Fireflies and Magnolias (9 page)

“If you’re sure,” Amelia Ann said with a mischievous smile. “Leave him to me.”

Her response made Susannah wonder if her friend had more than a professional interest in Clayton. In fact, she acted like the interest was decidedly personal.

Look out
,
Clayton
, she thought. Amelia Ann was not a woman to be denied.

They stayed a while longer, drinking their beverages and chatting, until they both eyed the clock. After gathering their things, they walked out into the sunshine. Susannah had a few more meetings in the afternoon, but this break had been a welcome respite.

“We should get together more often,” she hinted. “Other than Sundays.”

“I know. I’ll see what I can do. As I said, I don’t have much free time right now.”

And yet she’d said her second year of law school was easier than the first. Well, she hadn’t seen much of J.P. while he was in law school either.

“And if you think you can handle my sisters whining about you and me getting to see Jake Lassiter—not that I’ve seen him yet…”

“Me either. But when we do meet him, I think we should take a picture with him and send it to them.”

She gave a bark of laughter. “They’d be pea green with envy. I love the idea! Anyway, we should have a girl’s night out. Maybe J.P. can take care of the kids so Tammy can come too.”

“That would be nice. Between the kids, J.P., and her new business, she’s been so busy lately…” She winced. “Not that I don’t love your brother. I adore him, and I’m so happy for them.”

Susannah put a hand on her arm. “No, I totally get it. I haven’t seen much of my brother either. I mean we get together a lot as a family—”

“But it’s different.”

They hugged and walked off to their respective cars. When Susannah settled into her seat, she pulled the little girl’s drawing out of her purse and studied it. It was a family. Even at her young age, Frannie knew what mattered most.

Just like she did.

The Community Legal Clinic sat on the corner of Hell and Purgatory, Amelia Ann was fond of telling herself. The sidewalk almost seemed to know it—the cement cracks twined their way up to the front walkway before trailing off. Every day, a community volunteer swept the front of the building of the garbage and dust that were constantly blowing down these East Nashville streets. Their windows were always clean and sparkling, while the others in the neighborhood were filmy with dirt or boarded up with plywood or cardboard. The crumbling brick buildings surrounding theirs were coated in spray painted slurs and profanity.

The first time she’d come here, five weeks ago, Amelia Ann had been scared to death. And determined.

Mrs. Augusta would have fainted if she’d seen the rough neighborhood where Amelia Ann Hollins was spending her days. No Southern belle would have been caught dead in it.

Then again, Amelia Ann wasn’t a Southern belle anymore.

* * *

She’d stuck out like a sore thumb that first day in this neighborhood filled with gangs, homeless folks, and teenage girls and aging women hooking on the dirty streets. When she parked her BMW convertible in front of the building, she felt like she was issuing an invitation for it to be stolen or boosted. Still, she somehow forced herself to follow the cracked cement path to and through the door, then check in at a busy reception desk jammed with tense and edgy people, mostly women and kids. The harried receptionist pointed her toward the right desk.

The lawyers stared at her like she was some foreign creature. Some were on the phone. Others were talking to women, some of whom were crying or staring into their laps. Older kids were running in between the desks like it was an obstacle course, while a couple babies drooled on their mama’s shoulders, plain tuckered out.

Felicia Towers, the head attorney of the clinic, took one look at her and dismissed her outright. The woman was in her fifties and had short, dark hair and a petite frame, but she carried herself like a warrior of justice. Amelia Ann squared her shoulders and held eye contact with the woman as she walked over to her messy, overcrowded desk and took a seat in the faded upholstered chair in front of it.

“You’re the Vandy student I talked to who wants to volunteer?” Felicia asked, her sharp gaze running over Amelia Ann’s navy designer suit and tan Coach purse. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I don’t think you’re a good fit for us.”

So they were going to dispense with the pleasantries. “You’re wrong,” she fired back. “I wanted to make a good impression today, so I wore what I would normally wear to an interview. I wasn’t aware of the dress code, but I don’t make the same mistakes twice.”

