Confessions of a Serial Alibi (18 page)

Nevertheless, the more I said it, the more I admitted my own humanity, and the more I came to accept it. Like a mantra, it had reprogrammed me by the time Vignarajah was done. In order to endure, I had to be willing to accept the fact that I was not going to remember everything, that I was not going to say everything just right. In order to be of service to the truth, I had to be willing to put my reputation on the line. I had to submit to going under the process and hope that I would arrive at the other side unharmed. When push came to shove, I had survived the scrutiny of those who said I wouldn’t show up to testify and those who said I would not stack up to the pressure of cross-examination. I had endured the combination of pregnancy hormones with the mixture of emotions associated with reliving all of these negative experiences over and over again. I had subjected myself to the intense eagle eye of not one, but two, seasoned attorneys, a judge and an audience of my peers. So when people emerged from the courtroom telling me that I had done well, that I was a rock star, it felt pretty damn awesome!

As Gary, my husband and I prepared to leave the courthouse, one of our new-found Sheriff friends asked if we would like to be escorted past the media. We took him up on his offer but to our pleasant surprise there were no cameramen outside of the courthouse. I don’t know if they were inside watching the hearing or if someone had just screwed up. In any case, it was nice. Gary had notified me that morning that several media outlets had reached out to him requesting a statement from me after the hearing. I hadn’t quite made my decision on whether I was going to participate with the media. The fact that there was none was a huge relief because the day before (and that morning), cameramen had bombarded us outside of the courthouse. Walking down the street with six cameras in my face is not something I am accustomed to. I didn’t how to respond or where to look for that matter. I tried to pretend that the cameramen weren’t there, but trying to see through six people as if they’re translucent is just not possible. It’s also very hard not to laugh when they trip, fall or walk into walls, because they are more focused on you than where they are walking. I had already been criticized for smiling the day before, so the morning of day two I decided to change my approach. In any case, it didn’t take long for the media to realize they had missed their opportunity to get a statement from me. To be precise it only took literally ten minutes before Gary’s phone began ringing non-stop. By that time, the three of us were already at Starbucks and I was in no mood to deal with the media.

Less than an hour after testifying, I found out that my baby might have Down syndrome. Phillip and I were still sitting in the downtown Starbucks when I received a message from my OBGYN. I gave them a return call to hear the scariest pregnancy news that I’ve ever experienced: the testing that I had the previous week had come back showing that the baby was at high risk for Down syndrome. I don’t even remember exactly what the woman said to me, because I went into complete shock when I heard the words “Down syndrome.” I don’t know what she said the probability was, I don’t recall what kind of tests she said I needed to have done, I don’t even remember who she said was going to give me a call in order to schedule the additional testing. All I heard was... high rate... Down syndrome... testing... okay?

Meanwhile Phillip was sitting next to me trying to talk to me about something else. What it was I couldn’t tell you either. In fact, while still on the phone with the woman from my OBGYN office, I blurted out, “Will you just shut up for a minute?” which of course is not the way I normally talk to my husband. When I hung up the phone I apologized but I was still in shock when Phillip asked me, “So who was that?”

I replied, “It was the doctor’s office. They said the baby might have Down syndrome.” It was at that moment that I literally could feel his heart drop to the ground where mine already lay. It was as if the time that followed stood still a few minutes.

Phillip then said, “Don’t worry, babe, everything’s going to be okay.” Although I wanted to believe him, part of me just had this awful feeling that maybe, just maybe, everything wasn’t going to be okay. I kept thinking to myself that maybe I did something wrong, but then my brain told me that Down syndrome has to do with chromosomes. I told myself that it was absurd to think that my actions had somehow contributed to this possible defect in my baby’s development.

