Chapter 11: The Key

The hearing room was small and beige, with a flag in the corner and a clock that ticked too loudly.

Inez sat at the front table in a navy suit with her lawyer and the family doctor.

Tristram sat one row behind her.

He did not look at me when I came in.

Bridget and Ethan took the bench at the back.

I had no lawyer, because I had spent a day trying to find one who could see me by nine.

The judge was a gray-haired woman with reading glasses on her head.

"Mrs. Nordin, you're entitled to counsel. Do you wish to continue without?"

"Yes, Your Honor."

"Then let's hear the petitioner."

Inez's lawyer stood and read for ten minutes.

He said I suffered from delusions, and that my family had documented them in a book kept over five years.

He said I had suffered an episode on my anniversary, and that the video showed my condition.

He asked the court to place my affairs in my husband's hands.

The family doctor took the stand and said that, in his opinion, I believed my family was poisoning me.

"Is there evidence she's wrong?" the judge asked.

"The ledger records ninety-nine claims that proved false."

"Where is this ledger?"

The lawyer looked around.

I stood up.

"I have it, Your Honor."

I carried the black book to the bench and set it down in front of her.

"Mrs. Nordin, that's your family's exhibit."

Keep reading free with an account. Start He Called Every Truth a Lie from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.