Old School Ch. 03: Naked Justice

"The end came when we failed to realize we weren't lovers anymore, we weren't parents anymore, we were... lawyers -- big, rich, powerful damn lawyers -- and we were treating each other like... lawyers. Our conversations sounded like conference calls. And behind the walls we had built over time, we started hiding secrets, things we should have and previously would have told each other," she said. "It wasn't the sort of secrets you might imagine, like an affair. At least not at first. He'd forget to tell me that he was boarding a flight to San Diego for a weekend client conference while I was at Union Station to hop on the Acela to see him in New York. Then I'd retaliate by taking the kids and sneaking off to our house in the Outer Banks for the weekend without telling him and he'd arrive in Georgetown to find an empty house."

I could hear her sniffle as the bitter memories poured out of her.

"I confronted Wright one day and told him I wanted off the merry-go-round. It had come with too high a cost. I wanted to go home and let the kids grow up in a nice house with a big yard close to their grandparents. I wanted to be there to care for my mom and dad. I even wanted another child, I told him, but none of that could happen in D.C. or New York no matter how much money we made."

Now there was silence on her end. I could sense she was holding the phone away from her face. After perhaps a minute, she returned and apologized. She blamed it on a head cold.

"He wouldn't get off the merry-go-round. And I couldn't stay on. So we split up, separated. Neither of us has filed for divorce. I can't tell you why not, though I'm sure you could figure it out. I looked you up on Chambers; you're quite good," she said.

I chuckled lamely.

"Les, by the time I was your age, Wright and I had been married for five years and had one kid. You and Kass... you have the chance to get it right before you start and I guess that's what I'm calling to say."

"You think there's a chance? Why do you say that?"

"Because I sat down with this broken-hearted girl for nearly three hours and two bottles of Charter Vineyards Malbec the night before last and listened to her rage and plead and argue and cry. And cry. And cry, Les. Underneath it all, for Kass, if it's not you then it's nobody. You're her first and last. Her only."

"Les, I've told you what I had to do to rediscover Jerilyn Bates. I don't know how you do this, but if there's a Les Walker in there who's not 'Bigtime Lawyer Les Walker,' you should find him and show Kassie Felson that he's real."

Next: Chapter Four -- The Weight