Chapter Text
For the longest time, Dot only existed by murdering Nadine.
She came to be by standing on top of that broken body, looking down at it with a detached sort of pity that felt much more comfortable than the grief or rage that had inhabited that skin, before she’d left it. It was ashes in her past, a trail she had set fire to in order to build in the razed foundations.
There wasn’t a space in Nadine that didn’t carry an echo of Roy’s hands on her. And Dorothy had left that beast behind to rage in its castle. She refused to carry its marks on her new chance, refused to so much as think of their stain lest they summon the demon that would drag her back to her cage.
The name choice was simple; she knew what she was after: A home. A real one. A happy ever after that she was all too happy to make-believe into reality, with every ounce of her courage and brains and heart. So Dorothy it was. Nadine had died in that ranch long before then, anyway. Killing and burying what was left was simple as breathing.
Lying was simple too. Stealing was old-hand. Smiling became so, over time. It wasn’t until Wayne that she began to mean it. His softness, his care, his unending goofy kindness. All the weakness she could have dreamed of for herself lived in him instead, and she learned to love it with a fierceness that was all Nadine, but not the one Dot had killed. Some other Nadine, the one that could have been in some other life, where her home life hadn’t been what it was, one where her savior hadn’t had claws ready to save her from the pan only to haul her straight into the fire.
By the time Scotty came along, Nadine was a bad dream. Anything attached to it was hazy and unacknowledged, left to rot in a box in her mind that she never intended to open. She’d made it out and the old skin wouldn’t fit her anyway.
It wasn’t until the after that it happened. When the house had settled into silence and calm, when she’d laughed and cried and hugged her family close, clinging to Wayne in the dark of their bed, Nadine’s ghost came to visit.
Not for Roy. God no. Nadine would never come alive again and wouldn’t stir from her grave for the shadow of a monster, not even when the monster came back with full force to try and rip her afterlife apart. No, Dot knew what Nadine was there for. Who she was there for.
Because she’d left the castle, the beast, the horror behind and clawed her way into a new, better fairytale by tearing her skin open to be reborn into a new day. One with no wolves after dark, no terror-fueled cowering, no struggle to breathe. One where her name was Dot and she had a man that knew what love was, one whose hands were sweet and whose voice was soft and filled with laughter.
She’d made it. She’d stolen and lied and fought for it, and would apologize for none of it, but it didn’t leave her unblemished on the other end of the rainbow. She’d torn chunks off herself to make it through, left a bloody trail in her wake, and somewhere in the shadows of the past, where Nadine had lived, where she never let herself look, back there and back then–
There’d been more than just horror and fear and pain and Roy. More than just Nadine, under his foot.
There’d been a Linda there too. One who had tried to teach her what a mother was, before leaving her own skin behind and covering Nadine with it, suffocating her to fill it. There’d been school lessons she’d never had before, there’d been patience and advice and new clothes made to fit her, there’d been meals she’d been taught how to cook with love, sunshine over the ranch and her very own room and her own bed before Roy had come and ripped her dream apart on it.
And there’d been someone else there, just as scared and just as trapped and just as small – smaller – who would come into her room in the dark, but not ever to destroy her. There’d once been small, clumsy hands attached to skinny arms that came to hug her when the yelling had been bad, or to seek one out when the hit had come down too hard.
There’d been a brother there once, a little boy who was quick to grin big and mischievous at her, with big curious hazel eyes that tried so hard to mimic whatever his daddy said until he’d be smacked into silence. But one who'd let Nadine talk as well, and listened just as close, tried just as hard to learn from her too.
There’d been a boy there who clumsily needed her in a way nobody had ever needed Nadine before, and nobody since, not until Scotty came along long after Nadine was buried in ashes. The outline of that kid had been obliterated along with her, Dot thought. She’d buried him too.
Because Nadine had shimmied out of that cage by chewing off her own skin to live as Dorothy. She’d run and she’d somehow made it out, but she hadn’t taken him along. There’d been no room for him. She wouldn’t apologize for what she’d had to do, but Nadine’s ghost came back regardless, in the dark, stirred back to life by that need and that love and those forgotten scraps of light Dot had killed along with the shadows.
“What are we making? Is it pancakes?” Scotty asked her in the early morning, hair still a whirlwind of bedhead and racecar pajamas askew. Dot smiled at her, always unable not to, and reached out her hand to beckon her close. Scotty was already moving in, big eyes following Dot’s hands as she cubed the butter, but always a warm weight of love against her side.
“Ooh, not this morning munchkin,” Dot sing-sang, smiling down at her daughter’s sleepy face. “Today we’re making a special treat,”
“Pancakes are special,” Scotty butted in with a half smile, but she was already leaning in to eye the ingredients Dot had set down on the table. “Can I help?”
“You sure can,” Dot kept right on smiling, set on pouring in the brown sugar next and turning to get the mixer out of the cabinet. “Grab that big bowl for the dry ingredients baby, I’ll tell you which to mix.”
The process was simple. She hadn’t even had to re-read the recipe, imprinted as it was in her memory. Nadine’s memory. It should have felt harder than it was to recall how much flour and how much baking soda, how to fold in the oats and the raisins, but it wasn’t.
“What’re the cookies for?” Scotty asked from where she sat licking up the batter at the table while Dot cleaned up the counter. The tin was already in the oven, ready to ping in a few minutes.
“They’re a very special gift,” Dot explained, turning to give Scotty a wide eyed look and imprint the seriousness of the matter with an exaggerated wink.
“For me?” Scotty teased, grinning. She had dough on her nose. Dot laughed and didn’t tell her about it as she went on to wash her bowls and utensils.
“You’re already eating half the batter, you little glutton,” Dot teased back, but her smile wasn’t as easy to sustain that morning as usual when she looked down at her hands under the sudsy water, blurry and clean. Looking away from Scotty, from Wayne, it usually wasn’t. “No, these are for someone that needs a little love.” A lot of it, Nadine’s ghost wanted to say. Dot sighed. “We’re gonna go and meet someone today, baby. It’s a bit of a drive, but we’ll go there after breakfast. I want you to meet him.”
“Is daddy coming?” Scotty inquired, back at her side as she handed her the used - and licked- bowl to wash.
“Not this time. Daddy’s got that commercial to shoot today, remember? No, no, it’ll just be our little adventure.” Dot wriggled her eyebrows to make Scotty laugh. It worked. “His name is Gator.”
“Is he a reptile? Do they like cookies too?” Scotty blinked curiously and Dot had to stifle a laugh. She reached out to poke Scotty’s face with a sudsy hand, leaving a blob of foam behind that she wrinkled her nose at.
