Our Man In Prison
Lucky & Rich:
Unchain Me
These are actual letters (four of them written in an 18-hour period, and there were many, many others over a long span of time) from an incarcerated man to what used to be his boyfriend, until the object of his affections discovered that he was a burglar and was eventually caught by the police and put in prison.
Their names have been changed to protect their identities.
Thursday, December 15, 1988 2 AM
Dear Lucky,
Hi there baby, I love you. It’s very late, or actually very early right now, but I thought I would write you a few lines before I try to go to sleep.
I hate to say this baby, but your letter from last night really fucked me up. I was crying and throwing up so bad my bunky finally called the cop. He in turn called the MTA who came and got me.
He said, "What’s the problem?" and I gave him your letter. So we talked for a couple of hours, he gave me something for my stomach and to calm my nerves and now I’m back.
He also said I should write you again, because god only knows what I sent out last night. He said the best thing I could do is write you the truth and you would either believe it or wouldn’t. He said from the looks of your letter he was sure you loved me and that you would believe me. So I’m supposed to stop panicking, write you a few lines and go to sleep. So here goes, baby.
Lucky, I don’t want to lose you, or any part of you or our relationship. You have become so very many things to me, and each one of them is vital, necessary, and special to me. I would never do anything that could jeopardize that, never.
It hurts me so much to think that you are out there thinking I went out on you, or even was thinking about it. Because it just isn’t true, pal. I love you just too, too, too fucking much. You must believe me when I say I have never slept with anyone else except you since the very day we met. I have not even had any interest in them and that is the honest to God’s truth.
Yes, I was going to Visions, but only for a drink and because I’d never been there. I never even went inside the place. So please don’t think there was anything else in my mind except a couple of drinks.
After that I was on my way to Tahoe and you. Not because I thought you were out fucking around, but because I didn’t know what to think. Let’s face it, you never went out on Friday or Saturday nights and here it was Wednesday and you weren’t there. I called 3 fucking times and finally just flipped. I mean it was totally out of character for what I had come to know as you. Now we know why, and that’s because you were there the whole time.
The bottom line is that you have to know that you have nothing to worry about in the way of me cheating. You never have, and you never will, it’s as simple as that.
Which brings us to the next thing, and that’s this cop. Is there something there baby? I need to know. I also need to know if you have slept with or fucked around with him, or anyone else for that matter since I met you that very first night in Sacramento. So please tell me, and don’t bother sparing my feelings.
If it’s true, then tell me so now, and I can deal with it. I’ll still love you, want you and need you for ever. I know that won’t ever change. But I have to know now, and deal with it now. That way it can have been dealt with and gone before I get out. So please tell me the truth.
To be honest, I don’t believe that you have. I think you’re honest enough that you would have said something by now. At the same time, though, I see you out there hurt and mad thinking I went out on you or was going to. To top it off, you tell me you spent 8 hours talking with that cop. Jesus. I guess I can see how you thought I did something.
As a matter of fact, I’m understanding it completely now. You thought that because I couldn’t talk to you on the phone I thought you were out fucking around. So I in turn was going to get even so to speak. That’s it isn’t it? Well, pal, I’m sorry to say that’s not how I work, it’s just not my style.
Well, baby, it’s very late and this stuff they gave me to calm me down is working. So I’m going to bring this to a close for now.
All that is really important baby is the plain and simple fact of how very much we love each other. It doesn’t matter to me what you have done, because all I think about it us and our future.
I think of how it will be to make love with you again. How it will be to spend the rest of my life with you growing old. You know what baby? I like what I see, and I’m very happy and content with it and it being just you and you alone.
What we had out there was very special and unique. It only comes around to a few select people GOD picks, and it only comes around once. Well baby, you’re it, and that makes me so very happy.
I’ll write more tomorrow, and don’t worry about me. I’ll be OK now, I guess I just went into one of my panics. So until tomorrow my love, remember how very much I love you. It’s deep and it’s forever. That will never ever change as long as I breathe and I can promise you that. I love and miss you very much, so much that it hurts me. You are in my thoughts constantly, from the minute I wake up to the time I go to sleep. Then the dreams come, and in some ways I like them the best.
So remember baby, I love you, and it is forever...
All My Love,
Rich xxxooo
Thursday, December 15, 1988 8 a.m.
Dear Lucky,
Hi there baby and good morning. Actually this is a terrible morning, at least for me.
I want to go home now. I have to see you and talk with you. I need to touch you and make love with you. I miss you so bad right now, and it’s hurting me not to see you.
