We discussed bills, leave, and what the next months would require. Accountability had ordinary consequences before it became a lesson anyone could quote.
I slept badly that night.
The following morning, I woke at my usual time and found nowhere official to be.
For fifteen years, a uniform made the shape of my day clear.
Without it, I had to sit with the parts of the job I had called someone else's problem.
Judge North made the boundaries clear before the jury heard the case.
The person harmed held a significant judicial office. That fact mattered to parts of the case and to the events that followed. It did not entitle the prosecution to a verdict or deprive Gavin of a defense.
The court would consider admissible evidence, apply the relevant standards, and protect a fair proceeding.
The public appetite for a reversal outside the courthouse was not one of those standards.
I waited to testify in a room down the hall.
Paul had helped me understand the difference between preparation and rehearsing an account until it sounded too smooth. I reviewed the records I was authorized to review and marked the places where memory and later observation were different.
I did not meet with other witnesses to compare recollections.
When I saw Malcolm Foster near the corridor, we exchanged a nod and continued separately.
Before going through courthouse screening, I had waited behind a woman carrying a file box tied with string. She asked a security employee whether she could bring it inside.
He checked the procedure and explained what would happen to the contents during screening.
She thanked him twice, plainly relieved to know what the rule required.
The exchange took less than a minute.
I noticed because the answer did not begin with a judgment about why she should already know it.
Inside the waiting room, a witness coordinator explained the arrangements. There might be delays. Testimony could take longer than expected. If I needed clarification, I should ask rather than pretend I understood.
For fifteen years, I delivered instructions to people waiting in unfamiliar buildings. I seldom considered how much energy they spent trying not to make another mistake.
The coordinator gave me a place to put my bag and a contact for practical questions.
That did not make testifying easy.
It prevented unnecessary uncertainty from adding to the difficulty.
When Paul arrived, he asked whether I had everything I needed. I said yes, then checked the notice again to confirm the time.
He waited without commenting.
I remembered Gavin treating a repeated question as a challenge and understood how ordinary anxiety could look like obstruction to someone unwilling to recognize it.
Then a court employee called us toward the corridor. The woman with the file box passed with her papers cleared for entry.
Nobody had needed to raise a voice.
Outside, reporters asked whether I feared losing friends in the department.
I declined to discuss testimony.
The question followed me anyway.
I had already lost the easy version of several friendships. Some people considered my account a betrayal. Others wanted me to become a spokesman for everything they disliked about the chief.
Neither role would make my evidence more accurate.
Inside the courtroom, Gavin wore a dark suit. He looked younger than he had in uniform and more frightened than he ever allowed a civilian to see.
I felt sympathy.
Then I remembered the judge's hand at her cheek and refused to confuse sympathy with an instruction about the facts.
The prosecution presented the approach recordings before the dramatic moment at the steps. The jury heard the offer of identification, the request to call inside, and my instruction to wait.
The defense challenged how those details should be understood under the conditions of the assignment.
Witnesses described the entrance procedures. The city perimeter role did not require Gavin to physically prevent someone from presenting credentials to the federal detail.
The security briefing available that morning identified who could answer access questions.
Gavin had acknowledged receiving it.
That did not prove he remembered every line under stress. It did undermine the suggestion that calling someone inside was an impractical request invented afterward.
The courtroom monitor displayed the relevant section.
Ask the entrance detail to verify authorization.
A simple instruction.
The kind I had expected him to follow without standing close enough to ensure it.
When my name was called, I walked past the defense table and took the oath.
I did not look for the judge's approval.