“He is not. He’s a person.” Dot explained patiently, trying to find the right words. “Gator’s his name.”
“Is he nice?” Scotty inquired and Dot shook her head, unwilling to lie.
“He was,” Dot said, blinking at her empty hands, washed clean. She turned off the tap and shooed Scotty off to grab the oven mitts when the oven beeped. “Oh shoot, grab those would you? We don’t want these to burn.”
“Who is he? Gator?” Scotty insisted, watching Dot scramble to get the cookies out without burning herself or the cookies and only half succeeding. The scalding she got on her arm was mild, and she ignored it. It was simple, for her, such a small pain. “Why are we visiting?”
“He’s my little brother,” Nadine said, and smiled. A hard smile. A long forgotten one. It was smaller than Dot’s. It made Scotty smile back all the same. “Your uncle. He did some bad things. Terrible things. And he’s in jail now, because he has a debt to pay for it. But we’re visiting because he’s family. And he deserves a good family that gives him a chance. A place to belong. He- he hasn’t had one of those before.”
“How come he hasn’t had one if he had you?” Scotty asked, because of course she asked. Her curious smart little cookie. There weren't any simple answers, but that was okay. Scotty was smart.
“He didn’t have me, for a long time,” Dot explained, but it was Nadine that crouched down to meet Scotty’s beautiful eyes. “It wasn’t really our choice. But now he does, because now we have that choice. And I need him to know that. And what better way to let him know that than to bring him his favorite cookies, huh?”
“That makes sense.” Scotty said, nodding wisely. Her bedhead was still a mess. Dot ruffled it some more and told her to go get ready for the day while she made them breakfast. But Scotty turned back at the foot of the stairs, head tilted curiously. “Can he pay?”
“What?” Dot asked, taken aback at Scotty’s more serious tone. “Pay what?”
“You said Gator had a debt,” Scotty explained, and Dot nodded, reading where this was going. “What if he can’t pay, like you said? Nana says debtors are prisoners. And you said that sometimes people can’t pay, remember? If - if they’re poor. Or there’s a death in the family. Can Gator pay?”
“He is,” Nadine answered. She remembered big hazel eyes hiding tears in the dark of her bedroom, a long time ago. Remembered him shaking against her chest, now trapped in a deeper dark, one he would never again escape. “He’s trying. But maybe we can help him with that, huh?”
“Nana has a lot of money,” Scotty offered and it was Dot that laughed.
“Not that way, baby,” She corrected softly, but her smile was bold. “We can help with cookies. And visits. And forgiveness.”
“Do you think he’ll be nice to us, if we’re helping?” Scotty asked, and it was Nadine that blinked the tears back and nodded. Awakening in a new skin, a thicker one, so much stronger. With so much to do still.
“Oh I know he will be,” Nadine told Scotty, and promised that boy she remembered, the one waiting for her. “That’s why we’re going. To help him.”
“Will he like my animal book?” Scotty asked, already climbing back to her room, seriousness forgotten. “I can tell him about the other gators. The ones in Florida.”
“We can go ask him ourselves,” Dot assured her, already turning back to get the bisquick box, hands sure and steady on the familiar motions. “As long as you can get dressed before I have these pancakes on your plate, huh? Chop chop now, daylight’s burning!”
Scotty ran the rest of the way up to her room, and Dot listened to her steps, to her noise, to her existence with her smile and her love. Nadine’s ghost didn’t feel so cold and dead anymore, inside her new skin. Not half so battered.
“You came,” Gator said, when he was finally sitting down across from them on the table of the visitation room.
He looked rough. Pale and crumpled small, still with crisp bandages over the ruin where his eyes should have been, but they were smaller now, more like patches. They let peeks of the forming scars he’d been left with be seen around the edges. His shoulders were slumped in a way Dot had only seen when Roy was through with him or when Linda’s calm, even voice had raised in cries that rang across the second floor of the ranch and drew him from his bed at night.
She smiled at him anyway, even though he couldn’t see it. She wanted him to know, to hear it in her voice, because she doubted anyone else was smiling at him in there these days.
“Told ja I would, didn’t I?” Dot said and squeezed Scotty’s hand. “I intend to keep that promise. Now, I have Scotty here with me so she could meet you proper.”
Gator looked floored, and Dot’s smile hurt a little to hold up. But she did and tried to imagine the way he’d be blinking at her in confusion if he could.
“You really brought your kid?” He asked, slow, like he thought she was joking. His fingers twitched where they were clutching the edge of the table and Dot wanted to reach out to hold his hand, but didn’t want to be warned off by the stern correction officers staring at them from over Gator’s shoulder in front of Scotty. A battle for another day.
“My name’s Scotty,” Scotty informed him primly, and Dot’s smile was easier then. “How come yours is Gator?”
Oh. Wincing, Dot opened her mouth to smooth that over, when she saw the way Gator hugged himself in front of them.
“Now, Scotty–” She began, but Gator interrupted her after clearing his throat, and she had to blink at his matter of fact tone.
“My dad didn’t like me.” He said, calmly. The echo of Dot’s own words made Nadine’s guilt stir in her chest, but she pushed it down. “How come you have a boy’s name?”
“My daddy’s weird,” Scotty answered, and Dot had to laugh. Gator just raised his eyebrows. “Mommy too, sometimes. I didn’t know you were her brother. I’d really like a brother too.”
“You told her that?” Gator asked, soft again. Baffled. Dot set her shoulders back and pushed. She wanted to see him straighten up, meet the challenge like he usually did.
“Of course. I don’t lie to my daughter, Gator. You’re family. She doesn’t have any other uncles, you know. Wayne’s a chronic only child.” She said, and watched him digest the words for a beat.
The room around them was loud with conversation of the other inmates and their families, but while Scotty was looking around curiously, Dot couldn’t look away from Gator’s hunched in form, the face he was struggling to keep neutral.
“I’m sorry,” He finally said, and it was Dot’s turn to frown. Before she could answer, Scotty came to her rescue.
“That’s not your fault,” Scotty said with the straightforward simplicity Dot loved about her. “Nana told me she didn’t want more fuss.”
“Daddy is a little fussy,” Dot joked to make Scotty laugh, and she tried not to take it personally when Gator didn’t smile. “How are you doing here, Gator? Your lawyers gave you my messages, didn’t they? Do you need something from me? Did they give you enough blankets? A toothbrush? You haven’t been calling me, do you have my number?”
