Breach of Promise (24 page)

“Mr. Gillen, please tell the court how you feel about your daughter.”
The question was so simple, but it hit me like a 350-pound lineman. Where do you even begin? How do you get it out so it made sense? This was like my one moment, the big one, the only chance I’d get.
If I was too emotional I’d seem unbalanced. But the emotion was so strong in me I wanted to jump up on the bench and grab the judge by the robes and shake him until he understood.
But Alex had prepped me and told me to take a few deep breaths before answering.
Which is what I did. And it helped. For about two minutes.
I looked at the judge, who seemed like Thomas Jefferson on Mount Rushmore. Rock hard, expressionless. “Words can’t really do justice to what I want to say, Your Honor. I could say I love my daughter, and that would be true, but it would also be something you’ve heard before, and it’s just words. I don’t know how to say that it’s more than that, so much more than that.”
I glanced at Paula. She was looking at the floor.
“I’ve pretty much been on my own ever since I was a kid, had to make my own way. And I thought I was pretty good at it. But when Maddie was born it was like—it was like being born myself, in a way. My life was just starting then. I felt like this was my life being born, because there she was, and then I had a reason for not being on my own, ever again.”
The courtroom was dead silent, but my pulse was pounding in my ears. This was when I began to lose that fragile control the few, short breaths had given me. A heat was rising up from my chest and taking over like a wildfire in the hot, dry California hills.
“What I guess I mean, judge, Your Honor, is that Maddie is more important to me than anything, and that’s coming from a guy who’s only wanted two things in his whole life. To be a major league baseball player, and to be an actor.”
When I said
actor
I looked, by reflex, out at Troncatti. He rolled his eyes. That’s when it all left me, the self-control. The bad reality of it hit me then, the nightmare part, the worst part of the nightmare, right before your brain wakes you up.
The words literally stuck in my throat. I always thought that was a dumb cliché, but it’s not after you feel it. My skin started tingling like I had a fever.
The next few seconds were like slow motion. There’s that scene in Sam Peckinpah’s
The Wild Bunch
where the entire population of Mexico is shot and dies in slow time, blood pouring out. That was the scene I was in.
I looked from the judge to Alex, who was starting to look concerned. She must have known I was in trouble.
I looked over at Bryce Jennings, weasel lawyer, sitting with what looked like a grin.
And then I saw Paula—smash cut to close up. Paula. The only woman I’d ever really wanted. Beautiful, but also somehow lost now.
I found my words. “Paula, don’t do this. Why are you doing this? Paula, why? Don’t, don’t—”
“Mr. Gillen.” It was the judge’s voice, from a far-off place.
“Paula, please, you can’t do this. Why—”
“Stop, Mr. Gil—”
I stood up. “Paula, look at me. Call this off, will you? Don’t do this to Maddie—”
“Ms. Bedrosian, tell your client to—”
“Mark!” That was Alex.
I was in a tunnel now, just looking at Paula like she was at the other end. “Paula, look at me, will you?”
She didn’t.
Next thing I knew this beefy deputy with a red face was at the side of the witness box, looking up at the judge like some obedient Doberman, waiting for the cue to bite.
The judge was slamming his hand on the bench and looking at me with all the understanding of Hannibal Lechter.
“That will be enough, Mr. Gillen!” He sounded like Moses, as played by Charlton Heston, rebuking the Israelites.
My face felt like it was going to melt right off me. It was Alex’s face I couldn’t bear to look at. She seemed at once to be full of pity for me and about to implode with professional embarrassment.
I clunked back down in my seat, like a condemned prisoner who just got turned down for a pardon from the governor.
“I’m not going to let this happen in my courtroom,” Moses said to me. “Do you understand that, Mr. Gillen?”
“Yes,” I said.
“I’m not sure that you do. I’m going to take a ten-minute break. Ten minutes exactly. You can confer with your lawyer and decide what you want to do. But if anything like this happens again, I’m going to disallow any further testimony from you. Are we clear on that?”
“Yes.”
The judge left the bench.
“You’ve done enough,” Alex said when we were alone in the hall.
