A dream in the dark, p.21
A Dream in the Dark, page 21
Two cups of tea steeped as they sat down in their usual chairs next to the fireplace.
“So, I see there’s been quite a ruckus going on down there.”
Eli nodded.
“Been on the news ever since King’s Day. The ‘Fires and the Fury’ is what they’ve called it. But I’ve been around long enough to know that where there’s fire, there was first dry kindling.”
Sister Francis was a child of Europe who lived with her eyes wide open. She had a knack for understanding the world from the perspective of others, often to the detriment of herself. Today was no different, and Eli was not surprised by what she asked next.
“Eli, have you noticed how when Black people destroy something, the media puts up some talking head to condemn your actions, but when we do the same thing, they talk about us like we’re patriots standing up for freedom, like righteous revolutionaries?”
Eli had noticed. Following what happened, the media had made the destruction sound like a spontaneous event, unrelated to current reality. Radio talk show hosts fed their listeners a daily narrative of Black people destroying the city and even their own neighborhoods like Five Points without thought or cause. Eli knew from personal experience that the selection of targets was far from random. What he had done to Chance’s Place that night was a well-aimed surgical strike.
“Reminds me of Killdozer,” Sister Francis said as she took a sip of the Earl Grey. “Yup, up in Granby, Colorado. That old boy got his panties in a wad because the city council wouldn’t give him what he wanted. Felt slighted. Let his anger get the best of him, and do you know what he did?”
Eli loved history lessons with Sister Francis.
“Made himself a tank out of a bulldozer, that’s what. Then one morning locked himself inside and went on a rampage through the small mountain town. Destroyed Main Street, the police station, newspaper building … leveled everything. Destroyed his own community.”
Eli had been young at the time but had a vague recollection of the event.
“I can still remember the headlines,” continued Sister Francis. “They treated him like an unheard, misunderstood victim. Even the politicians said, ‘This is what happens when government isn’t responsive to the people.’ If he hadn’t taken his life when the tank ran out of gas, they would have made him mayor or senator or something.”
Eli took a sip of his drink but mostly held the mug for the warmth and aroma. Tea wasn’t his thing, but tea with Sister Francis was.
“Eli, let’s talk about you. Liza called up here looking for you when you disappeared. We were all worried, prayed for you.”
He didn’t respond.
The smoldering logs in the fireplace still warmed the room.
“Anger has to come out. It will come out. If you don’t give it an escape door, then it will eat its way out and destroy you. You hear me?”
Eli nodded. Smoke ascended up the flue.
“Son, what are you doing with your anger? From the looks of things, it’s getting the best of you.”
Eli didn’t hide things from Sister Francis. She knew about his panic attacks after Father Myriel’s murder. When he fell in love with Antoinette and decided to propose, he’d taken the same 15 Limited bus to show her the ring he’d bought. He’d always shared the unvarnished truth with her, and it didn’t make sense for him to start hiding things from her now.
“I haven’t been dealing with it well at all.”
Eli told her about The Roz and how things had fallen apart when Liza left.
“I’ve been drinking way too much. After I closed The Roz, I emptied all but one of the liquor bottles.”
He explained what the police were doing in Five Points and about Tyrone. He even admitted to helping with the overturning and burning of the police cars, but he stopped short of confessing what he’d done to Chance’s Place.
When he finished, they sat in silence, his tea now cold. The old woman leaned forward. Her eyes lacked judgment or condemnation. But when she asked her question, Eli’s soul unraveled.
“My son, you are angry at a lot of things and a lot of people, but I noticed you left someone out. Eli, why didn’t you mention Antoinette?”
Eli sank into his chair as if to escape into the cushion.
“Could it be that you’re angry at everyone else, including yourself, so you don’t have to admit that you’re angry at her? Eli, Liza didn’t leave you; it was Antoinette who did.”
* * *
That had been this morning.
Tonight, Eli sat at his kitchen table with candlelight and his last bottle of whiskey to comfort him as he stared at the empty chair draped with Antoinette’s burnt-orange scarf. His wedding ring sat on the table between them.
WHO THEY?
Eli didn’t know what to say to her.
Sister Francis was right. Eli’s exasperation with life would remain even if The Roz, Liza, the police, and Chance disappeared. His three months on the streets showed him that as he turned his aggravation inward while trying to avoid the inevitable truth: Antoinette had left him.
Her departure was not out of volition or malice, but she’d left him feeling empty and alone to navigate a world in which he’d become dependent on the stability of her love.
Eli had liked himself when he was with Antoinette. Her presence had improved him, and he increasingly despised who he’d become in her absence. Without her, he was an underground rodent blindly searching for a way out of the darkness.
The bottle of whiskey invited him to soothe his sorrow as the candle flame flickered through the brown liquid. He wanted to drink every ounce, fast. Perhaps this would be the way to end everything. How much more could his body take? How much longer could he share dinner with an empty chair, a ghost for a wife?
Sister Francis’s words rang a true and certain note in his mind: “Anger has to come out. It will come out. If you don’t give it an escape door, then it will eat its way out and destroy you.”