“That’s a lot of questions,” Scotty observed, and Dot reigned herself in, because Gator hadn’t answered any of them. She wished she could see more of his face under those bandages, and then wished she couldn’t in the same breath.
“They said,” Gator finally said, and his head was turned down, like he was speaking to the table. It didn’t make a difference, Dot knew, he couldn’t see them, but it bothered her, the way he wouldn’t raise his head. “About the money in my account, for. For blankets and shit. You didn’t have to.”
“We live in Minnesota Gator, of course I had to.” Dot chided him, tapping the table to get his attention, to get him to raise his head. He didn’t. “And anyway, the money was all Lorraine. Scotty’s grandmother. You don’t have to worry about all that, alright? Buy the stuff you need, it’s what it’s there for.”
“I think there’s a canteen,” Gator told them, but Dot had to lean forward to hear him, his voice was so low among the bustle and laughter from the tables around them. “I don’t know where it is.”
“So ask the guards to take you,” Dot demanded, tried to smile at Scotty when she looked at her in confusion at her sharp tone. “Are they treating you alright? Lorraine said you’d have protection, accommodation. Do you?”
“Sure,” Gator said, but it dawned on Dot that he didn’t have a cane, that he’d been led into the room and pushed in without ceremony to find his way to the table, and he didn’t have sunglasses to cover his bandages with. “Nobody’s been– it’s fine. I have two roommates.”
“Are they nice?” Scotty asked, and Dot would have asked the same. Gator’s face didn’t move when he shrugged, nodded. Dot was going to have to call Lorraine after this.
“There’s lots of buildings in here,” Gator said, and Dot tried to imagine what it would be like for him. How he would have to navigate moving around. The lack of a cane niggled at her. “They have like- courts. Books. Classes and shi– stuff. It’s not bad.”
Gator had played football in high school, Dot remembered. Football and track, athletic scholarship well on the way despite homeschooling by the time she’d gotten away. He’d never been big on reading, too hyper and set on being better at numbers, just like his father. Even if he wanted to read now, if he wanted to be outside in the courts–
“Do you like animals?” Scotty interrupted her train of thought again, before she could spiral into another useless barrage of questions. “My favorite book is about animals. Did you know some alligators can hold their breaths for a whole day?”
“Can’t say I did,” Gator said, and this time he raised his head in their direction. Dot squeezed Scotty’s hand again and found it easier to smile again. She always made it easier. “That’s pretty cool.”
“Why’d you come to hurt us on Halloween?” Scotty asked next and Dot froze. Gator did too. “You called mom the wrong name.”
“Yeah,” Gator said, voice choked. Scotty was squeezing Dot’s hand back now, and Dot kissed her fingers. “Yeah, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. That was- that was wrong. I thought I had to. That was dumb of me. I’m not real bright, you know? Dad– yeah. I get told that a lot.”
“Her name’s Dot,” Scotty went on. “Not the other name. Were you mad at her? Is that why?”
“Someone else was,” Gator said. Dot watched him turn his head in her direction, his mouth pull down into a grimace. His voice was getting shaky, and again, Dot had to look at the guards to remember why she couldn’t go around to hug him. Shake him some. Let him feel she was there. “He told me to go, and I listened. I shouldn’t have. I’ll never do that again.”
“‘Cause mommy shot you?” Scotty asked and Gator did smile then. It was still shaky. So was Dot’s own grin.
“Nah, I had that one coming.” Gator said, hoarse and finally straightened up some. “I won’t listen to that man again. I promise. Your mom can shoot me all she likes if I do.”
“Ooh, her mom will,” Dot warned, and Gator’s grin firmed up in response. “The man that told Gator to do that was a bad man, baby. He’s gone now, you don’t have to worry about that no more.”
“Listening to bad men is dumb,” Scotty told them seriously and Gator nodded, turning away from them. Dot finally gave in and leaned across the table to grab at his hands, glaring down the guard that took a step to stop her over Gator’s shoulder.
“It’s a good thing we can learn from our mistakes then, isn’t it?” She asked brightly, and squeezed at his hands hard. Gator startled at the touch but immediately leaned into it, toward them. The guard behind him was taking another step. Dot let go with difficulty, and he stopped approaching. Gator wilted a bit when she did. “We can make better choices that way. Learn and grow.”
“Eventually,” He said, and Scotty nodded sagely. Dot wished Gator could see her. “Thanks for coming., Na- Dot.”
“We’re coming next week too, and every week after that so get used to it.” Dot informed him, having already told Wayne about it. He would come too, he said, when they came on a weekend.
“You don’t have to,” Gator said, frown back in place. “I don’t expect–”
“We made you cookies,” Scotty said, and Gator gaped at them. It was pretty funny. “The man at the door said you can get them later if you’re good. Do you like pancakes?”
“He sure does,” Dot answered for him when it seemed he wouldn’t, and cleared her throat pointedly to remind him to close his mouth. “You still like them with chocolate chips, Gator?”
“Uh-huh,” he said slowly. His lips twitched like he wanted to smile, but didn’t. “And maple syrup.”
“Duh,” Scotty said, because she was a sugar fiend and regularly drowned her own in the stuff. “I like the blueberry ones. Mama likes–”
“The plain ones. I remember,” Gator said, and Dot felt a warmth in her chest she didn’t think she could feel anymore, from somewhere under the skin she’d once shed. “She is a weird one, you’re right about that.”
“Takes one to know one,” Dot said playfully, poking Scotty in the nose. “Or two, as it were. Now, Gator, why haven’t you been calling? Lorraine has to keep sending Indira to update me about you and it’s driving her batty. And believe you me, we don’t want that lady madder than she has to be.”
“Indira is nice.” Scotty cut in, because Indira was her favorite person outside the family since she gave them all of Lars’ old gaming consoles. There’d been so many of them that Wayne had had to sell a few just to make sure they’d have space, and that Scotty wouldn’t be spending the rest of her life in her room. “But I think she doesn’t like you.”
“Not many people do,” Gator answered drily, and Dot grimaced. The visitor’s log for Gator in this place only had her and Scotty as approved visitations. She’d have to get Gator to add Wayne as well soon.
“She’ll come around,” Dot insisted before the doom and gloom could send him slumping down small again. Gator didn’t look convinced but said nothing. “Answer me now, why the radio silence huh? You been too busy to let me know how you’re getting along?”
“I didn’t think you’d want me to,” Gator finally answered, fingers twitching on the table. His cast had been replaced with a fresh one, blue as well. His favorite color, Nadine had known once. “Or that I- uh. That it’d mattered.”
