Let’s hope it’s enough.
48
CASS
The next morning, I’m woken up and assigned to laundry duty.
It’s not the worst thing in the world. If nothing else, it’s robotic and mindless. Kinda meditative, almost. Of all the various prison jobs, many of which involve backed-up toilets, this is the one that the yoga-and-matcha girlies would be fighting tooth and manicured nail to get.
Not that there’s a ton of that species in here. I keep getting strange looks and muted laughs. One woman even guffaws in my face and declares, “There must be some justice in the universe after all, because I have never in my life seen a rich, stuck-up bitch like you getting locked up in a place like this!”
She seems genuinely pleased to see me. I’m glad I can restore her faith in karmic retribution.
Anyway, the laundry. It could be worse. Keeps my mind off the bigger problems, like the baby in my belly that might be born into captivity or the Blue-Eyed Bastard who promised me the moon and got me a jail cell instead.
I’m elbow-deep in a hamper of khaki when a guard approaches at the end of my row. She’s short and square, wearing her hair in a French braid so tight it looks load-bearing. I’m genuinely concerned for the skin tension on her scalp. The name tape on her chest readsCOLLINS.
“Snyder. With me.”
I drop the bundle I’m sorting. “Did I do something wrong?”
“Don’t ask questions, inmate. Just move.”
I dry my hands on the front of my smock and fall in behind her. The woman who called me a stuck-up bitch watches me go with a strange sort of pity in her eyes.
I don’t like that.
I don’t like thatat all.
Collins walks fast, so I have to trot to keep up. We pass through the first checkpoint without anyone looking at us, which is strange, because in my brief experience here, the guards at the checkpoints look ateverything. Collins flashes a card at the reader, the lock chimes, and we’re through.
“Lawyer?” I venture, because I can’t help myself.
“Didn’t I just tell you not to ask questions?”
The hallway is quieter on this side, with less of that angry, pent-up energy in the air. Even the lights seem to be making less noise than they did back where I came from.
But it’s not a nice kind of quiet. In fact, the anxious whining noise in my ears seems to be getting louder to compensate for the ominous stillness.
I try to quell it as best as I can. I tell myself,Cassandra, do not be a fucking idiot. There are a hundred reasons a guard might walk you through a prison. Maybe even somegoodreasons.
I’m clearly new to this whole game, but I still name them in my head: Lawyer. Doctor. Disciplinary. A snitch interview. A surprise medical for the baby, perhaps. Maybe the nurse who did my medical intake called somebody.
And maybe even…
But no. Don’t eventhinkof that one. Hoping is the most dangerous thing you can do in here. Best not to even begin.
And yet I can’t help it. My eyes close and I conjure up an image.
Blue eyes emerging from the darkness. Pale skin, dark stubble.
It’s him.
I don’t allow myself to say his name, even in my head, because the last time I did, I was lying on a guest room mattress with my hand with a one-way ticket to visit the Sandman, courtesy of that half-milligram of zolpidem, and the saying of it did not summon him the way I thought it would. It was more of a monkey’s paw situation. Saying Mat’s name summoned the inside of this grim, gray-walled detention center.
Besides, he’s in trouble, too. He got bailed out, so why on earth would he traipse right back into a prison?
No, it just can’t be him. It’s dumb to hope.
