Here Comes Trouble

In the public defender’s waiting room, the welcome mat is torn. Paper and files erupt from boxes stacked against walls, which are covered in a chaotic collage of peeling wallpaper, framed art, and Star Wars posters. In one corner stands a life-sized cardboard cut-out of Bart Simpson. A yellow lei hangs beside a sign reading, “Hippie parking only, all others will be stoned.” 

The receptionist, a woman in her fifties with a sharp nose and frizzy hair, unburies something for me on her desk and smiles. “I work in layers,” she says.

My stomach churns.

Typically, February is chilly and wet in my small town in the Sierra Nevada foothills, even snowy. But this year, a severe drought persists, and outside the window I can see the sky, a cloudless blue with a warm sun. I’m wearing flip-flops. It’s as if the world is conspiring to bewilder me. 

I’ve never broken the law, not in any significant way. One speeding ticket, a few parking tickets. Sometimes I get bold and jaywalk. I like to follow rules and hate being in trouble, getting called out. I always respond to jury duty requests. I vote, pay taxes, don’t use drugs, don’t drink and drive. Yet, here I sit. Waiting. 

I’m waiting for my 14-year-old boy to meet with his public defender. Although I am legally responsible for him, his actions, and his court fees, I am not allowed into this confidential meeting. I feed the meter enough for one hour and twenty-three minutes.  One quarter and one dime. I hope that’s long enough.

Grant started smoking pot in the eighth grade. He started drinking that same year. Suddenly, the terrible twos seemed like the easy years. If only I could go back to the time when I could blame sleepless nights on my baby teething, not my growing boy sneaking out after dark. But time ticks on, and I’m here now, regularly lying awake at one a.m., wondering where my son is, and when he’ll come home.

How do we parents find out anything at all about our secretive, fiercely independent adolescents? I’ve come to trust the mysterious social network of parents who tip each other off, in hopes that the favor will be returned. One friend has a friend who overheard her daughter talking to friends in the kitchen about someone’s ex-boyfriend going to Gold Run Park to drop acid and take mushrooms. It’s possible, I was told, that my son might have been friends with this guy. I evaluated my friend’s suspicion, weighing whether to dismiss or add it to my list of worries.

One day later, Grant was arrested for possession of psilocybin mushrooms, a controlled substance. The arresting officer said the offense was serious and could be treated as a felony. Which is how I find myself here, in this chaotic waiting room, with no idea what is happening behind the public defender’s door. Will my son have to serve time, I wonder, or have a criminal record? Will this send him further down a path of addiction and lawlessness?

At 14, my boy’s voice has dropped an octave. He is six feet tall; his long hair falls in his face. He avoids all eye contact, shrinks from my touch, retreats to his room, and communicates with silence. What happened to the cuddly, affectionate boy with the golden hair, the pirate costume, the Harry Potter obsession, and the knock-knock jokes? My heart flops over as I recall his laughter and his little chubby hand in mine. 

After about 30 minutes, Grant emerges. I can’t read his face. In the car, on the way home, he tells me that his attorney will recommend drug treatment and probation. When I ask how he’s feeling, he turns away. “Fine, I guess.”

My chest feels heavy.

*  

The more experienced parents have been telling me not to worry. He’ll come back to you, they all say. 

I run into Grant’s second-grade teacher in the grocery store.  “How’s Grant doing? Does he still love to read?” she asks. 

I smile and sigh, remembering her sweet way with the kids, and how, throughout elementary school, my boy plowed through books, reading more than 300 pages a week. 

“He’s in ninth grade now. A teenager,” as if that explains it all.  “He’s not as interested in reading anymore. He does like music, though. He plays the guitar.”

She leans in. “And how are you?”

“I’m okay.” Her soft, wrinkled face radiates kindness, and my protective shell melts away. “I’m worried,” I tell her. “He’s so young and not making the best choices. I can’t seem to reach him.”

The smile leaves her face, and her forehead furrows in concern. “I remember when my boys were that age. It’s hard, but you’ll get through it. He’s always had wisdom beyond his years.” She reaches out and pats my arm. “My boys are 30 and 34 now. They have wives and jobs. They call me to say ‘hello.’” 

I appreciate the encouragement, but I know better. Not everyone gets a happy ending.  Experimental drinking can turn into alcoholism, drug use can slip into addiction. Accidents happen. Teenagers drown in the river, die in car accidents, commit suicide.  All I want to do is keep him safe. 

*

Grant’s court date is the first Thursday of March. “Do you have any collared shirts?” I ask that morning, filling a glass of water in the kitchen.  

Grant is at the counter, finishing a bowl of chips and salsa. He cried, but didn’t speak, when I brought him home after his arrest. Since then, his emotions and thoughts have remained a mystery.

 “I can wear my chorus uniform,” he says.

