WEEK TWENTY-SEVEN
"I'm going home!" I crowed.
"Yeah," the cockroach groused. "You go with that - see how it works for you."
"What do you mean?" I asked, more out of defensiveness than any actual need for clarifying information.
"The chances of them letting you out of here - with what they've done...with what you know - are about as good as me winning Miss Congeniality at the Miss Teen USA pageant!"
"But...but..." I sputtered, "the charges - they were dismissed."
"So, you think they can't make up new ones if they want?"
"They...they have to have evidence..." I tried. If cockroaches could look sardonic, Phil's glance would have been considered withering. "Okay," I tried again, "they can't hold me here forever." Watching Phil's response to that made me realize that cockroaches possess an unexpectedly expressive body language. "Okay, look," I started, face flushing with anger. It's embarrassing to lose an argument to an insect, even if the insect is a part of your psyche.
Before I could tell Phil the philosophical cockroach what to look at, the door to the cell burst open. If this had been a television show, the person who ran into the room would have been my wife, all teary-eyed and winsome. She would hug me tightly and whisper in my ear that she knew all along that I was innocent, and that every night the children (which, admittedly, we didn't have) asked every night when their daddy was coming home, and that she always told them that it would be soon because she had faith in the American justice system. Then, taking me by the hand, she would lead me out of the cell, out of the prison, and back to the world to reclaim my life.
In the real world, the person who entered the room was my interrogator. He was becoming a real TV moment buzz kill.
Pacing my cell, he sneered, "You bastard!"
"Umm?" I responded.
"You weren't responsible for the attack on American troops in Iraq!"
"I wasn't?" I said. I was as surprised as anybody.
"You had nothing to do with arms sales to the Taliban!" the interrogator accused.
"Let's not be too hasty about that," I insisted. I may have thought I was going home, but that doesn't mean I thought I was innocent. "The evidence you collected suggests -"
"You've been lying to us this whole time!" the interrogator spat out. "Lying...to me!"
"Why would you say that?" I asked, hurt.
"Because we just captured the man who really did those things."
"How do you know it was him?"
"He confessed."
"Oh," I angrily tossed off, "he confessed. Well, how about that? And, you believed his confession over mine?"
"His confession actually contained verifiable information that corroborates his story. You were just telling us what we wanted to hear."
"But, what I told you was verified by other prisoners," I insisted.
"Who were also just telling us what we wanted to hear."
"So...after all this, you expect me to believe that I'm...innocent?"
"Life's a bitch."
We were silent for a while. The interrogator continued pacing. Phil, the philosophical cockroach, rolled his eyes, but said nothing. I wondered how I could be innocent after months in jail. Eventually, I said, "Look, I - I don't know how this happened. Still, I hope you don't take it personally."
"Of course I bloody take it personally!" the interrogator exploded. "Do you have any idea how this will affect my career!"
I admitted that I didn't.
"I had a high-ranking terrorist leader in my control, and I had to let him go on a technicality."
"So, you are letting me go?" I smirked at the cockroach, who, if anything, looked more convinced that he was right.
"The technicality that he wasn't a high-ranking terrorist leader at all!"
"But, you are letting me go?"
"CAN WE FOCUS ON WHAT'S IMPORTANT, HERE?"
"Sorry."
"Oh, nothing will happen immediately," the interrogator mused. "There will just be muttered accusations that 'he's lost his edge' and that 'it's a shame when good officers go bad.' They'll break me with whispered innuendo, you just watch and see if they don't. Could you make everybody's lives easier and hang yourself in your cell?"
"Sorry," I repeated.
"You bastard!" the interrogator hissed, and fled the room.
"I'm getting out of here," I positively sang.
The cockroach shrugged. "Life is complicated," he warned me. He was philosophical like that.
SOURCE: Harpo's
[http://harpos.org/archive/2012/07/08/dd-9000027]
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