Indigo: The Saving Bailey Trilogy #2

by Nikki Roman

  “You can go on through the metal detector then, but take your shoes off, first.”

  I turn to my left and there is a single metal detector set up and a couple of bins laid out, a smaller version of the security measures at airports before boarding a plane.

  I pull my boots off and put them in a bin, and trying to hide the holes in my socks, I scuffle along to the metal detector. The guard waves me through and a light above turns green as I make it clear to the other side. I shove my feet into my boots, and then another officer escorts me through a hallway that smells like someone peed the length of it.

  The officer takes me into a room full of people. There are the inmates in their orange ensembles, and then the normal people, the family and friends who are visiting them.

  “I get to touch him?” I gulp.

  The officer chuckles.

  “I thought he’d be behind glass.”

  “We can put him behind glass, if you want,” he says. “Who are you here for?”

  “I… uh—I,” I choke up. “Clad, I’m here for Clad.”

  “Yeah? Gun Boy, huh? He’s real popular around here,” the officer says. “I’ll go get him.”

  I take a seat at one of the empty tables; my legs have started to shake and I doubt they will hold me much longer. The officer returns shortly, with his meaty hand tight around Clad’s bicep. Or at least I think it’s Clad; it must be, because he shares the same vibrant green eyes. But his most easily recognizable trait, his hair, is gone. All that remains of his once unruly mop of curls are dark brown bristles.

  What have they done to him? I think in a panic. What have I done to him?

  He pulls out a chair, and leans back in it like he used to in high school. “Look at me,” he says. “I can’t see your eyes.”

  “You got a haircut,” I say, raising my head.

  “Yeah, do you like it? It’s easier to maintain this way.”

  “It’s different.”

  Different—there’s that theme again. I’m beginning to grow sick of things being different. I slide my ponytail holder out of my hair.

  “You look beautiful, as always,” Clad says.

  “Thanks.” I force a smile.

  I reach across the table and grab his hand. Partially out of my seat, I fight the impulse to fling myself at him. “I missed hearing your voice…” I say. “Clad, I missed every little thing about you…” My voice fades away.

  “I truly thought you were going to visit me sooner,” he says, not squeezing my hand back. “It hasn’t been a cakewalk and seeing you could have made things more…bearable.”

  My voice leaves me completely. It’s in another world, along with all my senses. I have only one feeling and aspiration right now: to be in Clad’s arms.

  “At first, I didn’t mind the bad smells and bland food. I was on a high because I had saved you. But Bailey, you must know I’ve come down from that high. Hard.”

  He lets my hand drop on the table. “Do you have anything to say?”

  I shake my head mechanically.

  “Okay, then just listen,” his voice lowers to a whisper and he looks around the room before saying, “I saw them kill a guy. They dug a well in him.”

  “Dug a well?” I say, my voice returning.

  “You take a toothbrush and grind it down to a point, then you stab it in the gut of whomever you’re trying to kill and dig out their organs,” he pauses, “you dig a well.”

  “I didn’t ask for you to save me,” I say.

  “You didn’t have to. I was bound to, the minute I found your Bullet List.” He smiles to himself, pleased with this one bit of knowledge he has held onto for six months.

  “That’s how you knew,” I say. “You snoop.”

  “I saved a lot of people… not just you.” He pushes his finger into my chest “It was my choice. And now I’m dealing with the consequences. I just wish you would have been there for me all along, like I was for you.”

  “I wanted to, Clad, but I was in a bad place mentally and physically.”

  “What kind of state do you think I was in, being handcuffed and pushed into the back of a police car—a criminal for doing the right thing, for doing the only thing I could, saving you and everyone else?”

  “You’ve changed.”

  His voice rises, “Of course I’ve changed! You don’t witness a gruesome murder and stay the same person you’ve always been. Prison changes people and never for the better.”

  “You’ve completely lost yourself!” I say in disbelief.

  “I tried to hold on to who I was, but everybody took a piece of me, until I had lost every part of my being.”

