Page 48 of One More Time

He waited for the seconds to tick by. Time, ironically enough, was all he had to structure himself by, and he’d learnt to harness the power of that. It gave him some kind of illusory hold on the reins of his life. And by god, he needed that. It had been more than two years in this godforsaken place, and he wasn’t even halfway through his sentence. There was no light at the end of his long dark tunnel yet.

Glancing to the wall above his poor excuse for a pillow, he ran his eyes over the photographs of Grace, Hope, Hudson, Bryn and Ava – his smiling, beautiful family, living their lives without him. God, how he missed them. He and Grace had agreed the children shouldn’t be brought to a place like this, not ever. The only time he saw any of them was when Grace brought him precious photographs at her weekly visit. It pained him to know he was missing their every milestone, and couldn’t help but often wonder if the kids would even remember him when he got out. And even if they did, would they want anything to do with him?

Still, each happy snap was worth more than gold, and also a firm reminder that their world kept on spinning without him in it.

But he wanted that for them – and for Grace.

Which was why he’d come to a decision. He knew this was going to break him, but that was his cross to bear, and bear it he would. With anxiety stretching like a rubber band across his chest, he fought to take a breath as his heart squeezed tightly. Closing his eyes, he calmed his mind and, in turn, slowed his pulse. It was doing him no good, pining for what he’d lost. For now, his life was here, in this prison, in this cell.

He could still recall his first step into this three-by-three-metre chamber, after his dignity had all but been taken during his strip-search. Donning his green prison tracksuit and with his arms full of prison-issued blankets, he’d been escorted up two flights of echoing metal stairs, over a heavily caged flybridge and to his unlocked cell at the very end of a shadowy corridor. There, he met a man who would eventually stab him, all because of a misunderstanding over a packet of cigarettes. Thank goodness there was a panic button in every cell or he’d be a dead man. He’d never forget the feeling of the ice-cold steel slicing through his stomach, nor would the raised red scar left there allow him to.

The door buzzed and slid open. Chatter sounded. Footsteps echoed.

‘Looks like it’s time for some fodder, Wilson,’ Lester said as he sauntered past without bothering to wash his hands. ‘Catch you later.’

Lacking manners, hygiene and half his teeth, the obnoxious guy hadn’t endeared himself to Charlie. ‘You most certainly will.’ He rose to his feet and left his cell with its uncomfortable bunk bed and lidless, stainless-steel toilet behind to join the long line of prisoners.

At nine-thirty, after another tasteless meal of slop and stodge, he was led into the exercise yard. He had half an hour before heading to work in the laundry room until lunch. Lighting his cigarette, Charlie sat on one of the five benches and inhaled deeply. As with every day he got to sit out here, he looked to the sky, imagining all the people living beneath it, thinking of his Grace. He didn’t deserve her forgiveness, nor did he deserve for her to wait for him. Yet, being the loyal wife she was, she continued to wait, visiting him each and every week. But their visits were no longer warm or cordial. Slowly but surely, Grace had grown as cold as a winter wind, and her eyes held none of the love she’d once had for him. How could he blame her, after what she’d been through? And all because of him.

Regarding the towering tree at the corner of the exercise yard, now void of leaves, he took comfort in the fact that he would watch it spring to life for yet another season. The ebb and flow of existence still occurred within these walls, if he forced himself from his introspection for long enough to become aware of it – practice was leading him to perfecting that art. He knew he had to continually find ways to focus on the limited good around him, or the overwhelming badness of the place would eat him up and spit him out as a man no longer able to live in a normal society. It happened to most prisoners who walked out of here, only to find themselves back behind bars before too long. As a prison guard, he’d seen it time and time again, and he refused for that to be his path.

He’d cringed at Grace’s daydreams of travelling the world when they retired, but now he’d give his right arm to walk along the crowded streets of New York, Sydney or London with her arm hooked into his, or sail the Mediterranean and wander between the whitewashed buildings of Greece with the warm sun on their faces. He’d never stopped long enough to consider the utter freedom of such things, or how it would make her extremely happy. So caught up in his internal negative web, he’d told her how he’d always hated the confinement of a city, with its buildings all slammed up against one another, leaving no breathing space, and the thought of being in a country where he didn’t understand what they were saying or the food they ate, didn’t appeal to him in the slightest. It had been so damn selfish of him.

Now, locked up in here, with time both his enemy and his friend, he’d learnt that how he viewed things all depended on what frame of mind he was in, and that he also had the power to change that, if he wanted to. Nowadays, he was determined to be present and conscious as often as possible, so he could make good use of this forced time out from the world he once lived in.

His cigarette finished, it was time for him to go to work.

Three days later Charlie woke to sirens blaring, men screaming and shouting, and what sounded like an army stampeding the prison. Tucked up beneath his itchy blanket, he craned his neck to see prison officers sprinting down the corridor, and heard their footsteps up the flights of stairs just past his cell.

Lester hung his head over the top bunk. ‘What the hell’s happening, Wilson?’

‘Someone’s either fighting, dying or dead,’ Charlie replied matter-of-factly over the rhythmic thumping of fists now banging against cell bars.

‘Oh, shit.’ Grimacing, Lester’s tattooed face disappeared again.

Looking to where a single shaft of daylight filtered through the window above the sink, Charlie folded his hands beneath his head, thinking about what lay ahead for him today. It was Sunday – official visitor’s day – but he wasn’t buoyed by the fact. Today, he was going to say what had been weighing heavily upon his mind and heart, and Grace was quite possibly going to hate him for it. He still hoped that, eventually, she would understand that this was his way of loving her.

Three and a half hours later, he was by the door, waiting to be buzzed into the communal visitation room. It pained him to know that each time Grace came here, she was patted down. The thought of another’s hands upon her made his blood boil, though he supposed with what he was about to do, he was going to have to come to grips with that. Somehow. For her.

The door slid open. His heart leapt into his throat as he stepped into limbo – the room where freedom and confinement met. And there she was, as always, in her slacks and conservative top, looking as pretty as the first day he’d fallen head-over-boots for her.

She rose from her chair. ‘Hey, Charlie.’

‘Hi, Grace.’ He pecked her cheek and waited for her to sit at the little round table before taking the chair opposite. ‘How are you?’

‘Yeah, good.’ She met his gaze. ‘You?’

‘Yeah, can’t complain.’ He made sure to take all of her in, the dusting of freckles across her petite nose, the laugh lines at the corners of her beautiful sea-green eyes, the glossy plump lips he’d kissed hundreds of times over. ‘And how are the kids?’

She smiled, but it was strained. ‘Yeah, they’re good too.’ She glanced down at her lap, clearing her throat, then came to meet his gaze once more. ‘The boys will be in year one soon, and Ava will be starting kindy.’

‘Wow, they’re growing up so fast.’ It was agony to not be sharing these moments, but he hid the hurt away as best he could. ‘And Hope, how is she going with school?’

Now Grace smiled from the heart. ‘She’s doing so well, Charlie, a top student her teachers tell me, as does her report card.’

‘That’s our girl,’ he said, proudly.

‘Yes.’ Grace’s smiled faded.