Page 5 of The Care of Broken Things
He forced a nod and could feel the comforting weight of her eyes as he went back to the line.
“Last one to the gate again,” Jameson said as he unlocked the door. “How does the man with the most regular visits manage to be last every time?”
By the time he reached the cafeteria, they were already serving dinner—an early occurrence in prison. The timing of his visit meant it was already full, and he annoyed himself when the first thing he did was sweep his eyes carefully overthe crowd, looking for a specific someone. There was a line, but when Cheese saw him, he beckoned him over to the side and held out a tray. He thought about ignoring that. Cheese only gave him personalized service when there was gossip he wanted confirmed. But another glance at the line had him settling on Cheese after all. It wasn’t that he really minded waiting, but part of him was nervous that if he waited, he might find Eli waiting behind him, and he wasn’t ready for that.
Cheese was wearing a huge grin that warned it was going to be worse than usual. The man waited until he had his hands on the tray and said, “So I hear you’re in love.”
Samuel closed his eyes. Wherever the man was, whatever he was doing, he was going to find Rat and strangle him.
Cheese’s hands had tightened on the tray, a common tactic he used to trap his audience. If Samuel wanted it free, he’d need to spill half the contents of the tray to do it. He opened his eyes and debated. Pea mash, potato mash, macaroni, and a pudding cup. The macaroni came in a block with powdered cheese and a puddle of oil, but it was still a top-three prison meal. Spilling wasn’t an option.
He gave Cheese his best Ice Queen disdain and said, “Sorry, Cheese. I see you only as a friend.”
The tone he used would have warned off most of his fellow prisoners, but Cheese wasn’t especially bright. Not me, the new guy. I hear you already proposed.” The smile widened. Samuel wanted to knock a few of the teeth out of it. “Figure you're going to have some competition. A lot of people have an eye on your man.”
He’d learned denial could be even worse than agreement, and he wouldn’t give the man the satisfaction. “You going to give me my dinner, or do you want to wear it?”
It wasn’t a threat he should have made. He wasn’t supposed to have fights, even little cafeteria tussles. Jennywould get an ulcer. But he was rescued from his idiocy when Norm stuck his head out the window and barked, “Cheese! Stop keeping Fuller’s food hostage and get back to work. You’re holding up the line.”
Cheese’s hands released the tray, and when Samuel stepped back, he gave Norm a nod. He’d go by the man’s bunk later and give him a packet of the cough drops he was addicted to.
He bypassed all the tables and headed straight for his closet. Occasionally there was a druggie or two napping in it, but this time it was empty, and he sank gratefully into the quiet. The bulb in the closet had long since burned out, but he always kept a penlight around his neck.
When he finished his dinner, he set the tray down on the floor beside him and switched off the penlight. When he was small, he’d been afraid of the dark, but he’d been too young to know real monsters then. Now the dark was a comfort, a way to rest his overstimulated senses, though it was difficult to find the dark in prison. They dimmed the lights at night but never shut them off entirely. The best he could get was the closet with the light seeping in through the crack at the bottom. He closed his eyes against it, but he could still see it, a band of stimulation across the inside of his eyelids.
He spent the last two hours before lights-out in the library. That wasn’t unusual, but now it felt imposed on him, as if the barracks were off limits with Eli was around. In the end, he cut it a little close and had Carnivore’s glare at his back. CO Park wasn’t known for her patience, nor for her clemency. “Get a watch, Fuller,” she said and poked his back with her baton as he went past.
He made sure to aim a kick at Rat as he climbed up his bunk.
“Ow! What was that for?”
He said nothing; the man knewexactlywhat it was for. He spent the next few minutes checking inventory. No one had stolen anything from him in years, but he found the routine soothing. His fingers lingered on his two jars of peanut butter. He wanted to crack one open, but with how stressed he was he’d end up polishing it off in a single sitting.
After everything was counted, it was time to change into his pajamas. He always waited until lights out to get undressed. People called him a prude for it, but he didn’t believe in tempting fate. He put his folded pants at the foot of the bed and dropped the rest into the hamper that hung from the bedpost. He’d only just laid down when Rat spoke.
“Whatever you think, I didn’t say anything. It was the new guy’s fault. He’s been going around asking about you.”
That was news he wasn’t sure how to react to, so he said nothing.
“I thought you wanted me to talk you up. Buying him all that stuff—what was I supposed to think? Besides, he seems like a smart guy. No way he would assume that’s the standard welcome basket after seeing what most of us are carrying around.”
Samuel turned over onto his side, as if he could block out the logic in Rat’s words simply by putting his back to him. The man poked his mattress. “Don’t shut me out. We’re friends, aren’t we?”
He wasn’t sure about that. Friendship required trust, and after five years he had none of that left.
“If you have any laundry, put it in the bag and I’ll do it in the morning,” he said in place of a proper answer. It was a way of saying he forgave him without the promise of real warmth.
He heard Rat sigh. “You’re a real bastard sometimes, you know that?”
He did know it. He’d known it for a long time. There was another poke at his mattress. “I wouldn’t screw you over. I hope you know that.”
The man didn’t seem to expect an answer. Rat knew him well enough for that, at least. “Moody bitch,” the man mumbled, but there was humor in it. Rat liked him, though he had no idea why. He’d never been nice to Rat, never greeted him or offered to eat a meal with him, and yet the man kept coming back for more abuse. Some people were like that. The man was probably lonely. Everyone was in prison, but most were better at hiding it.
“G’night, princess,” Rat said. His voice was already thickening with sleep. The man could fall asleep anywhere and through anything. Samuel was nothing like him. Even on good nights, it could take over an hour to shut his brain down enough to rest. He was tempted to turn over to check if Eli was lying awake too, but he kept his back a rigid barrier.Zero contact, he reminded himself.
When he woke, the dimmers were still on. That wasn’t unusual. He usually came awake sometime between 4:00 and 4:30. But something was off. He sat up and looked around. It took him a moment to see him crouched there, a statue in the dark. With his blood roaring to life, he grabbed the first thing his hand found and threw.
The jar of Skippy’s finest hit Racer in the shoulder like a baseball off the pitcher’s mound.
