DAYS EVENTS, GOOD CITIZENS, AND TIME WELL SPENT   by Jayne Leitch
   C. 2000

~~We can take a bit of a breather
~~We can skip to the practical part
~~We can skip to the Time of Neither
~~When we're together and even when we're apart...

     "All rise."

     Zander pushed himself to his feet, squashing the nervous tremour that shivered through him at the appearance of the judge.  Beside him, Alexis cleared her throat, folding her hands resolutely in front of her.

     "Please be seated."

     It was crazy, he thought as he retook his chair to wait for the
jury to enter.  Over the course of his trial, he'd figured out that the legal process involved two things--standing and sitting.  It was a wonder anyone was ever able to testify, what with the entire room bobbing up and down like jack-in-the-boxes half the time.

     Alexis cleared her throat again, and Zander dragged his mind back to the present.  He could feel the eyes of the entire courtroom on his back, and he tried to keep from shifting uncomfortably under the attention; they were the same eyes that had been following his every move for the last month, it wasn't as if they could do anything to him now.  It was just the
press, after all.  The press, and some others...

     Straight ahead of him, the judge folded the piece of paper on which the foreman of the jury had written their verdict, and handed it back to the bailiff.  As the bailiff carried it back to the foreman, Zander rose out of his seat yet again, burying a bemused smile under a quick glance to his attorney.

     The lightening-quick smile Alexis sent him was anything but reassuring.

     "Mister Foreman, have you reached a verdict?"  The judge's voice dripped with professionalism; there wasn't the slightest hint either way.  Zander closed his eyes for a second, then half-turned so he could see the foreman read the verdict.

~~You didn't say yes or no, neither...

     "We find the defendent, Zander Smith...guilty."

~~We can take it a little bit further
~~We can stick to the after-effects part
~~Not trying to make you a believer
~~Don't want a lil' piece of your heart...

     Zander looked up from his book as a shadow blocked the light from the corridor outside his cell.  "What's going on?"

     The warden jangled the keys as he unlocked the cell.  "You have a visitor, Smith.  This one looked serious."

     "Don't they all?"  Dropping the novel on his bed, Zander stood and let the warden take him by the arm.  As they marched easily through the corridors to the visitor phones, Zander wondered who it was today.  As his execution date got closer and closer, more press had been trying to find a way to talk to him; thankfully, rules prohibited all but the most famous from getting within spitting distance of the phones, and those people he did talk to never stayed long.  It wasn't as if he told them anything...

     He hardly even bothered to hope for the one visitor he wanted to see.  She never came anymore.

     They waited for a moment while the warden buzzed him into the phone room; beyond that door, prisoner and keeper parted company, and Zander wandered along the length of the narrow room towards the booth on the end.  It had to be his; it was the only one left empty.

     Reaching the chair, Zander turned to take his seat--and froze for a moment as he came face to plexiglass-separated face with his visitor.  Then, swallowing the lump that had formed in his throat, he shifted against the hard plastic chair and reached for his receiver.

     On the other side of the glass, his visitor did the same, never
once looking away.

     Zander cleared his throat, straightened his shoulders, and tried not to blink.  He might be the one in prison, but he was damned if he was going to show any weakness.  Taking a breath, he tilted his head in forced greeting and said one word: "Juan."

     On the other side of the glass, Juan's knuckles turned white as they gripped the receiver.  Then, abruptly, he wrenched the phone away from his ear, slammed it back into its cradle, stood up so suddenly his chair nearly fell over, and left.

     After a moment Zander hung up his own phone, then went back to his cell.

~~We can skip to a neutral fury
~~You didn't say yes or no, neither...

     Zander ate slowly, savouring the taste of every mouthful.  After months of prison food, this was a definite improvement.

     At least he was alone.  After all the time he'd spent by himself in anticipation of this day, it felt odd to be thankful for such a thing--but there he was.  There was just something about eating your last meal, Zander thought, that required the presence of no one but yourself.  It was almost peaceful, being able to put one forkful of food into your mouth after another, knowing that each forkful took you closer to the very last one you would ever have--and being able to savour those mouthfuls and that knowledge in privacy.

     He washed down a bite of tender steak with a swallow of scotch, and smiled.  This was one last meal they'd remember for a while; his tastes in food were so strange, some of his requests had actually made a warden laugh out loud.  But in the end, he'd gotten everything he'd asked for.

     He ate steadily, until finally there was only one item left.  Setting his fork and knife neatly on the side of his tray, Zander picked up the single grape Pixie Stick and looked at it, his free hand arrested in motion before it could rip the paper open.

     He'd never really liked Pixie Stix.  He didn't quite know why he had asked for one now, of all times.  He certainly didn't want that to be the last taste he would ever have in his mouth.

     Sighing heavily, Zander set the powdered candy back on the tray.

