I Like Dirt (Jack. Book 2)

by Laine Watson

  “What kind of stuff?” I asked, looking back at him as he led me into a cement room with little cells and bars in front of them. He took the handcuffs off of me.

  “I gotta take your picture and book you into the jail,” he said, handing me a piece of paper after he had typed some things on the computer. I took the paper and did what he asked me to do, turning and posing as he took my mug shots.

  “We only have a little more paperwork to fill out, and then you can make your call.,” He said. “And then you gotta go to a holding cell.”

  “Those cells look creepy,” I said, looking over at the cells on the left side of the room and then back at the officer, who was standing next to the two-sided desks that were to the right of me, each side divided by bulletproof glass. There were about six chairs on each side of the glass.

  “You don’t have to go in to one these cells here.. There’s more behind them.. I mean, they aren’t fancy, this isn’t exactly the Ritz, after all, but at least they have somewhere to sit and they’re not dark,” he said. I smirked.

  The officer walked around to the other side of the glass and sat down in front of me.

  “Have a seat,” he instructed me.

  “Okay,” I said, sitting down on the circular chair in front of him. He handed me some paperwork.

  “You can fill this out.”

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Just run-of-the-mill stuff. Your name, address, medical history etc.” He explained.

  “Oh, okay.” I smiled. He slid the papers through the silver slit connected to both sides of the desks under the glass. I filled out the paperwork and handed it back to him.

  I noticed a landline phone next to him. I was anxious to call Trey. I wanted to leave. I knew Trey and Becs were together. I thought that the longer I was there, the more trouble I could get in. It wasn’t rational, but I still felt it.

  The officer did not reach for the phone. Instead, he reached into his navy blue uniform and tossed his black smartphone to me through the slit in the desks. I looked up at him.

  “Call whoever you need to,” he said, seeming to be preoccupied with my paperwork, likely because he didn’t want to talk about what he was allowing. I smirked and dialed Treys’ cell.

  “Who is this?” Trey said. That was how he answered the phone when he didn’t know who it was.

  “Trey, it’s me,” I said.

  “Katie?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Where are you?”

  “Me and Becs out to eat,” he replied.

  “Well, I’m in jail,” I said.

  “What?” Trey said. “Nah, Katie, you lying.”

  “No, I’m not,” I insisted. “It’s two hundred dollars to get me out.”

  “Where you at?”

  “Down at the police station on D Street,” I told him.

  “Dang! Katie, what you do?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. He said I had a warrant.”

  “A WARRANT!” Trey shouted.

  “I know Trey, please! Tell Becs…” I begged him.

  “Alright, man. Here we come!” Trey said. The call ended.

  “Who was that?” the officer asked, looking at me. Who did he think he was, asking me anything about my conversation?

  “What’s your name?” I asked in response. He looked at me as if he didn’t know I would be so forward. He pointed to the golden name tag on the left side of his chest.

  “Officer…” he started to say.

  “What’s your first name, your whole name?” I asked. He smirked.

  “David, David Holland.”

  “Oh okay, Officer David Holland. My name is Katie.”

  “What’s your whole name?” he asked me.

  “Katelyn Everland.”

  “I knew that.” He smiled.

  “Why am I here?” I asked.

  “Oh,” he said, standing up. “Let me actually look at your file, and I’ll tell you exactly what your charge is.” He moved to the desk that was located behind the chair where he had been sitting. He began to use the computer again. Since I still had his phone, I called Bianca.

  “Hello?” she said.

  “Bianca,” I said.

  “Katie?”

  “Yeah, girl. I’m in jail,” I said, rolling my eyes.

  “You a lie…” she said.

  “No, I’m not. I’m sitting right here at the police station. I was in handcuffs and everything.”

  “Fo’real girl? What you do?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. Something about the metro. I don’t even ride the metro,” I replied.

  “Where yo stupid-ass brother at? He the one need to be in jail,” she said. I laughed.

