Left for Garbage

kind of impression you are making in public, then you’ve stopped caring about yourself.
    It used to be one of my favorite things to do when trying on outfits at the mall. I wouldn’t look to see if I liked a particular outfit, I would think of other people, what they would see when they’d see me in it. I’d strike a pose and see how I’d look on the dance floor, or I’d raise my hands to see how the bikini top would make my breasts look when laying down.
    I guess a lot of people would think that’s self-centered, but how can it be self-centered when you are thinking of others? I hate sitting on the beach next to a girl who doesn’t know what she would look like to me before she left the dressing room. If that’s a fault, then score another fault for me. It’s all everyone is dwelling on now, anyway. My faults.
    Yes, I was stupid for not calling for help sooner. Yes, I should’ve put Deeley in daycare , like Dad suggested. Yes, I shouldn’t have left garbage in my trunk. Yes, I shouldn’t have taken one of Grand-Mom’s checks. I don’t belong in here for those things. Even Emily would understand why I used her checks at Target if I could only have the chance to explain to her in private.
    That’s the hardest thing about being here. I have no opportunity to explain myself. Thank goodness there are people, like my brother, who accept me for who I am and who understand me in my soul of souls. He told me he knew I would never do anything to harm my child.
    Most of the time I think Salvatore believes that too , but then he’ll ask me something that makes me wonder. For example, he keeps asking me if I fought with my mom the night before I took off with Deeley, back in June. I told him I didn’t, but fact is, some words were exchanged.
    So , yes, Salvatore comforts me, but he puts on pressure too and he confuses me sometimes. I mean, he says the minute we go to trial is when I can start counting down to being free forever, finally, but then the next day he says we need to postpone going to trial for as long as possible because he doesn’t completely feel his defense yet.
    Salvatore knows exactly why I wanted to get out of my house ever since I was a little girl. Though it’s weird because now the only thing I want to do is to go home, I mean at least for a while , until I decide what to do next.
    Salvatore says it’s not my parents’ home I want to go to but s ome idealized fantasy home. I don’t know, maybe he’s right. What I do know for sure is that anywhere is better than here. This hole, this cell is a torture I do not deserve.
    Every time I see my mom on the news, I want to puke. Yet when I get a letter from her, I cry.
    I k now I’m lucky to have Salvatore. I’ve heard he pushes the envelope and knows how to throw his weight around in a courtroom, and that’s exactly what I’m going to need.
    He’s outraged that I’m being held without bail , like I’m the biggest criminal on the planet. He says it’s all bullshit that the prosecution is arguing murder when what we have here is a missing child case, and he gets all excited talking about the civil suit he’s going to file when Deeley is found.
    I had to ask him what would happen if she wasn’t , and he got very quiet, the way he dos sometimes, and said, “Then I’m afraid they are going to ask for the death penalty, Denise.”
    I know he hoped hearing that would make me finally tell him the secret Salvatore believes I’m withholding from him, but what can I say, I mean I don’t have anything to say , so I wish people would stop asking me.
    It was another girl here at the jail wh o recommended Salvatore to me. Then a correction officer said she’d heard he was good. So I asked around and then I gave him a call, and Salvatore showed up - pro bono, mind you.
    I do have his support , this belief him and my brother are on my side. I’m not so sure about my parents. I’ve never been sure of my parents. I’ve told Salvatore to remember that when he prepares his case, no one who comes from the house on Subdivision Lane is a very good bet, me excepted, I said, then I laughed. Salvatore didn’t. I don’t know, maybe that thing he said to me about the death penalty is worrying him. I guess maybe it worries me, too. Is it legal to kill someone who’s never lived at all yet?

Bobby Rightman
    (Ex-boyfriend of Denise Brown)

    I guess I know Denise as well as anybody does, and I guess , except for her family members, I’ve known her the