Sam and Colby: The Penitentiary

34

A loud buzzing sound echoed through the air, making me jolt awake. I sighed when I saw the same grimy ceiling above me that I'd fallen asleep staring at last night. We were still here.

                "Morning count's in ten!" Jinx yelled from downstairs.

                "Great," I mumbled. I sat up and stretched for a minute. I swung my legs over the side of my bed to jump down, but the cell door suddenly jolting open startled me and I fell down onto the floor.

                "Oh, kid. If that scares you, you're not going to make it in this place," Waco chuckled, standing on the other side of the bars. He dropped two sets of folded clothes on the ground and nudged them into our cell with his foot, then walked on to the next one.

                "Damn it," Colby whispered.

                "Morning, sunshine," I said.

                "Yeah. Why are you on the floor?" he asked, rolling over to see me.

                "Seriously? You missed that?" I asked.

                "We both know waking me up is quite the task," Colby said.

                "I fell," I said.

                "Oh shit, are you okay?" he asked, sitting up.

                "Yes, Sleeping Beauty. I'm fine," I said. "Told you we weren't going to magically wake up back where we belong."

                "To be fair, we did magically wake up where we don't belong," Colby pointed out.

                "Fair point," I replied. I got up and walked over to the two sets of clothes. One was a size medium, the other an extra small. "Here go," I said, tossing Colby his size. We quickly changed, me being incredibly grateful that there was a staircase leading down in front of us instead of a cell across the way that could see through the bars.

                The clothes were too big. Like, way too big. I was a women's small, which was much smaller than a men's extra small. I had to roll up the waistband of my pants and the bottom of the legs, then roll up the arm's sleeves several times as well.

                "Morning count!" Jinx yelled. Colby pushed the cell door open and we both walked out, assuming our positions in front of the cell. Waco was there a minute later, standing in front of us.

                "Brock, Atkins," he said, no longer waiting for our nods since he knew who we were now. He made his way down the line, all of us standing in silence. I noticed that I was starting to get looks from other prisoners, people I hadn't even noticed yesterday.

                After the guards deemed each level to be clear, we all made our way downstairs for breakfast. There was a big sea of people all going to the same place, all of them much bigger than me. I grabbed Colby's hand so I wouldn't get separated from him and heard a chuckle. I looked up at the man next to me, who was staring down at our clasped hands.

                "Boys ain't gonna like him," he laughed. I immediately dropped Colby's hand and scampered up next to him, staying as close as I could without touching him. We made our way into the line, ending up with trays of shitty bland oatmeal-looking stuff.

                We walked over to Center's tables and sat down, joining everyone else.

                "What was that about? The guy, I mean," Colby asked.

                "I'm not really sure," I said.

                "What was what about?" asked Big.