In the back of a patrol car, I understood what hitting rock bottom must be like for an addict. I didn’t worry about what might happen to me at all. My only thoughts were of Jenny. All the times, I wished we’d done more things together. How I took her for granted. Always assumed she’d be around. I remembered the last good day we had at the Tiffany mall concert when we were making fun of all the ridiculous fans and changed the lyrics to her songs. Recently, it seemed like Jenny knew her end was near. She’d been calmer these last few days than ever before, as if she’d come to peace with her fate. I would blame Barry and Mom forever. Nothing they’d ever do would get me to forgive them. But the biggest blame should be directed toward myself. If we had run away from them sooner, if I hadn’t listened to Barry and fired the gun at the FBI agent, maybe the guy wouldn’t have fired back. Maybe Jenny would still be here. I deserved all that guilt, which was like a tumor festering in my stomach. If they wanted to lock me up for the rest of my life, I was fine with that. Maybe only then would the rot within go away.
The next few months of my life were a whirlwind, to say the least. Not that it hadn’t been a shitshow already, but we were thrust into the spotlight, our faces on every magazine, newspaper, every reporter weighing in. Barry and Mom were vilified, the worst parents on the planet. Steph and I received mixed reviews. To some, we were forced into this life of crime and shouldn’t be to blame, too young to understand the gravity of what we were doing. To others, we were Satan incarnate, evidenced by me as Jimi Hendrix on all the camera footage. Steph admitted to being the getaway driver, and there were multiple discussions as to how we all would be tried.
Robbing a bank was a federal crime, and the murder a federal case. They never found out about Mr. Bianchi and Fingers, their bodies coming to surface years too late to make a connection to us. Since the security guard had been killed in Houston, Barry and Mom were being charged by the DOJ in Texas, but they were also tried by Virginia, Florida, and California on the state level. With Steph and me, it was more complicated. The police submitted the evidence from my journal, and our public defenders used it as leverage. Steph, at sixteen going on seventeen, was originally going to be tried as an adult. Evidently, if someone got murdered and you drove the getaway car, you could be tried for murder, too.
We were kept at juvenile detention centers in our home state of New Jersey while we waited for our separate trials. Because the FBI bungled our arrests and shot our little sister, the DA didn’t want to bring further charges against us kids. The thought being that we had been through enough trauma. We would be used as leverage against Barry and Mom. If we testified against them, each of us was offered a plea deal to avoid juvie, or possibly worse, and would wind up with community service. Between the relatives we had left, Mort and Connie wanted nothing to do with us, but Grandma Bernice stepped up for us to be remanded to her care should the judge rule in our favor.
The narrative of our story in the media began to veer toward us. The innocent children prey to our greedy parents. My journal held evidence of every time Barry struck me, or threatened me if I didn’t follow instructions. In tandem with our own trials, we became witnesses against our parents. For Mom’s trial, I described how she was Barry’s follower. None of this was her idea, but she failed to protect us, especially Jenny. Mom cried through it all. She looked like she had lost a ton of weight, her cheeks gaunt. The DA laid into her for being so negligent. Her trial was the first time I saw Steph since the arrest, because we were kept in different detention centers, and our own trials were separate. The only person I was able to speak to on the phone was Grandma Bernice, who would tell me of Steph’s welfare. As the trials progressed, Steph started showing more, and I believed that her being pregnant softened us in the jury’s eyes. She looked hardened, too. No longer the bubbly sister with her hair in a side-ponytail, both of us pale and wan, grizzled from time spent in the detention centers with horrible criminal kids and bare-bones comforts. But it was Mom who seemed like she really was about to crumble. After our testimonies, against the advice of her lawyer, Mom spoke. She said she deserved life in prison for what she’d done. She and Barry had forced us kids into their heists. When we first started, it appeared to be innocent, small robberies just to get by after her husband lost his job and savings. Then it got out of hand. She couldn’t reckon with Barry, who wouldn’t hear of giving up. She saw something terrible happening on the horizon but was powerless to stop the freight train. For this, she did not want to be let off, nor should that happen to Barry as well. Only for us kids. We deserved a life after this with her mother in Florida. We should not be punished for our parents’ abuse.
The judge and jury ruled fifteen years, since Mom hadn’t personally killed anyone. She got off getting a life sentence for that reason only. There were still state charges to deal with, which would likely add years to her sentence. She would be an old woman when she’d be free. She didn’t want it any other way.
