Chapter 16.
16.
Hearsay (n.)
an out-of-court statement that is being offered in court for the truth of what was asserted
lies, all of it
I don’t run into Damon the next morning, as I arrive as late as possible for breakfast, grabbing a stale blueberry muffin and scarfing it down on the way to the shuttle. Most mornings, I’ve headed down early to talk with the other jurors, ensuring I know each of their names and a detail or two about them. Despite all the curveballs Damon’s presence has brought, I still want to be foreperson. It stings when I finally emerge to find Xavier chatting up a group of four other jurors, right as they all erupt into roaring laughter at something he’s just said. I make a vow to up my game.
It’s not that I’m avoiding Damon—that’s impossible when we’ll be seated next to each other all day. I just don’t know how to be around him after last night.
I tossed all night thinking about him, yes, but mostly about Kara. About her life. Her death. About what it must have been like in his house when they got the news. I pictured his mom crumpled in a heap on the floor, wrapped in the sunflower-covered sundress that was always Kara’s favorite. I pictured his father staring at a doctor in shock, his gentle blue-green eyes (Damon’s eyes) pleading. And I pictured Damon, tears falling silently down his cheeks as he bent to the cold hospital linoleum to console his mother. I can’t imagine what their family has been through, and I don’t know if it brought them closer together or tore them apart. There’s still so much unknown space.
When we’re lining up to enter the courtroom, he turns and addresses me over his shoulder. “Hey,” he says, that jaw muscle flexing as soon as he closes his mouth.
“Hi,” I return, losing the battle with the corners of my lips to keep them in place as they upturn.
He’s about to say more, but the door opens and a bailiff ushers us into the courtroom.
Once seated, I’m dumbfounded at how much Damon has distracted me from the case. It’s only day four of testimonies and my mind, once consumed by Margot and this trial, has quickly made too much room for Damon. I still can’t reconcile which Damon it is I am finding myself drawn to—this new, hardened one or the best friend I used to wish would see me as more.
It takes a full few minutes to move my attention to Margot and the courtroom.
Today, Margot has donned a fitted pantsuit the color of an acorn, pant legs flaring slightly at the ankle, ending just before her subdued black heels. I take her in, surprised to find she seems almost upbeat. Though she doesn’t smile, she’s noticeably less tense than yesterday. I wonder if she’s intent on staying positive. A fake-it-till-you-make-it approach to the day.
I’m getting to know the faces in the room a bit, too. Most of the gallery comprises the same people in the same seats each day. There’s the woman with the bright blond locks who appears to be perpetually dressed in the same black suit. Next to her, the gangly man who constantly shifts his position on the bench, causing it to creak every few minutes. And on the other side of him, the older woman who, when not scrawling copious notes on her legal pad, swipes at her nose at regular intervals with the ever-present tissue in her hand.
There’s no time to think about the repercussions of last night’s revelations. The prosecution calls AMOM cast member Meredith Dixon as their next witness, and I shift my attention to the court proceedings. I expect to be excited about another one of the Moms in this room, but instead I’m anxious. I really hope we’re not about to find out that Joe was sleeping with Meredith , too.
The double doors at the back of the courtroom open, and Meredith approaches the stand. She is raven-haired and in her late forties. Her hair is pulled back in a low, tight bun at the base of her neck, accentuating her long, thin face.
Meredith is widely considered the most “normal” of all the cast members. She wears stylish outfits, though they’re far more subdued than the others’. She is rarely the instigator of arguments and often plays peacemaker between the women. The most controversial things about her are that she puts her twin toddlers on leashes at Disneyland and constantly says “irregardless.” As a result, she is regularly called boring by the fan base. Her tagline is “You may judge me for being the voice of reason, but having class is never out of season.”
I watch Margot evaluate her, eyes raking over Meredith, and her face twists in dissatisfaction. Any positivity Margot held is wiped completely from her face and overall demeanor, her efforts short-lived.
