She squared her shoulders, pulled them back, and tilted her head back and to the side. She knew that the posture accentuated her defined jawline. Just the way the camera liked it. The pose had once come natural, now it felt uncomfortable and arrogant. She softened her stance and sighed.
Her eyes scanned her surroundings. A small parking lot sprawled before her with three-dozen or so cars baking in the sun. Not a person was in sight. Relief and disappointment shared a moment within her.
Fergie towered behind her, cleared her throat, choosing to remain in the shade. Reilly had heard the sound a thousand times. At one time, it had scared her. She had worried about its intent. Now, it was a backdrop to her metered days, familiar in its gruffness, comforting in its steadiness.
She realized she would miss it.
She swiveled to meet Fergie’s eyes. Clear, blue, and unwavering, they stared back at her. Reilly held them for a moment, even though her conditioned response was to avert her gaze. For once, the guard’s eyes held no challenge. A small thing, really, but enormous to Reilly, who had faced what seemed to be a lifetime of challenges while under the watchful gaze of the taciturn giant before her.
The guard’s hand, strong with short, neat fingernails, held a limp, white plastic bag out to her. Reilly regarded it with numb detachment. Fergie flicked a glance at the bag and then nodded. Reilly took the bag and dropped her clenched fist to her side so that the sad package hung along her thigh. She searched the guard’s expression for a clue about what came next, but the eyes were already scanning the parking lot. Reilly thought she had become accustomed to being ignored, that so many months of not mattering had hardened her a little more. But the dismissal stung.
Reilly turned back to the parking lot to see what caught Fergie’s attention. Nothing had changed. Just the bright sun, still glaring off of windshields and the dusty metal of the cars parked in three neat rows.
A pumpkin-sized tumbleweed blew a lazy path across the faded pavement. She watched as it skipped up the broken curb and lodged itself against the base of the razor wire topped chain-link fence that wrapped around the prison. A second fence stood inside of that, forming a double-dare canyon. A dozen other tumbleweeds cowered in scattered groups along the outer barrier, and Reilly knew that by dinnertime, there would be an even skirt of dried weeds, two or three deep, pressed against the fence. She also knew that the short-timers would be out to clear them in the morning. Her nose itched at the memory of the dusty baked wood scent of them, and she ran her fingers over the half-dozen fresh and healing scratches she had on her own forearm.
The plastic bag next to her leg twisted in the wind. The heel of a very expensive shoe poked through and stabbed her leg, and then the bag spun the other way.
Standing there at the mouth of the tunnel-cage, she wriggled her toes in her pressed out flip-flops. Reilly had been relieved to shed the state-issued pants and work shirt, but she hadn’t been able to bring herself to slip into the four-inch heels that she had worn during the entrance march into the facility all those months ago. Instead, she opted for the plastic shower shoes that the other inmates called rice paddy racers. She was sure the term was born of racism, but on the inside, everything had an element of some sort of –ism. It was the way the population defined itself. If you didn’t belong to one of the groups, you wouldn’t survive. Somehow though, Reilly had defined her group of one and had survived her stay, but not without serious impact to the way she saw herself and the world around her.
Looking down at her toes, she thought about the no-brand tennis shoes she had thrown, along with an unread book of poetry, into the trash bin next to the battered desk in her cell. Who was going to empty the bin now that she was gone? The thought of the abandoned shoes, a ghost of her former life, elicited a memory that she pushed away, leaving in its stead the shadow of a dull pain that she had learned to live with.
The metallic clank of the heavy security door closing behind her preceded the quick-paced, tooth-grating sound of footsteps that grew closer with the signature tap-scratch of metal against cement. Always a precursor to punishment or unwanted attention, the steps made Reilly’s heart race. Her first response was to feign sleep or find a corner to hide in, but now neither option was available to her. Before she had come here, though, she had learned to hide her fear, and she didn’t allow a muscle to twitch in her too-thin frame. She stood still and tracked with her ears the person approaching from behind.
