There I was, sitting in my room, when Papa walked in, slamming the door behind him. Mama had to leave earlier for her job, and Papa had been drinking since before she left. Mama told me to wait in my room while she was gone, and as she left, I heard glass breaking and then the sound of the door slamming shut. As Papa walked in with his belt in hand, he yelled and screamed at me, and I could smell the alcohol in his breath. As Papa approached closer to me, I grabbed the pocket knife I had gotten for Christmas and put it in my pocket. Papa unraveled his belt, and started to lash at me multiple times. I was frightened and in great pain and knew from previous beatings that he would not stop on his own. I knew I had to retaliate so I grabbed the knife from my pocket and stabbed him right in the throat.
I sat on my bed, panicking over what I had done, and thinking about what I would tell Mama. I heard the garage door open and knew Mama was home. She called out my name and I said “in my room, Mama. She walked into my room and covered her face with her hands and started to cry. Why would she cry at this I thought to myself. Papa was an alcoholic and repeatedly beat me and my Mama. I thought I did her a favor by killing him; I was tired of all of his crap.
Mama cried and screamed “Why did you do this? I loved him with all my heart and you just took away the one person I loved the most!” I tried to explain that he had been lashing out at me and I was tired of us getting punished for no reason other than he was drunk and hated his own life. This made her even more upset. I was deeply hurt because Mama just told me that Papa was the only person that she loved most in this world. She didn’t even mention me. I was so tired of living in this house and trying to please my family all the time. So, you know what I did? I decided to run away.
While I was packing my belongings, my Mama called the police and screamed at me saying “You will go to hell for this, you know. Get out of my house, I never want to see you again you little monster!” I was sad about what she said, but it didn’t bother me that much because I was so used to being blamed for everything anyway, I had to hurry and get out of the house unless I wanted to go to jail for the rest of my life. I had to figure out right away where I was going to stay that night. The only real friend I had was Kyle, but he lived about fifteen miles away. Kyle and I had a lot in common. He is a tall kid, almost my height at about 5’7” and we are the same age as well. We are both freshman in high school, and we were the only friends each other had. We lived on the west side of Nevada, approximately two hours away from Las Vegas. Kyle lived in a really nice two story house which I thought was pretty amazing considering the fact that his Dad was an alcoholic, just like my dad. I called Kyle to tell him that I was about ten minutes from his house, and in the background I heard his parents yelling at each other. Just before I hung up the phone, I heard two gun shots in the distance. I started running immediately towards his house to see if everything was ok.
Kyle was outside his house crying. “What’s wrong?” I asked Kyle. “My dad just shot my mom and then shot himself The worst part is, I saw the whole thing. Blood is everywhere, the cops are coming, and I just don’t know what to do.” Kyle sat slumped on top of the stairs. I felt sorry for him because I guess he truly loved his dad even though he was an alcoholic.
All of a sudden it dawned on me that the cops were on their way, and I really started to freak out. I told Kyle everything about what happened at my house, and I also told him that the cops were probably now searching for me. He told me that I could stay in the pool house in his backyard. Kyle decided to come with me to the pool house because for some strange reason, he has a phobia of cops.
All night we stayed in Kyle’s pool house, praying that the cops wouldn’t find us there. The next day when we woke up, we headed over to the nearest Denny’s with the money we had to spend. When we got to Denny’s, I ordered pancakes with orange juice and a side of bacon. After Kyle and I finished our meal, we stayed and just talked for a while. All of a sudden we saw two police cars driving into the parking lot. One of the cars went through the drive-thru and the officer handed some pamphlets to the lady in the window. The cop cars left, and the lady walked up to the door and taped wanted posters on the window. The pictures were of Kyle and me! We rushed out of Denny’s hoping that no one recognized us, and we ran back over to Kyle’s house. When we got to his house, three FBI cars were out front, and the agents were searching the place for any trace of us. We hid in the neighbors bushes and watched as one of the agents walked out with MY SUITCASE! I couldn’t believe it, how could I have been so stupid as to leave my suitcase lying around in the pool house and not expect anyone to find it. Now the FBI, and the police, are looking for me, and they know where Kyle and I were staying.
