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Up From Here	By : aliciakristine Category: Singers/Bands/Musicians > Eminem/Marshall Mathers Views: 3454 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. I do not know Eminem (Marshall Mathers). I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 15
- 16
- 17
Author's Note: I don't know much about
the type of custody battle that's fought in a court room (fortunately, I've
never been involved in one quite so complicated), so a lot of this is total
imagination. If it falls far short of reality, forgive me, as I'm too engrossed
in the plot to do in-depth research on the topic. With that said, I'll make
every attempt possible to ensure it's as realistic as possible. (I don't like
reading stories that are so completely unbelievable that it draws away from the
actual content, and I'm sure none of you do, either). Thank you all so much for
your reviews. They're appreciated more than you'll ever imagine!

16.

To say Tara was nervous would be an
understatement. She and Marshall flew into Boston early Tuesday morning. Tara
was so preoccupied and anxious that she could hardly enjoy the first-class
plane seats or the elegant suite Marshall rented for three nights in one of
Boston's most upscale hotels. They spent most of Tuesday afternoon in a small
conference room that the hotel provided with their attorneys, who had flown in
the day before along with four paralegals, going over their arguments one last
time.

Afterwards, Tara and Marshall went shopping.
Marshall bought a dark charcoal suit for himself, and after more than an hour,
Tara finally settled on a black pinstriped pantsuit with a cream-colored silk
blouse for her to wear. Marshall already had dress shoes, but Tara bought some,
cream-colored high-heeled pumps to match her blouse. She made an appointment to
have her hair done early the next morning, and Marshall treated her to a
manicure that night. It seemed so silly, to make herself look so done-up just
to get her son back, but the lawyers and Marshall all insisted that appearances
played a bigger part in things that anyone was going to admit.

Around eight o'clock that night, they found
themselves with nothing to do. "Why don't you call Rob?" Marshall
finally asked.

"And say what?"

"I don't know, that you're in town, that
you'd like to see Cameron no matter how the judge rules."

"I don't know, Marshall..."

"What, you want me to do it? I'd like to
meet the kid, you know, whether we get custody of him or not."

He had to argue with her a little more, but he
finally convinced her to call him.

Penelope, Rob's wife, answered the phone. Tara
hadn't talked to the woman in years, and hearing her nasally New England voice
brought back a flood of painful memories that Tara didn't know whether or not
she could bear. She cleared her throat. "Hi, Penelope. This is... This is
Tara, Cameron's mom. Is Rob around?"

Penelope sniffed. "How dare you call my house?"

"I... I'm sorry, I just want to talk to Rob
for a minute."

"What are you thinking, snatching a little
boy from the only life he's ever known."

"He was snatched from me, Penelope, and I
was the only life he had known." Her voice trembled, and Marshall pulled
her against him. "Please, may I speak to Rob?"

"Hang on," Penelope said in disgust,
and the line went silent. For a second, Tara thought she'd hung up on her, but
then another extension picked up.

"What?" Rob asked.

Tara swallowed. "Hi, Rob. It's Tara."

"I know who it is. What do you want?"

She had expected his animosity, but it still
hurt. "I... I wanted to make sure you knew that this wasn't anything
personal to you. I just... Cameron's our son, Rob, and we-"

"You what? You decided it's finally time for
you to step in and claim responsibility, after I've fed and clothed and
provided for him these last nine years?"

"I wasn't capable of doing that before, Rob,
and you know it. You made sure of it."

"Meaning what, that I didn't agree to pay
you thousands of dollars a month in alimony just because I was unfortunate
enough to marry you?"

Marshall, close enough to hear both sides of the
conversation, reached for the phone, but Tara shook her head at him. "That
isn't fair, Rob. Unfortunate enough? You begged me to go."

"You lied to me about being Cameron's
biological father. How do you think I felt when he came out of you with blue
eyes and blonde hair? It didn't come from me, did it? And it sure didn't come
from you."

"I didn't know who the father was, Rob, and
why would I have sacrificed my marriage when you accepted him without question?
I was going to tell you, but I was a coward. I didn't want to lose what I
had."

"You lost it anyway, didn't you?" he
sneered.

"I did lose it. But I want it back. At least
a part of it. And think of Marshall, Rob! He's never had a chance to so much as
meet his son, do you think that's fair? Of course it's not your fault, but it
isn't his either. Doesn't he deserve a chance to know his own son?"

