"The past is gone. It went by, like dusk to dawn."

[nickthewarbler]

Who: nickthewarbler, warble_on_jeff, alittletoolegal and jewhawk (posting order)
What: The verdict
Where: New York County Criminal Court, Manhattan
When: Wednesday afternoon, a couple of weeks after THIS
Rating: Leaving it open

Comments

[warble_on_jeff]

It had only been a matter of weeks that the trial had gone on... Dani, her legal team, and a number of witnesses fighting like hell to clear Nick's name, and to let everyone know, once and for all, that Neil Carter was a horrible person, an evil son of a bitch who'd pushed Nick to the point of having no choice but to defend himself, even when that had come at the cost of the bastard's life. Nick had never intended to kill Neil, and his act had been one of pure desperation not to die himself. Everyone in Nick's life knew that. They all knew the gentle person he'd been, though for some, like Jeff, it had been a long time since the last time they saw him before he fell into this life with his husband. But Nick was not, at heart, cold-blooded, and certainly not a killer. He wouldn't even hurt an animal, much less a human being, unless pushed to it with no other choice. Yes, it had only been a few weeks, but for Jeff, and everyone who loved Nick? It had felt more like an eternity.

When the word had been delivered that the jury had reached a verdict, Jeff had been both elated and terrified, two emotions he'd never imagined would go together, but as thrilled as he was that things would soon come to a conclusion, he couldn't for the life of him stomach the thought of Nick being found guilty and put in prison. He couldn't let himself think of that. Nick wouldn't survive. He just wouldn't.

He took his seat in the courtroom, between Mercedes, and Leslie, Nick's sister-in-law who'd testified on his behalf about what an abusive dick her dead brother was. Jeff had come to really like her, and his friendship with Mercedes had grown very quickly after the day she'd found him crying his eyes out during a court recess.

Eyes fixed on the front of the courtroom as the bailiff gave the, "All rise," Jeff rose from his chair, immediately feeling the warmth of Mercedes slipping her hand into his and giving it a firm squeeze. He turned to give her a grateful nod, squeezing her hand back as the judge and jury entered the courtroom.

[alittletoolegal]

Dani was sure she had never felt this bad in her life. The collective amount of sleep she had over the past weeks was negligible and whilst it could be argued that it was all catching up with her, it just felt like something was wrong. She had been pregnant once before, and she knew that maternal instinct could be a powerful thing sometimes. Completely unexplainable. There was also the fact that a woman just knew her body, and you knew when something wasn't right with it. She didn't know what it was, but she knew that whilst they had been waiting in her office that wasn't too far from the court house for the jury to declare verdict, she had privately made an urgent phone call with her doctor for that afternoon, and she had been planning to go whether the verdict had come or not.

She was just so fucking relieved it was finally here. As horrible as it was to be standing on the edge of a huge cliff waiting to jump off right now, it was well overdue for this to be over. Nick looked like he needed a doctor too and she was going to strongly suggest, whatever the outcome, he have a medical examination ASAP too. She had reached blindly for his hand, both for him and for her, just needing something to tether onto to get through the. But when they were directed to stand, she stumbled just a little and was forced to discreetly hold onto her partner beside her, who gave her a brief 'You okay?' look before he had to respectfully avert gaze back to the judge and jury.

Dani wet her lips and followed suit, but she had to fight the urge not to grab her stomach, feeling an odd cramp twist low down. Oh god, this wasn't good... but she just had to get through this verdict without causing a scene. It was only when Nick, too stumbled on his feet upon standing that she put his arm around his waist to hold him up. She didn't know how she did it, but she knew if she didn't, he would be out cold on the floor simply from fear. Nick had been a mess jury the jury deliberation. He had been physically and she, along with Nick's parents, had almost had to force-feed him so he end up in a diabetic coma. She wanted to wrap her arms around him in a hug and promise him it would be okay like she had wanted to do for fucking long, but she just had to push through a few more minutes and try to cope through that rush of terror that she hadn't done enough. What if, after everything, Nick still went to jail?

"Jury, have you reached your verdict?" the judge prompted, and the jury foreman stood up to the microphone with a confirmation, and then began to read off the paper he was holding.

[jewhawk]

Ordinarily, Puck would've been at Dani's, getting ready for Benny to come home. But his son had football practice, and one of the other moms, whose son was one of Benny's good friends, asked if Puck and Dani would mind the boys having a play date, and Benny had seemed so excited that they couldn't say no. With everything going on around him, it was hard for them to find things that really got Benny excited anymore, and they'd given in to the request pretty quickly.

