“Your Honor, thank you for hearing my statement and considering my case.”

I was sentenced to fifteen months in federal prison, and I could hear Larry, my parents, and my friend Kristen crying behind me. I thought it was a miracle it wasn’t a longer sentence, and I was so exhausted by waiting that I was eager to get it over with as quickly as possible. Still, my parents’ suffering was worse than any strain, fatigue, or depression that the long legal delay caused me.

But the wait continued, this time for my prison assignment. It felt a lot like waiting for my college acceptance letter-I hope I get into Danbury in Connecticut! Anywhere else would have proved disastrous in respect to seeing Larry or my family with any frequency. West Virginia, five hundred miles away, had the next closest federal women’s prison. When the thin envelope arrived from the federal marshals telling me to report to the Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) in Danbury on February 4, 2004, my relief was overwhelming.

I tried to get my affairs in order, preparing to vanish for over a year. I had already read the books on Amazon about surviving prison, but they were written for men. I paid a visit to my grandparents, nervously fighting off the fear that I might not see them again. About a week before I was to report, Larry and I met a small group of friends at Joe’s Bar on Sixth Street in the East Village, for an impromptu going-away. These were our good friends from the city, who had known my secret and done whatever they could to help. We had a good time-shot pool, told stories, drank tequila. The night went on-I wasn’t slowing down, I wasn’t going to exercise any tequila restraint, I wasn’t going to be a bummer. Night turned into morning, and finally someone had to go home. And as I hugged them as hard and relentlessly as only a girl drunk on tequila can, it sank in on me that this was really goodbye. I didn’t know when I would see any of my friends again or what I would be like when I did. And I started to cry.

I never wept in front of anyone but Larry. But now I cried, and then my friends started to cry. We must have looked like lunatics, a dozen people sitting in an East Village bar at three in the morning, sobbing. I couldn’t stop. I cried and cried, as I said goodbye to every one of them. It took forever. I would calm down for a minute and then turn to another friend and start to sob again. Completely beyond embarrassment, I was so sad.

The next afternoon I could barely see myself between the puffy slits that were my eyes. I had never looked worse. But I felt a little better.

My lawyer, Pat Cotter, had sent his share of white-collar clients off to prison. He advised me, “Piper, I think for you the hardest thing about prison will be chickenshit rules enforced by chickenshit people. Call me if you run into trouble. And don’t make any friends.”

On February 4, 2004, more than a decade after I had committed my crime, Larry drove me to the women’s prison in Danbury, Connecticut. We had spent the previous night at home; Larry had cooked me an elaborate dinner, and then we curled up in a ball on our bed, crying. Now we were heading much too quickly through a drab February morning toward the unknown. As we made a right onto the federal reservation and up a hill to the parking lot, a hulking building with a vicious-looking triple-layer razor-wire fence loomed up. If that was minimum security, I was fucked.

Larry pulled into one of the parking areas. We looked at each other, saucer-eyed. Almost immediately a white pickup with police lights on its roof pulled in after us. I rolled down my window.

“There’s no visiting today,” the officer told me.

I stuck my chin out, defiance covering my fear. “I’m here to surrender.”

“Oh. All right then.” He pulled out and drove away. Had he looked surprised? I wasn’t sure.

In the car I stripped off all my jewelry-the seven gold rings; the diamond earrings Larry had given me for Christmas; the sapphire ring from my grandmother; the 1950s man’s watch that was always around my wrist; all the earrings from all the extra holes that had so vexed my grandfather. I had on jeans, sneakers, and a long-sleeved T-shirt. With false bravado I said, “Let’s do this.”

We walked into the lobby. A placid woman in uniform was sitting behind the raised desk. There were chairs, some lockers, a pay phone, and a soda machine. It was spotless. “I’m here to surrender,” I announced.

“Hold on.” She picked up a phone and spoke to someone briefly. “Have a seat.” We sat. For several hours. It got to be lunchtime. Larry handed me a foie gras sandwich that he had made from last night’s leftovers. I wasn’t hungry at all but unwrapped it from the tinfoil and munched every gourmet bite miserably. I am fairly certain that I was the first Seven Sisters grad to eat duck liver chased with a Diet Coke in the lobby of a federal penitentiary. Then again, you never know.

Finally, a considerably less pleasant-looking woman entered the lobby. She had a dreadful scar down the side of her face and neck. “ Kerman?” she barked.

We sprang to our feet. “Yes, that’s me.”

“Who’s this?” she said.

“This is my fiancé.”

“Well, he’s gotta leave before I take you in.” Larry looked outraged. “That’s the rule, it prevents problems. You have any personal items?”

I had a manila envelope in my hands, which I handed to her. It contained my self-surrender instructions from the U.S. Marshals, some of my legal paperwork, twenty-five photographs (an embarrassing number of my cats), lists of my friends’ and family’s addresses, and a cashier’s check for $290 that I had been instructed to bring. I knew that I would need money in my prison account to make phone calls and buy… something? I couldn’t imagine what.

“Can’t take that,” she said, handing the check to Larry.

“But I called last week, and they told me to bring it!”

“He has to send it to Georgia, then they’ll process it,” she said with absolute finality.

“Where do we send it?” I asked. I was suddenly furious.

“Hey, do you have that Georgia address?” the prison guard asked over her shoulder to the woman at the desk while poking through my envelope. “What are these, pictures? You got any nudie Judies in here?” She raised an eyebrow in her already-crooked face. Nudie Judies? Was she for real? She looked at me as if to ask, Do I need to go through all these photos to see if you’re a dirty girl?

“No. No nudie Judies,” I said. Three minutes into my self-surrender, and I already felt humiliated and beaten.

“Okay, are you ready?” I nodded. “Well, say goodbye. Since you’re not married, it could be a while until he can visit.” She took a symbolic step away from us, I guess to give us privacy.

I looked at Larry and hurled myself into his arms, holding on as tight as I could. I had no idea when I would see him again, or what would happen to me in the next fifteen months.

He looked as if he was going to cry; yet at the same time he was also furious. “I love you! I love you!” I said into his neck and his nice oatmeal sweater that I had picked for him. He squeezed me and told me he loved me too.

“I’ll call you as soon as I can,” I croaked.

“Okay.”

“Please call my parents.”

“Okay.”

“Send that check immediately!”

“I know.”

“I love you!”

And then he left the lobby, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand. He banged the doors hard and walked quickly to the parking lot.

The prison guard and I watched him get into the car. As soon as he was out of sight, I felt a surge of fear.

She turned to me. “You ready?” I was alone with her and whatever else was waiting for me.

“Yeah.”

“Well, come on.”