“Of course it matters.” Dot said. Frowning when Gator shrugged, she doubled down and tapped the table again to make him look up again. “Of course it matters, Gator, I don’t want you thinking you’re alone here. You’re not. I need to know you’re getting by, that you’re not in trouble.”
“I don’t think I can afford to be in more trouble,” Gator joked, and Dot was glad his tone wasn’t glum about it, even if she wished the humor was less self-deprecating. “It’s- it’s pretty boring, Dot. I don’t do anything. It’s just the legal shit, when the lawyers come by.”
“Then I want to know about that,” Dot insisted, because this was important. He needed to know there was a life outside these walls, outside the dark he was stuck in. “I want to know all the boring nothings you want to tell me. Then Scotty can tell you about her books and I can tell you all about which PTA moms I fought with that week.”
“They’re all afraid of mom.” Scotty told Gator and this time he laughed. It made Dot hug Scotty close to her side in thanks, for being here. For making things easy for her.
“I’ll get you some audiobooks,” Dot promised, adding it to her mental list. “I’m sure they have some, I’ll ask around. Or order them. We can’t have your brain completely shriveling up, can we?”
“I don’t think brains really do that,” Scotty reassured Gator, because she hated people thinking wrong science facts.
“Mine just might,” Gator said, with a vague gesture to the side of his head. “I told you, I’m real dumb, so. Just hot air in here, mostly.”
“That’s not how brains work either,” Scotty shook her head, and this time it was her that reached out to pat Gator’s casted hand and made him and Dot both startle. The guard behind Gator was twitching, but Dot’s burning glare held him back. “It’s not nice to call people dumb. Not even yourself.”
“Ah,” Gator said, and nodded. Dot thought he couldn’t really speak, so she did instead.
“So now you know you were just being silly, huh? Do you have my number memorized?” Gator nodded again, mechanically. “I’ll expect that call. Don’t make me bring you cookies without any raisins next time.”
“Daddy likes snickerdoodles. They’re boring,” Scotty put in, pulling back to lean into Dot’s side.
Gator’s fingers went back to gripping the edge of the table, like he was holding on. Or holding back. Dot couldn’t take it anymore and stood, moving to his side of the table and hugging him tight where he sat, for the forty seconds it took the burly correction officer to ask her to step back.
She did, and gestured to Scotty to take her hand so they could get ready to drive back home. Gator just sat there, and Dot had to hold back too, not to reach out again and mess up his hair some.
“We’ll be back next week, Gator.” She promised, and Gator nodded, then tried to smile. The bandages around his eyes were damp, and so were the edges of Dot’s cheerful grin. Scotty just waved, then said bye aloud when she realized Gator couldn’t see her. “Chin up, kid. You’ve got cookies to get to.”
“Thank you,” he said, loud, to their backs as they walked away. Dot looked back to see him standing, swaying a bit in place, head trying to turn to where he thought they were. It was a bit off to the left, but close enough. The grumpy correctional officer already had a hand on his shoulders to lead him away. “Dorothy. Thank you.”
“Anytime,” She called back, and watched him being led back for a second before smiling down at Scotty as the loud door security mechanism went off behind her. “Now, what do you say we go surprise Daddy at work, huh squirt?”
“Are you sure about this, Dot?” Wayne asked her, and it was fair. It was more than fair, that he didn’t understand, but that he wanted to. That he wouldn’t stop her, even if he didn’t.
God, she loved him. She hadn’t known this kind of love before him.
“I’m sure,” She said, and it was easy to smile. With him, it always was, to even mean it.
Lorraine had already gone over this with her. And Indira. At great length. With them, she’d used logic and reasonable points of favor for the case against Roy, for the upcoming trial, for how solid it needed to remain, and how much it mattered to her that Gator didn’t get buried in the same grave. Not again, when she’d already buried him once, when he hadn’t yet deserved it. Even if he deserved it now, she owed it to him to give him some way out of the pit he’d been born in if he was willing to work for it.
With Wayne, none of that was necessary. Not when it was just the two of them.
“I mean, he was neck deep in it, honey,” Wayne tried and Dot nodded, because it was true. She wasn’t blind, and Lorraine had certainly showed her every evidence she'd had in order to test her determination to follow through. It hadn’t swayed her. She’d been where he was now, once. There were things erased off her own record, debts she hadn’t had to pay, to get her to the person she’d become, that she’d made.
She’d suffered for it, certainly, but some would argue that not enough. 10 years of bliss against those dragging years of hell. If put in a balance, where would the ax fall? It wasn’t for her to decide, to say. It wasn’t for any of them.
“You know, when I met him? I was fifteen,” She told Wayne, because she hadn’t told Wayne before. And Wayne listened, because he always would have, and it hadn’t been for fear of him that Dot had never spoken of it before. “He was- maybe eleven? Twelve, at most. And he thought having a sister was the coolest thing. This short little nuisance whose mom still combed his hair for him so he wouldn’t get gel everywhere. He wanted me to teach him how to steal. So I did.”
“To steal?” Wayne asked, because he’d grown up rich and sheltered, and no manner of years in the real world of his own means would erase his privilege. The security he’d always had, and always would, that a mother, a family was there at his back to catch him and shelter him when needed.
“Oh yeah,” Dot nodded, matter of fact. Her grin was fond. “All manner of things. Candies. Cookies. A stupid little prize dog at the county fair we couldn’t win because the game was so rigged and our arms were too skinny.” She paused, hesitated at the edge of that shadow, but then stepped through it, because the memory was altogether light, even with the darker edges. The kind of thing she’d made herself forget so she could bury it in the bad. “He got lashed proper for it later, when he slipped up. ‘Cause he was quick, you know, but I’d gotten caught too, once. I probably shouldn’t have been giving lessons. You know what he said to me, after?”
Wayne had already drawn her close, when her smile had faltered. His arms were warm around her, and his glasses crooked when he tilted his head in askance. “What?”
“We needta find a better hiding spot for your birthday stuff, he said.” She sniffled once, and then laughed about it when Wayne’s face went puzzled. “Squirt already had it, you see, wrapped and all, and instead of fessing up to Roy and get me belted right along with him, he goes, well, we can’t ruin your present, you know? We went through all that trouble and all. He took the licks for it, so might as well.”
“So… he was a good thief?” Wayne asked, voice high and Dot sighed and kissed his nose, because she was glad, almost, that he couldn’t get it. What it was, to live knowing the pain would come anyway, good or bad, and you had to carve out your little joys where you could find them. Knowing the only law that ruled you was someone else’s will, and not the real rules, the real world. You took the licks in private and you shut the fuck up about it after, and you tried to keep small pieces of yourself alive throughout it.
