The Eternal Smile

Author : Diwakar Narayan

Author Introduction : A former teacher of English Grammar (though I have started forgetting the basics now) and a great admirer of English Language, I took on blogging to show my skills to the virtual world and nick-named myself as Infected Mind. However, having stepped in, I found that I deserved less than the place of a fish in the ocean. Since then, I have been trying to polish my skills to attain the position of a fish. I have no great job and high education to boast of. Philosophically, a God hater who wants to see how life could be, not believing in Him at all.

Story:

The only thing I could see was the vast and endless sky, stained with the white spots. No! From inside the narrow window, half of which wore black paint keeping me from gaining a wider view outside, the only thing I could see was a narrow sky. But it must have been vast; yes, it is vast. I have seen the sky since my childhood and it has always been endless. It was only me who could see it narrow, but only till the next day. After that, I longed to see the sky as it is for I am born to see it the way it actually is, not the way that I saw it then. No one was to prevent me from doing so, from gaining freedom once again!

I took out my magazine and looked at the front cover. It had a picture of a baby. That baby, if it existed, knew little how cruel the world is. But the world is not cruel for it is abstract. It is the people who are cruel. Really? In face, they are not cruel. You can only be cruel if you have a mind. They do not have any. They cannot seem to understand the nature of a human being. He is born to be free, not kept inside a prison. It hurts him, breaks him and weakens him. But to understand that, that little baby had to grow up!

I now opened the magazine to read it but noticed a very strange thing. The address of the publisher was written in reverse order. It read as: XYZ Building, ABC Road, Washington DC. These morons do not now the basics! When a baby is born, it is not born in X hospital but is born into the world, the world that exists. He is born into existence, and then comes the world, then the United States, then a state inside it, then a city and location and a hospital. Ah! Forty years ago, how I was born to existence and they put me under the restrictions of the United States, Virginia, Arlington and now they have dragged me to North Courthouse Road, 1435, Arlington State Penitentiary. When this did not satisfy them, they put in the SuperMax unit and now inside that hell-hole. Never mind, I was to prove them wrong once again.

"Bruce, what happened? What makes you walk restlessly inside this little world, my friend?"

Bruce turned to me. He must have been angry with me till then. But he should not have been, should he? After all, it was not my fault that the cops chanced to shift him in my ward because of some bastard who created havoc by flooding his cell and thus making the cops to move everyone from the other block to mine. Either the cops should have shifted him to any other ward or he should not have had such nice body. Men are supposed to be rough, not soft, don't they?

How could he give so much pain to his soft body? One hour of intense exercise must have had tired each muscle of him.Innocent guy! He did not realize that his body was made to be pampered with the petals of roses and not for intense work-out.

My intelligent mind sometimes gives me such ideas which work in any situation. Those fools! They did not even notice on their computer screens when I gave Bruce the divine pleasure, that also continuously for a period of thirty minutes. But how could have they? I had already blurred the camera with the foam of the bath soap. After all, it is not polite to see the intimate moments of two humans, is it?. That also, blurred scenes! I smiled at my own stupid joke.

"Mind your business, you bastard!"

Ah! He called me names! Yes, he must have still been angry at me. He must be made to calm down. The guards had told me that he had to stay with me for two days and I could not see him furious over my holy deed of this morning.

"Keep it cool, Bruce. You are such a sweetheart. An angry face does not suit you. Tell me, what bothers you so much that you cannot even take some rest?"

”Rest? I have been resting for a very long time and doing nothing. Let my body feel the severest pain so that I can be ready for the eternal sleep."

"Eternal sleep? What do you mean?"

"Yes, eternal sleep. I only have 48 hours of life. How I wish I could have a glimpse of Amy."

"Amy? Who is she?"

"My darling. My dream of days and my reality of nights. The happy moments of my life. My food when I was hungry, my water when I was thirsty. My life when I ran out of breath, my death when I was too lively. But you know what? I killed her."

"And, why did you do so, pray, if I may ask?"

"No! I did not kill her. This is what they say. I was arrested within hours of her murder and soon convicted of the crime. I was too shocked to speak for myself. Further, Everything was against me."

I remained silent to let him speak more.

"When I first got in here, I wanted to get out as soon as possible. But the closed walls are not kind enough, it seems. When she was lost, everything of mine was lost. Now, I think it is better to be a real corpse than a walking one with no human emotions."

He spoke no more now. I let him be.