  “Where the kids?” I asked her.

  “Ashlyn sleep and Bryn losing her mind. I swear I don’t know how she gone be when she get older, she be trippin’.”

  “She’s only one year old,” I said.

  “Exactly!” She replied. We both laughed.

  “You still in school?” she asked me.

  “Yeah, I can’t wait to finish,” I said. “I’m moving to Westfield. I’mma get a good job, get my own car.”

  “Bitch, if you can get outta jail!” Bianca laughed.

  “Shut up!” I laughed, too.

  “And how you in jail and just on the phone? What jail you at?” she asked me. We laughed.

  “Alright. I got the charges,” the officer said, walking back over to the many desks and bulletproof glass.

  “Oh. I gotta go, the police coming,” I said, ending the call. The officer sat down across from me where he had been sitting before.

  “Okay. It looks like the original charge was boarding a train car without a ticket,” he explained. “It was thirty-five dollars, but it was roughly two years ago.”

  I remembered all those officers, catching me when I was running away from home and sneaking on the metro to get down to Washington Heights. I didn’t remember getting any tickets.

  “Looks like you and your mom were supposed to go to court,” he said. “You could have done some community service, but I guess when you turned seventeen they charged you.”

  “So, what do I do now?” I asked.

  “Well, if you pay the two hundred bucks today, you’ll have a court date set, and then they’ll decide what you have to do,” he replied. I sighed and bowed my head. A few officers passed the window of the door that we had come in.

  “Well, I’m gonna have to put you in a holding cell until you roommate comes,” Officer Holland said hesitantly. My shoulders dropped, and I sighed again.

  He came around the bulletproof glass as I rose from my chair, and he led me behind the dark, scary cells to an area behind them. There were two cells with no bars, only a door with a small window at the top, probably for observation. The door was heavy and gray on the outside and creamy-peachy color on the room side. The room was creamy, too. There was somewhere to sit, a matching cream and peach bench-looking slope that emerged from the wall. There was a window on the back wall, just a plain window with a screen, but no bars. It was opened, I suppose, to let the breeze blow in. There was nothing else in the room.

  I walked into the room and turned to the officer and stood in the doorway. He stared at me from the other side of the door.

  “I’ll let you know when your roommate gets here,” he promised.

  “Okay,” I said. He shut the door, leaving the small window open at the top of the door. The shutting of the door seemed louder and more doom-like than it actually was. I sighed for the third time in those last couple of minutes and took a seat on that slopey, peach-colored seat coming out of the wall.

  There I was, with nothing to do, , no one to talk to, nothing to do except think. I’m assuming the officer went and sat back in the room we had been in because I could still hear him talking, maybe on the phone. I looked around the holding cell a few times and played with my skirt. My idle mind had only one destination, and I was trying not to go there…Jack. I couldn’t refuse him any lo
nger. I had nothing but space, time, and opportunity.

  I wonder if Jack has ever been to jail, I questioned to myself. Obviously. I laughed. I wonder what he’d think if he knew I was here. I paused, and a dark thought crept into my mind. He doesn’t care. I’m so stupid. I can’t live without him, but he probably isn’t even thinking about me.

  I straightened myself out on the slope and lay down with my arm behind my head, letting my legs dangle off the end.

  There’s nobody else like Jack. So, I guess it’s okay to just be in love with’em, I decided, unable to hate him. I thought about when we were elementary school kids. His teeth were so big. I giggled. I couldn’t help but smile.

  “So, my real name isn’t Jack…I’m a superhero,” I mimicked a ten-year-old Jack. I giggled even more, having that feeling of “Jack” around me. I sighed.

  I stared at the ceiling, empty-minded, and not realizing that the ceiling was open to the larger room, and the room that I was in had no real ceiling. Anything said or done was probably not seen, but definitely heard. The air seemed to blow in from the window, and the silence spread through the atmosphere. I could hear myself breath, and I felt the words come into my mind and release from my lips as I started singing…

  Pretty little girl on the outside, fearful child in my mind

  The only one who can set me free.

