The Life of Lol (2 page)

Chapter 2.  A change in management.

I lay on my bunk, gingerly as my sides were still all bruised and sore.  Trying to figure out a way to stop being Diane’s punching practice dummy again.  As if she could read my mind, Dorothy leaned over from the top bunk,

“They see you as a threat, honey” she said softly, “just keep your head down, keep out of trouble, prove to them you’re not a threat and they’ll leave you alone.”

I kind of understood, but my pain made me sulky and belligerent. 

“How the fuck am I a threat?” I snapped, “I’m barely 22 and know fuck about being in jail?”

“You’re young, honey, they can see that”, she explained smiling, “And you’re in here for quite a while.  Plus, you’re pretty and obviously smart.  Diane’s afraid of you”

“Yeah”, I snorted, “funny way to show fear, to beat the living shit out of me.”

Dorothy lay back in her bunk.  She’d had enough of the moody kid who wouldn’t be told.  Privately, she worried about her young cell mate.  She’d seen that look in the blonde’s eye as she walked in here.  Most kids her age would have been full of fear walking into a jail for the first time.  Not this one though.  The look of a predator, looking to see how the situation could be taken advantage of.  She hoped the kid would learn to keep her head down, and then maybe Diana and her cronies would leave her alone.  I spoke up again,

“What day are we allowed to go see that hairdresser woman?” I asked from her bunk, distracted with my thoughts.

Dorothy’s stomach churned.  The predator was planning something, she could just feel it.

“Thursday, honey”, she said, why, you planning to come.  You got enough money?”

“Just about”, I replied, “I’ll head down there then.

“That’s the spirit”, said Dorothy, “go make yourself pretty.  Forget about Diane and her goons.”

“Hmm”, I murmured. 

“Just remember”, said Dorothy, “nothing too short or above the ears or you’ll attract attention…if you know what I mean?”

“I don’t want anybody touching me” I said sullenly.

“Well then just be careful what you get done”, said Dorothy.

I had to think.  This blonde swishing about behind me was a problem in a fight, and had already proven that.  That’s why I planned to get the lot hacked off on Thursday.  Then, when Diane and I met, there would be a bit less of me to grab hold of.  Course there was a problem with the lesbians.  This was a closed society, as I’ve said before.  Little groups.  The blacks, the Chinese, the lesbians, the whites, the peaceful old ones.  I knew that after Thursday and my appointment with the prison hairdresser the dyke bitches would think I was one of them.  That was the signal, or so it seemed.  Most of them looked less like women and more like men to my young eyes anyway.  I hated the thought of looking like one of them, or even them thinking I was one.  Not that I was against them, but you gotta remember I grew up with a whole heap of traditional thinking people.  I didn’t mind them, as long as they didn’t go around touching me up. 

Fuck them, I thought, in my usual self destructive way.  The prison hairdresser was four dollars.  I had four twenty five left.  That wouldn’t leave me much till next pay day, but if my plan worked, I wouldn’t have a problem with money again.  And if it didn’t work, then Diane’s fat bitch friend would likely either kill me, blind me with that fucking pencil or make sure I was drinking my food through a straw for the next year anyway, so money wouldn’t matter either way.  See.  There I go again.  In my eyes, that was a fool proof plan. 

I began to sort of enjoy prison, in my own way.  Sure, I still hated that door, and talked to hardly anyone, but at home or with the guys in the squat, I had nobody in the world.  At least here I had Dorothy, and I could make plans.  Like I said before, the world is a hard place, so big and hard for one little person to make a mark, the rules are always changing where ever you go.  Not here.  Here there was a set structure, set in concrete.  That helped people like me, a set structure I could work around, I can always work with something that never changes, it’s the unpredictable stuff that turns around and takes a chunk out of your ass.  That was why I was here in the first place.

