Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: I call my girl from the payphone at discharge.Ekat tells me she's on her way, which means sprawled across the couch, debating whether to put on a bra.I hang up and tell C.O. Holland my ride's running late.He wants me to wait inside, where he can keep an eye on me."Fat chance," I say.And choose the cold.I served my time with the comfort of knowing when it would end.An eight-month bid in women's county.I counted down the days.Eight months without a fart of snow and the day I'm supposed to be released, a blizzard shits all over southeast Michigan.Just my luck.She put up a fight.The Midwest, I mean.Snowplows and salt and teams of teens with shovels, grateful for a few bucks.But in the end, she lost.Power lines went down, pipes froze, schools closed.So many guards called into work, no one was around to process me.And freedom vanished like sugar in tea.I threw a fit and got sent to the hole.Solitary almost did me in.Crouched on that stained cot, all I could smell were the woods of Tuscola County where my daddy took me hunting.Wet mulch and animal piss; green paint and itchy instant coffee.First time I shot a deer, I missed her heart by an inch.My daddy slapped me.Hard.Said it was my fault that animal had to suffer, then he pushed me deep into the woods.I tracked that doe all afternoon.Squinted at pine needles for blood and dreaded using my daddy's knife on skin and bone.When I finally found the deer, she was dying and by the time I dragged her home, she hadn't finished.I stuffed her in our neighbor's freezer all the same, a large white ice box outside his garage.As I closed the lid, I hated her for her defiance, the way she begged me not to leave her like that: a deer in an ice box.*** I lean on a snowplow left in handicap parking and rub my arms to stay warm.Eager to strip off that ugly orange jumpsuit, I grabbed a flimsy coat from the donation pile -a cheap puffer with a fur hood, which I might have shoplifted from the mall at thirteen.Discharge offered my old clothes in a plastic bag, but I told them to give it to another girl.
Author: Chou, Meghan
Language: English
Subfield: Literature and Literary Theory
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7059637919
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