Falling For An Inmate

Chapter 3: Not even his name

CHAPTER 3

Arya Crawford

"You sure you didn't say or do anything to offend him?

"I'm sure. At least I don't think I did."

Megan and I stood in the prison kitchen, making coffee for ourselves during our fifteen-minute break after the first session.

"Hmm. Tell me again what happened. And this time a little slowly."

I gulped a mouthful of air and started retelling the events of a failed first interaction session.

"I was waiting at a table like all the others. My mentee came in and sat at my table. I looked up from my bag and gasped a little because he had a bruise on his left eye."

Megan pulled out a pocket-sized mirror and began examining her face closely, applying another coat of lip-gloss on her pursed lips. "Did he hear you? You were subtle right?"

"Umm, define subtleness.."

"Oh my god, he heard you didn't he?" She had put away the mirror and lip-gloss and turned fully to me, in attention. Waiting for me to add to the story.

I started stacking spoons and forks in the small plastic wrack present for cutlery, out of nervousness and mumbled softly. "So did everyone else.."

"Arya! You're such an idiot! No wonder he walked out."

By now the coffee had brewed. Megan poured some into two plain white cups and pushed the sugar and milk containers towards me.

I prepared my coffee the way I drank it at home and fiddled with the mixing spoon, making a sad face pattern in my coffee.

"I know." I agreed, gloomily.

"So, you got nothing out of him? Not even his name?"

Megan's questions just kept depressing me even further. I had screwed up during, literally, the first fifteen minutes of the day. Without even having to try. If I couldn't get a convicted man to talk to me, how would I get frightened clients to talk to me when I became a lawyer? Why was I such an idiot?. I still had three more sessions to go but after the first, I wasn't sure I could talk to any of them. Let alone help them.

I sighed deeply and sadly, still mixing my coffee. "All I know is his last name."

"Alright come on, don't look so down. It's not the end of the world. He'll get over it. Cheer up!"

She threw me a smile and squeezed my hand reassuringly then left the kitchen with her coffee mug with a casual grace I couldn't even hope to exude.

Megan Sanders was an encapsulation of grace, tact and beauty. I, on the other hand, was quite the opposite. Clumsy to the point of getting seriously hurt, indiscreet to the point of unintentionally hurting people's feelings and impulsive to the point where it's dangerous.

I've already displayed my indiscreetness by pissing an inmate off the first day. Now all that's left to be witnessed is my clumsiness and impulsivity.

"DAMN IT! FUCK!!"

Scratch that. All that's left to be seen is my dangerous impulsivity.

Lost in my thoughts, I had started walking towards the door with the steaming cup of coffee in my hands and without realizing it, bumped straight into Captain Brandon. Spilling the scalding contents of the cup onto his chest and bloated stomach.

I quickly put the cup on the table and grabbed a hand towel from the counter to soak in cold water. The Captain, meanwhile, continued to yell and curse at the top of his lungs.