The Fabulous Firebird
Dear Diary.
I dont know why I’m writeing to you.
I lied. I do. The court psyciatrist (I’ll use Dr. from now on) says I should write stuff: my feelings, my past, anything. She says it will help her help me, understand me, and help me by maybe letting some things out. Seeing as how I don’t have anything else to do in this cell besides pushups, I guess I’ll give it a chance.
Here goes nothing!

Where to begin? The beginning of course. I grew up in Baltimore, a hard city for a single mom. Guess I should mention I never knew my father. I don’t know if that made a difference or why that’s where I am today, I had never really thought about it.
My childhood was pretty normal, I guess. Except I started stealing when I was thirteen. It wasn’t really because we needed it. We were poor, but I didn’t steal things we needed like food or money or cigarets for my Mom. I stole dumb things like hats and extension cords and one time I stole a road sign by some construction. I just wanted to see what I could get away with.
I got caught a few times, but they didn’t call the cops. They called my Mom though, and she was pissed. She’d take me back to the apartment and yell at me. I didn’t feel bad, though. That made her more mad.

My Mom started drinking heavy when I was 15. She lost her job. Then I had to steal things we needed so that me and my brother wouldn’t be hungry. Luckily I already didn’t feel bad about stealing because I had been doing it for years so it was no sweat. Sometimes Mom would get mad, but she was mad a lot because of the drinking. Sometimes she was proud though, that I would look after the family like that.

The doctor said she liked what I wrote. But she wants to know about the fire. I don’t know why I like fire. I used to hate fire, but when I was stealing after high school I started to think burning things would make it harder to catch me. I can’t remember why I didn’t like fire, though.

I remembered.