“Thanks for everything,” she said quietly to David the next morning when he came to say goodbye to her at seven in the morning. “You did everything you could. Thank you,” she whispered, and kissed him on the cheek, as he hugged her, willing her to survive and remain as whole as possible during her two years in prison. He knew that, if she chose to, she could do it. There was a great deal of inner strength in her. It had kept her going, and sane, during the nightmarish years with her parents.
“I wish we could have done better,” David said sadly. But at least it hadn't been murder one. He couldn't have stood it if she'd gotten the death penalty. And as he looked at her, he realized something he had never let himself think before, that if she'd been older than eighteen he'd have been in love with her. She was that kind of person, there was something beautiful and strong hidden deep inside her, and it drew him toward her like a magnet. But knowing all she'd been through, and how young she was, he couldn't allow his feelings to run wild, and he had to force himself to think of her as a little sister.
“Don't worry about it, David. I'll be fine,” she said with a quiet smile, wanting to make him feel better. She knew that a part of her had long since died, and the rest of her would just have to hang on until a higher force decided that her life was over. Dying would have been so easy for her, because she had so little to lose, so little to live for. Except, somewhere, deep inside of her, she felt that she owed it to him to survive, and to Molly. They had done so much for her, they were the first people in her whole life who had really been there. She couldn't let them down now. She couldn't let go of life yet, if only for their sakes.
Just before they led her away, she gently touched his arm, and for an odd instant, as he looked at her, he thought there was something almost saintly about her. She had accepted her fate, and her destiny. And she looked dignified beyond her years, and strangely beautiful as they led her away in handcuffs. She turned once to wave to him, and he watched her with eyes blurred by tears that ran slowly down his cheeks as soon as she left him.
Chapter 4
At eight o'clock they put her on the bus to Dwight in leg irons and chains and handcuffs. It was just routine to transfer prisoners that way, and no particular reflection on her. And oddly, she found that once she was all trussed up in chains, the guards no longer spoke to her. To them, she had ceased to be a real person. There was no one to say goodbye to her, to wish her well. Molly had come the night before, and David that morning before she left, and the guards watched her leave without a word. She'd been no trouble for them, but she was just another convict to them, a face they would soon forget, in a daily lineup of felons.
The only thing memorable about her, as far as the guards were concerned, was that her case had been written about a lot in the papers. But essentially, it was nothing special to them. She'd killed her father, so had a lot of other convicts before her. And she hadn't gotten away with it. They thought she'd been lucky to get convicted of manslaughter instead of murder. But luck wasn't something Grace had seen a lot of.
The ride to Dwight took an hour and a half from Watseka, and the bus bounced along, as her chains ratded and her ankles and wrists ached. It was an uncomfortable trip to a fearsome destination. Grace sat alone for most of the trip, and then an hour before Dwight, they picked up four more women at a local jail, and one of them was chained to the seat beside her. She was a tough-looking girl about five years older than Grace, and she looked her over with interest.
“You ever been to Dwight before?” Grace shook her head, and was less than anxious to start a conversation. She had already figured out that the more she kept to herself, the better off she'd be once she got to prison. “What are you in for?” The girl got straight to the point, as she sized Grace up. She knew her for a fish the minute she saw her. It was obvious to her that Grace had never been to prison before, and it was unlikely that she'd survive it. “How old are you, kid?”
“Nineteen,” Grace lied, adding on a year, hoping to convince her inquisitor that she was a grown-up. To her, nineteen sounded really old.
“Playing with the big girls, huh? What'd you do? Steal some candy?”
Grace just shrugged and for a short while they rode on in silence. But there was nothing to see or do. The windows of the bus were covered so they couldn't see out, and no one could look in, and it was stifling.
“You read about the big drug bust in Kankakee?” the girl asked Grace after a while, sizing her up. But there was no mystery to Grace. She was almost what she appeared to be, a very young girl who didn't belong here. What the other girl couldn't see was how much she had suffered to get there. But nothing showed on Grace's face as she looked at her, it was as though the last of her soul had been boarded up when she left David and Molly. And no one could see inside now. She intended to keep it that way, and with luck, they would leave her alone once she got to prison.
She had heard hideous stories about rape and stab-bings while she was in jail, but she forced herself not to think of that now. If she had lived through the last four years, she could make it through the next two. Somehow, some tiny shred of what Molly and David had said to her had given her hope, and in spite of all the miseries in her life, if only for their sakes, she was determined to make it. It was different now. Someone cared about her. She had two friends, the first she'd ever had. They were allies.
“No, I didn't read about the drug bust,” Grace said quiedy, and the other girl shrugged in annoyance. She had bleached blond hair that looked as though it had been sawed off at her shoulders with a butcher knife and hadn't seen a comb in decades. Her eyes were cold and hard, and Grace noticed when she glanced at her arms that she had powerful muscles.
“They tried to get me to turn state's evidence against all the big guys, but I'm no snitch. I got integrity, ya know? Besides, I ain't lookin’ to have them come lookin’ for me at Dwight and fry my ass. Know what I mean? You work out?” Her accent said she was from New York, and she was exactly who Grace expected to meet in prison. She looked angry and tough and as though she could take care of herself. She seemed anxious to talk, and she started to tell Grace about the gym she'd helped build and her job in the laundry the last time she'd been in prison. She told her about two escapes that had taken place while she was there, but they had caught all the women who'd gotten out within a day. “It ain't worth it, they stick on another five years every time you do it. How long you got? I'm in for a dime this time, I should be out in a nickel.” Five years … ten … it seemed like a lifetime to Grace as she listened. “What about you?”
“Two years,” Grace said, not volunteering anything more than that. It seemed long enough to her, although it was certainly better than ten years, or what she might have gotten with another verdict.
“That's nothin’, kid, you'll do that in a minute. So,” she grinned, and Grace could see that all her teeth along the sides were missing. “So, you're a virgin, huh?” Grace glanced at her nervously at the question. “I mean this is your first time, right?” She really was a fish, and the idea amused the older girl. This was her third time at Dwight, and she was twenty-three years old. She'd been very busy.