On the inside, you expand to fill your limitations. To find the limits of your world. Your place in it.
We’re not precisely in prison. We do have freedom to wander the grounds. To use the bathroom in waking hours when we’d like. Wards may only enter their assigned wing, Commons, the cafeteria, the classrooms, the library. Admin is off-limits, unless summoned. Believe me, you don’t want to be summoned to the Warden.
All three of us stand in the hallway outside the infirmary, one way leading back to Commons and the entrances to the various wings, and the other way leading to Admin and the exit. All Mrs. Cheeves, the nurse, did was slap an Insta-Freeze cold pack on my face and pump me full of ibuprofen.
Booth glares at us. “As you’re so happy to point out often, Shreve, I’m just the Assistant Warden, which means the next eight hours of my time will be spent filling out forms in triplicate and reviewing all the video of the classroom and classroom hallway.”
“There’s a camera in the classroom?” I glance at Jack.
Booth smiles a cat-about-to-pounce-smile. “Why, yes, there is. Didn’t you know that?”
I might have paled. Just a little, though, and only for a moment. “Wait a sec. So there’s cameras in the classrooms? How come you never used them to bust me?”
It’s Booth’s turn to pale. He opens his mouth, and then he shuts it.
I pat his arm. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m out of the business anyway, Assistant Warden.”
His face purples until it resembles … well, half of mine. For a second he looks like he wants to rip me apart with his bare hands.
But then he throws back his shoulders and laughs.
He laughs.
He grabs me and pulls me into him, to his chest, in a big bear hug. I don’t quite know what to do. It’s inappropriate physical contact, of course, and I might be able to make some kind of trouble for him about it. But I can smell the man. Part cologne, part hair product, a taint of sweat and … well … him.
For a moment I think of the words parens patriae engraved over the entrance to the commons. Part of me wants to punch, scratch, kick—anything—not to have this contact. This closeness, never looked for. Never asked for.
But that moment’s gone, and he has me in his grip.
He’s not trying very hard to be the best enemy he can be right now. But there’s no indication he’s going to let me go anytime soon. So I hug back. What else am I supposed to do? He’s not that bad a guy.
When he’s done, he holds me out at arm’s length, tears streaming from his eyes, and peers at me.
“Shreve, be careful, will you? I don’t know what’s going on around here, but I know you.” He releases my arms. “I know you. And you’re as reckless as the day is long. I don’t want to see you get hurt.” Booth laughs again and wipes the tears from his face and points at my mug. “Any more hurt.”
My smile makes it feel like the flesh of my cheek is being drawn tight across a drum. I’m trying not to do it, trying not to smile back at him, because it hurts and because that’s not what we do at each other. He’s supposed to be my nemesis, for crying out loud. I don’t have a center point anymore if I don’t have Booth to fight against.
“Get yourselves back to your room. For today, I don’t want you roaming around until I get a handle on what’s going on.”
I nod. But I have no intention of doing what he says. That feels good, to get to disobey him again. Seems like old times.
Booth jangles off toward Admin, and I wait until he’s out of sight. Then I say to Jack, “If you tell anyone about that, I’ll kill you.” We’ve got to run. Now. But we’ve got to get back to the cell first. “C’mon,” I tell Jack. “We’ll get all my money, which isn’t too much, but enough. And we’ll get my secret weapons.”