The Walls Stay Silent

If walls could talk, why didn’t anyone hear them? On that day, that fateful day when your life changed forever, nobody heard a sound.

The walls of your home stayed silent as they watched the metal blade pierce your wife’s chest. They didn’t utter a word as she fell to the floor, her life blood spilling onto the cold linoleum tile, and they offered no explanation as to what happened in that room on that day.

When the police arrived, they found you there, leaning over your wife’s lifeless body, a bloodied knife in your hand. They heard your pathetic cries of innocence. They wrestled you to the ground when you tried to escape through the still opened door, then slapped you in cuffs and read your rights - as they should have.

The police interviewed your neighbours, who told them about the fights you had. The neighbours heard the shouts coming from your home. They heard the crashes of objects thrown against walls, and they were witness to you slamming the doors on your way out, still screaming at her from the driveway.

The neighbours saw you get in your car and heard the screeching tires as you carelessly sped away, nearly hitting a pedestrian on the sidewalk. They screamed at you from their doorsteps. Then they saw you return later and heard the banging and crashing and shouting start all over again.

Five days later, your wife was dead, and life as you knew it was over.

Of course, you claimed innocence, but nobody believed you. Why should they have? You were caught red-handed. Literally. Hanging over your wife’s body, your hands covered in blood.

You said you found her there, on the kitchen floor, when you came home, and that you picked up the knife in shock. Again, nobody believed you.

The neighbours testified against you. They told of the fights they heard. They told of you, in your car, speeding away from your house, not just on the day of the big fight, but on the very day of your wife’s murder as well. You swore it wasn’t you in that car but, come on. You didn’t really expect anyone to believe that did you?

You testified that you were late arriving home because you got a flat tire on the highway. You told the court you got out on the side of the road to fix it, but you had no witnesses. Police even asked the public to check their dash cams, but no one came forward to support your claim.

You had no alibi.

*

Even your only daughter, Melanie, testified against you.

She informed the court what happened between you and her mother. She told them that you found texts on your wife’s phone from her lover, that you had a huge fight and stormed out. Your daughter told them how angry she was with her mom when she heard the news, and how she defended you.

She defended you; the kind, loving dad who helped raise her. The dad who happily watched her favourite cartoons and played with her dolls; the dad who joined her for mini tea parties and allowed her to make up your face.

The same dad who never missed a soccer practice, or a school Christmas concert; the one who kissed better her cuts and boo-boos as a child and, later, held her while she cried over the boy who broke her heart.

You see that day when you inadvertently found those texts on her phone and stormed out, your wife called your daughter and told her the truth. Your daughter was furious. While you were driving in your car, trying desperately to get those “I love you, can’t wait to see you again” messages out of your head, Melanie was giving her mom hell.

She didn’t want to hear her mother’s excuses. She didn’t care how lonely and neglected she felt and had no interest in soothing her cries. She told your wife she hated her, then hung up. Melanie defended you. She loved you and she believed in you with every fiber of her being.

Until you murdered her mother.

Melanie was devasted when she heard of her mom’s death, and even more so that you were the prime suspect. She didn’t believe it at first, still stood by your side, but as the evidence began to mount, doubt crept in. The more testimony she heard, the less confident she became in your innocence, until eventually she had no faith left. You were guilty. How could she believe anything else?

When she came to visit you at the county jail after your arrest, the look on her face displayed her love and belief in you. When she saw you before your transfer to the prison, that look was gone, replaced by a heart-numbing hatred. You could see the difference when you looked in her eyes.

You could tell she was angry, not just with you but with herself. The last time she spoke with her mother was that phone call when she found out about the affair. The last words she said to her mother were “I hate you.” She didn’t mean it of course. They were just words said in anger, but she would never have a chance to say she was sorry.

Five days later, her mom was dead.

Melanie was heartbroken. She blamed you and didn’t hesitate to let you know. Your daughter didn’t need to tell you though, you could see it in her eyes. You wanted to soothe her, but you couldn’t. She wouldn’t let you.

She wanted nothing to do with you, said you were dead to her. The father who played with her dolls was gone. The dad who soothed her teenage heart was no more. The hero she looked up to, the finest man she’d ever known, no longer existed - replaced by the monster who murdered her mother.

That day at the courthouse was the last time you saw your daughter. You’ve been here six months and Melanie has never visited. You called her on the phone several times, but the one time she answered, she asked you to not to call again.

Could you blame her? Her entire world was turned upside down and shredded by a butcher knife. How could she be anything but bitter? It’s a tragic situation.

As is the situation you now find yourself in, Andrew. Such a tragedy, indeed.

I remember hearing of your testimony from the courthouse. The prosecutor had you on the stand, hammering you with questions in an attempt to have you admit your guilt. You wouldn’t give in, still insisting you were innocent. He kept barking at you about all the evidence they had against you, but you stood your ground, swore you and your wife had reconciled and agreed to work through her affair. You insisted you weren’t there when she was murdered and insinuated you may have been set up by her lover.