**************

I tried to sleep, but to no avail. My excitement of getting out of that bloody hell had given me sleepless nights. The first thing I was to do after I came out was to rob the bank again. Yes, I was not the one to be challenged. The arms my gang carried ditched me. Had the gun fired on time when I pulled the triggers, I would not have been there. I intended to see the supplier also. How could he supply faulty armory to me? Did he not realize that it could have cost him his life? No problem, I would make him realize it the moment I was out. Such thoughts gathered in my mind.

Money is the most sacred thing ever known to mankind, is it not? It must not be kept in banks. It must be available to everyone in need. They do not get this. In a wedding ceremony, if food is left out in the end, it is distributed among the poor. Similarly, why cannot they distribute the money to us when they have no use of it? Phew! The whole system needs to change and I must take the responsibility of doing so. I thought so.

"What is that inside your bed?"

His scream woke me up. Had he noticed something?

"Nothing, go to bed and stop screaming. You will land up in more trouble." I retorted.

"Let me see it myself if you do not tell me what it is."

Saying so, he came near my bed and slipped inside my bed. He must have noticed my way to freedom! How could he? I made sure to hide it properly with old magazines. No, he could not see that, he could not cut the rope when I was walking on it? He had no rights to do so. I must convince him not to do so.

"Did you notice a rat, Bruce? These little monsters are everywhere." I said peeping beneath my bead with rest of my body on the bed.

"What is this big hole for? Are you escaping?"

The question stunned me, to the highest degree. Unbelievable! He had discovered my secret. Yes, it was not his fault that the guards put him in my cell. It was my fault to have allowed him. I could have told them that I feared being attached. Any other prisoner was dangerous to me for he would kill me. Such a fool I was! I came under extreme pressure to talk to him tactfully. Any mistake could have ruined my future!

"Bruce, come here. Sit next to me. Listen! This is very important for me to go out. I am not made to be poisoned. I have a different philosophy of life and I must enlighten the world with my thinking, my ways, and my belief."

He continued staring at me. This frightened me even more. If this was any other place in the world, I would have killed him. But here, I could not take any risk. His death in my cell would have been an obstacle in my way out. I could not do that. Simply not!

"Look! Here is a proposal for you. If you want, you can come with me. The tunnel is ready. I could have escaped by now, but the havoc that you created last night made all the guards alert. If you wish to join me, we can execute our plans tonight. Are you listening?"

He turned his head down and looked at the ground. Was that guy crazy? He should have been excited to have known that he had got a way out of this hell.

"Bruce, my friend, see! If you go out, you can kill those bastards who put you here. You can hunt the real murderers of your lady. You will do it, will you not?"

"No. My heart does not allow me to hunt her killers."

"What?" I was taken aback at this sudden turn of his thinking.

"Being behind bars and dying with poison is far more relaxing that knowing that the lady who you have admired your whole life has been a whore!"

It was time for me to remain silent. Not intentionally though; I could not think what to speak. His girlfriend had been a whore! If so, why did he want to kill the murderers when he came here. Yes, this was the question I was to ask him.

"But you wanted to kill those murderers when you came here, did you not?"

"Yes, I did. I have been thinking on it since I spoke to you last. Why did they kill her? Did they know that she was a hooker? It must have been the case that she had been in relationship with them too and cheating them like she did to me. Once they found it out, they took their revenge on her. I must have also done the same thing they did. I must have killed her myself. I regret not having done so."

"But how did you know she was a whore? With little correspondence here, you must have known it before you were arrested and jailed. You had a fair chance of bleeding her to death, did you not?"

"It was proved in the federal court. Till then, it was too late"

I had no more questions to ask him. He obviously did not seem interested in any escape attempts. Was he then going to tell the truth of my secret tunnel to the prison guards? Was he going to take revenge on me for I had raped him in the shower that morning? was he going to deny me my life? No, he had no right in doing so.

"So, you are not telling anyone that you saw anything here, are you?"

"No. But you must do something for me."

"What? Tell me what you want and it is done."

"I need some drugs so as to not feel the pain. My legs have started to refuse to walk anymore. They must be put unconscious so that my mind can make them walk more and more and be ready for the eternal sleep."

This was a huge demand. But I must arrange for it. Yes, rat-lining was the solution. That very practice had helped me plan the escape with my co-inmates and it came handy when Bruce demanded the drugs too. I quickly passed on the message to my co-inmate and in return he sent me the power of life wrapped in paper. Small quantity it was, but had the potential to give anyone the highest of pleasures.

***************

It was time for Bruce to depart. The security guards called him from outside.

"Give me a minute." He responded to the cops. He then turned to me and asked:

"Thank you for preparing me for the eternal sleep, Billy. Live your life to the fullest. You anyway have got very less time to live."