It took the FBI and the cops a combined a total of four hours to collect evidence. Once they left the premises, we went into the pool house and found almost nothing left. That’s right, NOTHING! The agents took everything, the bodies (thank God), all the pictures, furniture, clothes, shampoo, and basically everything you would find in a house. It was all gone, and we just stared into one big empty room. I was really frustrated because all my belongings were gone. However, surprisingly enough, they didn’t empty the refrigerator or the food cabinet. We still had a little food left from Kyle’s house, but only a hundred bucks total left in our pockets. The cops also took all of our money we had left behind.
Now that Kyle and I were officially fugitives, there was little we could do. We weren’t able to go out to eat without constantly getting weird looks from random people on the street. We were officially broke, couldn’t go out, and his house smelled terrible from the blood left behind. So, you know what we did? Well we didn’t turn ourselves in like we should have, but we tried to rob a house. That’s right, ROB A HOUSE! Like you would think we couldn’t get any stupider. Well long story short, we saw Kyle’s neighbors going out to a party one night. We were starving, smelled terrible, and had no money. Kyle and I smelled so bad, I think even skunks would be afraid to come near us. When we robbed the house, we quickly took showers, stole all of their valuable belongings, and ate most of their food. As we were leaving, in the corner of my eye, I saw a camera looking directly at us. After noticing the camera of course we had to destroy it.
It took the neighbors three days to notice the camera was broken, and all their valuables were gone. I was very shocked. One day of not noticing that your camera is broken and your valuables are gone is not normal. Two days of not noticing that your camera is broken and your valuables are gone is completely insane. However it took this couple three days to figure out that everything was gone and broken. That just depicts how stupid these neighbors are.
For Kyle and I, we were just about giving up hope. We were tired of running from the police, and tired of having to worry about the cops barging through the front door and taking us to prison. So what we ended up doing was walking through the little town near the house and hoped we would be recognized. We went to the very same Denny’s and waited inside for someone to call the cops on us. It only took the cops about ten minutes to arrive at Denny’s and take us to the nearest police station.
Ten days after being arrested, Kyle and I had our days in court. The only I couldn’t understand though, is why Kyle is even there. He never did anything wrong, he never killed anyone, or even tried to. However, he did rob multiple houses with me, so he was looking at seven years in prison max. With me on the other hand, I was looking at twenty two years to life in prison. Even after getting one of the best lawyers in Nevada, and trying to sweet-talk my way out of this, there was absolutely no way of escaping my prison time.
When the judge was about to sentence Kyle and I to how much time we were going to spending in jail, I looked back behind my shoulder and saw my Mama sitting down on one of the side chairs. I waved at her, and her face showed a sign of disappointment with a side of disgust. After waving at her a second time, she waved back, but she gave me the middle finger wave. I wasn’t really surprised to see that considering my mom hated my guts. She always treated me like an accident, and never truly loved me or paid any attention to me. The only attention I got from my parents, was them yelling at me all the time.
after looking at my disappointed Mama, I looked to the judge to tell Kyle and me how much time we had to spend in prison.
After a long pause, the judge finally spoke “Now Mr. Shmidt for robbery and mass murder of your father I here by sentence you to thirty five years in Nebraskas state prison along with your measly little friend.” Kyle would only have to spend four and a half years in prison, while I had thirty-five years in prison. Yea, I have to admit it really sucked to find out I had to stay in prison for thirty five years.

Kyle and I said goodbye to each other, and left for our prison terms. Actually, we were staying in the same prison, and his cell was right beside mine. How great is that! We stay right next to each other and we didn’t have to share a cell with anyone else. I am stoked that I will spend the next five years with my best friend in the cell next to me. I’m also glad that I will not have to endure anymore beatings and screaming matches with my parents. The next five years of my life will be the best ever. I will miss Kyle when he leaves.