meals, conversations, dreams. Somewhere there was love, affection, trust.
Rafe squirmed away from him and stood up. He pointed to the door, his mouth working with hopeful anticipation. “Ice ceam!”
Jason could see two more people through the wire mesh window — the woman from the front desk, and another uniformed guard. He shook his head, as embarrassed as he was frustrated. Four hours ago when they announced his name, he’d received the ovation of 3,000 people who believed he was the reincarnation of Sandy Koufax. Now, he couldn’t even take his own son out for ice cream.
Rafe began crying again. It was so simple — a piece of fruit, a pretzel, a juice box would have made all the difference. He would never forgive Vicki for this. He would never forgive her for taking away his son.
He squeezed the Nerf ball into a tiny wad and tossed it at Rafe. It sprang open and popped against his face, startling him. He began to cry so hard he had trouble catching his breath. Jason held him close and looked over the top of his head to the clock — 6:25. Thirty-five minutes to go. It would be another week before he saw Rafe again. Same time, same place.
THEY WERE gathered at a large conference table in a glass-walled room overlooking the parking lot of the Santa Clara County Courthouse, waiting as Judge Finbarr O’Halloran read, clearly for the first time, from a thick stack of materials. O’Halloran was a tall, heavy-set man with wavy white hair and a droll, irritated manner developed from decades of having the power to control significant portions of other people’s lives. Jason sat directly across from him, stuffed uncomfortably into a blue wool suit, white shirt and tie. Beside him sat his attorney, Robert Marks; beside him the Court Evaluator, Bonnie Ripston, in a cherry red pant suit. Vicki sat across from her in a plum-colored Italian suit and white silk blouse, a stack of folders and law texts in front of her. Behind her, seated alone in a row of chairs against the wall, was her mother.
Silence reigned. Then, “How old is the child now?” O’Halloran asked no one in particular, startling everyone. “Two-and-a-half,” Vicki replied. The judge flipped through the contents of a blue folder, then began reading from other reports — one from the court-appointed mediator, another from the evaluator, along with depositions from Jason’s teammates and Vicki’s classmates, from Rafe’s pediatrician and baby sitters, and transcripts and recommendations from Stanford Law School attesting to Vicki’s character. Jason felt he’d done everything he could to strengthen his claim to joint custody. He’d hired the best lawyer he could find, spending well over half his inheritance on his fees, and as painful as the supervised visits were, he’d managed to make the best of them.
But as the session wore on, he feared it wasn’t enough. Marks had warned him that joint custody was a long-shot, but he’d never understood the ramifications of that until now. In baseball, being a long-shot meant you just had to try harder, train longer, pray that your team jelled at the right point — and even then there was no guarantee. The week before, he’d been passed over in the baseball draft. Having missed his junior year, when most top-rated players were selected and sometimes seduced from their last year of schooling, scouts had waited to see how he developed and lost interest when Stanford failed to make the Regionals. Baptiste hadn’t helped. He’d developed enough topnotch ballplayers to have scouts trust him when he said he had a live one. But all he would say about Jason was, “What you see is what you get.” The skinny was, the kid most people had considered a sure thing had become a “head case” — someone with the physical infrastructure but not the emotional and psychological tools to make the most of it. Not to be taken as one of the 1,498 young men selected in the draft was crushing.
O’Halloran finished reading and looked at Jason and Vicki over the bridge of his reading glasses. “Why can’t two intelligent people like yourselves work this out?”
Vicki’s voice was calm, rehearsed. “The issue is finding a parenting plan that works for the best interests of my son, Raphael. The record is clear that Mr. Thibodeaux is incapable of providing a sustained and sensitive level of care for a child of this age. It’s clearly in the best interests of the child for the court to award primary custody — ”
“Your Honor,” Robert Marks interrupted. “There are numerous reports before you that attest to the fact that Mr. Thibodeaux is a loving, competent caretaker — ”
O’Halloran held up his hand. “Your client has been slapped with a restraining order and his psychological evaluation raises serious questions about his relationship with authority. Why should I award custody of a two-and-a-half year old boy to such a man?”
Jason looked at the judge and felt a rising sense of dread. He was in some kind of nightmare — trapped in the legal system, in a full-fledged fight with a lawyer. He was going to lose his son.
He leaned forward. “I’m not sure how to say this,” he began, his voice tight and nervous. “My father wasn’t there for me when I was a kid, and I always wondered why. I used to think, he’s not around because he doesn’t like me … he doesn’t love me.” Marks set a hand on Jason’s forearm, whether in restraint or consolation it was hard to tell. Jason went on. “I felt that no matter what happened in my life, I would never hurt my son like that, but that’s exactly what’s happening. I can’t even see him except two hours in a childcare center, with people staring at me like I’m some kind of child molester. Every day he’s growing, changing, discovering things and I want to be there — ”
“Thank you!” O’Halloran said with brusque sarcasm. He leafed through several other folders, his brows knotting as he tried to get his mind around something that eluded him. “Have you ever struck your son?” he asked Jason in a matter-of-fact voice.
“No sir,” he answered firmly. “And I never will.”
Robert Marks rose. “Your Honor, we have here a man who has been willing to make extraordinary sacrifices to fulfill his responsibilities as a father. This kind of behavior needs to be rewarded. We’re only asking for joint custody, the presumption under the law — ”
Vicki rose from her chair. “Your honor, if I may address the court — ”
“You may not,” O’Halloran said. He closed the last of the folders and rose abruptly. “The decision of this court will be rendered within twenty-one days.”
THE CALL came eight days later. ‘Robert Marks’ the phone displayed. He didn’t want to pick up. Marks had warned him that the best he could expect was ‘visitation rights’ — every other weekend, every other Wednesday, and two weeks in the summer.
“I never had a chance, did I?” he said, before Marks could speak.
“Like I said, it was a longshot.”
“Can I appeal?”
“You could,” the lawyer replied. “But I wouldn’t take your money.”
Jason hadn’t felt so helpless since he’d heard about his father’s death on the oil platform. That seemed so ferocious in its details, it had to be an act of God. This felt more like something from hell. For a moment he understood the stories he read in newspapers about parents who took their children hostages, or used guns, machetes, knives or their bare hands to lay waste to those who denied them access to their own children.
He called Vuco. “I lost my court case.”
“Jesus, I’m sorry.”
“You don’t sound sorry.”
“I just got some really good news,” Vuco said.
“About what?”
“The Reds want me to manage their team in Billings, Montana — the Mustangs, Single A. Their GM’s a Stanford guy.”
“That’s great, Vuco,” Jason said, trying to sound enthused.
“Yeah, it is,” he said. “Why don’t you come with me?”
“Come and do what?”
“Pitch, you asshole. But you’ve got to work your