My words stun them. Sometimes, I think they forget what I’ve done. But I never do.
“That’s different,” Blister tries.
Mr. Wick doesn’t say anything. He must find it hard to look at me, because he’s staring intently at his hands as he traces his wedding ring with his thumb.
“I’d like to be a social worker,” I say. Blister doesn’t take his eyes from me.
“I never knew that,” he says.
“Neither did I,” I reply.
“You’ll be the best social worker there is,” he says, his face strong again.
“I will, won’t I?” Despair winds its way in and out of my words.
“Yes, you will.” Blister smiles, his dimples deep. “You will.”
After
eighteen years old
“June.” Mickey’s voice drifts through the vent. She takes me out of the paper world I’m in. “Are you there?” Her voice sounds bleak. “Course you’re there. Where else would you be?”
I sit up, pull the blanket around me in the shallow dark and press my lips as close to the little grate as I can.
“Yes, I’m here,” I say.
“Did I wake you up?”
“No. I wasn’t sleeping,” I say. There’s silence. Nothing. “Mickey?”
“I miss my son, June,” she finally says.
“I know.” Her sadness sits heavy in my chest.
“And I miss Jade.”
“You’ll see them soon. Just two days and you’ll see them again.”
“I want to see them every day.”
“I know you do.”
“At home, my son lived just two doors from me. Did I tell you that?”
“Yes.”
“I can picture Jade’s room. Where her bed is. My son puts my pictures on her wall.”
“Even the fish ones?” I laugh.
“Not the fish ones.” I think I’ve made her smile. I hope I have. “But I want to tuck her in, June. I want to kneel by her bed and read her a story. I want to stroke her hair until she goes to sleep.” The sadness in her voice is so deep now. “I’m going to miss her first day of school, every birthday, every Christmas.”
“You might get out, Mickey.”
“I don’t deserve to.” Her words fall into my room. The grille cuts them up and scatters them across my bed.
I put my hand on the wall to steady myself.
“We can’t make it different, can we?” I whisper. It’s too quiet for Mickey to hear.
“Tell me something good, June,” she says.
Something good.
It’s difficult for good things to find their way in here. These blank walls sometimes make me think that nothing else really exists.
“Aster flowers are good,” I say. “Their purple color is something else.”
“It is,” Mickey says.
“We’ll see some aster flowers on our walk tomorrow,” I say. Mickey laughs so sadly. “We’ll find the biggest field, filled with the biggest flowers, and we’ll sit in it and stare at the beauty of the sky.”
“Not the sky,” Mickey says. “I’ll look closely at the grass. I miss the insects, the bugs, all the animals.”
“Did you know that ants never sleep?” I ask.
Mickey laughs gently. “Where did you learn that?”
“Blister,” I say.
Blister Blister Blister.
I close my eyes to see the field more clearly. I reach out to touch the grass, to feel the green on my fingers.
“I was bitten by a snake once,” I say. Mickey doesn’t reply. “It was hurt and Blister and I wanted to save it. He picked it up and we made a nest for it in our trailer. But it bit me.”
“Did it hurt?”
“Yes. But it got me into a hospital, where I nearly told the nurse about Kathleen. I tried so hard to tell her, but I couldn’t.” I lean my forehead against the wall. I’m so close to the grate that I can smell the dust and rust trapped in there. “I would look at the nurse and beg her to read my mind, you know?”
“Yes,” Mickey says. “I know.”
“My arm was swollen for weeks and every time I saw it I was so angry with myself. The snake bite got me to a safe place where I could tell and I didn’t do it.”
“What happened to the snake?”
“It died.”
“That’s a shame.”
“Blister didn’t even bury it. He was angry that it’d hurt me, so he just threw it in the bushes.” I remember Blister’s earnest eyes as he’d told me. But he was smiling so much, because I was back, after two weeks away.
I hear Mickey’s worn breath fall heavily into the room. “I never told either, June,” she says quietly.
•••
“How many prisoners have you lost?” I ask Reverend Shaw.
“Too many.” He hangs his head slightly, his eyes on the open Bible in his hands.
“Do you ever feel angry?”
“Often. But I read this.” He holds up his Bible slightly. Its pages are worn from years of use. “And I talk.”
“Talking doesn’t bring dead people back.”
“No, but it helps me to sort out my thoughts. Sometimes, there are too many of them—I have to let them go.”
“But how do you cope with all the people you lose? In here, how do you say goodbye?”
Reverend Shaw knows what I’m asking. I’ve wanted to find the way to these words for so long and now they’ve fallen in front of us.
“It’s very difficult,” he says. I’ve never seen him awkward. “Sometimes, I question whether I can keep doing it.”
“Is it very final?” I ask. He won’t look away from me. “Death.”
“I believe it’s just the beginning.”
“Will I see my mom there?” I ask.
“I believe you will.”
“And my dad?” My voice begins to crack. “What if he doesn’t forgive me?”
Reverend Shaw looks at me steadily. “I think he already has.”
“But I took his life.”
“You didn’t mean to.”
“He died because of me. If I hadn’t hated Kathleen so much, I never would have lit the fire.”
