Full Ride (32 page)

I guess we actually both found good friends in Deskins,
I think.

This makes me want to cry again, but I don't let myself. I just lie there, staring into darkness. And then, though this seems like the longest night in history, somehow it gets to be morning, and I'm padding down the hall to the strangeness of a communal bathroom.

I meet my Deskins friends for breakfast back at the dining hall, and they chatter about how nice their host students were and what they did and how excited they are about sitting in on classes this morning. They've all pored over the list of possible classes, and I wait until everyone else has revealed a choice before I tell mine.

“I'm going to Religion and Contemporary Experience,” I say, picking the class least likely to attract anyone else. “It gets out the latest, so I'll just meet you all back here for lunch.”

I'm hoping that gives me enough time for what I actually plan to do.

But Oscar chimes in, “Oh, that sounds better than Computer Science Fundamentals! I'll go with you!”

Panic floods over me.

“No, no, no offense but . . . if you're there, I won't be able to concentrate,” I say. “It'll feel like it's still high school and—”

“And back off, lover boy,” Stuart says, snickering.

I look back and forth between the two of them. I'm pretty sure Oscar must have told Stuart I said yes to homecoming, and now Stuart is making fun of him for it, and—

And why can't I do this without hurting Oscar's feelings?
I wonder.

“Just for today,” I say quickly. “At Vanderbilt tomorrow, I'll go to every session with you, I'll, I'll . . .”

“It does make sense to get an idea of what college is like by yourself,” Jala says, nodding sagely. “It can feel kind of lonely.”

And now I feel bad for Jala, too. But all I can do is back away from my friends and pretend I urgently need to find Smith Hall.

In reality, as soon as I'm out of sight, I rush toward the bus stop at Clifton Road and Gambrell Drive.

Atlanta does not have the best public transportation. If I took Stuart's SUV, or if I could afford a cab, I could get to Mr. Trumbull's office off Peachtree Road in fifteen minutes. But the combination of bus and metro and walking will take me more than an hour. Mom and I were paranoid enough to map it all out on a computer at Deskins Public Library, not on my laptop. The route looked daunting enough then, when I had Mom beside me.

It feels unbearable now that I'm alone. I look around, and it seems like any of my fellow bus passengers might be spies for Excellerand. That man in a suit, scratching his ear—is that a signal? That woman with the little girl beside her—is she trying to trick me into thinking a spy wouldn't have a kid with her?

Now you're totally losing it,
I tell myself.
Stop it. Nobody knew you'd be on this bus. Except Mom.

I edge Mrs. Collins's iPhone out of my pocket and summon up the number Mom gave me to contact her at her friend's house. I don't call it, because what would I say, here on the bus where anyone could hear? But it makes me feel better just to have the number in front of me.

I finally get to Mr. Trumbull's office building, and it's as huge and overwhelming as I remember. It's all metal and glass, probably some architect's vision of the cruel heartlessness of justice.

This is a stupid plan,
I think as I step into the elevator and it lurches up.
Why couldn't Mom and I have come up with something better?

I know why: Because there isn't anything better, not for either of us. Daddy's crimes and his bargain with the government and Excellerand's evil ruthlessness shoved us into a tiny, tiny box, and this is the only way out.

I get off the elevator and walk down the hall to the receptionist's desk. The elderly receptionist I remember from three years ago has evidently been replaced—this one doesn't seem any older than me. She has long dark hair like I do, and she looks as uncomfortable in her stiff blue blazer as I would feel.

Is this the kind of job I'd have to take if I don't get to go to college?
I wonder.

I don't know much about it, but being a receptionist in a law firm would probably require some training beyond high school, and that would mean financial aid, too.

I'm ranked fourth in my class, but being a receptionist is beyond me if I can't change my identity,
I think.

“Can I help you?” the receptionist asks. She may be young, but she's already mastered the snooty law-office tone that seems to say beneath the words,
My time is worth so much more than yours—how dare you bother me!

