Jail sucks.
I've known that for a while but what really cemented it was when a girl on the top floor of the pod decided to flood her room by flushing her bedsheets and a bunch of her hygiene supplies, subsequently flooding the entire pod.
It happened probably 30 minuets after Jade got back from her short, sort of vacation.
As soon as Jade noticed the water flowing out of our toilet, she started picking up everything that was on the ground and throwing it up onto my bed before I could even process what was going on. Jade pulled my hand so I fell onto her bed just as the dirty water flooded our entire room.
"Oh god," Jade groaned, covering her nose with the collar of her shirt, "That smell is unbearable,"
"I guess I'm lucky then," I shrugged, "I don't have a sense of smell," Jade gave me a funny look.
"You don't have a sense of smell?" I shook my head, "You lucky motherfucker," I laughed at her with a small smile.
"So you're telling me you can't smell all of that?" She gestured to the general area of our room that was now completely covered in disgusting looking gray water.
"Nope, but based on your facial expression I don't think I'm missing out on much," Jade shook her head.
"Absolutely not," Jade said, slightly coughing from what I'm assuming is the smell of the room, "Last time this happened I felt like I was dying,"
"Is that why you knew to get everything off the ground as soon as you saw the water?" Jade nodded.
"In my first month essentially the same thing happened but I wasn't quick enough to save a bunch of my stuff so everything smelled like shit for a while and the one picture I had of my brother and sister got destroyed. I was stuck in here for like an hour before the CO's moved us into the rec yard,"
"Is that how long we're going to be stuck in here?" I asked.
"Potentially... Honestly you'd think that they would know what to do, but when anything out of the ordinary happens it's clear that they don't know what to do."
"Well, at least we're stuck in here together," I shrugged.
"That's definitely a plus," Jade said, briefly letting her shirt fall to flash me a small smile before quickly covering her nose again.
We spent the next hour just talking and laying together, periodically making sure that we were far enough away from each other just in case someone walked by. It was sort of refreshing. Normally we were on a schedule and our time together was always determined by someone else. So this flood let us spend time together without being forced to think about what we had to do next. It was our one taste of normal and I absolutely loved it.
I think Jade did too. Minus the apparently bad smells.
~~~~~~~~~~
That night I found myself in Jade's bed again. Not that that was anything unusual, especially considering how I spent my night without Jade. When I climbed into her bed after the last CO passed by and did their night checks, I made sure that Jade couldn't possibly hit any of the bruises that riddled my abdomen. Thankfully she didn't seem to notice how I laid down.
Earlier in the day, Jade told me that she's up for early release in a couple weeks. Obviously I'm happy for her, it would be stupid and incredibly selfish of me to not. At the same time, I was a little scared. Jade was gone one day and I get my ass handed to me in the bathroom. What happens when she does get out? I'll be here for probably a year longer without her. Not to mention she would get to start living her life again. All without me. Surely there had to be better people in Jade's hometown. Who would settle for me?
And not to mention that I would miss her. A lot.
"When you get out, will you remember me?" Jade shifted her body to look at me, raising one of her eyebrows.
"How could I ever forget you Pez?" The nickname caught me off guard. She's only ever referred to me as blondie regularly and Perrie when we're talking about something serious, or when she's being genuine. Pez probably lands somewhere in between those two. And I'm not particularly mad about it.
"Wow, a nickname that actually incorporates my name, you're improving!" I said sarcastically. Jade shook her head with a small smile.
"Shut up blondie, you ruined it. And don't worry, I'll give you my number before I go so you can call. And I'll write to you. Chicago isn't that far from Rockford. Once you get out, I'll come and visit you," She paused for a second, "That is is if you want me to visit," she trailed off slightly.
"Okay, now it's your turn to shut up, of course I want you to come visit," I said, nudging her shoulder slightly. She nodded slowly and laid back down with her eyes closed. I assumed that she wasn't fully asleep, her heartbeat hadn't slowed down, but I couldn't keep my eyes off of her. I've always known she was attractive, her natural beauty has always been prevalent despite seeing her in literally the same outfit everyday with her hair sort of wild since she can't properly take care of it. She is... beautiful. That's the only way to put it.
So I acted on it. And we got caught. Well, sort of.
As soon I I finished going down on Jade, she pulled me up for a passionate kiss. Which unfortunately was rudely interrupted by the worst possible person.
"Hey! What are you two doing?"
I lept off of Jade as quickly as possible as she pulled up her pants.
A CO shined a flashlight directly into our room, making me squint at the bright light. Jade had a deer in the headlights sort of expression on her face, which was odd since I always considered her the more calm and collected one between the two of us. He paused, probably reading the names printed on the door to make sure he got our names right.
"Edwards! Thirlwall! What did I just see?"
"Oh, something bit Jade on the leg and she asked me to look at it," I said as quickly as possible, trying to cover for Jade. The look on her face made me think that she probably wasn't in the right space to make up a lie quick enough.
The CO's eyes darted back and forth between the two of us, probably trying to figure out if I was lying.
"Then why were the two of you... you know what, never mind," He started fumbling with his keys and opened the door to our room manually, "Get out, come on"
I exchanged a worried glance with Jade before quickly pulling on my shoes and following her outside our room.
The disgruntled CO looked between Jade and I, most likely sizing us up since he was only one person and there were two delinquents standing in front of him. He ordered Jade to cuff up before grabbing our arms and guiding us through areas of the facility I've never seen before and briefly stopped to get me hand cuffs. Eventually, we stopped outside an office I've never seen before. I glanced at Jade and instantly got nervous. She had visibly paled, a reaction I had yet to see from her.
We're fucked.
AN: I've had this finished for a while but I forgot to publish it??? Anyway, there's not too many chapters left, I've finished the epilogue (I think I mentioned that a while ago) and I just need to write everything in between.
In other news, I've started drafting a new story... based on the reception from this particular one shot, I feel like y'all are gonna like it.
OH OH OH, guess who's going to the confetti tour... I've never been to the uk before so this is gonna be interesting... (as long as covid chills tf out)
stay safe and wash your hands!
