Blessed Are the Wholly Broken (17 page)

It was a hellish trip to Big Hill Pond. There’s no other way to describe it. Anna sat in silence the half-hour it took us to reach Brownsville. I, on the other hand, was plagued by what I’d seen, or at least by what I was fairly certain I’d seen. As much as I tried to tell myself Anna would never harm our son, the more I allowed myself to think of it, the more I was convinced she had.

It was the sound I couldn’t deny, no matter how hard I tried. When I’d arrived in the bathroom, my heart pounding, my feet slipping on the tiles, for that split second before Anna turned and saw me I’d heard nothing other than the soft lapping of water against the sides of the tub.

No panicked alarm raised by Anna. No cries from Peter. No furious splashing as Anna struggled to regain her grip. Nothing except the quiet sound of water settling after previously being disturbed. It was only after I called her name that she reacted. She turned towards my voice and then stumbled backwards with a choking Peter in her grasp.

Dear God.

As I pulled up to the pump to fill the car with gas, I didn’t even think about what I was doing before automatically removing Peter from his car seat and taking him with me. All the while, Anna sat immobile in the front seat, staring straight ahead. He was sleeping, barely even stirring as I held him against me with one hand and worked the gas pump with the other.

I took him with me when I entered the store to pay, holding him in the crook of my left arm while I poured a cup of coffee from the machines in the back of the store. It was when I approached the counter that I saw Anna exiting the car. At first I thought she must be coming to join me. Neither of us had slept well; maybe she needed coffee too, although that would have been unusual for her. Anna had always had a clumsy streak; she’d never wanted to take the chance of spilling hot coffee in the car.

But she didn’t turn towards the store; instead, she headed to the street beyond. Throwing what I hoped was enough money on the counter to cover the gas, I ran after her, reaching her and grabbing her arm just as she stepped off the curb. “Anna?  What are you doing?”

“Let me go,” she said, and as she turned to face me I saw she was crying. “Do us all a favor, please, Phil. Let me go.” Her voice was soft, clogged with tears.

“What are you talking about? Come here.” I tried to pull her to me, but she held herself apart.

“I’m no good. Not for you; not for Peter.”

“You’re perfect for us,” I said, leading her back to the car while struggling not to lose my grip on Peter, who had awakened and was beginning to cry. “Anna, what is all this?”

She didn’t answer as I briefly released her to open the car door, then gently nudged her in. I soothed Peter before securing him in his seat and sliding behind the wheel. Anna was turned away from me, but I could hear her ragged breathing in the silence of the car.

“Please tell me what’s wrong. Let me help you.” I reached for her hand. She didn’t resist; nor did she return my squeeze.

“You can’t.”

Behind us, a car honked an impatient reminder. I let go of Anna’s hand long enough to pull away from the pump and get us back on the main road, then reached to take it again, holding it against my thigh in an effort to bring some warmth into her cold fingers. I was afraid, both for Peter and for Anna, but also for myself. “Talk to me.”

“There’s nothing to say. You should have let me go.”

“Go where?  This is crazy talk, Anna. You’re not thinking clearly. We need to call the doctor again. We need to get you some help. Where were you going? What were you trying to do?”

“It’s not what I was trying to do,” she said, and her voice dropped so I had to strain to hear. “It’s what I was trying not to do.”

We pulled into the Big Hill Pond Visitor Center just before ten. Anna hadn’t spoken for the rest of the trip, but at least she’d stopped crying. Looking back, I should have turned the car around in Brownsville and driven straight to the Tyler’s home. Looking back further, given what had happened with Peter and the bathtub I should have called the doctor’s emergency pager and insisted on getting Anna some immediate help. But how far should one look back?  If I look back far enough, I see a marriage full of
should haves
, but isn’t that the case with every life?

Isn’t it?

I’m not sure why I continued on an obviously failed trip that morning. Maybe because I simply didn’t know what else to do. At any rate Anna and I sat in silence for several moments before I opened the car door and stepped out to retrieve Peter from his car seat in the back.

“Bathroom break,” I said to Anna as I straightened with Peter in my arms. “Are you coming?”

“No,” she said. “I’m fine.”

I nodded and turned toward the restrooms. I was halfway there when I heard the car door slam.

