Chapter 3 - Entering the Courtroom
The courtroom was already stuffy, filled with the low hum of lawyers shuffling papers and families whispering anxiously in the oak-paneled pews. When the court clerk loudly announced Case 4238B, I stood up from the back bench, squared my shoulders, and walked down the center aisle alone, choosing not to waste money on a civilian defense attorney when the facts of my life were already carved into my medals.
As I took my seat at the defendant’s table, my father turned his head and gave me the exact same cold, hard, judging look I remembered from every childhood dinner table where I refused to fit into their delicate, upper-middle-class mold. Dad was dressed in an expensive charcoal suit, his silver hair neatly combed. Mom sat right beside him, wearing an expensive string of pearls and a tailored pastel blazer.
She took one look at my Navy uniform, and an expression of unmistakable, bottomless disgust twisted her face.
"In uniform," she whispered audibly across the aisle, leaning over to poke my father’s arm as if I had shown up in dirty work clothes. "Can you believe her? Always trying to be dramatic."
I didn't blink. I kept my eyes fixed straight ahead on the elevated judicial bench.
A moment later, the side door opened and the bailiff barked, "All rise for the Honorable Judge Arthur Simmons."
Judge Simmons stepped up to the bench, adjusted his heavy black spectacles, and scanned the paperwork spread out before him. He was an older man with sharp, intelligent eyes and a reputation in Portsmouth for having zero tolerance for frivolous litigation or bullying plaintiffs.
"Please be seated," Judge Simmons announced, his voice echoing off the high ceiling. He looked down at his docket. "We have Case 4238B, Carter versus Carter. Property dispute regarding historical parcel 104, commonly known as the Carter homestead. Mr. Carter, you are representing the plaintiffs. Are you claiming your daughter legally abandoned this property?"
My father stood up smoothly, buttoning his suit jacket with an air of practiced theatrical righteousness.
"Yes, Your Honor," Dad answered, pitching his voice to sound like a deeply wounded, exhausted patriarch. "We hate to be here, truly we do. But Evelyn walked out on our family twelve years ago, cut off all communication, and vanished into the military. That property has sat completely abandoned, rotting away. My wife and I have personally carried every single property tax payment, insurance bill, and maintenance cost for over a decade just to keep the roof from collapsing. She has zero claim to it."
Mom nodded sympathetically beside him, dabbing an imaginary tear from the corner of her eye with a lace handkerchief.
Judge Simmons listened quietly, stroking his chin. Then, slowly, his gaze shifted away from my parents and moved down the courtroom table until his eyes locked directly onto me, sitting rigidly in my Navy dress uniform with my ribbons gleaming under the fluorescent lights.
A heavy, lingering silence settled over the entire room.
"Commander Carter," Judge Simmons said, his voice softening with sudden, intense curiosity. "You are listed as the defendant representing yourself. Would you like to make an opening statement?"
Dad’s smug, self-satisfied smile instantly vanished from his face, replaced by a twitch of irritation. Mom’s fingers gripped her pearl necklace so tightly I thought the silk string might snap right then and there.
May you like
I took a deep breath, braced my injured knee against the wooden leg of the table, and opened my mouth to speak. But before a single syllable could escape my lips, Judge Simmons suddenly reached out, picked up the thick cream-colored case folder, and flipped open the brass fasteners.
"Before you answer, Commander," Judge Simmons said, raising his head and staring directly down at my parents with a look of icy disdain, "there is something in this court file that your parents apparently didn't know that I happen to know very well."
