Malarkay’s hand trembled as she drew the letter from the mailbox. She knew what it would say before she opened the letter…he was going to be up for parole again. “They always warn us”, she thought to herself, “do I want to humiliate myself again in front of all those people?”
“I don’t know if I can do it again, he will have served the full sentence in two years anyway!” she muttered angrily. Then there will be nowhere to run far enough from this old life.
She crunched through the leaves getting to her front door, the front door all her neighbors had made fun of for its wild orange color. Malarkay liked to put all the exuberance that should be in her life into her decorating. Her own appearance was always inconspicuous, but her house fairly shouted with vibrancy. Malarkay had once been flamboyant herself…before Dan. Everything in life was before Dan or after Dan. She only looked at those Dan years for the benefit of the parole board.
She reached for the phone and the lifeline it represented in her friend Kriket. She had known Kriket since they were six.
“Hey it’s me,” she finally said to Kriket’s repeated hello’s.
“Hey Gal, what in the world is up with you?” came Kriket’s giggly voice from the other end.
“Kriket, another parole hearing on the 20th” was all Malarkay had to say.
Kriket was full of commiseration and pleas to come over, but all Malarkay had really wanted was a friendly voice. They told themselves the same reassuring lies they always told.
“He can’t hurt you anymore.”
“He would be stupid to come back here.”
“If anything happens to you, everyone will know it was him.”
It was a ritual of kindness, but like most rituals, it held more comfort than truth. Both of them knew that Dan’s first stop from prison would be Malarkay’s tidy little house on Front Street. Dan couldn’t abide tidiness, not in emotions and not in houses. He was only happy with upheaval.
Yes, the nastiness had preceded the pain. Tonight she had to remember again, because she had to write out yet another victim impact statement. She walked over to her computer and proceeded to compile words once again to describe devastation. Words are inadequate, even the best of them don’t sear and burn, they just might slightly sizzle on the page.
VICTIM IMPACT STATEMENT
I was eighteen years old when I married Dan Williams, still so much a child. I pictured rosy sunsets and wicker furniture, lazy cats and bouncing babies. But I got none of those things. Dan hit me for the first time on our honeymoon. Just a backhand slap, claimed I had on too much makeup for a married woman. I cried so much there was no dinner out that night, just a lot of apologies and promises and the beginning of the pattern of our married life.
Dan found a way to inflict some kind of pain on me each day. It might be a pinch, it might be a shove, or it might be cruel belittling remarks that ran around my head even after he left for work. I wish I could say I didn’t leave because I was afraid of him, but that is not it. I didn’t leave because I thought it was my fault. I was too organized, too flashy, too talkative, not a good cook, too much or not enough of everything that makes a perfect wife.
I knew that I should leave when he broke my arm over the quiche that fell flat when I tried to wait supper for him for an hour. But that broken arm broke the rest of my spirit. Attached to this document you will find the twenty eight pages of medical records that tell the story of my marriage. Broken ribs, dislocated shoulder, concussion, and of course you see the results of the last instance.
When he put me in the hospital the last time, there was no question of probation. He has been here for eight years now, and six of those are solely because I have shown myself at every hearing. This face you see is the best evidence I have of the danger I will be in if you let him out. Gentlemen, this face is the result of having pan of boiling spaghetti thrown on you. The pinched lips, the scars that makeup will not hide, the eye drawn down at the corner. All the makeup Dan would not let me wear will not fix that Gentlemen. And so I beseech you to keep him here, he deserves his full sentence under the law and more.
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