Page 64 of Margo's Got Money Troubles

Jinx and Ward were going through Jinx’s phone call to Mark and exactly what threats were made, exactly what wording used. I couldn’t make myself listen or care.

“So basically,” Ward said, “you have to respond within thirty days using Form 220, and you have two options.” Ward flipped a paper toward us and pointed with his finger. “You can propose a custody split to counter his request for full custody—maybe he agrees, maybe not. The next option: you can request mediation, which means you both meet with a court-appointed mediator and try to hash it out. If you come to an agreement, great. If you can’t agree, that’s when it would go to court.”

“The thing is,” Jinx said, “we don’t think he’s serious. This is a guy with a wife and kids. You can’t tell me this is what his wife wants.”

“And that may be,” Ward said. “But in my experience people don’t go to the trouble of filing for custody unless they want custody.”

Jinx was nodding, thoughtful.

“I mean, one positive thing is, hey, at least he’ll be paying child support!” Ward said. His eyes were a weirdly bright blue, like the ocean on a classroom globe. “Can’t establish paternity without signing up for child support!”

I didn’t know how to explain that Mark’s money was newly useless to me.

“So you can settle this through forms, don’t need me for that,” Ward continued. “Or you can go to mediation. In that case, you would probably want to retain me so I can give you advice and help you prepare for mediation. I wouldn’t be present in the room, though, it would just be you and Dad. Right? Mediation can drag on for months, all sorts of things can go into it, and there’s things you can do to stack the deck in your favor.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“Like you can order a deposition. That means I get to sit down with Dad and a court stenographer and ask him as many questions as I want. Doesn’t even have to be related to the case. And if he lies, it’s perjury. I mean, it’s a little pricey, but I’d recommend it one hundred percent.”

“So what does the money side of all this look like?” Jinx asked. He was so good at this.

“Right,” Ward said, and launched into his fee structure and how much a deposition would be ($2k) and how much a trial might be (upward of $40k). It had not occurred to me the price could be that high. I knew lawyers were expensive; I just hadn’t imagined my entire bank account being emptied. One thing I knew: Mark’s pockets were deep. And if his intention was to hurt me, he could drag this out long enough to bankrupt me. I might wind up needing that child support after all.

“What do you think, honey?” Jinx asked.

I shrugged again. Was this guy a good lawyer? He seemed no more ridiculous than good old Larry. Maybe all lawyers were like this?

“Hey,” Ward said, and I looked up into his eyes. “This is the absolute hardest, scariest thing you’ll ever do.”

Fuck, he was gonna make me cry.

“It’s your kid. You know? It’s the greatest pain and the greatest love you’ve ever known. This is a bad situation where the other party seems to perhaps have malicious intent. If you feel overwhelmed, if you feel emotional, that’s only natural. My job, should you decide to retain me, is to be the one person in this who’s completely on your side. And that means telling you the truth, leveling with you, giving you the power to understand what’s going on. So I’m not just gonna tell you what you want to hear. Unless something powerful comes out in that deposition, there’s very little chance you come out of this with full custody and no visitation. Your one advantage here is that Bodhi is still very young, you are breastfeeding; judges would be sympathetic to you retaining physical custody on a temporary basis.”

One of Jinx’s hands landed on my back. Ward leaned over his desk, holding a box of tissues out to me. I took one and blew my nose.

“It’s gonna be all right,” Jinx said.

“It will. It really will, sweetheart,” Ward said. “You want a donut? I think there’s donuts in the conference room.”

Ward went to get me a donut, and Jinx raised his eyebrows, silently asking what I wanted to do.

I hesitated, then nodded. The donut had clinched it. Ward was hired.

Chapter Seventeen

In Mark’s course on narrative, I spoke during exactly one class period. It was the week we read Gogol’s “The Nose.”

“What exactly does this story have to do with narrative perspective?” Derek asked. “Isn’t it third-person omniscient?”

“That’s a good question,” Mark said. “What do you think?”

Mark had gestured to the class as a whole, but Derek responded as though Mark were talking only to him. “I just told you—it’s third person about some guy whose nose runs away.”

Mark nodded, as if conceding this was true. He was much more patient than I would have been. “Let me ask you,” he said, “when Gogol describes the nose walking around Saint Petersburg, what did you picture? Was it still nose-sized, scurrying around like a mouse? Was it the size of a person? How exactly was it capable of wearing an officer’s uniform?”

“I pictured a giant nose with legs,” a girl named Brittany said.

There were some murmurs of assent, people who pictured a giant nose; others had pictured a man who just was the nose while looking like a normal man, and some had pictured a man’s body with a giant nose for a head. Everyone had pictured the nose a different way, but no matter how they pictured it, Mark pointed out a place in the text that contradicted what they had imagined. If the nose was big, how could it be baked into a loaf of bread? If the nose was small, how could it wear an officer’s uniform or exit a tram car?

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