As Meredith is sworn in, Damon scrawls on his notepad. When finished, he passes the pad from his left leg to his right and angles it toward me. He’s written in all caps but small print, his handwriting bold and slightly intimidating, like him.
YOU OK?
?
?
YES
NO
?
STILL PASSED OUT IN A CLOSET
The first note Damon ever wrote me was the same format as this one. It was in Mr. Clayborn’s first-period algebra class in sixth grade, when we felt like the only two people on Earth who didn’t have phones yet. He reached across the aisle, holding a folded sheet while Mr. Clayborn scrawled equations on the board.
HOW MANY MORE TIMES WILL MR. C ADJUST HIS CROTCH BEFORE THE BELL RINGS?
?
?
6
8
?
THE LIMIT DOES NOT EXIST
Now I smile and place a checkmark in the third box, grateful for the easy out. Fair enough, he writes back, then moves his pad back to his other leg, but not before his eyes catch mine and we exchange a charged look, the shared secret of our escapade in the presidential suite last night between us. I appreciate that he doesn’t press further, though a small, bothersome part of me wants him to.
D.A. Stern’s co-prosecutor, Albert D’Agostino, dives into his questions to Meredith, and I am grateful for the distraction.
“Ms. Dixon, you’ve spent countless hours with Mrs. Kitsch over the years, filming for the show Authentic Moms of Malibu and otherwise, is that correct?”
“Yes, we’ve been on the show together since season one. We are both original cast members.”
“Are you two friends?”
Meredith takes a moment before answering. “We have been, in the past.” She is calm, factual, as she speaks in her distinct, croakier-than-one-might-expect voice. She sounds like someone on the cusp of losing their voice or a lifelong smoker, though I know she is neither.
D’Agostino asks more questions about their on-and-off friendship and then gets to a very specific point.
“Despite this history, we are here to discuss one event in particular. You took a trip with Margot and other cast members two years ago, correct?”
Meredith nods. “Yes.”
There is one trip that immediately comes to mind that I assume as the one the prosecutor is referencing. Margot went on a girls’ trip with three cast members during the past off-season—Alizay, Meredith, and Britain Buchanan, a onetime assistant to Dua Lipa. Between the four of them, they posted dozens of bikini boat shots. Even more bikini beach shots. There were also some bikini making-drinks-in-the-expansive-stone-kitchen-of-their-exclusive-rental shots. The trip wasn’t filmed for the show, so I don’t know the details of it other than what the women chose to post. What could have happened on that trip that’s relevant to this trial?
At D’Agostino’s urging, Meredith describes the trip. “We ate, drank, lounged. It was delightfully unexciting.”
Indeed, this sounds like quite a departure from the televised trips the women usually take (at least one per season to some tropical destination), where they fight over who gets the best room and dance with unassuming waiters after too many glasses of pinot grigio. Meredith is perhaps best known for drinking too much and then falling into bushes. Margot, on the other hand, is usually diving naked into the pool or ocean or hot tub.
“What did you ladies talk about? On this trip?” Albert D’Agostino asks. The co-prosecutor is a stout man, portly and short-limbed with glasses he pushes up his nose with a pointed index finger. When beside each other, D’Agostino looks a bit like a child compared to D.A. Stern’s long, towering frame.
Durrant Hammerstead’s foot taps under the defense table. I assume he is awaiting an opportunity to interject with an objection if D’Agostino doesn’t make a connection soon.
“We discussed normal things mostly. Our families, what activities our kids were obsessed with at the moment. What we were reading. But Margot was reading this book, The Poison Keeper .”
She glances at Margot who looks sad, a defeated, sunken quality having taken over her eyes and cheeks. This isn’t like the catty exchanges expected between the women on the show. It is, instead, one-sided.
I exhale as a murmur of confusion streaks across the room.