She pleaded sorry to both of us, but Steph and I held firm. We wouldn’t give her that satisfaction, or at least we weren’t ready yet. Frail Mom was led away by the guards, and it could be the last time we’d see her if, we so chose. At that moment, I was convinced I’d never see her again. None of this made the pain in my stomach over Jenny any better. The only saving grace was reuniting with Steph, and we were allowed to hug. I never wanted to let go. I felt her stomach as the baby kicked. We cried together.
Barry’s trial was a whole other headache. There was more evidence against him, so it took much longer. Mom had already been sentenced when his trial had barely started. We were still kept in the detention centers because our trials were on pause until we delivered what the DA wanted against Barry: a full-court press against him that would include Mom’s testimony too. During his trials, he didn’t look at any of us. He seemed a whittled-down version of himself, too. It was hard to tell what emotions were going through his thick skull. He had shaved his head, no longer sprouting curls, and grown a beard. I didn’t know if he was angry at us for turning on him to save our own skin, upset at Mom for testifying when she wasn’t even getting anything in return, pissed at me for keeping a journal of his wrongdoings, or simply mad at being responsible for Jenny’s death. Did he weep himself to sleep every night, tossing and turning until cruel morning arrived? Like Mom, did he welcome a sentence, believing he deserved nothing less? His poker face wouldn’t say.
Similar to Mom’s trial, we testified, going through every grueling incident of our haphazard journey. Hearing me say it out loud made me realize that we really were abused. There were the multiple times he had hit me, used us kids as pawns in the robberies. The judge was flabbergasted from never having dealt with such an insane case before. After every day, the media exploded outside of the courtroom, me and Steph’s lawyers not letting us speak. Barry had hired a souped-up defense that tried every trick in the book, but it seemed like the judge wasn’t leaning in his favor. Mom’s testimony, a gut punch as well. He may have thought that us kids would turn, but never Judith. She did it for us, whether to gain favor or for her own culpability. It was why I still thought of her as Mom, while Barry would never be Dad again. She was ashamed of what she did but didn’t just put the blame on him. In front of the jury, she held herself responsible and encouraged Barry to do the same. He didn’t. There was no speech at the end to me or Steph. Again, he never even looked our way. When I read from my journal about the worst of his crimes, I thought I saw a glimmer of his gaze shifting my way, a pin sticking into his tough exterior. If he felt bad for a moment, he quickly hid it deep down. He wouldn’t even give me the satisfaction of shooting me with dagger eyes.
The only time his lawyer spoke up against any accusations that were actually false was related to Special Agent Terbert. When Agent Terbert was on the stand, he was convinced that Barry was the one who fired the gun at him, causing the retaliation that killed Jenny. Maybe it was easier for him not to admit it was just a kid. Neither Mom, Steph, nor I refuted it, and when Barry’s lawyer tried to sell me down the river, it became the nail in Barry’s defense. Newspapers ran with that juicy morsel, and the hatred toward Barry skyrocketed. Finally, when the jury read the verdict, all our assholes clenched. He was given a life sentence, not the death penalty, so he could spend the rest of his time on Earth thinking about what he’d done. To kill him would be too kind. On the way out of the courtroom, he turned his bearded face away from us as he passed. There were things I wanted to say, shout, curse, attack even, claw out those eyes, make him bleed. I let myself imagine the torture against him. I let that be enough.
Because Steph and I cooperated and the big fish got caught, we weren’t sentenced to juvie until we were eighteen, or even worse, adult prison for Steph since she was closer in age. We got hundreds of hours of community service in Boca Raton with Grandma Bernice as our guardian. I was glad to have a home outside of the detention center because it had been eight months since we arrived. Steph was about to give birth, and her judge wanted it to be in Florida with her family.
A car came to pick us up from our separate facilities and take us to the airport, where we sat next to one another on the plane, holding hands. We were out of tears. Thankful but also spent. Neither of us had anything to say. We munched on peanuts, avoided the whispers from people who knew who we were. I closed my eyes and slept for a few hours, which was something I hadn’t done since this whole mess began.
Steph woke me up as we touched down in Florida. She was so big she looked about to pop. In my grogginess, I placed my palm against her enlarged stomach.
“Jenny belly,” I said, still attached to my dreams. I’d been chasing Jenny down an endless hill, never able to catch her as her cackles echoed.
Steph cocked her head to the side, confused, but then her lips turned upwards for a semi-smile. She nodded. Rubbed her stomach.
“Jenny belly,” she agreed, and we exited the plane.