8
The Gang sneaks off to their jobs after they finish lunch. Izz remains at their table, unsure what to do with himself. Glancing around the room he observes the slow filtering of inmates off to their own assigned jobs, wherever those may be.
I could sit here until dinner?
Then again, that might get boring . . .
Maybe find the library Reni was talking about? Izz never liked sitting still to read novels. Perhaps that can be a new talent for him to learn in here. . .
No. No, that sounds torturous and dull.
He groans. Rubbing his face. When he drops his hands, his eyes lock on a certain male—an inmate he shouldn’t be looking at—alone on the isolated table in the corner—
The killer’s eyes shift over, meeting Izz’s—
Yep, I’m not staying here.
Izz practically face plants it when his shoe catches on the bench in his hasty retreat to leave. Stumbling, he heads elsewhere, not to be caught in the vicinity of the serial killer. The one he’s not supposed to be anywhere near. The one he keeps thinking about and staring at. It’s like he wants to die. He should chain his wrist and cuff himself to the bed frame, and lie there for the serial killer to disembowel. He may as well, he’s making it easy enough. Constantly sneaking glances at the inmate—not so unnoticed, if the way the male looked over at him is any indication.
He may be lining himself up as the perfect victim. Predators can sense weakness, can’t they? Well, if they can, he’s surely shown this dangerous killer how weak he is and how easy a target he would make.
He knows the double doors on the opposite side of the kitchen lead to the yard. You can see the grass beyond them, flashing every time someone exits or enters.
It’s where he decides he will go, in the complete opposite direction of the serial killer.
He’s going to check out the yard. See if it’s as vast and unexpected as the selection of Commissary goods, or as flat and lifeless as the prison pillows.
Only one way to find out.
Slapping his palms on either side of the doors, Izz exits the cafeteria—movie actor style—throwing both doors wide—and instantly regrets it when one side slams into an inmate—
Who stands so close with their back to doors anyway? That’s just asking to be hit.
Who throws open doors like they’re a damn stunt double in a movie scene. Izz’s inner voice snarks back at him.
“Fuck’s your problem,” the inmate growls, turning to glare ice into his veins.
Izz has two options. Hit the inmate with aggression or . . . Apologise? Grovel? Run? Maybe those three can be a one and done combo deal.
Fight or flight—
Or dismiss? He’s choosing to go with dismissal. Play it off. Act indifferent.
“Nothing,” Izz squares his shoulders and strides on, throwing his whole appearance into the persona of confidence—while moving swiftly to the small building across the way, to hide behind. It’s close to the fence line, but not quite touching, so there should—in theory—be a gap between the two to hide in.
“I am filled with confidence,” Izz mutters under his breath, optimistically lying to himself.
Izz skims the outskirts of the small compact shed-like structure which appears as if its purpose is to house the mower for the yard’s lawn, and perhaps tools for the garden. He wonders what types of plants they grow here, fruits and vegetables? Or flowers? Both?
Izz rounds the corner, hoping to have some privacy to lay back in the surprisingly lush green grass and stare at the blue clear sky—
What he does not expect is to find an inmate—small and cute—leaning against the building’s wall. He swallows hard as his mind comes to terms with what his eyes are identifying—
A guard, stepping away from an inmate—
The inmate who has their front squashed against the building, back bent, ass out, with pants bunched around the knees—
A guard who is clearly tucking back in. And zipping up—and turning to leave—
Izz quickly ducks back behind the wall. To avoid being caught. Too late to run off, that will definitely make it obvious. So he casually sits back against the building. Sprawling out like he’s innocently enjoying the sun, closing his eyes and trying to quieten his rapid heart rate—praying the guard can’t hear it thumping in his chest.
He detects the guard sauntering closer, their strides faltering sloppily when they obviously become aware of Izz’s presence. When Izz doesn’t react—focusing on keeping his features schooled into indifference—the footfalls continue, disappearing off towards the yard.
He releases his breath, lungs deflating in a whooshing rush, cracking his eyes open—
“Not polite to stare.”
Izz nearly dies. He’s sure his heart exploded out of his chest and is now rolling a hasty retreat through the grass.
The cute inmate—who was being railed by a guard—is planted right in front of his outstretched legs, peering at him.
