A Moment in Time

by Jane Gallagher

It’s not me, the smiling bride on the wedding photograph; it’s simply a moment in time, not as it is, but as it was, for a split second. The first strike took him more by surprise than me, the hand with the ring (“a ring has no beginning and no end,” said the priest) that ripped with fearsome anger into my trusting flesh. That day was the beginning of the end: years passed as, battle scarred, I wore my wounds like clothes. But when I saw him with her I knew the end was in sight. In a split second I took him by surprise and watched with cold joy as the rivulets of tear-shaped blood dripped slowly into the red hall carpet, disappearing without a trace. Since they locked me up I have never felt freer; I look at the murderess’s photograph on the front page of today’s newspaper but it’s not me; it captures me not as I am but as I was, for a split second.

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Jane Gallagher lives in Liverpool with her husband, four children, and chocolate brown labrador. In 2007, the former journalist was "sentenced" to a men's prison where she works two days a week as writer in residence. To find out more, visit her website.