"Less time?"

"Yes, you would have gotten AIDS by now."

I could not take my eyes off his smile while he moved out of my cell.

The Perfect Revenge

Author : Rajrupa Gupta

About the Author:

Rajrupa is whimsical in one part, carefree daydreamer and obsessive freak in another part. She suffers from nostalgia and worries about the uncertain. She has a varied range of conflicting interests - books, movies, music, travel, architecture, hacking, cooking, sleeping, gossiping, being lazy on purpose and perhaps most importantly - observing people and reflecting about life. In her head random thoughts are always rioting to come out first. She presents them to you as Riot of Random.

I

I lay wide awake staring at the stone ceiling again. Sleeplessness was my only faithful companion since Dominique had died. Not that any of it mattered. Not when I had only 48 hours to live. Or was it even lesser? I didn't know. No sunlight entered where I lived, so I was starting to have a disoriented sense of day and night. I was counting my days just by the number of my meals and bath. I was relieved, almost happy that the hour of my execution was nearing.

I came to this isolated cell recently. Just a few days back. They wanted me to be in a low stimuli zone to calm my senses down. I guess it was easy on their nerves to stick the needles in when the person could produce no more than just a little confused stare.

I stayed inside for 23 hours and was let out for an hour to take bath. It was a perfectly square room with solid walls on all four sides with a little opening for a heavy iron barred gate. There was a toilet at the corner but no tissue. A yellow low wattage bulb hung from the ceiling - the only source of light inside the cell, which, at present was switched off. Outside the Iron Gate another solid door secured the view of the corridor from me. The guards had no way of seeing what I did inside. I guess they just didn’t care. Only the expendables came here. The solid door opened three times a day to pass on the meals while the barred gate opened only once when I was allowed to drag my feet for the shower.

Frankly, I preferred this over sharing a dingy nick with 11 other criminals. Inmates of this jail displayed such scrambled sense of public and private behaviours that it left me red faced many times. They m@sterb@ted openly, especially when a lady guard was on duty, in full sight of her. An act which they so proudly called as gunning. They sneered at my accent and the way I cringed when forced to use the open toilet in the nick. They fought violently among themselves just for time pass. Black eyes and broken bones were daily routine. The air was always thick with the smell of human sweat, blood and urine. I could do with the little bit of peace I could siege.

*****

A cockroach had come out from the hidden crack in the wall. I didn’t even flinch when I felt it climbing my sweaty body nor did I do anything to brush it off. No matter what time of the day it was, it was incredibly hot all the time. But that was okay. It was long ago that I had learnt to tone down my stimulants to these inseparable parts of my life in an American prison.

Life! Ha! It was funny that I still had the illusion of life. They called me zombie. I guess they were right.

After all now I could only vaguely remember the shock I felt when I found Dominique’s body on the floor of her den; legs twisted at odd angles she lay wide eyed in a pool of blood. I had little recollection of the pain that washed me afterwards or later when the Bobbies had pushed me face down to the floor with a knee firmly placed at the root of my spine. Or even the feeling of disbelief when the judge had found me guilty of Dominique’s murder. The only feeling that still throbbed inside me was of a terrible loss. Sometimes it got so worse that I felt like an iron punch was knocking all the air out of me. But even it was not so much that I displayed any unusual violent behaviour like most of the other inmates did. Most of the times I just kept to myself, doing nothing. So I guess it was true; there wasn’t much life left in me.

But during those rare times when I managed to fall asleep just from the exhaustion of staying awake for too long, I had nightmares of Dominique, invariably telling me that I failed her terribly with hatred in her eyes. On these occasions I woke up, bathed in cold sweat; a rage so blind flowed through my veins, followed by an overwhelming sense of helplessness. On these days I punched the prison walls, with as much force as I could summon to my needle tracked arms.

I instinctively rubbed my fingers over the tattoo on my left forearm. It was of a wild rose and two hearts. ‘Dominique’ was inked on one heart while the other said ‘Bruce’. Dominique made me get it to cover the needle tracks I got from mainlining the Heroine through my veins. It was cheesy. But I treasured it. It was my only physical reminder that once she was mine. She took me to the rehab. She tried to give me a new life or at least the dream of it. And I failed her.

The people who killed her so brutally roamed free on the streets and I sat here impotent in a closed cell doing nothing. The only man she could count on in the cruel world didn’t do anything to avenge her murder.

Oh! Why now? Why suddenly with just two days to go this horrible helplessness chose to haunt me now? It had long before ceased to torment me in my wakefulness.

