Five Months After
Peter was convicted of eight first-degree murders and two second-degree murders. The jury decided that in the case of Matt Royston and Courtney Ignatio, he had not been acting with premeditation and deliberation. He'd been provoked. Peter would spend the rest of his life in prison.
Exactly one month after Peter was convicted, when the lights were dimmed and the detention officers made a final sweep of the catwalk, Peter reached down and pulled his right sock off. He turned on the side of his bed to face the wall and fed the sock into his mouth, stuffing it as far back as it would go. When it got hard to breathe, he fell into a dream. He was still eighteen, but it was the first day of kindergarten. He was carrying his backpack and his Superman lunch box. Peter climbs on the bus to find no other students present. The bus drives off into the sunset and a voice whispers, "Almost there"(451).