Hicks was the one who interviewed me. He’d tell me again about all the evidence they had stacked against us and how much easier things would go for me if I just cooperated with them. I kept my mouth shut. I thought about Ryan and how he was faring. It was taking all my strength not to defend myself, not to tell Hicks to fuck off, but I had a feeling Ryan would handle the interrogations okay. He was used to people and teachers giving him a hard time.
Finally it was Monday and I was brought before the provincial judge. My lawyer said Ryan was probably coming in after us. My parents were in the courthouse, my dad in a suit and my mom in dress pants and a blouse, her hair pulled back. They both looked nervous, their faces strained. I thought I’d find out about bail that day, but now my lawyer explained what he hadn’t wanted to tell me on Friday. This was just to set a bail hearing with a Supreme Court judge. That would take another couple of weeks. Meanwhile I’d be in custody at the pretrial center over in Vancouver, in the women’s unit. I was going to jail. I listened to the judge asking my lawyer questions, talking about things like disclosure, but I couldn’t grasp anything, couldn’t stop thinking about jail. What would happen there? Would I get beaten up? What about Ryan? Would he be hurt?
I’d been transported by sheriffs that morning to the courthouse, and they took me now in one of their vans to the airport. I watched the world go by, already feeling separate, removed from the people going about their day, on their way to work or home, carrying on with their lives.
I’m going to jail. I’m going to jail, to jail, to jail.
The pretrial center was a terrifying place, concrete and institutional. Because of my age, I was held in protective custody, placed in a cell with heavy metal doors and a small window. I sat on my bed and cried so hard I threw up. They brought food later, dry tasteless stuff that I couldn’t eat. The next days were a blur. I sat scared in my cell most of the time, sometimes venturing out to the TV room but leaving when the news came on because I’d see an anchorman talking about me with photos of my dead sister up on the screen, or a shot of my parents’ anguished faces as they left the courtroom, or my high school photo. The other women in protective custody gave me curious looks, but no one talked to me. They just whispered in their little groups.
Two weeks later I was brought before the Supreme Court judge. My lawyer, Angus, argued that I wasn’t a flight risk, pointing to my parents, saying I didn’t have the means to run away, didn’t have a record. Though Angus was heavy, moved awkwardly, and sometimes seemed to drift off midsentence, he spoke so passionately and eloquently on my behalf I began to hope that maybe everything would be okay, that maybe we could win at trial.
I was granted bail, but I had to stay in the holding cell at the courthouse for a couple more days until my parents were approved as guarantors. Then I was brought before the judge again and had to agree to all the conditions. I’d have to meet with a bail supervisor weekly, continue to live at my parents’, not drink or do any drugs, have a curfew, hand over my passport, not leave the jurisdiction of the court—but the worst was that I wasn’t allowed to have any contact “directly or indirectly with co-accused except through legal counsel.” I started to cry when Angus explained later that it meant I couldn’t communicate with Ryan until we went to trial, cried even harder when he said it could take a couple of years to get a date. My only hope was that something would happen in the meantime. There would be a break in the case and we’d go free.
“Angus is the best,” my father said on the tense ride home from the bail hearing. “The best lawyer on the island.” He was saying it forcefully, like he was trying to convince himself. My mom glanced over, watching his face, then gazed back out the window. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. I saw her trace a small symbol in the condensation in the window and remembered how she and Nicole used to play tic-tac-toe on the windows when we went on road trips.
That night they came into my room after dinner. My dad was pale, and my mom looked like she’d been crying. Dad sat on my bed, Mom at my desk.
“Why do the police think you did it, Toni?” Her voice was anguished. “What did you do?”
“Nothing! Shauna and her friends, they lied and said they saw us fighting with Nicole. But it’s not true. I didn’t even see them out there.”
My dad was staring at me, like he was trying to look into my soul.
I met his eyes. “Dad, I swear we did not do this. I could never hurt Nicole like that. The way she died…” I was crying now, hating the look in their faces, the fear, wondering if their daughter was a killer. “The girls are lying. They hate me—I told you they were coming into the restaurant all the time.”
I could see him thinking it through, remembering. He sat back, looking relieved. “Then it will get cleared up. Angus, he’ll be able to sort this out.”