“I don’t understand why he couldn’t come to us,” I mutter.

“Because he’s not on our side,” my mother says.

The way competency works is this:

1. The State of Vermont hires a psychiatrist who will interview me and tell the judge everything the DA wants to hear.

2. My lawyer will counter this with Dr. Moon, my own psychiatrist, who will tell the judge everything Oliver Bond wants to hear.

Frankly, I don’t see the point, since we all know this is how it’s going to shake out, anyway.

Dr. Martin Cohn’s office is not as nice as Dr. Moon’s. Dr. Moon decorates in shades of blue, which have been proven to enhance relaxation. Dr. Martin Cohn decorates in industrial gray. His secretary’s desk looks like the one my math teacher uses. “Can I help you?” she asks.

My mother steps forward. “Jacob Hunt is here to see Dr. Cohn.”

“You can go right in.” She points to another doorway.

Dr. Moon has that, too. You go into her office through one door and exit through the other, so that no one who’s waiting will see you. I know it’s supposed to be about privacy, but if you ask me, it’s like the psychiatrists themselves are buying into that stupid belief that therapy is something to hide.

I put my hand on the doorknob and take a deep breath. This time you’re coming back, I promise myself.

A joke:

A guy is flying in a hot-air balloon and he’s lost. He lowers himself over a cornfield and calls out to a woman. “Can you tell me where I am and where I’m headed?”

“Sure,” this woman says. “You are at 41 degrees, 2 minutes, and 14 seconds north, 144 degrees, 4 minutes, 19 seconds east; you’re at an altitude of 762 meters above sea level, and right now you’re hovering, but you were on a vector of 234 degrees at 12 meters per second.”

“Amazing! Thanks! By the way, do you have Asperger’s syndrome?”

“I do!” the woman replies. “How did you know?”

“Because everything you said is true, it’s much more detail than I need, and you told me in a way that’s of no use to me at all.”

The woman frowns. “Huh. Are you a psychiatrist?”

“I am,” the man says. “But how the heck could you tell?”

“You don’t know where you are. You don’t know where you’re headed. You got where you are by blowing hot air. You put labels on people after asking a few questions, and you’re in exactly the same spot you were in five minutes ago, but now, somehow, it’s my fault!”

Dr. Martin Cohn is smaller than I am and has a beard. He wears glasses without rims, and as soon as I come into the room, he walks toward me. “Hello,” he says. “I’m Dr. Cohn. Take a seat.”

The chairs are metal frames with pleather cushions. One is orange, and that’s totally not happening. The other is gray and has a sunken circle in the middle, as if the cushion has simply given out.

When I was younger and I was asked to take a seat, I’d lift it up. Now I know that it means I am supposed to sit down. There are many statements that do not mean what they say: Mark my words. Hang around. Just a second. Get off my back.

The psychiatrist takes out a pen from his pocket. He sits down, too, and puts his yellow pad on his lap. “What’s your name?”

“Jacob Thomas Hunt,” I say.

“How old are you, Jacob?”

“Eighteen.”

“Do you know why you’re here?”

“Don’t you?”

He writes something down on his paper. “Do you know that you’ve been charged with a crime?”

“Yes. Thirteen VSA, section 2301. Murder committed by means of poison, or by lying in wait, or by willful, deliberate and premeditated killing, or committed in perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate arson, sexual assault, aggravated sexual assault, robbery or burglary, shall be murder in the first degree. All other kinds of murder shall be murder in the second degree.”

I would have thought reciting the entire statute would impress Dr. Cohn, but he doesn’t register any emotion.

Maybe he’s got Asperger’s, too.

“Do you understand whether that’s a major or minor charge, Jacob?”

“It’s a felony that carries a minimum sentence of thirty-five years to life in prison.”

Dr. Cohn looks up over his glasses. “What about probation?” he asks. “Do you know what that is?”

“It’s when you have to check in with a court officer for a certain amount of time,” I say. “You have to follow rules and give reports, you have to have a job, you have to live somewhere where they know your address, you have to stay out of trouble, you have to not drink alcohol…”

“Right,” Dr. Cohn says. “Tell me, Jacob, what should your lawyer focus on in order to defend you?”

I shrug. “My innocence.”

“Do you understand what a plea of guilty or not guilty means?”

“Yes. Guilty means that you admit you committed the crime and that you need to be punished for it. Not guilty means you don’t admit you committed the crime and you don’t think you should be punished for it… but it’s not the same as being innocent, because in our legal system you get found guilty or not guilty. You don’t get found innocent, even if you are, like me.”

Dr. Cohn stares at me. “What’s a plea bargain?”

“When the prosecutor talks to the lawyer and they agree on a sentence, and then they both go before the judge to see if the judge will accept that, too. It means you don’t have to have a trial, because you’ve admitted to the crime by taking the plea.”

These are all easy questions, because the end of every CrimeBusters episode is a trial, where the evidence is relayed to a judge and jury. If I’d known the questions were going to be this simple, I wouldn’t have been so nervous. Instead, I’d been expecting Dr. Cohn to ask me about Jess. About what happened that afternoon.

And of course I couldn’t tell him, which would mean I’d have to lie, and that would be breaking the rules.

“What’s an insanity plea?” Dr. Cohn asks.

“When you claim you’re not guilty because you were dissociated from reality at the time you committed the crime and can’t be held legally responsible for your actions. Like Edward Norton in Primal Fear.”

“Great flick,” the psychiatrist says. “Jacob, if your lawyer thinks you shouldn’t testify, would you agree to that?”

“Why wouldn’t I want to testify? I’m going to tell the truth.”

“When can you speak out in the courtroom?”

“I can’t. My lawyer told me not to talk to anyone.”

“What do you think your chances are of being found not guilty?”

“One hundred percent,” I say, “since I didn’t do it.”

“Do you know how strong the case is against you?”

“Obviously not, since I haven’t seen the discovery-”

“You know what discovery is?” Dr. Cohn asks, surprised.

I roll my eyes. “Pursuant to Rule Sixteen of the Vermont Rules of Discovery, Rules of Procedure for the Superior Court, the Prosecution is required to turn over all the evidence they have in the case, including the photographs, documents, statements, physical examinations, and any other material that they intend to use at the trial, and if they don’t turn it over, then I’m allowed to go free.”

“Do you understand the difference between the defense, the prosecution, the judge, the jury, the witnesses…?”

I nod. “The defense is my team-my lawyer and the witnesses and me, because we’re defending me against the crime the prosecution’s charged me with. The judge is the man or woman who has authority over everyone in the courtroom. He runs the trial and listens to the evidence and makes decisions about the law, and the judge I met a few days ago wasn’t very nice and sent me to jail.” I take a breath. “The jury is a group of twelve that listens to the facts and hears the evidence and the arguments of the lawyers and then goes into a room where no one can hear them or see them and they decide the outcome of the case.” As an afterthought I add, “The jury is supposed to be twelve peers, but technically that would mean every single person on the jury should have Asperger’s syndrome, because then they’d really understand me.”