She had been waiting for this day for a long time. For the day that they would finally strap her down, and inject her with poison. Ending her life for ending theirs. I guess this was supposed to be fair, she had taken life, so hers deserved to be taken. Capital punishment didn’t make much sense to her, killing her wouldn’t bring them back. If only it worked that way, then maybe her daughter would be here to say goodbye. Then maybe her daughter would be here thanking her. She didn’t care about dying; her real death sentence had been made a long time ago…
“Mom!!” her ten year old daughters screaming voice boomed through the crisp October air. They were at the playground and her head was down in a Better Homes and Gardens magazine. She looked up, and saw a glimpse of a man dragging her daughter toward a silver van across the field. She leapt from the bench, and sprinted toward the man, screaming “Hey!” over and over. The van door opened and she could see her daughter being thrown in the back. The man leaped in after her, and the van sped off. She kept running in the direction that the van had gone until she tripped and fell hard onto the sidewalk. She felt pieces of her skin tear off of her face and legs, and when she tried to get up she felt a searing pain in her knee, making it impossible. Her mind was racing, and she started to drag herself forward, she had to keep moving, had to find her. She could hear someone running up behind her.
“Was that your daughter? I just called the police,” a woman said kneeling down to her.
The police questioned everyone at the park that day. No one had seen anything, just heard a lot of screaming.
“Don’t worry, we will find her, we just sent out an Amber Alert, they won’t make it far,” a young policeman assured her. Empty promises.
A clanking noise filled her ears, and she looked up to see the warden opening her cell.
“Ready?” he asked.
She smiled, maybe the first genuine smile since that day 15 years ago, and simply said:
“Yes.”