with a curved ceiling like an airplane hangar, and at the front of the room the judge sat at the bench, the American flag and the California flag hanging limp behind him, flanking the seal of the State of California. These were the totems. These were the details that made this a real courtroom and not a dream. The judge seemed to be some kind of ancient mouse king, swallowed in his black robes, with a pointy face and bifocals. He still had all his hair and it was an unremarkable brown color, gray at the temples. His voice was a nasal, pointy instrument he used to poke holes in things. We watched a gun charge get dismissed, and the young man bounced out of there like he could barely keep his feet on the ground. His friend was wearing a crucifix so covered in diamonds it must have cost as much as a car. The bailiff was constantly hunting people secretly looking at their cell phones, the use of which was prohibited as many notices in the courtroom advertised, and whenever he would catch someone silently scrolling or texting, there would be titters as he confronted the person and confiscated their phone. The first time it happened, I didn’t know what was going on, and he moved from the bailiff’s box with such speed and emergency that I thought someone had drawn a gun.
Bunny and I held hands. Ray sat on her other side, and next to him Swanson sat, although Swan kept getting up, going outside, coming back in, and generally being in constant, agitated motion. We were watching a setting hearing where they were arguing over the date of a preliminary hearing, and the public defender explained she would be occupied for at least a month on a murder trial, and then would be taking a two-week vacation.
“Would you like to cancel your vacation?” the judge asked her.
“Excuse me?” the public defender asked.
“Would you like to cancel your vacation?” he asked again.
“No, thank you,” the public defender said, very smoothly, but I could hear, we all could hear, the quaver in her voice.
“Very well,” the judge said, and set the date of the preliminary hearing.
Watching all of this was absorbing and boring at the same time, much like a piece of theater. The case right before Bunny’s, we were all on edge with the knowledge that we were next. The defendant was in custody, and when the bailiff brought him out, there was an anguished twist to his face, and it was plain he was on the verge of tears. He slumped as far down into the chair as he could.
A man got up and said that the defendant’s lawyer had had a family emergency and he would be stepping in for her for the day.
“Sit up,” the judge yelled at the defendant. “Sit up like a man at your own hearing.”
The boy sat up more in the chair, but I could see his shoulders were shaking. I understood then what the man representing him was saying. The boy’s lawyer had not shown up. She had a family emergency. And now this young man was at his murder prelim alone, and he was angry and terrified and crying very much against his will in front of the judge. I guess it was then that I understood how unsafe we really were. The judge did not have any tenderness or even any inclination toward civility for this young man. The fact that we would all be crying if our lawyer bailed on us during a hearing when we were accused of murder was not of consequence.
What it most reminded me of, in a way, was the haughtiness and control of a drag queen. I pictured RuPaul saying, “Sashay away.” What was important to the judge was that the defendant maintain the decorum of the courtroom. That he control himself. Control was the matrix, was the soil, in which any kind of justice or rationality could grow, and if you did not carefully and rigorously maintain the atmosphere of control, then you would have no hope of clarity in anything. Or these were the thoughts that bubbled in my adolescent brain.
And then it was Bunny’s turn. She and Swan pushed to the front of the room. Ray and I sat with the empty chair between us, the air still warm from Bunny’s body. All I could see was her broad back as she stood before the judge.