“Where does the circle start, though? You suffered terribly, June. And I’ve no doubt that Kathleen suffered in her life too.”
“Kathleen?”
“No one is born bad, June.”
“She was.”
“She was a vulnerable child once, and I think someone probably hurt her too.”
“No one could hurt her.” Anger reaches up inside me. I remember my days and nights pieced together by terror.
“Maybe if you try to understand her, forgiveness will be easier.”
“There’s nothing to understand.” I’ve never raised my voice to Reverend Shaw before.
“It’s not easy.”
“What do you know about it?” My yelling shocks him. “Did she torture you? Did she try to destroy every part of you?”
“She didn’t succeed, though.” He puts his hand gently on me, but I yank my arm away.
“Didn’t she? Look at me. Look at my life. I’ve got nothing left.”
“You have, June.”
“But they want me to die. They think I’m not good enough to live.” I’m finding it difficult to breathe.
“You are good enough,” Reverend Shaw says. “And you are loved.”
The door unlocks.
“We’re fine,” Reverend Shaw tells the warden.
“She needs to go back to her cell,” the man says.
“She’s allowed to be angry,” Reverend Shaw replies, his voice rising.
“Not on my watch.” The warden strides over toward us and pulls me up.
“No!” I cry, and try to thrash out with my legs.
“June.” Reverend Shaw kneels next to me. He’s trying to calm me.
“I want to stay with you,” I beg.
But another officer comes in and they’re dragging me out the door.
“Do
n’t let Kathleen win,” I hear Reverend Shaw say, but the rest of his words are crushed by the metal doors locking behind me.
After
six months later
“How’s your studying?”
“It’s good,” Blister replies. “At the moment, I’m doing Civil Procedure.” He has so much energy, contained in the room. “Mr. Johnson says that the third appeal should be in three months.”
“Three months?”
“Yes,” Blister says. He doesn’t know how every second stretches in here. “But, June, I’m not sure about him anymore.”
“Why?” Mr. Johnson has been the line of hope I’ve been holding onto.
“I’m not sure he’s good enough. I think he’s made mistakes. And he hasn’t tried hard enough to get Megan involved. With someone else, I’m sure we can win it.”
“Blister, I don’t have anyone else.”
Blister glances quickly to the side.
Through the mesh wall next to him, I can just see Mickey’s granddaughter as she begins to cry. It hits me hard that this isn’t a place for her. This isn’t a place for anyone to be.
Blister looks back at me. He suddenly looks too vulnerable on the other side of the glass.
Mickey’s son looks bewildered as he gathers up his daughter. He says something to his mom, before he takes his crying child from the room.
When it’s quiet, Blister continues. “I’m trying to persuade Mr. Johnson to go over Mrs. Andrews’ statement again. And I’m sure we can find something in your old school records.”
“You can’t make your whole life about this, Blister,” I say.
There’s a scream, so loud that I can hear it in my cage. I look through the bars behind me. They’re dragging Mickey out. She’s trying to kick at the door as she thumps her hands raw on the wall, her fists clenched tight.
Another officer comes in. Mickey lashes out at the two of them, until more arrive and she’s screaming as they drag her away.
We can hear her, even through the thick, locked doors. Her screams getting quieter. Until they’re not there.
As if she never was.
After
nineteen years old
“You’re not wearing your glasses,” I say to Blister. He looks awkward, touching his face where they should be.
“I’m trying contact lenses.”
“Why?”
“I wanted to see what they’re like.”
“I prefer your glasses,” I say. He doesn’t smile. “How’s your mom?”
“Getting better. The doctors said it was a clean break, so it should be easy to heal.”
“How long will she be in a cast?”
“Another two weeks.”
“It must be difficult for your dad.”
“Yeah. It’s not been the easiest few weeks.”
“And coming here can only make it harder for you,” I say, not letting him take his eyes from mine.
“It’s OK.”
“I don’t know if it is anymore,” I say calmly, even though my heart is beating so hard that it hurts.
“I won’t stop coming to see you, June.”
“But what if it’s not what I want?”
“I’ll still come.” He tries to smile. “Did you get the book Mom sent you?”
I nod. “Blister, please, you have to listen.”
He looks away from me, down at his hand. He doesn’t want to hear the words that I don’t want to say.
“I need you to live a life for both of us.” I sound strong, even though I’m turning hollow inside. “I want you to use every day for something good.”
“But coming here is good.” He sounds so like the boy who saved me, the boy who took me from Kathleen and reminded me how to be happy.
“Nothing about here is good.” My hands ache to hold his face close to mine, to make him look at me again. “I’m taking your freedom away too, Blister.”
“I don’t want it.”
Anger suddenly boils in me. “Yes, you do. You can’t save the world by staying tied to this prison.”
“But what about your world?” he asks quietly as he looks up at me.
“You’ll always be in it.”
•••
I rip a piece of paper carefully from my book and I fold it and fold it and open it up until the shape appears. I’m trying to make a swallow, with its thin body and elegant wings, but I can’t remember how. I need Blister to help me.