Then I started to feel guilty because I thought about the two miscarriages that we had the year before. I remembered reading an article about miscarriages, and that it said that most early first trimester miscarriages are a result of some type of genetic chromosomal or biological defect. That even though the cells are able to make a fetus, sometimes the fetus isn’t viable and the mother’s body rejects it. I thought to myself,
Maybe God knew something was wrong and that’s why I had the two miscarriages. I kept thinking maybe God was trying to tell us to stop trying back then, and we didn’t listen? Was that why this Down syndrome thing was happening to us?
Then I had the worst thought of all.
I’m not equipped for a child with Down syndrome. I’ll have to literally take care of this person the rest of my life
. I even began to contemplate how cruel our society often is to people with disabilities. I became very pathetic in my thoughts. I began to sink into the center seat at my own personal little pity party. I started to wonder why was God doing this to us. I had just stood up and done something so great in the name of a Godly concept—truth. I began to feel as if God was testing me, yet again. I began to feel weary and tired of being tested. I got angry with God for bringing me this news. I couldn’t believe his timing! Then I got angry at the idea that it seemed to be one thing after another after another. Nevertheless, my husband, the wonderful loving man that he is, could sense that I was hurting. He continued to tell me not to worry. “The baby is fine,” he said. “Everything’s going to be alright.” And so I began to repress my feelings about the whole situation. Swallow the stress. Repress my anxiety in the hopes that I wouldn’t think about it in that moment. Still, later that night the thought could not be pushed aside any longer and I brought it up to Phillip again.

Now let me back track a little bit in the day. When we arrived back from the courthouse I found my mother with the kids. She asked me how I was feeling and if I was okay. Being the discreet person that I am, I made a split second decision that I wasn’t going to share the baby news right then and there. My husband, being the man that he is, immediately blurted out, “The doctor called and said the baby might have Down syndrome.” Although I didn’t show it I was very dissatisfied. I could not believe that he just blurted it out before we had a chance discuss if we were going to tell the family right away. I didn’t express my frustrations at that moment, but later in the night when the conversation came up again I did.

During the conversation I told Phillip that I didn’t know if I wanted to tell anybody else about the Down syndrome risk. That’s when Philip looked at me very lovingly and in his most sincere voice said, “I do—I want as many prayers as we can get! I want as many people as we can get praying for this child.” Being the Christian woman that I am and knowing the caliber of Christian woman that I would like to grow to be one day, I shook my head and agreed. It was then that I replied, “Well, if you want a lot of prayers, I might be able to make that happen,” and giggled.

That’s when the idea of sending a tweet came to mind. Initially it was not something that I took seriously—a joke at best. Then the more the thought lingered, the more it made perfect sense. I went to the Google App Store and I reinstalled Twitter. I logged in, erased a few old tweets that were really outdated and then chickened out! A few hours went by before I picked up my phone and opened the app again. So when I did, I decided to just start off slow and nonsensical. I sent a simple tweet to first notify those concerned about me in “Twitterland” that I was okay, exhausted, but still trying to keep my sense of humor about the whole situation. The tweet read:

“Talk about a crazy 2 days. It was really uncomfortable. Mentally & physically. That damn chair sucks! Poor hubby rode the bench literally :(“

Then I began to look at the tweets of others and that’s when I realized that as expected, my married last name was
everywhere.
I had always known going to court was going to force me to reveal my married name. It was an inescapable fact that I thought I had prepared myself for. All the same, seeing it all over the Internet was somewhat surreal. All this time, I had been given some sort of autonomy because everyone knew me as Asia McClain and not Asia Chapman. I had found peace in feeling like I had a little insulation from the social media crowd. Now I would no longer have that insulation. It was then that for the second time that week I told myself, “Screw it, deal with it, own it.” So I tweeted:

“Wondering what the future holds next. #asiamcclain is now #asiachapman EVERYWHERE...”

Then I read a few more tweets and to my surprise everyone was unexpectedly obsessed with my red lipstick. I was flattered of course, so I thought to tell them where I got it (the same I had done with Thiru’s associate). The thought also made me think of my good friend Tagen. After all, before I left Washington state, I asked her where she had purchased it and she replied by simply giving it to me. With the court ordered sequestration still in place, I wasn’t able to discuss the hearing. Tweeting about lipstick didn’t violate the sequestration and it just made sense for me to do so. Never did I once think that anyone would make it into something nefarious like some sort of marketing ploy. To me, it was a light-hearted and innocent tweet. It felt like a “Typical Asia” thing to say. Typical and normal is what I needed most.