“Dressing down in this neighborhood won’t help you much,” the woman continued, tapping her unpainted nails on her desk. “I need someone who has some street sense, and no offense, but that’s not you.”

Amelia Ann had been told she looked and smelled like she was from money all her life, and she was. That she couldn’t change. But she wouldn’t let anyone underestimate her because of her appearance.

“Anyone can come in here wearing cheaper clothes and less makeup. You won’t find a student volunteer more committed than I am or one who knows the law better. You’re the best attorney for domestic violence in the city, and I want to work with you. Don’t make the mistake of thinking I’m just some pretty-face law student. I’m not.”

“This isn’t Kelly, Prentice & Stacks,” Felicia said, her expression still giving nothing away.

Asking her old boss for a reference had been a risk, but she hoped he’d keep his word about not telling her family.

Amelia Ann let her lips curve into a small smile and went for sarcasm, something her gut told her would impress the woman. “You mean I plugged the right address into my GPS all by myself?”

The woman’s mouth twitched. “Your posture is finishing-school straight.”

“I can hunch over like an old woman if you think it’ll make me more effective with your clients. I’ll do
anything
to volunteer here.”

“Even clean the toilets?” the woman asked, crossing her arms over a basic black suit jacket and white dress shirt. “We all take turns.”

She’d never cleaned a toilet in her life, and from the look of the clinic, it would be a disgusting job. “I’d revel in it. I’ll even take out the trash.”

“Hmmm…everyone here works where they’re needed, but we try and tailor a legal volunteer’s work to their interests. We don’t only do domestic violence.”

“I know that. I’m happy to help wherever I’m needed.”

“At the Community Legal Clinic, we like to throw people in the deep end to determine if they can learn to swim. I’d like to watch you interview one of our clients today. There’s a woman here who was beaten by her husband last week. She’s asking for information on filing a protection order.”

“I saw her when I came in.” She knew exactly who Felicia was talking about. The bruises on the woman’s face had made her insides seize up. “I’d be happy to talk to her. Do you have a list of questions you use for a baseline?”

Felicia’s brow rose at that. “No. There are some standard pieces of information we take from them such as some form of identification to verify they are who they say they are, their marital status, and any children that are involved. Then we take their lead and ask them about the situation that brought them to the clinic. You refine your questions from there.”

Her gut was burning now. “I can handle that.”

“Well, you don’t lack self-confidence, do you?” Felicia asked, ignoring the phone ringing at her desk.

“No one ever believed in me growing up. I had to believe in myself enough for everyone.” And that was true. Thank God it was all in the past now.

“I know Professor Clark well, and since he’s one of your references, I’m willing to give you a shot. Go find the client in reception and bring her back to my desk. We can do the interview here.” She gestured to the chair beside the one where Amelia Ann was sitting.

With that, Amelia Ann walked to the front and found the woman, biting her cheek to still the trembling in her body. Injecting every ounce of steel she possessed into her spine, she led the client back to Felicia’s desk, and once she was seated, settled into the chair beside her. After a brief nod from the petite woman, she started asking what she hoped were the right questions.

The interview had broken her heart. She hadn’t been able to stop herself from grabbing the woman’s hand as she described, through a haze of tears and sobs, how her boyfriend had kicked her repeatedly in the stomach after knocking her down on the kitchen floor. Felicia had taken over at one point to describe how the clinic could assist. After escorting the woman out, Amelia Ann had firmed her shoulders and headed back to hear Felicia’s decision.

The hand Felicia extended to her shot a spurt of hope through her heart.

“Welcome to Community Legal, Amelia Ann.”

* * *

Over the ensuing week, Felicia had given her their standard de-escalation training and instruction on how to create healthy boundaries with clients. Of course, Felicia didn’t follow that advice herself, as she freely admitted. She gave her clients her cell phone number and was pretty much on call for them twenty-four seven. Amelia Ann knew she’d be the same way.

Amelia Ann started to tone down her finishing school comportment and took to wearing off-the-rack clothes from a local department store she’d never before visited. Nothing that showed her legs since the men loitering on the streets gazed at her like voracious lions when she came to work in the used Honda Accord she’d leased from a nearby car dealer.

