Slammer

by Tabatha Vargo

  Leaning against the bedrail, I watched as the COs put Carlos in restraints and hauled him off to solitary confinement. Everything began moving in slow motion as Officer Douglas handed me my scrubs. Pulling them over my hips, I covered myself. I couldn’t even believe I’d stood there as long as I had without any pants on.

  I was in shock.

  At that moment, Dr. Giles arrived. He leaned over me, calling out to the COs for supplies even though they had no idea where to look for it. I hadn’t even noticed the large amount of blood that was running down the front of my shirt.

  “Lyla, put pressure on your neck until I get back,” he said, rushing from the space toward the supply closet.

  I reached up and covered the cut on my neck. Everything around me began to move quickly as Dr. Giles tended to my cuts. I heard nothing as I sat and replayed X rescuing me through my mind like a rerun of my favorite show.

  I couldn’t make sense out of it. Nothing I’d learned about him over the last few weeks was fitting. It was like I had different pieces to several puzzles. I freaking hated puzzles, but something in my gut told me that things were off when it came to X. Things just weren’t right.

  “Lyla? Can you hear me?” Dr. Giles asked, trying to get my attention.

  “Yes,” I mumbled. I was slowly coming out of my shock, and the room around me was starting to come into focus. Relief filled his wrinkled face.

  “Your neck wound isn’t too bad, but the one on your arm required several stitches. I’m sending you home for the rest of the day.”

  Stitches? He’d given me stitches, and I’d had no idea. Suddenly, I remembered giving X stitches and him not even flinching.

  Was this how he felt? Cold and emotionless? Full of shock and fear?

  I nodded instead of talking.

  After filling out an incident report, I left the prison and walked to my car. Starting my engine, I sat in the driver’s seat and stared at myself in the rearview mirror. I couldn’t wrap my head around the things that had happened. But the same question kept surfacing.

  If X was such a cold-blooded murderer, why did he save me?

  CHAPTER 10

  x

  I TORE MY eyes away from her as the door shut, cutting off the connection between us. She was going home for the day, which made perfect sense, and while I knew I’d miss her sunny smile, I couldn’t help but hope she’d never come back.

  She’d seen firsthand the demons that occupied every corner and shadow of this purgatory. I wouldn’t always be there to save her, and even thinking of something happening to her when I wasn’t there made my blood boil.

  Closing my eyes, I could still see her piercing green gaze and the haunted look that moved over it. I could still see the way her face contorted in agony as the scum of the fucking earth violated her. It was a memory that was sure to be etched in my brain for the rest of my life. It would stick the way the lifeless eyes of those I murdered did. Except I felt more fear seeing Lyla hurt than I ever did when I realized I’d murdered people.

  It was sad to say, but I couldn’t abide by her getting hurt. Ever.

  The cuffs were tighter than usual on my wrists as the COs escorted me back to my bed. I hated being in restraints all the time. They were symbols of my enslavement, taunting me and reminding me that I was forever locked behind the bare walls of this dark and lifeless place. A place where innocent women could be raped and murdered not five feet away from those who were meant to protect them.

  Hope didn’t reside in Fulton. There was no such thing as a better day. There was only despair and fear. It thrived throughout the walls and into the ground to the point where Satan himself wouldn’t dare enter.

  We were all sinners. We all had secrets. When they finally released me from the infirmary and I was being escorted to the hole for what I had done to the COs, I passed the cells of hundreds of inmates. I cast a look into each one, seeing things the COs pretended not to see. Seeing what we really were.

  Evil.

  A few inmates looked at me and smiled, showing their appreciation for what I’d done to the COs, while other practically hissed through the bars holding them in.

  “X on the block!” an inmate called out from somewhere above me.

  Things came flying at me from different directions. Most of it was harmless—paper balls, wads of trash, and wrappers from the canteen. The COs pushed through the chaos, dragging me along with them.

