I got to the courthouse early and took a seat in the back. I was there to contest a ticket I’d been issued following an accident on I-35W southbound from Denton to Fort Worth. The charge--failure to control speed--was one automatically issued by the state of Texas when no wrongdoing was evident. I hadn’t been speeding and was there to try my luck.

Seated across from the defendants was a lawyer. He was facing the group from behind a fold-up table, and to his right, standing next to the American flag, was a cop. The hearing got underway, and one by one the lawyer took pleas of no contest and not guilty and informed the defendants know their next steps. Eventually, my name was called and I took my seat at the front table.

“I’ll level with you,” he said. “These tickets are very easy for the state to prove. All I have to do is show you hit something.”

“I didn’t hit anything,” I said. “The truck skid on a patch of ice and rolled through the median.”

“There was no collision?”

“No, sir.”

“You didn’t hit a road sign, guardrail, anything like that?”

“No, sir. Just the grass and the road.”

It was true. After hitting the ice and overcompensating with the wheel, the truck rolled through the median like a tin can and landed upside down on the opposite stretch of freeway. Even after screeching down the pavement on the roof and me scrambling through the broken windshield, the only thing that got fucked up was my roommate’s Toyota.

“Alright,” he said. “The officer who wrote the ticket is here this morning. I'll be right back.”

At that point, I started to feel pretty good. Maybe I’d even get the charge dropped. After all the other shit--thinking I was going to die, dealing with my self-righteous, pissed off roommate--that’d be a win. I sat and waited for the lawyer to return.

After a few minutes, the door reopened and the cop who gave me the ticket peered in. "Yeah, that's him," he said. He shut the door again. Then, crickets.

At that point, my confidence was increasing. The cop and I had had a pleasant conversation that morning standing next to the squashed truck. He remembered me, and I figured I was home free. But then the lawyer came back and he had a pissy look on his face. He sat down across from me, looked me in the eyes, and asked why I was lying to him.

“I’m not lying,” I said, shocked.

“If what that officer told me is true, you most certainly are lying. And I don’t appreciate being lied to.”

“I’m not lying. I didn’t hit anything!”

“Are you a musician?” he asked.

“Yes.” (I had explained to the officer the morning of the accident that I was a trumpeter on my way to a church gig.)

“Were you on your way to a church?”

“Yes.”

"What that officer just told me is that you lost control of your vehicle and hit the Fire Chief's wife head-on. She's been in the hospital for two weeks in critical condition."

I was stunned. "That's not true!" I blurted out. I started to feel sick and got tunnel vision. What was this? Some bit where small-town Texas yokels fuck a passer-through with their podunk conspiracy? My mind ran to thoughts of an innocent man in prison. 

“Why are you dressed like that?”

“In a suit?”

“You look like you're trying to get away with something dressed like that.”

“What? I just wanted to look professional for the hearing.” I leaned into the table. “What he’s telling you isn’t true. I didn’t hit anything. Go read the police report!”

The lawyer looked like he wanted to punch me in the face. He got up and left the room again. After he left, I looked over at the police officer standing next to the flagpole. He looked back at me and shrugged. "Maybe you forgot,” he said. “Bad wrecks like that, people forget."

After a few minutes, the lawyer came back. He told me to get out. My ticket was being dismissed on some indiscriminate technicality, and after sharing his opinions about the quality of my character, told me to stay out of town. I was pretty freaked out and drove straight to the nearest liquor store.