  Is the only one I will ever need.

  There are many things that I know, that only I can know

  There are many places, only I can go.

  There are many things I can see, many things I want to be…with you.

  Only, with you.

  You are all I need, I don’t need no more.

  Say that you are mine, super hero.

  Say that you are mine, super hero.

  Say that you are…mine.

  This is how it usually goes: a beautiful memory turns into the ugly truth. I took a breath, I just…I had to say his name.

  “Jack…” I called, like he was there. Like he could hear me. I don’t know how long I thought and fantasized about Jack, but the next thing I knew, someone was knocking on the door.

  “Hey, there?” Officer Holland said, opening the door. I hadn’t heard him saying anything to me.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” I said, sitting up.

  “Your roommate is here,” he said.

  “Oh…”

  “Yeah, so we can get you processed now, and you can go,” he told me.

  “Awesome.” I smiled as he led me out of the door. We walked a little way down the front of the room.

  “Hey, that song you were singing…” he began, looking over at me. I realized that he had heard me singing. I was completely embarrassed. I turned red.

  “Who’s that by?” he asked.

  “What? Oh.” I panicked.

  “You have a really pretty voice,” he said, bringing me around to the front of the room.

  “Uhm…” I didn’t know what to say. He stopped at the door before he opened it. “Are you gonna put handcuffs on me again?” I asked, trying to change the subject.

  “Nah, it’s not necessary,” he replied. I smiled. He opened the door and led me to the front to do my processing.

  “So, do you dance, too?” he asked me as he led me down the white corridor.

  “What?” I said, confused.

  “Your roommate paid the two hundred dollars all in single bills,” he explained. “You guys are dancers, aren’t you?”

  “No…” I replied.

  “You don’t have to be ashamed. I mean, you have a great body. You’re probably putting yourself through school or something. I understand,” he said coolly, all while still leading me to the front.

  “I’m not a stripper!” I said, snatching myself away from him.

  “There’s nothing wrong with it,” he replied.

  “No, there isn’t, but there’s nothing wrong with not being one, either,” I said, annoyed with him.

  “Com’on, turn back around. I didn’t mean anything by it. I mean, I just thought…” he said, leading me down the hall again.

  I think he said he was sorry, but I couldn’t hear anything except for what I’d always heard. Upon my skin were the words, of how dirty I was, of how the world looked at me. How men looked at me, maybe women, maybe everybody. It didn’t start until after Dodges. When this kind of thing happened, I missed Jack the most. I had been doing alright with letting go. But when you have large breasts, it’s hard to assume people look at you any other way but trashy.

  I was silent the rest of the way. I could hear him talking to me. I know he felt me shy away from him when he tried to guide me through the door. There was another officer who he led me to. I could feel him looking at me as if he thought I was a psychopath. How could I have just been so chill and inviting, and all of a sudden turn into a fidgety, anxious mess? How could we just have been so chill with one another, and now I was acting like he had tried to rape me? That’s how I felt—like he could see me without any clothes, exposed and vulnerable.

  I could feel him staring. I didn’t look at him as the other officer spoke, and I filled out my processing paper.

  Officer Holland left. Maybe he said goodbye or something like that, but I didn’t notice. Everything was cloudy, and I wanted Jack. When the officer led me outside into the lobby to meet Trey and Becs, she brought me out like I had been battered and bruised.

  “What happened, Katie?” Trey said, rushing over to me.

  “Nothing…I just wanna go home,” I said, quickly looking at Trey and then averting my eyes.

  “You alright?” he asked me.

  “Yeah…” I nodded, trying to hide the insults on my skin from Trey and everyone else.

  “Com’on,” Trey said protectively, leading me out of the lobby and to the car. I sat in the backseat as Trey drove Becs’ car. I know Becs said something to me, I just can’t remember what she said or even what my responses were.

