On the morning of the first day of September, Paul watched Tyler walk into his office. Skinny, looked innocent, not the type of kids that would usually come to him for his services, first thing he did when he sat across from him was pick up the little plastic doll sitting on his deck that he got from a little girl years ago.
"Welcome… how are you?' Paul had asked him.
"I'm fine sir, good morning, hope you had a good night rest." Tyler replied.
"Yes I did, how about you?"
"Mine was really good,"
"So, what is your name, and what can I do for you?" Paul had asked and Tyler took one last look at the doll then he dropped the doll back on the table and turned his gaze to Paul.
"You're Paul Goodman right?" Tyler asked
"Yes I am, what is your own name?"
"My name is Tyler Robson and I want to hire you as my attorney."
"Why would a young man like you need an attorney?"
"Do I need a reason before I decide to get a lawyer for myself?"
"Usually, you do not..." Paul paused for a bit, he knew the only reason people hire a lawyer like him is because they want to get out of trouble, or they were about to get into trouble and they needed someone that will help him get out. Now, it was hard to tell which category Tyler would fall into, but he didn't look like someone that will go looking for trouble, yet, as someone that has spent years on that line of work he knew that appearance can be very deceiving too. Besides, his biggest client was an innocent looking drug dealer that became a menace. Thanks to this drug dealer, he was sent him to prison and was almost permanently disbarred.
"See what will happen here Tyler", Paul continued, "You will pay me an upfront fee of two hundred dollars, then, once we have established that you are my client. And then, you can tell me whatever you it is that really brought you here, because you will be covered by the attorney-client privilege. That means that whatever you tell me, I am not allowed to say a word of it to another soul because you are now my client." A good ploy by Paul, once Tyler paid and told him whatever messed up activity he was involved in, Paul planned to simply refund the money back to him and decline working for him. He wasn't ready to be roped into another crazy scandal, the last one almost cost him his life.
"Okay," Tyler dipped his hand and brought out a bundle of cash, a couple of twenties and handed it to Paul.
Paul carefully counted the money, it was three hundred and fifty dollars, he then took out one fifty, opened his table's drawer and dropped the two hundred into it.
"You can keep all of it," Tyler said standing up.
"No, what I take is just 200," Paul replied stretching out his hand for Tyler to take the one fifty in his hand.
"I might incur some bill in the future, settle it with that," Tyler turned and headed for the door, and Paul rose to his feet too.
"Where are you going to? You are under attorney client privilege, you can tell me anything you want…"
"Goodbye Mr Paul Goodman, we will meet again soon" Tyler stepped out and closed the door behind him.
A week went by, and there was no message from Tyler, he didn't show up again after that. Every time Paul opened his drawer and saw that money, his heart got heavy. He didn't know why something inside him kept telling him that the boy was trouble, to the point that he started to lose sleep over this exchange. More than a week later, news broke that a certain right wing political commentator was assassinated at a university in Utah. Paul didn't know the man personally, heck that was the first time he even heard of the guy because of the heavy media coverage. The president spoke about it, the vice president, and every single right and left wing politician was talking about him, how he was such a great man, a good Christian and a wonderful husband and father.
Paul said his silent prayer for the guy, no one deserved to die like that in front of their family. Few days later, the president announced that the assassin has been found. A 22 years old Tyler Robson, turned in by his own father. The name sounded so familiar but he couldn't place exactly where he'd heard the name before so he shrugged it off. As he got to his office to start his activity for the day, he opened the drawer in his office table to see that three hundred and fifty dollars Tyler gave him, sitting there and looking back at him.
"No fucking way," was the words that words that slipped right out of his mouth. Instantly, he took out his phone and typed in the name 'Tyler Robson' in Google. The search result came in, and the first picture looking right back at him was the same kid that sat right opposite of him few weeks ago. He sat, silent for a few minutes. Going from helping a drug dealer to helping an assassin that half the country including the president and vice president, he found his palms holding and ruffling his hair. Was he somehow cursed by his deceased brother? Why was he always drawn to the center of crime? He wanted went to that public law school because he wanted to help those that couldn't afford to help themselves, but all he actually did was help bad people.
"Sir?"
Tyler's voice brought Paul back to the present, inside the police station, he looked at Tyler who was already looking back at him.
"Are you okay?" Tyler asked, "You blacked out for a moment there,"
"I'm fine, do not worry… what did you ask me?"
"I wasn't sure you were going to come again,"
"Getting access to you was made almost impossible by the FBI, I had to pull all the strings and pay everyone I knew so I could be able to get here today," he opened the briefcase, and took out packs of white A4 paper, then he took out two blue pens, "how are you doing kid?"
"I'm okay, what is it like outside?" Tyler walked to chair and sat
"It is really chaotic out there, half of the world likes you, and the other half wants you dead. But at least the memes have been really funny."