"He didn't care before, did he?"

"He didn't know before, Rob. He
didn't find out until last month."

Rob was silent for a long moment. "And he's
still putting up with you?"

She felt as though she'd been slapped, but she
tried to keep the hurt from her voice. "If that's what you'd call
it."

"Is he there with you now?"

"Yes. He's right here."

"What a fool."

Marshall took the phone without asking that time,
and Tara went into the bathroom to keep from hearing the conversation. She
threw up violently, then went and lay down beside Marshall silently. Neither of
them spoke until morning.

Tara went and had her hair cut and styled early
the next morning while Marshall met one last time with his lawyers. She felt
like royalty, being whisked around in a black limousine, but she was unbearably
lonely by herself in the back of the car. The stylist knew exactly what she was
doing. Tara could barely recognize herself in the mirror. After a make-up
artist had shown up (Marshall had arranged for her to come without telling
Tara) and worked her magic and the hairstylist had finished with her hair, she
was spun around to face the mirror.

She looked amazing. Her eyes had always been
almond-shaped, but now they were pronounced. Smokey makeup around her eyes set
off the color, and tiny individual false lashes around the corners of her eyes
made them look wider. Her lips were stained a pale red color, not too flashy,
but enough to bring attention to her smile. She looked strong, intelligent, and
independent. She could scarcely recognize herself. Where was the waitress from
Boston, where was the railroad girl from Detroit?

Her hair was straightened and pulled back in a
tight twist. A few wisps were left loose around her face, not so much that she
looked like a teenage girl on prom night, but enough to frame her face and make
it look thinner. After she'd changed into her pantsuit, she looked at herself
in the mirror again and nearly laughed out loud. "If only you could see me
now, Mama," she whispered.

The limo took her back to the hotel, where she
met Marshall. His jaw dropped when he saw her, then curled in an appreciative
smile. "Damn," he said. "Where'd you come from?"

She slapped his arm, but she felt as beautiful as
she looked.

They rode to the courthouse in the limo with Bill
Tolbert and his paralegal. The other lawyers followed behind them in another chauffeured
limousine, and they all stepped out in front of the courthouse at the same
time.

Tara saw him before he saw her, and she pressed a
fist to her mouth to keep from choking. Marshall and Bill Tolbert were talking
quietly with the other attorneys, and she stood apart from them, gaping across
the courtyard. Rob was standing with two other men she assumed to be lawyers,
and off to the side, looking over at her, was Cameron.

Their eyes met, and she lifted one hand in a shy
wave. He waved back.

He was absolutely breathtaking. Even from a
distance, she could see Marshall in him. His hair was dark blonde and thick,
combed neatly. He wore a button-down shirt the color of olives tucked into
khaki pants. Penelope does a good job of dressing him, Tara thought. She
couldn't see the color of his eyes from so far away, but she knew that they
would be startlingly blue.

She went towards him without thinking. Her entire
body ached for him, and she was halfway across the courtyard before Marshall
realized what was going on. He looked up and felt himself freeze. He felt like
he was looking at a miniature of himself. Bill had to gently push him away
before he was able to start walking towards him.

Rob looked up sharply when Tara came to him, and
he reached out to hold Cameron back. "Don't you look," he said,
menace in his eyes, "different."

She bit back a scathing remark and looked at her
son instead. "Hi, Cameron. Do you remember me?"

He nodded shyly. "You're my first mom."

She smiled. "Yes. You've gotten so
big." There were tears in her eyes, but she made no move to wipe them
away. This was her son, her flesh and blood, her Cameron.
She wanted to lift him up into her arms and hold him against her breast, but he
was much too big. At only nine years old, he already stood to her elbow.

She felt Marshall's hands on her arm, and she
turned to look at him. "This is Cameron," she said, but it wasn't
necessary. Marshall knew exactly who he was.

"Hi," he said.

Cameron smiled at him, still so shy! But he said
nothing.

"I'm Marshall," he said.

Cameron nodded. "I know who you are,"
he said. "You're Eminem. I have your CD."

Marshall elbowed Tara in the ribs. "Told you
so," he said to her, and then grinned at Cameron. "She didn't think
you were allowed to listen to my music."

