SquidgeWorld Archive

"Kathryn," Alan said softly, eyes staring out over the terrace wall. "Her name was Kathryn."

"Pretty name."

"Mm."

Silence enveloped the pair. Denny had asked the question, Alan had answered. And suddenly he saw her face before him, and memory transported him back to the moment he'd first seen her.

Denny listened.

~-~-~-~-

December 4, 1989

I walked into the office for the first time since my second interview two weeks earlier. I'd wanted some time to just revel in being a lawyer but not yet having to do the work of one. Lifelong ambition, law school. But now that I was about to actually start practicing law, I wasn't sure exactly what to expect.

It was the first staff meeting. Introductions were made, I was civil.

~-~-~-~-

"You? Civil?"

"Yes, Denny. Believe it or not, I was once a civil person."

"Thank God you came to your senses."

~-~-~-~-

She was directly on the other side of the table from me. Her hair was long, down to the middle of her back. Brunette, green eyes, sensuous lips...I found myself instantly smitten. I must have spent that entire half-hour surreptitiously giving her the eye.

At 32, she was five years older than me. The first time she stood up all I wanted to do was lick her legs. She'd made junior partner. And she was made my sitter. She could throw lightning bolts in the courtroom. Her methods were unorthodox, but she was unbeaten. She'd grab hold of the tiniest fact and make it seem to the jury like the touchstone for that case. She always won them over.

Her creativity astounded me. She'd have a case that seemed hopeless, seemed like there'd be no way to win it. Yet she manipulated the world like it was her toy and thought so far outside the box that Lonnie James used to say she was halfway to Mars.

The first case I ever saw her in was Pardee vs. Filmin. Victor Pardee's parents died in a car crash when he was twelve years of age. Everything was left to him, but since he was a minor, his uncle was named guardian. Chapter 202, Section 21 allowed Uncle Bill to sell the Pardee home a year later since what had been left to Victor by his parents was, apparently, not enough to sustain his financial needs.

Years later it was discovered that the wood the Pardee house was made of was priceless and worth millions. Victor decided he wanted a piece of what had once belonged to him, so he tried getting the owner, Filmin, to let him share the profits. Of course he wouldn't, so Victor sued.

The defense made a damn good case. Logically, it makes sense that it's not Filmin's fault Uncle Bill sold Victor's house. Under the law, Uncle Bill did nothing wrong. And Filmin had no compelling reason to share his newfound fortune with Victor Pardee nearly 21 years after he and his wife had bought the place.

That's when I first saw Kathryn's brilliance. Instead of trying to convince the jury that Uncle Bill, Filmin or anyone else owed Victor a piece of the action, she tried to convince them that Victor was simply out to gain a buck after years of failed business ventures had left him broke. She used reverse psychology, and then pulled the rabbit.

She had a psychiatrist on the stand, the seeming point of whose testimony was to explain away why a child would need to have the place where he retained the most memories of his parents. The jury began to sympathize with Victor emotionally, even though that really didn't have any bearing on the fact that Victor was trying to get money he wasn't owed.

Then came her sucker punch. Her last question to the psychiatrist was, "What effect did the loss of his home have on Victor Pardee?" The doctor testified that their death had been so tragic, had made such a negative impression upon Victor, that when his uncle sold the house, the devastation of losing that last connection to his parents scarred him to the point of being unable to be successful in the world, either in business or in love.

But when the defense attorney claimed it was Uncle Bill Victor should be going after instead of Filmin, Kathryn came right back at him with the realtor who had originally shown the Filmins the house. One tiny phrase uttered by Albert Filmin as he and his wife were being given the tour was "What great wood. It looks expensive." And yet another witness, a former secretary at Filmin's insurance company, testified that she very clearly remembered Bill Pardee coming in for several meetings with Filmin.

On rebuttal, Filmin claimed if he had seen Pardee, it had been simply in the course of doing business and providing him an insurance policy. But the life insurance Pardee took out on his wife totaled more than $600,000, and she died one year later under mysterious circumstances. Add to that the fact that when Pardee sold to the Filmins, he retained 15% ownership, meaning he, too, was benefiting from the newly discovered wood value.