“Phil?  Why are you taking Peter? Let me have him. I’m sure he needs changing by now.”

I hesitated, which only served to annoy Anna.

“For heaven’s sake, Phil, stop being ridiculous. You can’t possibly relieve yourself while holding a baby. What exactly do you think I’m going to do? Look, I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but frankly, I find it insulting and I’m getting really tired of it.” She approached me and reached for Peter. “Give him to me,” she said, as she pulled him from my arms. “I’ll just get his bag from the car and we’ll meet you back here as soon as he’s nice and dry.” She bent down to kiss Peter’s nose. “You need a bathroom break too, don’t you sweetie? Phil, hand me your keys.”

Still, I hesitated, but Anna turned to pop the trunk and retrieve Peter’s diaper bag, and in the bright summer morning, the blue sky above, the sound of people talking and laughing, the smell of the lake, I felt as if we’d both been behaving ridiculously. We were both tired; we’d had a stressful few weeks. Maybe the day would work out after all, I thought. Maybe the fresh air would clear our heads and put everything back in perspective. I watched Anna sling the bag over her shoulder and slam the trunk lid before turning to continue my way to the restroom.

Of course, when I returned to the parking lot the car was gone, Peter and Anna nowhere to be seen.

Court Clerk:  Please state your name for the record.

Amanda Whitburn: Amanda Lee Whitburn. People just call me Mandy.

Court Clerk:  Spell your last name, please.

Amanda Whitburn:  W-h-i-t-b-u-r-n.

The Court:  You may proceed, Mr. Young.

Prosecutor:  Thank you, Your Honor. Okay, Ms. Whitburn. Where were you on the morning of June 3, 2012?

Amanda Whitburn:  I was just past Dismal Swamp.

Prosecutor:  As you can see by the chuckles, not everyone is familiar with Dismal Swamp. Where, exactly, is it?

Amanda Whitburn:  Oh, I’m sorry! It’s at Big Hill Pond, the state park over in Pocahontas.

Prosecutor:  That’s in McNairy County, right?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir.

Prosecutor:  So you were in a part of the park called Dismal Swamp?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir.

Prosecutor:  Can you give us an idea of what that particular section of the park is like?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir. It really is a swamp, but it’s not ugly like you might think. There’s a boardwalk people use to cross over it, like a wooden bridge type thing. People go there to hike or camp or fish. It’s really pretty, with all the wildlife and stuff.

Prosecutor:  What time of day was it when you were at Dismal Swamp?

Amanda Whitburn:  It was around ten in the morning when I started on the boardwalk. I remember because me and my fiancé camped overnight at the park, and I was mad at him because he wouldn’t get up. I thought it was stupid to travel all that way to just sleep the day away, so I decided I’d go look around without him.

Prosecutor:  So at close to ten o’clock the morning of June 3, 2012, you were on the boardwalk hiking across Dismal Swamp?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir. I was heading towards the big tower, the observation tower they have there. They say you can see the whole park and even over into Mississippi from the top of it. I wanted to check it out for myself.

Prosecutor:  How long were you on the boardwalk?

Amanda Whitburn:  Not too long. It’s not even a mile, so maybe fifteen minutes? I wasn’t walking too fast.

Prosecutor:  So by 10:15, you had crossed Dismal Swamp.

Amanda Whitburn:  That’s probably right.

Prosecutor:  Could you see the tower from the end of Dismal Swamp?

Amanda Whitburn:  No, sir. There’s too many trees, and the tower is up a big hill, maybe a quarter mile away, as the crow flies, but the trail is longer than that because it doesn’t go straight up.

Prosecutor:  Do you remember what you heard that morning, after you’d crossed Dismal Swamp?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir. After I crossed the swamp and started up the foot trail, I heard a bunch of yelling and screaming coming from up towards the tower.

Prosecutor:  Could you see what was happening?

Amanda Whitburn:  No, sir, not at first because of the hill and all. But I ran towards it. Everybody did. The screaming was terrible. It sounded like somebody was dying. Oh, sh—I mean, crap. Somebody really was. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean any disrespect.

Prosecutor:  That’s all right, Ms. Whitburn. You say you ran towards the screaming. What did you see when you got there?

