He swallowed hard, staring at the words on the page. Written in swirly cursive, as only a woman could write, it made him smile. He sighed deeply and began to read.

Dear Cary,

I'm guessing that I'm the last person in the world you expected to get a letter from, right? But I couldn't think of anyone better. Oh, don't take it the wrong way. I owe you a lot for trying to help me. Well, you and Alicia. Tell her hello for me, okay? But in here-in jail, they only let me write one letter a month, so I chose you. I should have written to my parents. That probably would have been the smartest choice. But I know that getting a letter from me would only upset them. You saw how my mom gets when she's upset.

God, I can't stop thinking about that day, when they dragged me off to jail. How my mom started screaming and crying, falling to the ground in hysterics. It still haunts me even now and it probably will continue to do so long after I get out of here. If I ever get out of here. Oh, I know the sentence is ten years but it's only been a year and it feels like twenty. To be honest, I don't think I'm ever going to get out of here.

I cried for days when I first got there. Prison is the scariest place in the world; people yelling, screaming fighting, all day and all night. And then they moved me to this place. Dwight Correctional Center makes the other place look like a playground. This place is pure hell.

It still happens; the fights, the screaming, the yelling constantly echoing in my ears. I can't eat, I can't sleep, I barely eat and this prison outfit-as lovely as it is-has become way too big, but I don't dare ask for a smaller one. I've become too afraid to ask for anything. Prison, so I've heard, is supposed to make you stronger, more immune to things. But for me it's had the opposite effect.

It's made me weaker, although I wouldn't dare tell my parents. They think I'm brave. How wrong they are. And as for my prison outfit, even if I could ask for a smaller size, I wouldn't have any idea what size to ask for. I don't have a clue how much I weigh and to be honest I don't have a clue about anything. Not anymore. My life as I once knew it has vanished before my eyes. I-

"Mr. Agos?"

Cary looked up sharply to see his assistant Amy smiling at him from the doorway. Damn, of all the times to interrupt. "What is it?"

"There's a phone call for you-a Mr. Lindkiff about the Thompson case?"

"Take a message."

"But he said it's urgent."

"Take a message!" Cary repeated, more firmly. "And don't bother me again. I'm very busy, all right?"

Amy's smile disappeared and she looked as though she might cry. She was so damn sensitivie. It seemed like he was forever apologizing for upsetting her. But not this time. Finally she nodded wordlessly. "All right. I'll take a message."

Cary waited until Amy closed the door and then returned his attention to the letter. It took him a few moments to figure out where he'd left off and his efforts resulted in his having to read the letter again from the beginning, but he found that he didn't mind. The letter was strangely comforting in a way.

"My life as I once knew it has vanished before my eyes. I know that everyone probably thinks that I have no remorse for what happened, but I think about Heather every day. Every day, Cary. Is that what prison is for? A place to put people to force them to think about the worst possible time of their lives? To scare them to death into becoming decent people? I'm beginning to think so. If it's true then it's working. It works really well, actually. I'll never get involved with something like that again. I wonder if Heather is looking down on me. She probably hates me. I'm pretty sure she-."

Cary moved the letter closer to his face. The next word was smudged on the page, unreadable, most likely due to a tear having fallen onto it. Suddenly the idea of her sitting in her prison cell writing a letter to him that should have been written to her parents was like a knife through his heart; the heart that went out to her. And then he read on.

"I was hoping that you'd come and visit me but I guess you're really busy. Lawyers usually are and you're certainly not obligated to do so-visit me, I mean. I'm not your client anymore and even though you lost the case, I'm guessing you get some money for your efforts, right? And I'm sure you split it with Alicia. It's only fair. It's none of my business, so I'll stop talking about it. I'm sorry; I just sometimes get a little crazy in here. You hear all of these stories on television about how prisoners get special privileges of watching TV and so forth. Well I guess I'm not one of those because all I have is this little cell that's about half the size of my dorm room. No TV, no Internet. Not even a book to read unless they come by every now and then with a book cart. I love to read. Only problem is that I've read everything on that cart probably five times over. My mom has brought me a few books but they all have a faint hint of her perfume and when I open the cover, all I do is sob. And so I just sit here staring at the walls, waiting for someone to come and visit me. Because I know it will be a long time before I get out of here.

Who knows if you'll even get this letter because I'm pretty sure that the guards open the mail and read every letter before they send them out. So if you're reading this, thank you again. And don't feel guilty because it's not your fault.

Bianca
Cary sighed deeply and refolded the letter placing it carefully back into the envelope. He eyed the crisp white stationery that sat on his desk; the one that read Lockhart/Gardner. Taking a pen out of his suit pocket, he grabbed a sheet of stationery and an envelope and addressed it to the prison; Dwight Correctional Facility, Inmate #96253.

Why did they always refer to inmates as numbers? Didn't the prison system realize that prisoners were real people? That they had names and families? It was ironic that he was even thinking this way because so many times he would cheer at the thought of someone rotting in jail after he'd won a big case for a client. Now he was seeing a different side. He read the letter again, absorbing each word. He knew he should write back; she was probably expecting it. But he didn't know what in the hell to say.

But then it hit him.

What he needed to say he couldn't put down on paper. He needed to do it in person.