My whole body wrung with hyper awareness of the cockroach still on my body as I got up from the bed. I slapped hard on my thigh, crushing the cockroach on the spot. The cockroach was a bigger loser than I was. I kicked the wall hard. Some loose plaster came off. I kicked again. I kept kicking and punching the wall, not caring the mess of my bloody knuckles, until suddenly a ray of light fell on the exact spot where the cockroach lay dead. It was coming from the wall. What in the name of Christ?

II

I peered through the place the light ray seemed to radiate. I couldn’t believe – my punching and kicking seemed to have loosened a brick a little above my ankle, wait, the cement didn’t seem too old. Did I accidentally discover a message passing hole? This jail has been the home for many influential criminals. And they always had whatever they needed smuggled right inside through “windows”. Was it any of those windows? I slowly removed the brick.

Ah! The sunlight. It almost blinded me. I had to blink several times to get my eyesight adjusted. I kneeled down to take a look. The “window” of the cell opened right on the jail backyard where prisoners tanned leather. I could see the electric fence and the guards far away. But then my vision was blocked by a massive black back, which I had no difficulty in identifying; Billy, the brawler, had to choose this precise moment to come and block my view and fill my nostrils with the foul odour of him, familiarity to which brought me shivers. Last time when I was full with this smell and worse, he was raping me in the showers.

Billy, the brawler was a bulky black man with a ridiculously small round head, resembling a small barren coconut. They said he was a boxer. He got his name apparently from the ugly fights he fought inside the ring which got him banished from the circuit after he broke an opponent’s neck. The only alternate profession he could choose was armed robbery of banks which was precisely the reason he came here in the Arlington prison. But now he faced charges of attempted murder of two inmates whom he stabbed with a sharpened pencil.

He was the indisputable gangman of the prison. Inmates worshiped him. As if they had any choice. They said, Billy was here only because he liked it here. He would leave the day he would want. Ha! If only it was that easy.  

I didn't sit well with him from the very first time for some reason. He called me blue eyed limey, given that my eyes were blue and I was a British. While the other inmates found me funny and left me be, he continuously provoked me by saying lewd jokes about my girl. One of my initial days when I was still getting used to bathing with ten different men in the same shower, he had grabbed me from behind.

“Feeling shy. Are ya?” he had said as his stench filled my senses. He had pushed me against the floor, pinning my legs firmly against the floor with his stout knees. Someone, one of his alleys, had held my both arms up. One of his large hands had held my head in place so that I was breathing the grime of the floor and his other hand had yanked open the orange jail trousers which I still had on. Soon I had felt an excruciating pain that was beyond hell.

My body tore open under that filthy grit. I wanted to kill him.

But my pain was nothing compared to Dominique’s when her chest was tore open from the bullet.

Ohh! It hurt.

But not more than it hurt her when her murderer broke her legs. She died for me. I was the reason she was murdered.

Maybe I deserved it. I deserved every bit of it. And then I had fainted.

I had found myself in the hospital bed when I had woken up.

*****

“Are ya sure? Darantino is back in town? This ain’t better be like last time.” Billy’s gruffly voice pulled me back into reality from the unpleasant memory. He now stood leaning on the wall for I could only see his back and the other person he spoke to remained out of my view.

But whatever I heard was enough to hold my attention. Darantino wasn’t a common name, was there a chance that it was the same person with whom Dominique worked in the strip club? I listened on.

“I can betcha my head, I saw him in the hood. Ain’t sure about the benjamins.” The other voice spoke.

“Aight. Get the cavity ready. If Billy can find Darantino, he can find the bejamins. What bout the whore?” Billy said.

“Ain’t seen her. Maybe hanging som’ere. Maybe she’s got all the loot.” The voice said.

“How long we got? How long he’d hang in the hood?” Billy said.

“Ain’t got no idea. He may have come on business. You gotta hurry.” The voice said.

“Aight. How long to get the cavity ready?” Billy asked.

“Ain’t not possible before tomorrow.” The voice said.

“Hmmph. That son of a b1tch. He gonna get his due for double crossing Billy.” Billy hissed.

“Sorry Billy. But you been foolish. I ain’t see no reason to trust Darantino. Keeping all the cash with him.” The invisible man said.

“No! Cash was with the whore. We kept the money with the whore. She said she’ll keep it safe ‘cause she needed few hundreds of benjamins out of it to treat her boyfriend. He got AIDS.” Billy sniggered loudly, “treatment of AIDS! Some cracked woman she was! I tell ya!”

“What a fool you been Billy! Dincha see they were making you fool?” the other voice was telling.