All in all, Kathryn made the jury believe that Filmin and Pardee knew the value of the wood, that they'd been in cahoots about the life insurance policy and subsequently Mrs. Firmin's death and that the ownership retention was Pardee's way of ensuring that when their elaborate plan came to fruition, he'd have his share of things. Even though these facts were so minute, and so disconnected in the real world that nobody else probably would even have thought to put them together. Jury deliberated only 25 minutes. Returned with not guilty.

~-~-~-~-

"Sounds like something you'd do."

Alan chuckled. "Where do you think I learned it?"

~-~-~-~-

Kathryn was unstoppable. She was fanatic about everything from knowing each and every tiny fact about her cases to how she dressed, look, ate. She exhausted me, but I couldn't get enough of her. She took me under her wing and pretty soon, to her bed.

October 13, 1990

You ever hear of puppy love? This was puppy love with someone who knew me better than I knew myself. She drove me crazy. So I married her.

~-~-~-~-

"How did you propose? I'm always interested in how a man proposes."

Alan cast a sidelong glance at his friend. Odd question. From an odd man.

~-~-~-~-

Rewind to April 1, 1990

~-~-~-~-

"You proposed to her on April Fools Day?"

"Denny, if you keep interrupting me, we're going to be here on the balcony until next week's episode. We can't do an entire episode on the balcony."

"Why not?" Denny asked.

"Shirley, Paul, Brad and Denise."

"You're no fun."

~-~-~-~-

Anyway, rewind to April 1, 1990

It was a gorgeous day in Cambridge. I spent the entire day playing practical jokes on her. She spent the time she wasn't the butt of the jokes as the prankster. Our apartment was a mess, we were both a mess by the time the evening came. I took her to dinner at Legal Sea Foods. Flounder. She loved flounder.

Afterwards we went for a walk by the Charles. You know, back then, by night, the river didn't look so bad. She was certain I was going to do something terrible, kept looking around for that final April Fools joke. There was that incident involving a roller skater, a dog and Kathryn and I tangled in a leash, but that wasn't planned.

We got to the bridge and halfway across I said, "Marry me." She said, "April Fools!" I said, "No." I'll never forget watching her face change from thinking I was joking to realizing I was serious. When I took the velvet box out of my pocket, she said, "I'll bet the rock in there comes from the bottom of the river." She still didn't believe I was serious.

But then I opened the box, and for the first time ever, I saw Kathryn Palmer cry.

~-~-~-~-

Denny watched as, for the first time ever, he saw Alan Shore cry. His heart seemed to skip a few beats, but he decided it was best not to mention it. Alan himself appeared to be lost in the memory and for many long minutes it was silent.

Then Alan took a deep breath and seemed to come back to himself. He swiped at his eye, not saying whether or not he cared that Denny had seen it. "So that's how I proposed."

"Unorthodox," Denny nodded, looking away. "Just like you."

"We both were. It was...she was my match. In every way."

~-~-~-~-

October 13, 1990

We got married on that bridge. Shut the whole thing down. It wasn't easy, but the partners were good friends with the commissioner, and we were given thirty minutes. Afterward...you know, big reception, big bucks, lots of presents. And then we left for our honeymoon.

Aside from the more recent memories of fish with their bodies blown off, I have very fond memories of Canada. We both wanted to just be out in the middle of nowhere. We figured, the best nowhere out there is Canada, and so we rented a cabin on a lake in Vancouver and didn't leave for two whole weeks. I ravished that woman in every way possible and then some.

~-~-~-~-

"Details."

Alan scrunched his face into a frown. "Go to hell."

"You can't blame a man for trying," Denny sighed, raising his glass in a mock salute. "So you made love what, twenty times a day and never had kids?"

