In August 1981, I was ten months into my sentence at Skagit Valley Correctional. When I woke up each morning, if I tried hard enough, I could forget where I was. I could pretend my thin mattress and gray, scratchy blanket were actually luxurious, that the funky, earthy smell of too many bodies sleeping in one place didn’t exist. I could tell myself there wasn’t a woman who had sold painkillers on a downtown Seattle street corner in a bed less than six feet from me, or guards posted at every door. I could believe that the early-morning light hitting my face streamed in through a beveled glass window instead of one secured with padlocks and wire mesh.
I could, if only for a moment, forget that I’d given my children away.
And then, when my eyes fluttered open, the truth came, slamming into my chest like a wrecking ball, and I wept, missing my girls. I imagined Brooke, holding her sister’s hand, helping to teach her how to walk. I pictured Natalie, gripping her older sister’s fingers, her chubby, slightly bowed legs taking one shaky step after the other. I remembered their sweet, little-girl scents and the way their belly giggles always made me laugh, too. I remembered the way they felt tucked up next to me in the back of our car, the three of us cuddled beneath an unzipped sleeping bag and several more blankets, keeping each other warm. I remembered all of this, and then tried to force myself to forget it. To instead focus on the task in front of me. Get up. Stand in line for the bathroom. Shower. Brush my teeth. One thing at a time, trying not to let my thoughts stray too far beyond the next indicated step.
Still, faced with long hours with nothing to do, I found myself writing little notes to my daughters whenever they came to mind. I used a yellow-and-brown–striped spiral notebook I’d found in the common room, jotting down a sentence or two at a time on the blue-lined pages, my lips twitching the way they always did when I was trying not to cry. Mama loves you so much, I wrote to Brooke. You have such a big, tender heart. You cried the first time you stepped on an ant and accidentally squished it; you asked if we could take it to the doctor. I hope you’re with people who know this about you. I hope you are tucked into bed every night with a story; I hope you’re in school now, and have lots of friends. I hope you never go to bed hungry. For Natalie, I recorded everything I remembered about her first six months: You slept through the night when you were only three weeks old, sweet girl, and I swear you smiled at me the very first time I held you. I wasn’t sure what I planned to do with these notes, but each time I wrote one, I experienced an infinitesimal flash of relief.
This morning, I stood in the kitchen at five thirty, wondering if my daughters would ever read the notes I’d written them, bleary-eyed as I mixed together enough pancake batter to feed three hundred inmates.
“Get those cakes on the griddle, Walker,” the kitchen manager, O’Brien, barked from across the room. She was an imposing woman of Native American and Irish descent, almost six feet tall and lithe. Her thick, black hair was lopped off just beneath her jawline, and her green eyes were set like emeralds above sharply drawn cheekbones. In another life, she might have been a model. In this one, she was a convicted cocaine dealer serving twenty years. She was also my boss.
“I’m on it,” I said, turning off the industrial mixer. I unhooked the large bowl and hefted it to the counter next to the stove, where I began spooning half-cup portions onto the already greased and hot griddle. We had less than an hour to get breakfast done; the first wave of inmates would line up at six, expecting to be fed by six fifteen, ready to threaten us with bodily harm if they weren’t. I’d been useless in the kitchen at first, having never used more than a toaster, but O’Brien believed in baptism by fire. My first week on breakfast duty she made me solely responsible for the production of scrambled eggs and banana muffins, and within a few hours, even with her screaming at me about everything I was doing wrong, I’d all but mastered the stove and the ill-tempered oven. I found I actually liked cooking; it was one of the few things that forced me to focus on something other than where Brooke and Natalie might be, and if they’d ever find a way to forgive me for letting them go. They’re better off without me, I told myself, so often that it became my mantra. They won’t even remember me. They deserve so much more than I could give them.
“Walker!” a man’s rough-edged voice called, yanking me out of my thoughts, surprising me enough to cause me to drop the ladle I held into the vat of batter.