Maybe they teach that in receptionist-training classes.

I clear my throat.

“I'm here to see Mr. Trumbull,” I tell her. “I don't have an appointment, but I know Mr. Trumbull will want to talk to me.”

This is the wording Mom and I agreed on. She thought that, given how difficult Mr. Trumbull has been lately, I should show up unannounced and take him by surprise. But we did call on Wednesday to make sure he'd be in the office today.

We called from a pay phone in Deskins, just to be safe. Do you know how hard it is to find a working pay phone nowadays?

The receptionist looks unimpressed. She looks like someone who has just discovered crumbs on an otherwise perfect white tablecloth—like she's annoyed that she will have to exert the effort to brush me away.

“I'm . . . ,” I try again. It's strange. I've said my name dozens of times over the past three years, always savoring the protective
anonymity of “Jones.” But here in this office I have to throw all that away. Even though I now know everything I'm risking, I have to identify myself fully. “I'm Becca Jones. Roger Jones's daughter.”

My heart pounds, but no alarms go off. No horde of camera-toting TV crews appear out of nowhere to scream at me, “How did you feel when your father was arrested? Did you know where all the money was coming from? Did your mom?” No Excellerand assassins swing in through the windows, guns blazing.

The only thing that happens is that the receptionist's eyes widen, and she gasps, “Ohhh . . .” Then she stares at me, as though I've suddenly become fascinating. Or horrifying.

She may be new here, but of course she knows who Daddy is.

You're back in Atlanta,
I remind myself.
Everybody remembers here. What did you expect?

At least the receptionist doesn't start peppering me with questions. But she stares long enough to make me feel I have to stare back, with a little defiance:
Yeah, that Roger Jones. Want to make something of it?

What if I'd acted like that three years ago, when everybody stared at me all the time?

I couldn't, back then,
I think. I'm barely managing to hold the stare now. At least the receptionist looks away first. She gives a little jump, as if remembering she's supposed to act professional.

“I'll see if Mr. Trumbull is available,” she says. She trots off to Mr. Trumbull's office on heels that seem too high for her. She reminds me of a little girl playing dress up. I think she was probably supposed to stay at her desk and just buzz Mr. Trumbull, but what do I know? It's hard enough figuring out what I'm supposed to do, let alone anyone else. I feel weak and dizzy just from three seconds of staring down the underage receptionist—how am I going to deal with Mr. Trumbull?

I step over to a display of framed magazine articles on the wall, because reading might calm me down. Big mistake: Most of the articles seem to be about how brilliantly Mr. Trumbull handled Daddy's case—“the biggest case any defense attorney could hope for,” as
Atlanta
magazine put it. Apparently it was actually a miracle that Daddy didn't get
more
than ten years in prison; apparently Daddy was pretty much the poster child for how defendants
aren't
supposed to behave. The articles all have titles like, “What to Do When Your Client Becomes a Loose Cannon” and “Loose Lips: When a Client Sabotages His Own Case.”

Who has ever used the term “loose lips” since World War II?
I think disgustedly, because it's easier to hate the headline writer than to think about what Daddy really said and did.

Still, I can't help myself: I keep reading. I'm surprised the articles focus more on Daddy's impersonal crimes—the computer hacking, the money laundering, the Ponzi scheme—instead of the ones where he scared parents and grandparents into giving him money because they thought their children or grandchildren were in trouble. Those were the crimes I thought were the worst.

But it's all about the money,
I think.
The bigger the money, the bigger the crime.

It's coming back to me, everything Mr. Trumbull told us three years ago about the law. Money is easier to measure than pain and suffering, so that's what the justice system looks at.

I hear the receptionist's heels click-clacking toward me, and I quickly move away from the wall. I go back to standing by her desk.

“He will be able to see you,” she says. “Briefly. But it will be a few more minutes. Have a seat.”

