Simultaneously, both Megan and Kalli grabbed one of my hands with theirs.
“Breathe, Fella,” Megan whispered in my ear. “We’re right here. We’ve got you.”
I nodded, my eyes glued to the floor beneath my primly crossed ankles.
After that, everything happened quickly. The doors were closed, the bailiff entered, the judge came in, and then Jason Ramie entered the courtroom. He had been kept in a separate room, still in custody of the Portland Police, and was hand cuffed when he entered. I forced myself to look at him and was pleased when the sight of him didn’t send me into a tailspin of emotion. It made me nervous when they took his handcuffs off, but I was calmed slightly by the fact that the police officer was never more than three steps from him.
I noticed the couple sitting behind him, who earlier seemed out of place, now looked desperate to touch him. There was compassion in their eyes, love. I figured they must be his parents. Suddenly I felt a new and unusual emotion towards Jason Ramie. I felt sorry for him. I felt sadness for him. Somewhere along the line of his life, he had made some really terrible decisions and enormously cold-hearted mistakes, but he was once someone’s little boy. The people behind him, his parents, looked broken.
Ugh. Unconditional love came with the highest of highs and the deepest, darkest, coldest, valleys of lows.
I tried hard to pay close attention to the proceedings, but my heartbeat was racing and my mind kept flittering to Porter and Mattie. Both the prosecution and defense teams gave their opening statements—short and sweet introductions as to how they were going to prove the other totally and completely wrong. There was lots of talk of alibis, testimonies, firearm ballistics, medical mistreatment, and circumstantial evidence.
After about an hour of listening to Detective Dillard talk about the bullet pulled from my shoulder and how it had matched the ballistic fingerprints from bullets fired from the gun found on Jason Ramie’s person at the time of his arrest, Mr. Donaldson addressed the judge and called his next witness: me.
As far as I could tell, Mattie was possibly the easiest baby to take care of in the history of newborns. The morning passed calmly enough. No real crying or issues, and Mattie did well too. We were both torn up with concern about Ella and missed her terribly. Well, I might have noticed her absence more than the baby, but we’d never tell Ella that.
I was able to feed her a bottle and even though I loved every moment, every tiny little whimpering gulping sound Mattie made as she drank her bottle and gazed into my eyes, I told her not to get used to it and that Mommy would be back soon enough and these bottles would be long gone. Mattie’s eyes drifted closed in what I took to understand as compliance.
Ella’s parents showed up mid-morning letting me know Megan and Kalli were with Ella and that gave me some relief from the tension I had felt all morning. Guilt was weaving its way into my mind and taking root, but I tried to remind myself frequently that Ella was strong and could handle this on her own. Plus, I couldn’t exactly promise myself that had I been in the same room with Jason Ramie he’d make it out of his own trial with his life.
Yes. It was better that I was here, calmly holding my daughter and just looking at her. She was beautiful, truly adorable. No one ever told me that when babies yawn, your whole heart sort of puddles around your feet. They yawn and stretch, arch their backs, and their tiny little bottoms push out making the whole thing too cute to stand. I watched her, enraptured by every wiggle, every sound, and every gurgle. I was interrupted when the door to her room opened and Dr. Edwards came in with more doctors in white coats flanking her sides.
“Hello, Mr. Masters. We’ve had a bit of juggling with schedules and procedures lately and it looks as though we’ll be able to get Mattie in for her PICC line sooner than we had thought.”
“Oh?” I asked, standing and placing Mattie in the crib.
“Yes. Is your wife here this morning?”
“No. She had to be at a trial this morning. She’s downtown.”
“Oh, well, that was probably difficult for her, but also good that she got out of this room. She’s been so attentive, but one can only take so much confinement.” Dr. Edwards gave me a smile that showed admiration.
“She’s pretty stubborn,” was all I could say as I laughed my reply.
“Well, be that as it may, she’s done an excellent job.” She looked over at Mattie. “We’re going to take her now, if that’s ok with you, and she should be back in about forty five minutes.”
“Now?”
“Yes. We’re ready for her.”
“And I can’t go with her?”
“Unfortunately, no. This isn’t an invasive procedure, but it is important that it is done in a controlled environment. We will be using ultrasound machines to watch the catheter in her veins to make sure we get it placed correctly.”