Searching for Hope

Prologue
Suddenly the steel door of the county jail garage slowly lifts, and the March rays of sunshine pour through the windshield, Julia's tear-filled eyes squint at the brightness as her thoughts run a rapid race through her mind.
As a twenty-eight -year -old mother of three and a teacher who never had so much as a parking ticket, why am I riding this prison bus shackled to the seat with my hands held in cuffs staring at prison guards holding shotguns across their legs? My five-foot four-inch frame of one hundred and twenty pounds can't even hold the straps tight enough that tether me to the seat. The excess chain is hitting the back of the brown pants that I wore ten days earlier to my sentencing. My tears now stream down my face as my stomach churns with worry and thoughts of already missing my daughters Joy, Haleigh, and little four-year old Cindy fill my mind. The sadness overwhelms me.
How did I ever come to be on a prison bus? I feel broken and hopeless as the bus turns on the highway leaving my hometown of Johnstown behind. I take a deep, slow breath and attempt to wipe my tears away with cuffed hands as the landscape goes by in a blur.
The bus ride to Chauncey State Prison takes six hours. But I don't see much of the Pennsylvania countryside as my body feels cold, and I just sit in a daze staring off. I can only think of the past events and my family. What an ordeal I have put them through. I hurt with remorse, guilt and shame which makes my palms sweat and imposes a heaviness on my heart.
After a long, numbing bus ride, my mindlessness is abruptly ended as the bus screeches to a halt. I peer out the barred widow and see a group of old brick buildings surrounded by a twenty-five-foot fence with rows of barbed wire rolled up above.
"ALL RIGHT, LADIES!" yells a huge guard. I jump in reaction as he continues. "I will call your name. Stand as I do so! Julia Martin Christianson!"
I rise tentatively barely able to keep my balance with shackled ankles. Roll call continues sounding like a distant buzz in my ears.
"Welcome to your new home, Chauncey State Correctional Institute," begins the guard. "Listen to my every word and if you do, maybe, just maybe, you won't end up in the hole! And oh yeah, thank you for my job security," he smiles sarcastically showing crooked teeth.