Without needing to pickup or feed Benny, Puck's usual routine was kind of out, and he ended up going to the courthouse for little more than a gut feeling that he needed to. It just felt like a place he should be. So he sat among the crowd, far enough to the back that he wouldn't feel like he was encroaching on Nick's closest family and friends. Still, from his seat, he could see Dani and Nick clearly, could see the way they clung to each other, and his heart broke. If this trial didn't go as they hoped, there was a lot more on the line to Dani than any other trial. This was her cousin, who'd been more like a brother when they were all back in Ohio. This was his whole life.

As the paper was read, Puck couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong, and it took a moment for him to realize he'd been holding his breath. God, he hoped this wasn't going to go the wrong way.

[nickthewarbler]

Probably looking back on this, Nick would never, ever know how he got through it. In fact, he probably would barely even remember most of it. The courtroom was dead silent and despite the fact the room was massive, it felt hot and claustrophobic to Nick, like the walls were trying to close in on him. He could hear a throbbing in his ears and he couldn't ignore how menacing the police guards looked at the side exit of the courtroom where he would be dragged away in cuffs after the guilty verdict to be thrown in prison for god knows how long.

He wanted to cry. He wanted to vomit, and it was probably some sort of plain miracle that he didn't soil himself. He was shaking from head to toe, and to Nick, it seemed like the jury foreperson was talking in slow motion and under water. If the didn't get through this soon, he was going to lose it and it probably wouldn't be pretty. He swallowed, but the lump stuck in his throat was firmly lodged there and his hand gripped around Dani's with painful force.

"In the New York County Criminal Court, criminal action, in the State of New York versus Nicholas Seamus Benito Matheson-Carter, as to case number 2012CF95782-6. Verdict, as to the charge of second degree murder count one, we the jury find the defendant not guilty, so say we all, dated at New York City, New York on this eighteenth day of May 2012. As to the charge of voluntary manslaughter count one, we the jury find the defendant not guilty, so say we all, dated at New York City, New York on this eighteenth day of May 2012. As to the charge of aggravated assault count one, we the jury find the defendant not guilty, so say we all, dated at New York City, New York on this eighteenth day of May 2012."

But everything was still quiet, and Nick was sure he hadn't heard right. He had to be hallucinating. Shouldn't everyone be cheering. And then Dani was responded... saying something when the judge seemed to address the parties. Nick just turned his head to look at her, having totally missed the judge querying whether either side wanted the jury polled as to their verdicts, but both sides declined, Dani haven't fought for the verdict and won in her entire right. It was only when the judge ruled, "Case closed", that there was an uproar in the courtroom and Nick felt Dani make a grab for him, even if he was in a numb haze about what had just happened.

Not guilty? Did they really just say not guilty?

[warble_on_jeff]

As the words were read from the paper, Jeff's eyes never left Nick. He was terrified, and Jeff knew it. He fought off all the urges to wish for things he couldn't have, and focused on this moment, on getting through this verdict. Nick and Dani stood close together, and Jeff was grateful that she was with him, holding onto him so he would know he wasn't alone. And then came the first not guilty, and Jeff didn't dare to give himself the pleasure of even a moment's relief, because there were two more charges, and he knew it.

A second not guilty, and his hand was tightening around Mercedes's. If he was found guilty of the last charge, as much as Jeff was fighting the relief, he knew that he'd be crushed. They'd come so far, they were so close, and they had to make it through this last thing. The third not guilty had hit Jeff with the force of a fighter jet, and he couldn't hold back the tears of relief anymore. They rolled down his face freely as he felt Mercedes's hand move to gently rub his back in that protective mama way she had down to a fine art.

Nick wasn't going to jail. He was staying out of jail, and he could get help now, and Jeff could be there with him, and all of these emotions were rushing on him in a way he didn't even totally know how to handle, when the entire feel of the courtroom changed, and through his tears, Jeff saw Dani stagger. Leslie immediately tensed beside him, he could feel it, even through the emotional rollercoaster going on inside of him, and Jeff's mouth fell open as if to call out for help, but it hit him quickly that he didn't even know who to call for.