“Shit,” I muttered, reaching into the sticky mixture to fish out the utensil. Once I’d grabbed it and set it on the counter, I turned toward where the voice came. One of the guards, a large black man with a belly that hung well over his belt, stood in the kitchen’s entryway with his thick arms crossed over his chest. I raised my hand and waved. “Here,” I said, keeping one eye on the pancakes already on the stove. If I couldn’t flip them, they’d burn, and we’d have to serve them anyway. There was not enough time or enough supplies to make more.
“Report to Myer’s office as soon as you’re done with your shift,” he instructed. “Eleven o’clock. Don’t make me come find you.”
“I won’t.” I grabbed a spatula and started flipping the pancakes, relieved they were only just on the cusp of turning black. Donald Myer was my assigned counselor, who was supposedly part of my rehabilitation process, but in reality, I’d only seen a couple of times. I doubted he could match my face with my name.
As I continued to cook, O’Brien sidled up next to me. “What the hell was that about?” she asked. Her breath was stale and laced with the instant coffee she purchased at the commissary and drank almost constantly. A few months before, she had broken a woman’s nose when she caught her trying to steal her stash of Folgers, a stunt that had landed her in solitary confinement for two weeks.
I shrugged. “No idea.” I was lucky, I knew, to work with O’Brien, and that she liked me. Most of the other inmates respected her, and as long as I was part of her crew, they left me alone. I quickly learned who the most dangerous women were, and made it a point to serve them extra-large portions and two desserts whenever I could. Food was a powerful presence inside the prison’s walls, and I used it to my advantage.
“You do anything wrong?”
“Not that I know of,” I said, though I knew that didn’t necessarily matter. I’d seen other women punished, their privileges taken away, for so much as looking at one of the guards in what was interpreted as a disrespectful manner, so it was possible I’d screwed up and didn’t know it. Other than my work in the kitchen, I made it a point to keep to myself; to not get in anyone else’s way. My belly clenched, wondering why he wanted to see me. Was I being assigned to another job? The laundry or, even worse, custodial?
“You keeping anything illegal in your bunk?”
“No,” I said. “Now let me get these goddamn pancakes cooked.” I shoved my hip against her in a playful movement, and she swatted my butt as she walked away.
“Make sure you get your lunch prep done before you leave,” she said, looking back at me over her shoulder.
“Yeah, yeah,” I said, waving her off. After I finished serving breakfast and cleaning the stove, I spent the next few hours mixing together canned tuna and cold, already-boiled noodles with cream of celery soup and shredded cheese, then poured the casseroles into shallow baking pans. I popped them into the oven to warm, and the next shift, responsible for serving lunch and prepping dinner, showed up a little before eleven. I headed out of the kitchen, down a long hallway to Myer’s office. I thought about showering first, so I wouldn’t smell like grease and tuna fish, but was too afraid of being late.
I smoothed my dark curls as best I could as I walked; they’d grown halfway down my back, and most days, I pulled them into a ponytail just to keep them out of the way while I worked. I readjusted it now, before knocking on Myer’s door.
“Come in,” he said. The words traveled on a weary voice. I entered the room and closed the door behind me. He was a slight man, probably in his late forties, with a bald patch on top of his head that reminded me of a flesh-colored yarmulke. He kept his eyes on his desk. “Can I help you?”
“I’m Walker. One of the guards told me to report here when I was done with my shift in the kitchen?” I stood with my hands behind my back, in an at-ease position. It was a small room, and I was less than six feet away from him.
He finally looked up, peering at me over black-framed bifocals that rested halfway down his nose. “Ah, right. Walker.” He shuffled through the stack of files on his desk. “Please,” he said, gesturing to the metal chair across from him. “Sit.”
I complied and carefully folded my hands in my lap, waiting for him to speak. The sun beat in through the window, creating a stifling heat. My heart pounded, and my forehead beaded with sweat.