“Huh?” Is all Izz’s mind can spit out. He tries to play dumb, to make a face like what-are-you-on-about. But he can feel his cheeks blushing bright red. He knows he’s failing miserably with the whole innocent act.
Sure enough, the inmate rolls his eyes, sitting down slowly next to Izz. Adopting a similar position against the building’s smooth exterior.
“Saw you watching, didn’t anyone ever tell you that’s rude?” The pretty inmate flutters his eyes at Izz, running them up and down Izz’s frame.
‘Watching’ might be a stretch, frozen-in-shock-for-a-split-second-that-felt-like-an-eternity would describe it better.
Izz’s mouth opens . . . and closes . . . he’s entirely blanking on any responses to deny the accusation. He would make a terrible criminal—eh, well, one who has to lie for a living, and stay cool and collected under interrogation.
Guess that rules out spy work for me as a future career.
He decides to go with the truth, for the life of him he can’t think of a lie to tell, the truth is all he has. “Not my fault you’re doing . . . That ,” he defends, “out in the open,” he adds exasperatedly.
“Was behind a building.” The inmate dismisses it as if that makes it fine and dandy to be doing it in a public place.
Izz raises his brows at the cute inmate, willing his expression to portray his you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me m indset.
The inmate laughs, a soft mellow sound, “you wanna share in my bounty?”
The cute inmate offers a thin white roll, nestled between delicate fingers.
“ . . . that what I think it is?” Izz breathes out, eyes widening.
The inmate nods, placing the blunt between his plump lips. He lifts a battery from his pocket, proceeding to press a thin strip of . . . a gum wrapper? . . . between the two ends—a little flame sparks to life, licking into the air, dancing off the wrapper.
Wow, Izz had no idea you could make a lighter with those objects.
“What’s the catch?” Izz questions sceptically, as the inmate beside him leans into the flame to light the blunt’s end. The warm scent in the air one he’s familiar with—a happy reminder of home.
Between puffs, the man divulges, “you don’t say shit . . . about what you saw . . . I share my blunt . . . with you . . . Deal?”
The delicate flame is snuffed out, the scorched wrapper’s remains removed from the battery to float free, and the battery disappearing back into its pocket home.
“. . . Deal.” Izz will never snitch on anyone regardless, which is not something he’ll willingly divulge to this cute inmate. Not when the revelation has the potential to screw up his chance to relax in this Hell-hole. And with the day he’s had, he needs it. Badly.
Izz seizes the blunt when it’s held out to him—brushing the man’s fingertips as he pinches the tightly wound paper—dragging the smoke deep into his starving lungs. Holding it in, until his lungs are screaming with the strain—
He blows out a thick cloud of smoke, slumping back further against the wall. The buzzing tingle warming his veins, unlocking and loosening the kinks and knots. He hadn’t been aware how much tension was within him. He’s beyond grateful to have this opportunity to release it.
~~~
They talked for an extensively long time. Izz can’t say he tracked the entire conversation, or that it didn’t spin out into weird life-values and shower-thoughts . What he can remember is the cute inmate’s name.
Vince.
Vince is in here for con artist things. He’s apparently extremely skilled in manipulation and deception. Using the skill set to construct deals and garner protection in this hazardous cage.
The whole afternoon had disappeared in a flash, the bell sounding out, to inform them of dinner’s arrival, too soon for his zonked-out mind to comprehend.
They say their goodbyes and part ways.
Izz glides off to find The Gang in the cafeteria and fetch some dinner. He’s feeling the munchies coming on. His skin prickling and warm, like it’s so hungry it’s beginning to eat itself.
And Vince, disappears around the cafeteria building, heading off to—who knows where.
~~~
Izz hunches over his dinner, alone in his usual place. His back to the kitchen, his front facing the back corner. No clue where The Gang is, they may be still finishing their jobs?
His wacked-out mind keeps picking up imaginary signals, telling him he’s being watched. He knows it’s a delusional issue, brought on by whatever was in Vince’s blunt—he’s figuring out prison is a whole other world where he doesn’t have the run-down of what is in the available substances. Who knows what may have been mixed with the blunt? He should have thought about it before it’s already in his bloodstream. Too late for regrets on that front. As long as it doesn’t kill him, he isn’t too fussed—
Someone is definitely watching me. It can’t all be a paranoid delusion.
