Free In the Sanctuary of Outcasts by Neil White Page A

I said. “So sorry I put you and the kids in this situation.”
    Linda was tired of my apologies. I had said I’m sorry so many times it didn’t carry much weight now.
    “If you’re really sorry,” she said gently, “you’ll change.”
    I knew she was counting on that. If I could change, she had told me, she might be able to take me back. But I didn’t know how to change. And, secretly, I didn’t think I needed to. I didn’t want to become a different person. I simply needed to operate within the bounds of the law. I wasn’t about to let go of the skills I’d developed or the plans I’d made. And I had a new plan as an undercover reporter that was going to secure my future. But I didn’t tell Linda. At least not yet. No need to get her involved. Plus, she might not have liked the idea.
    Little Neil grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the playground. The racquetball had bounced over the fence and stopped about ten feet outside the perimeter.
    “Go get it, Dad,” Neil said. Maggie stood next to him and pointed at the blue ball. They waited for me to step over the three-foot fence and get the ball. I looked around. A guard was watching me from the deck. It had been made clear to the inmates. If you go outside the fence, you lose visiting privileges .
    For as long as my children could remember, I had ignored fences and boundaries and rules. I climbed buildings to get balls out of gutters. I jumped curbs to get closer to the entrance of football games. I talked clerks into giving us rooms at overbooked hotels. Nothing much had prevented me from getting what I wanted, and I made sure my children knew it. Now I stood at the edge of a knee-high fence, embarrassed to be so helpless.

CHAPTER 16
    That night, just before lights out, Doc asked if I would take a look at the mole he had removed with the razor blade. He stood up, turned his back to me, and pulled up his khaki shirt.
    “Did I get it all?” he asked.
    I stared at the scab left from Doc’s self-surgery. The spot looked black and jagged. I told him I couldn’t really tell much.
    “Is any of the mole left?” he said. “Can you describe it?”
    I couldn’t believe he wanted me to examine his back. I couldn’t begin to distinguish between the remnants of the dark mole I’d never seen up close and the scab forming over his incisions.
    “I can’t tell,” I said.
    Doc sighed in frustration. He walked over to the mirror and looked over his shoulder to try to get a good look at his handiwork.
    After lights out, I lay in the dark thinking about Neil and Maggie and how my imprisonment would affect them. Linda told me that she and the kids had been invited to spend the month of July in a Florida condominium with our friends the Singletarys. I thought she needed a vacation from my troubles more than I needed visits. I encouraged her to go.
    Linda had never promised to stay with me. The last year had been difficult for her. Too many lies. Too much trust to regain. From the outset, she had never made any guarantees.
    I didn’t know if Doc was still awake, but I asked aloud, “I wonder if my wife is going to stay with me.”
    Groggy, Doc answered, “Was your marriage solid?”
    We had been seeing a psychologist, I told him.
    “ Not a good sign.”
    “I hope we can pick it back up when I get out,” I said. I thought the counseling had been helpful.
    “Don’t waste your money.”
    “What do you mean?” I asked.
    “If you have a male counselor, he’ll just want to sleep with your wife,” Doc said. He rolled over in his bed and pulled the covers up over his shoulder. “If she’s female, she’ll just want to screw you.”

 
    A stained-glass window behind the pews in the Catholic church where leprosy patients worshipped.

CHAPTER 17
    On a Sunday morning in late June, in spite of the three-hour round-trip, Linda brought the children to Carville for the Catholic church service. Families entered the Catholic church from the outside. Inmates and leprosy