Whenever I think I have my emotions under control, they suddenly come back twice as intense. Sometimes I don’t know if I can make it. But then I think of you again, and I know I just have to. I have to get out of this place and come home to you.
God how I hope and pray everything works out OK in Lassen County. I can’t bear to think of all this shit lasting any longer than spring. All I want is to go home, and I want to do it fucking now.
I’m scared again, too, baby. I’m so very scared. I don’t know why, because Lassen County has no burglary case. But I guess there’s always that chance, and it scares me. Why doesn’t that DA just let it all go and let me get on with my life?
Well, I guess we’re back to "let’s wait and see." Jesus, I hate the waiting most of all. Well my love, I’ll stop for now and write some more later.
Remember always how very, very much I love you. You’re everything to me, and without you I am nothing. I love you with all of my heart and more than life itself. Please never, ever doubt that, because it is the truest feeling of all, and it comes from my heart. I love you, I want you, I need you, I must have you back in my life, full time and for ever. So until later, always know those things. They never cease, and never will. I love you...xxxoooxxxooo Rich
Thursday, December 15, 1988 Noon
Dear Lucky,
Hi there sex kitten, how are you? Myself, I guess I am doing a little better. At least I seem to have gotten some of my emotions back under control.
Anyways, I thought I might write you a few lines and answer that statement in your letter. OK?
At the end of your letter you said to "keep you encouraged." To let you know everyday how much I love you. That, "it was like fuel" to you and just because I say one day, not to forget to say it the next.
Well, baby, all I can say to that is, I know. That’s one of the reasons I write to you at least twice a day. Just so you’ll always know you’re in my mind and in my heart. Also though because it helps me to talk to you on this paper. It gets me from one day to the next.
There’s one other thing too though baby, and that’s that I need it too. More than you can possibly believe I need to know my love with you is secure. That nothing and no one is going to change it.
So don’t forget about me baby, because I need it just as much. In some ways maybe even more. OK?
The bottom line is that you don’t ever need to worry about me "forgetting" to tell you how very much I love you. Your love for me and my love for you is all that gets me from one day to the next. Without it baby, I wouldn’t even try. So you’ll always be able to find at least a few "I love you’s" in every letter.
How could I have someone as beautiful and special as you, and forget to tell them I loved them? It just isn’t going to happen. OK?
Well, that’s all I want to say for right now. I’ll write more this evening before I drop this in the mail. I hope you got some of my letters today. Maybe it was just the weekend traffic that did it in the mail room. Even though I mail a letter on Saturday, and another one on Sunday, I don’t think they even get processed until Monday. Anyways, let me know if you’re getting all these OK or not.
I hope you’re having a nice day, even though I’m sure my short call to you yesterday probably threw you into a state, so to speak.
I love you baby and I’m missing you very bad today. I need to be able to see and talk with you soon. God how I need to see you.
So until later, take care of yourself, stay out of trouble and please be good. I’m thinking about you every minute of every day, it never ever stops.
I love you baby, with all my heart and soul, I love and miss you. So don’t you forget it. ;-)
All My Love,
Rich xxxxoooo
Thursday, December 15, 1988 7:00 p.m.
Dear Lucky,
Hi there pumpkin, how are you? Hopefully all the letters you should have gotten on Tuesday and Wednesday came to you today. Otherwise I know you’re probably not doing so well. That still really pisses me off when I think about your not getting my letters. I’m sure it will be OK, it just pisses me off. Anyways, let’s talk some business for a few minutes. OK?
Hopefully they will come and get me for the trip to Lassen County within the next week. If they don’t, then it may not be until after the New Year. One thing I will promise you is the minute I get there I will call you on the phone. OK?
They’re not as lax with the calls as Reno was, but I will be able to make a call or two. Unfortunately, once I get there I will be back to square one. You see, when I leave here, they will make me put all of my property in R & R. So in reality I’ll walk into Lassen County Jail without so much as even a toothbrush. But we can figure that out once I get there.
The best thing about this is that it will force Lassen County to either press the charges or drop them all together. I suppose if they press the charge, then we can draw it out and I’ll do my violation there. After the violation is up, then we can post bail. I somehow don’t think it will go that far though. They just don’t have a very good case for a conviction. Although if they were to come at me and offer me a deal such as a trespassing charge or some other kind of a misdemeanor I would probably be inclined to take it. Any kind of a burglary conviction is in no way acceptable though. But you already know that.
I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens. Anyways, we should look at this as a good thing. As long as Fr. Pat goes in and says something to the effect of "everything is OK, and it may have been just a misunderstanding," then shit baby, not only will the DA back up, but the board itself may give me a minimum violation. So have Fr. Bill talk with Fr. Pat quick. OK? Enough of all that, though.