Alan's face morphed from frowning to sad. "She couldn't have them," he whispered. "We didn't know it until two years later. Christ, we fucked like rabbits and never once did she have a scare. But the doctor finally told her she was sterile. She didn't tell me for two days."

"But you loved her anyway."

"More than ever. No more precautions. I suppose at some point I did want kids, but now I'm glad I don't have them. They're a pain in the ass."

"Tell me about it."

They were quiet again for a time, each man lost in his own thoughts. At last, Denny broke the silence while stubbing his cigar out in the ashtray.

"You going to tell me how she died?"

"Why do you want to know?" Alan asked curiously.

"Knowing what's in a man's past gives you a lot of clues as to his present."

"In other words, you want to psychoanalyze me."

"No," Denny shook his head, looking Alan directly in the eyes. "I want to know you."

Alan looked at him for several more seconds, a rather quizzical look upon his face. Then he nodded his head and rose to his feet, walking forward and leaning on the terrace wall.

~-~-~-~-

December 21, 1999

I knew Kathryn was working late that night. She called me some time around six, I'd gotten back from court about an hour earlier, and told me she was meeting with a client of ours. It was a young lady whose parents had denied her the right to have an abortion. Something went wrong with the pregnancy...God, I don't even remember what now...and she wound up losing the baby and having a complete hysterectomy. At seventeen years of age, she knew she would never be able to bear children. She was suing her parents, the hospital and the state.

Kathryn took it personally, you know, given that she couldn't have them either. The girl didn't want to talk to a man about it, so Kathryn had agreed to meet with her alone at the room she was renting. It was on the way back from that meeting two hours later that a DHL delivery truck ran a red light and hit her broadside.

~-~-~-~-

Denny watched Alan's body grow rigid, his hands splayed flat on the top of the wall. He shook his head as he stood, and moved to his friend's side. "I'm sorry, Alan."

Alan gave a sort of half-snort/half-chuckle, a bark of a laugh that showed no amusement. "It wasn't bad enough that she was hurt so badly," he said so quietly Denny barely heard the words. "She was also eight weeks pregnant."

Denny's eyes widened, his mouth hung open as he stared at Alan's profiled face. "I thought you said she was sterile."

"That's what we were told. Her eggs weren't viable. Every one that was tested was completely sterile."

~-~-~-~-

December 31, 1999

Ten days later, on a Monday...New Year's Eve...she'd been home for four days. They'd done surgery, she had broken ribs, herniated discs, a broken arm, broken femur. But we put in a hospital bed at home, had a nurse coming to check vitals and administer medication throughout the day and night.

I monitored her constantly. Moved a rollaway into the spare room where we'd set her up and took a leave of absence to take care of her. She was so excited about the baby. So glad she'd survived the accident so she'd be able to have this child. She even said that was the reason she'd had the accident, so she could find out she was pregnant. She always looked at things like that. Always thought everything had a reason. She had me believing it too until that day.

She'd been getting headaches and her fever had started to rise. The nurse kept telling us it was a normal reaction to the antibiotics and painkillers, that she had to be on a strange mixture of drugs to make sure none of it hurt the baby. She was desperate not to lose him.

~-~-~-~-

"Him? It was a boy?"

"Yes. I had a son. He would've been six now. Can you imagine me with a six-year old?"

"No," Denny chuckled. "But I bet he would've been a real pisser."

"Probably."

~-~-~-~-

She kept complaining about a pain in her stomach. The nurse said it was indigestion and left at three o'clock that afternoon. Two hours later, Kathryn was screaming in pain. I called an ambulance. Her condition worsened. They did all kinds of blood tests. It wasn't until nearly nine that night they figured out she had septicemia.

Somehow, either as a result of her injuries or the surgical procedures, a bacteria normally found only in the colon had gotten into her bloodstream. It poisoned her blood, her organs.

~-~-~-~-

Alan took a deep, shaky breath. Denny placed a hand on his arm. "She died at ten minutes to midnight." Alan closed his eyes. "She never got to see whether or not Y2K happened." He reopened his eyes and looked down at the street below. "She never got to become a mother."