“I couldn’t help it. You want me to lie?”
“Calm down.” She was gun-shy now, looking around for reporters. “There’s nothing more we can do. Nothing you say is going to add or detract from what just happened in there. You can go back in and be contrite, and it will make your outburst look more like some out-of-control episode. Or you can go in and say nothing and look belligerent. What we’re going to do is go in there, and I will make a statement of apology to the judge on your behalf. I don’t think he wants you to say anything at this point, but if he does you get on your feet and say you’re sorry. Right?”
“You know what a blimp feels like when it’s deflated?”
“Mark, this was the Hindenburg. My only hope is that the judge will pick up your sincerity and not your instability.”
“Thanks.”
She put her hand on my shoulder. “We are long past the point where I patronize you, Mark. You are not doing well on this whole thing. We have no more evidence to put on. We leave this to Judge Winger.”
“Throw ourselves on the mercy of the court?”
“If it helps to think of it that way, yes. And start praying now.”

“Your Honor,” Alex said, “my client is apologetic for his outburst on the stand and wants the court to know that he regrets his feelings for his daughter became so—obvious. We trust the court will take his testimony into account on its merits.”

“You can trust the court, Ms. Bedrosian,” the judge said. “Do you wish to question your client further?”
“No, Your Honor.”
“Mr. Jennings, do you wish to cross-examine?”
The lawyer stood, like a man about to start demolition. “Most definitely.”
“Mr. Gillen,” Judge Winger said, “please retake the stand. I will remind you, you are still under oath.”
My knees were doing a rumba as I walked back to the witness chair. I was, frankly, scared out of my shoes. Alex had said she’d do everything to protect me, if Jennings crossed the line. Whatever that meant.
But the look on his face was something between a surgeon’s seriousness and the maniacal glee of a serial killer.
“How are you feeling, Mr. Gillen?” Jennings asked with fake concern. A nice way to remind everybody how I’d lost my cool half an hour ago.
“I’m fine,” I said, and out of habit added, “thank you.” It was like we were at a tea party.
“Good. We were a little concerned there.”
I’m sure you were. Like an aardvark is concerned about ants.
“Mr. Gillen, you’re an aspiring actor, are you not?”
What a great question, slipping that little word
aspiring
in there. But I was ready. “I’m a professional actor, yes.”
“Professional?”
“Yes.”
“How much did you make from acting last year?”
Not much. “I did all right.”
“Can’t recall a figure?”
“Not right now, no.” And that was true.
“Would it be fair to say that the majority of your household income came from Ms. Montgomery’s paychecks?”
“She had a recurring role on a soap.”
“Do you have a recurring role in anything?”
I saw Troncatti was smiling widely, the way a beer-guzzling gambler must smile at a cockfight when his bird is humiliating the opponent.
“Not at this time.”
“Have you ever had a recurring role?”
“I’ve done stage work.”
“Paying?”
“Minimum.”
“You also work as a waiter, is that right?”
“Yeah. I have a recurring role at Josephina’s.”
“You make more money as a waiter than as an actor, is that right?”
Alex objected. “Irrelevant.”
“Sustained,” the judge said, but it was clear Jennings was satisfied with his opening salvo. My right leg was jerking up and down, the way it gets when your nerves are snapping through it. I put my right hand on my thigh to stop it.
Jennings said, “Do you consider yourself a good actor, Mr. Gillen?”
Again Alex objected, but Jennings convinced the judge this was a different line of questioning. The judge gave him some room. “Yes,” I said.
“Feel like you’re good enough for a series or movie role?” “Yeah. If I didn’t, I’d quit.”
“Take acting classes and the like?”
“Sure. I work hard at the craft.”
“So it wouldn’t be hard for you to make a scene, say in a courtroom, to try and sway a judge?”
“Objection!” Alex almost blew papers off the counsel table with her voice.
“That’s argumentative, counsel,” Judge Winger said. “Sustain the objection.”