"After today, he isn't," Rob said.
"Come on, Cameron."

Marshall looked up, eyes flashing. "This is
the first time I've ever laid eyes on the kid," he said. "Can't I
talk to him for a minute?"

"No," Rob snapped. "You
can't."

Marshall's fists clenched, but Tara put a hand on
his chest. "Behave, Marshall," she said quietly, not taking her eyes
off o the little boy following Rob into the building. "It isn't the time
or the place."

"I'd really like to knock that cocky son of
a bitch out."

"You think I don't? Come on, let's go
inside."

Any other day, Tara would have stopped to admire
the inside of the courthouse. Arched ceilings rose to peaks above crystal
chandeliers, and everything gleamed. The wooden benches gleamed, the wooden
doors gleamed, the marble floors gleamed - but they were rushed into the
courtroom by members of Marshall's security team. Reporters and fans had
already crowded the main lobby, and as soon as Tara and Marshall came inside,
an explosion of camera flashes hit them. Tara ducked her face into Marshall's
arm, terrified. Everyone was yelling and screaming their names. Their voices
echoed off of the high ceiling, and they all sounded maddened, insane.

Marshall's security formed a tight circle around
them and pushed through the crowd. Tara kept her face down and squeezed
Marshall's hand for dear life. "What's going on?" she yelled at him
through the chaos.

"I warned you," he said, gritting his
teeth.

They finally burst into the courtroom, and an
armed police officer pushed the door shut behind them. "Thanks,
guys," Marshall muttered to the security guards. "Call me a fucking
idiot, but I didn't expect it to be so bad."

"It's the most exciting thing that's
happened around here in a long time," an unfamiliar voice said, and
everyone turned to face a man in a nondescript brown suit. A press badge hung
from a lanyard around his neck, and Marshall had to fight off the urge to punch
him in the face.

"Bone," he said to the security guard
nearest him. "Get this motherfucker out of here."

They took their seats at tables on either side of
the court room. Cameron was taken out of the room by another uniformed police
officer. Tara's heart pounded. She sat down in her wooden chair, licking her
lips, wishing she had something to drink. As though reading her mind, a
paralegal leaned forward and quietly asked if they'd like anything to drink.
"Yes," Tara said. "Thank you so much. If you can find one, I'd
really like a bottle of water."

"Of course," he said. "And you,
Mr. Mathers?"

He waved the paralegal off, shaking his head. He
was already deep in conversation with Bill Tolbert, their heads bowed over an
open file folder. A thick stack of papers sat inside of it, and they paged
through them. Bill circled parts of words in red ink and set those pages to the
side; the others stayed in the stack. Tara wondered what they were doing, but
she was too flustered to pay attention to anything.

The clock said it was 9:05. They had a
twenty-five minute wait ahead of them. She thought she would die in the meantime.

The paralegal came back with a cold bottle of
Fuji water. She gulped down a fourth of the bottle greedily before thinking to
say thank-you, but the paralegal only flushed and nodded. Marshall tapped her
on the shoulder. "Listen, Tara, we're going over things one more time. You
need to listen so you know what to expect."

"We've gone over it a hundred times."

"A hundred and one won't hurt
anything."

She listened while Bill explained that, like in a
criminal trial, witnesses would be called to the stand. A few of Marshall's
friends and acquaintances had been flown in from Detroit to testify, though
they were being kept in a small room elsewhere in the courthouse. Marshall and
Tara would both be questioned. Rob would undoubtedly have more character witnesses
than either Tara or Marshall, but that was all he had to rely on. Marshall and
Tara had blood on their side; Cameron was their biological son.

Rob was huddled up with his lawyers, too, but his
eyes met Tara's from across the room. For a split second, she almost felt pity
for him. His face was anguished. She had tried to keep from thinking about how
deeply Rob must be hurting, instead thinking of her own pain. But Rob loved
Cameron. That much was apparent from the day Cameron was born, however much
time Rob spent away from the two of them those first few years of his life. She
looked away guiltily.

The time seemed to be passing by in slow motion.
She couldn't concentrate on what Bill and Marshall whispered about, and when
Thomas Redding and Ryan Wilkes, the younger lawyers, joined their little
huddle, she backed away, overwhelmed, having faith that Marshall could handle
everything. She put her head against the cool wooden top of the table before
them and took deep breaths. Her stomach hurt in a way that it hadn't since
before her surgery, and she thought she would throw up again. Her skin was
clammy and her face was flushed; were these nerves, she wondered? Or was she
getting sick again?

