Summer 2000
I’d never attended an execution before. Well, at least not a legal one. My husband sat to my left. A reporter for Rolling Stone was on my right.
The reporter, Leslie Cowan, fidgeted nervously, and I looked over at her. I’m pretty sure this was her first execution of any kind. Rolling Stone had an upcoming issue dedicated to celebrity bikers. They thought it would be interesting to include a real biker story in that issue. The story of a girl who’d been abducted by a motorcycle gang in 1975.
That girl was me.
The remnants of Leslie’s accident three weeks before were still visible. The stitches had been removed from her forehead, but there was a thin red line where the cut had been. Her eyes weren’t quite as raccoonish as before, but it was apparent she’d recently suffered two severe black eyes. The swelling of her nose had almost gone down completely, and she’d been to a dental surgeon to replace her broken teeth.
When we’d first started the interview, she’d told me she wanted me to be completely honest about my experience with the man who was about to be executed. I’d spent the last three months with her and held almost nothing back about my relationship with him. Today was supposed to be the culmination of the interview, a chance for her to truly understand the real side of that experience. To see the unpleasant alongside the rest.
Of course, a man’s death should be more than just unpleasant.
I knew as well as he did that he deserved what he was getting. It was strange. I thought knowing it and believing it would make it a little easier, but it didn’t. I thought I would get through his execution unscathed emotionally. But I was only fooling myself.
Just because I hadn’t been with him for almost fifteen years did not mean I didn’t have feelings for him. He was my first love. He was a true love. In fact, he was the biological father of my firstborn, though she would never meet him. He wanted it that way. And deep down, so did I.
The curtain opened. I was no longer aware of anyone else in the small viewing room around me. I stared through a large glass window at an empty gurney. I’d read up on what to expect at an execution. He was supposed to be strapped to the gurney when the curtain opened, wasn’t he? I’m sure that was procedure. But he was never one for following rules. I wondered how he’d managed to convince law enforcement to forego this important detail.
With a jolt, I realized someone had entered the sterile-looking room. It was him, along with two officers, the warden and a physician. No priest or pastor. He didn’t want one.
Him.
His name was Jason William Talbot. Such a normal-sounding name. It’s funny. I’d known him almost twenty-five years and it wasn’t until his arrest fifteen years earlier that I learned his real middle and last name. That is, if it was his real name. I’m still not certain.
He was always Grizz to me. Short for Grizzly, a nickname he’d earned due to his massive size and brutal behavior. Grizz was a huge and imposing man. Ruggedly handsome. Tattoos from neck to toe covered his enormous body. His large hands could crush a windpipe without effort. I knew this from experience. I’d personally witnessed what those hands could do. I couldn’t keep my eyes off them now.
He had no family. Just me. And I was not his family.
I immediately sensed when he spotted me. I looked up from his hands into his mesmerizing bright green eyes. I tried to assess whether those eyes held any emotion, but I couldn’t tell. It’d been too long. He’d always been good at hiding his feelings. I used to be able to read him. Not today, though.
As he looked at me, he lifted his handcuffed hands and used the fingers of his right hand to encircle the ring finger on his left hand. He then looked down to my hands, but couldn’t see them. They were in my lap and blocked by the person seated in front of me.
Would I give him that last consolation? I didn’t want to hurt my husband. But considering I was the reason for Grizz’s impending death, I felt the stirrings of an old, old obligation to comfort him in those last moments. At the same time, I felt an uncomfortable thrill in having some control over him. In having the ability to be in charge of something, to be the decision-maker, the empowered one. For once.
Perhaps I was the empowered one all along.
I felt my husband’s hand on my left thigh, just above my knee. He gently squeezed. A memory almost twenty-five years old rushed over me of another hand squeezing my leg. A harder, crueler hand. I turned to look at my husband, and even though he was looking straight ahead, he was aware of my glance. He gave an almost imperceptible nod. He’d decided for me. I was okay with that.
I removed my wide wedding band and lifted my left hand so Grizz could see it. He smiled ever so slightly. Then he looked at my husband, nodded once and said, “Let’s get this shit over with.”
The warden asked if he had any last words. Grizz replied, “I just said ’em.”
Leslie had caught the exchange between us and mouthed, “What?”
I ignored her. That was one part of my story that wouldn’t make it into her article. Even though I’d vowed to be completely forthcoming, some things, no matter how insignificant, had to remain mine. This was one of them.
Grizz wasn’t an easy prisoner, so the guards assigned to him were super-sized, just like him. Much to their surprise, this day he put up no resistance. He lay down and stared at the ceiling as his handcuffs were removed and he was strapped tightly to the gurney. He didn’t flinch when the doctor inserted the IV needles, one in each arm. His shirt was unbuttoned and heart monitors were attached to his chest. I wondered why he didn’t fight, wondered whether he’d been given a sedative of some sort. But I wouldn’t ask.
He didn’t glance around. He just closed his eyes and passed away. It took nine minutes. It sounds quick. Less than ten minutes. But for me, it was an eternity.
An elderly woman in the front row started to sob quietly. She said to the woman sitting next to her, “He didn’t even say he was sorry.”
The woman whispered back to her, “That’s because he wasn’t.”
The doctor officially pronounced Grizz dead at 12:19 p.m. One of the guards walked over to the big window and closed the curtain. Done.
There were about ten of us in the small viewing room, and as soon as the curtain closed, almost everyone stood up and filed out without a word. I could still hear the elderly woman crying as her companion placed her arms around her shoulders and guided her toward the door.
Leslie looked at me and asked just a little too loudly, “You okay, Ginny?”
“I’m fine.” I couldn’t look at her. “Just no more interviews for the rest of the day.”
“Yeah, sure, that’s understandable. I have just a few more questions for you before I can wrap this story up. Let’s meet tomorrow and talk.”
My husband took my hand, stood with me and told Leslie, “It’ll have to wait until we get home. You can reach us by phone to finish the interview.”
My knees felt wobbly. I sat back down.
Leslie started to object, then noticed the expression on my husband’s face and stopped herself from saying more. She managed a smile and said, “Okay then, until Sunday. Have a safe trip home.”
She left the room.
My husband and I were the only ones remaining. I stood to leave and couldn’t move. I fell into his arms, sobbing. He gently lowered me to the floor and sat down with me, holding me against him. I lay like that in his arms, crying, for a long time. A very long time.