She was hysterical, screeching so loudly I couldn’t be sure that she’d heard what I said. I stood up, and the piercing agony in my right ankle almost took me down again. Ignoring my own injuries, I helped her stand so I could inspect hers. Her hair was a mess, and her legs and arms looked as though they’d been attacked by an angry cat; no matter how much I’d tried to protect her skin, the razor-tip ends of the tree branches had had their way with her, too. A river of tears ran through the mess of grime and blood on her face as I put more pressure on the cut on her head. Her eyes were squeezed shut, her mouth was open wide. Her sundress was dirty and torn.
Seeing all of this—knowing I was responsible for her injuries and her tears—I started to cry, too. I heard a dog bark and knew I had to get her back to her mother just as quickly as I could. I felt dizzy and sick, bells going off inside my head, but I picked her up, keeping the makeshift bandage pressed against her forehead as I limped in what I hoped was the direction of the play area. My ankle screamed at me with every step. After only a moment, I saw her mother and several other adults charging toward me.
The girl’s mother sped up until she reached us. She yanked her daughter from my arms and held her close. “Shh, shh, baby,” she said. “I’ve got you. You’re all right. Everything’s going to be fine.” She gave me a fierce glare. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
I took a step backward, almost stumbling again because of the pain in my ankle. “I don’t know,” I said. “I’m so, so sorry.” My eyes widened as two men—fathers who had been playing with their children at the park—pushed past the woman. Each of them grabbed one of my arms and squeezed them, tightly. “It’s okay,” I said. “I’m so sorry, but she’s okay. We fell. I don’t know what happened.”
“My wife called the police,” one of them said to the woman.
“Wait,” I said, feeling panic rise in a wave inside my chest. “You don’t understand. It was a mistake. I thought . . . I saw her fall and heard her crying and I thought she was mine.” A sob tore at my throat. “I’m sorry,” I said again. “Please. I’m so sorry.”
The woman said nothing. She simply held on to her daughter, whipped around, and walked away. The men who held me led me back through the woods, never letting up on their grip.
The gravity of what I’d just done sank down deep in my body, melting into a dark, rancid ink, staining my insides black. Before I knew it, my stomach heaved and emptied its contents on the ground. I straightened and tried to wipe my mouth as the two men still moved us forward.
I saw the red and blue flash of police lights as we exited the woods. The woman and her daughter were already with the paramedics, and when the officers saw the two men holding me, they marched in our direction. When they reached us, the two men finally let go, only to have one of the officers tell me to put my hands behind my back.
“Wait, please,” I begged. “Let me explain.”
The officer took my arms and forced them behind my back, securing my wrists together with handcuffs. “There’s nothing for you to explain,” he said. He was a muscular black man with a strong jaw and a bald head. “We have multiple eyewitness accounts that describe how you grabbed the child from the playground and ran into the woods.”
“I didn’t mean to,” I said, choking on my tears. “It was a mistake. I thought she was my daughter. I didn’t realize what I was doing.”
“Tell it to your lawyer,” said the other officer, a stocky woman with pale skin and black hair, shorn short against her head. “Right now, you’re being placed under arrest for attempted kidnapping.”
“You have the right to remain silent,” the male officer began, and as he continued reading me my rights, my mind went blank, and I didn’t hear anything else. I couldn’t take my eyes away from the mother as she stood next to her little girl, who the paramedics had now placed on a gurney. The mother had her hand on top of her daughter’s head as she also held one of her small hands. She only glanced up at me once, and it was with so much bitterness, so much hate in her eyes, I looked at the ground. I wondered if there was something really wrong with me. There had to be, for me to do something so unthinkable. Why else would I have grabbed that little girl and run? Why else would I have thought I was holding Brooke?
After the officer finished speaking, he asked if I had any identification. “In my back pocket,” I said, and he reached for my wallet, pulling out my driver’s license, which had expired two years before. He took it and walked over to his vehicle, then climbed inside the driver’s seat. A couple of minutes later he returned and spoke to the female officer as though I wasn’t standing right there.
“Jennifer Walker,” he said. “Just out last week from Skagit Correctional.”
“Really,” the female officer replied. “What was she in for?”
“Several counts of petty theft and child endangerment and neglect.” The officer looked at me and frowned. “Guess they let you go too soon.”
I didn’t respond. To him, I was just a criminal. A repeat offender. Nothing else. Maybe that’s the truth, I thought. Maybe I’ll be better off in jail. I’ll never get my daughters back anyway, so what does it matter?