Anything You Say Can and Will Be Used Against You (10 page)

You feel your heart thudding, taste the staleness, the dryness in your throat. You place the gun in your mouth and tilt it up slightly so the bullet will slice through the brain instead of following the curve of your skull. The gun tastes bitter and oily; it is heavy against your teeth. Close your lips around the cold metal; it is unbearably, soothingly foreign. A thick, wet silence wraps around you, drifts into your ears, fills your skull.

You tighten your right thumb on the trigger, hold the gun with both hands, your left thumb hovering above the hammer. A distant voice tells you steady pressure on the trigger will ensure a perfect shot with little recoil. Continual, steady pressure, the familiar voice says, don't anticipate the sound of the gun going off. And you see your father again in that moment before the trigger gives, a quick montage: his hand raised, descending; his head framed in the sights of your gun; his flesh twitching just below his eye; his body twisted and bleeding, dying alone on the barren strip of roadway, fingers clawing the cement. Turkey buzzards circle overhead in sync with the revolving lights of his unit. Just like her old man, you hear the whispers, echoing voices across the stretch of years as the trigger releases, the hammer flies forward.

The pain of the hammer hitting the thumb of your left hand is as sharp and sweet and real as the gentle folding inward of yourself, this giving in to life.

The gun grows heavy in your hand. Your lips and cheeks feel bruised. Ease your thumb out from under the hammer. Slowly pull the gun back out of your mouth. Open your eyes and look at the gun. Carefully push it away. Listen to the hum of the refrigerator, the uneven drip of the kitchen sink. Briefly, for an instant, another vision: your mother leaning toward you, offering you your daughter's stuffed lion in her outstretched hands.

The first time I saw Marjorie LaSalle she was kneeling on her bed naked, hands gripping the sheets to help support her weight, a nine-inch steak knife embedded deep just above the spot where the flesh parts to rise and become breast; the place where a child or lover would rest his head in grief, in need, in utter devotion; that place the tips of fingers caress and feel both implacable bone and sweet, full softness—a place of promise, of absolution, the center of ourselves.

Her house was impossibly full of men, overly loud voices, and too much artificial light for 2:52 in the morning. All those police officers—five out in the yard, three in the living room, two talking in the hallway, one taking pictures of the nightstand, another speaking into a portable radio by the walk-in closet—and not one touched her or sat by her or held a sheet to cover her. Only two paramedics hovered nearby, talking briskly and efficiently as they set up an IV and discussed how best to move her to the gurney. They eased her onto her back as I finally stepped into her bedroom, handling her body, it seemed to me, as though it were separate from her soul.

There wasn't much blood, and this small detail bothers me even today: a smear on the portable phone, the sheets wet with red in places, but not drenched. When the phone rang, wrenching me out of sleep, and the flat male voice said, “We got a VS request on a stabbing and sexual assault in Southdowns,” I'd expected to walk into a small pond of blood. Half awake, I'd stumbled over my still slumbering dog and put on old stone-washed jeans and a black polo shirt with my name,
CATHY
, and
VICTIM SERVICES
embroidered on the front, clothing that could handle cold-water soaking and heavy detergent.

On the short drive into Southdowns, I rehearsed the Victim Services' list of rules in my head: do not touch anything, do not interfere with the police officers, do not make judgments or offer opinions, use a soothing voice, do not volunteer information about yourself, do not touch the victim without asking the victim first, do not ask what happened; focus on active listening, compassionate support, and contacting the friends and relatives the victim wants notified. This was my first solo call out, and I still believed in the rules.

As soon as I turned off Perkins Road, I knew I was close to the scene: taillights, spotlights, and flashing red and blue lights punctured what should have been dark, calm, sleepy: a simple middle-class neighborhood in the heart of Baton Rouge where during daylight children rode bikes, dogs trotted aimlessly in neighbors' yards, couples bickered lightly on porches, and lawn mowers puttered every weekend. Generally a safe place, or as safe as any place can be.

But now police cars lined the block, along with a fire truck and ambulance. Some neighbors stood on the edge of their driveways or in doorways, peering toward all the activity, dressed in hastily thrown-on clothes and bathrobes. I felt a momentary thrill that unlike them, I would walk into the crime scene; unlike them, I would have access to the intimate details.