“So,” he said. “You’re probably wondering why I called you in.” I nodded and again waited for him to continue. He skimmed the paper he held in his right hand, then looked back at me. “You’re getting out,” he said. “Early release.”
“Really?” I blinked fast, unsure I’d heard him correctly. “Why?”
He shrugged. “You’re a lightweight. Nothing violent on your record. No disciplinary actions while you’ve been here. You’ll be processed on Friday and the bus will take you back to Seattle to meet with your probation officer.” He paused. “Any questions?”
I shook my head, thoughts whirling. What will I do? How will I survive? Should I visit my mom? A dull ache formed in my chest at the thought of seeing her again. “Thank you,” I said. I perched on the edge of my seat, waiting to see if he would have anything else to say.
He stared at me a moment, then leaned back in his chair, drumming his fingers on the tops of his thighs. “Can I give you some advice?”
“Sure,” I said, which I figured was the only right answer.
“You seem like a nice girl. You still have plenty of time to start over.” He waited a beat. “You know what I’m saying?”
I nodded, still clutching my fingers together in my lap.
“You’ve made good choices in here. You’ve kept your head down and done your job. Keep it up on the outside and you’ll be okay.”
“I will,” I said. “Thanks.”
He dismissed me, and I hurried back to the kitchen, where O’Brien was overseeing the lunch crew as they pulled the tuna casseroles from the oven. “Hey,” I said, and she strode over to the entryway, where I stood.
“Don’t you have a meeting with Myer?” she asked.
“I already went,” I said, a little breathless. “I’m getting out on Friday. Early release.”
“No shit,” O’Brien said, with a slow smile. “Congrats.”
I shrugged, shifting my weight from one foot to the other, and ran a hand up and down my opposite arm.
O’Brien raised a single eyebrow. “Let me guess. You’re worried how you’re going to make it?”
“Yeah,” I said, relieved she understood. This wasn’t her first stretch in prison; she’d done five years at a women’s facility in Tacoma two years before she came here. She could have shortened her sentence this time if she’d been willing to turn in dealers higher up on the chain, but she “wasn’t no snitch,” she told me. She’d be rewarded for her loyalty, she said, when she got out. The world she lived in was one I’d only witnessed in movies and on TV. I took her word that everything she said about it was true.
Before answering me, she glanced around the room and then lowered her voice. “You’re quiet. You know how to fly under the radar. My boss is always looking for people like you.”
My eyes widened when it hit me what she meant. “You want me to be a dealer?” I whispered.
“Fuck no,” she said, laughing. “Delivery girl. My boss will set you up with an apartment and put you to work. You’ll have pay stubs to show your PO and everything. It pays for shit, but then there’s the cash he gives you on the side. A thousand a week.”
I was quiet for a minute, processing what that kind of money would do for me. But I didn’t really want to be connected to a coke dealer.
“Listen,” O’Brien said, putting her hand on my arm. “It’s not like it would be forever, you know? Just long enough to get you on your feet.”
“I don’t know . . .” I thought about seeing my mother again, what I would tell her about myself, where I was living, what I was doing for work. Maybe she would be willing to let me stay with her now, even though she had remarried. I could get a real job and start all over again.
“Think about it, Walker. You can go back to school. Get a degree. Buy a house. I don’t know. You could do whatever the hell you want.” When I still didn’t answer, she grabbed the notepad she kept tucked in her waistband, set it on the counter, and wrote something down. Tearing off a piece of paper, she handed it to me. “Here,” she said. “If you decide you’re interested, call the number and tell whoever answers that I sent you.”
“Thanks.” I took the paper, knowing I would throw it away as soon as I could. If I was going to change my life, delivering drugs was no way to make it happen.
“You’re welcome.” She put a hand on my shoulder. “Maybe you could use the money to get your girls back.”
My eyes prickled with tears. I’d thought every day about regaining custody of Natalie and Brooke, but was unsure of my rights. The way Gina had explained it to me made it sound as though once I’d signed the papers, there was no turning back. Still, I couldn’t help but harbor a bit of hope. Maybe there’s a chance, I thought. Maybe I can find a way to be their mother again.
