TO-WIT: TRUE CONFESSIONS
It was the third of June, 1:45 pm, when the phone rang, just as it always has lo these past twenty four years at this exact same date and time. I picked up the receiver without waiting for my secretary to answer; I already knew who it was and what he was going to say.
“I’m going to get even with you,” Bill said again in that iconic alcoholic slur of his, “even if it takes me the rest of my career.”
I didn’t remind him that his career was already over, that would have only infuriated him more. I know he’s been retired now for exactly ten years because that’s how long he’s been calling me collect.
On that date twenty four years ago I skinned him like a sloshed bunny. It wasn’t hard to do because in those days that’s what he was; inebriated was the only state in which he practiced.
We had a difficult litigation case then and I got him to stipulate certain facts which, had he been doing more thinking than drinking, he would never have agreed to. I could never have proven some of those facts but I intentionally went to his office and presented them to him right before lunch when I knew his Sirens would be wailing. He signed without reading them and bolted out the door for lunch. That rapacious hunger ultimately cost his client more than half a million dollars and him his partnership in his firm; to this day he’s still a bit, shall we say, miffed.
His annual call doesn't bother me; I'm actually glad he still has any memory left at all. What does bother me is this haunting doubt I still have that maybe I did something wrong, that maybe I took undue advantage of his condition.
My doubt in this regard has bothered me so much that some time back I sought therapy to help me sort it out.
"So, tell me about your mother," Dr. Risotto asked as soon as I lay down.
"This isn't about my mother," I replied, "its about a professional matter."
"So you say," he said.
Therapy didn't accomplish much, other than to firm up my suspicion that my mother loved my brother more than me.
Discussing the matter with my colleagues over the years hasn't helped much either. A few are of the notion that what I did was well within the fairness parameters of an adversarial system but most decline to answer in favor of racing back to their offices to review any current cases I had with them.
Last night Leonard, the first and only lawyer I ever worked for, came to me once again in a dream. He was wearing boxing shorts, not a pretty sight, and he was climbing into a boxing ring with Bill.
When the bell rang, Bill wobbled into the center of the ring where Leonard leveled him with a solitary right to the chops. Bill staggered to the ropes, looked me straight in the eye and said "Drink Responsibly." He then dropped to the canvas and was counted out.
As Leonard climbed out of the ring, I threw a robe over his shoulders and asked if he thought Bill was drunk.
"If he was he shouldn't have gotten into the ring," Leonard said. "Send the check to my office."
It certainly seemed an easy problem for Leonard to solve, so easy in fact that it seemed to be no problem at all. I'm glad he approved, his opinion has always meant a lot to me. Someday it may help.
©2014, S. Sponte, Esq.