Reminders of Him

the same team. Everyone wanted justice, and sadly,
justice and empathy couldn’t both fit inside that
courtroom.
But what’s funny is I was on their side. I wanted
justice for them. I empathized with them. With your
mother, with your father, with all the people in your life
who were packed inside that courtroom.
I pleaded guilty, to my lawyer’s dismay. I had to.
When they started talking about what you went through
after I ran away from you that night, I knew I would
rather die than sit through a trial and listen to the details.
It was all too gruesome, like I was living some horror
story, and not my own life.
I’m sorry, Scotty.
I tuned it all out somehow by just repeating that
phrase over and over in my head. I’m sorry, Scotty. I’m
sorry, Scotty. I’m sorry, Scotty.
They scheduled another court date for sentencing,
and it was sometime between those two court dates that I
realized I hadn’t had my period in a while. I thought my
cycle was messed up, so I didn’t mention it to anyone.

---

Had I known I was growing a part of you inside me
sooner, I’m positive I would have found the will to go to
trial and fight for myself. Fight for our daughter.
When the sentencing date came, I tried not to listen
as your mother read her victim impact statement, but
every word she spoke is still engraved in my bones.
I kept thinking about what you told me as you were
carrying me up the stairs on your back that night in her
house—about how they wanted more kids, but you were
their miracle baby.
That’s all I could think of in that moment. I had killed
their miracle baby, and now they had no one, and it was
all my fault.
I had planned to give an allocution statement, but I
was too weak and too broken, so when it came time for
me to stand up and speak, I couldn’t. Physically,
emotionally, mentally. I was stuck in that chair, but I tried
to stand. My lawyer grabbed my arm to make sure I
didn’t collapse, and then I think he might have read
something out loud for me, I don’t know. I’m still not
clear on what happened in the courtroom that day,
because that day was so much like that night. A
nightmare that I was somehow watching play out from a
distance.
I had tunnel vision. I knew there were people around
me, and I knew the judge was speaking, but my brain was
so exhausted, I couldn’t process what anyone was saying.
Even when the judge read my sentence, I had no reaction,
because I couldn’t absorb it. It wasn’t until later, after I
was given an IV for dehydration, that I found out I had
been sentenced to seven years in prison, with the
eligibility for parole even sooner than that.
“Seven years,” I remember thinking. “That’s bullshit.
That isn’t nearly long enough.”
I try not to think about what it must have been like
for you in that car after I left you there. What must you

---

have thought of me? Did you think I had been thrown
from the car? Were you looking for me? Or did you know
I had left you there all alone?
It’s the time you spent alone that night that I know
haunts us all, because we’ll never know what you went
through. What you were thinking. Who you were calling
out to. What your final minutes were like.
I can’t imagine a more painful way for your mother
and father to be forced to live out the rest of their lives.
Sometimes I wonder if that’s why Diem is here.
Maybe Diem was your way of making sure your parents
would be okay.
But in that same vein, not having Diem in my life
would mean it’s your way of punishing me. It’s okay. I
deserve it.
I plan to fight it, but I know I deserve it.
Every morning, I wake up and I silently apologize.
To you, to your parents, to Diem. Throughout the day, I
silently thank your parents for raising our daughter since
we can’t. And every night, I apologize again before I fall
asleep.