13. Cain
CAIN
My knee shook, jangling the metal handcuffs that were clasped around my wrists as I waited for them to call my case.
My toes twitched and cramped inside my shoes as the stress buzzed over my skin.
They’d dressed me in an orange jumpsuit and hadn’t allowed me to shave.
I’m sure I looked a wreck. Fatigue pressed into my bones and rage simmered low in my gut.
I hadn’t slept. I couldn’t. Not with the images of what I saw plaguing me each time I closed my eyes.
But I wondered if Delilah was here. If I’d see her angelic face waiting for me.
Fuck knows my parents weren’t about to show up for me.
Had anyone finally listened to her pleas?
“All rise,” a man to the right of the stuffy room said.
I did as I was told, standing to my full height.
The judge was an older white man, who resembled a bulldog with his pronounced jowls and deeply ingrained wrinkles that puckered his forehead.
There wasn’t one hair on his head, and his neck seemed situated a vertebra or two too close to his shoulders, giving the illusion that someone had whacked him on the head and he’d gotten stuck there.
One glance around the courtroom and I knew it’d been foolish to have that sliver of hope.
No one was coming to save me.
I bet they didn’t even allow Delilah to come, now that I thought about it. I heard her cries as they took me away, how she tried to tell them the truth. They didn’t believe her then. Not sure why I hoped they would believe her now.
The only person who did show up to the hearing was none other than that smug prick, Pastor John in the fucking flesh.
I took satisfaction in seeing his visibly bruised face and partially shut eye, though that would only make his case stronger.
And if he was here, he wasn’t near Delilah, and I took comfort in that.
I just hoped wherever she was, she was safe.
They took his testimony and he made a show of appearing far more injured than he was as he ambled up to the stand, placing his hand that wasn’t in a sling on top of the Bible. Swearing to tell the whole truth.
He didn’t even flinch.
The lie slipped out of his crooked mouth as easily as water poured from a faucet.
“Your honor, I worry for the boy’s soul. He’s clearly troubled, and I worry who else he could hurt if he’s let out,” Pastor John lamented from the stand. I bet he loved this. The attention. The sympathy. Dude should have been an actor.
My court appointed lawyer sat back completely useless playing with his ugly burgundy tie and letting Pastor John turn his testimony into an impromptu sermon. Shouldn’t he have been objecting? Standing up for me?
“I believe he’s beyond help and should be punished to the fullest extent of the law for what he’s done,” Pastor John continued.
I shouldn’t have been surprised that the judge didn’t grant me bail.
I wouldn’t have had someone to offer that to me anyway.
My parents made that clear. But the part that really fucking threw me, was hearing the judge say I was to be tried as an adult.
Even though I was several months away from owning that particular title.
Without a chance to fight for myself, I was hauled away and taken to the nearest prison. My fate seemed to be set in stone.
Once there, I was strip searched, made to shower, and then they held me down in a chair while they shaved my hair into a buzzcut. The clip was set so low I could feel how they gouged part of my scalp and left it a bloody mess. Bastards.
They marked down my tattoos, my height, my eye color, and all my scars. I was assessed and picked over like they were a bunch of vultures feasting on my corpse.
“Pretty boy like you is gunna be popular here,” one of the correctional officers said with a menacing smirk.
He had beady little eyes and a receding hairline that reflected the shine of the fluorescent lights on his expanding forehead.
I was convinced guys like him had a kink for making people feel less than, so they could fuel their egos and feel important.
I ignored his barbs and stared straight ahead as I was walked to what would be my temporary cell.
That is until I received a formal sentencing.
My lawyer said I could get anywhere from five to ten years, depending on how strict the judge was feeling that day. At least the guy didn’t lie to me and pretend we stood a chance of winning.
There were two officers escorting me. Mr. Beady Eyed Asshole, and his menacing looking friend with large muscles, a thin mustache and hair cut into a perfect square on top of his head.
He walked with his spine ramrod straight and his hands behind his back like he was hiding something back there.
I eyed him warily. Something about that guy felt off.
Dude gave off pedo vibes with that mustache.
Or maybe it was the look in his eyes, like he was capable of evil.
I’d seen my fair share of evil men and knew the look well.
We went past rows of cells. Each reeking of a putrid combination of cleaning fluids, piss, and body odor. Delightful, but I guess I better get used to it. Inmates were winding down for the day, and I was feeling a hint of apprehension in my gut at my newfound surroundings.
It wasn’t lost on me that going from Kingston to here felt a little like trading one prison for another. Only I didn’t know the rules here. And I sure as shit didn’t know who the people were to steer clear of. I just hoped if I had a cellmate, that he wouldn’t kill me in my sleep.
But thankfully, the cell they took me to was devoid of any roommate. Though the place looked bleak as hell. It made the one in Kingston seem like a dreamy vacation.
As I was shuffled into the small cell, I heard the resounding sound of the door shutting closed behind me.
Only when I turned around, I was met with the stinging end of a burning substance that clawed into my face and ate at my skin.
Hot liquid bubbled on my cheek, up over my nose, and into my eyebrow, missing my eye by a millimeter.
It smelled like burning flesh and pierced so far down into my skin that had every nerve the substance touched feeling like it was on fire.
I was down on my knees screaming in pain and covering my face when I felt a large boot smash into my already fragile ribs. The pop of pain was instant, fighting for top billing over whatever was happening to my face. I couldn’t see. Couldn’t think. And couldn’t breathe.
“You’d do best to keep your mouth shut. Or we’ll make sure you won’t have the chance to ever speak again,” I assumed it was the menacing one, but my eyes were screwed shut from the agony that saturated my nerves.
One of the officers grabbed my shoulder and rolled me onto my back, yanking me up by the collar of my standard issued orange jumpsuit.
“Compliments of Pastor John,” he said, throwing me down hard. The back of my head met concrete, and a burst of stars smattered across my vision.
The message was clear. If I said anything about Pastor John’s guilt, I’d be a fucking dead man.