To me?
He’s the man who stepped out of the trees when no one else did. The man who roared. The man who bled for me. Fought for me. Took the hit so I could run. The least I can do is find a way to say thank you. Even if no one else does.
I set the star down gently on the coffee table and reach for my notebook. The one I take to the writing group. The one full of half-finished stories and abandoned lines and characters who always seem to find their way home, no matter how lost they get. My hand hovers over a blank page.
I don’t know his favorite food, his middle name, or the color of his eyes. I don’t know where he grew up, what he’s done, or who hurt him enough that his first instinct is to throw himself between a stranger and danger. But I know this: He deserves to be more than a line on a report. He deserves to hear the words no one else is going to say. Thank you. My fingers close around the pen. I don’t start writing yet. Not quite. But I know, at that moment, that I will.
Five ~ Steel Bars, Silent Nights
Jaxon
JAil Smells Like Bleach And Old Sweat. Like somebody tried to scrub the bad out and just ended up stirring it around. They gave me a cell on the far side, low-risk block, they said. Doesn’t feel low-risk. Feels like a coffin with metal bars.
Concrete walls. One cot bolted to the floor, mattress thin enough to fold in half like paper. One toilet with a metal sink welded on top. One flickering bulb overhead that buzzes like it’s got something to say and never quite gets there. I’ve been in worse. That’s the sad part.
The guards don’t talk much. Neither do the guys in here. But the ones who do glance my way as I walk past like I’m either a hero or a lunatic. A couple nod that tight little nod men give each other when they recognize violence. One just stares, eyes narrowed. Measuring. Truth is, I’m not sure which I am.
The door clanks shut behind me with that too-familiar sound, and the lock slides home. There’s always this brief pocket of silence after a door like that closes, like the air is adjusting to one more body inside. I sit on the cot, elbows on my knees, hands still scabbed and raw.
They kept me in holding most of the day. Took my laces, my belt, my jacket, and felt that one more than I want to admit. Took my rings too, the ones I never take off. Said they could be used as weapons. Like that’s not the point. Mugshot, fingerprints, the whole song, and dance. I stared at the camera like I was looking straight through it, jaw already stiffening where that asshole’s knuckles connected. The cop taking the picture avoided my eyes. Like if he didn’t really look, I’d be easier to file.
Processing is all fluorescent lights and bored faces. A metal bench bolted to the floor. Paperwork with boxes to tick:
Have you ever been here before?
Any medical conditions?
Anyone you want us to call?
No, no, and no.
My jaw’s swollen from the hit that guy landed. My ribs ache worse than I’ll admit, each breath stretching something that doesn’t want to be stretched. There’s a cut on my neck that keeps sticking to the collar of the county-issue shirt they gave me. It’ll scar. Most things do on me. But what sticks with me most isn’t the pain. It’s her. The girl. I didn’t even really see her face properly. Not like you’d see someone across a bar, or in a coffee shop. Everything was too fast, fear blurring the edges, snow stinging my eyes, adrenaline making everything sharp and hazy at the same time. But I remember enough.
She looked back at me. Just once. Her eyes locked on mine for all of three seconds before she vanished into the dark. But I remember the look. Scared, yes. That kind of terror etches itself in. I know it. I’ve worn it. But something else. Trust? No. That’snot right. She didn’t know me well enough to trust me. Hope, maybe. Desperation. That flicker you see in someone who wants to believe this isn’t the end of the story.
I don’t know her name. Just the sound of her scream, and the shape of her face as she disappeared into the trees. The way her hat had slipped sideways, the wool bunched above one eyebrow. The way her scarf trailed in the snow as she ran.
I keep seeing her, even now, hours later. Eyes wide, breath visible in the cold, a wool hat pulled low over her ears. I didn’t do what I did for thanks. I did it because I couldn’t not do it. I’ve walked away from a lot of things in my life, but not that. Not when someone’s screaming. Not when I know exactly what it sounds like when no one comes.
I rub my palms over my jeans, feel the pull in the split skin over my knuckles. They’ll scab, then scar, then blend in with all the others. I’ve carried worse on these hands.
The cell across the corridor has two guys in it, both older, both staring at the TV mounted high on the wall at the end of the block. It plays some daytime show with the sound turned low and the subtitles on. A woman is crying in big, dramatic sobs while a studio audience pretends to care.
One of the men glances at me, eyes flicking to my face, then my hands, then back to the TV. I can almost see the wheels turning.
New guy.
Fight in the yard later?
No?
Okay, leave him.
Fine by me.
The lawyer they assigned me is fresh out of law school. I could tell the second he walked into the interview room, too-clean suit, tie knot a little too big, hair parted like he learned how froma YouTube tutorial. He talks too fast, tries to sound confident, but I can see the panic in his eyes. Not about me. About the system he’s just stepped into. About the realization that all those textbooks didn’t cover what it feels like to sit across from someone who might go away for years because of how a story got told.
“They’re charging you with aggravated assault,” he said, sliding a thin manila file onto the table between us. “Serious injury. Your history doesn’t help. Two priors, one fight in a bar, one resisting arrest. This is your third strike in this county.”