Denny swallowed hard. "I'm sorry, Alan. I wouldn't have asked if I knew."

Alan shrugged and tried to smile. "How can you know unless I tell you? Besides, I hadn't thought about it in years. I suppose it's...therapeutic."

Denny looked across at the tall buildings. It was only when a nearly indiscernible noise caught his attention that he looked back at Alan. Tears were streaming down his face.

"Alan?"

"I'm sorry."

Denny physically turned the younger man so they were face-to-face. "Don't ever apologize for being human," he said softly, and before he could think twice about it, he pulled Alan into a full-body hug.

Alan hesitated a moment before deciding it was okay to wrap his arms around Denny. His hands grabbed fistfuls of the expensive suit jacket. His face buried in Denny's shoulder, Alan let it go for the first time since Kathryn's death.

"I named him," he murmured into the soaked fabric of the jacket nearly five minutes later.

"What did you name him?"

"Palmer," Alan replied, backing away and pulling out his handkerchief. "Kathryn's maiden name. Palmer Shore." He wiped his eyes and face and unceremoniously blew his nose, causing Denny to jump from the sheer force of it. "I feel like a real ass now."

"You're only an ass when you lose in court, remember?"

Alan laughed and went back to his chair, slumping in it, thoroughly spent.

Denny turned and leaned against the wall, regarding him for a moment. "Your son would've been born...what, in July, right?"

Looking up with questions in his eyes, Alan replied, "Yes, I guess so. Why?"

"It's July 14th," Denny replied matter-of-factly. He poured them each a glass of Scotch and went back to the wall. "Come here."

Alan rose and joined him, taking the offered glass. "Happy Birthday, Palmer," he said, raising his glass toward Alan.

His lower lip trembled for a second as he fought to keep from repeating his earlier spectacle. He raised his glass and clinked it to Denny's. "Yeah," he said. "Happy Birthday, Palmer." They each took a swig and then lowered their glasses, leaning their elbows on the wall and looking at each other. "Thanks, Denny."

He shrugged. "That's what friends are for."

Alan took a deep breath and let it out in a long, slow sigh. "You would have loved Kathryn. She would have given you a run for your money."

"I probably would have loved her. But unfortunately, all I'll ever know is that I love you."

Alan dropped his glass. It clinked on the top of the wall and tipped, spilling Scotch over the side. His red-rimmed eyes widened. His jaw dropped in disbelief. For a moment he quite resembled a fish out of water until he finally got his voice to work.

"What the hell did you just say?"

"You heard me," Denny said, then drained his glass. "You spilled."

"From the sound of it, so did you."

"I'm not as cold and heartless as you might think."

"I never thought you were cold and heartless."

"Really?"

"Really."

Alan reached out and gently laid his hand over Denny's. "What...what kind of love are we talking about?"

"The only kind that makes any difference," Denny replied gruffly. "If you're going to do something, you'd better do it before I change my mind."

His emotions were out of control. First reliving meeting and marrying his beautiful wife. Then reliving her awful death...the death of his child. And now...now this. He reached out, fingertips lightly brushing Denny's lips. Denny's eyes closed.

Slowly Alan leaned forward. His hand dropped to Denny's shoulder as his lips touched those of his friend for the first time. He pressed only slightly, close-mouthed, and was surprised at the softness surrounded by nighttime whiskers. He pulled away and two pairs of eyes opened, reflecting the uncertainty and awkwardness both men felt.

"Let's go home," Denny said. Without a word, they turned and crossed the terrace. Halfway down the corridor, Denny reached out and took Alan's arm. "I have a better idea."

"What's that?"

They entered the elevator and Denny pushed the button for ground level. "How about we take a walk across the bridge?"

The man before him would never cease to amaze him, in every sense of the word. They had reached the ground floor and exited into the massive office building's lobby before he worked up the courage to speak.

"I'd like that, Denny," he said softly. "I'd like that a lot."