Page 60 of Absolution

The yells and pleas of the other inmates, surrounding me, echo off the walls. My head pounds from them, and they remain unanswered.

My head hangs in my hands as I try to wrap my mind around my current situation. In one fleeting moment, I thought that I had it all only for it to be taken away just as fast.

This was my father’s doing. The smirk on his weathered face told me the truth as I watched him from the squad car. He did this to punish me. This was the price that I had to pay for that moment with Asher. Remembering the smile on his face is all I’ll have now. The deputy that booked me assured me multiple times that bail and freedom were two words that I should just forgot the meanings of.

How he had access to my truck boggles my mind. I never left it unlocked, despite the low chances of it being stolen or ransacked in this town. Too many years of having everything I owned striped away from me, taught me that lesson. Protect yourself, and the things you cherished most. Yet, here I was. Alone in my own agonizing memory with only hope left to pray for. Hope that the man I love would see through the farce of these charges and free me. Even with that hope, self-doubt took over my thoughts. Would he run for the hills or would he be the knight in shining armor after all? Only time would tell, and I had plenty of time to kill in here.

Heavy footsteps ricochet off the walls as they move toward my cell. A female officer steps into view, and her hands fall to the lock of my holding cell.

My heart pounds with the hope that this madness is over already.

“You have a visitor,” she bellows, fiddling with the lock.

As quickly as my heart raced, it now slows in a slow beat of despair. Visitors within a few hours of imprisonment meant only one thing. My court appointed attorney was here, and with his or her arrival, my hope of leaving any time soon diminishes.

The officer slides open the door and it clangs against the bricks as it stops. She motions for me to step forward with a pair of handcuffs dangling from her handcuffs. I outstretch my wrists as she shackles me. The cold metal sends a shutter throughout my body.

“This way, inmate.” She orders. I step out in front of her, and she follows closely behind. Each cell I pass, the faces of those inside are hardened or fearful. A combination that I too have felt in here.

We reach the end of the cellblock, and she shoves me to the left down a hallway. The shackles at my wrists clink and clang with every step. A second shove leads me into a room with mirrors on all the walls. An interview room. Just great.

The table in the room has one of the two chairs occupied. The occupant is not the lawyer that I had hoped to see, but that of my father. His eyes twinkle with delight in seeing me this way. The product of his handiwork on display for his entertainment pleasure.

“Sit,” the officer orders. I comply, and she connects my shackles to metal hoops bolted to the table. Why this would make more sense for a more violent criminal, it doesn’t for me. Drug charges are a dime a dozen, especially in this part of the country, where meth production runs rampant in the quiet country suburbs. Most first offenders were issued commuted sentences of community service and a hefty fine, so for me to be treated like this tells me that there’s something more to this. And that something more is sitting right across from me.

The officer finishes the task of shackling me and steps out of the room, closing it behind her. For the first time since Willie’s, I am alone with my father and completely at his mercy. I have nowhere to run and hide from him.

“I tried to tell you girl, but you didn’t listen,” he starts, clasping his hands in front of him on the table. “Just like your mother.”

“I am nothing like my mother,” I sneer back at him. His face remains unchanged from the pure look of delight, since I entered the room. He’s enjoying watching me squirm.

“My mother was nothing more than a mindless whore who’s biggest mistake was fucking you.” I argue.

“No, your mother’s biggest mistake was opening her slut mouth, and ruining my life. I was happy until she brought you into the world. No matter how much I offered to pay her, she wouldn’t give up her fight to name me. You were born out of pure need for greed. You were her meal ticket, when her tap from me ran dry.”

I growl, and pull against my bonds. There bite into my wrists take me back to the Tribe dungeon, and my stomach churns at the thought. The cusp of my anxiety begins to build and my throat attempts to seize when my lungs restrict my airway.

Force it down, Ricca. You can’t go back there right now. This isn’t them. This is your father trying to punish you in a different manner. Fight. Do not let him win.

“My mother was a monster, but you ruined your own life. You slept with her. You got her pregnant, and when it was time to own up and take responsibility, you didn’t,” I berate with my eyes glued to his. He could try to tear me down, to keep me imprisoned here, but he would never break my spirit. That is something that he would never have over me. His words were only an instrument to cut me down even more. Brutal realities of a life that I had already lived. A life he had nothing to do with, until he decided that the breath coming out of my chest, that he helped create, was disposable in his pursuit.

“My mother may have been a monster, but you are the bigger one. You let your own daughter be raped, starved, and tortured for those financial gains. You set on your throne of righteousness and let it happen. Punish me all you want, but over my dead body will I let Asher live that kind of life.”

“Oh, Erica,” he explains. “That’s where you are already wrong. I’ve already won. Look around. You’re in jail, and I still have him. There’s nothing you can do to change that fact.”

“Never underestimate me, father. I may be in here,” I declare, motioning to the room around me. My restraints jingle with the flicks of my wrists. “But you will never win. Asher will never be yours.”

I push up from the chair, and get as close as I can to him. He leans back to avoid contact, and I laugh in his face.

“I may be out of the game, but there are other players still left in it.”

“Look at you,” he smiles. “So much piss and vinegar. Posturing yourself when you can’t even leave this room without someone unhooking you, from the restraints that bind you. You’re helpless here. Just like your brother. You’ve both fallen into my web, and neither of you will escape.”

His smug demeanor beams more, and I want to rip these chains off the table, and strangle him with them. The officer raps on the door, and steps inside. My father leans back into his chair, knowing that his chance is over for now.

The officer removes my additional shackles, and starts moving me toward the door. I stop, and pivot back towards him.

“Even if I have to sell my soul to the devil himself, I will never let you win.”

---