Invader by Margie Benedict

Author:Margie Benedict
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781954584204
Publisher: Marjory Kaptanoglu

Chapter Twenty

KAILEY

After my time in solitary, several weeks passed without any problems. I went back to my monotonous life of keeping to myself, exercising in the yard, and working at my boring job for most of the day. My one pleasure came at night, when I got to lie in bed and read until lights out.

For some reason Pall kept his distance. He didn’t look at me, touch me, or even speak to me if he could avoid it. There were no more notes. I wanted to believe he’d lost all interest in me. But being a devious person myself, I was convinced it was just the opposite. He’s silently plotting his next move, I thought. He was pretending not to notice me so that when he did act, it would take me completely by surprise and I wouldn’t have any defense for it. In the meantime, it must’ve amused him no end to keep me guessing, to turn me into a quivering lump of anxiety as I worried about how to avoid the something big that was coming down any day now.

I tried never to be alone. I took showers at popular times. Ran in a loop around the basketball players outside. Ate at crowded tables. Went to bed after my roommates. Shit was less likely to happen when there were witnesses.

I was reading Great Expectations the night it happened. I’d been thinking how ironic the title was, both for Dickens’ characters and for me. I was a person with zero expectations, let alone any great ones.

When the lights went out, I closed my Kindle and slid it under the bed. I shut my eyes, picturing Pip and Estella and Miss Havisham, thinking about what had happened to them so far, and what might happen to them in the future. I imagined myself as Estella, even though I didn’t find her very likable. Maybe that made me relate to her all the more, I don’t know. She also had a weird and difficult mother figure who appeared to be ruining her life. I enjoyed playing this game, immersing myself in the story world, which kept me from dwelling every night on my own insurmountable problems.

I was drifting off to sleep when Pall’s hand clapped over my mouth. My eyes shot open and a scream arose in my throat, but he pulled tightly to muffle it.

“Get up,” he hissed in my ear.

Helen, lying in the lower bunk across from mine, stared at the back of Pall, bent over me. I shifted my gaze to her, sending a silent appeal. She squeezed her eyes shut, making it clear there would be no help from that quarter. She followed the prisoner’s mantra: don’t get involved.

Pall drew his hideous face close to mine. “You say a word, you’ll be back in solitary sooner than you can spit.”

He drew back his hand. I wanted to scream and punch him, but the threat of solitary was too much for me. The wounds it caused were too recent, too deep.

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