Sycamore Row - John Grisham

nonetheless serious rules was one that required him to return every phone call by noon
Friday. He preferred to avoid most of his phone calls, but that was not possible.
Returning them was easy to put off. They often slid from one workday to the next, but
he was determined not to drag them through the weekend. Another rule forbade him to
take worthless cases that would pay little or nothing and turn his obnoxious clients into
people he could choke. But, like every other lawyer, he routinely said yes to some
deadbeat whose mother taught Jake in the fourth grade, or whose uncle knew his father,
or the broke widow from church who couldn’t afford a lawyer but couldn’t live without
one. Invariably, these matters turned into “fish files,” the ones that grew fouler the
longer they sat in a corner, untouched. Every lawyer had them. Every lawyer hated
them. Every lawyer swore he would never take another; you could almost smell them
the first time the client walked in the door.
Freedom for Jake would be an office free from fish files, and he still approached every
new year with the determination to say no to the deadbeats. Years ago, Lucien had said
repeatedly, “It’s not the cases you take that make you, it’s the cases you don’t take.” Just
say no. Nonetheless, his special drawer for fish files was depressingly full, and every
Friday afternoon he stared at them and cursed himself.
Without knocking, Portia walked into his office, obviously upset. She was patting her
chest as if she couldn’t breathe. “There’s a man here,” she said, almost in a whisper
because she couldn’t speak any louder.
“Are you okay?” he asked, once again tossing aside a fish file.
She shook her head rapidly. “No. It’s Mr. Roston. The boys’ father.”
“What?” Jake said as he bolted to his feet.
She kept patting her chest. “He wants to see you.”
“Why?”
“Please, Jake, don’t tell him who I am.” They stared at each other for a second,
neither with a clue.
“Okay, okay. Put him in the conference room. I’ll be down in a minute.”
Jeff Roston was not much older than Jake, but under the circumstances he was a very
old man. He sat with his hands together and his shoulders sagging, as if burdened by an
enormous weight. He wore heavily starched khakis and a navy blazer, and looked more
like a casual preppy than a man who grew soybeans. He also wore the face of a father
in the midst of an unspeakable nightmare. He rose and they shook hands and Jake said,
“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Roston.”
“Thank you. Let’s go with Jeff and Jake, okay?”
“Sure.” Jake sat beside him along one side of the table and they faced each other.
After an awkward pause, Jake said, “I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”
“No, you can’t,” he said softly and slowly, each word laden with grief. “I can’t either. I
think we’re just sort of sleepwalking, you know, just going through the motions, trying
to survive this hour so we can deal with the next one. We’re praying for time. Praying
for the days to turn into weeks and then months, and then maybe one day years from
now the nightmare will be over and we can manage the pain and the sorrow. But at the
same time we know that’ll never happen. You’re not supposed to bury your kids, Jake.