She sounds like she's had to practice saying things like that in front of a mirror. She points toward a leather couch that also seems new. I sit down and sink into it. I struggle back up into a
standing position. I don't want Mr. Trumbull's first view of me to be as I flounder around just trying to escape his couch.

Receptionist girl watches me while pretending not to.

“Nervous energy,” I tell her. “Can't sit still.”

I'm pretty sure this makes me sound like a drug addict or something, but I don't know how to fix that. Not when my head is going all spinny on me again. Maybe this is what it feels like to be a drug addict. Or crazy.

I pull out Mrs. Collins's iPhone. Isn't that a normal thing to do, waiting? But I've lost my skill at goofing around on a cell phone. I could text my friends something like “Wow, Relig and Contemp Exp is great! How's ur class?” But I can't stomach yet another lie right now. Instead, I pretend to be absorbed in flipping through apps. I accidentally turn on the recording function, then scramble to turn it off.

This is going to be hard enough, without knowing every word I say is recorded, and then I have to make sure it's erased completely from the phone,
I think.

I glance up, and Mr. Trumbull is turning the corner. I stuff the phone back into my jeans pocket.

“Becca!” he says. “Good to see you! Well, haven't you grown up!”

The way he's looking at me makes me almost wish I hadn't developed breasts and hips. It also makes me think there's something kind of wrong about him having such a young receptionist. Like he didn't hire her for her job qualifications.

“Nice to see you again,” I say automatically, shaking his outstretched hand.

“Tria, hold my calls,” Mr. Trumbull tells the receptionist.

“Oh, yes, sir!” the receptionist says immediately. The way she sounds, she might as well snap her arm into a salute.

Mr. Trumbull puts his hand on my back, steering me toward his
office. This is something else I remember about Mr. Trumbull: how he always took control. I remember feeling relieved by that three years ago, when my daddy had turned into a criminal stranger, and my mother seemed thoroughly lost.

But today I kind of want to step away, to tell Mr. Trumbull, “I know where your office is.”

I let him guide me anyway.

We go into his office and he shuts the door. He indicates a chair for me to sit on. Then he settles in behind his massive mahogany desk. He looks the same as he did three years ago: a rich man in a rich man's suit, his glossy brown hair improbably thick for a man in his fifties. He could play a defense attorney on TV—he kind of already did, as a star of my father's trial.

But somehow his demeanor has changed. He no longer has that defense-attorney air of confidence that seems to say,
Of course my client's innocent. Of course I could convince any jury that any defendant's innocent.
It's like a mask slipped, revealing the pool of anxiety below.

I correct my own impression: It's not that Mr. Trumbull lost that confident aura over the past three years. He still had it out in the lobby, in front of the receptionist. The angst didn't come out until he was alone with me.

He leans urgently toward me.

“Where's your mother?” he asks. “Why are you here?”

I hesitate. Could his office be bugged? I try to guess from Mr. Trumbull's expression, but it's hard to tell. The lines around his eyes telegraph extreme worry, but is that because he's concerned about Mom? Or because he thinks I'm in danger, just sitting in his office? Wouldn't he give some signal if it wasn't safe for me to speak?

I opt for caution, regardless.

“Mom's still back home,” I say, and I am oh so careful not to
say, “in Ohio” or “in Deskins.” “She's fine. We just thought it would be . . . safer if I came without her.”

The worry lines around his eyes turn into disapproving trenches.

“It's not safe for you either,” he says.

I feel a jolt of irritation: Is he trying to make me feel even
more
terrified?

He probably thinks it's for my own good,
I tell myself.
So I don't do anything stupid.

Too late for that.

“I had to come here,” I say. “Because . . . I made a mistake.”

Shouldn't Mr. Trumbull be impressed that I'm admitting fault?

I remember suddenly that Mr. Trumbull never asked Daddy if he did his crimes or not. Defense attorneys aren't that interested in actual guilt or innocence.

Mr. Trumbull just lifts an eyebrow and waits.