“He was a good brother,” Dot said, and Wayne’s face softened in some shallow understanding of what she meant. He might not get the hows, the whys, but he understood love. More importantly, it was Dot’s love he knew best. “And he never got out, Wayne. I know you don’t know… everything. That I asked you not to read those files. But trust me. It was a dark, deep well, living in there. And getting away took- took everything. His mom didn’t make it. I almost didn’t either. He was too scared to try.”
“Dot, I get that you love him,” Wayne tried, because of course he knew that, could see it in her. “But, he’s- he’s not a good man.”
“He can be,” Dot assured him, because she didn’t have to be Nadine to know that. To believe it, because she’d seen glimpses before. Short and flickering, but there all the same. “He wants to be, and I think he deserves to try. And Wayne – “
Here she faltered, but Wayne’s attentive gaze on hers, his trust in her eyes made her continue. She put a hand on his jaw and sighed.
“Honey. People aren’t always good. Your mom isn’t good. Danish Graves wasn’t good. But they can do good things. They get given chances and - and choices. They get to make decisions, and Gator….” Dot paused, then shrugged it off. “Most people get to think for themselves, is all. To not be afraid to. He’s making those choices now, and I’m not gonna be the one that closes the latch down on him when he’s trying.”
“Alright,” Wayne sighed into her hair, already resigned to it before he’d even asked. “I trust ya, you know I do. I just don’t want you to be disappointed, you know? If he’s– if he’s not.”
“I’m a tough cookie,” Dot assured him, smiling into the kiss he gave her. “I can take him.”
“Oh, we all know that by now,” Wayne teased, but nudged her back to turn just a little more serious. “So… you got big plans for that spare room, don’tcha?”
“It’s gonna be blue,” She told him calmly, but nodded. “We got plenty of time to furnish it, and we gotta make some changes here and there to make it just right, but what do ya know? It's good timin', since we’re doing all this reno right now and all!”
“What a coincidence,” Wayne agreed drily, but kissed her forehead. “I’ll call the contractor in the morning.”
“I love you,” Dot told him, and Wayne said it right back, like clockwork. Like safety. Like home ought to be.
You have an incoming call from an inmate in Duluth Federal Prison Camp by the name of oh, uh... Gator Tillman. If you wish to accept this call, please remain on the line. If you wish to decline the call, you may simply hang up. Calls emanating from this facility will be subject to monitoring and recording for security purposes.
“Hello?”
“Hey uh, Dot. It’s uh. Gator.”
“I know doofus, there’s a whole intro to these calls.” Dot teased, and sat down with the phone after closing her bedroom door behind her. Wayne and Scotty’s voices in the living room got fainter, but still present, a comforting background noise to the twist of anxiety in her as she waited for Gator to speak again.
“Right,” He said, short. Then sighed. “Yeah, sorry. That was dumb. So… I’m callin’.”
“I’m so glad to hear ya,” She assured him, but she knew he didn’t believe it. “How are you doing, huh? Did you like the cookies?”
“They were the best,” Gator said, low, then cleared his throat. “I ate them all in one sitting ‘cause I couldn’t stop. Got the runs for it, but they were worth it.”
“Oh my,” Dot laughed, covering her mouth with her hand. That was Gator, alright. “Should I take it easy on the raisins next time?”
“Don’t you dare,” Gator murmured, but she could hear the grin. “Thank you.”
“You said,” She reminded him gently, then had to clear her own throat. “How’s the rest?”
“It’s… prison.” He said, short again. She didn’t have to hide her grimace this time, alone in her bedroom. “Not too bad, considering. Just boring.”
“Any trouble with the others so far?” Dorothy prodded, trying not to feel like she had when she’d asked Scotty if her classmates at preschool were playing nice. “Your roommates? The guards?”
“You know I only called them that for the kid’s sake,” Gator complained, and Dot had to smile at his miffed tone. “They’re… uh.” Dot really had to call Lorraine, maybe bite the bullet and visit for this. “They like to fuck around, I guess? Easy pickings and all, but nothing too bad.”
“Are you getting bullied?” Dot asked and immediately wanted to smack herself. It was prison. Of course he was. “Never mind, just. Tell me if it gets bad, alright? Or tell your lawyers. If it-” She hesitated, then pressed on. “If they try to hurt you. You still have rights, Gator.”
“It’s nothing,” He scoffed, but Nadine knew him. She knew him too well to believe his ‘I can handle it’ bravado, because it was paper thin and always had been. One word, one look from Roy, and– “Don’t worry, I got it handled.”
So now she was really worried. She wished fiercely, not for the first time, that Danish Graves was still alive to be on top of things.
“You have rights,” She stressed, trying to sound stern. He used to listen to her, for all the blustering, all the put-on offense. She’d go and find him quietly doing what she’d said, all sulking and angry and embarrassed, but doing it anyway. “Just because you’re blind–”
“And an ex-cop. And a state witness, which is just a fancy term for snitch,” Gator sniffed, voice brisk and Dot really let herself close her eyes and feel the truth of it, how little she could do. How little Gator could do. “It’s fine, Na- Dot. They got me in the Special Housing Unit, so- I’m fine. I mostly just sit there.”
“That’s another thing,” She couldn’t help but say, hoping her conversation with Indira about accommodations for him had gotten at least some gears moving to get him access to something suited for him. An audiobook, a braille coach. Something. Indira hadn’t really promised anything, but Dot wanted to believe her, and Gator needed her to try. She’d try again, if she had to. “What are ya doing all day, huh? You said they had those classes. Any of those for you?”
“Uh, not in SHU, I think.” He told her, but didn’t sound sure. “One of the lawyers read me this- this page about it? They've got a manual. But I wasn’t really- I don’t know. I don’t remember how it works. I don’t know if I can- given. Y’know.”
“Of course you can,” Dot insisted, because she had to believe that, and so did Gator. “None of that defeatist talk, you’re plenty smart. It’s gotta be better than just sitting there, right? More interesting?”
“I can’t fucking read, Dot,” Gator said, and he didn’t sound angry. It was almost worse, how he didn’t, where he would have before.
“You still got those big dumb ears, don’tcha?” She teased, but Gator didn’t play along.
“It’s not like homeschool,” He said, and his voice had gone flat. Dead. “Warden ain’t gonna read me to sleep so I won’t flunk the lesson the next day.”