But nothing entered my ears. What I heard was enough to make my whole body feel like I was dipped into a pool of hot lava. My whole body burned and writhed in a pain I knew no word to describe. I was afraid my skin would dissolve in the heat. Suddenly the distant memory of my last days with Dominique was vivid in front of my eyes. It was as clear and detached as if I was watching the whole thing happening in a movie.

*****

Those days after coming back from the rehab I was in a desperate need of money. I had already screwed my navy career because of my addiction. My blood always boiled when I saw those glassy eyed people on whose faces Dominique danced in flimsy lingerie and sometime shared the bed with for some extra money. But this was the first time I wanted to do something about it. I wanted to take my girl away from this filth and start our lives all over.

I had signed up for a sperm donation program just for some easy cash till I found something more permanent. But the medical tests’ results devastated me. I was HIV positive. I was not entirely surprised given the reckless lifestyle I had been leading till Dominique came along.

My worry was Dominique. As a professional stripper she was trained to have safe sex, and the club got them checked up regularly, but I would not be able to forgive myself if I somehow gave it to her.

As expected she broke down when I broke the news to her. She refused to get herself checked. Said she didn’t care. But I wasn’t resting till I was satisfied.

Once I relaxed after her negative test results, she became hyper active. She became hooked to the internet reading articles after articles and then one day she came to me and said that she found a place where they treated AIDS victims. I too, like Billy, had laughed at first. But her enthusiasm was infectious. So much so, that it lit a tiny spark of hope inside me. But we needed money for that. Lots of money.

I knew Dominique was planning something with Darantino Noam - a bartender in the club she worked. And I had vague idea of it being illegal. But in my desperation I ignored it. After all, I was no saint. I had also done many illegal things to keep my supply of drug intact. If it was illegal, it was for a good cause now. I let Dominique go ahead with whatever she was planning after she assured she was not directly involved. I let Dominique die for me.

The whole thing was clear now to me. Billy and Darantino, I didn’t care how they knew each other, had robbed this bank and Dominique had agreed to keep the looted money till the air cooled. Then Darantino double crossed Billy and Dominique, got one arrested and killed the other.

 

III

I was shocked to see that the life’s surprises were not over for me. Why otherwise with just two days to go for my death, would I discover the most shocking truth of my life – that the person I loved most and the person I hated most, were both betrayed by the same person. Though I always knew Darantino was involved in Dominique’s murder, I could not really put my finger on it. And after my sentence I was convinced that this was how it was supposed to end. And I felt responsible, because after all, I was the person for whom she got herself into such trouble.

But if the sheer turn of events in just an hour’s time was anything to indicate then my conviction was not true after all. I had a chance, finally a tiny chance to avenge my girl’s murder; to punish the criminal who crushed our dream of living a peaceful life far away. Ironically I would need Billy’s help in that. If it had to be that way, then be it.

Billy and his ally were still speaking. They carefully discussed Billy’s plan of escape, oblivious to my prying ears. Thinking hard to myself, I poked Billy’s back. Billy jumped like a wounded spring. One would expect vivacious criminals like him to have a tamed reflex.

I could tell that Billy was scared because when he found the hole in the wall and lowered his face to peer through the opening, I could clearly see that his pupils were dilated. But given that my cell was pitch dark, he could not see anything.

“Hey Billy. It’s me. The blue eyed limey.” I called out through the hole.

Billy’s face straightened. “Whaddya want? Ya wanna sing?” he sniggered. But the hint of panic was unmistakeable in his voice.

“No. Rather I want to help you. The Darantino you want to kill, is his full name Darantino Noam? Is he a bar tender?” I asked.

“Whatddya want limey? How ya know him?” Billy’s voice was cautious.

“He killed my girlfriend Billy. The girl you kept all your money with.” I decided to throw it all on his face.

“What? Ya the one she wan’ed to treat? Ya got AIDS?” Billy clearly panicked. I knew it worked.

“Yes Billy. And now mostly you got it too. Remember the shower? But I can help you. I can give you the address of the place where they treated AIDS. In return, I just want you to take me with you to Darantino and let me kill him.” I said coolly.

Billy’s expression hardened. “Ya turd of misery! Playing games with Billy eh! Ain’t tomorrow your last day? Ya wanna fool Billy to get out before that?” he hissed.

“Billy. Do you remember the girl’s name?” I asked.

“Yah! Fucking stylish name for a whore, Dominique.” He sniggered. Then abruptly stopped.

I had thrust my hand out in Billy’s view.  “I ain’t got no idea, how to get ya out.” Billy said.