Eli stood and walked to Antoinette’s chair. He picked up her scarf and buried his face in it. Her smell still lingered. He draped it around his neck like one of the stoles Father Myriel used to wear with his robe on Sunday mornings.
The liquor summoned him.
Eli reached for the bottle. His fingers gripped the neck. He clutched it to his chest, held it like a precious artifact that belonged in a museum. He knew he couldn’t let himself drink it, but he also couldn’t bring himself to pour it out.
Deep inside, something gave way, like a shift of the earth plates but more violent. His grip tightened on the bottle.
“Why?” It was a faint whisper, but he said it—to her.
The question felt like a betrayal of the one he lived for.
“Why?”
A tear fell on to the table in front of him, next to his wedding band.
Rage rose inside like trapped steam.
Eli opened the door, offering it a way to escape.
He raised the bottle high above his shoulders and with both hands brought the thick bottom down on his teardrop. A dent appeared in the table, and his wedding band jumped. The noise must have echoed, but he couldn’t hear it. Eli threw the gold band down the open hatch into the darkness of his underground catacomb.
“Why?”
He returned to the table and sledgehammered the same spot. Again and again.
The candle bounced high off the table and onto the rug. Eli stomped the flame with his boot.
The bottle was still intact, and Eli continued to slam it down on the makeshift altar, the centerpiece in the temple dedicated to his dead wife.
“Antoinette.” He finally said her name.
Three more blows to the table, and then five more, one following each word.
“Why—”
Thud.
“—did—”
Thud.
“—you—”
A crack.
“—leave—”
The wood splintered.
“—me?”
The bottle shattered, slicing Eli’s hand as it gave way.
Eli threw the remnants aside as the alcohol saturated and burned in his wound. He continued his destruction with his bare hands with blows from his palms angled down, pounding the table, smearing his blood on the altar to his god.
He paused long enough to remove the orange silk scarf now hanging from one of his shoulders and wrapped it around the cut on his swollen hand. His blood soaked through the thin silk in an instant.
Eli returned to the weakened table, flipped it on its side, and kicked it. The heft of his boots caused chunks to break away. For a moment, an image flashed of Father Myriel’s bloodied face after the murderer stomped him to death, but Eli kept going. Only after he snapped the legs and tossed them aside did his body give way.
The desecration was complete.
Eli spent the next hour caring for the cut on his hand and throwing the remnants of the table in the dumpster, but then he was at a lost as to what to do next. He was too amped to sleep and too tired to process the meaning behind what he’d done.
He settled on the boxes of files from Moses’s case and set out to read every word of every page. If there was an unturned stone in the trial transcripts, police reports, or evidence notes, Eli was determined to find it.
The break came when he opened an envelope labeled Detective notes and reread the familiar pages containing references to Moses and Calhoun. As Eli turned the page, one sentence glowed like a neon sign in the night.
How had he missed it?
Five words: They moved out of town.
Was this a reference to Claudette when she’d escaped Denver for Colorado Springs?
As far as Eli knew, Claudette had lived alone then as she did now.
If so, then who was they?
THE ROCK
Liza wasted no time.
First, she called the media, both television and print.
The DA was next. After informing Taylor of the news, she let him know that he should expect calls from reporters.
“The city is watching. Everyone will be wondering what you’re going to do,” she said.
The DNA results were back on the weapon used to murder the teacher. The blood on the rock was a mixture of two people’s, one male and one female. As expected, the victim’s DNA was present. However, highly relevant to the fate of Dexter Diaz, the male DNA was not a match to the man convicted for the crime.
This was enough to get a new trial and hopefully enough to provide a jury with reasonable doubt. There was still the issue of why Dexter had been in the passenger seat of the victim’s car a day after the murder, but Liza believed her team could explain that away, given the opportunity. Namely, Liza envisioned highlighting for the jurors that there had been two crimes: the murder and the car theft. Dexter riding in a stolen car that—unbeknownst to him—belonged to the murder victim did not mean he’d been involved in her murder. It would require a legal argument with the precision of a scalpel, and while Liza knew she lacked the experience needed, she felt confident that Project Joseph’s lead trial counsel, Lee Goldstein, would be up for the task.
However, there was a reason Liza had called the media first. It wasn’t just to inform them that her client was innocent but also to make them aware that her team had discovered who the real perpetrator was and that she would leave it to DA Taylor to announce the findings to the media.
The male DNA on the rock was a match for the victim’s boyfriend. While detectives had failed to explore him as a suspect during the original investigation, they’d had the foresight to get a swab from him before they shifted their attention to Dexter.
* * *
Liza sat at the defense table next to Dexter Diaz. He was nervous and kept turning to see his family, who lined the rail behind him. She put her hand on his shoulder and whispered reassurance.
DA Taylor had responded as she had hoped—held a press conference extolling the work of Liza and Project Joseph and promised “to continue our track record of transparency for the good of all.” He’d also announced that his office was in support of Dexter’s exoneration and that he was “calling on the courts to expedite the process.” Liza assumed that Taylor had also made a few personal calls, because ten days after she’d called the media and made him aware of the DNA results, they had a court date.