  Finally, we left the block and entered the darker part of Fulton. The hole was black, dark with shadows and grime. To be placed in solitary confinement was the equivalent of being shut in an inescapable cinderblock box. The walls closed in on you inch by excruciating inch while your mind started to do the same thing. As the space got smaller, your mind started to drift off to unknown, strange places. And if left there long enough, you walked out not sure if it was all a bad fucking nightmare or reality.

  The air was musty and damp. The smell of a decaying basement flooded my nostrils. The crumbling tiles echoed in the guts of the withering dungeon as my feet shuffled along the floor. When we came to my door, the sound of rusted hinges whined when they opened it. With an unsettling stride, I walked in. As one CO watched my every move, a hand poised on his baton, the other bent over to unlatch me from my restraints.

  I rubbed my hands over my leathery wrists, burned by how tight they’d made the cuffs. As they shut the door to my solitary confinement, I relaxed for a moment and prepared my mind for the mental disconnect I would surely feel once I’d spent some time in the fucking place. I closed my eyes and imagined I was in my own cell. Only in my own cell did I feel somewhat at home, and I hadn’t been in there since before my attack on the COs.

  I sat in the darkness and rested my head in my hands. By then, I was sure the entire prison would know I’d saved the pretty redhead in medical. They would think I was getting soft, which meant there would be hell to pay when I got out of the hole.

  I didn’t regret saving her, but I did regret forming any kind of attachment to anyone or anything, and I’d definitely done that with Lyla. Prison wasn’t a place for that. Forming attachments was dangerous because it gave the other inmates leverage. It didn’t pay to have any weaknesses in prison, and Lyla had become one for me… whether she knew it or not.

  A WEEK.

  That was how long I was stuck in the darkness of the hole. It was a disgusting place. One filled with vermin and feces. There was no such thing as being comfortable. There was no such thing as clean. The hole was meant to be torture, and it was.

  And worse than the hole was the fact that I spent most of my time there thinking about Lyla. I craved her sunny disposition and the life she brought into the room. I longed to hear her tiny giggle or see her sweet smile. Simply put, I wanted her to quit. I hoped that when I got out and put back into my cell, I’d find out from Scoop that she’d ran and never looked back. At the same time, I knew her leaving meant I would have nothing to look forward to anymore.

  Time in prison was different than time outside. Days felt like weeks and weeks felt like years, but my week in the hole felt more like ten years. When they finally opened the door to let me out, the light stung my eyes and my legs ached from disuse when I walked back to my cell.

  Once I was back in my cell, I stood in the middle of my space and stared at the wall adorned with my signatures. I counted the Xs to myself almost every day, mourning the sight of them.

  Stepping closer to the wall, I ran my fingers over their roughness and lowered my head in sadness. I’d never wanted any of this. I never wanted to hurt anyone, but they were always pushing me—always attacking.

  Why couldn’t they just let me serve my time in peace?

  Going back to my bed, I pulled out my trusty screw and began etching three new Xs into the wall—two for the COs and one for Carlos. My jaw ached as I clenched my teeth together. Etching the Xs felt like I was etching into my soul, digging myself a hole deeper and deeper to hell.

  Once I was done, I sat on my bed and put
my screw back into its place.

  Three hundred and forty-six.

  That was how many fights I’d been in since I got to Fulton. How many times I’d lost myself and hurt another human being. That included the two murders I’d committed.

  My eyes moved over the Xs. I’d have to look at them for the rest of my life. I’d add them every day I needed to until someone was finally able to take me out. X became my name mostly because everyone thought the Xs were marks of victory. But in reality, they were headstones. Tiny graves for each of my victims, whether they were dead or not. It was a place where I could go every day and mourn the things I’d done. I could grieve the loss of the boy I used to be.

  The Xs were a place where I could be sad over all I’d lost, my sanity included. They screamed at me from the wall, keeping me accountable for all that I’d done in my life—reminding me every day that I was a monster.

