Tits for Tats

"Tats"

I look up at the lawyer. Mr. Stone.

"So Ms Johnson. Want to tell me about the events of last Monday?" he steeples his fingers in front of his face.

I shake my head not wanting to talk really. I'm still embarrassed as hell by all that's happened.

He nods.

"Okay well let me begin with saying I already know what you and your brother did. I'm not here to judge you for that. That's not my job. I'm here to make sure you and your brother don't go away to prison for a very long time. You're both looking at a class 'C' felony. In this state that means a minimum of two years. Given that you don't have a criminal record that would probably be what they give you. I may be able to get it suspended to probation time, maybe house arrest. Prison over crowding they will probably take that as a plea bargain. In your case."

I look up at him. My eyes hurt from all the crying I've done over the last few days.

"And Kevin?" I ask softly.

"Sara... May I call you Sara? Well for Kevin it's bad. He was out on parole so they will say he violated his parole and he will go back to serve his remaining time. That's ten years. Then he will probably get the max if the judge isn't feeling lenient. Given all the publicity your brother original trial had he really can't be seen to be lenient to a man who just violated parole. The max in this state for a class 'C' felony is twenty years."

My jaw drops and my breathing becomes a pant. No, Oh god no.

"Sara? Stay with me now. This is important and I can't have you breaking down. Okay. I need you to know and understand something. They have a videotape of the two of you...doing... it. There is no way I can get a jury to not convict Kevin and probably you as well. When a jury watches a videotape it's like they're watching CNN. They will believe everything they see. Kevin will be found guilty. You as well."

I feel the tears start to fall down my cheeks.

"However..."

I look up to him quickly. Clutching at hope.

"I have reviewed your brother's trial. I'm going to ask the judge to throw out the original sentence on the grounds of a miss trial."

"What?" I feel my pulse soar.

"Your brother should have never been convicted for murder. There are so many things wrong with his original trial it's criminal. To begin with it should have never been held where it was. His lawyer should have filed for a change of venue. There should have never been a trial in the same county where your father was a deacon of his church. There was no way the jury could have been unbiased. Then your brother's lawyer had him plead guilty. Why? All he needed to show was a history of abuse from your father and that case would have had enough holes in it to get started tearing it apart."

I sit up on the edge of my chair.

"I understand your fathers was whipping you when Kevin hit him with the bat...is this correct?"

"Yes."

"Would you by any chance have any scars from that or any beating before that?" he asks me tilting his head a little. His blue eyes glance down my body. I shiver when I feel that. Like his eyes touched me under my skin.

"Yes." I say in a whisper.

He gives a slow nod.

"Kevin's lawyer, this Mr. Faltwin? Should have tried for a charge of third degree manslaughter based on a history of parental abuse. Then he should have had you subpoenaed and your back photographed as evidence. You and Kevin both. I take it he has scars as well."

"Yes, but his' are under his tattoos now."

"I know. I've talked to my friend Mr. Tyler." He picks up a pen and starts to tap at his desk. "He told me about the dozens of criss crossing scars on your brother back."

"Mr. Tyler?"

"You know him as Ink." He puts down the pen and moves his hand to his shirt.

I watch at first with fear as the lawyer undoes three buttons of his shirt then with relief when he opened it to display the tattooing on his chest.

"If your brother lawyer had done his job right, those photos would have been the end of that trial. Kevin would have walked."

I stare at Mr. Stone.

My lip trembles.

"Why? Why didn't he?"

Mr. Stone sits for a second then leans down and opens his desk drawer. He pulls out a very old book. It looks familiar for some reason. Like I may have seen it before at some point in life. I realize as he opens it that it's a high school yearbook. I watch him flip though several pages. Then he slides it across the desk to me.

Looking down I see my Dad's picture. Next row up is a circled photo.

John Faltwin.

"Your brother's lawyer knew your dad. He never should have been your brother's lawyer. I think he went out of his way to get your brother convicted."

The tears dry up.

They evaporate under a fire of hate.

"Where is he?"

Mr. Stone gives a sigh.

"He passed away about two years ago. Heart attack. Otherwise I would have his ass on the stand so fast his head would spin past his disbarment."

I sit not knowing what to do, but wanting to scream. I finally choke back a ton of bile and look up at the man giving me hope.