Albert D’Agostino returns to the prosecutors’ table and picks up a clicker. He lifts it toward the screen beside the witness stand. When he does, a photo of Margot fills it, one pulled from her social media, including the caption and like count. She’s wearing a shiny gold bikini and straw hat, lounging poolside, her bronzed legs crossed at the ankle on a lounge chair. She’s on a terrace, sea glistening behind her below the balcony’s edge. It’s somewhat reminiscent of the opening shot of season one of the show. The caption reads “Misbehaving in Mallorca”and has more than one hundred thousand likes.
“This is a picture Margot posted on her social media. Can you confirm this is from the trip in question?”
“Yes, it is. I took that photo for her,” Meredith says.
Albert D’Agostino clicks again, and a new photo appears, this one a pixilated close-up of the book splayed open on the end table next to the lounger, too blurry to notice in the original. The title fills most of the screen.
The Poison Keeper .
The title alone is damning enough, but it’s about to get a lot worse for Margot, I realize, knowing most of the courtroom and jury likely haven’t heard the details of the story Margot was casually reading poolside in Mallorca. I know them only because of a documentary I happened to watch a few months ago when deep into my true crime phase.
Albert D’Agostino clicks again. This time, he has pulled up the back of the book jacket. Words pop out at me like jabs to the eyes. Poison. Cruel death. Based on the legendary life of Giulia Tofana.
“ The Poison Keeper ,” Albert D’Agostino reads as he steps toward the jury box. “A novel all about the life of Giulia Tofana. On this trip, did Mrs. Kitsch talk about this book she was reading, just seven months before her husband died?”
Meredith leans forward and gazes at Margot, the two looking at each other as if strangers. As if they haven’t shared so much of their lives with each other. I wonder what led Meredith to do this to someone she considered a friend. Tenley, I get. They had a falling out. Tenley was sleeping with Joe. But Meredith has always been the levelheaded one.
“Yes. At dinner on the last night of our trip, Margot told us all about it. About how fascinated she was by the story. How this woman, Giulia Tofana, lived in Italy in the 1600s and was the daughter of an apothecary. Apparently, her mother was executed for murdering her husband. Margot told us how this woman went on to sell this product called Aqua Tofana, I think it was. This face cream or oil, or something, given to women looking to escape abusive husbands. As Margot described it, this Giulia was selling these women a mix of toxic chemicals so they could kill their husbands. The women would add drops to their husbands’ drinks or meals. Margot told us about how it would happen slowly, over time, so most of the deaths were never attributed to poison but rather some unknown illness.” She pauses. “She even told us how Mozart claimed he was poisoned by Aqua Tofana on his deathbed. Giulia Tofana was a bit of an icon, the way Margot described it.”
I hear the word objection in my head before Durrant Hammerstead even says it. There’s a slight squabble between Judge Gillespy, Albert D’Agostino, and Durrant Hammerstead, and I draw a tally mark in the corner of the sheet in my notebook, where I’ve taken to tracking the number of objections. I’ll need a new sheet corner soon.
Once the objection is resolved, Judge Gillespy allows the line of questioning to continue, and D’Agostino asks, “Why is it that you remember this particular conversation so distinctly?”
“Because”—Meredith leans in again—“Margot was... excited. Like, enthralled by this book, this woman. She was talking fast and loud and went on and on about it, to the point where Britain—she’s another cast member who was on the trip—and I talked about how weirdly obsessed she was with it.”
Virtually everyone in the courtroom looks at Margot. Damon’s eyes, though, shift to me. But not before I watch him underline a statement he’s written on his notepad.
WAS READING A BOOK ABOUT POISONING HUSBANDS
Durrant Hammerstead’s counterpart, Irena Medley, cross-examines Meredith. Irena Medley holds her own physically against the rest of the occupants of the defense table. She towers over both Margot and Durrant Hammerstead, long and lanky lean like a supermodel. She wears her hair pulled back tightly and has the sharp cheekbones and jawline to match, giving her an exquisite androgynous quality.