  I was just a shell of the person I used to be—hard on the outside and empty on the inside. Those marks were my own personal tombstone, reminding me every day that I was just as dead as the ones I’d murdered.

  As night crept over Fulton, the familiar sound of snoring filled the block. Things settled down quickly at night. Closing my eyes, I reserved my energy for what the following day would bring.

  Which motherfucker would try and take me on tomorrow?

  They knew I was weak, mentally and physically. If anyone were going to try and take me out, it would be then.

  I glanced over at my wall once more, the Xs standing out like shadowed souls in the night, Sarah’s being the biggest on top, and then Lyla filled my head. I’d shown her a side of myself that I never should’ve. Flashes of her face moved through my memory—terrified and bloodied. Again, I could feel anger churning in my stomach.

  It didn’t pay to care for another person in this world, and I knew as I closed my eyes and began to fall asleep that caring for Lyla the way I did was surely going to be the death of me.

  THE FOLLOWING DAY I found Carlos dead inside one of the industrial dryers. I pulled open the handle, ready to put in a load, and was met with the smell of burnt flesh and blood. His melting flesh hung from his bones, and he was bent into an unnatural position from his tumble in the heated barrel of death.

  The other inmates in the laundry with me went nuts, and it wasn’t long before COs came spilling into the room. The inmates were lined against the wall, forced to watch as his body was removed from the dryer piece by melted piece. It was graphic, and I found myself closing my eyes and seeing flashes of the scene that landed me in Fulton.

  Talk about who’d murdered Carlos spread through the prison like fire, lighting the minds of murderers and gang members. Some thought the COs had done it as payback for his attack on a prison employee, but most of his brothers in the Mexican Mafia placed the blame at my cell door. It was common knowledge that Carlos and I had bad blood. Hell, just a week before, I’d almost killed him with my bare hands for his attack on Lyla, but it wasn’t me.

  I knew from that point on I’d have to sleep with my eyes open. Jose Alvarez, Carlos’ right-hand man, stepped up as the leader of the Mafia, and his eyes were glued to me, blaming me for the loss of his brother and former leader. Shit was about to get real in Fulton.

  CHAPTER 11

  LYLA

  I TOOK A week off from work, missing my four-day shift. I worried about my bills being paid, but I couldn’t go back yet. Thankfully, I found out on my second day off that I was paid for my leave because of what happened. That made it easier to relax and take advantage of my time away from Fulton. It gave me time to reflect on the incident.

  That was what I’d taken to calling my attack—the incident. I couldn’t bring myself to say the word rape. I couldn’t think about the fact that I’d almost been murdered. I had the cuts and bruises to prove it, but I made sure to keep my eyes away from them when I looked at myself in the mirror.

  I didn’t tell Diana about what happened. I didn’t need anyone trying to talk me into quitting, as I was already doing that to myself enough. Using my week off to my advantage, I put in applications at local medical offices and a few hospitals, but I had no bites. When it was time for me to go back to work, I drove to the prison with what felt like a ball lodged in my throat.

  The sense of dread that loomed over me was suffocating, and I felt as though an elephant had taken up residence on my chest. I’d had patients describe a heart attack to me before, and if I was going by their explanations, then I was definitely having a massive one.

  I sat in the parking lot, building up my courage, and when I had less than five minutes to clock in, I pushed my car door open and climbed out. Breathing deeply, I put one foot in front of the other until I was stepping into the warm air of the prison.

  When I walked the block to the infirmary, I shut out all the shouts and usual vile language. You’d think that after a month of working in the infirmary, the men would’ve gotten used to me by now, but still, they acted as if I were fresh meat and they were starving.

  I submerged myself in work, filling my day with intake screenings so that I wouldn’t have to go face to face with X, but there were only so many new inmates. After stressing over seeing him, I realized my worry was for nothing. Right after I went home, X left the infirmary.

  He was sent straight to solitary for his attack on the COs. It was well deserved, but still, it bothered me knowing he was locked in such a terrible place after he’d rescued me. Not that my life was any more important than the COs, but you’d think one would cancel the other out.