“Ms. Ransome, your car is running a few minutes late. Have a seat inside where it’s cooler.” His voice was clipped and professional, but she knew it was a façade.
Reilly, who hadn’t said a word all day, maybe all week, swallowed and turned toward the voice. There was no fucking way that she was retracing those steps again. Not in this lifetime. She didn’t want to acknowledge the man who had spoken, and she willed him to disappear. Instead, she concentrated on a point just past his shoulder. She opened her mouth to decline the offer, and then shut it. A year and a half of words roared back into her, filling her throat, choking her with their volume. Her chapped lips formed a thin white slash on her face. She was afraid that the words she withheld might be as dangerous as the feelings that fueled them. Despite her struggle to refrain from letting her words free, they pressed against her lips, stronger than her resolve, and she knew that she was about to lose the battle. The low rumble of an engine and the crunch of wheels rolling over sandy pavement saved her. She turned toward the interruption and watched a long, black car pull up to the sidewalk in front of her and stop. The desert seemed to recede, and a shroud of vertigo enfolded her. The familiar sight in such an unlikely place turned her senses on their side, and a poignant sense of surrealism filled her. A sudden breath of fine sand scoured her ankles, restoring Reilly’s sense of reality, and the ground upon which she stood felt solid again. She took half a step toward the car and rested her hand on the smooth black paint.
An attractive woman wearing mirrored sunglasses and an expensive suit emerged from the driver’s seat and walked with a brisk gait to the passenger door of the limousine. When the driver opened the door, the smell of fresh lavender and fine leather swirled around Reilly from the air-conditioned interior. The cool whisper of chilly air and the remembered scent brought back a flood of memories, and Reilly felt the tension that had been her companion longer than she could remember begin to slide away. A little of who she knew herself to be came back to her, and she closed her eyes to regroup. When she opened them again, the driver had her hand out. Reilly offered her the limp plastic bag, and the driver took it as she lowered her dark glasses with her other hand and smiled.
As one of the few people Reilly had allowed visit her in prison, the driver’s familiar face was a welcome sight for homesick eyes, and Reilly smiled back. It was the first time she had smiled in months. Her even, white teeth showed against her chapped, full lips. She turned back to the guard, her smile disappearing, and in a gesture she would never have tested before, rested her palm on the Fergie’s beige uniform sleeve. The guard glanced down at her hand, but when the eyes returned to Reilly’s face, there was no warning in them.
“Thanks for everything, Fergie. If you’re ever in the Valley…”
“Ms. Ransome, I don’t think that’s within protocol—” began the warden, shifting from one foot to the other beside the guard.
“Fuck you, Warden.”
Reilly was surprised she said it, but she didn’t stick around to take in his reaction. She just patted Fergie’s arm, which felt strong under the stiff sleeve, and turned to get into the town car that idled at the curb, noting the slight smile that twitched in the corner of the guard’s mouth before she turned away.
The feel of her driver’s hand on her elbow as she ducked into the waiting car shocked her. That it was brief, and that Alison was both her friend and her driver, was all that kept Reilly from shaking it off. She would have to learn to live with casual touch again.
Relief was not an adequate enough word to describe the
emotion that overtook Reilly as she settled into the soft leather seat. The tinted windows created a shadowy refuge, and the soft scent of lavender enveloped her. Out a little over four months early for good behavior, she was beyond ready to leave the shithole that had housed her for so long.
She wouldn’t miss a thing about that place. As soon as she thought it, she realized that wasn’t completely true. In an unexpected way, she found that she would miss Fergie and the yoga classes she taught. At first the classes were a way to stay in a safe place, away from menacing inmates during free time, but after a while, they became a ninety-minute escape from the tedium. That was something Reilly would miss. If she never saw the warden again, it would be too soon. She squeezed her eyes shut against the memories as they played through her mind.