  His words are still wise but they lack all their previous comfort, they are hateful now. Turned sour, like milk left out in the sun.

  “Do you hate me for not coming?” I ask.

  “No.”

  “Do you hate me at all?”

  “If I hated you, would I have gone to prison for you?”

  Good point.

  “Have they hurt you?”

  “No, I met somebody… a friend who’s always got my back. He won’t let anything touch me.”

  “What’s his name?” I ask trying to small talk my way into a lighter subject.

  “Angel,” he says.

  “That’s a coincidence, my dad’s—”

  “No, it’s not.”

  Way to make small talk; this conversation just gained a few thousand pounds.

  “He’s your dad.” Clad pulls a wallet sized picture out of his jumpsuit. He puts the picture on the table in front of me.

  It’s me—well, three year old me—with short black curls and my eyes as large as the sea, my smile not yet tainted by the cruel world.

  “Really?” I ask. “You know my dad? You’ve seen him?”

  “I share a bunk with him,” he says, blasé.

  “How is he?”

  “He misses you, talks about you every night before we go to bed; I try to fill him in on what he’s been missing. He calls out your name in his sleep.”

  “Will he see me?” Tears blur my vision until Clad looks like he could be the same boy that gave me his cookies at recess and pummeled T-rod.

  “I thought this might be too much for you,” he says, squeezing my hand at last.

  “What does he look like?” Questions that demand answers flood my mind.

  “Long, black hair, dark blue eyes. He looks like you, just in male form,” Clad says. “He wants to see you, but he doesn’t think your mom would like it. He doesn’t want to upset her.”

  “Fuck my mom,” I croak. “I have to see him. Clad, I must.”

  “We just knew you’d say that.”

  “She can’t keep me from seeing him… not anymore,” I say.

  A bell rings, like we’re back in high school and it’s time for our next class. Only this time, Clad won’t be coming with me when I leave.

  “Time’s up,” he says. “If I don’t get back to my bunk, the screws will put me in the hole.”

  We both stand and push our chairs in. I hold my arms out like I’m stretching, but I’m really offering a hug. Clad doesn’t take it.

  “See ya round, kid,” he says.

  “Clad,” I say, before he walks away.

  “Yes?”

  I’m going to ask him for a hug but it seems like too much, and I think he will reject it anyway. “See ya, Gun Boy,” I say and turn for the door.

  •••

  I barely make it to my car before the screaming starts. I stand out in the downpour, my mouth open, letting the rain fall into it.

  I cry out in anguish because Clad doesn’t want to touch me and his hair is gone, and I am all my dad thinks about.

  Then, I remember the dead birds and I lose all resolve. I’m on the asphalt halfway under my car clutching my stomach. My teeth knock against the road; I can’t control my body with the sobs that are racing through me. As soon as one ends another begins, fiercer then the previous, like birthing pains they intens
ify.

  I uncurl myself and open my car door, twisted on the ground I pull out my vodka. I chug until the bottle is empty and then smash it against the road. Picking up a shard of glass, I hold it to my wrist.

  Voices, Spencer’s and Sarah’s, speak to me. They strain to be heard over the pounding of my heart and peals of thunder that rock the ground. Why would you hurt yourself? You really outdid yourself this time, Bailey. Pretty girls shouldn’t self-harm.

  With reluctance, I toss the piece of glass, reasoning that I had better wait for the vodka to kick in before doing anything rash.

  I think about the birds and how the mound of dirt must be being washed away by the rain, their flowers drooping. I worry that they will be exposed for squirrels and raccoons to nibble at their bodies. I hate Spencer for not digging the hole deeper, even though I hear his song now—the one he sang at the birds’ funeral.

  The rain slows to a drizzle. I rise once more, hoping this will be the last time I will be picking myself off the ground for a while, Spencer’s wet shirt sticking to me like a tight hug from him.

