The Last Chapter with apologies to

The Archangel Gabriel

Chapter 22

When the Christmas pageant committee literally accosts me, I am startled and frightened.  The lead in the pageant has just quit.  They are asking me to play the part of the angel Gabriel next week. In fact, in six days.  Melynda looks earnestly at me for the first time ever and says, “You’re the only one here we figure can learn all of the lines in time for the play.  I think that’s why Annie quit, because she couldn’t get her lines, and everyone was yelling at her.”  I think carefully, “Shit, if I do the Christmas play, the Jews are gonna skewer me.  But how can I say no to someone serving fifteen years.”  

I don’t like Melynda much, but I’d never say no to the rest of the community, especially the director who is really a talent woman. 

“On one condition,” I reply. 

“Wha,” said Mel. 

“NO one, and I mean no one, yells at me if I’m too fucked up to get all the lines right.  My mind has been very unsteady since I got here.”  The director, who would go home two days after Christmas, had written the play herself and since it was her last gift to the women of Danbury, she is very much vested in her production. 

I look at the script.  “Shit.  I can’t even pronounce these lines.  Hark.  Though that art… Damn.”  I begin again, “Hark though that art (can’t remember) The Lord is with thee.”  I try again. “Hark thou that art highly flavored. The Lord is with thee.” 

I am pleased until I realize that I have six pages of single spaced lines to go.  The girl playing Joseph pretends to smack the girl playing the Virgin Mary saying, “Bitch, you all better tell me who knocked you up.  I’m not playin’.”  The non-religious fanatics and I laugh.  The zealots are furious and yell at ‘Joseph’. No one yells at me. I have a sense of inclusion. The director turns to the crowd and says, “Let’s take it from the top.”  That was my cue. “Hark, thou that art highly flavored, the Lord is with thee.”  “Close enough,” I think. 

Another faux actress turns to me and says, “You’re already doing better than the last bitch.”  I laugh appreciatively.  Any compliment would do, even a backhanded one. 

Shana and Ellie come by to tell me that the word had traveled about my playing the role of the angel Gabriel in the Christmas play.  I tell them, “They asked for a favor and I’m doing it for the girls.  It doesn’t make me Christian. It makes me charitable.” 

Shana says, “These people all hate us.  Don’t expect me to go to the play. Okay.” 

 “You’re my friend and I expect you to be there to support me, yes I do, while I do the girls a favor. We will all be charitable. Oh, and I’m having trouble learning the lines.  I’ve never been in a Christmas play before.”  I laugh. No one else laughs with me. 

I go back over to the stage area (near the dish room in the cafeteria), thinking that that didn’t go so well.  The women practice late into the night.  It is a distraction and gives me something to do. 

The next morning, my lawyer, John, is already seated in the tiny chapel when I arrive for the unplanned and unexpected visit.  He looks paler than usual, visually different from the times when his transplanted liver was not functioning properly.

 “I’m sorry,” he intones as I walked into the room.

 “Huh?” is my not so articulate reply.

 “I’m sorry.”  A long pause ensues.  “We lost the appeal.” 

Always the asshole, I think, “What you mean we, Lone Ranger?”  I am truly shocked. It has never occurred to me that I could lose this appeal. My very life and sanity have depended on winning it.  I think, “Shit. There goes the ending to my book.   I was supposed to win.  I was supposed to win, because I deserved to win. That was supposed to be my last chapter.  You know, the system works.  I get my life back.”

“Can we go to the Supreme Court?” and then I think, “Here’s that ‘we’ again.” 

John looks sad and says, “Sure. I never, ever thought you’d lose. The jurors on the panel never even read the brief. They didn’t respond to a single one of our issues.” 

“Tonight, when you are in your eight by ten bathroom, remember that I share that small space with another woman for the next ten months. Try to get me out of here, anyway you can.  And thanks, I’m really more grateful to you than I am sounding.”

So, this is how the book ends, I lose.  I have spent four months in prison.  I spend another ten months in damnation. The system gets away with criminalizing non-criminal acts, because it can.     I learn that once convicted no one cares that I should not have been indicted or convicted. No one, even people who I thought were my friends, will believe me.  I think about all of the women who lost appeals that should have been won and think about Shana’s gifted and talented daughter, who actually wins her appeal. 

Then I know what to look for in the future. I will re-appeal as soon as the government has a case that holds that it was unconstitutional for the government to try someone criminally for a parallel case won by the defendant civilly.  The government should not be allowed to use the same government witnesses in the civil success to stand for the proposition that a crime had been committed.  I will wait for the government to stop criminalizing the civil defendant and then I will pounce.    

Oh yes, the Christmas pageant was perfect and I remembered all my lines, and correctly stated “Hark Thou that are highly FAVORED.” My audience of Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Catholic, Black, White, and Hispanic women cheered loudly.  The spirit and will to survive is “all that.” 

More than ten inmates are freed from prison early as a result of letters I wrote on their behalf.

I still await my chance to overturn my conviction.

The End