"So can you? Get Kevin's original sentence dropped?" I ask softly not wanting to believe, but praying for the first time in a decade that it will happen.

"I have enough evidence to put the case into question. But I need more. That's why I need you to talk to me Sara. Anything you can tell me may be of help."

I slowly nod. I hesitate, then speak of what happen to me for the first time to anyone other than my old girl friend Alex. And Sam.

"I... I didn't know what my father was doing was wrong till one night I got up to go get a drink of water."

Mr. Stone starts taking notes after a few minutes.

"Ink?"

"Yea Mary?' I answer sticking my head around the corner of the wall. I see her standing by her desk with the phone held to her chest. As I watch she sits it down.

"Another one."

I want to spit. I nod to let her know I understand and go back to the autoclave.

Not that I really have a need for the tubes I'm sterilizing.

I don't have any customers.

I start the cycle then go back out to my station. I plop down and rub at the bridge of my nose. My glasses are making my head hurt.

"Who was it?" I ask not really wanting to hear the answer. I know who I had booked for today.

"Tiffany."

Wonderful. A thousand dollars out the fucking door. Her work plus the tip would have been at least that much.

I don't bother to look up when I hear the door open. I figure it's another reporter. Mary has her hands full keeping herself from strangling them without me helping.

"Welcome to Hell...Madison?"

Looking over I let my glasses drop from my forehead back down across my eyes. The stripper from Sara's club looks so out of place here. I can tell she's been crying.

"Mary...have you heard from Sara? I asked, but they wouldn't let me see her. Her lawyer is keeping her sequestered."

"Yea Madison... um we posted bail for her." Mary walks over to beside the taller girl.

"What do you need to talk with her about?" I ask getting up from my chair. "I know the lawyer. I can get you to see her if it's important."

I watch her look from me to Mary, then back. When she look back to Mary her face just falls apart and she pulls Mary to her.

"This is all my fault!"

It's several minutes before we can get her to speak coherently. When she tells us about her asking her brother's advice on incest I want to strangle her far more than I have the reporters.

Her brother.... the cop.

The smell is similar, but different. The bunks are harder. The sounds are similar. Maybe a bit more desperate. Less jaded down by long years.

I look up at the bars of my cell.

County lock up. Not the federal I was held at for a decade. Though I've been told I'm going to be moved there at anytime.

Welcome home.

"Kev?"

I look over at my cellmate. One of the four housed in this box of concrete.

"Yea?" I take a deep breath. "What you need Jeff?"

He sniffles. God he's young. Eighteen. Older than I was but maybe younger in ways.

"What's going to happen when they ship us to the prison?"

I hear a chuckle from underneath me before I can answer.

"You going to get your lily white ass fucked till you bleed that's what's going to happen."

I lean under the bunk and look at Curtis.

"Say one more fucking thing like that to him and I swear they will find that crack your muleing. If they have to dig deep enough to hit your teeth to find it."

"You don't talk to..."

"Any fucking time you want to jump you step up. They will find your head in the fucking toilet." I slide off the bunk and land silently by the bunk. The muscles in my arms flex. My bare chest puffs up and the dim lights make me look like a tatted demon. "Stop trying to fucking scare the boy. That's shit Curtis and you know it. Someone helped you out your first time in. Now be a better man than half those shits that he has waiting for him."

I stare him down for a second, then he slowly nods and turns over. I look over at our other cellmate. Tyson. He hasn't said a thing to anyone. He has the look of a second timer like Curtis and me. I give him a slow nod. He gives me one back. I kneel down by Jeff.

I can see the kid is scared. My eyes go to the cheap tribal work he's had done on one shoulder. Its quality is so poor my fingers itch to fix it.

"I'm not going to lie to you Jeff it's going to be tuff. There are things you don't know and that I can't teach you quickly. Who to talk to. Who not to. Where to step, where not too. Those things can get you killed. They will probably put you with a second timer. Someone doing short years. That helps. He won't do shit to get himself more time. Listen to him. Do what he says to do and he can keep you alive."

"Will it be you?"

I hear Curtis laugh behind me.

"Got you a boyfriend already Kev."

"Yea. You... if you open your mouth one more time tonight." My voice is cold as the showers in this place.

