The Bureau: Volume 2 by Kim Fielding

Author:Kim Fielding [Fielding, Kim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kim Fielding

Chapter Five

Days felt interminable inside the cell, but nights were worse. Des had never needed much sleep. When he was a boy, he’d sneak out of the house after everyone had gone to bed—carefully avoiding the creaky floorboards—and wander the alleyways of Belfast in search of adventure. He wasn’t supposed to go, due to the soldiers on patrol, but he was good at slinking through shadows. Generally all he found were drunks and stray cats, but that was all right. Even though his Illinois family had kept him from straying after bedtime, he kept a flashlight hidden under his mattress, and after hours he’d read or draw or play with the set of toy soldiers his mam had given him before sending him away. His teenage years had found him back on midnight streets again, visiting bars if he could afford a few drinks or just walking if he couldn’t.

Now he was allowed none of these luxuries. His cell lights were doused at ten, shortly after his outdoor time, and then it was too dark to read. The guards yelled and threatened him if he got out of bed for any reason other than the toilet.

“Could wank,” he whispered as he slid a hand into his jumpsuit to fondle his cock. But it remained uninterested, as it generally did. His fantasies had grown stale years ago, and he was weary of his own touch. With a sigh, he pulled his hand out, tugged the blanket more tightly around his chest, and did his best to reposition himself—his too-tall, too-broad frame no match for the hard narrow mattress.

He pulled up a different distraction. “Remember the eggs, Desmond? Yeah, I’ll never forget them.” After running away from Illinois when he was fourteen, he tramped around the country, hitching rides and catching odd jobs when he could. One job—when he was fifteen or sixteen—had been on a vast chicken ranch where he gathered eggs. Everyone there thought he was twenty because he’d lied about his age and his body was big enough for them to believe it. He hauled heavy sacks of chicken feed, shoveled manure, found and removed dead chickens, and collected eggs. “Hard work. They paid me nothing but shite. And I’d come back to that trailer stinking so badly I had to hose myself off before going inside.” But he’d shared that tiny living space with three young men, and at night they’d drink cheap booze, play cards, and fuck like bunnies.

Eventually he fell asleep on his concrete bed and dreamed of eggs.

Six o’clock: lights on. Piss, wash, exercise, breakfast eggs made of chemicals and sawdust. Then a third read of a book about a woman who gets knocked up by the devil. Partway through he closed the book and paused to think. “Does the devil really exist? Mam said so, and so did the priests, but I didn’t believe it when I was a lad. But then there was Larry….” No. Larry had been a man and nothing more. No use giving Satan credit for purely human evil.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.