Reclaiming a Life

The van needs major repairs, though, and now Teressa doesn't have the money to tow it away, much less get it fixed. It's as much a symbol as an eyesore sitting there in the driveway. Her seasonal job has ended. Erin's mother is vowing to fight for permanent custody of the kids. No free car has materialized, and the rent and utility bills are overdue. "I don't know what's going to happen," Teressa admits.

Everything, it seems, has screeched to a standstill.

'I Grabbed a Knife'

God will provide, Teressa tells herself. Why lift her up only to drop her again?

But faith isn't going to appease the landlady, who sends an eviction notice.

"I filled out over 30 job applications online," Teressa reports, "and on all of them, they ask if you've ever been convicted of a felony and ask you to explain. I put 'involuntary manslaughter causing death.' I tried Silver Diner, a stock job at Toys R Us, clothing stores, Valvoline. . . . I only got one response, from Chuck E. Cheez, saying sorry, you're disqualified." A friend from church thinks she may be able to get Teressa part-time administrative work in her Alexandria office, but it's a defense subcontractor, and when that contract's up, there's no guarantee they'd keep her on.

Tensions at home are mounting, too. The court is gradually increasing the amount of time Teressa's kids visit, and now that they're back a few days a week, Teressa enforces strict house rules that cause her grown sisters to balk.

"Last night, the kids were awful," Teressa says, looking exhausted one gloomy afternoon after a weekend visitation spent "trying to draw birthday cards for their dad because it was his birthday." Her younger son grew angry, and ran outside in the dark. "What're we going to do with these?" he demanded. "We can't just take them to Dad's grave; they'll get wet.' "

It's January, but 13 months after Erin's death, Teressa herself hasn't visited his grave yet, though she spends hours arguing with the military to correct his erroneous marker to reflect Erin's promotion to corporal, and to find out what happened to the flag she was supposed to be presented with. She would have had to go to Arlington National Cemetery in shackles for his funeral, and pay three prison guards to accompany her. She promises herself she'll make the pilgrimage now when she's ready, when she can afford to have his favorite dress of hers dry-cleaned. How handsome he looked in his uniform. She used to write love poems to him in spiral notebooks, about how he smelled like the color yellow, soapy and fresh, full of sunlight.

The night she killed him, Teressa says, Erin was falsely accusing her of an affair with one of his friends. "He pushed my head against the wall and I pushed him away and went to the kitchen to get a bottle of medicine. I had a migraine," she says. "I was putting water in the glass when I heard him yell, 'I'm going to kill you, you [expletive].' It just scared me. He'd choked me before until I blacked out. It was just a spontaneous act. I grabbed a knife that was drying on a towel on the counter. I turned around just as he lunged."

Her first month out of jail, donations from friends, family and church covered the rent. Now she contacts county social services, looking for emergency assistance. "They gave me a piece of paper with the names of different churches on it and told me to start calling," she says. When that didn't work, "I opened the phone book and started calling all the churches listed. I had one church tell me to come in Wednesday by 5 and bring my pay-or-quit notice and a photo ID, so I did. I waited around till about 6:30. . . . They asked for my children's Social Security numbers or cards. I didn't have that, and they said they couldn't help me.

"I got out the door and in the parking lot I started crying. The next day I called the chaplain from jail and asked if he knew any organizations that could help with rent." The $1,500 rent was paid a couple of days later. "I have no idea what I would've done otherwise," Teressa says. "Plan B? There wasn't one."

Her plight plainly worries the next-door neighbors who have been like surrogate grandparents since the Turner-Schaefers moved in. The kids often wander over to watch cartoons with Mr. Earl and Miss Etta, or to raid the candy jar. "They're all three on my desktop," Earl says. "I wouldn't take a million dollars for any one of those kids." The Hardys never doubted Teressa's innocence, staying in touch with her while she was in jail, even depositing money each month into her commissary account.