Page 24 of Freshman

“The mobile phone you’re hiding.”

Nate tipped his head back, smirking. “Except that.”

“No phone,” Marie said, leaving the cell. She dusted her hands together. Glen joined them, sagging with defeat. He shook his head at Alfie.

“Back in the cell,” Alfie said.

Nate went without protest and paused in the doorway as he took in the destruction. He took a deep breath, then spoke over his shoulder. “It was worth it.”

Alfie locked him inside, then the three of them trudged back down to the office.

“Anything?” Henry asked for his chair.

“No,” Alfie admitted.

“Smart, that one.” Henry put his glasses on and leaned back to signal the end of their conversation.

Alfie sat down and tried his hardest to push the images out of his head that Nate had put there, but they dug their heels in, and he could see himself tangled up in his sheets as he swept Nate’s T-shirt over his sensitive skin.

He hadn’t masturbated in a long time, not since Nate had first called him Freshman. He couldn’t risk it, knowing how attractive he found the killer. Henry thankfully started snoring, and the lust Alfie felt faded, all until six hours later at roll call when he stood in front of cell 150.

Queenie had just confirmed himself present, and he waited for Nate to answer him through the door.

“It’s yours if you want it,” Nate said.

Alfie ticked off his name. His hand shook. “What?”

“The T-shirt.”

“Nate…”

“I love the thought of you using it like that. If you open the hatch, you can stuff it down your shirt, take it home and later—”

Alfie turned on his heels and left before Nate could say anything more.

As Henry was the senior officer, it was up to him to relay the night’s events to Ryan and the day staff. Henry, out of all of them, seemed the freshest, most alert member of the team. They didn’t know he spent the night in and out of consciousness. They believed him to be a lively seventy-year-old and were inspired by his energy.

“We spun cell 150.” Henry shook his head. “But nothing.”

Ryan nodded along to Henry, but his eyes never left Alfie. Once Henry had finished, Ryan scratched the annoying strip of facial hair with a hum. No amount of stroking it could clean the dirty arse crack on his face.

“We’ll get him eventually,” Ryan said with a nod. “You’re done for the day.”

The six of them from night shift got in line and left the office one after the other. The zombies of the night gave way to the wide-eyed dayshift.

In the car park, Marie and Glen gave each other longing looks, then climbed into their separate cars. The former off to her house and husband and the latter to the home he still shared with his parents. Alfie hadn’t asked, but Henry was a man of all knowledge and told him. The twins shared a car, one of them could drive and the other couldn’t, but Alfie still couldn’t tell them apart to know which one had the licence.

Henry climbed into his battered old beetle and drove away, narrowly avoiding the gate, the kerb and a pedestrian.

That left Alfie. He walked back to his two-bedroom house.

One of the advantages of living near a prison was the cheap housing, and he had the biggest house of anyone he knew. But that didn’t mean he had anything to fill it with. His place, Tia had told him, had a distinct lack of personality, so she added spice to the rooms in the form of cock-shaped candles and inspiration stickers on the walls.

He might have saved money living in that area and didn’t have to pay for fuel to get to work when he could walk, but Larkwood still paid him a meagre wage.

He could only afford a second-hand sofa, a coffee table and a bed.

The kitchen appliances were ancient and failed on a weekly basis.

---