Disequilibrium

Part 5: Denouement - Scene 1

Winter

They drive me all the way over to the nearest city and straight to a penitentiary, and from that point on, everything is a blur.

They take my fingerprints and saliva. They also take pictures. One facing forward, another to the left, maybe one more on the right.

Flash. Flash. Flash.

They strip me.

A man checks my body for anything hidden while another stands watch by the doorway. They make me cough a few times. Says it's regulation. "I don't want to be here as much as you, kid," he says, then hands me a new set of clothing. I get dressed while the man types something up on his computer. The other by the door still stares straight forward. The black sweatpants are a bit itchy, the grey tee-shirt hangs like a dress, and one of the socks have a hole on the left toe. They let me keep my shoes.

As soon as I'm done, the officer by the door tells me to get walking. We walk through narrow corridors, sometimes passing other men who are dressed the same way I am, bearing tattoos, gashes, or just plain boredom.

I'm placed in a two-by-four room with beige cement walls, two steel beds, and an old toilet. There's another guy in the room already, but he doesn't even look at me.

Before the officer leaves, I ask for my hundred dollars. "I worked hard for it," I say, which makes the other guy in the room laugh, but he still doesn't look at me. The officer doesn't say a word; just slams the door shut in my face.

The room smells like shit.

Around every hour or so when officers pass by our room, I'd hear them talking about me. They often refer to me as the homoerotic fucker who's making their buddies work overtime, but they love it. I know they do.

Humans are nosy as fuck.

Sometimes, when things get a little quiet, I'd go over to the door and ask about him. Where he is, how he's doing, that sort of stuff. Usually, nobody would hear me, but sometimes someone would slam their fist on the door and yell, "Would you shut up in there?" I can't ever see who it is since the tiny square window the door offers faces a brick wall, but I can tell by the guttural guffaw they probably look like that fat bastard from earlier on.

For lunch and dinner, we don't go to a cafeteria like they do in the movies. We're still new, they say, and until they figure out what to do with us, we're secluded from the others.

They open up the door and hand us two trays, then shut it again. The guy and I eat in silence. He asks nothing about me, so I don't say anything either. He's a big guy—burly looking—and has a mean gash extending from the corner of his left eyebrow to his jawline. If Casper were here, he'd probably make some stories about him. Trying to guess his past life. Maybe he has a girlfriend and a kid. Maybe he's got nobody, like me. Maybe that's why he's here.

When night comes, the guy snores, but I don't sleep. Whenever I close my eyes, I see pictures of him, his face flashing over and over in a whirlwind. So I decide to stare straight into the darkness. Waiting.

The door opens again when it's morning. An officer cuffs me and takes me out, leaving the other guy sitting there. We go to a private bathroom where he watches me brush my teeth and take a shower, staring like he's seen this sort of thing a million times before. He probably has. When I'm done, I get dressed, and the officer cuffs me again. But we don't go back to the room. He leads me somewhere else instead.

"Where are we going?"

No answer.

"Where are you taking me?"