The Fight for the Second Trial---Approximately 4 months after the Previous Verdict which is Guilty of Murder in the Second Degree.

"Due to sufficient new evidences being presented in court today, I do believe that there is a basis for reasonable doubt in this case. And thus, defense lawyer motion for the case to be reopen is granted. Bail for Joseph Hardy is set at eight-hundred thousand dollars. Adjourned." The judge hammered the table and sighs of relief were heard all over the courtroom. Joe heard his brother let out a huge breathe and he felt the lawyer squeezed his shoulder. Very roughly, he shook away the touch.

I should be happy. I should be so very happy.

"You’ll not be going back to state prison Joe. You’ll be held up here and when we raised enough cash for the bail, you’re going back home." Hector Angrid, an old family friend of the Hardy’s spoke hopeful, comforting words to Joe and Joe nodded numbly. The results of the verdict did not matter the first time round, it would not matter the second time round.

Not matter because nothing will bring back to me the ambrosia of my life. Nothing can bring back the one who saved me from my depression after Iola. When she burst into my life, so cool, calm and beautiful, my heart too burst with joy, hope and so much love that I never thought I was capable of giving to another girl.

She died because of me.

And I died with her. In prison, in that crowded, cold brutal environment, I died with her.

She tried to stop me, to explain things to me but I said those hurtful words that I cannot take back.

I did hear something, something sweet from behind me. But I was too angry to hear, I did not really listen.

If only I did. I failed her.

***

 

Present

 

"Have you studied for your test?" Frank tapped Joe on the shoulders, waking Joe from his flashback. Joe slammed a book down on the photo of Vanessa that he was starring at and swung his locker shut. He turned and saw his elder brother behind him, and prayed that Frank had not caught him walking into his nightmare.

Frank’s deep brown eyes darkened to a mysterious shade of black in concern for his kid brother. Volatile, irritable, impatient Joe Hardy. Joe swallowed a lump in his throat, knowing that Frank had sacrificed too much for him. He sacrificed so much that Joe was pressurized, so very pressurized into normalcy.

But I can never be normal again. What will I not give to be normal?

"Yah…JS Mill right? On Liberty? I know it by heart now…" Joe shoved his hands into his pocket, hands with scars on them as he walked down the lockers bordered hallway with his brother next to him. The scars were souvenirs from that hell hole called state prison -overcrowded; under-watched; punishing. Very punishing.

"Joe! What happened? Joe…"

"Frank…get me out here…I can’t take it anymore…can’t…" He sobbed and Frank ran over to his side in the prison hospital, wanting to comfort him.

But he shuddered and cringed involuntarily when Frank touched him, he could not help it and was shocked at himself for doing it. Frank was puzzled, hurt.

"Joe?"

"Just get me out of here…out of here…" Joe stared at the ceiling, chanting his mantra, willing himself not to think.

Frank slowed his steps so Joe could keep pace with him. His elder brother kept forgetting that Joe was no longer with that athletic gait and grace that had held many juniors in the old Bayport High in awe of him; was no longer that muscular quarterback who had garnered so much cheers from the stands, attracted so many admirers that Vanessa had to fend off always, possessive of him with a ferocity that amused him and touched him.

Vanessa…angel…

"What’s his stance?"

"Tyranny of the Majority."

"And comparing with Alexis Tocqueville?"

Joe was now at a loss. Frank shot those questions knowing that Joe had not studied. Frank always known things like that and Joe felt sometimes, Frank knew him better than he knew himself. Maybe he could get Frank to perform some psychoanalytical test on him and sort out the cobwebs in his mushy brains.

"Paternalistic despotism of the nobles? I don’t know…" Joe shrugged. "Can I copy off you?"

Frank shot him then again, not with another question but with a reproachable, big-brother kind of look. "Alexis Tocqueville’s work was written when he was traveling through America, commenting on the democracy there with an eye on his home country, France. France was set in egoism, while America, he claimed, was governed by the people with civil societies, groups…"

"Frank, it’s useless to coach me now 5 minutes before paper." Joe paused at the lecture theatre’s entrance, seeing that Shane and Craig had already saved him a seat. But there was only one empty space beside them and thus he gave them an apologetic look and they understood.

"I know. I was hoping to trigger your memory…" Frank dryly replied. "I see two seats at the back. C’mon brother. But you still can’t copy off me. You can’t copy an essay."

