The looks directed at him by clerks and judge alike suggested that this was the way of things in the practice of law and that he, of all people, ought to realize it by now. He ought, in fact, simply to accept it.
He did not choose to accept it however, did not care in the least to accept it, and was, by God, sick and tired of the whole business. On the other hand, there was not very much he could do about it. So, frustrated and angered, he went on to work, greeted the girls in the reception area with a mumbled good morning, picked up his phone messages, and retired to the confines of his office to fume. He had enjoyed less than five minutes of that when Miles appeared through the doorway.
“Well, well, just a little ray of sunshine this morning, aren’t we?” his friend needled cheerfully.
“Yeah, that’s me,” he agreed rocking back in his desk chair. “Joy to the world.”
“Hearing didn’t go so well, I gather?”
“Hearing didn’t go at all. Some incompetent took it off the call. Now I’m told it can’t be put back on until hell freezes over and cows fly.” He shook his head. “What a life.”
“Hey, it’s a living. Besides, that’s the way it all works — hurry up and wait, time is all we’ve got.”
“Well, I’m fed up to the teeth with it!”
Miles moved over to occupy one of the client chairs that fronted the long oak desk. He was a big man, heavy through the middle, thick dark hair and mustache lending maturity to an almost cherubic face.
His eyes, perpetually lidded at half-mast, blinked slowly. “Know what your problem is, Ben?”
“I ought to. You’ve told me often enough.”
“Then why don’t you listen? Quit spending all of your time trying to change the things you can’t!”
“Miles…”
“Annie’s death and the way the legal system works — you can’t change those kinds of things, Ben. Not now, not ever. You’re like Don Quixote tilting with windmills! You’re ruining your life, do you know that?”
Ben brushed Miles aside with a wave of his hand. “I do not know that, as a matter of fact. Besides, your equation doesn’t balance. I know that nothing will bring Annie back — I’ve accepted that. But maybe it’s not too late for the legal system — the system of justice that we used to know, the one we both went into the practice of law to uphold.”
“You ought to listen to yourself sometime,” Miles sighed. “There’s nothing wrong with my equation, chief. My equation is painfully accurate. You have never accepted Annie’s death. You live your life in a goddamned shell, because you won’t accept what’s happened — as if living like that is somehow going to change things! I’m your friend, Ben — maybe the only one you’ve got left. That’s why I can talk to you like this — because you can’t afford to lose me!”
The big man leaned forward. “And all of this crap about the way things used to be in the practice of law sounds like my father telling me how he used to walk five miles through the snow to get to school. What am I supposed to do — sell my car and walk to work from Barrington? You can’t turn back the clock, no matter how much you might like to. You have to accept things as you find them.”
Ben let Miles finish without interruption. Miles was right about one thing — only he could talk to him like this, and it was because he was his best friend. But Miles had always approached life differently than he, always preferring to blend in with his surroundings rather than to shape them, always preferring to make do. He just didn’t understand that there were some things in life a man simply should not accept.
“Forget about Annie for the moment.” Ben paused meaningfully before continuing. “Let me suggest that change is a fact of life, that it is a process brought about by the efforts of men and women dissatisfied with the status quo, and that it is essentially a good thing. Let me also suggest that change is frequently the result of what we have learned, not simply what we have envisioned. History plays a part in change. Therefore, what once was and was good ought not to be cast aside as being simply wishful reminiscence.”