Page 49 of Someone Like Me
He shrugs. “Sure, yeah, but it was harder to come by. There’s a music collection in the prison library. You can put on headphones and listen to that, but most of it is old shit. Perry Como and Elvis.” He tilts his head to the side like he’s confessing a secret and whispers. “And there’s contraband music, of course. Just like there’s contraband everything.”
I want to hear more, but is it rude to ask? To be so curious? I can’t imagine living in prison, but as I’ve come to know Drew, it’s not hard to picture him there. He wears its effects like a second skin. I read discipline in his posture. Restriction in his muscles. Deprivation in his eyes.
“Christian music?” I say, unable to help my grimace at the thought of listening to gospel for eight years.
“Whether you wanted to hear it or not,” he says, executing a slow nod. “There are speakers all over The Farm, so the warden can reach all sixty-three hundred inmates at once.”
“What would he say?”
“Hedidn’t say much, but he also liked to play recorded sermons. A couple a day.”
My mouth drops in horror.
Drew’s laugh is bitter. “Guppy, there’s far worse things to happen in prison than listening to sermons and Christian rock.”
I close my mouth, suddenly ill. He’s smiling at me, sort of, but he’s watching my expression, too. What worse things happened to him at Angola? Did someone hurt him?
Or worse?
The thought nearly tears my heart out of my chest, and I want to hug him.
“Don’t look at me like that, Evie.” His voice rasps with something I can’t name. It’s not warning. Desperation?
I tear my eyes away, blushing. Still carrying the CD, I move back to the table. “Are you hungry?” I ask, unwrapping the cake of cheese.
“Starving.” His voice behind me is low, almost feral, and I can’t help but feel he’s not talking about hunger. Not normal hunger, anyway. But the word isn’t an invitation. I know this. So I ignore the stirring it triggers in me.
Taking the knife, I slice the camembert in half before cutting small wedges of the butter soft cheese.
“Come sit,” I tell him.
But he doesn’t. Instead, he goes to the mini fridge and pulls out a green apple and a ceramic pitcher. He rinses the apple at the sink before drying it on his shirt, and then he picks up a lone glass in the otherwise empty draining rack.
He turns back to me. “I just have the one glass,” he says, his tone apologetic. “You can have it.”
I smile at him because the gesture is immeasurably sweet. “We’ll share.”
With a shrug of acquiescence, Drew fills the glass with a purple liquid.
“What’s that?” I ask startled.
Before my eyes, color rises to his cheeks. “Grape Kool-Aid,” he says with chagrin. “Grandma Quincy makes it.”
I stifle a laugh. “Why does she make you grape Kool-Aid?”
Drew sets the apple and the glass on the table and sits across from me. “Because it was my favorite as a kid, and I don’t have the heart to tell her it’s too sweet for me now.”
This time, I do laugh.He’stoo sweet.
“I cut it with a little water to make it bearable,” he says wryly, and this makes me laugh harder.
Putting on a harrassed look, Drew takes the knife I’ve abandoned and slices the apple. I open the box of crackers and serve us each a generous handful. With care, he lays apple slices on my plate, like a row of crescent moons.
“Thank you,” I murmur.
He just nods, not meeting my eyes.
We sit silently for a moment before I realize he’s waiting for me. And as polite as that is, I quickly understand it’s not out of politeness. He’s looking at the cheese wedges like they’re about to sprout legs and walk off the table.
