Even the bailiff stood frozen near the door with an expression of pure shock on his face. Harrison finally broke the silence with a quiet laugh and muttered that this was exactly the kind of instability he had been dealing with for years.
That was the moment I stopped feeling the familiar sting of embarrassment. I felt something much worse than shame because I realized I was becoming invisible in a room full of people.
A pregnant woman had just been assaulted in open court, and my own husband was trying to use it as evidence of my mental decline. I looked down at my shaking hands and noticed the folder was vibrating against the wooden surface of the table.
Then I realized that Judge Randall Thompson was staring directly at me instead of the lawyers. Until that exact second, he had been skimming the file as if it were just another routine case on a very crowded Friday docket.
He had probably seen dozens of marriages end and hundreds of signatures placed on documents that day. But now his entire expression changed, and his face went remarkably pale as he focused on the paperwork at the top of his bench.