  •••

  On the long drive home, I entertain the thought of my worn tires hydroplaning on the slick road and killing me in an uncontrollable crash.

  Mom keeps calling. I turn my cellphone off.

  Fort Myers lunch-hour traffic is horrendous; it’s a miracle I make it back before dark, just as the sun bursts creating a cotton candy sky.

  I get into the house and swing my head around, searching for Mom. On my second scan, I see she is at the table, waiting for me. I didn’t see her the first time because her head was bowed, her eyes wandering across a page in her AA book.

  I drop my cellphone on the floor and she starts. “Not good?”

  I shake my head tersely.

  She looks at me with sympathy but it isn’t right, not the motherly concerned look it should be; forced because she has had to use it many times before. Leaving her book open on the table, she comes to me and puts her hands on my arms.

  “He wouldn’t even hug me,” I say, staring at my open bedroom door where Angel is standing, hesitant to greet me. He doesn’t know me, anymore. I have made him lost by taking away his purpose in life—to comfort—replacing him with Spencer’s arms and chest.

  “I saw Clad today. Please, don’t be angry I didn’t tell you. I was scared you wouldn’t let me go.”

  Her hands leave my arms and I fear she might strike me. Instead, she starts to unbutton Spencer’s shirt. I pull my arms out of the sleeves; she rolls it up and places it on the table. “You should have told me,” is all she says. Leaning back for a moment, she studies me. She sighs and goes into my bedroom.

  “He wouldn’t even hold my hand,” I say following her around as she searches my room for something. “He saw a murder…the food is tasteless…he’s a totally different person, now.”

  She opens my closet and pulls out my favorite Winnie the Pooh nightshirt, the tag faded from being washed too many times.

  “All because of me,” I say.

  “Put this on,” she says, “and give me your wet pants, so I can put them in the dryer.”

  I put the nightshirt on and then change my expression to show I mean business. She tries to leave the room to dry my pants but I block her. “Mom, why couldn’t I just let Miemah kill me? Why did I have to hurt everyone I love?”

  “How were you supposed to know he’d bring a gun to school?” she says, throwing her hand out, as if she is holding Clad’s gun, displaying it for emphasis.

  “I could have known, if I hadn’t been too stupid to see how much he loved me.”

  “Even if you had known, what would that have changed?”

  “I would have gone about things differently… I wouldn’t have let him go to prison for me.”

  “You can’t give back a sacrifice of love, Bailey.”

  “But I didn’t deserve it,” I say.

  “Clad thought you did.”

  I walk into the kitchen, grab Spencer’s shirt off the table, and take it to the floor with me, digesting what Mom has said.

  “You hang in there,” Mom says, pulling my hair back from my face. “You’ve gone too long to suddenly just give out. You are my light.”

  I rest my cheek against her thigh.

  “Things went dark for me, too, when your father left.”

  She strokes my hair.

  “You never talk about him.”

  “It hurts too much. I loved him…more than you can imagine.”

  “Every light burns out eventually,” I say.

  “Then be an LED.”

  “You know I’ll try and last for you… as long as I can.” I yawn. “And my baby brother.”

  “Sister.”

  “Whatever,” I mumble.

  Mom continues stroking my hair and rattling off baby names—all of them girls’—until I am asleep.

  •••

  When I wake up, there is a blanket covering me; Spencer’s shirt is gone, and Angel is keeping watch at my window. The moon is fresh in the sky. I judge it to be around one in the morning.

  Refreshed and not the least bit groggy, I feel like I could take on anything… then the birds, Clad, and my father knock right into me and I am reminded that I could never be so strong when all these things hold me back.

  “Boy,” I say to Angel, “what do you think would make me happy right now?” I pick him up and stare into his eyes, like the answers might appear as they do in a magic eight ball.

  He barks and I put him down. He runs in a circle and then gives me both his paws. I make him stand and dance. “Should I dance, too?”

  He barks again.

  “If you are sure.”

  He barks louder and licks my face.

  “Okay, but I need music.”