Soon after I tried getting some rest, but I was still stressed. As a result, my sleep didn’t last long and I woke up unable to fall back asleep. I found myself obsessively stressing over the baby and worrying about the whole Down syndrome possibility. My husband had fallen fast asleep and there I lay with him, but somehow I still felt alone. That’s when I picked up my phone and tweeted:

“Can’t sleep Got some worrisome news about the baby less than 1 hr after testifying #asiachapman needs prayers for baby. The more the better”

Almost immediately after I received a comforting reply, then a retweet, then another reply and so on. As I lay there in the dark, I suddenly didn’t feel so alone. To my surprise people were receptive and cooperative with my request for prayers. People were friendly and hopeful. People made me feel supported and cared about. For the first time ever I really liked Twitter.

But, alas, there’s always got to be at least one asshole in a crowd (right?). As I poured through prayer mentions and wishes of good vibes and hopes for my baby, my family and I, I saw a reply that made me mentally flip the bird. Some asshole that I will not give the benefit of mentioning, had written a horribly mean and morally barren tweet that I won’t quote. I will simply say that it referenced my pregnancy struggles in relation to my testimony. Now I don’t know why I didn’t anticipate someone to stoop that low. We all have seen evidence of such atrociousness on social media before. I guess I just figured that my unborn child wasn’t worthy of such idiotic debauchery. Apparently, I was wrong because there it was. So as quickly as I received that awful tweet, I blocked that waste of a brain, that incestuously spermed asshole from my Twitter account.

The most damaging thing about this case and SERIAL is being put on display for the whole world to scrutinize. It’s not an easy thing to have every Joe Blow give his/her opinion about who they think I am. I thought I could read it all and take it in stride, but now I’m not too sure. Although I do laugh at most of it, there are those certain comments that bug me, mainly the ones that reference my appearance, personal choices, call me stupid, a pushover or call my actions or words nefarious. It’s hard to keep close to your convictions while having other people drag your name through the mud. That’s the primary reason this whole situation has been so stressful.

It’s a weird thing to have people I have no personal attachment to discussing me in such a public manner, to be referred to as “A Great White Hope” and to be thanked by so many people from such a distance. One thing that I have been struggling with is having to distance myself from certain people simply because of their affiliations with this case.

Being positioned to feel as if I can’t allow myself to be nice towards them feels so counterintuitive to me. It’s hard because despite their bias on some matters, there are
some
instances when I can relate to a few of their sentiments and/or experiences. For example, one night I was watching a video where Rabia Chaudry talked about how Urick’s Intercept interview made her feel. In the midst of viewing the video, I subsequently had to pause it in order to serve my children dinner. While doing so, I made a comment to my husband about how I felt about the interview. Ironically, upon resuming the video, I was tickled pink to hear that she had literally taken the words right out of my mouth. I couldn’t help but laugh. My husband looked up at me and chuckled in amazement as well.

Another difficult emotion to stomach is the remorse I feel for both the Lee and Syed families. From the very beginning, I’ve always had a firm understanding of the grief facing both families. As a mother I can only imagine the pain they are bearing, both seeking for the lives of their children to be vindicated. Most of the crying I’ve done has been in the name of the Lee and Syed families. It really hurts to think that Hae’s family is upset with me. I’m only telling the truth about what I know. Ask my husband—I had a total emotional meltdown when I read their statement that was released by Thiru after the post-conviction hearing in 2016. It definitely hurt me and I was devastated to the point where I cried about it for a long time. Most of the time I feel like a piece of shit because I could be helping a murderer. Other times I feel like a piece of shit for calling Adnan a possible murderer. I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t. I try to find solace by not trying to determine Adnan’s guilt or innocence. I try to stay focused on doing my part and letting the chips fall where they may. One thing I can tell you is that’s a lot harder to do than you would ever imagine. I often find myself questioning why God allowed me to be stuck in the Woodlawn Public Library in the first place.