House Rules: A Novel Read online

  “And yet,” Helen qualifies, “Jacob has a history of aggression, doesn’t he?”

  “Not to my knowledge.”

  “Did he or did he not have an argument with Jess two days before her death, one that was overheard by employees of Mama S’s Pizzeria?”

  “Well, yes, but that wasn’t a physical assault—”

  “Okay, what about the fact that he was given detention last year for trying to strangle a classmate?”

  A flurry of blank notes land in front of me, and again, I sweep them aside. “Just hang on,” I say through my teeth to Jacob, and then I signal to the judge. “Objection—”

  “I’ll rephrase. Did you know that Jacob was given detention for physically assaulting a girl in his grade?”

  “Yes, I remember Dr. Murano mentioning that to me. Yet it seems the trigger was the same: an interpersonal relationship that didn’t quite match Jacob’s intentions. He felt humiliated, and he—”

  “Snapped,” the prosecutor interrupts. “Right?”

  “Right.”

  “And that’s why Jess Ogilvy was killed.”

  “In my opinion, yes.”

  “Tell me this, Doctor,” Helen says. “Had Jacob still snapped when he was alphabetizing the CD collection in her residence, after her death?”

  “Yes.”

  “How about when he moved Jess’s body three hundred yards to a culvert behind the house?”

  “Yes.”

  “Had he still snapped when he sat her upright and carefully covered her with his quilt and set her hands in her lap?”

  Dr. Newcomb jerks her chin the slightest bit.

  “And had he still snapped days later when he went back to visit Jess’s body and phoned 911 so that the police would find her?”

  “Well,” the psychiatrist says quietly. “I guess so.”

  “Then tell me, Doctor,” Helen Sharp asks. “When did Jacob snap out of it?”

  Emma

  “They’re lying,” Jacob says heatedly, as soon as we are alone. “They’re all lying.”

  I have been watching him grow more tightly wound with each passing minute of the forensic psychiatrist’s cross-examination; even though Jacob passed multiple notes to Oliver, he didn’t ask for a break until Helen Sharp finished going for the kill. I didn’t know what would happen, to be honest—if he would refuse to let me join him for the recess, if he’d still be holding a grudge from last night’s episode—but apparently, I am the lesser of the two evils at the defense table, which is why I’m granted admission to the sensory break room and Oliver is not.

  “We talked about this, Jacob,” I say. “Remember? How saying you’re legally insane doesn’t mean anything; it just gives the jury something to use to find you not guilty. It’s a tool, like telling the school district you have Asperger’s. That didn’t change who you were … it only made it easier for teachers to understand your learning style.”

  “I don’t care about the defense,” Jacob argues. “I care about what those people are saying I did.”

  “You know how the law works. The burden of proof is on the prosecution. If Oliver can find witnesses who’ll weave another scenario about what could have happened, the jury might find reasonable doubt, and then they can’t convict.” I reach for Jacob’s hand. “It’s like giving someone a book, baby, and saying there might be more than one ending.”

  “But I didn’t want her to die, Mom. It wasn’t my fault. I know it was an accident.” Jacob’s eyes are full of tears. “I miss her.”

  My breath freezes in my throat. “Oh, Jacob,” I whisper. “What did you do?”

  “The right thing. So why can’t we tell the jury that?”

  I want to block out his words, because I am about to testify, and that means I cannot lie if the prosecutor asks what Jacob’s told me about Jess’s death. I want to run until all I can hear is the rush of my blood, instead of his confession. “Because,” I say softly, “sometimes the hardest thing to hear is the truth.”

  Oliver

  Here’s what I know:

  Before we took that last sensory break, Jacob was a jittery, wild mess.

  Now that we’re back in session, Emma’s on the witness stand, and she’s a jittery, wild mess.

  After I lead her through the basics of her identity and her relationship to Jacob, I walk up to the witness box and pretend to fumble and drop my pen. As I bend down, I whisper to her: Just breathe.

  What the hell could have happened in the fifteen minutes they were gone?

  “What do you do for a living, Ms. Hunt?”

  She doesn’t answer, just stares into her lap.

  “Ms. Hunt?”

  Emma’s head jerks up. “Can you repeat the question?”

  Focus, sweetheart, I think. “Your job. What do you do?”

  “I used to write an advice column,” she says quietly. “I was asked to take a leave of absence after Jacob’s arrest.”

  “How did you get into that business?”

  “Desperation. I was a single parent with a newborn, and a three-year-old who’d suddenly developed autistic behaviors.” As she speaks, her voice gets stronger and picks up steam. “There were therapists in and out of my house all day long who were trying to keep Jacob from completely slipping away from me. I had to find work, but I couldn’t leave the house.”

  “How did Jacob’s diagnosis come about?”

  “He was a perfectly healthy, happy baby,” Emma says, and she looks at Jacob. For a moment she can’t speak, and she shakes her head. “We gave him his shots, and within a week this very loving, interactive, verbal boy stopped being the child I knew. Suddenly he was lying on his side, spinning the wheels of his toy trucks instead of zooming them around the living room.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Everything,” Emma says. “I put Jacob through applied behavior analysis, occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech therapy. I put him on a gluten-free, casein-free diet. I gave him a regimen of vitamins and supplements that had been successful for other parents of autistic kids.”

  “Did it work?”

  “To some extent. Jacob got to the point where he wasn’t isolating himself. He could function in the world, with limitations. Eventually, his diagnosis changed from a generic autism spectrum disorder to pervasive developmental disorder to, finally, Asperger’s.”

  “Is there a silver lining to that diagnosis?”

  “Yes,” Emma says. “Jacob has an amazing, dry sense of humor. He’s the smartest person I know. And if I want someone to keep me company when I’m running errands or unloading the dishwasher or just taking a walk, he’s quick to volunteer. He’ll do anything I ask him to. And he’ll also not do something, if I ask. I’m probably the only mother who’s never had to worry about her son doing drugs or drinking underage.”

  “But there must be times that it’s hard for you, as a parent.”

  “All the things I listed that make Jacob a perfect kid—well, that’s what makes him different from the average kid. All his life, Jacob’s wanted to fit in with his peers, and all his life, I’ve watched him be teased or turned down. You can’t imagine what it’s like to force a smile when your son wins a medal at his Pee Wee T-ball team banquet for getting hit by the most pitches. You have to close your eyes when you drop him off at school and he gets out of the car, wearing a big pair of headphones to help block out the noise of the busy hallways, and then as he walks away, you see other kids teasing him behind his back.”

  “If I were to come to your house on a Tuesday,” I say, “what would I notice?”

  “The food. If it’s Tuesday, all the food has to be red. Raspberries and strawberries and tomato soup. Sushi-grade tuna. Shaved rare roast beef. Beets. If it’s not red, Jacob will get very agitated, and sometimes he’ll go to his room and stop speaking to us. There’s a color for each day of the week, for food and for clothing. In his closet, his clothes hang in rainbow order, and the different colors aren’t allowed to touch.”

  She tu