know we haven ’ t really talked about you at all,” he said cautiously. “I don ’ t mean the case I mean you personally. Who you are where you come from.”
“You mean with all your lawyer ’ s emphasis on preparation and reading you didn ’ t have me checked out by a private dick or go snooping around my friends.”
“That ’ s not the way we do things in Legal Aid. Besides, I didn ’ t have the money to hire a private investigator or the time to do it myself.”
“So you come right out with it,” she said approvingly. “Well I like your style. At least you ’ re straight.”
“So what about it?” he asked, sensing that “being straight” was very much part of her creed. “Will the real Justine Levy please stand up.”
In the space of a few seconds, two emotions vied for control in Justine ’ s mind: regret and joy. She frowned, threw back her head, smiled and then looked at the space on the table between their plates.
“I was born in 1973 when my father was in the ROTC program and my mother was working as a secretary to a real estate broker. When I was two my father was sent to Vietnam as an adviser. It was 1975 and he was one the last people to be sent there before the war ended. I mean before it really ended. He saw the fall of Saigon and the mad scramble of the people to get out before the Barbarians took over. Then they brought him out, or at least what was left of him”
“In a coffin?”
“Yes and no.”
“Paralysed? Injured?”
“He was blinded by a shell.”
“Shrapnel?”
“Rick for God ’ s sake will you stop trying to guess and let me tell it like it was!”
He swallowed nervously and mouthed a brief apology.
“It was concussion blindness. Physically he made a complete recovery before he was even brought back. He got his sight back within a few days. But when you ’ re stuck out there on a battlefield with shells falling all around you, and you can ’ t even see what ’ s going on it does something to your mind. That ’ s what happened to my father. He was never the same.”
She broke off, as if fighting some inner conflict. But she wouldn ’ t share it with Rick. There was a part of her that still had to remain private.
“He came back suffering from what they now call ‘ post-traumatic stress disorder ’ . He went through seven years of alternating passivity and violent spells. Finally he splattered his brains all over the wall with his service revolver.”
Rick winced. For all his legal work with street punks and the scum of the Earth he was still squeamish.
“Seven years? That would have made you nine at the time.”
“That ’ s right. I walked into the room just in time to see him do it.”
“Oh God...”
It was an unfamiliar feeling, the lump in his throat. He stopped speaking, unwilling to trust his voice.
The enigma of Justine Levy was beginning, just beginning, to unravel.
“Wait, it gets worse later. Anyway, that was the day I decided to study medicine. Well, it was a good enough ambition, and I figured it was a good way to help people, and there was money in it which didn ’ t hurt either. My mother gave me all the encouragement in the world. She studied and took her real estate exams and became an real-estate agent herself. Now I ’ m living in a duplex penthouse that we got for seven fifty grand, and it ’ s probably worth one and a half million now. Then my mother got ill and it all started to fall apart.”
“What did she have?”
“Infiltrating lobular carcinoma. It had already metastasized by the time it was detected.”
“What happened then?”
“I wanted to quit my studies and just stay home and take care of her, but she wouldn ’ t hear of it. We had medical insurance and some money put aside, but to cover the costs of a day nurse and my medical studies we had to sell off some of her jewellery. Only she refused to sell the apartment. She wanted to keep it for me. She didn ’ t know it, but I took a job as a waitress
“You mean with all your lawyer ’ s emphasis on preparation and reading you didn ’ t have me checked out by a private dick or go snooping around my friends.”
“That ’ s not the way we do things in Legal Aid. Besides, I didn ’ t have the money to hire a private investigator or the time to do it myself.”
“So you come right out with it,” she said approvingly. “Well I like your style. At least you ’ re straight.”
“So what about it?” he asked, sensing that “being straight” was very much part of her creed. “Will the real Justine Levy please stand up.”
In the space of a few seconds, two emotions vied for control in Justine ’ s mind: regret and joy. She frowned, threw back her head, smiled and then looked at the space on the table between their plates.
“I was born in 1973 when my father was in the ROTC program and my mother was working as a secretary to a real estate broker. When I was two my father was sent to Vietnam as an adviser. It was 1975 and he was one the last people to be sent there before the war ended. I mean before it really ended. He saw the fall of Saigon and the mad scramble of the people to get out before the Barbarians took over. Then they brought him out, or at least what was left of him”
“In a coffin?”
“Yes and no.”
“Paralysed? Injured?”
“He was blinded by a shell.”
“Shrapnel?”
“Rick for God ’ s sake will you stop trying to guess and let me tell it like it was!”
He swallowed nervously and mouthed a brief apology.
“It was concussion blindness. Physically he made a complete recovery before he was even brought back. He got his sight back within a few days. But when you ’ re stuck out there on a battlefield with shells falling all around you, and you can ’ t even see what ’ s going on it does something to your mind. That ’ s what happened to my father. He was never the same.”
She broke off, as if fighting some inner conflict. But she wouldn ’ t share it with Rick. There was a part of her that still had to remain private.
“He came back suffering from what they now call ‘ post-traumatic stress disorder ’ . He went through seven years of alternating passivity and violent spells. Finally he splattered his brains all over the wall with his service revolver.”
Rick winced. For all his legal work with street punks and the scum of the Earth he was still squeamish.
“Seven years? That would have made you nine at the time.”
“That ’ s right. I walked into the room just in time to see him do it.”
“Oh God...”
It was an unfamiliar feeling, the lump in his throat. He stopped speaking, unwilling to trust his voice.
The enigma of Justine Levy was beginning, just beginning, to unravel.
“Wait, it gets worse later. Anyway, that was the day I decided to study medicine. Well, it was a good enough ambition, and I figured it was a good way to help people, and there was money in it which didn ’ t hurt either. My mother gave me all the encouragement in the world. She studied and took her real estate exams and became an real-estate agent herself. Now I ’ m living in a duplex penthouse that we got for seven fifty grand, and it ’ s probably worth one and a half million now. Then my mother got ill and it all started to fall apart.”
“What did she have?”
“Infiltrating lobular carcinoma. It had already metastasized by the time it was detected.”
“What happened then?”
“I wanted to quit my studies and just stay home and take care of her, but she wouldn ’ t hear of it. We had medical insurance and some money put aside, but to cover the costs of a day nurse and my medical studies we had to sell off some of her jewellery. Only she refused to sell the apartment. She wanted to keep it for me. She didn ’ t know it, but I took a job as a waitress
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