Free Talk Talk by T. C. Boyle Page A

finally got to her, after Angela, after the big girl with the shaven head (with the unlikely name of Beatrice Flowers), after half a dozen men who tightened their jaws and flexed their shoulders as they stood before the judge, she came out of her trance long enough to startle the whole courtroom with the unleashed power of her voice: “Yes,” she said, standing as Iverson signed that they'd called her name, “I'm present.” That was when she looked up and saw Bridger, his face crying out to her, and he was the only one in the courtroom who didn't flinch at the sound of her voice. She gave him nothing, not hope or joy or love. Then she sat down again and dropped her head.
    More waiting. Eternal waiting. Cases came and went, charges were read aloud, pleas made and recorded, bail set and fines levied. At four-fifteen Marie Eustace reappeared to confer with the judge and present into evidence faxes from each of the jurisdictions in question, and the judge put on her reading glasses while the court went lax and people studied the ceiling or ducked in and out of the door on urgent business. Then the judge removed her glasses and called Dana's name again, Iverson signing, and Dana found herself edging past people to approach the bench, and at least they'd released her shackles, at least there was that.
    The judge's eyes were a milky blue, faded and blanched as if all the vitality had gone out of them, yet she had a smile in reserve, a rueful smile, which she somehow managed to summon for the occasion of this, Dana Halter's exoneration. Dana could see it all before it happened--yes, it was a case of mistaken identity, or worse, identity theft--and the lethargy she'd felt was replaced suddenly by anger, by a rage that built in her till she couldn't contain it. “The court must offer you our deepest apologies,” the judge was saying, as Iverson's hands worked and twisted before her, “because this was an ordeal you've been through, I know that, but until the evidence came in”--and here she held up a handful of faxes, the first of which, from Tulare County, showed the shadowy likeness of a stranger, a white male nonetheless, under the tag Dana Halter--“there was nothing we could do. But we do apologize--I apologize--and we will give you every consideration we can in straightening this out. Our victims' assistance people are as good as they come and will be available to you immediately on release.”
    But she had to speak, had to push it. “Is that it?” she said, and she had no idea whether she was shouting or whispering. “Is that all you're going to do?”
    Marie Eustace blanched. Iverson signed frantically, “That's enough. No more. She's going to dismiss.”
    Dana swung round on him, signing back, big Sign, angry Sign, her arms looping and elbows jabbing: “You shut up because I don't need you”--“and when I did need you you weren't there.” All of it came out then, all the hurt and confusion, and she turned back to the judge and let her voice lash out like a physical extension of herself, of her furiously signing hands: “I've been locked up, I've been abused--I missed two days of work with no way even to call anybody--and you give me this, this “apology” and it's supposed to make everything all right?” Her face twisted. She felt absurd, hateful, a clown in an orange jumpsuit, and she could see the judge's eyes hardening, and what word was on her lips, what curse?--“Shit, shit,” that was what it was, she was about to proclaim it all “shit”--but before she could spew it out Marie Eustace stepped forward and said something to the judge and the judge looked directly at Dana and her lips said, “Case dismissed.”
    She had no intention of sitting in an airless office disclosing herself to the victims' assistance people, answering their idiotic questions, filling out forms, lip-reading the banality of their clichés while Charles Iverson juggled his hands--she didn't have one more second to waste. Not