Turtle Shell
FAMILIAR AND DEPENDABLE, THE INSIDE of the car enclosed Reilly in a sense of safety she’d forgotten. Reilly sighed and closed her eyes, letting it sink in, not quite ready to believe she was free. When she opened her eyes, her eyes had adjusted and she found that she wasn’t alone. Her best friend Hank was waiting in the dark interior. She had asked Alison not to bring anyone with her when she picked her up, but she knew that Hank would be there anyway.
She was glad that he was.
He started to hug her and then stopped. Less than a foot separated them, but it felt like a mile. At one time, they’d touched and hugged without restraint. But since the accident, she had pulled away from everyone in her life, emotionally and physically, even Hank. Prison had built a chasm where physical touch was forbidden, and even embraces between inmates and visitors were not permitted. She had been relieved with the simple spoken hellos and goodbyes that she was allowed. Prison had honed her protection of personal space, and she knew that her body language warned against any intrusion into it. When she saw Hank, in this familiar place, she felt a hunger for a sense of her old self. But she couldn’t break down in minutes what had taken her eighteen months to build. So they just sat there and stared at each other. She watched his eyes take in her split ends and ratty headscarf, the prominence of her collarbones and bony wrists, her unadorned toenails. At one time, she would have cared what he thought of all of that. Now she just wondered if she radiated the jagged wariness that she felt. Whether he could see the Reilly that he used to know under this unfamiliar shell.
Finally, Hank reached over and took her hand. They sat like that as the car pulled out of the prison parking lot and sped down the desolate highway that would take them back to the Los Angeles Basin.
As the miles accumulated between her and the prison, Reilly fought the sensation that someone would chase her down and drag her back. She wondered how long it would take for her to feel comfortable in her own skin outside of the prison, how long it would take her not to feel like a turtle out of its shell.
Hank broke the silence, and the uncomfortable tether snapped.
“Hey, Rye. I see you’re rockin’ the refugee look. You look good,” he said, waving his free hand to indicate her clothes. “Aside from that outfit. It’s so two years ago.”
Hank squeezed her fingers and let out a self-conscious laugh as his eyes searched her for a reaction. Reilly smiled and tried to think of something to say in response. Her months in prison had atrophied her conversation muscles, and as she searched for words, she had a strange feeling of sliding backward.
“The scarf makes it all work,” continued Hank, filling in her awkward pause. She knew him well enough to know that he’d keep on talking until she said something. That he’d probably resort to harsher teasing to get a response. That her continued silence would make it harder and harder for him to act normal—if normal and Hank could be used in the same reference.
“I’m glad you came, Hank,” she said, finally.
Hanks eyes were glued to her flip-flops. He had been getting ready to say something else, but he paused. His smile stayed, but his eyes took on an earnest gaze as they shifted back to her face.
“You do look good, Rye. You always look good. Could be better, but nothing a spa treatment can’t correct, you know,” he said with a sincere smile. “Al almost didn’t let me come. I had to threaten her with—”
“Hank,” warned Alison from the front seat.
“What?” asked Reilly, wondering what Hank, who was all of five-foot-six and small-boned, could ever threaten the six-foot-tall, muscle-bound Alison with.
“Al is in love and I told her that I would start telling people about it if she didn’t let me come,” said Hank in a stage whisper, his hand ineffectually blocking the sound from traveling to Alison.
“Really?” asked Reilly, pulling herself up closer to the front seat. In the rearview mirror, she saw Alison glare at Hank. “Is it true, Al?”
“She made me promise not to say anything. But everyone knows that I can’t keep a secret,” laughed Hank, warming up to the topic.
A kind of relief swept through Reilly. She realized that hearing about her friend’s love life helped her to get out of her head. It had been so long since she had anything else to focus on outside of the bleary existence of her incarceration. She was beyond bored with thinking about herself.
“That’s a lie. You’ve kept many of mine,” Reilly reminded him.
“Self-preservation. You have just as many on me as I do on you,” responded Hank.