The second part of my plan only occurred to me when I was working.  I was good at my job on the phone, my broad southern accent and way with words used to get me a lot of clients signing up for the offer.  And I guess this was one thing that taught me how to talk to people to get what I wanted.  Anyway, under the watchful eye of the guard, we were all dutifully working in our little call centre, and I began to idly play with the ring binder that held the written records we had to file away.  Pens were signed in and out, as they could have been used as sharp weapons, something like that would have been noticed straight away.  The ring binder, a battered thing covered with green vinyl, had a piece of round cylindrical metal tubing down the inside of its spine, to keep the metal binder together, I imagined.  Due to its age, the metal slots holding it in were working loose and beginning to rust.  I checked that Blessing, working at the side of me, was engrossed in her work, and began to play with the metal tube with my fingers as my thick accented voice droned on.  But I wasn’t concentrating on the work anymore; I just wanted the metal loose.

“What y’all doin with that”, Blessing suddenly asked, seeing my fingers working the metal rod. 

Blessing was a fat black girl, young and really spoilt.  If I’d have had a tenth of the stuff she’d had showered on her during her life, I’d have been fucking made.  Fat spoilt bitch.  I suddenly felt like sticking my pen into the skanks face, but I didn’t.   

“What am I doin with this?” I hissed under my breath, “I’m gonna stick it in your fucking eye, that’s what.”

“I’ll tell the warden and he’ll cook your ass”, she shot back, attempting to take the file from me, “ya ain’t allowed to touch that!”

I grabbed it back,

“He’ll cook my ass yeah, but you’ll still only have one fucking eye” I replied, hissing again like an alley cat.

Blessing wasn’t tough.  She hadn’t grown up on the streets; she hadn’t had to run from cops dragging behind her a boyfriend that was in the middle of an OD, she hadn’t had to hide a hot handgun in her knickers as she returned to her children’s home where she lived.  No, Blessing hadn’t done any of that.  She’d had a fucking car on her 18
th
birthday, and a fucking party with a fucking live band and her daddy had spent more fucking money on her that I would ever fucking see.  So she wasn’t tough.  She looked at me, decided that she was about ready to wet her panties at the thought of what the skinny young blonde was going to do to her, and shrank away back to her work.

“Yeah, you better” I hissed.  Fuck her.

I didn’t hear another word out of her.  The warden was a thick piece of shit, all I had to do was look like I was trying to pocket my pen, and he’d train his eye on that.  Sleight of hand.  Honestly, even a chimp would have looked at my other hand trying hard to work the metal rod free of the ring binder.  But not this thick piece of shit.  And ten minutes to the end of work time, he was ready for finishing.  I watched his hand fiddle in his pocket for his cigarettes as if to get one ready for when the bell sounded.  He wasn’t even watching me now, nobody was.  And so I downed my pen and wrenched at the metal rod with both hands and tugged at it as hard as I could.  Stubborn fucker.  I had to get it loose.  If it was noticed, then I wouldn’t have another chance.  Still he was fiddling with his cigarettes and looking at the hands of the clock tick slowly and silently away.  One final pull and the metal rod came suddenly away with a sharp crack.  Quick as a flash I slipped it into my pocket and scattered my pen onto the floor.  He looked up,

“What you doin there, Taylor?” he asked sharply.

“Dropped my pen sir”, I said, “Shall I get it?”

I knew I wasn’t allowed to move without his permission. He came over to me, picked up the pen where it had fallen near my slippers and placed it gently on my desk, allowing his face to brush a little too close to my cheek. 

“There ya go”, he said softly”

“Why thank you sugar”, I whispered.  As he walked away with his cheeks a little flush, I noticed a bulge come in his pants.  Probably thinking about me later, all chained up.  Most likely be yanking one off.  Men were all the same.  I’d learned that a long time ago.  Think with their dicks, not their brains.  Nobody had noticed the metal rod now safely in my pocket.  Diane would notice it.  And very soon.

Thursday came.  Anybody wanting to visit the hairdresser had to sign a sheet saying they didn’t want to work that afternoon.  Sure, I wouldn’t get any money, but I had a plan, didn’t I?  And so off I went, to check out what this beautician’s parlour looked like.  It looked like any other prison room to be honest, with the exception of a few chairs, and a sink.  I wasn’t sure whether i\ was doing the right thing, but I remembered the way they’d held my head as they were punching me, and it hurt like shit.  I didn’t want that to happen again.  Sure, they could still hold me down, but there wouldn’t be a rope for them to hold. 