[alittletoolegal]

The relief and disbelief hit Dani like a tonne of bricks. In fact, it felt like she was knocked over with just that. At first, she couldn't even process or absorb that Nick was just declared not guilty of every horrible charge the prosecution tried to pin him with, and that all the blood, sweat, tears and heartache with her trying to build this case with every intricate detail was worth it. Her beloved cousin, who was like a brother to her, was free. It would take a lot more than a court verdict to release him from the terrible lingering affects of everything he suffered, but now he was cleared and rightfully so.

But as much as she wanted to scream and cry from excitement over getting the verdict Nick deserved and clearing his name, she could barely move. She was rooted on the spot in agony and had made a desperate grab for Nick's arm to keep up right. Her lower stomach felt like it was on fire, like she had been stabbed, and was twisting up with waves of cramping. To now, she had been able to tolerate it to hear the verdict, but the pain was getting worse with each passing minute. She felt like she was going vomit, and for an absolutely horrifying moment, she felt a wetness between her legs and thought she had wet herself.

When Nick turned to her at the sharp and painful grab of his arm, bracing her hand on the bench in front of her, Dani looked down and found a patch of dark blood seeping through the front of her light grey tailored skirt. It was like the floor got ripped out from under her and suddenly it was impossible to keep Nick out of the loop of anything happening to her to protect him. "O-Oh god," she gasped, the sight of the blood alone setting off a chain reaction in her. Stars formed in her peripheral vision and the slice pain through her stomach felt like someone had reached through her and ripped her insides out. The last thing she heard was Nick's horrified scream of, "Oh my god, someone help me! She's bleeding!" but it was muffled and she had the sensation of arms enclosing around her before the blackness hit.

[jewhawk]

What followed the verdict seemed like the world spinning completely and totally out of control, like it was going a million miles a minute, and in slow motion all at the same time, and Puck was completely and utterly confused. Dani was swaying in place, clearly in pain, and suddenly, he heard Nick's voice crying out in fear that she was bleeding. Why the fuck would she be bleeding? His first thought was something crazy like a gunshot wound from a gun with a silencer, but that was too many gangster movies speaking, and there was no reason for anyone to hurt Dani anyway. Still, he couldn't figure out why she'd be bleeding... not enough for this.

And just like that, she was falling over, and Puck was out of his seat rushing toward the front of the courtroom, only to be stopped by one of the officers standing at the gate between the gallery and the benches. His heart was pounding in his chest, and a million words were rushing to the forefront of his mind, and he didn't know what to say, but he had to get to her. "She's my... w... my son's mother..." he stammered, almost having let their soon-to-be-over marriage out of the bag. She'd kill him for that, and he knew it. But they weren't letting him through, and he was panicking.

"Dani!" he cried out in a pained, terrified voice as the officer directed him to return to his seat.

[nickthewarbler]

There was no end to horrible scenarios that were abruptly playing through Nick's already-scrambled mind when he saw that Dani was bleeding. It went to the same place as Puck's, and then some, but as far as he was concerned, anyone on that opposing team would have reason to hurt Dani. The very evil bastard they were fighting for seemed to feel he had all the reasons in the world to hurt Nick over and over again, so why wouldn't his own flesh and blood, and team of cheerleaders in his honour have the same tendencies. His verdict suddenly felt irrelevant, and he grabbed Dani as soon as she passed out, managing to catch her before she fell and hurt herself. All he could do was sink down to his knees to lower her to the floor, because the condition he had been in himself these past few weeks, he had very little physical strength left. Dani was petite and tiny, but it still felt like a dead weight in Nick's arms when she went down.

People were already crowding around to help, but that was the last thing Nick wanted, so despite screaming that he needed help - and he did - he didn't want the entire courtroom, including court reporters, gawking at her. Only a few days before, poor Blaine had ended up in the papers from having a fit at the airport, and Nick didn't want Dani to suffer the same way, especially when he had no idea what was wrong with her. He could hear people shouting to call 911, and some other people asking if she was breathing. "Oh god, Dani! Dani, can you hear me?!" he screeched, terrified someone had hurt her without him even realised. "Get out of the way! Just stay away!."

There was a flurry of activity all around him, but he hardly noticed. It must have been a few of the court's first aid officers that came running then to help him, and he was relieved, because after a moment, the utter shock of the verdict and then having Dani fall like this set in hard and fast, and Nick burst into petrified and helpless tears as he knelt there beside his cousin, and rational ability to think leaving him.