Joe smiled weakly at his brother as they walked up the steps and took their respective places. The professor announced that they could all turn the question paper over and start writing shortly after Joe and Frank sat down, just in time for the start of the paper.

Frank wrote furiously after thinking for a minute or two. Joe knew Frank was going to ace this test which made up ten percent of their final grade. He stared at the question left and right but for the life of him, could not understand what his professor wanted.

***

Frank concluded his essay with a quote. The question needed critical thinking and he thought Joe looked too wasted to be able to engage in such an activity. He glanced at his brother’s paper about fifteen minutes before the hour was up. Joe barely wrote half a page, and his handwriting was purposely made very huge.

If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.’ (On Liberty, 1859)"

And he flipped his paper over, not wanting to think anymore. He just knew that philosophy, or rather, intellectual history in this case, was terribly draining on the brain cells as it forced his mind to explore into places he hardly ventured into before. Sure, he had dabbled a little here and there in philosophical works but it was different now that he actually had a whole lecture group to thrash out ideas with. Discussions made ideas clearer and more thought-provoking. He now wished he was majoring in Philosophy rather than Law because he was finding it to be extremely interesting.

So I’m going to be a lawyer soon. Better start saving for that post graduate master program in Harvard.

 

History was not Frank’s major and he would normally not choose to have anything to do with it. He took this module as an elective only to spend more time with his reticent brother- to be at least in part of Joe’s world. After the last case with the serial killer that the two brothers had actively pursued when one of their friends, Liz Webling was attacked and almost killed, Joe was forever changed. The friends had held a party to celebrate the Hardys’ triumph over the evil that had gripped Bayport in cold fear. A party Frank wished had never been planned. Joe stopped pursuing sports of all kind, started losing massive amount of mass and weight, started drinking and even questioned God sometimes. He stopped going to Frank whenever he needed help.

And he had always came to me. Always.

He looked at his brother who was listlessly scribbling onto the answer sheet, trying to understand or at least, catch a glimpse of the old boisterous spirit inside- if there were any left.

Yet, Joe’s wide sapphire blue eyes were like mirrors, mirrors that refused to crack a little to let Frank reach in and grab hold of the little brother that he once knew and loved so protectively- still loved so protectively.

Too often Joe had refused his brother’s care and love- much too often.

And he spotted what Joe was writing and his eyes widened in alarm. His brother’s work as almost as dark as the cloak he covered himself with these days.

*Democracy won’t hold because we are all trying to turn it into a dictatorship of the masses. It’ll always be a dictatorship… I have no quotes from Mill or Tocqueville. I only know. Who cares about democracy now? The president sides with who can lobby him the most votes. Minorities still get stormed upon.

I may be rambling but hell! I’m entitled to free speech. I totally support anarchy. If you want freedom, then you’ll find it in chaos. Where men fight against men, where no one is protected so everyone can have the chance to brutalize whoever they wish. All done in act of free will. I can kill you and say it’s my right because I want to do it. I must be allowed the freedom to do it. That’s freedom. Democracy does not offer that. Democracy silence the voice of the minority or the less privilege.

You want freedom?

Go ahead and kiss my…*

Frank refused to read anymore. 

***

*Author’s note: Joe’s really only rambling. He’s a smart kid but he’s all morbid doom and gloom. But we should not believe in what he wrote.

Just a side-track. Ocean believes in Democracy. It’s the best system now though it’s not perfect but we can work on it. It’s the closest thing we have to check authorities from becoming too overbearing and corrupted and to give the people power in the decisions that will affect their lives. And Joe was not rambling about freedom. He mistaken brutality and animal instincts for freedom. You’ll all understand why later. The scenario he wrote of will keep mankind a prisoner of fear, not make mankind free.

Freedom must always come with responsibility. To keep ourselves free, we must keep others free. The only way to be free is to love one another the best we can, in the spiritual way of course.

All in my humble opinion of course. That’s how I feel. I don’t think the world can be free if we’re still like animals, hurting one another, killing, bombing…raping…judging…tormenting…

How did I get so far? Anyway…back to the real concern…

Joe’s dark thoughts are for himself only. I will never condone it. He don’t really believe in it either. He just needed to write something and he’s pissed because he don’t understand the question.

What’s the question? It’s a tough one.

It’s simply titled…Discuss Democracy. Frank aced it of course.