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I killed your dad. Now you belong to me. You’re my woman. You better not have a boyfriend, or maybe I’ll kill him too.
These are the insane things that jolt through my head, possible things I could say. I push them all down.
I see she’s already prepared the soda. She takes the lid off the bottle, upturns the glasses, wipes them down, and pours.
“Thanks for meeting me,” she says.
“You don’t have to thank me. It’s the least I could do.”
We sit opposite each other. I’m pathetically grateful for the table between us. It’s the only thing stopping me from grabbing onto her shapely legs. Or leaning over and pushing my lips against hers, subtly pouting as if her concern shapes her mouth. I could spend hours studying her, every inch.
Silence falls over us, and I take a sip of soda.
“I bet you wondered why I wanted to meet,” Lucy says.
“I was a little surprised when they told me,” I reply.
“I guess I’ve been holding onto a lot of pain. You know, losing my mom before I even knew her. I don’t remember her, and then my dad. Growing up on my own. My aunt passed last year, so now I’mreallyon my own.”
“I’m sorry,” I tell her.
She shrugs, not showing any sadness, bravely facing the blunt truth of her reality. It makes me think of her as a mother again and meetingthatchallenge just as courageously.
“It’s not your fault. My aunt, I mean.”
Herdadis my fault.
“I’ve been thinking about what to say to you,” she continues. “I saw that documentary you were in. I saw that you’ve been writing novels. I’m studying to be an editor at a community college. I work at a restaurant too. Sorry, I’m rambling.”
“You never have to apologize to me, Lucy,” I say seriously. “Not for anything.”
She smiles fleetingly.
“I hope that documentary didn’t make it seem like we were having fun there,” I go on.
Two years ago, a crew visited the prison to interview some inmates. They became interested in me because I pled guilty the moment they arrested me, gave no explanation for the killing, and wrote twenty novels up to that point.
“Was it bad?” she asks.
“It was hell at times,” I tell her. “I can take care of myself, so I wasn’t beaten up often, but it did happen. When ten men gang up on one, things can get bad, but once you show you won’t take any crap, mostly, they’ll leave you alone. But the isolation, the cage, the loneliness…”
I expect her to saygoodand give me some evil eyes. I’d deserve it, but she just looks down at her soda for a long time.
Her captivating green eyes get a faraway quality, as though she’s lost in a thousand thoughts. I want to draw out each one, study them, and get to know her better than I know myself. I’m already sure she’s mine. How can that be? She could have a boyfriend or a girlfriend, for all I know.
“Are you going to try to find a publisher for your books?” she asks.
I shrug, feeling off balance. This conversation feels far more natural than I thought it would.
“I’m copying them to the computer at the moment.”
“I bet you realize all the places you messed up as you’re doing it, right? I do that with my essays.”
I smirk. “You hit the nail on the head there, Lucy.”
Quickly, I wipe the smirk off my face. Her expression has turned to ash.
She stands. “Excuse me. I need to use the bathroom.”
