“In your opinion, why did she keep it as a secret? Was she afraid of the defendant?”
“Objection, Your Honor, irrelevant!” the defense lawyer protested.
“Objection sustained,” the judge said.
The prosecutor turned and faced the jury. “Now, Ms. Shao, how would you describe the deceased?”
“She was the most generous, warm-hearted woman I’ve ever met,” she said. The dear girl even taught her how to save money while job-hunting.
She knew from the beginning that she needed a full-time job—a job that could provide her and her son health insurance. She could go on without it, but she didn’t want to take chances with her young son. Since she couldn’t speak English properly, she had very limited choices. She could never be a receptionist who had to talk on the phones. She could never be a word processor because she could only type with her two index fingers, and she could never be a science teacher because she wouldn’t be able to obtain a teaching certificate.
After more than a few months’ rigorous and continuous job searching, as soon as she was able to obtain a work permit, she finally landed an interview for a clerk position in a big insurance company.
Desperately wanting the job, Shao Mei bought a how-to-interview book and read it from cover to cover. She even went to Filene’s Basement, the most famous discount store in Boston, to buy a proper outfit. The jacket was perfectly cut, and the skirt was nicely fit. She was so gorgeous in the suit that she had to buy a pair of shoes to match it. She had never, ever spent so much money on one outfit. Shao Mei was nearly suffocated when she tried to swallow the price at the cashier counter.
“Can you believe it?” she complained to Yi-yun. “I spent almost two hundred dollars on my interview outfit! What if I don’t get the job? I’ll never have the chance to wear them again. What a waste! Two hundred bucks! That’s more than one month of our grocery money.”
“Keep the receipt,” Yi-yun said. “Maybe you can return them later. I heard about a guy who went to an interview in a suit that had a price tag on it. During the interview, however, the tag loosened and—”
“Did he get the job?” Shao Mei asked eagerly, interrupting Yi-yun in the middle of her sentence.
“I don’t know,” she said. “It’s a joke.”
“But it’s definitely a good idea,” Shao Mei said with a nod to herself. “Maybe I should give the tag a few stitches so nobody would see it. After the interview, I can return the suit.”
“Are you serious?” Yi-yun looked at her incredulously.
“Yes, I’m deadly serious,” Shao Mei said determinedly. “I just can’t waste that amount of money on clothes and shoes!”
“What if you have to go for another interview? What if the process is longer than the return period?” she asked.
“I’ll return it first, then get another suit at a different store when I need it. As long as I keep the price tag, it’s returnable, right?”
“Right,” Yi-yun said, couldn’t stop chuckling, “but this is crazy, Shao Mei.”
“I thought you told me the story on purpose,” Shao Mei said with a straight face and then a flashy grin.
“Yes, I did, but I didn’t expect you would do it,” Yi-yun said sheepishly.
“What kind of job are you holding right now?” the defense lawyer came up to her and asked. It was the cross-exam that the prosecutor had warned her about.
“Mailroom clerk at John Hancock,” Shao Mei said calmly.
“So a professor at a famous university becomes a mailroom clerk,” the lawyer smirked.
“I consider living on my own, without taking a handout, is the honest and right way to live. It is better than sitting at home and eating off government and tax payers,” she replied defiantly, glaring at the defense lawyer, a young man who was not much older than her students in China.
The smirk disappeared. “Is it true that the deceased married her ex-husband for the green card?” he asked now with a straight face.
“It’s not true!” she said angrily. “That marriage was based on love.”
“But she walked out of this loving marriage only a few months after she got her green card,” he said sarcastically. “Is this correct?”
“That’s because the defendant—”
“Yes or no,” he cut her off curtly in the middle of the sentence.
She lowered her head and murmured yes.
“Do you know their divorce cited irreconcilable differences?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t think so,” she said rebelliously.
“We have the court papers here. In fact, the deceased was a woman who liked to attach herself to whoever was useful to her at the time.”
“Objection!” The prosecutor was quick on his feet.
But Shao Mei already shouted at the lawyer. “It’s totally false!” She was so mad she forgot she was on the witness stand in a courtroom. “You don’t even know her!”
The young lawyer stepped away and faced the jury. “You do know the defendant has won one of the most prestigious music awards in the world, is that correct?” he asked and then turned and looked at her.
“Yes,” she said reluctantly.
“You also know that he signed a contract with the Boston Symphony, which pays him a six-figure annual salary?”
The defense lawyer led Shao Mei to confirm all the accounts that showed Tom Meyers a fine gentleman and Yi-yun a greedy bitch who had huge character flaws. Shao Mei was seething when she was finally allowed to leave the witness stand. Poor Yi-yun, who got murdered not only once but twice—first by her boyfriend, then by his defense lawyer who twisted the facts in the way that the nicest girl on earth now became a selfish, self-centered monster.
The defense lawyer had a field day with Fang Chen as well.
