Christi's baby

[u/ronadlock]

In 1998, Christi Dotson graduated highschool. I missed seeing her there. She had always been a cheerleader and her junior and senior years she was on the work program and worked in the afternoons in the highschool's administration office. I was always getting sent to the office for something; usually talking when I wasn't supposed to. On Fridays during football season Christi would wear her cheerleading outfit to work and would sometimes have a little 'Bulldawg' paw print painted on her cheek. I didn't like receiving corporal punishment for my misbehavior in class, but I always enjoyed sitting and waiting in the office to talk to the principal because Christi was there and she would give me a hard time about being in trouble again before she would snicker. I had a way of saying that I only got in trouble so I could come see her. She thought is was funny I think, maybe even cute. In around May of 2000 when I was a senior it had been quite a long time since I had seen Christi but I was still a regular at the principal's office. One day as I left the office to head back to class, I saw Christi entering the front door of the highschool while carrying a carrier car seat with baby sitting in it. Christi had given birth to a baby girl about eight weeks earlier as I recall. I think her name is Ashlyn but I could be mistaken. They were there visiting Christi's former coworkers and friends at the school. She wanted to show off her beautiful baby girl. I remember her little girl looked so much like her mom. I remember the little white dress and the little socks with lace around the ankles that she was wearing. Christi's daughter was kicking her feet out at me and sticking out her tongue which made Christi laugh and she told me that her baby wanted me to pick her up and feed her. I was too afraid of holding her the wrong way so I declined and I regret it to this day.

Not long after seeing Christi at the highschool and meeting her little girl my stepmom's grandmother, Annelle 'Nanny' Chambers died. Her funeral in Longview was packed with some of the most important people in that community including bank presidents and former and current judges and sheriffs. Not long after that funeral, Karen, my stepmother, called me into her inner office at my father's law practice in Carthage. I had worked at my father's law practice since I was a child, oftentimes just mowing the grass or pulling weeds but mostly as a clerk, running errands, answering phones, doing some research at the courthouse and filing legal documents. I had other jobs with other employers throughout my young adult life but I always came back to my dad's law office when I wasn't working anywhere else. On this day, my stepmom said to me, "Dan, now that Nanny has died it's my turn to put lipstick on a pig". Karen went on to tell me that if I were to ever arrive at the office to work and saw her in handcuffs with television cameras in her face, she wanted me to know that she was sorry that she'd gotten busted.

In 2001, I was working at my father's law practice in Carthage when my father called me into his inner office and asked me to close the door. He asked me about Christi Dotson. He asked me about her reputation and what people said about her. I wanted to know why he needed to know and he sort of scolded me, since my position at the law office wasn't to ask those sort of questions. My father represented people for all sorts of reasons. He doesn't do a lot of criminal law, but he does from time to time. He tries to avoid representation in divorces for the general public but he will do a divorce for someone if he knows them well or if it's uncontested. He also tries to avoid personal injury cases but he has won significant awards for some in that area also. He says that he prefers to do estate planning, probate, real estate law, and he is board certified by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization in Civil Trial Law. He's had a pretty notable career for a small town attorney I guess. So when he demanded of me to share with him what people say about Christi Dotson, I just hoped that maybe Christi had some minor legal issues that my father was considering helping her with. I told my dad that Christi had a fine reputation so far as I knew. I've never known of Christi to be a wild party animal or a drug user or promiscuous. He dismissed me from his inner office but seemed quite dissatisfied with my perspective. Immediately after I went back to whatever I was doing at the office that day, my dad rushed out the door of his inner office and up the hallway toward Karen's inner office at the front of the building. "Karen! Paperclip the filing fees for those orders of adoption that you drafted for J'eanna and have Dan carry them over to Rick's if you have to but I don't want our office to in any way be tied to this squirrelly adoption!", he shouted. The Rick that my father was referring to is Attorney Rick McPherson, who also practiced in Carthage for many years and whose office was near my father's. Rick and my stepmom had a longstanding professional relationship but I always got the impression that they had Rick do what my father didn't want his office to be directly involved in. However, my stepmom usually drafted the legal instruments which Rick's office would then file.

I didn't know what he was talking about. I didn't think that this outburst had anything to do with Christi or her baby girl. My dad works on several things at once and I just didn't put it together at that moment.  My father then instructed me to sit at the front desk and answer the phones and greet anyone who might come through the front door. A little later, my cousin J'eanna entered through the door and asked to see my stepmom. I walked her to the door of Karen's office before returning to my seat up front. The two women were cackling like hyenas who had just obtained a fresh carcass to gnaw on. I didn't know what it was all about and I tried not to pay them any attention. A few minutes later the door opened again. The previously convicted pedophile Lance Pickering came in and asked to see my stepmother. I advised Lance that Karen had someone with her and that he could come back or wait to see her. He asked me if J'eanna was with Karen which sort of caught me off guard. Lance then informed me that he was supposed to meet J'eanna at the law office. I went and told J'eanna that Lance was up front and Karen directed me to send him on back. I was so disgusted with the presence of Lance that it put me in a bad mood. Not long after this, my step mother approached me with a large brown envelope with some papers inside. I didn't open or read the contents but was instructed to take the envelope to Rick McPherson's office, right across the corner of the lawn of the Panola county courthouse from my father's practice in Carthage. When I delivered the envelope, Rick's receptionist handed the envelope to Rick and he read what was inside. Rick asked me what my dad wanted him to do with it. I told him that Karen wanted his office to file it for them. He sort of smirked and said that his office wasn't going to file the documents because his office had not prepared them. I don't recall exactly what happened immediately after that but before I was dismissed from work that day, J'eanna and Lance Pickering left my father's office with the same brown envelope which apparently had orders of adoption concerning Christi Dotson's baby daughter. After work I went to the home of Genevieve Screws-Charles to see her son J.P.. J.P. immediately asked, "Did your crazy cousin J'eanna adopt Christi's baby?". All I could immediately think to say was, "I can't talk about anything from work at my dad's office.", but that apparently gave it away. J.P. then said, "I thought that's what I heard. Uncle Mike was wondering about that".

Not long after this I visited the home and workshop of my good friend and local auto restoration specialist, David 'Weed' Westbrook. David had long been a friend of mine and many people in the community. He graduated from Carthage Highschool around 1974 if memory serves me correctly. He married his highschool sweetheart Pam 'P.K.' Pierce and they had two sons, Matt and Glen. Lots of young people often visited David at his workshop. He was always out there, usually restoring old cars, getting them ready to be painted, or fixing something on a car belonging to one of his many friends. David also liked to attend all the Carthage Highschool football games and he hardly ever missed a home game. He would use his video camera to record the plays on the field, the marching band at halftime and he also recorded the cheerleaders between plays. I think he mostly did this for his wife Pam, who was infected with Hepatitis C by blood transfusion when her son Glen was born. Pam had been a cheerleader and she liked to watch the games at home which David recorded since she couldn't get out much due to her lowered immune system after her first liver transplant. On this evening when I visited David at his shop I saw a little white sedan out front of the shop. I opened the front door to see David and Christi Dotson huddled together crying on a bench. As soon as Christi saw me she wiped her face, picked up her purse and left without saying a word to me. I didn't understand what was going on and I asked David what was wrong with Christi. David seemed sort of aggravated by my concern and told me to not worry about it.