her daddy so to speak. It’s going to be yet another soul-killer for him. Maybe, if in the letter, I tell him that, okay, he’s from henceforth going to be recognized as the main daddy. And that you will only be standing in for him for the day. I mean what do you think,” she said. Her husband was nodding.

“Yes, I think that’s a good idea. The catch-22 is will he believe you after the way you threatened him. His tone of voice with me was not real positive in terms of getting him to believe us, any of us. But I guess putting that in the letter along with the news of her graduation wouldn’t hurt,” he said.

“Since the bad news about my possibility of getting paroled, I hadn’t seen my lawyer in person. We had talked some on the phone, and he was still hopeful that long term things would change and my chances for freedom would improve. I let him know that I didn’t want the big man messing with my parole or anything else to do with me. My lawyer hemmed-and-hawed, but said he understood.

But now he was here.

“So,” I said, as he took the stool across from me. It was Sunday, but the meeting hall was less than a quarter full, kinda unusual, actually very unusual.

“Your daughter graduated from high school last week,” said William. I shrugged.

“She’s not my daughter anymore. You know the drill on that one. The woman doesn’t want me to have anything to do with her, not in any significant way,” I said. “She actually threatened to cut me off completely from Jillian if I didn’t follow the party line, her party line.”

“Hmm, you might have another think coming on that score,” he said.

“What are you talking about,” I said.

He reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a letter. “It’s from your ex. I think there’s a picture of your daughter in it too, from her graduation ceremony.”

Suddenly I was emotional. “I don’t want to see it.”

“But Chase...”

“I said I don’t want to see it. It’s just a sop thrown to me to make herself feel better and means nothing because nothing is going to change. I know it and you know it,” I said.

“Chase I kinda know what’s in the letter. It was kinda explained to me when I met with them. She says, in the letter that she was wrong, and that from now on you are the main daddy, and that Herbert is the stepdaddy. I think she meant what she said. Man, really, you need to give the woman a chance here. You do,” he said.

“Like she gave me a chance when she dumped me!”

He pushed the letter across the table’s surface toward me. I looked at it. I picked it up and tore it in half. I pushed it back across the table to him.

“Return to sender,” I said. “I will never again believe a thing that whore says, and I’d more than appreciate it if you would tell her that, and I mean in those exact words!” I stood and walked out of the room. Tomorrow would be Monday I would have some things to do.

“Chase...” he said, as I walked off. I wasn’t sure I’d done the right thing, but I was damn sure I’d done something that she would understand. Oh yeah!

“William?” said Valerie.

“Is Herb around?” he said. “I need to talk to him.”

“About Chase?” He looked down.

“Kinda.”

“You went to see him. I mean like we planned?”

“Yes.”

“And the letter, the picture. What did he think of the picture? He appreciated that at least, right?”

“Herb?” said William.

“He’s not here right now. But I am, and I’m the one that wrote the letter. William, what’s going on?”

“He didn’t read the letter. He...”

“He will. You left it with him, right?” she said.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the two halves of the letter and passed them to her. She fell backwards onto the couch she’d been standing in front of.

“Oh my God!” she said.

“He was emotional, Val. Another day, another time...” he said. “He thinks that you do not want him to be in her life at all. And any idea of Herb helping him to get paroled must be shelved. He really doesn’t want any more contact with you guys, really anybody. Me maybe because I’m his lawyer, but nobody else.”

“He wouldn’t even look at the picture?” she said.

“No, he was adamant. He really believes that you’ve cut him off from ever being a part of her life. And he wouldn’t settle for anything but the biggest part of her life in any event. He didn’t say that, but there is no doubt that that’s what he wants, demands, feels entitled to,” said William.

“I guess I really screwed up when I went to see him that last time. I was just trying to be realistic. I was thinking that if you and Herb were successful in getting him out that he would need to come to realize what the relationships were going to be, have to be, realistically have to be. I guess I was too much on the Cooper side of things and not enough on the Benedict side. And now he’s screwed and so am I,” she said, and cried.