“No, that’s too formal.” It’s a white tux shirt, red bow tie, and cummerbund, with black slacks. He wears it when he sings with the men’s chorus at his high school concerts.

His lips tighten, and his eyes narrow in annoyance. “Why is it too formal? It looks nice. I won’t wear the tie or cummerbund.”

I take a sip of water and shake my head. “It will look funny. It’s the wrong kind of collar.”

“Really? The judge is going to look at my collar? That’s ridiculous. Why do they care what I wear anyway.” His voice has an edge now. 

I launch into an informational lecture (I’m sure he’s not listening) about the different types of dressy attire: formal for affairs like black-tie dinners, or chorus concerts, versus business formal, which is not a tux but a jacket, or just a nice shirt and tie, or on the more business casual end– – I hear myself starting to ramble.

“Fine, I’ll wear the other white shirt.” He walks into his room, shutting the door behind him. 

The other shirt is plain white, with a button-down collar and long sleeves. I wish he had an undershirt to wear. Maybe I should have bought him a tie. What will he wear with the white shirt? Clean jeans? The black tux pants?   

Near tears, I knock on his door. 

“What?”

I push the door open and stand quietly, bracing myself in the doorway, waiting for his anger to pass, waiting for the right words. He glances up from his bed, his shoulders slumped. He looks defeated. Instead of arguing and explaining, my voice softens. “I was just trying to help.”

He is wearing the formal black tux pants. He stands, puts on the shirt, and starts buttoning it from the bottom. “Help with what? I’m fine.”

“I want you to feel good about yourself and how you look when you sit in front of the judge.” I want to say more, to tell him he made me a mother, and I’m eternally grateful. I want to tell him I would sacrifice everything for him to be well. Please don’t destroy your life, I want to say. And, I love you to the moon and back, like we always told each other when he was little. But I don’t. 

Grant’s face has grown more angular over the past several months, and downy hair is visible on his upper lip. The bright voice of his childhood is now thick and deep. He tucks in his shirt and stands tall; his earlier look of defeat has vanished. “I feel great about myself,” he says.

I just stand and look at him, remembering. Once, when he was eight, he picked out a bright orange shirt at a discount clothing store. Across the front, large black letters spelled out “HERE COMES TROUBLE.” He liked to wear it with a pair of orange athletic shorts and an American flag bandana tied around his head, like a little representative from Planet Mischief.

I remember him just born, in my arms, the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen, his wide eyes focused on mine. A stranger I loved deeply and couldn’t wait to get to know, yet already knew more intimately than anyone I’d ever known. I wanted to be the best mother to him. The kind of mother he deserved. Where did I go wrong?

On the drive to the courthouse, I remind Grant to be respectful to the judge. “I will,” he says quietly. We wait our turn in silence in the stark, gray hallway, seated on one of the hard benches lining the walls, surrounded by murmuring parents, teenagers, and attorneys. It smells musty here, like a dishcloth left to mildew, and I find it hard to take a deep breath. 

I’m wearing a knee-length floral skirt and my favorite light blue sweater. Surreptitiously, I compare myself to the other mothers. One, carrying a folder and notepad, is dressed in professional attire, as if she’s just come from a corporate office. Perhaps I should have come more prepared, with a notebook of my own. A mom in sweatpants and dirty sneakers, with a resigned expression, looks like she hasn’t tried at all. Another woman, with missing teeth, chose too-tight dark slacks and a sweater that shows her generous cleavage. She points to her daughter, and I hear the exasperation in her voice as she tells her attorney, “I don’t know what to do with her anymore.” Maybe she’s as bewildered by her kid as I am by mine, but how could someone show up for court looking like that? Then I catch myself, ashamed to be judging these women harshly, just to make myself feel better.

The deputy calls Grant’s name, and we walk into the courtroom, with its imposing ceilings and ornate, dark furnishings. I smooth my skirt before sitting down and looking at the judge, a woman in her fifties. Perhaps she is a parent, too. Suddenly, I feel like I’m the one in trouble.  

My son has pulled his hair out of his face and into a ponytail for the first time in over a year. He sits up straight and answers the judge the way his attorney must have instructed him. “Yes, Your Honor,” and “No, Your Honor.” 

I watch the judge speak with my son, her expressions inscrutable. Is she concerned? Kind? Tired of seeing one law-breaking kid after another? I want her to peer into Grant’s eyes and recognize the goodness and potential that I see. I want her to teach him the lessons I have failed to impart and then give him a chance to redeem himself. So much pain and worry come with loving and raising a child. Does the judge know how hard it is to make peace with that? Does she know how helpless I feel at this moment?  Then from my seat off to the side, I turn my gaze to Grant, who is looking at the judge, his profile solemn. The winter sun shines in the courtroom window, illuminating his beautiful, troubled face.