~~Want to be a nobody without peer
~~Want to be a thought that's never done
~~Want to shake your faith in human nature
~~Want to break the hearts of everyone...

     He'd never been very religious, but he sat quietly as the priest gave him last rites.  It was all for the appearance of the thing; the press were outside the building, and there was any number of people inside who would dearly love to break the news that the convicted cop killer had refused even the detached comfort of the church.

     Instead, while the old man spoke quietly and asked him to bow his head, Zander's thoughts went to everyone who hadn't visited.  He'd had open hours for visiting over the past two days, and while some people had shown--Alexis, Roy, even Gabriel from Canada--their presence had just made the absences more glaring.  His mom had called, but hadn't wanted to speak with him personally.  He hadn't even heard from his sister.  And Emily...

     Zander crossed himself and raised his head again, half-listening as the priest continued.  When Alexis had stopped by, she'd mentioned that Emily was having a hard time getting out of the house; something about the family and Juan practically keeping her under house arrest.  The attorney hadn't met his eyes once throughout the whole visit, and Zander knew that whatever the Quartermaines and Santiago were doing, it wasn't the whole reason Emily was staying away.  And when Alexis had finally looked straight into his face just before leaving, he'd seen that knowledge echoed in her expression, and in her quiet, "I'm sorry."

     Still, he couldn't give up hope completely.  He wasn't sure he wanted to see her again, especially since it would be for the last time--but there was a part of him, deep down, that wanted to look into her eyes one last time and *see* what had changed.  It was the thought that had been keeping him going for the last month, ever since she stopped calling; something must have changed.  He could only assume that it was her, that her feelings, whatever they had been, were gone--but he couldn't believe that they'd just evaporated.  It would be best if they had, but...he wanted to know for sure.  And even now, even if they had, there was still time.  Time for--something.  Zander only wished he knew what he was hoping for...

     The priest laid a gnarled hand on his head, and Zander closed his eyes.  Those were the last rites; behind him, he could hear the jangle of keys as the warden opened the cell door.

     Zander stood up, and turned to the door.  There wasn't much time now.

~~You whispered, Hurry...

     There was a clock on the institutional white wall, and under it, the painfully red phone.

     Zander laid down on the cold metal gurney, keeping his eyes resolutely forward.  If he could keep the flash of red at the very corner of his vision, he could keep the thought of whether or not that phone would ring out of his mind completely.

     There was a large window at his feet, and the gurney was tilted at such an angle that he could see through the glass to the people beyond.  It made him feel like a science experiment; the peaceful solitude of his last meal was long gone, and Zander swallowed back a sudden lump in his throat as he failed to catch the eyes of even one of the people behind the partition.  He didn't have privacy anymore, and would never have it
again--but at least he was still alone.

     His eyes were dry as he felt the nurse roll up his sleeve, her actions brisk and professional.  He heard the metallic scraping of tiny wheels as the tray with the syringe was moved to the side of his gurney, and he kept his eyes desperately forward, straining to watch the people behind the glass.  This was his first execution; he wanted to know how people reacted, and he didn't have a lot of time left for that observation.

     There was a reporter, with a notepad and bored expression.  There were men in suits, three of them, their lips moving silently at each other.  There was Commissioner Scorpio, arms crossed, standing a little apart from the group.  There was a door beyond them all, barely visible through the glare of the lights on the glass...

     It was silent.  Not even the clock made a noise, and Zander's eyes swivelled around against his will to see if the hands had somehow frozen in place.

     They had.  11:59.  And the moment crystallized, and went on forever, and Zander held his breath...

~~You whispered, Hurry...

     The second hand moved, and at 12:00 Zander felt the prick of the needle as it slid into his arm.

     He thought he could feel the drug slipping into his blood and spreading through his body; he felt warm, and calm, and tired.  He knew it was all in his mind, the poison couldn't possibly work that quickly--

     There was movement out of the corner of his eye, and he dragged his gaze away from the clock and back to the people on the other side of the window.

     She was there.  Her hands were pressed against the glass, her hair wild around her pale face, her eyes--

     Her eyes found his, and a core of ice opened in Zander's stomach.  As quickly as the warmth had spread through his limbs, it was replaced by a chill.

     She had come.  Emily had come to watch him die.

     All at once he felt the resignation he'd forced upon himself for so long break apart, and everything he'd buried came rushing to the surface.  Fear, anger, worry, hurt, desperation, love--he choked out a sob that was supposed to be her name, and felt tears spill over onto his frozen cheeks.  She was there, straight ahead of him, if he could lose himself in her eyes--

     He was dizzy, but he kept his eyes on her face.  And suddenly, as if they had never existed at all, Zander's anxieties and frustrations and anger disappeared, and all he knew was that a single tear was rolling over her cheek.

     He was dizzy.  He closed his eyes.

~~Until we're talking in whispers again
~~Until we're talking in whispers again...

End.
Song:  Lake Fever, by The Tragically Hip

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