• • •
Friday came, and once I was back in Seattle, I gave my probation officer my mother’s address on Beacon Hill when he asked where I’d be living. He handed me a piece of paper with a list of places where I could apply for work, mostly jobs at fast-food joints flipping burgers or washing dishes in a diner, which I stuck in the backpack that carried my few belongings: my spiral notebook and an extra pair of jeans.
“Don’t fuck up,” he told me, and sent me on my way. I had a little cash in my pocket, “gate money,” they called it, so I waited for the bus at the downtown Metro station that would take me to my childhood home. Even though I’d been away from the city less than a year, things looked so different—buildings seemed bigger and taller somehow, crosswalks filled with more people, and the streets busy with more cars. After months of having to follow a precise schedule, of daily head counts and bunk inspections, I marveled at the freedom of being able to board the bus, drop in my fifty-five cents, and ride wherever I wanted. A few times I found myself glancing over my shoulder, looking for a guard.
When my bus came, I sat in the very back, staring up at the advertising posters glued near the ceiling, including one with a picture of Harrison Ford for a movie called Raiders of the Lost Ark. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been to a theater; it was probably when I was still with Michael and pregnant with Brooke. Another poster immediately caught my eye: it was a picture of a red-haired little girl with long braids who wore denim overalls and held a structure built out of Legos. The white lettering on the ad proclaimed, WHAT IT IS IS BEAUTIFUL. Before I knew it, I had tears in my eyes, wondering if Brooke liked to play with Legos, or if she preferred the company of dolls. Perhaps she enjoyed both . . . or neither. There was no way for me to know.
At least they’re together, I told myself. At least they have each other. I kept my eyes down for the rest of the ride, and after I got off the bus at the appropriate stop, my stomach twisted as I walked the two blocks to the house I’d grown up in—a two-bedroom, dark brown, rectangular box of a 1950s rambler. The August sun beat down on my skin; drops of sweat beaded at the nape of my neck and dripped down my back. It was almost four o’clock, and I figured my mother would be home. That was, if she was still working the early shift as a pharmacy clerk at Pay ’n Save. She had a new husband—I supposed it was possible she had a new job. She could have moved somewhere else entirely.
But then I saw her car parked in the driveway—a dark green, two-door VW Rabbit—and I knew she was there. I ran over the things I thought I should say, the words I hoped would help her forgive me. I was her daughter, for god’s sake. She had to forgive me—isn’t that what mothers are programmed to do? I imagined if my father hadn’t left us, he would have fought for me to stay when I got pregnant with Brooke. He would have been on my side. He would have helped make everything okay. That was the story I told myself. The way I wished things might have been.
With my pulse racing, I stood on the front porch and knocked, wondering what I would say if my mother’s new husband appeared. I had to assume she’d told him about me, but I didn’t know if his distaste for children extended to after they’d become adults.
Fortunately, my mother was the one who opened the door. When she did, her eyes widened and her jaw dropped. “Jenny,” she said, still gripping the knob. Her dark curly hair was pulled back from her face with a white plastic banana clip, and she wore a puffy-shouldered blue blouse with a high, ruffled collar tucked into black stirrup pants. At thirty-eight, except for a few more lines across her forehead and around her mouth, she looked almost exactly the same as she had when I was growing up—short and curvy, with the same violet eyes she passed on to me. If she and I stood in a room together with a hundred other people, there would be no doubt that we were related.
“Hi, Mom,” I said. My voice shook as I tried to smile.
“What are you doing here?” she asked. She glanced behind her and then looked back at me, moving the door a few inches toward shut.
“I need to talk with you,” I said. “So much has happened and I just—”
“I know what happened,” she said, cutting me off. “The woman from Social Services told me you were going to jail and wanted me to take care of your kids.”
“I didn’t ask her to do that. She was required to. I told her what your answer would be.” She didn’t respond, so I continued. “She said you got married again.”