You know when I talked with you on the phone yesterday? I’m really sorry I had to be so quick. Please believe it was not because of me or any wishes. The guy was just in a hurry and really couldn’t have given me a call in the first place. Boy did he look at me funny when I said, "I love and miss you a lot." Oh, well. I figured it really doesn’t matter. Also who knew when I would be able to say it to you on the phone again. So I said it for you baby.
Right now I’m in my cell (as usual) and I’m waiting for mail call. We also shower tonight. That’s when I’ll mail this letter to you. Hopefully mail call will come fast enough that I am able to answer some of any letter I may get from you. If not though, know that I will answer your letter tonight and you’ll get it the day after you get this. OK?
I can’t wait to get out and start life over again with you. We are going to have such a good life. Whenever I think of having you to grow old with I become so very, very happy. We just fit together so perfectly. I’m not just talking about in bed either. Although we fit together there real good too. ;-) I was talking about how well we get along. We can be doing anything, anywhere, and we look like we were born doing it together. That’s a special thing baby.
I am never going to let you go pal. You are mine for life and it’s just as simple as that. We are going to be together, in the same bed, and making love until the day we die.
None of this ‘you have your room and I have mine’ bullshit. I want us to have our room and our bed. Because we are going to have a good old-fashioned marriage baby. Every time I think of it I get excited and so very happy. I tell you I just can’t wait!
Hey baby. You know the card you sent me that I got yesterday? The black one with the piggy bank on it and all the hearts going into it, that says "I’m saving all my love for you." Well, I was just wondering why you didn’t write anything inside it like you do all the others. Was there a reason? Or did you just somehow forget?
Hey! Guess what? I just got your letter, or actually a card from you that you put in the mail on Tuesday the 13th. I guess that our mail’s just a little slow with the holidays right now. Anyways, in this card you wrote all over the place. ;-)
Thanks so very much the beautiful cards you always send me. They mean so very much to me that you can’t even imagine. I was thinking that when I get out I may put them all together and make something neat out of them. Like a huge collage or something. Anyways, I just wanted you to know how very much I appreciate the card and letters.
By the way, all this time has counted for anything Lassen may do. They have to give me credit for every day I’ve done while they have had that hold on me. Which is ever since day one. In all honesty though I don’t see them being able to give me any time at all. OK?
Did I tell you today how very much I love you? Yes, I’m sure I did, but, oh well. You are special enough you should hear it 100 times a day. ;-) You know baby, right now I feel really good. Your cards and letters do that to me.
Anyways, I wanted to say I’m sorry for the first part of this letter and whatever I sent you yesterday. Your letters just have such a powerful impact on me and the one I got yesterday just freaked me out. So I’m sorry.
Please don’t change how you write your letters either. You simply wrote down your honest feelings, and that’s what is most of all important. So don’t change. OK? I would hate that even worse.
Also, you don’t need to answer that question about whether you have slept with that cop or anyone else since we have met. Not only is it not important, I already know the answer. So don’t worry about it. I am deeply ashamed and embarrassed I even asked you that. So please accept my apology. OK baby? Please?
We have to try and get them this in one piece, together. I know we can if we try. I also know it will make us so very close in the end. We will have a bond closer than any two lovers on earth baby.
Of course, we’re going to have our days then this thing. What we have to do is not flip out an jump to conclusions. Like you did with the police report, and like I did after I read your letter. Most of all baby, we have to take everything and learn and grow from it. After that, we will be absolutely invincible!
I need to bring this to a close because showers are soon and I want this to get in the box by my own personal hands. Also I think 18 pages is more than enough for one letter. Of course, this letter did start at 2:00 a.m. today.
Anyways, remember how very much I love you all the time. Whenever you sit back and dream, know in your heart that I am in a cell at that very moment and I’m probably writing you. One thing is for damn sure, and that’s that I am thinking about you. Why? Because I think of you all day long every day of the week. That’s why.
Take care of yourself baby, stay out of trouble and be good. I love and miss you with all my heart baby. You are everything to me and you always will be. We are going to be together forever. Just you and me, and it will be forever. Know it and feel it, because I do.
So until tomorrow...I love you...and...I miss you...with all my heart...and...all my soul...Never forget that. I love you baby! ;-) I LOVE YOU!!
All My Love
Rich xxxxoooollll
PS. Yes, I am still exercising, but don’t worry. I won’t get like old Schwarzenegger. I’m just going to get perfect so you’ll never ever see anything better. ;-) I also want you to feel like you’re getting something from this very expensive date. ;-) I love you baby. I love you.
