There isn’t a morning that goes by that I don’t squeeze my eyes tight before I open them and pray that this is all a dream. But there are no dreams or nightmares here, Mom. There’s just this unimaginable emptiness when you close your eyes. An emptiness so disconnected from reality that you can’t imagine you’re still alive.

I haven’t heard from you in a few months. This will be my sixth letter to you from jail without a response. I  guess it’d be wrong of me to imagine you’re not serving your own kind of time without me there. It wouldn’t be wrong of me to imagine that, would it, Mom?

I  got a letter from Dailee last week. She told me she saw all my letters on the kitchen table unopened and that your drinking was getting out of hand again. She said she’s going to come around more often to try to get you back on track. You raised a good daughter there, Mom. 

I know it’s hard with me not there, but I want you to know I need you, Mom. Please, let Dailee help you get sober In the meantime, I’ll keep writing. It helps me to write to you.

Mom, I  made mistakes and bad choices on the outside. We all know that. You’ll be happy to know I can’t do that here. You see, there are no choices, Mom, and you sure as shit better not make a mistake.

I’m not proud of this, Mom, but on the outside, I learned where to draw the line on the streets. I learned not to go too far. It all seemed so easy. I was comfortable. I fit in. Nothing fits here, Mom. But I don’t have to tell you life isn’t always a perfect fit, do I? How often you look in the mirror and tell yourself it is, doesn't matter. I dropped my guard out there, Mom. I got too comfortable. I trusted too many people who I thought had my back. Maybe I deserved to be their whipping boy. You know that’s what happened to me. You know, don’t you, Mom? Please write back if for nothing else but to tell me you know I’m innocent.

Anyway, Mom, I’ll move on to a subject less mind meddling for me, if you don’t mind. I don’t want you to get all frantic about this, but I’m double-bunking with an inmate who's in for murder. This guy legit killed someone, Mom, with his bare hands. The interesting thing about him is he’s super intelligent and is constantly reading. He’s big into love stories. Isn’t that nuts, Mom?  This guy is as big as a house. I caught him wiping his cheek the other day while he was reading. I’d never call him out on it; the guy has muscles in his ear lobes. 

I know the question going through your head: Is he a friend? It’s weird, Mom, but no one uses the term friend. Words like that don’t have a definition in a place like this. These guys are all like walking, breathing viruses; the only difference between them and the real thing is a virus gets better over time.

I was going to end this letter here, but I have time this week as we’re in lockdown. An inmate in the rec yard stabbed another in the face a hundred times with a shiv.  A hundred fucking times, Mom! I didn’t think anyone had that much face area or rage in them to stab someone else a hundred times. No one cared, Mom. The guards never came over until the guy was long dead. His face looked like a bowl of cranberry sauce. I felt like yacking but didn’t dare in front of the other inmates. Yacking over something like that puts a target on your back.

I probably shouldn’t have told you that, but if I start crossing shit out and erasing, the letter will be considered inappropriate and won’t be mailed, or worse, it will be redacted.

In your only letter to me a few months ago, you asked me a few questions that were hard to answer. Mom, listen, I don’t want you to worry about me. I’m not scared anymore. But the shit that happens to me here I can’t tell you about, and if I take it to my grave, that’ll be the best for everyone. There’s no room for shame or guilt here, Mom, cuz if the shame doesn’t kill you, the guilt sure as shit will. You just have to learn how to bury one emotion at a time.

I’m not ashamed to tell you I still pretend, Mom. You remember, like, when I was a kid. I do it even more so now that I’m here. It’s nuts to imagine me doing that at twenty-three. I guess pretending I’m someone else helps me cope. It makes me wonder, if I weren’t here, would pretending be my go-to; maybe it would. Maybe I'd pretend  I was a guy full of murderous thoughts and mayhem. But that would just be pretend. You know it would be pretend, right, Mom?  

Dailee has my inmate ID number. She told me she’ll pass it on to you. You’ll need it when you write me. I’m nothing but a number here, Mom. It’s strange how much you take hearing your name for granted. I feel like a headless body. You always used to tell me you felt like that, too. I  never understood what you meant until now. It’s funny how that’s suddenly our only commonality. 

It would be nice to hear from you, Mom, to have you write my name so I can read it and imagine your voice saying it. I remember how you used to shorten it from Henrey to Hen. I hated it when you did that, Mom. But Hen will be just fine.

I know my paragraph segways are abrupt, but we’re always pressed for TIME here. It's just a stupid inside joke, Mom. Don’t ponder too long on it. I hope it made you smile. I was always good at making you smile, Mom.

I know I’m writing about stuff that isn’t so happy. But you soon learn that ‘happy’ is only written on birthday cakes. There aren’t any birthdays here; there are no days, just check marks on a block wall.  I’m afraid it’s all about cigarettes and sex here, Mom, and trading one for the other. You’ll be happy to know I don’t smoke.

Anyway, yesterday, an inmate died. Someone said he died of old age. It’s hard to believe anyone would die here of old age, Mom. I wonder if he considered himself lucky. Here’s the kicker: that same day, a fight broke out in the rec yard over who should get the old guy’s cigarettes and the laces to his shoes! It was then I realized that this is it! This is their world; small or large, good or bad, this is it for them. 

I looked out over the yard for the first time I saw people. I saw human beings, Mom. I understood that it wasn’t their fault. Inside or outside, life is a fucking blame game. I realized these guys were broken at birth, and no one had the know-how or cared enough to make them right. Anyway, my point is, if you’re perceptive enough, you’ll begin to understand them. Have you ever looked through a kaleidoscope, Mom? When the light hits it just right, you realize all the colors are there, but all the shapes are broken into tiny glass fragments, never coming together to become much of anything. That’s who they are, and that’s the dangerous part of jail, Mom—the glass fragments. If you’re not watching where you step, you’ll get cut.

I hope this next paragraph doesn’t appear hurtful, but I can feel myself hardening. It will be soon that I won’t be the kid you remember. He’s having a hard time making it here, Mom. This place is made of inescapable evil, and it’s not the inmates, Mom; it’s the system.

Some tell me to look for God. But for me, it surely seems a sin to look for Him in a place like this. I’m told by inmates who have found Him that these are the places where He hangs out. Huh, it seems God makes bad choices, too. If I do find Him, the first thing I’ll do is ask Him to take me. It's a strange feeling to be torn between ‘ living death in life’ and ‘loving life in death.’ It’s hard to know if there’s any difference between them at all. I’m sorry for that, Mom. I know you're a religious woman. It's just that there’s no such thing as an alternative thought here.

Huh, ‘sorry’. I haven’t said that word in months, Mom. Being sorry is a sign of weakness. It's as dangerous to write it as it is to speak it. But the censoring staff don’t care much about what I  have to say. 

I tried once to tell my story, Mom. One of the inmates spat on me and told me I was nothing. He said I was a dead pawn on a chessboard, and all I was good for was taking up space in a tiny 10x12 square. He told me the game was over the second I stepped foot in here. He said it didn’t matter how anything played out on the outside. In here, checkmate is checkmate. He went on to tell me it wasn't the physical imprisonment that would get me; it was the mental imprisonment. It took me a while to realize he was right.

I have to wrap this up, Mom. They’re assigning chairs to us to save a spot in the shower line. If you don’t get a chair, you don’t get a shower. It's funny, Mom; who would’ve thought a chair could be such a big deal? But in here, it’s what’s viable that matters. 

Mom, please write back. 

Hen.