Chapter 20 - My assault case ends
I completed diversion.
Forty hours community service.
Anger-management assessment.
Restitution of Colin’s uninsured urgent-care expenses.
No new offense.
Dismissal.
My community service involved a regional food warehouse.
Not because the court designed symbolism.
Random assignment.
I spent several Saturdays moving boxes and checking expiration dates beside volunteers who did not care that I owned buildings.
One twenty-two-year-old supervisor said:
“Mr. Bellafonte, you’re stacking those wrong.”
I looked at him.
He froze.
Then I looked at the boxes.
He was right.
“Show me.”
He did.
That sentence became useful elsewhere.
Show me.
Not:
Do you know who I am?
Not:
I’ve done this longer.
Show me.
During anger-management sessions, the facilitator asked about the slap.
“What did you want?”
“For Colin to feel something.”
“What?”
“Fear.”
“Why?”
“Because my daughter looked afraid and he didn’t.”
“What did hitting him change?”
“He became afraid.”
“And your daughter?”
“More chaos.”
There.
The slap was emotionally satisfying for approximately one second.
Then it became another problem Alessandra had to manage.
May you like
That was the opposite of protection.
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