Page 38 of Two Kinds of Stranger

Stripping naked. Trembling with cold and fear. Spreading her legs while a female corrections officer laughed, barked instructions and shone a flashlight at her genitals and anus.

A cold shower. Fresh, thin orange clothes. A cloth bag with more of the same clothes, a towel, a toothbrush and toothpaste.

There was a line of fresh detainees ahead of her, but Elly only stared at her new gray slip-and-slides over gray socks. She picked up a thin rubber mattress, which was also surprisingly heavy despite its appearance, and dragged it, along with her bag, along endless gray corridors, with steel bars painted blue every hundred yards. She passed the overflowing dorm rooms–fifty beds, fifty women, to every dorm–to the clanking of the steel doors, and the buzzing of the electronic locks, and the hollers of the women.

Elly’s arms were aching by the time they got to Max. That’s what the male CO called it. Maximum security house 421 looked like a cave built with cinderblocks, painted white. Lights hung from the high ceiling. Several steel tables stood in the center, with stools around–all bolted to the ground or cemented directly into the floor. She could see fifteen steel cell doors– five on the bottom, ten one floor up accessed by a steel staircase and walkway. At first the house looked deserted. All the doors were closed. The correction officer led Elly up the steel staircase and along the walkway and told her to wait outside cell M8. He called for an unlock on M8. The buzzer, more high-pitched than the others, signaled the CO to yank open the cell door.

She wished it had never opened.

It was a single cell, obviously designed for one prisoner, but inside were three women. Steel plates secured to the wall with chains acted as bunk beds. Bunks on either side of the narrow cell, a toilet in the corner. Just enough space to walk in between them. The lower bunk on the right was empty, and Elly stepped in, put her mattress over the steel and her bag on top. She took her rough blue blanket from the bag. She didn’t look at the other women in the cell. She just crawled onto the bed, still clutching the cloth bag with her meager possessions inside, and turned to face the wall.

The CO said, ‘Play nice with the new fish.’

Elly heard his boots on the floor as he turned, and the steel door slammed shut.

She was in darkness.

She cried as quietly as she could.

The other three women didn’t speak.

They tutted, and one of them sucked their teeth, no doubt irritated by the further erosion of what little space they had left by a fourth body in a cell that would be cramped for two.

In the dark, she heard the singing, and the crying and the screaming and the banging, and all the sounds of two thousand women in torment.

Right then, at that moment, she just wanted her father more than anyone else on this earth. He was the one who always made things right. Over these past torturous weeks, she had thought of him often and her pain caused by James and Harriet’s betrayal mixed with her grief for his loss. Her mother was practical, but never an optimist. Her father, Stewart, balanced things out in that marriage. He always told Elly that everything would work out just fine.

She needed her dad to tell her that right now. To give her one of his big hugs, to smell that old aftershave on his shirt and thefaint odor of motor oil that somehow never left his hands. When Elly was at her lowest, Stewart had always been there for her. The last time, before he died, when Elly was struggling badly for money, he had taken her in his arms and told her he would pay her rent, but the relief didn’t come from the handout, it came from the love and warmth of her father. They weren’t religious. Never went to church, but Stewart had been raised Catholic and that never really left him.

He sometimes told Elly to say a prayer if she was really worried. That this would help, no matter what.

Elly, shaking in her bunk, said a silent prayer.

She prayed for Eddie Flynn, and Kate, and Harry, and for them to get her the hell out of here.

PART THREE

ellyparker

Manhattan, New York

Taylor Swift–‘Shake It Off’

AUDIO DESCRIPTION OF VIDEO PROVIDED BY META AI

A bedroom. Painted gray. Morning sunlight through the blinds. A young couple in bed. The young woman throws back the covers, stretches her arms to the ceiling. She leans over and kisses the still-sleeping young man beside her. She gets up.

ELLY: Hey, people, Elly here. It’s a Saturday and, even though it’s been almost two weeks, I still can’t believe I’m married...

The young woman walks through a kitchen. She holds up her left hand. She is wearing a diamond ring and a gold wedding band. She fills a barista coffee machine with coffee beans and water. She drinks a large glass of iced water.

ELLY: I need coffee first thing, but these last two weeks I’ve been starting my day with water. James swears by this cool app, so I can track my hydration.

Close-up of her iPad. On the screen is a graphic of an empty glass. A thumb presses an icon on screen. An animation plays of a small amount of water trickling into the bottom of the glass. An animation of a thumbs up appears on screen. And then a message–KEEP GOING–ONLY 0.45 GALLONS TO GO...

The young woman exits an elevator, then crosses a lobby and exits a building. She goes into a Starbucks.

ELLY: Water is great and all, but, like, I still need coffee. Luckily, we have a Starbies right next to our building.