Evelyn didn't flinch. I know. And you're prepared for that? I prepared for that the morning I got on the subway in a wool cap instead of calling a lawyer, Evelyn said. If that was going to stop me, it would have stopped me before I started.
Patricia looked at her for one more long moment. Then she picked up her desk phone. Let me make that call, she said. Marcus sat in the chair against the wall while Patricia spoke in low rapid precise language into the phone and he felt something he hadn't felt in 5 years. Something so unfamiliar that it took him almost the full length of the phone call to identify it.
It wasn't hope exactly. It was more specific than hope. It was the feeling of being in a room where something was finally being handled correctly. Where the right people were finally looking at the right thing. Where his name Marcus Carter was being spoken in a context that wasn't conduct violation or troublemaker or prior porn flag do not process.
Where the thing he had seen and documented and been destroyed for documenting was finally 5 years too late being seen by someone with the authority to do something about it. Patricia hung up the phone. She looked at them both. We have a meeting at 2:00 this afternoon with the Deputy Inspector General for the Southeast region, she said. You'll need to bring the drive.
Evelyn nodded. I'll be there. Patricia looked at Marcus. You too. They'll want your testimony.
What you witnessed from the inside, the documentation you compiled, the termination, the housing application denials. All of it. Marcus nodded once. I'll be there. Good.
Patricia stood up. Go get lunch. Get your heads right. Be back here at 1:30. She looked at Evelyn one more time.
And Ms. Brooks, yes? Go back to your office this morning. Attend your 10:00. Have your 11:00.
Be Gerald Pruitt's boss for the next 3 hours like nothing in the world has changed. Can you do that? Evelyn picked up her bag. I ran a $4 billion company for 11 years, she said. I can have a normal morning.