“You have to look at the evidences presented in this courtroom carefully,” the defense lawyer addressed the jury in his closing argument. “Yes, Yi-yun Lin was killed in her own apartment. But there was no eyewitness. It could be one of those men she had taken advantage of in the past, or it could be her ex-husband who has admitted he threatened to kill the defendant and wanted to kill the deceased when he found out they committed adultery. There is no murder weapon. The police told us the deceased was killed by a bullet from a .22 caliber handgun, but how many of those handguns are out there, maybe a thousand? Anyone can get hold of a gun these days. As for motive, what motive does this defendant have? He is a talented musician, has a great job, and he loved his girlfriend. As their upstairs neighbor testified, before he left for his tour, he made love to her. Do you think a man in this state of mind and in his position would kill? There is not a thread of real evidence in this case other than a circumstantial one. Now this innocent young man’s life is in your hands. If you can’t prove him guilty beyond any reasonable doubt for a second-degree murder, you have to set him free.”
This was absolutely madness! Shao Mei was beside herself. Tom Meyers having sex with Yi-yun the night before was not because he loved her; it was because he was a pervert who treated her like a sex slave. Everyone could get the picture if they only listened to what Ms. White had to say. Who were the men out there Yi-yun had taken advantage of? There was nobody! The ex-husband indeed! Fang Chen was the most honorable and trustworthy person she had ever met. How would the defense lawyer explain Tom Meyers’ missing handgun? Where was it, and who took it other than the owner himself? And what motive did they need? It’s all there. Because he was getting rich and famous, he didn’t need Yi-yun anymore, and he didn’t want the baby, so he killed them both.
She wanted to shake those men and women sitting in the jury box to make them see her points. Unfortunately, she could do nothing but glare at them, hoping they could see through the game the defense lawyer had been playing and return with a guilty verdict.
In his offic
e, Paul Winderman was looking at the records he got from the payphone company in town. The two payphones within walking distance from Yi-yun Lin’s apartment had generated a dozen or so outgoing calls the days before and after her death. Using a pen, he carefully struck through the numbers of recipients that were out of state, eventually there were only three to four local phone numbers left on the call-lists.
He checked each of them and came up with a hospital, a couple of private homes and a school in the city as the recipients of the outgoing calls. Like a cat spotting a mouse, his eyes lit up when he noticed the name of the school. He grabbed his jacket and headed to the door. He wanted to get a comprehensive list of extensions and the phone records from the school. It could be the breakthrough he had been looking for.
Chapter 16
Yi-yun was dumbfounded when Tom turned her down brutally. “No,” he said, eyeing her expanded waistline with disgust. “Do you think I will give up my career simply because you’re pregnant?” He had just made love to her, and they were lying naked next to each other.
She was staring at him, shocked to her core. “Why would you have to give up your career if you marry me?” she asked, feeling the cold sweat tripping down her spine.
“Because I would be disturbed by you and your baby when I’m playing,” he said coolly without irony.
She felt so cold that she started shaking uncontrollably. She had thought she was important to him; she had thought she was his love, his backbone, even his bank account before he had his competition. But apparently, he didn’t think so.
It had been a week since she found and talked to an immigration lawyer. The lawyer told her she should be able to keep her legal status because the US government had recently granted everyone from mainland China a permanent residency if he or she came to the United States before 1990 in response to the Tiananmen massacre, which made the country unsafe for its expatriates to return. But she would have to reapply under the new law because her original application was based on her marriage and what she had in hand was a temporary green card, which could raise legal issues if she had been divorced. A couple of thousand dollars for the new application and legal fee should be sufficient, the lawyer said.
To avoid the legal fees, he said, knowing she was living with her boyfriend, she should marry again. As the wife of an American citizen, she would be out of trouble for free. Besides, she really wanted to keep the baby who was the result of their everlasting love. She knew Tom would like to wait for a few years, but she thought she could make it work by moving out and getting herself a separate apartment with the baby—there were two studio apartments available in the building as Ms. White told her the day before.
“You won’t be disturbed,” she told him. “We can live separately in the same building.”
“What?” Tom was horrified after she explained. “Are you crazy? I can’t let you do that!” He looked at her incredulously as if she had asked for his dear life.
“Why?” She was so angry that she started shouting at him.
He was taken aback by her voice. “Because I’m not ready,” he said in a sullen voice while picking up his clothes.
“What did you mean that you’re not ready?” Yi-yun got up and ran after him, still naked. “We’ve been living together for quite a while now.”
“Living together doesn’t mean I’m ready for a marriage,” he replied dryly, without looking at her. “I’d been living with several girls before, and I’m still single!”
“But we are different,” Yi-yun was furious. She divorced Fang Chen so she could be with him, she gave up her comfortable life so she could help him financially, and she devoted her time so he could pursue his career carefree. “I’ve been sacrificing my life for you, and I need the marriage right now!”
“I appreciate your support, honestly,” he said rather unenthusiastically. “But—”
“Do you love me?” she interrupted him and pulled him back to face her.