Yesterday, I tried to make a dragonfly. I wanted to hang it on my door. But it was impossible without Blister. Everything is impossible without Blister.
The strip of window is white today. These are the worst days. It just mingles with the wall and I can barely see where one begins and the other stops. The world outside is lost to me and I think it may have disappeared altogether. I watch for a clue that it still exists. A bird, or a splash of blue. It can be hours with nothing.
Hours to think about why I didn’t just tell. Why I was so terrified that it stopped me from speaking. How Kathleen had my mouth trapped shut with fear.
The slot in the door opens. I get up and put my arms through. The handcuffs are on, so they open the door. It’s the officer with the trousers stretched too tight across her legs. Maybe that’s why she moves so stiffly.
She shackles my ankles. I shuffle forward, with the loud clink of metal shadowing my every move. It’s good, though. Good to be out. To feel the floor beneath my feet. To see hints of the rest of the building, edges of corridors, closed doors. Windows. I love the windows.
We go through the internal double gates.
Through the door.
And the air is on my face. I tip my head back, as I always do, keep my eyes shut tight and breathe the deepest I can go. I want to fill my insides up with air, to have enough to keep me going.
As usual Mickey is already here, pacing around on her own, as close to the edge of the wall as possible. When she walks past, I join her.
“Shall we go to the woods over there?” Mickey asks.
I look to where she points. I try to see the woods, but today there’s nothing there.
“I can’t see beyond the walls,” I say.
“Try harder, girl,” Mickey says. But there are only bricks, stacked one on top of the other, blocking us in.
Slowly, our feet shuffle forward on the ground.
“I wish it’d rain,” she says. Her voice is rubbed raw from her years of being in here.
“It will.” I look up at the blank white. I like the feel of rain falling all the way down here. It makes me know that I’m part of something much bigger. When it rains, it moves from us, over the wall and across the fields. It will fall on a child a hundred miles from here.
But they won’t know it fell on us first.
“Do you think it’s wrong if I don’t want to forgive?” I ask Mickey.
“They hurt you a lot,” she replies. “It’s a lot to forgive.”
“It is. And it feels like, if I do, then what they did becomes all right. When it wasn’t. None of it was all right.”
“I think the first person that you should forgive is yourself. I see the guilt eating you up, June. It poisons you.”
“I don’t know how to,” I say. The walls suddenly seem even higher around us, the sky just that bit further away.
Mickey nods. “Forgiveness takes a lot of courage.”
“I don’t know if I have that,” I say.
Mickey stops walking and looks at me.
“June, you’re one of the bravest people I know.”
“Have you forgiven yourself?” I ask.
“I have to, June, because I’m running out of time.”
“Don’t say that, Mickey.”
“My clock’s almost stopped ticking,” she rasps out. “But it’s better for my son this way. It’s ruined his life. He works his hours, his days, his weeks around visiting. He might as well be in here with me.”
“He wants to see you, though.”
“But it’s not right.�
�� Mickey’s voice scratches slightly. “You heard that saying? That if you love someone enough, then you’ve got to set them free? That’s why I want this over with. I don’t want to keep him in this prison anymore.”
“I don’t want you to go anywhere, Mickey.”
She laughs sadly and struggles into rattling coughs.
“My son says he wants to be there. That he wants me to know that he’s with me. That I’ll think only of him, sitting on the other side of that glass.”
It’s a horror I don’t want to imagine.
“What about you, June? Who’ll be there for you?” Mickey asks.
“I won’t let them kill me,” I say.
“Your mom will be waiting on the other side, girl,” she says. “Open arms for sure.”
And it hits me like a bolt. Whips any words clean from me.
Because, soon, Mickey’s voice will go and then mine will too. The sight of me, the sound of me, my heart, my hands, my skin, my bones. There’ll be nothing left.
I look to the sky and beg for a miracle.
•••
I push my face to the bars in my door and I can see Mickey, moving in shackles down the corridor, flanked by two guards. She’s almost doubled over. She can barely walk.
“Mickey,” I whisper. She’s crying so hard that she doesn’t even see me as she goes past. “Mickey,” I say louder, but she doesn’t look back. I thought she would be strong. I thought she’d be able to hold her head high. But the sound of her tears echoes and fills the place.
They almost drag her along. Two arms are around her back. She’s the terrified little girl whom no one would help. She’s crying and there’s the key in the lock for the next corridor.
She’s disappearing.
I press my ears to the bars, desperate to hear the last trace of her.
They are taking Mickey to the Death House. For one more day and one more night, she’ll be alone in a strange cell. Maybe tomorrow morning she will wake and wash her face and brush her teeth. Her comb will get stuck slightly in the tangle of her night hair, but she will gently work it through and then clip her hair back from her face with the big, brown barrette that I’ve never seen her without.
I think she will struggle with her breakfast.
Maybe she’ll write a letter to her son. And maybe one to Jade. And all the time her heart will be hammering to get out. Trying to get out before they stop it from beating.
They’ll unlock her door and Mickey will be led to her final room. The gurney will be waiting, its leather straps ready to hold her thin arms. She won’t cry, as they help her onto it.
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