Page 27 of The River Is Waiting

“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” Her hand flies at me, bats me on the side of my head. With her hand off the wheel, her car veers into the lane of oncoming traffic.

“Jesus! Watch where you’re going!” I shout. She corrects her course and drives on for a couple of minutes. Then she pulls onto the shoulder, stops the car, puts her head against the steering wheel, and sobs. Again, I resist the impulse to touch her.

“It’s okay,” I say. “Nothing happened. It’s okay.”

She mumbles an apology and drives back onto the road.

“We’re going to get through this, Emily. I love you.”

She just keeps driving.

CHAPTER TWELVE

July 26, 2017

At Attorney Dixon’s suggestion, I arrive at her office building to read and discuss the report that Probation Officer Jonathan Gonzalez filed after having completed my presentence investigation. Before climbing the stairs, I stop first at that bakery on the ground floor and buy her one of those Death by Chocolate cupcakes I remember she loves. “I’m touched but goddamn you, Ledbetter,” she says when I hand her the treat. “I just started doing keto. Oh well, my wife will enjoy it. She eats like a lumberjack without gaining an ounce.” She hands me the PSI report. “Tell me what you think,” she says. My sentencing hearing is in a week.

Officer Gonzalez has done a thorough job. He’s included the police reports filed by Sergeant Fazio and Officer Longo, Detective Sparks, and the officer who arrested me for my earlier DUI. The toxicology reports based on the blood draw they’d taken from me at the hospital are in there, too. Gonzalez notes that I had not sought treatment for my substance abuse before the “event” for which I have been charged, but he’s attached photocopies of the scrawled signatures of chairs from the various AA and NA meetings I’ve been attending since then. Gonzalez has also accessed and included my lackluster school records, not only from RISD but also from Three Rivers High School, which includes the information that I was suspended during my sophomore year for streaking during an outdoorassembly. There’s no mention that I did this on a dare from Ethan Martineau, the police chief’s grandson.

Also attached are letters of support from Rhonda Tolliver, my former boss at Creative Strategies, Michael McGee, the shift supervisor at the Amazon warehouse where I work now, my AA sponsor, Dale Tebbins, and Dr. Patel, who has written that my participation in our grief counseling sessions has led to genuine progress and that “a prison sentence will serve only to impede or perhaps even arrest the positive changes he has begun to make.”

In addition to all that, Officer Gonzalez interviewed me twice to evaluate the degree to which he feels I exhibit remorse and the will to rehabilitate myself. Both of the times I sat in his office, I was confronted by the framed picture of him, his wife, and their three kids and worried that he might not be able to empathize with a failed father like me. But in his conclusion, Gonzalez wrote this: “I am convinced that Mr. Ledbetter is genuinely contrite and that his efforts to address his addictions have been serious and sincere.”

When I look up from the report, Dixon is shaking her head and smirking. “Streaking, Ledbetter? Seriously?”

“Youthful idiocy,” I say, shrugging. “Plus I got a hundred bucks from the kid who dared me.”

“Oh, well then,” Dixon says. “Other than the tox report and public nudity, I’d say this is pretty positive.” She tells me it is fairly unusual for the person writing the PSI to avoid making a sentencing recommendation. “Which could work in your favor. Judges are free to ignore the probation officer’s recommendations, but mostly they tend to follow those guidelines. If Gonzalez had suggested you serve time, that would have upped your chance of going to prison. That’s the good news.”

“You saying there’s bad news?”

“Maybe, maybe not. I think you had a shot at avoiding time in with Judge Pelto, but his mother’s gone into hospice down in Florida. He’s on temporary leave so he can be with her. Judge Palazzolo is subbing in for him.She’s not a hanging judge by any means, but she’s no softie either. She could go either way. Guess we’ll have to argue like hell on your behalf, then wait and see. Of course, Reitland’s going to argue just as hard that you should do time; that’s what prosecutors do and she’s not above getting nasty sometimes. I tell you what, though, Ledbetter. However this plays out, you’ve made some legit efforts during these twelve weeks. You were one hell of a hot mess when you walked into my office that first time, but I’ve noticed some real changes. It’s not easy for a cynic like me to admit this, but I’m impressed.”

The unexpected compliment flusters me. Mumbling a thank-you, I look down at her desk to avoid looking at her. That’s when I noticed that, while I was reading the PSI report, she’s scarfed down half of her chocolate cupcake.

July 27, 2017

Dr. Patel asks me how many of these episodes I’ve had.

“Two. Both of them at night.”

“Can you say what precipitated them?”

“Insomnia, I guess. The first time, I couldn’tgetto sleep and the other time I woke up and couldn’t getbackto sleep. The longer I stayed awake, the more anxious I got about what’s going to happen. It got so bad, I started getting the shakes and panting like I couldn’t catch my breath.”

“You were hyperventilating,” she says.

“Yeah, and my heart was pounding so fast, it felt like it might explode. I didn’t know what the hell was going on.”

“Well, as frightening as they feel while you’re experiencing them, panic attacks aren’t fatalandthey can be managed.”

Her calming voice, the aroma of the tea she’s poured, the colorful sari—peacock blues and greens: being in her presence is soothing. She’s what—in her sixties maybe? Wedding ring, so there’s a husband. Kids? Grandkids? There’s a bit of mystery to her.

“You mention your anxiety about the future is a trigger for these attacks. Can you be more specific?”

I look over her shoulder at the thing mounted on the wall behind her, the source of the sound of trickling water. I ask her whether it’s new. She says no, I just must not have noticed it during my earlier appointments. “Now, again, tell me more about why the future is making you so anxious.”

“If I get sentenced to prison, I’ve got fear of the unknown about that. And fear of what Idoknow from watching shows likeOzandThe Wire.”

---