“Who is it?” Reilly asked Alison. She slid up so that she could lean over the front seat. “Why didn’t you tell me when you visited, Al?”
“Yeah, Al. Why didn’t you say something?” teased Hank.
“I’m gonna kick your skinny twink ass, Hank!” growled Alison, shooting him daggers over her shoulder as she drove. With an abrupt yank of the wheel, she changed lanes and Hank thumped into the door next to him, which just made him laugh harder.
“Ow! Al, you used to have a sense of humor!”
“Are you going to tell me what you two are talking about?” laughed Reilly. She had missed Alison and Hank’s habitual, mostly good-natured bickering. “Why didn’t you want me to know?”
“Alison is in love with a certain paramedic.”
“Hank…” Alison’s voice was low with steely warning.
Reilly scrutinized Hank for information, but his face held no clue as to why Alison didn’t want him talking about her new love interest. She touched Al’s shoulder. It felt weird after so many months of not touching another person, but she was desperate to feel a connection with her friends.
“That’s great, Al. It’s about time. I was afraid that your lesbian card was just for show. Wait—” said Reilly, pausing. “A female paramedic, right? You didn’t switch teams did you?”
Hank hooted.
“That’s hilarious. Al? With a guy? I think I just peed myself!” he said, slapping his thighs, rocking back and forth.
“Shut up, Hank!” growled Alison.
“What the hell is so funny?” asked Reilly. She felt the sting of disconnection that came with being on the outside of an inside joke. It wasn’t a feeling she had experienced much until she went to prison. And then it had become a daily part of her life. She hadn’t expected it to continue once she got out.
Alison glared at Hank in the rearview and she saw them silently argue about whether to explain.
“Fuck you both,” Reilly said, sitting back in her seat. The strength of her reaction surprised her, but she was pissed. “What is this? High school? Keep your secrets. I could give a—”
“She’s dating the paramedic who took care of you that night at the pier,” explained Hank, cutting her off.
Reilly watched Alison’s eyes, moss green and serious, studying her over the rims of her mirrored sunglasses via the rearview mirror. Alison was obviously worried how she would react to the news. Reilly didn’t know how she felt about it.
Hank cleared his throat to break the silence.
“In case you want to change, I brought you some things.” Hank pulled a bag up from the floor and rifled through it. It was just like him to
start shit and then try to change the subject when things got uncomfortable.
“Is that why you didn’t want to tell me, Al?” asked Reilly, ignoring Hank, her eyes intent on the eyes in the rearview mirror. A parade of emotion flew across her friend’s face. “Is it serious? Are you happy?”
“Damn you, Hank! I wanted to tell you on my own, Rye, after you settled in. It sounds bad, but…”
“Are you happy, Al?” repeated Reilly. The answer mattered to her. Alison studied her from the rearview, and she gazed back, waiting. Alison’s eyes softened.
“She’s awesome, Rye. I knew Lisa was it for me as soon as I saw her,” said Alison, a trace of her old Brooklyn accent coming out. Any ambivalence Reilly would have felt at Alison’s unfortunate choice in girlfriends flew away at the expression she saw on her friend’s face. Reilly had never heard Alison’s voice sound quite like it did, dreamy and happy. Her heart, which had felt dead for so long, began to beat again for her friend’s happiness.
“Her name’s Lisa? Tell me about her,” said Reilly.
“Yeah. Lisa Ruiz. Captain Lisa Ruiz. She’s in the Air Force Reserve and works for the Santa Monica Fire Department. I met her at a coffee shop two months ago. Totally random. She’d just got back from her second call up to Afghanistan. It felt like I already knew her, you know? It wasn’t until she found out that I was friends with you that she told me she was there that night. She didn’t have to. She could have not said anything. But she thought it was important. That’s the kind of person she is, Rye. It made things weird. But I couldn’t stop seeing her. I just couldn’t—”
Life in High Def Page 15