Irena Medley asks a rapid-fire series of questions, attempting to poke holes in Meredith’s account of the evening in question. How many drinks did Meredith have that night? “Two tequila sodas.” Were there side conversations going on? “No. When Margot speaks, she commands the whole room.” What was Margot wearing? “I don’t remember, probably something long and floral,” Meredith says.
“Was her hair up or down?”
Meredith shakes her head delicately. “I couldn’t say.”
“So, you listened to Margot go ‘on and on,’ as you describe it, about this book she was reading, and you were paying close enough attention to remember exactly what Mrs. Kitsch said but don’t remember what she was wearing or any details of her appearance that night?”
“I didn’t say I remember every detail of what she said. But I remember the gist of it.”
Satisfied, Irena Medley emphasizes how thousands of people have read this particular book, one that is a fictionalized retelling of Giulia Tofana’s life, none of whom have then gone on to kill their husbands, that we know of.
“Reading a book that thousands of others have read...” Irena Medley wrings her hands thoughtfully. “It’s an incredible stretch to assume a correlation to this case.”
“Is that a question?” Meredith asks, looking up at Judge Gillespy.
“No,” Irena Medley concedes, accomplishing, as I see it, very little of substance in her cross-examination.
It’s Albert D’Agostino’s redirect that truly hammers home the prosecution’s goal with this witness. “Ms. Dixon, were there any other relevant details of that conversation or others with Margot along similar topics, since my counterpart has suggested that the topic of a book Mrs. Kitsch may have been reading doesn’t apply here?”
“Yes,” Meredith affirms. “A week after that trip, Margot and I grabbed coffee after school dropoff. She was designing this flyer for an upcoming Sea Save event. I told her there were people who could do that, but she wanted to do it herself. She had a vision.” Meredith flips her hand in the air as she says vision . “Anyway, she left her laptop open when she went to the restroom, and I noticed the article she had pulled up in another window.”
“What was the article?”
“It was about this woman. Nancy something Brophy.”
“Nancy Crampton-Brophy?” D’Agostino fills in.
“Yes, that’s it. It was this news article about this woman who wrote romantic thrillers and became known for one blog essay in particular.”
I’m not familiar with this new reference.
Durrant Hammerstead and Irena Medley whisper to each other, likely discussing whether to object yet again.
D’Agostino continues quickly, as if sensing he’s on borrowed time. “Ms. Dixon, were you able to read the full article before Margot returned to the table?”
Meredith shakes her head. “No. But it was... interesting enough that I researched when I got home.” She raises her eyebrows at Margot, who stares as though she’s looking right through Meredith.
“What did you find in your later research of this woman Mrs. Kitsch was reading about?”
“So, this woman, Nancy Crampton-Brophy, became ‘famous’ for writing an essay.” Meredith leans forward again, painfully close to the microphone, and I can’t help but follow suit. She pauses for what I can only assume is dramatic effect, trained well by the show. “The essay title was ‘How to Murder Your Husband.’ ”
I glance at Margot, who shakes her head ever so slightly as if to say, You are wrong, you’re all wrong about me , in a desperate plea.
Meredith continues. “Apparently, after she wrote this ‘How to Murder Your Husband’ essay, she was convicted of murdering her husband .”
The expected whispers make their way across the room.
Knowing how things usually play out, I have a hard time believing these conversations would have occurred without Meredith or Tenley bringing them into the show as an attempted storyline. An Authentic Mom potentially plotting the demise of her husband? The other Moms and producers would have jumped on the chance to exploit it—just the kind of hyperbolic storyline that would have been ratings gold for the show.
Judge Gillespy wraps her hand around her gavel, though she doesn’t lift it, the movement alone threatening enough to silence the gallery. D’Agostino is sure to note a summary of Nancy Crampton-Brophy’s case will be included as an exhibit, before focusing again on the jury. “No further questions,” he affirms, before setting in the direction of the prosecution table to join a clearly content D.A. Stern.
Damon looks over at me, eyebrows raised.
I attempt to hide my dismay.