36.

“So what you’re saying is that some man, just some man, did that to your mother?” the prosecutor slid a picture in front of me and jutted her long, talon-like finger at it, but I quickly pushed it away.

“Don’t make me look at that please,” tears and makeup covered my cheeks but it seemed as thought I had cried all the tears away and now I was just in shock.  “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“I want you to say the truth,” her face was calm even though I knew that she felt like punching me.

“I have been.  You obviously don’t believe me.  You think-”

“Argumentative.  Just answer the question, Ms. Adams,” the judge snaps at me.

I stare down at the hard wood of the witness stand for a few seconds, wishing the day would end.  I finally respond, “Yes, I’m saying that a man, just some man, did that,” I indicated to the picture pushed to the end of the witness stand, “to my mother.”

“Did you, do you, know who this man was?”

“No.  Why are you doing this to me?  I didn’t kill my mother!”

“Then who did it?” The woman demanded.

She came all the way up to the witness stand, placed her hands flat on the table, and leaned forward so her angry scowl was no more than two inches from my face.  Her breath reeked of onion bagels and garlic.  “You very conveniently arrived home just in time to see this “killer” standing over your mother, and this killer just looked at you and left.  They didn’t try to attack you or anything.  Just a small, petite girl like you scared away a person large enough to drag your mother from the kitchen and into the living room.  Does that sound at all believable to you?  Does it, Chloe?” she tilted her head to the side and ended her words with a sort of babyish tone.

I could tell she was patronizing me.  “I don’t know.  I didn’t do that to her!  You must have found some evidence, something, anything at all, that doesn’t point to me…you had to have,” I practically yelled it at her as sweat dampened my long blond hair, turning it brunette.

She squinted at me, her face now about a foot from mine, and I could tell she was trying to read me.  She was certain I was hiding something.  My defense attorney had said that I had a guilty complexion, and if I got angry I would end up looking like I just killed ten people.  She moved away from the stand.  “See Chloe, that’s the thing.  No one did,” she turned towards the jury that consisted of 12 people, all of them in their early twenties.  “The detectives scored her house.  Not a strand of hair or a single fingerprint was found in the Adams’ home that didn’t belong to Chloe, her mother, or a family friend who had a solid alibi the afternoon of the murder.  How do you explain that?  Well, simple.  Chloe did not have a solid alibi.  Chloe does not have an explanation for anyone wanting to hurt her mother.  Chloe is the one and only suspect and witness to this crime.”  The prosecutor paused for a second preparing to make her closing statement.  “The girl who sits in front of you on the witness stand is not as innocent as she would like you to think.  No, she is a cold-blooded killer, and on January 14, 2015, she brutally stabbed her mother thirty-six times in their own home.  That is why I ask each and everyone of you to do what’s right and sentence this girl to life in prison and bring justice to Clarissa Marie Adams.  Thank you ladies and gentlemen.”

The prosecutor strutted to her seat like a queen who’s certain she’s won, but I prayed she hadn’t.  I looked over at the jury and they were all unreadable; even the judge’s expression was skeptical, as if he could be pushed any which way.  But like I had said, I hoped he didn’t pick the prosecutor’s way.  “You can step down now, Ms. Adams,” the judge says to me.

I looked over at him in an attempt to read his expression.  His face didn’t console me, though.  If anything, it worries me more, and as I walked to my seat I looked over at the twelve jurors.  They all had the same facial expressions: concern, confusion, and self-doubt.  It worried me because my trial had been going on for a whopping twelve weeks.  Each day had been a struggle of grueling cross-examinations, witnesses, and damning evidence against me.  But some evidence had helped me, too.  The little piece of evidence against me stating that I didn’t have a solid alibi was wrong.  It wasn’t very solid, but it was in fact an alibi.

On the afternoon of my mother’s gruesome murder, I had been headed to my friend Jessica’s house.  I had been eager to surprise her with a box of cupcakes in the hopes of cheering her up after a hard breakup with her boyfriend.  But when I had arrived at her house at exactly 4:15 (something both the prosecutor and my defense attorney liked to stress), no one had been home.  So I had set off back to my house seeing no reason to stay there at approximately 4:20.  It only took me an average of ten minutes to walk back home, meaning that I would have arrived home at 4:30.  I would have been gone for 25 minutes.  Only 25 minutes for an unknown assassin to stab my mother thirty-six times, but that felt more logical to me than me only having about 11 minutes to kill my mother since I had called 911 at 4:41.

This day was the last day of my trial and then I would wait for God only knew how long until the judge and jury would have made their decision.  Before my fate was decided…

Three days later…

Do you have any pleas, Ms. Adams?”

“No.  No, I do not.”

I was innocent.  The judge cleared his throat and stood.  “We, the jury…” I breathed in. “…find the defendant…” I breathed out. “…Chloe Adams…” I breathed in. “…not guilty of second degree murder.”

The courtroom was silent.  I smiled a small smile, so only I would know, Chloe Adams: the girl who got away with murder.