That's cause I mean what I'm saying.

Curtis knows it.

I look back to Jeff.

"I don't know. Probably not. I'm going back for a long stretch."

"What did you do?"

"I violated my parole." I swallow at the memory of how. Something that felt so wonderful, then went so badly wrong. "I'm looking at a decade plus Jeff. Not short time. If they send us to the same House I'll do what I can."

"Thanks."

I nod and go stand by the bars looking out at the cellblock. I can hear a soft whimper from down the row. I close my eyes to the sound I can't do anything about. At least I can keep it from happening in here.

Till I leave.

I tighten my fingers till they hurt on the cold metal bars. My time with Sara seems to be falling away like a dream.

I turn away as the whimpers get worse.

I catch a sight of a guard standing by the bars of a cell looking in.

Just watching it happen.

"All rise."

I stand up next to Mr. Stone. I tug down my blouse and straighten my skirt a bit then stop fidgeting. I watch the judge move without haste to his seat.

I look past Mr. Stone to the prosecutor. He's all but drooling. Near him I see a sketch artist working at a pad with frantic haste. I realize she's sketching me and try again to straighten my skirt.

"Easy Sara." Says Stone in a whisper.

Then the judge speaks.

"Bailiff bring in the second defendant."

The uniformed man goes to a door and opens it. When he says something inside I see it open all the way and two men with their hands resting on his arms bring Kevin into the courtroom. He is in shackles. And orange.

It's a familiar picture. All he needs is to be skinny and have a bulletproof vest on and it would match my memory perfectly.

I see the jury watching Kevin with a variety of looks. None are friendly. The guards lead my brother to the chair next to me.

They hook his chains to it.

Reaching over to him I take his hand, give it a squeeze. It's hard to let him go. It's the first time I've been near him in seven weeks.

He gives me a smile.

He looks back over his shoulder to Ink and Mary sitting behind us.

I see Ink's hand reach out next to Kevin's shoulder and give him a pat. I watch one of the guards walks over and give Ink a warning not to do that again.

We sit and listen then to the prosecutor give his opening statement. An hour-long diatribe of how Kevin is no better than the Menendez brothers. A cold-blooded murder who killed his father without an ounce of continence. I'm portrayed as his innocent pawn lured into a web of perverted sex, tattoos, and drug use. That I'm a bartended at a strip club is mentioned showing how I'm of low character. Mr. Stone told me this would happen so it doesn't come as a shock. When I'm accused of maybe selling more than alcohol I flinch and want to scream at the man. Mr. Stone's hand on mine calms me somewhat.

I watch the prosecutor go back to his chair.

"Mr. Stone if you would care to address the jury at this time.' Say the judge with a gesture.

Our lawyer gives a nod. He get to his feet and goes to stand in front of the Jury.

"Ladies and gentle men of the jury I come not before you today to plead the innocence of my clients. The prosecutor here will be soon presenting you with evidence that would make that a useless gesture. Instead I'm here to see an injustice be over turned. My client Mr. Johnson was convicted of the murder of his father when he was sixteen years old. He spent ten years of his life in federal prison for that crime. It's my intent to show that he was absolutely innocent of that crime and that a miscarriage of justice railroaded my client into prison. That's all I have to say for now, thank you for your patients with the prosecutor."

The judge sits up as he starts to move away from the jury.

"Mr. Stone would you please approach my bench."

I watch the judge and our lawyer talking for several minutes At first the judge is rather heated then I see a bit of doubt come into his face. He gestures for Stone to go back to his seat.

The judge sits quite for several seconds.

"I would like to see both councilors in my chambers." He gets up and picks up several papers from the desk in front of him. "All other remain here."

The two lawyers and the judge leave us to sit shaking with nerves for what feels like hours.

When they come back I can't read their expressions.

Mr. Stone sits down and leans in towards us.

"The judge is going to suspend the original sentence for now." He says softly.

"What does that mean?' Kevin asks.

"That there is a real good chance he'll declare it a miss trial and throw out your original conviction."

"So where still facing the incest charges then?" Kevin asks.

"Yes, but without the bias of your original sentence you'll get the minimum. Maybe." Stone gives a shrug. "Some of that depends on the jury. He's going to allow me to use some of the evidence I've gathered about the event of your first trial in your incest trial. I 'm going to try and show that your actions are a result of your upbringing and your time in prison." He turns to me. "And of your molestation Sara."