“I can help.” Said the man who was invisible till now. As he came into view, I realized with a soaring heart that God indeed wanted me out. Because he was Rob. The guard who secured my corridor. They said Billy had a guard boyfriend. So it was true.

IV

I waited the whole day and night and the day again, aware of my each breath, counting every second. My muscles had reached their capacity of being tensed so now they slacked. What if Billy double crossed me? What if he told the Bobbies everything? But then, what did I have to lose? I was already a dead man.

As the night matured, Rob entered my cell. Like any other day, he was the only one on duty. Since I was the lone inmate of the low stimuli corridor nobody cared. I hit Rob, tied him, took his uniform and key, closed the cell door and came out. “Slow limey! Tie tight.” Rob had said when my hands were failing me.

I had exactly 5 minutes to make it to the dump yard which overlooked the lake. The tunnel lay there. The guard at the entrance of the corridor didn’t give more than a side glance when I deliberately kept my pace down while crossing him. Outside the night was dark and stormy. Another good sign. The dust in the air would provide me a natural cover. I needed to cross the backyard in two minutes. A dog barked somewhere. Clenching my stomach pit, I took long strides. One of the guards siting inside the shade, near the fence, called out, “Going to meet your lover, eh? Nice romantic weather isn’t it?” I made a grunt of acknowledgement and strode on.

It was not particularly hot, but I was dripping wet with sweat when I reached the tunnel where Billy waited. After an awkward handshake we were off down the tunnel. Seconds later the mad sounds of siren told us that Rob had started banging the cell door just as per the plan. Thus on the day of my execution I fled a federal prison. Frankly, I never imagined, fleeing would be that easy. It gave me an indescribable thrill.

*****

Darantino jolted out of bed when he saw us. It was as if he saw ghosts. His face was drained of all its colour and he sweated like a pig. We were in his cabin, a tin room at the edge of the forest. I knew about it because Dominique’s colleague Clara, who OD’ed and died mysteriously, used to be Daratino’s girlfriend and had told Dominique about their steamy love making nights in the woods by this cabin. I had taken a chance, and voila, he was there. God was indeed going out of his way to get me lucky.

It was almost morning. I didn’t have much time. I took out the gun Billy gave me earlier. Darantino pleaded and cried. He offered me half the money. I closed my eyes. Dominique was serene in my head for the first time in such a long time. I opened my eyes. I pulled the trigger.

I looked at the lifeless body of Darantino with no expression. And then I laughed. Laughter bubbled from my belly making it cramped. But I kept laughing. I took revenge. It made me happy.

And then I cried. Like the laughter, my howls also erupted from my belly making it hollow. For the first time, I truly grieved for my Dominique.

Billy watched me incredulously. “Limey, don’t be crazy now. Tell Billy the place for AIDS treatment yer girlfriend wan’ed to take ya.” Billy asked urgently.

I got up. My tears had dried. It was as if fire was running through my eyes.

“AIDS can’t be treated Billy. It’s incurable.” I started laughing again.

“Ya liar! Ya cheated me!” Billy had taken out his gun.

“Didn’t you know Billy? Dominique was crazy. Crazy for me. Like I am crazy for her.” I was still guffawing kneeling on the floor.

Billy removed the safety clutch. Tears were glistening in his eyes. His finger closed against the trigger.

I pulled the trigger too.

As my eyes closed, I saw blood oozing through Billy’s chest and his knees giving in.

As I took my last breath, I was satisfied. I avenged my girl’s murder. I died in a face to face duel in which I killed my opponent.

Yummy

Author: Jayashree Srivatsan

Author Introduction: I am Jayashree Srivatsan a.k.a jaishvats and I blog at http://jaishwrites.blogspot.com I am an Indian currently residing in Singapore with my husband and my little boy. I have always been passionate about creative writing. I started blogging in 2010. Though it was initially for fun, blogging has now become an integral and serious part of my life. I have made a lot of online friends through this medium and that definitely is a huge motivation factor.I aspire publishing my work of fiction in print someday.

Story:

The cacophony of voices spewing filth and abuse, blended with the clanking sounds of mugs and plates, permeate the entire expanse of the dining area. Loud thuds from overturning tables and falling men rise from a corner. Perhaps a brawl is brewing up again.

Sounds!  Extremely loud sounds!

They reach my ears and transform almost instantaneously into nothingness. Some nerves have become totally impermeable now.

A spoon of the tasteless gravy reaches my numb taste buds, and a drop spills on my lap. I watch the red oil spreading slowly, causing a stain on my orange robe.

