8Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd0ReryowM1
Once again, Steven and his wife made a trip to the grocery store, Janelle carrying the baby in an ancient carrier to the tune of its usual screaming. Ella had gotten the carrier from a friend who was a serious hoarder and stockpiled all kinds of junk that they never got rid of. The carrier had been sitting in a spare bedroom for years.
Steven and Janelle had gone their separate ways for a few minutes in order to look for different things they needed. He was near the back of the store, but from his vantage point at the end of the aisle, he could see Janelle had gathered some items she and the baby needed and were waiting for him at the front of the store.
He was halfway up the aisle of the nearly deserted store when he saw a guy jump into view and snatch the baby carrier right out of Janelle's hand.
Janelle instantly went into fight mode and made for a comical scene despite the circumstances. It was a typical hot summer day in New Mexico and Janelle was letting it all hang out in shorts and a tank top that was too tight. She had her hair drawn up in a high-pitched ponytail, something that showed off her large round face even more. Her hair had become thinner and stringier, the color fading. Her lackluster ponytail bobbed up and down frantically behind her as she engaged in a tug-of-war with the stranger.
The guy was tall, skinny, and young. He and Janelle tugged on the carrier's handle with all their might.
Steven remained completely stock-still as he observed the scene. The cashier, who was on the other side of the dueling twosome, shouted to someone to call 911 and ran to help Janelle while throwing an occasional why-the-hell-aren't-you-helping-this-woman? glance in Steven’s direction.
But not surprisingly, Janelle was able to help herself before the cashier could reach her, throwing a fist into the guy's face, busting his nose and lip, and knocking out a tooth which was later discovered by the police on the store’s floor.
The guy made a run for it and escaped before the police could apprehend him, leaving Steven secretly disappointed that the guy hadn't managed to seize the child.
“It's not mine,” was Steven’s regular answer whenever he was asked why he didn't participate or assist his wife when it came to the baby. “Besides, there was nothing I could do. The whole thing was over long before I could get anywhere near them.”
The cashier countered this claim, insisting that he had remained in place watching the whole incident play out.
“Regardless," said the officer who was taking their statements. "Does anyone have any idea who this guy may be?"
No one did, although people often wondered if the guy might have been connected to the family of the woman whose unborn child Janelle had murdered.
It angered Janelle that the woman and her family were never questioned, as far as she knew, and bitched about how everyone got away with doing whatever they wanted to her while she had to pay for things she didn't even do.
Steven’s first break with the kid came three months after it was born when they were in the car taking a remote route through the mountains and he hit a rough patch, losing control of the vehicle, and ending up at the edge of a cliff.
Upon impact, Janelle was knocked semi-unconscious after screaming bloody murder.
“Can you please not do that?” Steven asked in annoyance as he struggled to maneuver the vehicle.
But then Janelle was out cold, and her child was screaming in its carrier on the floor by her feet. Steven had to climb over his wife in order to get out of the vehicle.
Janelle later wrote in her journal that she vaguely remembered the accident and thought that of course he would remove the baby before he would consider her, but sure enough, he placed his hands under her arms and slowly managed to drag her weighty body from the vehicle that could easily slip over the edge without thinking of the baby first.
“Oh, God,” she thought she remembered Steven muttering due to how heavy she was and grunting as he struggled to move her.
Knowing the car could explode at any second, Steven dragged her about 60 feet away and left her lying on the ground while he stood beside her to call for help on his old mobile, ignoring the screaming child still in the vehicle on the passenger floor.
Get the baby, I kept thinking. Why hasn't he gotten the baby? Janelle later wrote in her journal. But it was like he didn't even exist. When I questioned him about it, he denied the whole thing. Instead. He tried to brainwash me into thinking it didn't happen that way. I get that those with head injuries can have memory issues, but I swear I saw what I saw.
Minutes went by and then emergency vehicles could be spotted approaching in the distance. As soon as Steven saw this, it was only then that he removed the child and placed it with a thud by its mother.
Steven said he removed us both at the same time, she also wrote. But I know what I saw. I know what I saw.
And what the doctors saw upon examining the child at the hospital told a story of its own and Janelle was promptly arrested on suspicion of child abuse.
Janelle insisted no one had ever harmed the child and that the bruises had to have been sustained in the accident but doctors testified that the baby's many bruises ranged in age and couldn't have all come from the accident.
The child was temporarily removed from Janelle’s custody and Steven got to spend one whole blissful night at home alone without his crazy angry wife and her screaming little bastard.
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