Chapter One
Lilly
This isn’t my first time in prison, and it surely won’t be my last.
I go through the usual checks, but the guards already know me. How could they not? I’ve been coming here for the last ten years. Some of these men have seen me grow up from a frightened little girl, who had no idea what happened to her father and why he was taken to this horrible, dark place, into the woman I am today, the woman who is trying her hardest to make a change in this world, which sometimes, tends to be so cruel to those who seem to be the weakest.
A guard by the name of Thomas nods at me, as he unlocks the door. I would be able to recognize the sound of prison doors unlocking anywhere. It is a different sound from regular doors or gates. It has a depth, a certain heaviness that presses upon your soul, trying to crush it, if only you allow it.
I don’t need to be shown into the visiting room. I already know where it is. I enter and the visiting room officer is there. In fact, there are three of them present now, because the visiting room is filled with people sitting opposite each other. I can see it in their eyes, how much they want to reach across the table and just touch each other’s hand, intertwine their fingers. Just that physical touch which sometimes means more than a million words ever could, but it is not allowed. All we can do is hug and kiss when we arrive and do the same when we depart. I guess we should count ourselves lucky. There are inmates who aren’t allowed to do even that.
I see my father all the way in the corner of the room, sitting at a table by the barred window. He lifts his hand shyly at me, smiling. I know he’s expecting mom to come, and he’s disappointed she didn’t join me, but he’ll do his best to try and hide it.
I walk over to him at a normal pace. He stands up, embracing me. I wrap my arms around him, and I can’t escape the feeling that every time I come see him, he feels a little less present in his own body, as if he’s losing more and more weight, but it’s not just weight. It’s like he’s losing himself in the process as well and I know I must hurry, if I want to help him.
Our hug is short, almost business-like. We both know we are being watched. Our physical contact is being counted by the seconds that have passed. When he lets go of me, he’s still smiling.
“You look good,” he tells me, as always.
“So do you,” I lie, as always.
We sit down. I know he wants to ask about mom, so I tell him immediately.
“Mom had to do a double shift,” I explain.
He looks worried. “Your mom works too much.”
I shrug. I know he feels guilty that he left us. Well, technically, he didn’t leave us. He was taken from us, stolen from us but he doesn’t see it as such. He thinks this is all his fault, although we try to assure him that it isn’t. He was wrongfully accused and convicted of a crime he didn’t commit but once you land in prison, everyone there keeps claiming that they are innocent. His voice got lost in the masses.
“How are you doing?” he asks me, as we start our usual dance.
I honestly don’t feel like talking about silly unimportant things. I want to keep asking him about what happened that night, although I’ve heard his version a million times. I’ve heard the other version as well, and I still couldn’t see any discrepancies, but I know I must be overseeing something. The truth is right in front of my eyes. I just can’t see it… yet but I also know that he’s had enough of telling that story over and over again. I know he wants to forget it, at least when he’s with me. He wants to try and take part in the life that I am leading outside the confines of these walls that have been keeping him separated from his family for the past ten years.
He wants to know about my life, about my studies, about my friends and the like. I can understand that. So, I comply. I tell him all about the silly, unimportant things that make up my everyday life. I tell him about the Starbucks coffee I have every morning when I go to work, because I am too lazy to get up earlier and make my own coffee at home, when I have a perfectly functional coffee machine that mom got me for my birthday when I started college. Her reasoning was that I would be up late often, and I needed a good cup of coffee to keep my focus going.
Dad agreed. When mom and I told him about that present, I could see how sad he was that he missed yet another birthday, yet another gift giving. There were now so many missed, stolen moments, which none of us will ever get back but we keep looking forward, into the future, hoping for a better tomorrow, which can only come if we ourselves work on it, instead of expecting someone else to do it for us.
“How’s work?” he asks, after I told him that my classes are over for the semester and I have a few exams to take, then I can rest for a month.
“It’s great,” I nod, smiling. “Marley is such a sweet, clever kid. I never thought a ten-year-old could be so intelligent.”
“You were also a clever ten-year-old,” he tells me. I can see that sparkle of love in his eyes. I can sense how much he misses both me and mom, and it kills me every time, that a man such as my father, who would never hurt a fly, ended up in a place like this, just because they couldn’t prove that he was innocent.
“I think such intelligence in children can only come out of some sad event,” I reveal, referring to the fact that Marley lost her mother.
Her sad event was the death of a parent, while mine was the incarceration of one. In both cases, something happens to you, something that changes the reality of your life in a way you never thought possible, in a way you can’t really understand, and it takes a long time for you to accept it. In Marley’s case, it is still noticeable in her speech and mannerisms, although she seems to have accepted the fact that her mother is gone. I wonder if one ever accepts such a thing, especially a child.
“She is lucky to have someone like you,” my father tells me.
“I am just her nanny,” I shrug.
In her case, a nanny is many things. Her father is a busy man. I guess every billionaire is. He has so much to think about, so much to control. I wonder what that must feel like, to have so much power and control over the fates of others.
Although it is obvious that everything he does, he does for her. Even though he should be doing less sometimes and just be with her more. That would mean more to her than any presents ever could but it’s not my place to make such comments.
“Is her father a good employer?” I hear my dad ask.
“I guess,” I shrug again. “We aren’t really talking much, apart from the usual exchange of pleasantries when I come and before I leave home.”