“Good thing nobody’s gonna belt ya if you fuck it up either,” Dot blurted, then blinked at herself. “Oh geez, that was inappropriate, wasn’t it?”
“Honest for once, more like,” Gator snorted at her. Nadine didn’t apologize for the brief possession of Dot’s lips, smirk wanting to pull at her lips. Dot held it back.
“Just saying. Trying won’t hurt. Ask someone, maybe? If they’d read to you? Describe things, maybe? I know Scotty was asking me about sending you some drawings. And she wanted to write letters so she can fill you in on all those animal facts she likes. She was happy you were interested, ya know?” Dot tried, more quietly, and Gator just sighed for a long beat of silence.
Then a beep from the phone startled them both.
This call will end in: One minute. The mechanical voice told them both, and it made Dot’s exhale shake on the line.
“I won’t see them, Dot,” Gator told her, and his voice was small. Then he blustered up a cocky “If she’s like you she probably can’t draw for shit anyway,”
“You won’t see them anyway, will ya?” She teased gingerly and got a scoff back. If it was shaky, neither of them mentioned it. “You gonna call me again next week?”
“Only get one a month,” Gator said, and Dot’s chest clenched. “It’s- it’s fine. You’ll come, right? You’ll come back?”
“Try and stop me,” She said. When the call automatically cut off a few seconds later, Dot sat there holding the phone to her ear for a long time.
It was the distant sound of Wayne’s laugh that bolstered her up again to put the phone down and breathe, not to let Nadine back up, with all her weight and grief.
She didn’t cry. There was no point to it.
Choices had consequences, she told herself. And then refused to remember who had first told her those words like a snake on her ear, and burst out of the dark of her room to follow the bright lights downstairs, where the TV was playing and Scotty was scolding Wayne for thinking fish had lungs.
“How do you stand it?” Nadine had asked once, a long time ago.
Linda had paused only briefly in pouring the batter onto the pan, before she’d smiled, soft and certain, serene as a breeze in summer. Dot could almost forget, looking at her made-up face, her soft blonde hair perfectly combed, her sure hands, how she’d screamed for Roy to stop.
The steam from the heat of the pan had steamed up Linda’s glasses, but there was no watery sorrow in her gaze when she lifted it to meet Nadine’s.
“For love, dear,” Linda said, then flipped the pancake to reveal a crisp golden brown. Magazine-perfect, just like the box promised. Nadine’s never came out so perfectly shaped, at just the right thickness like Linda’s did.
She hadn’t gotten it then. Who could love a monster so willingly, so passively, who would feed it and smile like that and mean it, when they knew what awaited them after dark. Not her, she swore, and then it had been her, but she gave none of her love away in return. It couldn’t be pried from her, couldn’t be taken.
It was only later, years later, Nadine a buried corpse and Dot in her place, that she got it.
Holding Scotty in the hospital, Wayne passed out asleep in the visiting chair, Lorraine outside the door making calls to get them moved to a better room. She looked down into newborn blue eyes and a pudgy little frowny face that was too red and misshaped to be called beautiful by someone who hadn’t given birth to it, and it was right there.
Blooming and all encompassing and obvious. Freely given.
For love.
Not for the monster. Not for the fear and the lies and the struggle.
“Hello my love,” Dot whispered to her daughter, and she thought of another pair of eyes, skinny arms and a mischievous laugh. “My little girl. I’ll love you better. Every single day. I’m never, ever leaving you behind, you hear? Not ever.“
Not by choice, she thought then, and it fed her anger, her resentment, the dark veil she’d set over that box with the corpse in her chest, in her head.
Not by choice, she thought later, hollowed out and small, trapped in a nightmare and staring at a windmill that she’d dreamt about. Knew about. Somewhere deep down, where she’d never let herself think about it. Where she’d buried all the monsters.
Not by choice.
“So?” Dot pressed impatiently, already done with Lorraine’s nonchalance and unwilling to play along for this. Lorraine, of course, paid her no mind, calmly writing out another donor check like Dot hadn’t opened her mouth at all.
“So,” Lorraine said back, slow and calm. Then she smiled down at her hand holding the pen. Dot felt her own mouth do something too sharp and eager to be called a smile. “It’s going swimmingly. Judge Traynor’s got the case, as we hoped. And the Prosecution is playing ball, what with the big fish hooked and wriggling, as it is.”
“So there’s a plea bargain on the table?”
“Oh no,” Lorraine demurred, and Dot’s heart froze cold for the seconds it took her mother-in-law to lean back on her office chair and blink at her like a satisfied cat in the sunlight. “Not on the table, dear, it’s already been signed. Being processed as we speak. Your boy’s getting his big chance and we,” Here she paused, and Dot felt absurdly giddy as the relief washed over her in waves. Her hands had gone clammy with the shock of it. “We are getting his no-holds barred cooperation to nail his daddy’s balls to the goddamn wall.”
“Oh thank the heavens,” Dot breathed, deep and full and long. Lorraine was already scoffing, reaching out to pointedly tap her undoubtedly absurdly expensive monogrammed pen against the wood of her oversized desk.
“Thank your federal buddies for leaning on them, more like,” Dot nodded wordlessly, giddy, but still managed to pull it together enough to give Lorraine a knowing look. “And yes, me, of course. For nudging a few heads to see reason, as it were.”
“Thank you,” Dot said, sincerely, but Lorraine was already waving her off. The second relief painted Dot’s face with emotion, Lorraine’s own closed off into aloof disinterest. It’s how they balanced.
“Yes, yes,” Lorraine said, eyebrows raised. “After all that, and you still weren’t sure, were you? You thought he might pussy out. Take his chances throwing himself to the beasts, as long as he didn’t have to be anywhere near that man again.”
“He might have,” Dot conceded, because the fear had been there. Truth was, Gator was depressed, trapped and terrified and backed into a corner, and she could reach out all she wanted, but she couldn’t make him take her hand. He had to climb out on his own. He had to try to fight back. “He’s still - ”
“A man-child,” Lorraine offered and Dot snorted. Nodded. Then shrugged.
“Terrified of Roy. He’s- he has to face him now.” Dot tried, but knew Lorraine wouldn’t sympathize. She was right.
“About time.” Lorraine said, and she wasn’t wrong. “I’m sure it helps that he won't have to actually see him there, trying to peel his skin off with his mind.”
“Don’t joke about that,” Dot chided, but Lorraine wasn’t one to be told what to do, and Dot didn’t really expect her to listen. Gator was undoubtedly going to hear it from the source constantly, whenever they finally got him out, and that– “How long is he looking at, here? What’s the deal?”
