12) The story “I was the Intruder” follows Andriea Davies as she recounts her childhood years in Brazil. In school she was bullied for being Chinese, and not belonging, by a Japanese girl. Davies then talks about her first home in Brazil, and its cold, unfinished rooms. She also speaks about her parent’s store, and how she was left in the back, away from her mom but with the rats.
Tags:
Japanese
Chinese
Children
Store
Rat
Brazil
Neglect
Migrate
Powerless
Convenience
Home
Concrete
14) Melody Roker Sims writes about her first experience being transferred to a prison upstate. She was woken up early and put into a patrol car with another women, a seventeen yea old. The women is named Patricia and is imprisoned for manslaughter. Patricia was consistently beaten by the father of her children and when he started beating the children, she killed him.
Tags:
Roll Up
Prison
Bedford Hills
Domestic Abuse
Transfer
Companionship
Innocence
Children
Manslaughter
Drugs
Tears
25 to Life
20) Erika Vasquez recalls her painful childhood memory in “A Childhood Taken” where she was assaulted by a complete stranger. Vasquez had a rough childhood as a result of this trauma and suffers from nightmare about that event. She has no one to confide this to because she is fearful about what will happen once this seeks the light of day. Eventually, this terror will vanish every morning when it is temporarily safe.
Tags:
1. Misery
2. Reality
3. Suffering
4. Violence
5. Brief Joy
6. Sexual Assault
7. Deception
8. Burdens
9. Fear
10. Pain
11. Nervous
12. Nightmare
21) Amanda Topping recalls a horrible memory of a nightmarish assault the lasted for two years in “Amanda Topping”. The events are an endless cycle which has Topping physically harmed to the point where she has to leave and eventually returns to her problem. She decides that she can handle the abuse by herself however, once her newly born child is almost killed she knows she has to protect him.
Tags:
1. Domestic Abuse
2. Fear
3. Violence
4. Entrapment
5. Brutality
6. Horror
7. Mistakes
8. Emergency Room
9. Anger
10. Near Death
11. Escape
12. Miracles
15)Captain Helen Geslak describes the transition of her every-day life into prison in “Pause Button”. The title “Pause Button” gives the impression that this change of going to jail has stopped her normal life and resumes once when she returns to it. Geslak reveals what great luxuries she has been forced to give up and misses as well as the submit her freedom and identity to become no one. Geslak also questions why she is in prison in the first place and lists the reasons why she is in jail.
Tags:
1. Prison
2. Depression
3. Loss
4. Confusion
5. Scared
6. Mystery
7. Desolated
8. Depravity
9. Submission
10. Nightmare
11. Conformity
12. Bargain
A Writer's Zone 