The prosecutor looks less like he's drooling and more think he's frothing at the mouth now. I watch with embarrassment as a large TV is brought into the room and the lights are dimmed. I close my eyes when it's turned on and the tape starts. I open them when I hear myself talking.

I can see it's camera footage of the tattoo shop. I watch as I strip out of my shirt and lay back on the table. I see my brother pull on his gloves and start his tattoo machine. I shiver when I hear the sound of the buzzing again. I feel my skin prickle and my nipples perk. I can't control the wetness that starts to develop as I watch myself being tattooed topless. I feel Kevin stir next to me.

The courtroom is silent as the tape plays it's way through the first ten minutes of Kevin's working on me. The prosecutor uses a remote to speed past the next hour. Pausing only to show the growing arousal I me. The long drawn out moans when Kevin's tattooing made me orgasm. The first of many.

I see a few of the jurors shift in their seat uncomfortable.

Then it happens. I come up off the table and grab my brother around the neck and pull him down to me. Our mouths joined in a hot embrace of passion. I claw at his shirt sending the buttons flying. His bare back with its dark tattoos in sharp contrast is soon visible.

I watch myself slide out my underwear with my face flushed with embarrassment. Kevin drops his pants and I pull him to me. I can hear myself begging him. Pleading with my brother to take me. To let me be his first. I see several of the jury shift I their seats and look over at us then. Kevin is looking down at the table and I've turned a bright red.

I have to turn away when I hear my cries rising to their crescendo. I now what's about to happen. I hear the harsh breathing of Kevin through the speakers as he cums inside me. I look up when I hear the voice of the police officer.

The voice that made my best day my worst.

I see the police swarm into the room. I see myself roll off the table as Kevin is dragged from me and driven into the tile floor. I cringe as I see how hard he is handled. The knee in the back of his head. The cuffs being put onto arms wrenched nearly to his shoulder blades.

I see the female officer cover me with a metallic blanket and get me to the back room and out of the camera. The prosecutor starts to fast forward again.

"Your honor I would like this to run at normal speed here if you please." Says Mr. Stone.

The prosecutor objects to this, but the judge over rules him.

I see myself half clothed and in handcuffs dragged back into camera then out the door. I'm screaming my brother's name the whole time. I see Kevin have his feet brought together and zip tied together. Then they are pulled to his ass and hooked to his cuffs.

"You honor I would like to point out at no point in this was my client resisting." say Mr. Stone.

"Your honor I would like to point out that this is footage of a know murder being arrested not a shop lifter!"

The judge sits silent for a second as the tape continues to play. He looks over to our table.

"So noted Mr. Stone."

The tape continues to play as Kevin is taken away. Then the officers start to gather up the evidence. One of them moves to Ink's computer and I see him pull up the camera footage.

"Your honor is there a point to Mr. Stone wanting to have more of this shown. The crime has clearly been committed. All we can see here is standard police work."

The judge looks at out table again. I feel his eyes on Kevin and me for a second. I see the disgust there.

"Mr. Stone?"

"What I'm looking for is right here your honor. I would hope this is not standard police work."

I stare in horror as the cops on the screen start to make jokes about the tape that they are watching. My ears, face, and hell even my toes turn red as I hear what they say.

The laughter and suggestions continue till I see Ink and a man in a blue jacket coming towards the door. The footage stops at that point.

"That was what I wanted the jury to see." Says Mr. Stone sitting up and arraigning the papers in front of him.

"Your honor I object. The arresting officers are not on trial for this crime."

"Well perhaps they should be brought up on charges." Says Mr. Stone standing up to face the prosecutor. "They clearly seemed to be enjoying watching a pornographic video tape of a couple committing a felonious sexual act."

"Counselors if you please. Sit down." The judge is pinching his nose. "Lights."

The main lights are turned back up and I see the jury again in the brighter lights. Some are looking at me like I'm sickening to behold. Others look uncomfortable.

The judge calls for a brief recess, and Kevin is led away. A bailiff takes me to a bathroom and brings me back. I know it's not to make sure I don't run but to keep the reporters away who are swarming the building like locust.