I still wasn’t sure about this though.  Not that I was vain about my hair or anything.  I mean, I knew I was pretty, and I could flick my blonde hair to get guys to look at me, but here was the thing.  I was locked up here for eight years, and all that flicking my hair was gonna get me was a randy fucking guard shoving his dick at me.  I didn’t want that.  I wanted the top rung another way.  The not whoring way.  So yeah, maybe I couldn’t flick my hair for a few years, so what; there would be nobody to flick it at anyway. 

As for the dykes, I didn’t know.  Most of the more butch lesbian groups had kind of horrible crew cuts going on, they looked more like guys.  I shuddered to think what they might want from me if I turned up like that.  Couldn’t have it both ways, I guess.  Either way, we would soon find out.  I might have to watch my ass for a while.  Literally.

I had to wait for a bit.  One of the black women was in getting some coloured stuff put into her thick black weaved rope like hair.  At the side of me was a thin middle aged woman.  Looked kinda washed out, like she was doing drugs.  I could’ve done with some stuff myself, but that was a problem for another day.  Needed to stop myself getting smashed to the floor first. 

“Your hair is nice”, she said quietly, “Haven’t seen you before.”

“Ain’t been here before”, I said a little too harshly.

Seeing the woman’s scared face, I continued,

“Names Taylor.”

“Borland”, she replied, “Nancy Borland.  I just come here to get out of work as often as I can.  I swear I used to have my hair down to my butt.”

Her hair was going grey now, and was just off her collar.  She looked like she’d been here for a while.

“I don’t even know who I afford it”, she said, “It’s not as though the wages go far, is it.”

“No”, I said, “I have nothing left for the rest of the week now”

“Hmm”, she looked at my blonde long hair, “

“It’s not as if you need it cutting”, she added, “You should probably save the money for toiletries”

“If it stops me getting my face smashed in, then its four dollars well spent.”

Borland nodded.

“I heard Diane showed you who was boss.  She normally does that to people she doesn’t like.”

“Yeah well”, I answered, suddenly being reminded of my beating, “she won’t be using my hair as a fucking bell pull again”

Borland was called to the chair then, and I began to look at my feet to while away the time.  Cheap ass uniform, cheap horrible white socks that got holes in straight away, cheap ass plastic slippers that didn’t fit.  Yeah, they liked us looking like trailer trash alright.  I watched Nancy get her hair cut.  The woman doing the cutting looked about sixty, and dressed like one of those frumpy old women you see in old ladies beauty parlours, light blue cardigan, permed hair, knee length skirt you know the type.  Flat frumpy fucking shoes like she’d never been fucked in her life before.  Maybe once just so her husband could have a kid, then she sealed it all up and nobody had touched it since.  Give her a week in her and those dykes would sort her out.  She was fucking around with Borland’s hair, cutting a little piece here and there.  Nancy was making small talk, or trying to, the prissy old bitch didn’t like to talk so much, apart from tut tutting when Nancy moved.  When Nancy slouched a little, she scolded her.  Who did the fucker think she was?

Anyway, after a while it got to my turn.  My plan was ready in my mind, and I had a new found confidence, a kind of swagger to my walk.  It was a confidence that suddenly came to me, a confidence that I had a plan of action, and whether it worked or didn’t, I was going to follow it through.  I always had this kind of swagger to my walk after that.  I know it freaked people out, that always amused me.  I saw the almost fear in her eyes as I sat in the chair, no, I slouched in the chair and waited for her to try to regain control of the situation. 

“Sit up, young lady”, she said, “let’s have a look at you.”

I didn’t move in the chair, and remained motionless.

“Such pretty hair”, she remarked, “shame it’s hidden with such a scowling face.  You know…you can get a lot more done in life with a smile than you can a frown.  Smile and people will smile back.  Scowl and people will scowl back.”