Chapter 8 - The Confession Behind Bars
The visiting room at the county correctional facility smelled of floor wax, desperation, and stale coffee.
I sat across the thick plexiglass partition, holding the heavy plastic telephone receiver to my ear. Moments later, the heavy metal door on the opposite side clicked open, and Evelyn was escorted in by a female guard.
She looked smaller now. The orange jumpsuit hung off her shrunken frame, and the fierce, arrogant defiance in her eyes had been replaced by a bitter, hollow resentment. She sat down on the bolted metal stool and picked up her receiver.
“You finally came,” she rasped, her voice dry and brittle. “I knew my son wouldn't completely abandon me. Even after all their lies.”
“I’m not here to bail you out, Evelyn,” I said, my voice entirely devoid of emotion. “I’m here to tell you it’s over.”
Evelyn’s jaw tightened, a flash of her old venom returning. “You think you’ve won, don't you? You think that little gold-digger you married is going to bring you happiness? She’s using you, Caleb! Just like your father used me!”
“My father loved you, and you poisoned him,” I said, leaning forward until my face was close to the glass. “Just like you tried to starve my wife and my unborn child. You are a monster, Evelyn. And the prosecutor offered your attorneys the final terms today: plead guilty to all charges—including the first-degree murder of my father and the attempted murder of my unborn child—and the state takes the death penalty off the table in exchange for life without parole.”
Evelyn went rigid. Her eyes widened in genuine shock. “You... you agreed to that? You’re letting them lock me away forever?”
“I didn't agree to it. I demanded it,” I corrected her coldly. “And your lawyers are signing the papers this afternoon.”
She slammed her fist against the plexiglass partition, a sharp thud that echoed through the visiting room. “I raised you! I sacrificed everything for you! You owe me your life!”
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“I owe you nothing,” I said softly, standing up from the metal stool and placing the receiver back on its cradle. “Goodbye, Evelyn.”
She screamed something else, but I didn't look back. I turned around and walked out of the prison doors into the warm, brilliant afternoon sunlight, leaving the ghosts of my past locked behind steel and concrete where they belonged.