“He pleads no contest, testifies for the prosecution, and his myriad of federal charges narrow down to three years and change in prison plus some time on supervised release. With good behavior, he’ll be out in two, three years tops.” Lorraine explained, and Dot stomped down on the reflexive feeling that she could protest, ask for anything further.
Three years. It was nothing. Survivable. Three years and he could be at home, a real one, for the first time. Still young, still able to start over, to find his own path, instead of spending his entire life rotting away in a prison cell like his miserable father would.
“Thank you,” She said again, and her voice was a bit lower. Lorraine didn’t comment, but her face said it all. She didn’t get why it mattered to Dorothy, to anyone, what happened to Gator past his usefulness in Roy’s trial.
“You’re banking a lot of resources on a lame horse with that one, dear,” Lorraine drawled, already turning back to her work with a dismissive wave. “You better hope he’s worth the investment.”
“Please thank Indira for me, since I missed her.” Dot asked as she stood and Lorraine looked up in askance. “For the audiotapes. He got them, he told me. Said to thank you for him.”
“What do you know,” Lorraine joked drily, nodding thoughtfully. “A lame horse with manners.”
“Always good to see you, mom.” Dot joked and got to see Lorraine smirk as he closed the office door behind herself, heart lighter than when she walked in.
It was happening. They were doing this.
They were finally burying Roy Tillman in a hole he couldn’t weasel out of, and Dot couldn’t wait to start shoveling the earth onto his head.
In the aftermath of a destructive tornado, of an earthquake or a flood, what people forgot to talk about was the silence. The calm. When there were no more sirens or screaming or death, there was just– life. Normal and mundane and wonderfully, beautifully dull.
“Honey, where did my socks go?” Wayne called, his bewildered voice making Dot smile as she finished up her make-up in the bathroom mirror. “I swear, I put them right down just a second ago.”
“Check the dresser,” She called back, fluffing up her hair just a little. “I bet you a milkshake you didn’t even take ‘em out of the drawer.”
Some shuffling noises later, and she heard Wayne exclaim ‘Oh geez!’
“So is strawberry okay, or do you want chocolate for that milkshake?” He called back and Dot laughed, walking out of the bathroom in her robe to go and kiss his cheek. He grinned back, unrepentant. “I’m thinking we both sneak out before closing time today and we can go pick Scotty up together for dinner.”
“Ooh, what’s the occasion?” Dot teased, reaching into her closet for the outfit she’d set out the night before. The notion of not just grabbing what was comfy for the day was still a little alien, in a wonderful way. Office clothes were not that different, really, if a bit less likely to consist of comfy cardigans and jeans everyday, but Dot hardly minded the excuse to play around a little with her looks for once.
“It’s Friday!” Wayne exclaimed, finishing up with his shoes and adjusting his shirt collar in her dressing room mirror for a beat before turning to smile at her. “And I’m the boss.”
“Ooh,” Dot teased, slipping into her dress and turning to let him do the back zipper up for her. “Frisky.”
“I’ll show you frisky,” Wayne murmured against her neck, and Dot leaned back into him, closing her eyes to savor it. The morning light, the moment, the solidity of him. Of them.
“That a promise?” She offered, and opened her eyes to see how his eyes lit up in excitement behind his glasses. She reached up to adjust them on his face and kissed his nose. “Down, Romeo, the munchkin awaits.”
“But tonight?” He tried, and she smiled back with a wink as she pulled back to head to the kitchen, hearing the predictable. “Shoot, where’s my wallet?” from behind her as she left the room.
“Morning baby,” She greeted when she found Scotty already sat at the table with her eyes glued to her tablet, crunching on cereal.
“Morning,” Scotty said, mouth full and Dot rolled her eyes, but didn’t bother saying anything as she went to the fridge to pull out the fixings of a decent breakfast for the lot of them. “I like your dress.”
“Do ya?” Dot teased, looking over her shoulder as Scotty shoved another spoonful in her mouth. “You want us to go find you one just like it, then?”
“No,” Scotty laughed, scuffed sneakers untied as she kicked them idly under the table. “I like my pants more.”
“They do look mighty nice on ya,” Dot conceded, even if she privately thought she might have to go shopping with Scotty soon anyway. She was getting so tall. “I think it’s the skinned knee that really pulls it together.”
“You’re silly,” was Scotty’s decree, and Dot had to agree, smiling at nothing as she put the bacon to fry on the pan.
“And you’re gonna be late,” Dot chided, pointing to the clock. “Remember you’re catching the bus today. Is your backpack even ready yet?”
“I couldn’t find my science notebook,” Scotty told her nonchalantly, unconcerned as she watched Sponge Bob. “I think I lost it.”
“This notebook?” Wayne called, coming into the kitchen and setting down his briefcase on the counter with one hand, showing off a glittery green notebook with the other. “The one I found in the bathroom?”
“The bathroom, really?” Dot complained, whisking the eggs, but she was laughing when Scotty sprang up to grab the notebook and ran to shove it into her school bag in the living room. “Don’t forget your pens this morning!”
“I won’t!” Scotty called back, but Dot held little hope it was true. Kid could lose her head if it wasn’t attached some days.
“Grab the orange juice, will you hon?” Dot asked Wayne, plating their food and turning with it in hand to find him already pouring it. “You’re on top of things this morning, huh?”
“Except for the socks,” Wayne nodded, and pulled her chair out for her. “I still owe you that milkshake.”
“You’ll just have to go get me one at lunch hour.” Dot primly informed him, “Extra cold, if you please.”
“I’ll just have to do that, won’t I?” Wayne said, not sounding put out at the prospect. “Might get myself one while I’m at it.”
“Now, I don’t know, that wasn’t in the deal,” Dot teased, and Wayne grinned. A long beat of comfortable silence followed as they dug in, cutlery noises taking over conversation as Dot heard Scotty still running around upstairs like a cute little headless chicken.
“How’re you feeling, about today?” Wayne asked after a few minutes, wiping his mouth on a napkin.
“Good,” Dot said, and meant more than he did with the question. Her bacon was a bit overcooked, but her eggs were perfect, and so was the rest of her morning. Her life. “Nervous, I guess. You know I’m still getting the hang of things, but I think I have a good idea on what we want for the new office.”
“I’ll say,” Wayne said, chewing with his mouth open in a perfect example of why her daughter had no manners at the table. “I think Todd was trying to get ya to run the whole project yourself so he wouldn’t hafta to keep explaining the changes to the contractors.”