The bailiff called the court to order, and as they stood, Liza looked toward Dexter’s mother. Dorothy’s tears flowed freely as she smiled and clasped her hands.
“Ms. Brown, you may address the court.”
Lee Goldstein remained seated beside her. Earlier he’d reminded her that he would not be around forever and that she needed to learn how to do these things.
“Your Honor, you have received the documentation, but for the record, Dexter Diaz was arrested at the age of fourteen and forced to endure what we can only describe as psychological torture. He asserted his innocence and denied his guilt sixty-five times. It was only after they isolated him from his mother and lied to him about the evidence they had against him that he succumbed to the pressure.
“We are here today for you, Your Honor, to right a wrong. We tested the murder weapon in this case—something, I might add, the police should have done in the beginning. Not only do the test results clear Dexter Diaz, but they point to the real perpetrator—a man that lived in the house at the time and is now on the run from the US Marshals due to this recent discovery.
“Your Honor, we ask that you set Mr. Diaz free today to go home with his family and begin life as a free man.”
The judge turned his attention to DA Taylor.
“Your Honor, the people have no desire to pursue this case regarding Mr. Diaz, and therefore no objection.”
The judge waited a beat.
“Mr. Diaz, please stand to your feet. I have reviewed the evidence in this case, and because the state desires not to pursue this matter, you are free to go. Bailiff, remove Mr. Diaz’s handcuffs. Court is adjourned.”
The judge stood.
Dexter’s family erupted.
Liza was perplexed. That was it. No apology. No We hope you can move on and make the most of your life. Colorado didn’t have a compensation policy, so Dexter was in for a long battle to get any apology, let alone remuneration for the loss of his childhood.
Liza felt Dexter’s hand on her shoulder.
“Ms. Brown, I was wrong about you. I’m sorry for what I said when we met. You ain’t no B-team.”
“You’ve been through the unimaginable. I want to say on behalf of everyone that we are sorry. You did not deserve what happened to you. We are beyond happy for you.”
The Diaz family hopped the rail in celebration.
Liza stepped aside and packed her briefcase.
DA Taylor attempted to slip through the swinging barrier doors, but Liza pivoted, forcing him to acknowledge her. He did with a nod.
Liza held her tongue and decided not to gloat, though all she could think was Not bad for a rookie.
WALK OF FREEDOM
Liza hadn’t known it would feel this good.
Garrett nodded for her to take the lead, so she walked shoulder to shoulder with Dexter down the long corridor toward the front door, flanked by Dexter’s family and the small but mighty team from Project Joseph.
Reporters with cameras and microphones greeted them as they exited the City and County Building.
Liza stepped forward.
“Today is a good day for Denver and an even better day for this man, Dexter Diaz.”
Cameras clicked, and Dexter’s family gave a collective hoot.
“Today is a day of justice for all of us. For Dexter and his family but also for the victim in this case, Kathy McCarver. Let us remember that when we convict the wrong person, the real perpetrator walks free.”
Liza took a moment and looked up. The gold dome on the state capitol building glistened, surrounded by scorched trees, the final remnants of what had happened on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. To the left was the tallest building in the skyline, Unity Bank, the place where her father had worked nights to supplement his day jobs as a maintenance man and barber. The location of the Mother’s Day Massacre, where four people had lost their lives and the nightmare of false imprisonment had begun, eventually resulting in the execution of her father. She stood on these steps with a juris doctorate because of the unchecked injustice in this city.
“My father, Langston Brown, was not the first, and I’m sorry to say Dexter Diaz will not be the last. There are more. It’s been well documented that the corruption in this city reached the highest levels of government, and it’s going to take years to unravel.”
Liza looked to her right and exchanged nods with Fredricka, who stood next to Roberta Messay. At the back of the crowd, Liza could see that Eli had come to celebrate her big day.
Liza acknowledged her team and highlighted the patience and vigilance of Dexter’s family.
“No family should have to endure what they have.” Her voice almost cracked under the weight of those words, for they betrayed what she and Journey and her mother were still bearing.
“So I’ve got all your pager numbers—stay tuned. There are far more wrongs to right than you can imagine, and we will be back.
“Denver, it is my privilege to introduce you to your newly freed son, Dexter Diaz.”
Dexter stepped forward as the applause erupted and began to field the reporter’s questions.
Liza turned to Dexter’s mother.
Dorothy hugged Liza. “Thank you. Thank you for bringing my hijo home.”
“Happy Mother’s Day,” Liza said as they hugged again.
She then stepped back next to Garrett as Dexter told his story.
“Our first exoneration.” Garrett smiled. “So,” he whispered as he leaned down, “who’s next in your box of prospects?”
There were more, many more that she wanted to present for consideration. Many that fit their criteria.
But all she could think about was the one who didn’t, Moses King.
BLIND LEADING THE BLIND