Izz swivels his head around—bracing his hands against the table’s surface when the sharp movement threatens to topple his rapidly-fading balance. His head is a million times heavier than humanly possible, straining his neck to keep it attached atop his body.
His eyes scan. Vision fluctuating in and out, like a camera’s zoom on the fritz. The colours of prisoners’ clothing are swirling together in blobs of grey and white mixed with blue and black from a few individual inmates—
There.
Across the path splitting the room—and the sea of churning colours—two vaguely familiar blurs catch his eye. They’re seated at a table which is swishing and tossing like a cracked boat on a rough sea. He has to strain hard to force his eyes to comprehend why the blurred silhouettes are drawing him in.
He shudders when their sleazy mugs come into focus. It’s those two scaly inmates from his Wing. The ones his cellmate said aren’t a worry. They sure resemble a worry with how they’re ogling him.
He scrunches his nose in distaste at how their squinting beady eyes bore into him. Like they’re undressing him in their minds. Their leering gazes have him feeling dirty and unclean. He doesn’t want to know how he’d react if he’s forced to interact with them again. From the way they’re grinning at him, he’s going to be interacting with them again, it’s enviable. Whether he wants to or not is irrelevant. He prays it’s in the far, far off, distant future—
Izz sighs in relief—louder than he intended too, his mind still a groggy mess—when The Gang bursts in through the double doors. Flowing over to the dwindling line to collect their meals.
He’s grateful for the distractions—and company—to pull his focus from the sleazy inmates. A concern he can easily shove to the back of his mind, now that he is not alone. He welcomes the distraction as The Gang trickles over to join him one by one, their food trays in hand. Slowly filling the places at their table.
Reni is a no-show, Izz’s way too out of it to form the words to find out about his cellmate. He elects to stay silent and eat his dinner, he barely remembers picking out the foods on his tray. Some kind of meat and mashed potatoes, with a heaping side of cooked carrots that taste faintly like honey. He fancied the sweet orange vegetables over the rest of the meal.
What his rattled mind does pick up on—outside of the chattering voices that came to him as if in a foreign language—is Erik’s weird antsy behaviour. The skinny inmate is squirming, drumming his fingers on the table, eyes rolling around to bounce off everything yet taking nothing in. Pupils dilated.
Izz scoffs to himself, guess he isn’t the only one out of it tonight. Wonder what Erik’s drug of choice is? The skinny inmate is way more out of it than Izz. Or at least, what he feels like he is. He doesn’t think he’s as far gone as Erik. But then again, he also feels like a crewman straddled over a wildly rocking table-ship. So presumably his judgement, currently, is not to be trusted.
~~~
The showers are uneventful. He has no serial killer to cut off his path. Reni and Erik are both no shows. The floor has a mind of its own and the only way to ensure it doesn’t run off, is for him not to take his eyes off it.
So he spends his shower with wide eyes fixating on the tiles, trying not to blink, in fear of missing the tiles retreating and him falling into the black abyss.
Isco keeps giving him the side eye. He isn’t sure what he did to deserve the judgemental gaze of the scarred inmate, but he isn’t about to draw attention to it. He knows who will win in a fight between them, he will be picking his teeth off the floor. If he doesn’t die before that. Or if his teeth don’t fall through the wobbling churning sea of floor tiles. Perhaps the watery tiles will help him out in a fight? And swallow Isco down into their depths.
David gives him nothing to work with, eyes squinting at Izz every time he looks at the other inmate. He has heard the man talking with the others but so far the guy hasn’t spoken a word to him. Or has he? Izz can’t recall.
He loses his battle with blinking, pinching his dry eyes shut—blinking rapidly as his eyes fill with unshed tears.
Opening his eyes, he—
Is back in his cell. No longer vertical, but horizontal and staring at the low-cut ceiling of his little caged room—weird, his hips aren’t digging into the metal beneath him.
Dragging his heavy head off his pillow, he slumps in a sitting position. Holding his head in his hands. Whatever he smoked is wearing off, leaving behind a sick nauseating feeling in its retreat.
“You doing better now?” Izz can hear the amusement in his cellmate’s voice.
“I think so . . .” Izz mumbles. Lifting his head to find his cellmate in front of him, sitting on his own bunk across the way. When had Reni come in . . . ?