The prosecutor all but laughed at your response, demanding you tell him if you had any witnesses that could vouch for you on that day. Of course, you didn’t because, as you told him, “The walls can’t talk.”

*

Well, my friend, I’m here to tell you differently. Walls can talk. Unfortunately for you, we only listen to each other. That’s how I know, as you lay on your iron cot between my walls in this eight by ten-foot cell, that you are an innocent man.

I only wish I had a way of letting you know what I know. I long for a way of telling you that you’re not alone, that there is someone who believes in you. More than anything, I wish I had a way of speaking the truth, your truth.

You weren’t lying about your innocence, not to the police and not in the courtroom. You did stop to fix a flat tire that day, and you did find your wife’s body on the kitchen floor when you arrived at your home. You weren’t lying about you and your wife reconciling either.

On the night you found those texts, you were hurt and angry. You did shout and scream. You did tip over a chair and throw a glass vase against the wall, and you did storm out. When you came back, the screaming and shouting started all over again and only stopped when you packed your overnight bag and went to the motel.

All of that is true, just as the neighbours said. What the neighbours don’t know is that after three days of fighting, with you insisting you were never coming home, your wife convinced you to stay. She apologized over and over, she begged you for forgiveness. She swore she would end the affair and that you were her one true love.

You weren’t ready to forgive her, but you weren’t ready to end your marriage of twenty-five years either, at least not without giving it another try. You knew it wouldn’t be easy, but you were willing to make the effort. For the sake of all you had built together, for the sake of your daughter, but mostly because you still loved your wife despite your broken heart, you agreed to try again.

True to her word, your wife ended her affair. She told her lover the relationship was over, and that she would never see him again. She told him that she still loved you and wanted to make your marriage work.

He didn’t want to let her go. He grabbed her arm and refused let her leave the hotel where she met him. When she broke free and rushed to the door, he threw her against a wall. She kneed him in the groin and ran before he had a chance to recover.

That was two days before her murder. He never stopped calling, begging her to meet him again. When she refused, he threatened her. He even threatened you when you took the phone and shouted at him. You told the police about that after your wife’s death, but after a brief interview they ruled him out as a suspect.

But you know all that, don’t you? What you don’t know is the truth of what happened that day. You were right to assume you were set up by your wife’s lover because you were.

After you took the phone from your wife and shouted at him, he hated you. He heard her over and over tell him she was done with him. He couldn’t convince her to stay and refused to accept that she had chosen you. Especially after you called him a fucking stalker and threatened to call the police.

He wasn’t going to let her get away with it. He wasn’t going to let you get away with it either.

He was there in your neighbourhood on the day of your wife’s murder, parked just up the street from your house. He watched you in the morning when you left for work. He took pictures of you before you got in your car, and more pictures of the car itself when you left, then he followed you to your office to watch where you parked.

That’s when he put his sinister plan into action. He bought clothes similar to those you were wearing and rented a car the same colour, make and model as yours, knowing people don’t really pay much attention to details.

He waited until mid-afternoon, before rush-hour, then he went to your work and stuck a nail in your tire. After that, he made his way to your home knowing you would be delayed with the flat. It was a stroke of luck on his part that your car wasn’t seen on any traffic cameras.

I am sorry to tell you, but your wife never had a chance. He went to your home, knocked on the door and wouldn’t leave until she spoke with him. He begged her to let him in, and when she refused, he pushed his way past her.

He followed her into the kitchen, and when she picked up her phone and threatened to call police, he grabbed the knife from the butcher block.

*

That’s the whole truth my friend. I won’t torture you with what comes next. You already know the ending. You’re still living it. I just wanted you to know that I believe you, even though you can’t hear me and even though there’s nothing I can do to soothe you.

I wish you could hear me, though. I wish you knew there was someone on your side, someone who weeps for you just as the walls of your home wept for your wife. I heard their cries, just like I hear yours when you lay on your cot at night.

I hear the cries in your daughter’s home as well, knowing that not only has she lost her mother, but also her father. She lost you because of shameful lies and it’s not fair. It’s not fair that your daughter believes you to be a monster when the real villain is sitting in a bar drowning his thoughts in bourbon.

The walls of that bar are screaming tonight, yearning to set themselves ablaze. Unfortunately, no one hears their silent screams, and no one sees the fire of hatred from the demon sitting on the barstool smugly sipping his drink. I believe those walls would collapse on top on him if they had the power to, sending him to the crushing hell he deserves, leaving nothing but truth in the ashes.

Just as I believe that one day the walls in the halls of justice will find a way to speak the truth, not just for you but for every unjustly convicted person. I know they wish the same. They would tell their stories if they were capable of being heard. They would shout their truth to the heavens, even if it meant they had to tear themselves apart to do so.

I would do the same for you, my friend, if I could. Unfortunately, for now at least, nobody hears the truths we walls speak. So all I can do for you is try my best to keep you safe while you lay here, within my walls, and hope that one day the truth will prevail and you will be set free.