FICLET: Letter from California
May. 29th, 2010 02:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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ofmyself's prompt for the 2010 OZ Free for All Kareem Said/Tricia Ross - Kareem gets a letter from California
Major angst ahead. Don't say I didn't warn you.
The postmark showed the letter was from California. The name on the return address was “T. Ross”. It was a letter that should have been destroyed immediately, but some things needed to be dealt with and he wasn’t one for shirking his responsibility.
My dear Kareem,
It seems like a lifetime since we last saw each other, but I still remember your quiet strength and your smile. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about you. I know you’d like me to say that I’ve prayed for you, but I can’t bring myself to do that, not anymore. Without you in my life, finding my own faith has been very difficult.
These past few months, I’ve been working at the Center for Prison Reform. It’s partly because of Scott but mostly because of you that I do this. I don’t know what would have happened had I not met you. All that violence. If there hadn’t been all that violence, we wouldn’t have met. It’s something that I think about every time I turn the pages of your book. I know the reasons for the violence, for the riot, and if I can prevent it from happening somewhere else, I will. There are too many brothers, too many husbands, too many loved ones locked away for them to suffer the injustices of the State.
You must be smiling now, thinking that I sound like you when I go on like that. And maybe I do. It’s not a bad thing to sound like you, I think. Or to want to see you again.
Every day brings you one day closer to parole. Now that you know where I am, will you come here once you are free? I can see you in this place, at my house, not far from the Pacific, enjoying the sunlight that’s been deprived from you for so long. I want to be able to touch you, to give you back everything that you’ve given me.
Please say you’ll think about it. And pray for me. I know you will, Kareem. You have faith and I have love enough for both of us.
Yours,
Tricia
Sighing deeply, he placed the letter back in the envelope and penned a reply.
Dear Miss Ross,
I regret to inform you that Kareem Said was killed January 19.
Please accept my condolences for your loss.
Sincerely,
Leo Glynn
Warden, Oswald State Correctional Facility
ofmyself's prompt for the 2010 OZ Free for All Kareem Said/Tricia Ross - Kareem gets a letter from CaliforniaMajor angst ahead. Don't say I didn't warn you.
The postmark showed the letter was from California. The name on the return address was “T. Ross”. It was a letter that should have been destroyed immediately, but some things needed to be dealt with and he wasn’t one for shirking his responsibility.
My dear Kareem,
It seems like a lifetime since we last saw each other, but I still remember your quiet strength and your smile. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about you. I know you’d like me to say that I’ve prayed for you, but I can’t bring myself to do that, not anymore. Without you in my life, finding my own faith has been very difficult.
These past few months, I’ve been working at the Center for Prison Reform. It’s partly because of Scott but mostly because of you that I do this. I don’t know what would have happened had I not met you. All that violence. If there hadn’t been all that violence, we wouldn’t have met. It’s something that I think about every time I turn the pages of your book. I know the reasons for the violence, for the riot, and if I can prevent it from happening somewhere else, I will. There are too many brothers, too many husbands, too many loved ones locked away for them to suffer the injustices of the State.
You must be smiling now, thinking that I sound like you when I go on like that. And maybe I do. It’s not a bad thing to sound like you, I think. Or to want to see you again.
Every day brings you one day closer to parole. Now that you know where I am, will you come here once you are free? I can see you in this place, at my house, not far from the Pacific, enjoying the sunlight that’s been deprived from you for so long. I want to be able to touch you, to give you back everything that you’ve given me.
Please say you’ll think about it. And pray for me. I know you will, Kareem. You have faith and I have love enough for both of us.
Yours,
Tricia
Sighing deeply, he placed the letter back in the envelope and penned a reply.
Dear Miss Ross,
I regret to inform you that Kareem Said was killed January 19.
Please accept my condolences for your loss.
Sincerely,
Leo Glynn
Warden, Oswald State Correctional Facility
