The Story of Tinkerbell

Tinkerbell Gets Unmade

"It's beautiful," I breathed. "This is where they're taking us?"

Jane cocked a fine, dark eyebrow, her lips quirking in amusement.

We motored around a bend and a drab fortress of concrete came into view: tall blocky buildings pierced by tiny windows resembling arrow slits. The complex was ringed by turret-like guard towers. If I didn't know better, I'd have thought it was an ancient Scottish stronghold.

"McNeil Island Prison," one of our guards said. "Built in 1875, and former home to such infamous greats as Robert Straud, James Fogle, and Charles Manson."

"Charles Manson?" I asked, my brow furrowing. "But he's..."

The guard grinned. "He was in here for check forgery, then he was released so he could move on to bigger things."

I grinned back uncertainly. "This place was opened in 1875? Jesus, Washington wasn't even a state until 1889."

The three guards' eyebrows shot up, and the boat captain shot me a look over his shoulder. The whole boat fell silent. Most of the prisoners gave me the blank, predatory looks I associated with school bullies, but Jane looked impressed, and another girl standing in the stern regarded me with bright interest.

"It was a federal prison before statehood, and even after," she said. She hobbled over on her shackled feet and plopped down next to me, smiling. "Hi. I'm Beth."

I smiled back. "Tinkerbell."

She giggled, crinkling her nose. Her long, brown hair billowed in the breeze. "Tinkerbell! I've heard of you, I think. You're that chick that writes funny short stories, right?"

"That's me." I took a deep breath of the sea air. Prison wasn't too bad, really.

***

"Wake up, wake up, wake up. It's oh-four-hundred, time to wake up."

The voice crackled over the intercom with cruel military exuberance. I squeezed my sandy eyes shut and tugged my thin blankets tighter around me. Charity, my roomie, groaned. It seemed unfair that now I'd figured out how to sleep again I never got a chance to do it.

With a sigh, I flung off my blankets and hauled myself to my feet, slipping into my Bob Barker sneakers. It took Charity a couple minutes longer, but she eventually achieved verticality. Women who couldn't keep the schedule were kicked out of the program and sent back to prison to serve the remainder of their long sentences.

The sleepy lot of us gathered in the hallway until the guards came and trouped us off to the gym for P.T.

***

I tried to hold myself halfway in pushup position, my skinny junkie arms trembling, while a steely-eyed man in military uniform stood over me. "What's wrong with you, Shirley Temple? You tired? You ready to give up?"

The other prisoners laid comfortably on their bellies, smirking behind the sergeant's back. I gritted my teeth. "No, sir! And the name's Tinkerbell, sir!"

I thought I saw his lips twitch into a faint grin, but it was hard to tell with my eyeballs bulging from the strain. "Keep it up, Tinkerbell."

He finally looked up and noticed the other prisoners lazing around like seals in the sun. He scowled. "What the hell are you soft-bellied morons doing?" He clapped his hands. "Push-ups! One-two!"

Somehow I got through the exercises, even though I was so sore from the previous day's session I could hardly walk. Inmates that had been there longer told me the soreness wore off after the first week. I hoped that was true, because even sitting on the toilet was an insurmountable task.