She whispered to Marshall that she had to go to
the bathroom, and two security guards held her by each elbow and shouldered
their way through the crowd outside the court room to a private bathroom on the
third floor. She had barely managed to lock the door behind her before she felt
bile rise in her throat, and she bent over the toilet, vomiting so violently
that her stomach felt sore afterwards. When she'd finished, she sat back on her
heels and wiped her mouth with toilet paper. Her chest heaved. She flushed the
toilet and stood on shaky feet.

Her makeup was still flawless and, careful not to
mess it up, she got a paper towel wet and carefully patted her face with it.
She looked pale and sick in the mirror.

She brushed her teeth with a small travel-sized
toothbrush and tube of toothpaste she kept in her purse and smoothed her
pantsuit. Her watch said it was 9:20. Ten more minutes. Her teeth were about to
chatter straight out of her head.

Finally, she opened the door and each guard took
one of her elbows again. She kept her head down and watched her feet as they
pushed her through the throng of people, all of them screaming her name. Camera
flashes went off in such quick succession that, after a few seconds, it didn't
even look like flashes of light but simply brightness. Her stomach jerked
again.

The courtroom was cool, and the cold air hit her
damp face and made goose bumps rise on her arms. She slid into her seat beside
Marshall and put her head on his padded shoulder. "I feel awful," she
said quietly.

"It'll be over soon," he said.
"It's worth it, Tara."

"I know it is. All the people... Marshall,
what if we lose?"

"Then we try again," he said firmly,
and lifted her chin with one of his knuckles. "Look at me, baby. If we
lose, we try again. We keep trying until we get what we want. Okay? I'm not
giving up, and I'm not letting you."

"I love you," she whispered.

"I love you, too."

"I told you that he looked like you."

"He does. He looks like Hailie."

"I know."

Marshall smiled at her and kissed her on the
lips. "You taste like toothpaste. Did you throw up?"

She nodded weakly.

"Poor baby," he murmured, and kissed
her again. "I'll rub your feet tonight. Isn't that what guys do when their
old ladies don't feel good?"

"Old lady?" she asked, grinning despite
herself.

"Okay, not ol' lady. Baby-mama."

"That's better," she said, feeling like
crying.

"So isn't that what we do? We rub our
baby-mama's feet?"

She could only nod.

He grinned at her, brimming with confidence.
"Everything's gonna be a'ight," he said, and she knew then that he
was as nervous as she was. The Detroit came out in his voice when he was
scared. "I just wish I'd thought to smoke a blunt this morning, my nerves
are shot."

She smiled. "You're absolutely fucking
awful, Marshall Bruce."

"And you're absolutely fucking perfect,
Tara," he said.

The bailiff stood, and everyone's attention went
to the front of the room. "Please rise," he said loudly, "for
Honorable Judge Ashcroft."

The judge came out of his chambers, surprising
Tara by how kind he looked. She'd imagined him to be a gruff, huge man that
looked down his nose at her, but he was actually quite small, no larger than
Marshall. His smile was genuine as he motioned for everyone to sit down, and he
himself took his own seat in front of them. "Good morning," he said.

"Good morning," they echoed.

"It's a madhouse out there, isn't it?"
He looked at the bailiff and pointed up at the choir loft above the court room,
where a dozen or so people had snuck in to watch the proceedings. "Please
clear that out, I don't want any distractions. That door was supposed to stay
locked," he added mildly, looking up at the young girls sitting there.
"I don't want to think that any of you found a way around that, so we'll
just pretend it was an error in my part, hmm?"

They all skirted out of the box before anyone had
a chance to go up there and escort them out.

"Alright. Case number
three-eight-nine-seven-six-four-one-zero-eight-dash-five-three, Marshall B.
Mathers III and Tara N. Allister versus Robert Hensen," he read off of a
sheet of paper before him, and then looked back up. "The defense can make
their opening statements whenever it's ready."

As Rob stood up from his chair, Tara felt her own
legs turn to jelly. She gripped Marshall's hand and said a prayer to God,
Jesus, and every saint she could think of.
- 15
- 16
- 17
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