More importantly, when had I come back to the cell—
Izz’s ass is cushioned, he can’t feel the hard cold metal beneath. It’s surreal. Like he’s sitting on a real bed—
His mind is spinning with thoughts he can’t keep a tight hold on. Switching and shifting, sliding away before racing back—
Perhaps the drugs haven’t worn off as much as he presumed—
Izz jolts to his feet—closely resembling a weaving strand of grass, blowing about in the breeze—reefing back the blanket covering his mattress.
He finds his mattress—like he expected—what he hadn’t expected, is the second mattress sitting on top of it.
Where did that come from . . . ?
His cellmate whistles low in his throat, “you giving it up already.”
“Giving what up?” Izz analyses his cellmate’s words, his drug-addled mind blanking on their meaning. Poking his finger at the second mattress to check it’s really real.
Turning to face Reni when the man doesn’t say anything further, he inspects the smug expression on the other man’s mug—
Izz’s eyes widen as his mind clicks onto what Reni is implying. “Fuck off, I did not sell my ass for a bloody mattress.” He grins at his cellmate’s raised eyebrow, like the other man doesn’t believe a word he just said.
Izz chooses to play a little. “I mean, I would have, if asked . . . but I didn’t.” He jokes, making his cellmate snort a laugh and punch Izz playfully.
“You may joke, newbie. But people have done worse for far less in this place—” Reni rubs his chin, pondering, his eyes scanning the second mattress. “Whoever this mattress fairy is, you might want to pray they’re not the stalker type.”
Izz’s clueless where the mattress could have come from. Clearly it’s from Commissary, but why? How . . . ? Who?
He remembers complaining to his cellmate about lying on the terrible metal slabs, but his cellmate is clearly shocked, so the man isn’t responsible.
He told that weird counsellor guy? Didn’t he? He doubts the depressive man would do this. And the cute junkie, Vince, smoked more than Izz did so they’re out of the suspect pool.
Who does that leave? He can’t recall anyone else—wait. He mentioned it to the beefy server, it was in vague passing, but he had mentioned it. Could the server have done this? But why? Those mattresses are extremely expensive—
Izz dismisses the thought.
No way would the server—who he has barely spoken to—buy him an expensive mattress. A little extra food is one thing, hundreds of dollars on a mattress is an entirely different story.
He should be worried, but he’s extremely appreciative to whomever gifted the mattress to him. After all, he’s not one to kick a gift horse in the mouth. If that is the saying?
“It’s alright.” Izz smirks at his cellmate. “They can stalk away, I know my ass is luscious.” He waggles his ass at Reni, joking around light-heartedly.
Plopping back down onto his bunk, Izz groans at how it absorbs his weight, cushioning his ass and not hitting him with the bed’s metal base. “Man, this feels like wonder bread. Heavenly. No more back pain for me.”
Reni scoffs, laughing, “you’ve been here a day. Try years on these damn things, then you can complain about back pains.”
Izz nestles in, tucking up into his blankets, loving that his hip bones don’t grind into metal as he snuggles into a comfortable position on his side, facing his cellmate who’s pegging him with an expression of fixated scrutiny.
“What?” Izz grits out at his cellmate, disturbed by how intense Reni has become.
“Be careful accepting gifts. They always come with a price.”
Izz laughs, shrugging off Reni’s worries. He closes his eyes longing to drift off into a well needed sleep. The lights are on, so the insides of his eyelids are a bright red. However, the cell door is closed which indicates the lights won’t be on for much longer—if it’s the same routine as last night.
He listens to a guard walking by the cell, clicking away at a little counting device. The Count guard last time carried a clipboard with a listing of the inmates for each cell, wonder if this guard has the same? Izz doesn’t care enough to peel his eyes open to find out.
Lights out arrives nearly immediately after the guard finishes counting. The bright red he’s inspecting behind his eyelids plunging into blackness.
He may have been a little weirded out by the appearance of the new mattress. But he isn’t about to complain, and he is exhausted.
Drained and tired from the long day—and all the events that transpired throughout it—
Izz’s annoyed by the image that crawls into his mind’s eye—the cute stoner inmate shoved against a wall by a guard—it’s burnt into his retinas now.
Yay for me. Izz cheers sarcastically.
He couldn’t be more thankful when the dark abyss of sleep finally consumes him.