The intimate details were this: Marjorie LaSalle awoke to a thud on her chest—the sound, she would say later, was what woke her—then pressure, a sharp pressure that made her think the cat had landed on her chest, claws digging deep. “Huh?” was all she managed before she saw him, a thin, shadowy outline at the side of her bed. And even then she thought she was having a waking dream, until
she smelled him, heard him, felt his hands on her legs, and she sat up. He stepped back, to the doorway, turned on a flashlight held high, shone it in her face. She squinted, swallowed a scream, scrambled backward, her spine crammed against the headboard.

“Don't hurt me; please don't hurt me,” she whispered.

The light changed directions, traveled down the hallway, and he was gone.

She got slowly to her knees, panting, realizing suddenly
holy mary mother of god
that she had a knife in her—so deep, the doctors would tell us later, that the blade tip was embedded in her spine, that it took such force to remove it, even after carefully cutting away all the tissue, muscle, tendons around each serrated edge of the knife, that her body came up off the surgical table.

She called 911, whispered her address over and over in a high-pitched voice—because she knew that's what they'd need first, how they'd find her—that she was hurt, that she needed help, the words tumbling on top of one another in a clatter of syllables, indistinguishable.

The dispatcher told her to be quiet. “
Be quiet
, ma'am. Just calm down now and let me find out what's going on.”

Something clicked inside her, shifted, and Marjorie came back into her body, eased herself down onto the bed.

She spoke her address into the phone, quick clenched words, and her name when she was asked, and that she was bleeding, a man had hurt her, when she was asked what happened, and then there wasn't time for anything more because
oh sweet jesus
the man returned, came to the side of the bed, pulled her knees apart.

“Shuddup, or I'll kill you,” he said as she whispered into the phone, “He's back.”

The dispatcher asked, “What's happening?” and she said in a voice soft but clear, “His hands are on my legs.”

The dispatcher said, “Do you know the man?”

But Marjorie never answered, because the man hit her, hard, and the phone went flying, disconnected. He pried her legs open, his knees holding her down, two fingers fumbling to find her, trying to guide himself into her but unable to; her crying and fighting to stay conscious, knowing she had to stay conscious to live; him getting
more agitated, pushing down on one shoulder, still probing with his fingers; her trying to remember whether the children were here at home or with their father, and, oh the relief, yes, they were with their father; him pushing, pushing, pushing.

She came up to her elbows, tears running down her face, breath catching in her throat, her throat was so dry, thought,
Okay, this is going to happen; this is happening; I need to not fight him; I need to see him and remember.
She squinted against the darkness, half blind without her contacts, and tried to see.

Black male, no shirt, long chest, thin build, tall, young, short nappy hair, small wire-frame glasses.

And what came out of her mouth then was so ridiculous she admitted later, over and over, so very ridiculous, but it's all that came to her mind because if she lived through this, she didn't want to die from AIDS.

“Are you wearing a condom?”

A long pause, him breathing into the darkness, the stale air from his lungs washing over her with the faintest hint of tobacco and spearmint. And then he was gone again, this time for good, the front screen door slamming hard behind him.

More slowly now, she moved back to her knees, carefully slithered onto the floor, found the phone, didn't want to bleed on the antique rug her mother had given her, got back up on the bed, onto her knees.
Stay conscious
, she told herself;
stay alive
. Dialed 911 again.

This time she was calmer, her voice high and skittery but clear. Said, “I'm bleeding” when the police dispatcher, a different dispatcher, answered. Said, “I've been stabbed.” Repeated it again when he transferred her over to EMS, gave her address to the EMS dispatcher, said, “Please help me, please hurry” many times. The police dispatcher told her to stay on the line.

A slight pause and then the police dispatcher asked her questions, many questions, and you can hear her on the tapes that are now a part of the official case files answering softly with just the occasional hitch in her voice: no, the man was gone, just seconds ago; yes, she lived in a house; her age was thirty-seven; no, there wasn't anyone else in the house; no, there weren't any weapons in the house; are the police on the way; no, he hadn't penetrated her;
please send help; no, there was just one man; is someone coming; yes, she'd stayed conscious; yes, she was still bleeding; no, she couldn't move to get a towel, she was afraid, the knife was still in her (and the dispatcher's incredulous voice coming back, the only time you hear any emotion in his voice, “The knife is
still in you
?”); okay, she'd wrapped the sheet around the knife; no, she didn't know what kind of knife it was; please hurry; no, she didn't know how he'd gotten in; no, the front door wasn't unlocked, oh, wait, she thought he might have left through it, so it was probably open. Please help me, she said, please hurry.

But I didn't learn any of this until much later.