The hours at Community always passed by in a buzz of activity, and yet it seemed as if there was never enough time to help everyone.

On the way back to her luxurious townhouse in Hillsboro Village, she usually cried. The streets here were clean, well-lit, and safe, lined with happy families walking down to neighborhood haunts like Fido and Pancake Pantry. People didn’t typically walk around with guns stuck in the back pockets of their jeans. There were no obscene phrases painted on any of the boutique shops. She felt like Persephone most days, traveling back and forth between two worlds—one bright and sunny, the other dark and fearsome.

But she did revel in the work, just like she’d told Felicia she would, even if she was relieved to learn her boss had been joking about cleaning toilets.

Deidre, the receptionist, looked harried when she walked through the door on a crisp Monday afternoon. There were at least twenty people crammed into the waiting room. Someone had painted it a sunshine yellow, but there were smudges on the wall since so many people ended up leaning against it when there were no chairs left to sit in.

She wasn’t surprised by the numbers. Monday was their official legal intake day, and they typically saw thirty to forty people in Amelia Ann’s two-hour shift. The process was the same each week. Reception funneled the clients back to them. They sat down with them and talked about their issues, giving legal advice and writing out a suggested course of action. Often the lawyers and the three volunteers would consult with one another about which family law cases to take on, as those cases were more intense and complicated.

Amelia Ann worked almost exclusively with Felicia. Despite their rocky initial interaction, Felicia had taken a shine to her, and Amelia Ann had a sense of warmth as well as respect for her boss.

After hanging her coat from one of the brass hooks lining the right wall, Amelia Ann walked over to Felicia’s desk. “It’s going to be a busy one.”

The woman was scratching out legal advice for a client on what the law may or may not be able to do for them, something she did whenever she had a spare moment. “Always is.”

“Do you want a cup of coffee? I’m going to grab one before Deidre starts the show.” Even though she’d just had a mocha with Susannah, that strong roast scent in the air was too tempting. Someone must have made a fresh pot in the break room.

“That’d be great,” Felicia answered, and soon they were both downing lukewarm black coffee to get their caffeine jolt for the afternoon.

They’d done about eight interviews when Deidre led over a painfully thin woman and two kids. The little girl had cute pigtails and looked to be about four, while the boy was a bit older, perhaps seven—Rory’s age. The yellow bruises on their mother’s cheekbone and around her eye made Amelia Ann want to weep. Even after all these weeks, she had to lock down her feelings when she saw such tangible evidence of brutality.

Felicia often let her kick off the interviews they conducted together—she joked that Amelia Ann seemed nicer and more approachable. After she asked many of the initial informational questions, her boss would start adding to the mix with some more pointed queries and legal options. Amelia Ann tore her gaze away from the woman for a moment and caught Felicia’s almost imperceptible nod. It was time to get started.

“Hello, there,” she said, softly and gently, knowing the courage it took for most women to get to this point. “I’m Amelia Ann, and this is Felicia.”

Her boss smiled kindly. “Welcome.”

“I’m Jasinda. Jasinda Parks,” the woman said, her children clinging to her like an ivy vine around an oak tree. “These are my children, Calvin and Kylie.”

Amelia Ann tried to gauge Jasinda’s age. Most of the women she spoke to here looked much older than they really were. Their hard lives carved deep grooves into their faces.

“I can see if one of our staff members can play with Calvin and Kylie while we talk, if you’d like.” Whenever possible, they tried to give their client the chance to speak freely since many women self-censored themselves in front of their kids.

“I don’t want to leave you, Mama,” the little girl murmured, clinging to the woman’s faded jeans.

“You can stay with me, sugar. They’re fine here if that’s okay,” she said to Amelia Ann. “Kylie, you can sit on Mama’s lap.”

Once they were situated—with the little girl nestled on Jasinda’s lap and Calvin standing sentry beside them—Amelia Ann sat and scooted her chair a little closer to Jasinda’s.