“I did.”
“What’s his name?” I asked, shifting my feet, unsure what I should do with my hands. It felt awkward, standing on the front porch of the house I’d lived in for so many years, wondering if she was going to invite me inside.
“Derek.”
“I’d love to meet him.”
“He’s asleep.” She glanced behind her into the house, again, then looked back at me. “He works the swing shift at Boeing.”
“Did you tell him about me?”
“Of course,” she said. “I tell him everything. He’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
I kept silent, feeling a sharp pain in my chest as I remembered that before I got pregnant with Brooke, my mother used those exact same words to describe me.
She looked behind me, toward the street. “Where are they?”
“Who?”
“Your kids, Jenny.”
“Oh,” I whispered, dropping my eyes to the porch. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” she repeated, leaning heavily on the last word.
“I gave them up. Signed away my rights.” I looked back up at her, my words trembling.
“Really?” she said, raising both of her dark eyebrows.
I nodded. “I want to try and get them back, but I just got out and I don’t have a place to stay . . .” I let my words trail off and kept my eyes on her face, trying to read her response before she spoke. I couldn’t decipher the cloudy look in her eyes, so I rambled on. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but it wouldn’t be for very long, I promise. Just until I get back on my feet. I can help out. Clean or cook . . . I actually worked in the prison kitchen . . .”
She stared at me, as though she was trying to decide how to respond. “Hold on,” she finally said. She disappeared from the doorway, then returned less than a minute later with a thin stack of cash in her right hand. “Here,” she said, holding out the money to me.
I dropped my eyes to the bills and then lifted them back to hers. “I can’t stay?”
She pressed her lips together and shook her head. “I’m sorry, but Derek just wouldn’t be okay with it. He’s very . . . structured.” With her free hand, she reached out and grabbed my arm, pressing the cash into my palm. “Take it, okay? I know it’s not much, but it’s all I had in my purse. I can try to get you more later this week.”
“But, Mom,” I said, blinking back my tears. “I’m trying to fix things. I want to go back to school. Make a fresh start. Please. I just need a little help.” I hated how desperate I sounded.
“I’m sorry,” she said again. “I wish things were different, but that’s all I can do.” For the second time, she threw a glance nervously toward the back of the house, where her new husband was sleeping, and I wondered to what extent his “structured” personality might go.
“Mom, please!” I whispered.
“Take care of yourself, Jenny,” she said. “I’m sure you’ll be fine.” And then she slowly shut the door in my face.
Dazed, I turned around and walked away from the house, shoving the money she’d given me into one of my front pockets. I felt numb, barely able to process what had just happened. I’d told my probation officer I’d be staying with her. I worried I might go straight back to jail if he came looking for me and I wasn’t there. My car had been auctioned off and the proceeds used to pay the fines that went along with my sentence, so all I had was the money my mother had just given me, and the aching desire to find my children.
I need a place to stay. I need to figure out what I’m going to do. I trudged back toward the bus stop and checked the schedule when I got there, deciding that I should head back downtown, where I knew of a few cheap motels, places I’d stayed with my daughters.
An hour and a half later, I found myself in a small, dingy room with a full bed and a television that the manager told me only had three channels. The walls were covered in dark wood paneling, and the well-worn bedspread was a print of large orange and brown flowers. I’d used a few dollars to buy a ham sandwich and a Snickers bar at the corner gas station, so I sat on the bed and wolfed them down, then drank metallic-tasting water using a smudged glass next to the sink. The room smelled of body odor and mildewed, sour towels, but I was too exhausted to care. All I wanted to do was sleep.
I lay down on top of the covers and stared up at the ceiling, counting the muddy brown spots that stained the white tiles, replaying the events of the day, sorting out everything I’d have to do in the morning. I’d need to call my probation officer and let him know where I was. I’d need to find Gina’s phone number and call her, too. I needed her to tell me that even without my mother’s help, I could get my daughters back.
