Guilty Or Innocent

“I didn’t kill Val!” I banged the bars to my jail cell again. The cop looked back and rolled her eyes. I wiped the tears from my eyes, and looked over at my cellmate. She had better not get any ideas about trying anything with me. Her beady black eyes kept staring at me, it made me uncomfortable. “What?”

“You killed the woman who was sleeping with your husband? I get it honey, I killed a bunch of tramps that my husband was paying to do things that I would have done for free,” Her voice had a soft southern accent to it. It was odd that she looked so pale, her jet black hair made her seem almost translucent, and evil but have a voice that seemed so innocent. “I shot most of them but some of them got a vase over the head, and one even got poisoned. That was my favorite because the bitch got pregnant and thought my husband was going to leave me. Ha!”

“Val is my husband’s name. Was my husband’s name, he was killed and instead of investigating and finding out who the real killer is, they decided to arrest me and throw me in here!” His body had been found in the hotel where we had honeymooned at. We couldn’t afford to go to a destination, so Val had surprised me with a room at one of the fancier hotels in town. “I don’t know what these cops are paid for; they never solve a crime around here. They just throw innocent people in jail.”

“My husband slept with a man once. I found out and killed him. The D.A. says that I’m a serial killer and dangerous. I say that all of these people deserved it; you know the bible says that you can pop out someone’s eye if they do the same to you. Every one of those people who slept with my husband killed me, just in a different way.” I was trying to tune her out but her voice kept drawing me back in. I let out a sigh and closed my eyes. “Don’t judge me! I’m not gonna pop out one of your eyes or anything. I might ask about your hair care though, your hair is fabulous.”

“Can we just sit in silence please? I need to think and figure out how the hell I am going to prove that I am innocent without any help from anyone. I don’t have the money for an attorney; all of my money has to go to burying my poor Val.” I couldn’t hold back the tears any longer and let them just fall down my face. It’s funny how in the span of just a few hours your life can go from being perfect to being in the dumps.

“Why don’t you tell me more about your husband, like what did he look like? How long were you married? How many times did he cheat on you?” She moved over to my bunk and put her arm around me. It was hard to be mad at her because it was obvious that her heart was in the right place. “Shoot where are my manners? I should introduce myself before asking those questions. My name is Dick, my parents were so sure that they were having a boy that they named me after male genitalia.”

“Your parents named you Dick? Here I have been angry at my parents for naming my Elizabeth! I guess I had it easy. Val always said that I never appreciated how easy my life was, he was right. After 5 years of marriage I still expected everything to be handed to me. He did his best but it was never enough for me. Nothing is ever good enough for me.” I buried my face in my new friend’s shoulder and sobbed. As more tears fell from my eyes, I felt cleansed. “Val never cheated on me, he loved me. He was a good man, he never pressured me for sex, he was never that interested in it. But that wasn’t good enough for me.”

“Oh Lizzie, every man is interested in sex. If he says he isn’t then he is either getting it from some other woman or he’s gay. I know that sounds harsh but you need some harsh truth right now.” The palm of my hand met her left cheek and we looked at each other for what seemed like hours. I expected her to attack me, beat me up but she didn’t. Instead she laughed. “We’re just like the famous Liz and Dick. It seems like fate wanted us to meet! I think we should be BFFs.”

“Well since we will be spending a lot of time together, I can’t see why we wouldn’t be friends. There is no way for me to prove that I wasn’t near the hotel, even though I wasn’t.” I slumped back against the wall. Dick continued to rub my shoulder and began humming under her breath. “I don’t know how this happened. Val and I had a great marriage, I know that he was trying to surprise me with a romantic anniversary present. I just don’t know who would want him dead, I don’t know why anyone would kill him.”

“I caught my husband in a hotel. Now he’s worm food and I’m sitting in this cell. The cops were all like, ‘you can’t go around killing people.’ I was like if my husband is going to mess around then I am going to kill people. It’s only fair if you ask me.” Somehow her logic began making sense to me. In that moment I knew that when the time for my trial came up I would be using an insanity defense. “Now I know that you might believe me but every time I use that in court, the judge looks at me and sighs. Then he adjourns the case, I go see a special man in white and then I’m released again.”