But Jennings was unfazed. It seemed to me he was more than willing to ask the occasional improper question, just to get into my head. So if it was acting he wanted, I’d give it to him by acting as calm as I could. Only my right leg didn’t want to cooperate.
“Let’s turn to the matter of your church, Mr. Gillen.”
Alex told me this was going to come up. How a parent intends to educate the child, what religion, if any, he wants the child to be raised in—these are all things a court will take into consideration. So I had to sweat it out.
“You attend this church, Gower Presbyterian, correct?”
“Yes.”
“And you have taken your daughter to church there?”
“Of course. She likes it.”
“They have a Sunday school, something of that nature, for children?”
“Yes.”
“Are you aware of what they teach?”
“Yeah,” I said. “The Bible.”
“Their
interpretation
of the Bible, correct?”
“They teach Bible stories. Maddie loves Bible stories.”
Jennings flipped to another page on his legal pad. “Are you aware this church has a program of child rearing called, I believe, Raising Godly Children?”
“Yeah, I’ve seen that.”
“Ever attend any classes?”
“No.”
“Intend to?”
“Maybe.”
“Do you endorse this program?”
“I don’t know much about it.”
“You do know it is sponsored by your church, do you not?” “Yeah.”
“Do you know, for example, that this program, Raising Godly Children, advocates corporal punishment with a stick?”
“Objection,” Alex said. “Foundation.”
“I am only asking if the witness knows,” Jennings said. “If counsel likes I can introduce into evidence a copy of the curriculum of this program, which we have obtained.”
“I also object on grounds of relevance,” Alex said. “As I mentioned during my cross-examination of Dr. Hallard, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, in the
Calabretta
case, held that the use of a token rod for disciplinary purposes did not violate California law.”
“It did no such thing,” Jennings remarked.
Alex went to her briefcase and snatched some papers. “I took advantage of the break to make copies of
Calabretta
. I will hand one to Mr. Jennings and one to the court. The relevant language is as follows: ‘The social worker plainly expressed the view to the mother that use of any object to spank a child, such as the “rod” (a nine-inch Lincoln log) was illegal, and she did have reason to believe that such an object was used, but appellants have cited no authority for the proposition she was right that California law prohibits use of any object to discipline a child. The statutes we have found prohibit “cruel” or “inhuman” corporal punishment or injury resulting in traumatic condition. While some punishment with some objects might necessarily amount to cruel or inhuman punishment, a token “rod” such as a nine-inch Lincoln log would not.’”
Judge Winger motioned for a copy of the case. Alex handed it to him. For what seemed like an hour, but was more like five minutes, the judge went through the copy. During the silence I kept my head down, not wanting to look at anyone. I think I was praying. Only once can I remember looking up, at Paula. She was not looking at me.
Finally the judge said, “In the best interest of the child, I am going to consider the curriculum Mr. Jennings has obtained. Regardless of what
Calabretta
holds, and it is a narrow holding, I believe I am duty bound to consider the consequences of a particular form of discipline on a particular child. Counsel’s objection is overruled.”
“Exception to that,” Alex said, “on First Amendment grounds.”
“Exception noted. Continue, Mr. Jennings.”
Paula’s lawyer, unflappable, in quiet and deadly tones, went on. “Would you describe yourself as a person who has to deal with anger, Mr. Gillen?”
“Deal with it?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know what you mean by that.”
“That’s confusing to you?”
“I just don’t know what you mean.”
Easy. Easy.
“Do you have an anger problem?”
Now what do I say? “I get angry sometimes, like everybody.”
Jennings raised his eyebrows. “Not everybody throws glass bottles at people, do they?”
Someone cackled in the audience. I looked over. It was Troncatti.
“I threw a bottle of water on the sidewalk next to Paula,” I said, keeping myself in check. “I lost my temper.”
“Do you often lose your temper?”
Alex stood. “Objective. Vague as to
often.
“Sustained.”
No stop from Jennings. “Have you lost your temper this week?” “I don’t know.”
“Can’t recall?”
“Right. Can’t recall.”
“Throw anything?”
“No.”
“Stayed pretty calm?”
