Curds and Whey Box Set

by G M Eppers

  I took a seat toward the front of the plane so as not to disturb the twins, found my Kindle, and pretended to read. My heart wasn’t in that, either. I was fidgety and anxious, thinking about what lay beneath me, but I managed to kill some time. Eventually, the team came down, discussing their game tactics in quiet voices. Some of them ducked into the bathrooms while others took window seats and looked at the clouds. They saw I was supposedly reading so they didn’t disturb me. I kept up the charade specifically for that reason. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to them or be sociable.

  We still had twenty minutes to go when I called it close enough and went to the cockpit. “Dinny, could I ask a favor?” I asked as I stood in the open doorway.

  “Sure, Billings. You want to honk the horn?”

  I blushed. “Kind of. When it’s time, could I…could I push the button to deploy the landing gear?”

  She shrugged. “Sure, I guess.” She unhooked her seatbelt and got up. “Here. Take my seat. I have to get the cats.” As she walked past me, she touched a control in the ceiling. From the cabin, I heard the light ping of the seatbelt warning light before Dinny closed the cockpit door.

  Shyly, I took the co-pilot’s seat and strapped in, marveling at the array of controls, switches, knobs and lights. Kevin looked at me sideways. “Don’t touch anything.” Part of me expected him to ask me if I’ve ever been in a Turkish prison, but he didn’t.

  “Of course not,” I said, replying to both his voiced question and my inner unasked question about the Turkish prison.

  “Landing gear comes pretty much last. See that knob there on your left? The yellow one?” I nodded, refraining from even pointing at it. “That’s the landing gear. You’ll be twisting it to activate hydraulic power before lowering the gear, then twisting it again.”

  “To turn off hydraulic power. Got it.”

  “Right. If you don’t turn off the hydraulics the gear will collapse on impact and we’ll belly on the runway.” I assured him I understood. “I’m going to circle once to give Dinny time to put the cats away. Then she’ll talk you through the whole process. Just relax.” He paused for a beat and added, “And don’t touch anything.”

  “Yeah, I got that. No problem.”

  A voice crackled over the radio. “CURDS1, this is Mike Charlie India, you are cleared for landing on runway one nine right.”

  “Roger that,” said Kevin into his microphone.

  With another glance at me, he pushed another button labeled CP Lock. I was reasonably sure he had locked out the co-pilot controls just in case I spasmed and touched something. We were descending and I watched as the cloud cover gave way to recognizable land. Defined squares of varied crops could be seen, speckled with microscopic houses, thin ribbons that were probably major multi-lane freeways, and a few small bodies of water. I’d seen these things out of the airplane window many times, but it looked different from the cockpit. Like getting the front seat on a roller coaster. It turned it into an entirely different ride. We leveled off again, flying just under the clouds.

  A few minutes later, Dinny came back into the cockpit. “Everyone’s secure. Let’s do this thing.” She took the navigator seat behind me and buckled in. Scanning the view, she craned her neck to see some of the instruments. “First step is to make sure we have level flight. The Attitude Indicator,” she pointed at the circular screen with a wingspan in it, with the top half blue and bottom half green,” shows your position relative to Earth’s surface.” At the moment, the wings were flat across the diameter. As she continued to talk me through the steps, she would point to each instrument in turn, which was only a small sampling of all the instruments. She showed me where to check the altitude and airspeed and told me what they should read. “Now, in your classes, you’re going to learn emergency procedures. This will be a normal landing, so it’s really just for comparison.”

  “It’s very helpful, Dinny. Thanks.”

  We started descending more sharply and Dinny pointed out the airport and runway ahead of us. “How do we know which runway is one nine?” About that time, we got close enough and I saw for myself. Right on the end of the runway, the designation was painted in bright white paint that reflected the running lights from the airplane. The characters were probably twenty feet high to be seen from this far above.

  “I’m sure your class will explain runway numbers to you. They aren’t ordinal, like people might assume. It’s based on the clockwise position with twelve at due north.” She watched the altitude indicator. As we hit 1000 feet, she pointed at me. “Deploy the landing gear, Billings.”