Orange! Sheryl’s favourite colour! A cringe forms on my face as a memory of the warmth I used to feel in her arms enfolds me. Ironically she was in her favourite orange flowered frock when I had found her that night at the street corner. The stain reminds me of her bleeding stab wounds and the way she had clung to me, fighting as best as she could to delay the closing of her eyelids .Perhaps she knew they would never open again.

The uniform had been given to me on my first day here at the Arlington State Penitentiary. Now, I have thinned down to almost half its size and it is clinging on loosely to my frail body. I am sitting alone on the dark green wooden bench that feels cold. As usual there is no one by my side.  They are ruthless convicts. Yet, they are terrified of some things in life. Like AIDS.

I am sure it must not have come from Sheryl. She was a hooker but she always played it safe. The needles and syringes that used to transcend me to a utopian trance of ecstasy should have stealthily diffused the virus into my veins. I had given up drugs because she forced me to.  Strange girl, Sheryl! Some of her beliefs were quite contradictory to her profession. Guess she had been too late in making me give them up. Anyways, what difference does it make now?

Day after tomorrow I, Bruce Tracy would be administered one final injection – the lethal one. Injections – They seem to be competing with one another to take my life. One went for the longer route and the other is going to be instant and quick!

He should have been in my place! That bastard! That brute of a man who thrust his knife into her again and again!  I had caught a good glimpse of the ghastly expression on his face that night.  I had been hunting for him like a werewolf. Had I succeeded, I would have ripped open his gut with my bare hands. Luckily for him, the police got to me before that. All evidence pointed against me. How could I kill Sheryl? MY SHERYL! May be, like many of them say, all this has a reason! Perhaps she is waiting for me! Somewhere!

The brawl keeps getting louder and suddenly the sounds subside. One side must have won.

The penitentiary is perennially quivering with tension and strife. There are some who have landed here purely due to a quirk of fate. Then there are the hardened criminals - Burly men sometimes sporting sinister-looking tattoos with their eyes spitting a whole lot of venom. Some of them even carry razors and pen knifes. They know how and where to procure them. Bloodshed is an unofficial component of the daily routine at Arlington.

“Bruce! We need to talk!” I look up and see Willis staring down at me with a very weird expression.

He occupies the seat opposite mine and looks around to make sure that none of the patrolling guards are at a earshot distance.

“Billy has made a plan for bustin’ outta here, man! Mike and Adam have been diggin’ that tunnel for over a month now. I hear it starts somewhere near the soccer ground.  The plan is to fly the coop tonite, buddy! I owe you man, for all that you did for me. I think you should go talk to Billy. This is a perfect chance Bruce! A perfect chance to get away! Flee.”

Willis looks around again to make sure that he has not caught the attention of any of the men in dark blue and makes a casual inconspicuous exit.

I deposit the plate at the collection counter and start walking towards my cell. Death row prisoners did not have to join the other inmates for work. Apart from the basic activities like eating, showering and sleeping, the only job one had was counting the minutes left to breathe ones last.

Today the others are also returning. Incessant rains have resulted in work getting called off.

I sit on the hard bed and stare at the ground. The shackles had been removed after the judgement but they had left a permanent deep blue scar that encircled my feet like an anklets.

“This is a perfect chance Bruce! A perfect chance to get away! Flee.” Willis words keep echoing in my head.

My thoughts turn to Billy. Billy the brawler! At six feet four inches, he was probably the tallest person in the entire prison. He was half way through his sentence for armed robbery. This had been his fourth and longest prison sentence.

I remember the first time I had met him. It had been my second day and I was seated at the lunch table. Suddenly I became aware of somebody standing behind me. I could not see who it was and something prevented me from turning back to find out. Yet, a feeling of absolute terror jolted down my spine. I sat glued to my seat , perfectly still.   I heard a snigger and a hard cold hand pressed on my shoulder. A stench of body odour stormed my nostrils as I felt long unruly hair brushing against my cheeks. Billy licked my neck a little above my right shoulder and said ‘Yummy! Really yummy! You seem to be one yummy bloody bitch” and he walked away.

A feeling of dread interspaced with shades of disgust engulfed my entire being. A premonition that this was only a prelude to a much more harrowing encounter crept up and spread like a wild creeper in my mind. The wait was not long. It happened two days later, in the showers.

I was standing facing the wall letting myself go in the cold splash of water against my face.