Amanda Whitburn:  Well, I saw him and a woman on the tower.

Prosecutor:  Let the record show the witness has pointed to the defendant, Phillip Lewinsky. Ms. Whitburn, when you say tower, you’re referring to the observation tower at Big Hill Pond?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir. They were all the way up at the top.

Prosecutor:  Who do you mean by “they?”

Amanda Whitburn:  Him. The…what do you call it?  Defendant. And a lady.

Prosecutor:  How tall is that tower?

Amanda Whitburn:  They say it’s seventy feet. You really haven’t ever seen it? You should go see it sometime.

Prosecutor:  I may just do that. So when you arrived at the tower you saw the defendant and Mrs. Lewinsky near the top. What were they doing?

Amanda Whitburn:  They were yelling and screaming, and she…the lady, I mean…she was holding a baby by the arm over the fencing at the top of the tower. Like she was trying to hang onto it and keep it from falling.

Defense Attorney:  Objection. The witness is speculating. It’s just as likely the lady was trying to drop it.

The Court:  Sustained. But Counselor, that was a pretty speculative comment you made, yourself. Watch it, now. The jury should disregard both comments. Continue with your witness, Mr. Young.

Prosecutor:  Just describe exactly what you saw. Don’t try to guess at anything.

Amanda Whitburn:  Okay. Sorry. Anyway, she was hanging onto the baby’s arm and leaning way over the fence, like she had climbed up it a little ways, and they were fighting. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, exactly, because they were so high up, but they sounded mad. And then all of a sudden he—Mr. Lewinsky—gave the lady this big push and grabbed the baby, and she…she fell. It was awful. I knew she had to be dead, she hit the ground so hard. Then everybody started running toward her and screaming, and I called nine-one-one but it took a while to get through on account of how out of the way it all is.

Prosecutor:  What was Mr. Lewinsky doing during this time?

Amanda Whitburn:  He was still up on the tower, and it looked like he was hitting that little baby, like he was hitting him right in the stomach.

The Court:  Order. We will have order in this courtroom, or Mr. Stone, your client will be removed.

Prosecutor:  What happened next, Ms. Whitburn?

Amanda Whitburn:  Well, the ambulance got there and they loaded her up on the stretcher, trying to work on her, you know, and the police came and ordered Mr. Lewinsky off the tower. They told him to hand over the baby, and he did. Then they cuffed him and put him in the car, and that was pretty much the end of it, except they roped off the whole tower and I never did get a chance to climb it.

Prosecutor:  I have no further questions for this witness, Your Honor.

The Court:  Mr. Stone?  Your witness.

Defense Attorney:  Good afternoon, Ms. Whitburn.

Amanda Whitburn:  Good afternoon.

Defense Attorney:  You testified that you couldn’t hear exactly what the Lewinskys were saying because they were so far up the tower, is that correct?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir.

Defense Attorney:  And that you saw Mrs. Lewinsky holding the baby over the side of the tower by his arm, correct?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir.

Defense Attorney:  Isn’t it possible she was attempting to drop the baby?

Amanda Whitburn:  Oh, I don’t think so. What sort of a mother would do that?

Defense Attorney:  But you don’t know that that wasn’t the case, correct?

Amanda Whitburn:  Well, I don’t know for sure, but—

Defense Attorney:  You also testified that Mr. Lewinsky appeared to be hitting the baby in the stomach, correct?

Amanda Whitburn:  Yes, sir.

Defense Attorney:  But could you actually see the baby’s stomach from your position on the ground?

Amanda Whitburn:  Well, no, because I was looking up from under them, but—

Defense Attorney:  Could you see Mr. Lewinsky’s hand?

Amanda Whitburn:  No, not…not specifically, but he was raising his arm up and down—

Defense Attorney:  Raising his arm up and down as if perhaps he were performing CPR on the baby?

Amanda Whitburn:  Well, I don’t know….

Defense Attorney:  But it is possible, isn’t it?

Amanda Whitburn:  I suppose it is.

Defense Attorney:  Thank you, Ms. Whitburn. No further questions, your honor.

The Court:  Mr. Young?

Prosecutor:  No further questions, Your Honor.

The Court:  The witness may step down.