CHAPTER 13 JORGE—STOLEN TIME
The door didn't open that night. Jorge's replayed it enough times since to know exactly how close it came, guard's flashlight sweeping the tier a full ninety seconds before either of them was fully dressed, and if the man had bothered stopping at their bars instead of moving on toward a noise complaint two cells down, there wouldn't have been a story to tell about it.
There'd have been a write-up. Maybe worse than a write-up.
Jorge doesn't scare easy. That night scared him.
Three days later and he still hasn't said as much out loud. Shawn hasn't either, though Jorge catches him doing the same math sometimes, eyes going distant mid-conversation like he's replaying the same ninety seconds.
They don't talk about it directly. Don't need to. What they do instead is smaller, quieter, rationed out in pieces that wouldn't mean anything to anybody watching from outside the cell.
A hand brushing Jorge's at chow, quick, gone before anybody's eyes could catch it lingering.
Shawn's shoulder pressed against his during count, close enough that Jorge feels the warmth of it through two layers of jumpsuit and pretends he doesn't.
A kiss, once, fast and hard, stolen in the four seconds between the door shutting after rec and the guard's footsteps fading down the tier. Over before either of them could call it anything but reckless.
"We're gonna get caught," Jorge says one night, low, after a near-miss that had Shawn's hand halfway down his waistband when a shadow crossed the wall outside.
"Probably." Shawn doesn't sound worried enough about it. "You stopping?"
"Didn't say that."
"Then quit bringing it up like a warning label."
Jorge doesn't have a good answer for that. Rubs a hand over his jaw instead, the same gesture he's used his whole life to buy himself a second before he says something he can't take back.
"You never asked," Jorge says finally. "That night. Never asked if this was new for me or not."
Shawn goes still, something careful in his face. "Wasn't gonna ask. Figured you'd say if you wanted me knowing."
"I'm bi. Have been since before I knew there was a word for it." Says it flat, the same way he'd state anything else true about himself, weather or a fact off a form. "Wasn't a secret. Wasn't advertised either. Didn't come up much in a shop full of guys who'd have made it weird."
"Would it have been weird?"
"For some of them." Jorge shrugs, small, like the answer costs him less than it used to. "Not for me."
Shawn's quiet a moment, turning that over. "Good to know. Wasn't sure if I was the first."
"Wasn't asking you to be." Jorge looks at him then, something almost gentle sneaking past the guard he keeps up around everything else. "You weren't the first. Doesn't mean you're not different."
Shawn doesn't push for more than that. Seems to understand, same as Jorge does, that a sentence like that is worth more coming out short than dressed up longer than it needs to be.
The scarcity doesn't get easier. If anything it gets worse, now that they both know exactly what they're rationing.
A full count cycle can go by with nothing but a look held a half second too long.
A whole day passes sometimes where the only contact is knees touching under a shared table at chow, neither one moving away first.
"This is gonna kill me," Shawn mutters one afternoon, watching a CO walk the tier at the exact wrong moment, timing gone to hell along with everything else about wanting something you can't have on your own schedule.
"Told you. We're stealing time. Nobody said stealing was comfortable."
"You'd know."
Jorge doesn't rise to that one. Lets it sit, lets Shawn have the small victory of a jab that actually lands, because there's something almost peaceful in letting somebody get one over on him without needing to win it back immediately.
That peace doesn't last. Nothing in this cell lasts long enough to get comfortable with.
Word comes down two days later that the block's going on lockdown starting Thursday, some incident on Tier C that's got the whole facility tightening up, showers running one cell at a time instead of the usual group rotation.
Jorge hears it and doesn't say anything. Doesn't have to.
Shawn's already looking at him like he's done the same math, arrived at the same conclusion, and neither one of them needs to say it out loud for it to be sitting right there between them, sharp enough to cut.
Thursday's going to change everything, one way or the other.