“Yummy” a disgruntled voice sneered from behind. I tried to turn and received a hard blow across my right jaw. Blood spat out from my mouth and got sprayed against the wet wall. My vision got blurred but I was clearly able to make out Billy’s naked figure standing over me with a menacing grin. A torrent of blows showered upon me mainly around my chest and abdomen. I perfectly knew what was coming but was in a vanquished state – physically and morally and in no position to defend myself. With a brutal and vicious force he raped me. I was almost knocked out unconscious yet I was perfectly aware of what was happening to me. The others in the shower were totally unperturbed by the sight or the groans coming from me as if it were a television running in a corner. Leaving me in a pool of blood he left saying “I was right! You are one helluva yummy bloody bitch”

Homosexual acts are an accepted routine within these walls akin to basic activities like eating and bathing. “Men” hook up with “Boys”. Apart from the sexual gratifications they sometimes develop intense strong relationships that last forever. Sometimes it is merely a display of superiority and power; an exploitation of the surrounding weaknesses.

But there are rules; Unwritten rules that everyone followed. No ‘Boy’ takes easily to his ‘Man’ messing up with another inmate. Taken ‘Boys’ are also never targeted. There were one or two exceptions like Billy who made his own rules. His modus operandi was simple – find a new target every now and then from amongst the new inmates; someone vulnerable and submissive. Then he would attack them once, be done with it and never approach them again. Not all new entrants triggered his liking. Only he knew what characteristics they possessed that attracted them to him. As days passed, I had become well verse with the otherwise general code of conduct. This knowledge had helped me protect a few newcomers like Willis and his tip off was a token of gratitude.

A distant rhythmic sound distracts my thoughts for a second. It must have started to rain. Water is dripping somewhere.

I look out of the window and take a glance at the barbed wire atop the high rise prison walls. A bald eagle is perched on it and is facing the world that stretched beyond. What constitutes the panorama subjected to its vision I wonder!

There have been some moments when I imagined about something out of the blue that would plummet me out of these corridors into the world outside. For a taste of freedom again!

A chance to live my life once more! A life where I decided what to wear, what to eat and above all what to do!  

A chance to be in some warm and bright place – far away from the darkness and rancid interiors that these grotesque walls encircled, where gun yielding men did not watch my every move!

But now- I don’t feel any such want or desire. In fact, I only have a feeling of impatience towards the impending execution; an intolerance for the remaining hours.

Even if I escaped, what sort of life would I be able to lead with the blood sucking virus plaguing inside of me?

By now, my belief in the unsurpassable distance between dreams and reality is quite firm.

Once successful at escaping, there was only one way for a fugitive to survive. More and more crimes!

I am here for a murder that I did not do and I have never actually been a part of any serious crimes. With my physical condition how would I survive?

The law does not take prison escapes lightly. The escaped convicts would be hounded and tracked down like animals.   

If I escaped and got caught again, the sentence would not change; there is nothing higher than capital punishment. In a death sentence, it’s the agonizing wait that is more torturous than the actual execution. Living with the knowledge of when you would die is the perfect definition of hell. I somehow sailed through that tormenting phase and am perfectly ready for salvation. I don’t want to change this chapter of my life. Let it end the way it was decided.

I actually don’t seem to have any reason to live either. My Sheryl is gone and there is no soul to cry for me. 

And escape at the mercy of Billy? Death is definitely a much more honourable choice.

Anger and rage fume up like wild fire inside of me. My knuckles turn white as I clench my fists.

That brute does not deserve a place outside.

I shudder at the thought of the wild rampage he would unleash if he was successful in getting out.

Men, young and old, teenagers and even kids would only appear as delicious flesh to that maniac.

I am aware of what happens after a foiled escape attempt. The ones involved are subjected to solitary confinement for weeks, and sometimes months. There would be absolutely no contact at all with the other inmates.

Breaking the heavy security at Arlington requires a whole lot of guts, exceptional intelligence and hard headed acumen. Guts, yes Billy would definitely have but the brains? I don’t think so. The chance of success for their plot is definitely very minimal.

He would be bundled off straight to solitary confinement chamber and the showers would be relieved of his barbaric acts.

Soon its lunch hour and my thoughts are still hovering over Billy and his plot to escape.

I hear a huge guffaw. Billy is seated at a table and laughing loudly. Every muscle on his massive body seems to be shaking separately. A timid looking guy probably in his early twenties is seated opposite to him in almost a crouching position.  Billy the brawler is busy bullying.

I close my eyes for a second.

I take a deep breath to confirm the decision to my own self. I then rise up from my seat and walk towards Edwin, one of the guards. One good thing to do before I die! A piece of revenge for a piece of peace!

 “Yummy” I say to myself.