I shrugged. This wasn’t getting any of us anywhere. “I’m not this out-of-control freak,” I said. “I’m no danger to society.”
“Pretty normal, you feel?”
“Sure.”
“Have you ever hit your daughter in anger?”
The question was delivered softly, but it had the impact of a smart bomb—the kind that kills people but leaves buildings intact. Looking back, I’m sure Jennings had asked all of his previous questions just to set me up for this.
The setup worked. My body jerked and my face flushed. I was sure it was a neon sign to the courtroom, flashing
guilty guilty guilty.
“I never . . . I only . . .” I stopped to regroup, catch a breath, which must have made me look even worse. “There was one time in the car, she was screaming and wouldn’t stop. I hit her on the arm. Once.”
“You dealt with her behavior by striking your daughter, isn’t that correct?”
No getting around it, nowhere to hide. “One time.”
“You did not spank her, did you?”
“No.”
“You did not, with deliberation, lay her over your knee and use a Lincoln log to discipline her, did you?”
Alex was silent at counsel table, and I knew there was nothing she could do to stop the bleeding.
“No. But I was sorry I did it, I told her how sorry I was.”
“Were you sorry when you let your daughter get kicked in the head at a park?”
I tried not to let my face light up with shock. How did Jennings get that information? It was like he had a video camera on my whole life.
“I did not let my daughter get kicked,” I said. “It was an accident.”
“She suffered a concussion, isn’t that right?”
“Mild concussion. I brought her home.”
“You were at a park, let her wander away—”
“She was
playing.
That’s what kids do at parks. Ever heard of that?”
Jennings smiled slightly, and I knew he was doing this to get me to lose it again. With all my strength I calmed myself down.
“The fact is,” Jennings said, “that your daughter was injured at a park while under your care, that is the truth, isn’t it?”
“It was an accident.”
“That’s not what I asked you.”
I just shook my head. “I’m telling you what happened.”
“I think we have enough of an answer here.” Jennings tugged at one of his cuffs. A gold cuff link glimmered in the harsh courtroom light.
“Do you have anger toward your wife?” Jennings said.
Another quick shift in the questions. I was starting to rock back and forth on the swivel witness chair. It squeaked. So did my voice.
“Paula?” I cleared my throat.
“Do you have another wife?” Before Alex could object, Jennings said, “Strike that last remark, Your Honor.”
“Stricken,” Winger said.
“Do you have anger toward your wife?”
His snide little remark had given me a moment to regroup. “No, I wouldn’t say that. Maybe at first there was. Now it’s just . . . hurt. I don’t understand why she’s doing this.”
“Do you think your
hurt
might affect how you act around your daughter?”
“No.”
“No chance of that?”
“No.”
“What is it that
hurts
you, Mr. Gillen?”
Was he serious? Or setting me up again? I just stared at him.
“Did you understand the question, Mr. Gillen?”
“Sure.” I paused. “Wouldn’t you be hurt if your wife took up with another man?”
Jennings didn’t flinch. “I’m not on the witness stand, sir. You are. So the fact that Ms. Montgomery fell in love with Antonio Troncatti is what
hurts
you?” Every time he said
hurt
he pounded it, like a boxer hitting a heavy bag.
I looked at Paula, who wouldn’t make eye contact. “Of course it does.”
“How does that
hurt
manifest itself?”
“You really want to know? I’ll tell you. I wake up every day feeling like I’ve lost something I’ll never get back. I wanted us to be a family, and now that’s not going to happen.”
Jennings paced a moment. “Does your
hurt
manifest itself by your involvement with other women?”
“What? Are you kidding me?”
Judge Winger said, “Please answer the question, Mr. Gillen.”
“Of course not,” I said.
“Do you know a woman named Nikki McNamara?”
Stunned, I stopped rocking. My face—must have been flashing neon again—felt hot.
Alex objected. “What is the relevance?”
“Veracity,” Jennings said. “Catching the witness in a lie.”
“I object to the characterization!”
“Hold on,” the judge said. “Let’s just take a step back here. The witness has asserted that he has a certain emotional state toward Ms. Montgomery—”