Page 27 - The Houseguest

expert’s testimony, to support the theory that Rachel was prone to uncontrollable and unpredictable seizures.
Day after day I sat alone, intently listening to every detail. Each day the jury walked in, the jury walked out. In my mind, it seemed like no time had passed in between these daily rituals. The jury wasn’t sequestered, but the trial had been moved out to Suffolk County, away from the local press and opinions expressed by the residents. If it’s one thing a true New Yorker is known for, it’s freely shared opinions. I remember thinking it didn’t matter where this trial was conducted because the facts were indisputable. Not even the best defense attorney could contort them to sway the opinions of a jury. No reasonable, rational individual could possibly construe the events in any other manner than which they had occurred.
With weekends and holidays, the trial dragged on well into the winter. I never wore a coat to the courtroom and didn’t even feel the cold northeastern winds that used to slice through me like a razor. It was as though the sting of the frigid air was dwarfed by the pain felt everywhere else. As a trial attorney, I would pride myself in analyzing and understanding jurors’ conduct, having learned to read them with amazing accuracy. Studying, ad nauseam, their average expressions and gestures enabled me to determine when they were shocked, curious or even confused. But, my absence from practicing law had apparently dampened my skills because this jury was impossible for me to read. Or maybe I was just so certain of their united response, I didn’t fully focus on my visual analyses. They deliberated for six days, which was later attributed to the three women who sat attentively in the jury box, taking
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The Houseguest by Linda Ellis www.LindaEllis.life