Unforgiven Past

I sat there, staring at the concrete floor, and cold metal bars. I could feel the cold air bouncing off it. I couldn’t believe there was a good chance that this was going to be my life for the next five to eight years. I didn’t do anything wrong, as far as I was concerned. He deserved what he got. Why should I be punished? Why did everyone think it was so wrong? He done worse to me and my family! -The justice system did agree; “Your record shows you’re a minor offender, but the callousness of this violent attack has to be taken into account when you are sentenced.”- That was one way that Judge Donnelly described me while we were at my hearing at the court house- “These charges your facing Mr Peter Greene, show a serious manor of violence.” He spoke down to me, like I was a nobody, and I meant s**t to him. He didn’t know me, and he could never understand why it happened. “You seem to think that just because you had a troubled childhood doesn’t mean you are above the law. Everyone has to abide by these, You are nothing special Mr Greene.” He continued. I remember everything he said. I had had time to reflect on everything, while I’m sitting here. My lawyer told me I should have been okay, and I was only looking at a suspended sentence. He seemed pretty adamant I wasn’t going to spend one day in jail- I wasn’t sure about that anymore. The Judge seemed very strict, and I couldn’t see my self getting any leniency under any circumstances. I’m not going to lie, and pretend that I wasn’t scared-because I was. I literally felt like I was going to spew! That’s the reason they put me in the cell. Because I had broke down in the court room, I got angry, because the Judge wouldn’t let me talk. I’m not a bad person, I’m not a violent person. I kept trying to talk to him, and try and make him understand-but he want interested. I couldn’t stop hyperventilating. So the judge sent me here to calm down, and held me in contempt. The court proceedings were adjourned until tomorrow, then I would find out what my future held. “You have severely injured this man- he has possibly lost sight in one of his eyes. He received a fractured skull, bleeding from his brain, and several broken bones from this extremely violent encounter. Plus you never took into consideration, all the terror you caused the innocent people that witnessed this savage attack.” I kept playing over the court proceedings in my head while I sat there in this small concrete box. I could still see the look on my mums face was completely broken, she had tears streaming from her face. Her eyes were red raw, I knew she blamed herself- It wasn’t her fault. We cant change the past. It was unforgivable. I have told her that since it happened, I hope she knew that she wasn’t to blame. I could see I had broken my girlfriends heart too, we had been together for two years, and she was my world. Leah Miller had saved me when I was in my darkest days- she was the sun that guided my though the toughest days. I had nothing but love for her. From the moment I met Leah, she was so nice and kind to me. Leah, had won my heart, I had never felt that way about any other girls through out my life. I was twenty-two when I met her. I had been really struggling with life in general. The first night I saw her, I was drinking and decided to do something stupid. I had never token anything in my life, but that night I was angry, and for some reason I decided to steal a car. Because I was drunk, and sick of walking everywhere. This particular old car I decided to take, had one of those metal bars that lock the steering wheel in place. It was supposed to be an anti-theft device. But I looked at it like a challenge, and I like a good challenge. So I decided it would be a good idea to use my foot to bend it, but it didn’t go to plan. When I finally managed to bend it and snap it, the metal stabbed into the top of my foot, and took a massive chunk of skin that left a deep wound. I was too dunk to feel it, so I just took my t-shirt off and wrapped it around my heavily bleeding foot. After I had my fun with the car, I wiped it down, and ditched it out in the cane fields. I didn’t want to bring any heat home, Mum doesn’t need my stupidity to bring her more grief. When I walked through my mums door, Mum was talking to a young girl, she was around my age. That’s how I met Leah, she had recently started working with Mum. They were sitting at the table talking, when she noticed the blood soaked t-shirt and blood drops behind me. “Oh god Peter, what have you done my boy?” Mum asked coming over to me, “I went to the beach and the oyster’s got me” It was the first excuse that popped into my head, and I knew Mum would believe me. “Leah, this is my son Peter. He is always clumsy” Mum said with a laugh, “Nice to finally put a face to the name” Leah said smiling at me, “Yeah nice to meet you too” I smiled, “I’ll be back in a minute, if that’s okay?” She said to mum, and gave me a smile as she left “That fine dear. I’ll just see what we have in the first aid kit” Mum said as she got up and walked down to the bathroom “Wait for me Pete” Leah said with a big grin, I nodded my head and said goodbye. I wondered if she was really coming back, but I figured I probably scared her. About fifteen minutes later she returned, holding a shopping bag of stuff. Mum had washed my foot in warm water and I had it up on the coffee table drying, while Mum was rummaging around trying to find something, “I’m back” Leah called through the door, “Come in dear” Mum yelled, Leah walked straight over to me with a smile on her face, she started pulling stuff out of the back bag, there was some Antiseptic wash, some gauze and a couple of bandages. Then she pulled out a Gatorade and a sausage roll. She passed them to me and told me to put my foot up so she could clean it and wrap it. I thanked her for the Gatorade and sausage roll. I lifted my foot onto the coffee table, and didn’t bother debating with her. No one had ever been so nice to me before. I think I fell in love with her from that moment. It got late, and Mum left us to talk so she could go to bed. Leah and I talked all night, we laughed and got to know each other. We sat on the futon couch until we both passed out. We have been together since that night. I loved Leah. We both had plans for our future together, and it looks like I’ve ruined it.