IT WAS THE NEW YEAR. AND THEN IT WAS LATE WINTER, THE FIRST thaw in April and melted ice water rushing frenzied in gutters, spilling across rooftops.

News came to me, my brothers who were incarcerated in the prison facility at Marcy were appealing their convictions.

Or rather, the new lawyer my father had hired to represent them was appealing their convictions

It would be argued that the baseball bat belonging to Jerome Kerrigan Jr. had been illegally seized by South Niagara police. Its whereabouts had been disclosed to police officers by the (juvenile) sister of the accused who’d been led into ratting on them by a police officer without benefit of a parent or a guardian. If the bat is excluded, DNA evidence acquired from the bat must be excluded. The case against the Kerrigans becomes circumstantial, the convictions must be overturned.

If this was so there would be new negotiations with the prosecutor. Why would any of the four boys plead guilty even to manslaughter, without DNA evidence linking the Kerrigan brothers to the bat? No murder weapon in evidence, anyone might have harassed and beaten Hadrian Johnson that night on Delahunt Road with any weapon.

The single eyewitness might change his account. All he’d need to say was It was dark, I can’t be sure what I saw.

Through a rushing sound like a distant waterfall these possibilities came to me. Not meaning to eavesdrop I would hear my aunt Irma and my uncle Oscar speaking together in lowered voices.

Poor Lula!—Irma murmured. What a terrible time this has been for her . . .

And Oscar would say dryly—Well. It’s been a pretty terrible time for the family of the black boy, too.

There was no doubt in my uncle’s mind that my brothers had killed Hadrian Johnson. Or, one of them had killed Hadrian Johnson and the other had assisted. What my aunt thought wasn’t so clear.

Within families, it’s best not to think at all. Just—not at all.

When I’d first come to live with Aunt Irma and Uncle Oscar, Aunt Irma had tried to hug me often in the (mistaken) assumption that because my family had cast me out, and my mother no longer hugged me, or would even speak with me on the phone, a hug from her, my mother’s sister, would be welcomed. And if I didn’t hug back but stood stiffly, holding my breath, eyes downcast, this did not entirely dissuade her. Violet is very shy. Violet is—what’s it called?—“traumatized.”

I cried often. I am ashamed now to recall. As if tears have ever helped anyone. Even Aunt Irma cautioned me, I would make myself sick if I cried so often, and so hard.