“Todd should watch his butt then, I just might,” Dot joked, even though a part of her thought she could handle it, actually. It might be fun. One eye up on the clock, she called out. “Scotty! Bus time!”
“Coming!” Scotty called, then came the scramble of her running steps on the stairs, ignoring both of their calls of ‘Careful!’ as she burst inside the kitchen, breath minty fresh as she kissed both their cheeks. “Bye!”
“Remember we’ll pick you up today, wait for us at the gate,” Dot instructed, then kissed her cheek in return and watched her scramble out the door with one shoe lace freshly untied. “Scotty! Your shoe-!”
But she was gone. Dot sighed as Wayne laughed, and stood to collect their dishes.
“You about ready to go?” He asked as he loaded the dishwasher and Dot gulped down the last of her juice and nodded, standing to go brush her teeth upstairs.
“Two minutes,” She called back, and when alone in the main bathroom again, she stared at herself in the mirror for a second, caught by the look on her face.
Her house was still under repair, from the fire and the break-in. Outside the door, she and Wayne had transplanted their bedroom to the guest room temporarily, and the stairs still had raw wood for banisters in places. The house still smelled vaguely of smoke, when she laid down at night. Her face still had the fading shades of bruising that her work-appropriate dress was concealing in other parts of her body.
But there she was, smiling.
There she was.
“Dot?” Wayne called, and Dot shook her head clear as she grabbed her toothbrush and got to work, calling back a garbled ‘Coming!’ back to him that made him shout back “What?!” and had her laughing and spraying the mirror with toothpaste she’d had to clean off later.
Later.
“What do you mean, I can’t see him?” Dot demanded, but the corrections officer stared back at her with a bored disinterest that threatened to light a fire under her ass. “No, see, there must be some mistake. He has rights. Even if he’s a felon now, he’s–”
“Ma’am,” The man interrupted her flatly, and Dot reigned herself in the best she could to give him a challenging look. It didn’t seem to impress him. “As I said, the inmate you came to see is unavailable for visitation at the current time. It’s not a debate. You can contact our call center with his prisoner ID number to ask when visitations may resume.”
“Now wait just a minute, is this legal?” Dot demanded, even if she knew it was a losing fight. Gesturing with her care package in hand was difficult, but the unimpressed look of the broad, mustached officer didn’t change. “We did all the - all the paperwork and authorizations and all the hoopla. You can check, I’m on his list. He already can’t call me except once a month. How else is his family supposed to check up on him?”
“Visitation is a privilege,” The officer said, and Dot was about ready to launch her package at his face. She couldn’t, she knew she couldn’t, she couldn’t lose her only way to give Gator something from outside these walls, couldn’t be so stupid as to get crossed off his approved visitors altogether because she lost her cool.
But having driven for over two hours to see him only to be turned away at the door with no explanation when she’d promised him–
“At least tell me why,” She bargained, and when the man didn’t look away from staring her down, she glared right back. “Don’t make me call your supervisor.”
“Ma’am, this is a federal prison, not your local Walmart,” The officer replied, but whatever he saw in Dot’s face made his mustache twitch, and he finally deigned to look down to the clipboard he held and at least pretend to try. “His status inside the facility is confidential. You’ll have to contact the Warden if you want more details. In the future, call ahead of your scheduled visit so you won’t waste your time and mine. Next!”
“No, no, wait! Wait! Let me speak to the Warden then!” She tried, but the other family members around her were already shoving right past her to get through the security procedure to enter the visiting room, and the officer turned his back on her with finality.
Dot froze, torn between the impulse to push ahead and the very real fear of crossing some thin boundary that would get Gator hurt, if he wasn’t already.
“It’s not worth it,” Dot heard, and whirled around in a tizzy of frizzy hair – she hadn’t had the time to comb it while it was still wet this morning in her hurry to drop Scotty off at Lorraine’s and still make good time on the drive over – to meet calm brown eyes in a withered face, wrinkles softening the sad smile directed her way from under the woman’s white hair. “They never listen and they won’t tell you anything. You don’t go in and see the Warden like in the movies, you have to write to them through the post.”
“Oh shoot,” Dot murmured, only then realizing she was still clutching the care package she’d brought Gator. “Oh. So I can’t- but, how do I know if he’s alright?”
“You don’t,” A younger woman put in, bleached blonde hair tied up in a ponytail that swayed as she walked closer to stare Dot down. She was unusually tall. “Your man a first timer, hon?”
“Oh,” Dot blinked, then laughed nervously. “Oh no, he’s not– I’m married. I mean, not to him. He’s - he’s not my husband, is what I mean. He’s my little brother. And- and yes, he’s- he’s never been in prison before.”
“Fresh meat,” The younger woman said, then winced at Dot’s reaction. “Sorry, sorry, that was a shit thing to joke about, innit? I’m sure he’s just fine. The guards like to play power games sometimes, you just gotta play by their rules.”
“Even if he ain’t, they’re not gonna tell ya,” The old woman said, nodding her head to where the guards at the entrance were already eyeing them all suspiciously. “We have to go inside now, and you gotta leave. Don’t loiter here fuming, they won’t let ya. Just send the Warden a letter to inquire about your kid brother, wait for them to contact you.”
“But my package-” Dot mumbled, taken aback. The older woman was already moving forward toward the doors to sign herself in, but the younger woman gave her a sympathetic look.
“He won’t get it, hon,” She explained softly, and Dot clutched her bag to her chest in reflex, like she’d take it from her. The woman just shook her head. “They won’t give him anything you hand in in person like this, you gotta send it all through the post and hope it makes it past inspection. If your boy’s in the hole, he wouldn’t get it anyway.”
“The hole?” Dot mumbled faintly, a nightmarish flashback of the grave at the ranch filling her vision for a second before she forcibly blinked it away. “No, no, see, he got my cookies last time. He told me so.”
“He lied, babe,” The woman said, reaching out to pat her shoulder before walking past her as well. “Old Gladys had a point though, you gotta go now before they get jumpy that you’re out here selling smack or pushing contraband. Good luck with your boy.”
Then Dot was alone, the flock of women and children moving on further inside the facility to be patted down and searched, while she stood there, a box of cookies and essentials in hand that suddenly had no purpose.
“Head back to your car ma’am,” Another correctional officer told her, this one sans mustache but with a similar disinterest. “Your visit is over for the day.”
She did. As she left, she looked back at the squat brown building, the care package in her passenger seat, and watched it grow smaller in her rearview mirror with a feeling of dread she’d hoped to have left behind in North Dakota.