  I put my hand on the lever and twisted. A green light went on right next to it. With my thoughts elsewhere, I brought the lever down, feeling the drag increasing as I did so. “Okay, lock it off,” she reminded me, and I twisted again and the green light turned off. In my head, I thought, Goodbye, Mom. I swallowed painfully, and tightened by arm against the empty pack, seeing the dusty cloud in my mind’s eye dissipate and vanish into the farmland and countryside of northeast Kansas. Some of it might have even blown over the state border into Missouri. I took a deep breath, not really seeing the runway coming up toward us. It was a good thing I wasn’t actually the pilot just then since I was so distracted I probably would have crashed into an outbuilding. But Kevin made a fine landing, the wheels squealing on impact with the runway, making me cringe a little, and rolled us to a stop. Kevin was already on the radio, talking to the control tower at Kansas City International Airport. They directed him to a gate and he taxied us into position. When the plane came to a full stop, I was still deep in thought about what I had just done. I felt a hand on my shoulder and it zapped me back to the present.

  “You have someplace to be, don’t you? I called ahead and there are taxicabs waiting for you,” Dinny said. “And Warden Fleischer is expecting you.”

  “Yes. Thank you, Dinny,” I replied, trying to focus. Oh yeah. Leavenworth. Rennet Butler. Unbuckling, I went back to the cabin where everyone was already gathered. “I don’t think they’ll let all of us in,” I said when I emerged from the cockpit. “Roxy, I’ll need you for legal counsel. Badger, you and the cell phone should come, too. The rest of you wait here. I don’t think this will take long.” McGrone looked up as if to challenge my orders, but then simply nodded and returned to a report he was reading.

  The three of us zipped through the locker room. We didn’t really need to bring anything but IDs. Prisons, of course, are pretty strict about extra things. Roxy slipped her heels on. Sometime during the flight she had changed into a fresh gown of pale yellow and seafoam green that looked like a Pollock painting ripped from its frame and sewn together. The shoes matched the green, which was the subordinate color, balancing the ensemble very nicely. Or so Badger told her. Badger wore dark brown denim jeans and a short-sleeve blue dress shirt. He also wore his eyeglasses, which was unusual for him. He normally had in contacts and I often forgot he needed corrective lenses.

  “They won’t let you bring the phone all the way in. Our ID’s and that will be going in a locker while we see Butler.” Roxy pointed at me. “You might as well leave that behind. They won’t let you bring that in, either.” She indicated my sub-shoulder pack, but didn’t mention it if she noticed how flat it was.

  “Oh, right. Of course.” I slipped it off and quickly stuck it in my locker, glad I’d gotten the practice of not wearing it while on the Ike. I tried to imagine how odd it would feel without it if I’d been wearing it consistently for the past two weeks and vowed never again to make fun of Badger when he wanted his phone. Everyone had little things they did to keep the comfort of a routine and no matter how silly it seemed they deserved respect. I knew someone at the Academy who put his socks on twice every morning, switching them to the opposite feet as he did so.

  “Everyone got their ID’s?” Roxy asked. We had our CURDS badges and driver’s licenses. If they needed a birth certificate we were out of luck.

  As we crossed the tunnel into the concourse, Roxy sai
d, “What are you going to ask him? Do you really think he’ll give us a straight answer?”

  “I don’t know. But he went to a lot of trouble to get my attention.”

  As promised, three taxis were waiting. One of the drivers was standing on the sidewalk watching for us. “You CURDS?” As Roxy and Badger got in the first taxi, I walked back and ducked my head in to the other two and excused the drivers. Dinny hadn’t known how many would be going.

  As I slid into the now crowded back seat, Roxy told the driver “Leavenworth prison, please.”

  About fifteen minutes later we pulled up to the imposing outer gate of Leavenworth prison. In front is a large, well-groomed lawn with single row parking on either side. From that angle, it looks more like a state capitol building rather than a prison, its walls and exercise yard hidden from view behind an imposing three story, white brick structure with a central domed section and what I guessed were cell blocks on either side. Tiered concrete stairs led up to the large entry door. “Wait for us,” Roxy told the driver. He gave her a friendly salute and tipped his cap. Two armed guards approached as we got out and we each submitted to a pat down. One of them found Badger’s phone and took it. “I’ll get it back when we leave, right?” Badger asked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  They escorted us to the steps and watched as we went inside, then took up their posts on either side just outside the doors.

