Page 105 of Butterfly

Ollie kept the visit secret. Guilt ate away at him for not telling Rory or Captain.

They both knew something was up; Ollie apparently showed his worry clear as day on his face, but he managed to deflect.

Ollie got a taxi to Hollybrook and looked both ways before crossing the road. Pichard had said it looked small from the outside, but walking towards the prison, Ollie shuddered at the shadow cast over him. It wasn’t seven floors high; it was three with a slate roof and blackened bricks. Bars were over every window drilled into the walls.

A blend of barbed and razor wire ran along the perimeter fence.

He joined the queue to the visitor entrance, breathing warmth into his hands as he waited. Everyone else wore a coat, but sweating, and jittery with nerves, Ollie hadn’t noticed what a bitterly cold day it was until he was standing outside Hollybrook with his nose Rudolph red and his toes frozen in his shoes. He wished he’d borrowed Rory’s checked jacket hanging on the bannister.

The queue shuffled forward in a penguin march until eventually Ollie stood inside the check-in area. He handed over his ID, and they checked his likeness, then asked who he was visiting that day.

“Teddy Saul.”

The woman at the desk nodded, then waved him along to sit in the waiting room. Every visitor had to be frisked, and a pang of shame hit Ollie that Leo and his auntie would’ve gone through it every time they visited.

Letting somebody touch you like that, no matter how briefly, left you feeling vulnerable.

There were lockers for coats and bags.

Ollie had neither.

They waited onpaddedwooden chairs arranged in rows and directed at the clock at the front of the room. An officer went round the room with a roll of clear labels and a pen. He watched with no emotion as Ollie did the same as everyone else, writing his name and slapping it to his chest. He couldn’t recall if Leo and Maggie had been wearing stickers when they visited. They certainly hadn’t been trembling like he was. One of the officers kept glancing at him with a frown. Ollie imagined he probably looked like a junkie desperate for his next fix.

He wasn’t escorted out of the room for being suspicious, though. They were asked to stand and form another queue, which they did before shuffling into the visiting room.

The walls were grey, the same colour as the chairs and tables. There was a label stuck to each table, and Ollie was hit by a memory of being at school and searching for his place in the examination room. His table was in the centre of the room. All visitors had to sit on the same side, and they were back to waiting, no longer staring at the clock but at a door at the end of the room.

Ollie wiped his sweating palms on his jeans. He kept his lips slightly parted so he could ease air in and out; it wasn’t a pant, but he wasn’t breathing normally either. His throat tightened, he struggled to swallow, and fuzz started to fill his head.

“Keep it together,” he hissed under his breath.

The unknown of what was about to happen made him nauseous. Teddy might not even show up, and somehow, that didn’t devastate him. It would’ve almost been a relief if he didn’t, and Ollie could walk out the way he’d come and hyperventilate himself back to normal in the car park.

The door opened. There was more haste to how the prisoners came in. Ollie got to see all their faces stretching into broad grins as they located their loved ones in the visiting room.

People were moving, standing up to hug and kiss, and the quiet was broken with murmurs, then conversation. Teddy came through the door last. His eyes found Ollie instantly, but he didn’t smile. He strode over, clutching a dictionary.

He stood beside the table, waiting.

There were still hugs going on around them, and Ollie wondered if that was what he was waiting for. Did he hope Ollie would spring to his feet and embrace him? Ollie curled his fingers into the bottom of his chair and made it clear to Teddy that he wasn’t getting up.

Teddy looked away, then pulled out his chair.

The dictionary hit the table with a thump.

Ollie’s brow twitched as he took in Teddy’s face. He appeared gaunter, his cheekbones sharper. The black beard he’d taken pride over each morning, brushing and trimming it to perfection, looked haggard, wild.

Ollie wondered if it always had, and he just hadn’t noticed.

Sunken grey pits were beneath Teddy’s eyes, and when he sat, he didn’t tuck his legs under the table like everyone else; he sat to the side, legs in the aisle like he couldn’t wait to leave. He didn’t look at Ollie. His eyes darted from the doors to the other prisoners, to the officers positioned around the room. He was on edge, his jaw shifting with tension.

It took a few minutes for Ollie to find his voice, and when he did, it was so small it surprised him that Teddy heard.

“Do you hate me that much?”

Teddy stiffened. He shook his head.

“Then why won’t you even look at me?”

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