  I think about where I can go to dance at this time of night.

  “Indigo, boy,” I whisper into his floppy ear.

  I can get a drink, too.

  Chapter 12

  I clomp up to the bouncer in four-inch heels and a leather mini-skirt with gobs of makeup slathered on my face, my best efforts to look twenty one.

  “I.D,” the black mass says.

  I flash him my fake I.D., with the name that Clad may or may not want to make love to.

  “Great,” he says, “now show me your real I.D. ”

  It says in the Bible if you had as much faith as a mustard seed you could move whole mountains; I wonder how much faith it will take to move this guy.

  “My mom is Sydney.”

  “Sykes?” he asks, guarding the door like his life depends on it. I don’t think a roach could slip past this guy.

  “Yes,” I say, adding one of my rare smiles.

  “’Kay, get in.” He steps aside, giving me just enough room to squeeze by.

  I shuffle through a mob of gyrators and make my way to the stage where the men are all huddled with their dollars and beers. Ella is wearing a bright pink bejeweled bra and panties; she’s working the pole like it’s a field needing to be plowed.

  “Ella!” I wave at her. “Over here!”

  She finishes her duet with the pole, and then leaves the stage by a small set of makeshift stairs. She runs at me in heels glued to her feet.

  “Bailey, baby, I didn’t recognize you! You look stunning!” She gives me a sweaty, sparkly, perfumed hug. “Where’s your mom?”

  “I came here by myself,” I say proudly.

  “Wow, rebel.”

  “I just wanted to dance.”

  “You could have danced anywhere, why sneak in here?”

  “I wanted to dance to the kind of music you can only find in a club. The kind where you can’t hear yourself speak, let alone think.”

  “I see,” she says, “trying to drown some nasty thoughts, eh? Let me get you some drinks.”

  “Make em’ strong,” I say, a phrase I have heard come out of Mom’s mouth more than once.

  From the cluster of bucking bodies, I pick out a guy to dance with. He looks
young enough to be in college, and isn’t too hard on the eyes. I figure after a few drinks he’ll start to look like Brad Pit and as he’s grinding on me, I’ll be able to forget that I have a boyfriend.

  Ella looks all too happy to see me dancing with someone and not sitting at a table alone. She hands me two shots. “Is there any way I can drink both of these at once?” I giggle.

  “Girlll, you can try but you’ll probably spill it.”

  I throw my head back and let the first shot slide down my throat. The man that was dancing with me claps his hands as I go in for the second one. “Those were amazing,” I shout, sticking my tongue out to Ella as proof. “Get me more!”

  “I can’t. The bartender is starting to get suspicious.” She frowns. “Maybe that guy you were dancing with will buy you one.”

  I swing around but can’t find him. Besides, with the hard liquor kicking in, and the volume of the music increasing, and bodies multiplying like gremlins, locating him would be a challenge, at best.

  “I’ll find another one.” I shrug.

  Ella smacks me on the back and says, “Good idea, kid.”

  She trots back on stage.

  As soon as I turn to seek another dancer/drink purchaser, my eyes land on two strong pecks. “Hey,” the pecks say.

  I follow the pecks to a face. Green eyes of less intensity than Clad’s look down at me. The young man is dressed like a thug, but his red athletic shorts and yellow bandanna can’t disguise how good looking he is.

  “Hi, want to dance?” I ask in a giggly schoolgirl voice.

  “Fuck yeah,” he says giving me his hand. “I’m Cai, and you are?”

  I put my hand in his. “Call me Sykes,” I say, because my first name would be too intimate.

  I catch the lyrics to the song that is playing and follow its beat with my body, giving meaning to the every part of the song like an interpretive dancer… or maybe I’m just a little drunk. Cai’s hands travel down my back and wrap around my hips, controlling my movement. His rhythm is way off.

  I pick his hands off me when they start to wander too far. Turning to face him I ask, “Can you get me a drink?”

  “What do you want?” he screams above the music.