  Badger, Roxy and I climbed the steps quickly. Roxy, who had been here before, led the way. Warden Fleischer met us at the door. The big booming bass voice, as it turned out, belonged to a tall, but thin man of about fifty wearing a snappy, three piece navy blue suit. There wasn’t a hair anywhere on his head except for a few I noticed poking out of his ears. “Billings Montana? I’m Warden Fleischer,” he said, allowing the door to close quietly with its pneumatic system. He held out his hand and I shook it, introducing my companions. “Ah, yes, Roxy Dubois. I remember seeing your name on our visitor log a few times, but not recently.”

  “Yes, I left private practice some time ago. I work for CURDS now.”

  “May I see your IDs, please?”

  We handed our CURDS identifications and driver’s licenses to Warden Fleischer. He examined them closely and handed them back. “Thank you.” He waved, and two more armed guards came up. This time one was a woman. With the warden watching, we were frisked again, the woman doing Roxy. The guards nodded at the warden as they finished.

  Badger threw a thumb over his shoulder. “Hey, one of the guards outside took my cell phone.”

  Before he could add a plea for its safety, the warden said, “I’ll see that you get it back when you leave. You have my word. Come this way.” He led us to a bank of twenty-one small lockers, three rows high, just outside his office. Removing the key from one at random, he handed it to Badger. It was marked with the number seventeen. “I’ll use my master key to put it in this locker for you. You can pick it up on the way out.”

  Badger pocketed the key and patted it for assurance. Being without his phone made him very nervous. They might as well have taken a thumb, or his entire arm. “Thanks.”

  “These guards will show you to the visitation room. You’ll be allowed no more than ten minutes.”

  “That will be fine,” I said, even though I still had no idea what I was going to say.

  Warden Fleischer went into his office and closed the door. The window in the top half of the door was blocked by horizontal blinds. We looked to the guards, each one with a belt of weapons that made our HEP belts look like toys, dangling a billy club on one side. The black leather squeaked as they walked, their arms habitually wide around their belted hips. We followed them through a number of corridors stopped by locked doors. One pulled out a heavy key ring with what looked like a hundred keys, but seemed to have no problem finding the right key each time, never fumbling or having to try again.

  We were shown into a small interrogation room. A large mirror was mounted on one wall that we knew, of course, hid an observation room where the guards would wait, presumably watching the clock on the wall. A matching analog clock above the mirror on this side was behind slim metal bars, ticking audibly as the thin red second hand swept around the dial. The room held four wooden chairs, one of which was behind a wide, plain table. Rennet Butler was seated there, his hands shackled to a thick metal bar embedded in the table. He smiled as we walked in. “It’s about time. I thought I was going to have to set up something in Butler Beach, Florida or find someone actually named Jeeves.”

  The three of us sat, sliding the chairs backwards, further away from the desk.

  Rennet Butler is not his real name. He’s had so many aliases no one knows which name is real, if any. The only thing we knew for sure was his obsession with an old actor named Clark Gable. He’d even had surgery at some point to physically resemble Gable. I’d seen him wear nineteenth century attire like the suits Gable’s character of Rhett Butler wore in Gone With the Wind. Now, he wore an orange jumpsuit with the number 93628-016 embroidered in black below his left shoulder. He glanced up at the clock, and rested his hands on the bar. “What’s with Poindexter?” he asked, nodding toward Badger.

  Badger pushed his glasses up on his nose. “I always wear…I mean, I thought it would be a good idea.” He sat in one of the chairs and folded his hands in his lap.

  Butler grinned. “Because guys don’t make passes…?” He let the rest of that adage, at girls who wear glasses, hang in the air unspoken as an insult to Badger. He clearly didn’t know much about Badger, who might have enjoyed a few passes, actually. Although he was pretty exclusive with Roger, so maybe not. I wasn’t sure what the details were on their relationship. It certainly wasn’t my business.