“Please,” was the first thing she said to me when I walked over to the far side of the bed. “Hold my hand, please?” Her green eyes wide, her teeth chattering, her hazelnut hair cut just below her ears and slicked tight down one side of her cheek. Three tiny diamond studs traveled up one ear lobe. Her arms and shoulders were muscular, like a swimmer's.

“I'm Cathy,” I said, kneeling down on the floor so I could meet her eye to eye, so I wasn't looking down and seeing the knife too. Her skin was rough and moist. The paramedics barely acknowledged me. “With Victim Services.”

“Just hold my hand,” she said, her words more short snaps of air than sound. One eye was slightly larger and darker than the other.

“Yes.” I wanted to cover her nakedness but knew that definitely constituted interference.

She nodded back at me, her stare intense. There was fear in her eyes, huge fear, but also something else, a kind of steel glinting at the corners that wasn't anger but something deeper. She smelled like laundry detergent and another, stronger, more acidic odor I couldn't place.

I gently squeezed her clenched fist. “It's okay.”

“Yes?”

“Yes,” I said, trying not to look directly at the knife—all I could see was the hilt flush against her flesh—but drawn to it in spite of myself. One paramedic held a huge pressure bandage around the edges of the knife while he adjusted the flow on the IV drip; the other talked to the hospital via radio, using medical terms and acronyms I didn't understand.

A plainclothes officer with short, sandy blond hair, lightly pockmarked skin, and rimless glasses came into the room carrying a small black leather bag in his plastic-gloved hand. He was handsome in an uncommon way; his energy and confidence filled the room. I smiled and nodded, but he ignored me.

“What's that?” Marjorie gasped. “I can't see.”

“A purse,” the officer said. “We found it one house over.”

“He wanted money?” she said.

“We need to move her,” one of the paramedics said.

I stood, but Marjorie didn't let go of my hand.

“I'll be with you all the way. Don't worry.” I smiled at her again and carefully removed my hand.

The plainclothes officer took several steps back. “Where did you leave your purse, Ms. LaSalle?”

“The stereo speaker, just inside the door.” Her shoulders flexed forward with the effort to bring forth each word.

“You sure?”

Her head bobbed once as the paramedics eased her to the edge of the bed. “Always in the same place,” she said.

“I do that too,” I said and immediately regretted allowing such inane words to come from my mouth.

The officer looked at me without raising his head. “You new?”

“Cathy Stevens. With Victim Services.”

“Yeah, kind of guessed that from your shirt.” He wrote something in his notebook. “Young, aren't you?” he said, more dismissal than interest to his question. “There is no sign of forced entry to your house, Ms. LaSalle. Are you sure your front door was locked when you went to bed?”

Marjorie's face went momentarily still, the knife hilt moving with each inhale exhale. “I, I think so, I'm almost positive.”

“Well it isn't now,” he said. “The responding officer found it ajar when he arrived.”

“We need a hand here,” a paramedic said, and two uniformed officers stepped forward. Marjorie's face twisted as the men bumped her onto the gurney. One of them finally pulled a sheet up over her, leaving just her left breast exposed.

The plainclothes officer shook his head, wrote some more. “All
your windows are locked; the back door is unlocked but with no sign of tampering; we haven't found any blood transfer yet; nothing seems to be missing but the contents of your purse.” His voice was devoid of emotion, almost as though he were dictating into a tape recorder. I wondered if he was this way on all his calls, what made him so detached. “Kind of strange.”

Mucus ran from her nostrils. I came around the bed, pulled a tissue from my back pocket, reached across the gurney and wiped her nose.

“Don't touch anything,” the plainclothes officer snapped.

I flinched, stepped away, wondering if he meant Marjorie or the bed.

“I don't understand.” Marjorie's hands gripped the edge of the gurney.

I smiled, whispered, “It's okay.”

“Actually, it's not,” he said.

“Okay.” I fought to keep my voice from quavering, cursed the flush I knew had just appeared on my face. Did he not like women or just people in general?

“I,” the officer said, still writing in his notebook, “am the detective in charge of this case.” He clipped his pen to the top of the notebook and folded his arms. “Robileaux. Detective Ray Robileaux. With Homicide.”

“Homicide?” The word slipped out before I could stop it. Robileaux gave me a long, steady look but didn't answer.

“We're out of here,” a paramedic said, and Robileaux nodded, asked, “The General or the Lake?”

“She said the General; she's got privileges there.”

“Privileges?” Robileaux's forehead folded into confusion.

“I'm a psychologist,” Marjorie said, each syllable coming slowly. She looked at me and fresh tears welled up. “I work with teenagers.”

“A psychologist,” Robileaux said, and jotted something down in his notepad.