  “Can you take me to get my car?” I asked. “It’s right by the laundromat by the house.”

  “Yeah,” Trey said. “You sure you cool?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I lied, looking at the city lights as we passed through downtown Reedsville on the way to my car.

  “Let me know, Katie, cuz we ‘bout to go, but we ain’t gotta go if you…” Trey trailed off.

  “I’m fine, Trey…” I said, annoyed.

  “Alright.” There was a little bit of silence.

  “Thanks,” I peeped.

  “It’s cool,” Trey said and turned up the radio. I sat back and sighed. We got to my car, where they let me out.

  They waited until I got in my car to leave. As soon as they pulled off, I burst into tears.

  “Jack!” I screamed, angry at him. You’d think I’d be able to let it go after almost three years, but nope. It was like a fresh wound every time I thought about him. It was worse this time. This time, I didn’t just want him, I wanted him to fuck me. I needed it. I tried to ignore it. I sniffled and started the car. I drove quickly to the house, still sobbing. I opened the front door and slammed it. I stomped down the stairs and to my room, locking the door.

  “JACK!” I sobbed and screamed. I didn’t know how to get the feeling out of me, how to make it better.

  “Jack…” I whispered, as if he possessed me.

  I was shaking, and my body was weak. I was holding my pussy, and I don’t even know why. I thought if I held it, pressed my palm against it, it would press out the feeling of wanting Jack to fuck me, but it didn’t. I was sweating and overtaken.

  This is when it all started. The first thought.

  If Jack can’t fuck me, I’m gonna fuck myself.

  I got up frantically, unlocked my bedroom door and went upstairs to the kitchen.

  Oh gawd, what the fuck is wrong with me? I asked myself.

  I was looking for anything that could pose as a cock. There was nothing in the fridge, there was nothing on the counter. I went into the living room—nothing. I ran down the stairs
into my bathroom and picked up my toothbrush and turned on the vibrations. I held it in my hand. I thought, this could work. But after holding it a few seconds, I thought, not good enough.

  I turned off the toothbrush, put it back in the holder, and headed to the front door and out to my grandmother’s car. I opened the trunk and frantically looked for something, anything that was remotely close to a dick. I about gave up. Was I going to have to call up someone? Ells? Finally give him what he had been asking for?

  I could fuck him and pretend it was Jack, I rationalized.

  Who’s Ells, you ask? A friend, you’ll meet him later.

  And just when it seemed like all hope was lost, I spotted it. It was to the left, in a black net pocket on the gray padding in the trunk, a lavender and purple tool bag. I pulled it to the middle of the trunk and opened it.

  There were hammers, nails, screws and about three or four screwdrivers. There was a black-and-yellow-handled one that was hard and almost shaped like a cylindrical stop sign, a green one that looked all knicked up, one with removable attachment heads, and then, finally, there was a light-blue one, semi see through one. It looked like rubber or something, and it had fine little grooves on it for grip, I’m supposing.

  It was like the color of Jack’s eyes, though his eyes were more brilliant. Immediately, I reached for that blue screwdriver. It was soft yet firm in my hand. I gulped, took a breath and slammed the trunk down. I swallowed the wetness that was in my mouth and held the screwdriver close to my chest. I ran back inside the house, locked the front door and went into my room, locking the door behind me. I stood in the middle of my room, shaking my head.

  “No…” I said in a frightened whisper. “This is stupid.” I turned to my dresser drawers and put the screwdriver in my underwear drawer.

  “I should just sing a song…” I said to myself. I grabbed my guitar and sat on my bed. My pussy was still calling out for Jack, hot and throbbing. I straightened myself in order to get the feeling out of me. I strummed on my guitar, trying to put Jack out of my mind, my body, but it was like I could see all the horrible thoughts that Officer Holland might have been thinking about me. I could see all the things boys and men had said to me, and I couldn’t get it off my skin. I put my guitar back and ran to the bathroom.