  “No,” Badger said, not taking the bait. “Because guys don’t hit people wearing glasses.”

  There was a beat of silence. “In what world?”

  “So you are connected with the counterfeiters,” Roxy stated, relieving Badger from Butler’s attentions. “Care to enlighten us as to how you communicate and to who?”

  “Whom,” I corrected without thinking.

  “Whom,” she said to Butler.

  “Now that would be too easy, wouldn’t it? You think I maneuvered you here to…wait, where’s my old friend Helena? I’m insulted she didn’t want to come herself.”

  I felt Roxy’s and Badger’s eyes on me. “She’s no longer with us. She was killed in the line of duty more than a month ago. I’m surprised you haven’t heard.”

  His hands fell off the bar and he shifted. Under the table, I saw his legs, previously outstretched and relaxed, tense up and he planted his feet squarely in line with the chair legs. “What?”

  “She was shot by Junior Krochedy. She gave her life to save her mother’s.”

  “Her moth—“ he stopped himself, still stunned by the news. “Ah,” he continued, understanding something he didn’t elaborate. “That explains it, then.” I was going to ask him to expand on that but before I could speak he went on, “My condolences. No, I hadn’t heard. News travels slowly in here. My cell block just got word that John Lennon was shot.”

  “John who?” I asked. Was he supposed to be someone important? Maybe he was a politician of some kind. Politicians are always getting shot, it seemed. It must have been a long time ago.

  “How old are you?” He waved away his own question. “Never mind.” He glanced up at the clock again.

  Badger couldn’t contain his curiosity. “What did you mean when you said, ‘That explains it?’”

  “Nothing.”

  I was getting annoyed. “Why are we here, Butler? You went to a lot of trouble. What are the counterfeiters doing? We could put in a good word for you if you cooperate.” I didn’t think it would help at all, what with his repeated escapes, but it was not a lie. Nor was it a promise. We could put in a good word didn’t mean that we would.

  He shrugged, making the chains of his cuffs rattle. “Just bored. Not much entertainment in here. My only entert
ainment is with the prison librarian.”

  “You mean library,” said Badger. “You like to read.”

  “Librarian,” Badger repeated with a lascivious grin. “Any other news? I can get cigarettes for something good. Any big celebrities die? Big drug bust? Natural disasters? Political scandals? Scandals are great. The right ones might even get me extra pudding.”

  “Quid pro quo, Clarice,” Roxy said ominously.

  “I don’t have any money,” Butler said.

  “That’s not what it means,” Roxy responded. “For someone so literate you seem kind of slow. It means you tell us something and we’ll tell you something.”

  “Who’s Clarice?” he asked.

  “John Lennon’s girlfriend,” I suggested. I didn’t know what she’d meant by Clarice, either.

  “That’s Yoko Ono,” Butler said.

  I was incredulous. “That’s not a real name. What kind of a name is that?”

  Badger looked at me sideways. “Japanese. Let’s move on.”

  I could hear the clock ticking, and Butler’s eyes moved up the wall again. “Tell us what the counterfeiters are doing,” I said.

  He stretched his legs out again, trying to look relaxed, but anyone could see he was nervous about something. “Shopping.”

  “For what?”

  “When do I get my turn?”

  Roxy answered. “When we’re satisfied. What are they shopping for?”

  “What anybody shops for. Something to buy.”

  Badger leaned forward and turned his head towards us, using a hand to shield his mouth from Butler’s view as he spoke softly, “This is getting us nowhere.” He nodded toward Roxy. “Do you think we should leave?”

  Roxy shook her head. Her red hair flopped over one shoulder and she flipped it back. “The president banned cheese,” she blurted out. “All of it.” Butler snapped to attention. A new banned substance made his eyeballs roll over into dollar signs. Wheels turned and he saw a chance, however small, not of getting out, obviously, but an opportunity to call in favors. It’s always been a mystery to me how anyone can run a criminal enterprise from inside a prison, but it happens all the time. “Do you have something more than cryptic analogies?”