“Yes, I do,” he said impatiently, trying to get free from her grip. His beautiful forehead was covered with dark clouds. “I love you, but I’m not ready to marry you.”
“What do you want me to do then?” she demanded. “If I don’t get married, I’ll have to pay several thousand dollars for legal fees and might have to go back to school full-time.”
“Why don’t you go back to school full-time?” Tom asked irritatingly. “Then you can get a professional job.” He turned away and murmured under his breath, “For Christ’s sake!”
“Yeah, who’s going to pay for my tuition?” she snapped. His cold reaction made her boil inside. Not long ago, he himself had to work several jobs to make ends meet. Had he already forgotten how difficult it was?
“You are,” he retorted without blinking his eyes. “If you worked full time, you’d make more than enough to handle tuitions and fees.”
“I can’t work full time as well as study full time! I only have twenty-four hours a day. If you’ve forgotten, I’m also pregnant!” She was so enraged that she screamed at the top of her lungs.
“Oh my God, here it comes again,” Tom groaned, pulling his hairs in frustration. “I’ve told you a hundred times already that you can’t have it!” He grabbed her arms and shook her madly. “You have to give it up! I can’t have a kid right now, I’m telling you! I won’t allow it!”
She started crying. “Oh, Tom, it’s your child too!”
He let go of her. “Yes, it’s mine,” Tom said dejectedly. “It’s my fault. We should’ve been more careful. But, Yi-yun, we’re both too young to have a child right now. You’re not even twenty-four!” He went to their bedroom and came back with his wallet. “Here, I will pay for the abortion.”
He could see the tears, then the fire in her eyes. “No, I’m not going to,” she said, refusing to accept his money. “It’s our kid, and I want to keep it.”
“I’m not going to let you ruin my career! I’ve been working too long for it, and you can be damn sure I won’t let you ruin it!” he hissed, mad with rage.
She glared at him as if she had never seen him before. Here was the man she loved. For him, she had thrown away everything she’d ever wanted—a loving husband, a comfortable home, and a bright future. What did she get from him in return? Nothing! Somehow, he had managed never even to inconvenience himself once for her!
At that moment, she knew for sure that Tom Meyers had never loved her. He chased her only because he needed her. He was always self-centered even when he was poor and struggling. Hadn’t he been telling her all along that the only thing that mattered in his life was his piano? How could she be so blind and naive? If she had known, she would have stayed in her marriage and with Fang Chen who loved her and would have done anything to protect her.
“Please, Yi-yun, can we wait? If you could only give me a few more years,” Tom was holding his wallet, pleading with her.
But she didn’t hear him. Her mind had strayed so far away that she didn’t even notice Tom had gone into their bedroom and closed the door.
The next morning, Tom was gone when Yi-yun woke up. On the kitchen table, he left her a note, saying he was on his way to the summer tour, which Yi-yun had totally forgotten due to her pressing issues.
She sat on her bed, sobbing bitterly. The sudden anger and agony was inflated by the fact that he had simply left her without trying to resolve their differences. A full month! What would she become after another month? She would be six months pregnant with no prospect for marriage!
What a mess! In fact, she couldn’t blame anyone for the mess she was in because she should have known. Tom Meyers was in love with his piano, which was his life, his lover, and his child. He also loved sex, but he could have sex without commitment to a marriage. She was just one of the women he had used in his grand scheme to become successful. Stupid of her, she didn’t walk away like all of his other girlfriends
did, so she got hurt.
Her heart wrenched with pain when she remembered the life she had left behind almost a year ago. Even though Fang Chen was the culprit for her current legal problems, she could never blame him. Why shouldn’t he be mad since she treated him so badly and betrayed him so heartlessly? Remembered how much he had wanted a child? He would cry with joy if he knew she was pregnant with his child.
Oh, poor Fang Chen! If only she knew, she would’ve never left him!
It was too late now. She had thrown everything away because she had fallen in love, yet the love brought her nothing but miseries. What was her future? There would be no husband, no money but an unwanted child. How much worse could it be?
She bit her lips to prevent a scream when she thought of the dream that she used to have. A big house and a beautiful yard, a college degree, and a rich husband—for a short while, she did make it a reality.
“A dream is only a dream,” her mother said to her when she found out her daughter was heading to America, the remote country where people spoke different languages and had different skin colors. “When you wake up, it is your home you’ll miss.” It was a sad day; her mother almost cried her eyes out. “Please don’t go,” she begged.
“Mama,” Yi-yun said impatiently. “I have to go.” She had wanted it for so long that she wouldn’t give it up for her mother or for anyone else.
“Why?” Poor mother, she could never understand why her child had a dream.
“It’s because I want to live a better life than you do.” For almost twenty years, her life in China had been anything but exciting. Before she read that fateful magazine, which opened her eyes to a totally different world, she could only foresee herself being old and worn out just like her parents, having no prospects, no fun, and living in the same city where they were born. No, she would not live like them. She wanted to live differently. She wanted to see the world and enjoy life while she could.