“That’s not going to work for me. The cops have already determined that I am guilty all because they found one text message from me yelling at Val.” I stood up and paced around the cell. I was mad at him for being late and accused him of cheating. “The message said something like ‘I can’t believe you’re messing around on me.’ One of the cops said that it had a threatening undertone to it.”

“See you thought that he was cheating on you. Why did you try to convince me that you didn’t think that he was cheating? All men are pigs. We both know that, yet instead of trading hot dogs for tacos, we keep searching for the right hot dog!” Her metaphor was simple and yet confused me. How did we go from talking about Val cheating on me to searching for the right hot dog? “Don’t look so confused honey, your man wasn’t interested in your wares, he wanted the same equipment that he has. Trust me when I tell you that your man was getting it from somewhere else. I know that it hurts, especially the first time that he cheats on you. The first time that my husband slept with someone else I almost didn’t kill her.” I walked over to the bars and rested my head on them; I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Dick was so convinced that no man could be faithful that she was trying to make it seem like Val was cheating on me. I knew that he would never do that to me; he abhorred even looking at other women, and only did it to fit in with the other guys. “Lizzie I know that this is hard to hear but every woman has to deal with it at some point. It’s better to face it now than later. You know, I now understand that movie about the murderesses. You know the one where they’re always singing about being jail? What’s her face is in it... you know who I’m talking about!”

“Chicago. The movie you are thinking about is Chicago, a story about a woman who cheats on her husband and kills her lover. Another woman killed her husband and her sister for sleeping together when she went to get ice.” I pinched the bridge of my nose and again wonder how in the world things had fallen as far as they had. How could anyone think that I would hurt my poor husband, I loved him. “I really don’t get what that has to do with me! My husband was murdered at the Royal Heaven Inn, and I have been arrested for his murder! I would never kill anyone, let alone the man that I love!”

“Where did you say he was?” Dick’s voice was shaken, her skin seemed to pale even more. She pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged them tightly. Her reaction seemed strange to me, why in the world would this woman suddenly seem so scared. “What was the name of the hotel? Please tell me that I misheard you.”

“He was setting up our anniversary getaway at the Royal Heaven Inn. It was where we spent our honeymoon.” I could still feel the way he held me in his arms and kissed me on our wedding night. Everything was perfect. A smile crept up on my face as I remembered it. “Someone killed him in cold blood and set me up.”

“Oh My God! What did he look like? Don’t give me any of the other bullshit either, just tell me what your husband looked like.” Her voice was tense, wrinkles formed around her eyes.

“He had dark blond hair, he worked out 4 to 5 times a week, so he had a very nice body. He wore khaki’s and a polo to work every day. He always looked so nice, he took very good care of himself. He just got his haircut.” It’s funny how after someone dies, you think about things that they will never do again. Like Val cutting his hair, or going to the gym with his buddy who came over when I was going to be out of town, so that Val wouldn’t be alone. “He liked his hair to be spiky, he had more hair product in the bathroom than I did.”

“Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God.” Dick moved off of my bunk and went to hers. She avoided looking at me, and flinched when I tried to grab her. She took in a couple of deep breaths then looked at me. “I killed your husband. He was the man that I caught mine sleeping with. They were in the Honeymoon Suite, and going at it like rabbits. I shot three or four warning shots into my husband, and then Val was all like ‘you killed him you stupid bitch.’ I yelled back that he was next and shot him too. Afterwards I dragged my husband out of the room and got caught. I claimed that I shot him in the parking lot and dragged him into the hotel, then told the cops that I heard another shot fired and seen a woman with dark brown hair running away from the room. They must have figured that it was you. I am so sorry Lizzie, I would never have lied if I had known that they would arrest you right away.”

“What?” There was no way what I was hearing was true. I went to yell at her but blackness creeped in around me, and before I knew it, that’s all there was. When I woke up, Dick had confessed all to the cops and I was released.

What no one knew was that I had committed murder that day, I had run the woman I thought Val was sleeping with over and over with my car.