Family

The Invitation ☑️

"Wakey wakey, time for breakfast." Guard yelled by Mitch's cell as he went from one side of the hallway to the other.

Mitch got up unwillingly. He didn't sleep much, because he kept thinking about his daughters. He stretched and made his bed. He leaned his head against the bed and closed his eyes.

His cellmate went to the toilet quickly and brush his teeth. "How was your first night? Oh still sleeping, okay." He chuckled and let Mitch be. After a minute or so he sighed loudly and went to brush his teeth too. "Will you be nicer today?"

"I don't want to be nice, I want to do my time and leave." Mitch hissed at his cellmate.

Ronnie sighed. "You'll need someone to show you around, maybe you don't want a friend, but you need an ally." He patted Mitch's shoulder and went to stand by the bars.

"I know I do, but I don't trust anyone in here. How can I? I'm in prison and I never met most of these people." He responded and sighed with annoyance.

Ronnie chuckled. "Haven't you heard about such thing as leap of faith? Plus I am willing to go through all your tests, because I feel like you'll need someone to show you around, tell you who is the dangerous one or crazy one."

"I will be both soon, if you don't shut your mouth." Mitch grunted and looked out, hoping to see something more interesting. He didn't see anything interesting at all. At least until they were out and one of the inmates didn't want to go anywhere.

The inmate got few hits and then was taken away. After that everything went smoothly until it was time to choose where to sit. Mitch scanned the room for a moment and then noticed empty table. He went there and did what he came there to do. The food was better than he expected, but it was barely good enough. He was about to stand up when few guys stood around him. "Do you have any idea where you're sitting?"

He rolled his eyes, stood up and left. He had better things to do, whatever they were. The rest of the day was pretty much nothing. When they went out where few guys were poking his buttons, when they were in other people bothered him. He even got himself a book from library, but he wasn't able to read a lot because the noise around him. It took him almost an hour the first chapter that had 10 and half pages. Then he gave up, seeing that it had no point to even try to read the other chapters.

He laid on his bed, looking at the ceiling and thinking who his little girls might be in the future... doctors or teachers, maybe lawyers like him, economists, there were tons of possibilities and too many moments in their lives that would shape them.

He was so deep in his thoughts that he didn't register any movement until someone was patting bed beside his arm. Mitch jumped up a little, being pulled out of his thoughts. "Deep in thoughts are we?" Man chuckled. Mitch rolled his eyes and huffed. "Hey, don't go all grumpy on me. I just want to see who we're dealing with, but you seem harmless, so you won't be a problem." He looked Mitch up and down again. "I can be wrong, but I don't think I am." He jumped up on Mitch's bed and sat beside him.

By the time the man came to Mitch, everyone knew that the newbie wasn't much of a talker. The man tried to get him to talk, but didn't have much luck. When he left, Mitch noticed few people looking his way. He decided to ignore it, it could be many things - maybe they were checking who they were dealing with from afar, maybe they were planning on beating him, maybe they were looking at the man that just left. He couldn't be sure of what they were really doing.

He wanted nothing more than get through his time and go back to his little baby girls. He got lost in his thoughts again, but this time it was guard announcing dinner. The dinner was something funnier to watch - Mitch sat by empty table and this time folks didn't come to tell him that it wasn't okay and they sat to another table. But that table wasn't free either and that caused fight in the canteen. Guards had a lot of work to do to push everyone away from the rest. But Mitch wasn't bothered until one of the men nearly fell into his food. He took away his plate and sat elsewhere. He finished his food there and stood on a side while guards were pulling everyone away from the rest and one by one either taking them to doctor or to solitary to cool down for few days.

After the entire thing which Mitch found quite bizarre, he was back in his cell. The surroundings were much quieter and he could finally read. After few pages Ronnie came to their cell with broken nose and purple circle mostly under his eye. "You lucky bastard, I thought they were going to kill me. Did anyone at least come anywhere near you?"

Mitch looked up at him coldly. "Yeah, somebody nearly fell into my plate, so I stood up and went away to eat the rest. Where were you for goodness sake? You look like every hit got to you." Mitch put the book away.

"I feel like it too. But doctor said I'll be fine in few weeks." Ronnie sighed and sat down on his bed. "So you decided you're going to talk to me now that I've been thrown around like a punching bag?" He asked with groan. Every breath he took hurt and it hurt even more when he by accident took a breath through his nose.

"No, I don't plan on keeping you as my ally as you called it, but you're still a human being. I want to know whether you're actually okay or you need a bit of help with something... besides breathing and looking." Mitch chuckled.

Ronnie beneath him only groaned. "That was funny and all I can do is cry in pain as I laugh. That is so evil." He grunted when he moved to laid down and every move he made felt like all the punches he received happened all over again and at the same second. "By the way, get used to such stuff. It happens every few days, we're lucky that nobody was found dead since then. That hasn't happened in years." He said with little bit of surprise and lots of pain. "I hope I didn't jinx it."

"We'll see. By the way, it would be better if we didn't sleep tonight. We need to be able to see whether you're actually okay. You got at least two mighty punches in your head, so you may have or get a stroke and die. Not that I would want to scare you, I'm just saying that we should try not to sleep tonight." Mitch said and went down from his bed. He took his chair and sat on it, so he could see in case something was about to go wrong.

They talked, eventually whispered when the nighttime came, for hours into the night, but they were too exhausted and eventually fell asleep. But sadly only one woke up the next morning.

Mitch called guards as soon as he woke up, but it was too late - Ronnie died over two hours before guards came to wake everyone up. After long night the day seemed to not be moving at all. Everyone blamed Mitch for his cellmate's death and cops and Todrick (as his lawyer) came to question everything multiple times just to be sure Mitch told everything he knew and that it was true. After 6 hours of interrogation the cops let him go and he was able to go back to his block - but not his cell. He sat the closest to his cell as he could and waited for anything - dinner, possibility of going inside his cell.

Then guard came up to him. "You're looking in there as if that was your last place. Come on, you're being moved. Tell me what was yours and once we can we'll bring it to you." Mitch nodded, stood up and followed him to cell at the end of the hallway. There was this little kid with shaky hands and knees as if he just saw his biggest nightmare. And that was only the first day of his journey.

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Hey guys, Christmas gifts are here. 5 new chapters under your Christmas trees. (2 over here, 1 in book One-Shots and 2 in book Jessie) don't forget to let me know what you think them in comments and please vote in case you like it :)

Merry Christmas and happy holidays- Alex24.12. 2020 5:05pm