When we pull up outside the facility, the nerves I’ve been keeping at bay crash down. It looks the same as always—modern brick, wide glass doors, hedges trimmed to perfection. Cheerful, in that way expensive places are. A lie painted in sunlight. It’s all a façade, but if it helps ease our conscious, then it’s worth every penny.
I mutter a thanks to Stoneface and shove my hands in my pockets, hood pulled low as I step out. The doors slide open with a hiss, letting out the sterile bite of disinfectant. Underneath it, faint traces of fresh linen, air freshener and just a faint whiff of food trolleys being wheeled around.
The receptionist looks up, recognizes me, smiles like she knows not to make a scene. I sign the book with a scrawl andtake the visitor pass, my hand tight around the stupid plastic clip.
The hallway is quiet. I can make lines in the carpets, its heavy-duty carpet tiles, reinforced and rubber footed, swallowing sounds and offering a barrier of water resistance. My boots don’t even echo. I pass open doors—rooms with pastel walls, TVs murmuring game shows, old men staring out at nothing, women humming to themselves like they’re still young, lost somewhere in the past. Some comb their hair, or at least go through the motions, and it hits me like a gut punch. This place is a waiting room. Lives already slowing down come here to grind to a halt altogether.
Mom’s door is near the end. My chest seizes when I see the brass number plate. I stand there for a beat too long, forehead pressed to the wood, trying to swallow the dread rising in my throat.
I push it open.
The room is dim, curtains drawn against the gray daylight. A TV mutters softly in the corner, reruns of some soap she used to follow religiously. The same one I grew up mocking with her when I was a kid. The voices are sharp, ridiculous, but the laugh track is gone now. Just static drama in the background.
Finally, my eyes flick to my mom.
She’s small. Smaller than I remember. Curled into the recliner, sweater swallowing her frame, a blanket pulled over her legs. Her hair—what’s left of it—is wispy, silver, nothing like the thick curls I used to braid around my fingers when I was little. Her hands tremble where they rest on her lap.
“Mom?” My voice cracks, breaks in half.
Her head tilts slowly, eyes searching, unfocused. For a heartbeat, I think she doesn’t know me. I brace for it. That hollow stab in the chest that never gets easier.
Faint recognition flickers. Her lips twitch. “Trey?”
Relief nearly knocks me flat. I drag a chair closer and drop into it, leaning forward so she doesn’t have to strain her neck. “Yeah, it’s me. Your favorite son,” I say, hamming it up a little—half a performance, half just pure relief that today’s one of the better days, the kind where she isn’t lost in some memory that has nothing to do with me. Her smile ghosts across her face, brief but real. “My only son,” she whispers, voice thin but teasing.
I laugh, but it comes out ragged. I fumble with the tin I brought, pulling it from my hoodie pocket. “Got you something.” I hold it up. “Chamomile. Your favorite. Thought you might be running low.”
Her fingers brush the tin, tentative, shaking. She clutches it to her chest like it’s worth more than gold. “You remembered.”
“Of course I remembered.” My throat burns. “You used to ration it out like it was contraband. One packet a week, or else.”
She chuckles faintly, but it dissolves into a cough. I reach forward, steady her until it passes. Her skin is papery thin, cool against my hand. It’s not the hand that used to tug me through grocery aisles, to swat me when I mouthed off, to cradle me when I was too small to understand why dad was angry.
I sit with her. Talk about nothing—the weather, the music charts, a ridiculous story about Sam at the gym last week. Sometimes she laughs, sometimes her gaze drifts, lost in the fog.
Every time her eyes slide past me, I feel like I’m disappearing with her.
The soap opera rises in the background, characters arguing about affairs that make zero sense. I watch her eyelids grow heavy, her head tilt. She’s drifting.
I press a kiss to her temple, whisper against her skin. “I love you, mom. Always.”
She doesn’t answer. Just breathes steady, clutching the tin of tea.
I sit there until her breathing evens out, until I’m sure she’s asleep. My chest is caving in by the time I stand, dragging my chair back with a soft scrape.
My keys slip from my pocket, clattering against the floor. I crouch to grab them, spotting an envelope wedged under the cabinet leg. The logo in the corner makes my blood run cold.
It’s from the Correctional Service of Canada.
My chest tightens. I tear it open, hands shaking.
“This letter is to inform you that inmate Jonathan Baker was released from custody on June 12th, following completion of his sentence.”
The words blur. My mouth goes dry.
Released.
Free.
