But, you see, I never considered having only one child. It would be two or none. I remembered all too well the six years of loneliness I’d felt until my brother was born. I wanted to make sure that my children were born as close together as my health and strength would allow. Then they would always have each other for company.
And so, I found myself pregnant again. This time, trying a double homicide. I was worried about being able to finish the case before I went into labor. But the judge ran a tight ship, and I figured things would move quickly.
Right in the middle of jury selection, however, the Rodney King verdict had come in. The riots shut us down for a few days. During that time, I fretted. Would our jury, which was shaping up to be largely African-American, take out their anger on me? It wasn’t a great time to be trying a case. Fortunately, the defendants thought so too. They moved for a mistrial, and the judge granted it.
That left me at loose ends, and still very pregnant. I got lucky. One of my friends in the Special Trials Unit, John Zajec, was getting ready to go to trial on another double homicide. For the past few months, whenever we met in the strip of hallway between our offices, John and I had been batting around the various legal and strategic issues on his case. When my case got bumped to the back burner, I’d go down to his office and hustle up some conversation. I was such a junkie, if I couldn’t have a case of my own, I’d glom onto someone else’s.
Over lunch, I’d come up with an idea. Maybe I could be his second chair.
“If you don’t like the idea, just tell me so,” I told him slyly. “But maybe having a pregnant chick next to you will get some jury sympathy. And I’ll put on all the boring stuff.”
“Sounds great,” he told me.
And that’s how I wound up arguing for the imposition of the death penalty exactly one week before giving birth to Tyler. My spirits were high, but my body wasn’t exactly cooperating. Although I was in good shape physically, my pelvic bones had loosened up, a natural occurrence that prepares women for birthing. I found that if I stood up too fast after I’d been sitting for a while, my legs felt like they’d come out of their sockets and I’d have to kind of shake them back into place.
I could hide most of that business sitting at counsel table. The awkward part came when I’d been standing at the lectern examining a witness. I’d just asked him if he’d like to refresh his memory by looking at the text of his statement. Yes, he told me, he would. I took a step, or rather tried to, when I realized that my leg wouldn’t go back where it belonged. I was struggling to coax it back into place when the judge, puzzled by the pause, asked, “Ms. Clark, would you like to approach the witness?”
“Yes… we ll… I’d like to, Your Honor.”
I was having to smother laughter. This was like a Buster Keaton routine. Finally, I shook the sucker back into joint and glided to the witness stand. Later when I told John what had happened, he just shook his head and said, “You women! I don’t know how you do it.”
The jurors returned a verdict of guilty. They later confided in me that they’d been taking bets as to whether I’d make it to the end.
I could never have imagined that motherhood would be so all-consuming. You spend the first thirty-six years of your life as a free agent-and pow. You’re responsible for the survival of a totally helpless humanoid. Colic! Life for the first four months is like one long wail. You’re frantic to ease the pain. Must be something you’re eating, right? So you add vegetables. Then you eliminate vegetables, cut out spices, reduce dairy intake.
Only time takes care of the problem.
My friends all warned me about what to expect when I went back to work. You think you’ll be glad to get out of the house, they said. But when the time comes, you’ll yearn to get back. You’ll actually find yourself calling home during the day just to hear the baby cry. They were right. Those same friends would later reassure me that it’s possible to love a second baby as much as the first. It’s true. I don’t know how that works, I guess the heart just expands.
Mothering, of course, complicated life exponentially. Suddenly, a trip to the grocery store became a major logistical ordeal. If I took a baby, or two of them, I’d have to bring a stroller or backpack carrier, a diaper bag, a bottle, and at least one toy. I’d reach in my purse for a pen and come up with a toy airplane or a G.I. Joe. Or I’d be sitting in court trying a case, and my beeper would go off with a call from home.
My colleagues were sympathetic. Even during the Simpson case, when we were all in the throes of monstrous stress, my teammates were all so sweet and considerate. It wasn’t unusual for our meetings to be interrupted by a phone call from the domestic front and Hank and Scott would riff on my transformation from Darth Vader to Mother Goose. Not until this Monday morning in February, when Johnnie hit me with his accusations that I had used my children-used them-had I come face-to-face with reality: not all the world loves a working mother.
I turned to the last page of the photo album and was mortified to realize that I hadn’t inserted any of the pictures taken over the last eight months. They were still up on the shelf in their plastic covers. When the trial was over, I’d get the album up-to-date, I promised myself.
I wanted to lock myself into the bathroom and scream, to pound on the walls. I wanted to mount an offensive that would lay waste to three countries. But I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t afford self-indulgence. I had to call a lawyer immediately to get the ball rolling.
Next morning, I slunk into work like a dog expecting to be hit. When I opened the door to my office I was overwhelmed by the sight and scent of flowers. There were red roses, yellow roses, white roses. There were stalks of gladiolus and eucalyptus, birds-of-paradise, pink and lavender freesias, knots of ‘sweet William and violets. My dank bureaucratic lair had been transformed into a hothouse in full riot. I read the cards on the first three or four bouquets to see who my well-wishers were. No one I knew-just strangers, from Texas, Connecticut, Washington, D.C. All over. They were sending me sympathy and wishing me luck.
Well, I’ll be dipped.
For months before this, supporters had been sending the team jewelry, cosmetics, clothing, and other trinkets. When the bottlers of Evian water saw that Chris and I kept Crystal Geyser on the counsel table, they air-freighted us cases of their own stuff. Someone even sent Chris an expensive leather flight jacket. Chris thought it was hilarious. He started calling this bounty “free shit,” FS for short.
But the FS we’d gotten to date was nothing compared to the avalanche that poured in during those days after Gordon’s custody filing. Scott dubbed the new influx “more free shit.” MFS! Before, I’d gotten flowers only from women; now I got them from men as well. And everybody wanted to know how they could help me out.
Amid this outpouring of goodwill there was a touching solicitude for me personally. A Holocaust survivor sent me a book on coping. My haggard appearance caused others to send cough medicine and vitamins. I got a lot of books on stress. I received angels of every kind. Ceramic, wood, papier-mâché. I kept them all.
I think what touched me most was a letter sent by a convent of Dominican nuns. This wonderful missive urged courage and fortitude; it was sort of the Dominican version of “Go, girlfriend.” I taped it to the wall next to my desk and turned to it several times a day for comfort.
Sisters, if you’re reading this, please accept my gratitude. The next few weeks would be the most trying of my life. Through it all, your prayers preserved my sanity.
And FS restored my faith in my fellow man.
Marine to Marine