  As bad as it sounded, I wasn’t sad when I found out that Carlos had been murdered. I didn’t even want to think about who’d killed him. I probably should’ve felt guilty knowing that his attack on me had something to do with his untimely death, but I had none.

  Rumors moved around the prison about who had ultimately taken his life, and X seemed to be the number-one pick. I wanted to believe differently, but I couldn’t forget about the fire that was in his eyes the day he saved me. He wanted to kill him then, but instead, he had waited.

  Of course, I couldn’t forget the fact that Carlos was the leader of a lethal gang. Gang violence was an everyday occurrence in Fulton. The simple fact was, no one would ever know what really happened to him, but there was one less killer in the world.

  It was wrong, but every day that I worked, I waited with bated breath for X to enter the infirmary. Wanting him there meant another lockdown for the prison. It meant some guy on the block was going to get his ass kicked by X, and it meant X getting hurt as well, but I was selfish. I wanted the opportunity to thank him properly and if I were being honest with myself, I wanted to see him.

  My eyes kept flickering to the door. Every time it opened, I’d hold my breath, but it was never X.

  “Who you waiting for?” a voice asked from my side.

  When I looked over, I saw an inmate sitting up in bed. It was a little guy the inmates liked to call Scoop. His real name was Evan Moore. He was serving fifteen years for self-defense and had already been at Fulton for seven. I’d only seen him a handful of times, but he wasn’t a very scary guy.

  He was short and skinny. Something about him reminded me of a little mouse. I thought it was his tiny, button nose or his pointy ears, but either way, I found myself smiling at him.

  “No one.”

  “So how you liking Fulton so far? To be honest, I’m surprised you’re still here considering.”

  He lifted a shoulder and grimaced. I knew without him saying that he was talking about the attack.

  And then I remembered some things I’d heard about Scoop. Things like he was X’s friend and that he knew everything there was to know about every inmate on the block. It was wrong, but my curious nature was getting the best of me. I wanted to know more about X.

  Ignoring his earlier question, I went straight for the kill. “So you’re friends with X?”

  The side of his mouth tilted in a knowing grin. “That I am.”

 
I was hoping he’d just automatically tell me things about X, but he was obviously going to make me work for it. Swallowing my pride, I nodded and continued my line of questioning.

  “How is he doing? He was pretty banged up the last time I was here.”

  “Don’t know. He was in the hole for a week, and now all this shit with Carlos. I haven’t been able to talk to him much.” He scratched the side of his neck and opened his mouth like he wanted to say more. Grinning, he did. “Being in the hole is hell, but looking at you now, I’d say you were worth it.”

  Maybe Scoop didn’t know everything he thought he did. He had his facts all messed up. X didn’t go to solitary because of me; he went there because he’d beaten two COs so badly they had to be rushed to the hospital.

  “I had nothing to do with his attack on the COs,” I insisted.

  He lifted a blond brow and looked at me as if I were insane. “You really have no idea, do you?”

  “No, I don’t. Why don’t you fill me in?”

  Again, he smirked, shaking his head in disbelief. “X was defending your honor. Stone and Parks were talking so much shit about you. They were even joking about getting you alone and raping you. I guess he couldn’t take it, and he snapped.” He shrugged like it was no big deal. “You should know X is crazy protective when it comes to the people he cares about.”

  I could hardly believe my ears.

  Swallowing hard, I let his words run though my brain, trying to make sense of everything. “Wait. What makes you think X cares about me? I’m just a nurse. I could lose my job if it were anything more.”

  When he stood from his bed, he seemed no worse for the wear, which made me wonder why he was even there to begin with.

  “You’re not very smart are you, Ms. Lyla?” He started toward the door as if he were just going to leave. There were no COs around him, and I knew without asking that he wasn’t supposed to be in the infirmary. “Trust me. X cares. He cares, and it’s eating him up inside.”