I slip from the hotel bed where Dylan is still sleeping, his toes peeking out from the polyester comforter. He’ll wake up later, stretching his arms out to reach for me. His eyes will search the room, and he’ll find the note I’ve left for him, stuck to the mirror on a pink Post-It.
D—
Had to see the lake one more time.
Love, Evelyn
I gather yesterday’s clothes from the floor and get dressed without turning on the light. According to the Florida Department of Corrections website, the prison opens for visitors at 8:00 a.m. so I need to get going. I slide my feet into sandals, grab Dylan’s keys, and walk out the door. Outside the air is sticky, the sun slung low in the sky. I rummage through my bag for mouthwash, take a swig, swish, and spit the green remains onto the concrete of the Motel 6 parking lot.
I punch my destination into the GPS, selecting a route full of back roads—fourteen miles from Starke to Raiford, northwest County Road 229 most of the way.
The road is narrow without a shoulder—just two lanes carved through a forest of slash pines and palmettos. I think about meeting him for the first time, imagine the sensation of my eyes finally meeting his. My chest feels tight, as if the blood is being squeezed from my heart.
I grip the steering wheel tighter, press my foot heavier on the gas. I imagine the first words he might say to me. I’ve had so long to think about it, to conjure up every possible scenario.
I already know what I’ll say to him. I’ve been practicing.
Last night, as we walked barefoot along the edge of Kingsley Lake, I caught a glimpse of something dark, and was sure it was the long body of an alligator gliding across the surface of the water. I grabbed Dylan’s hand and ran from the water and then buried my head in his chest until he assured me it was nothing, probably just a shadow.
“They’ll only hurt you if you hurt them,” he said as he rubbed my back.
There aren’t many houses along this road, just a pair of mailboxes here and there, a few small signs of life. The houses are set back along dirt roads, trees obscuring them from the main drag mostly, but in one spot, there is a clearing, and I can see a white mobile home with red trim around the windows and a rotting wooden deck. There’s a doghouse in the yard but no dog. A little girl’s bicycle, but no little girl.
When the GPS tells me to turn onto FL-16, I’ve almost reached my destination. I see an American flag waving high and a Florida state flag waving a bit lower, the red bars striking against the white. Then finally, a sign, smaller than I’d imagined, the signal I’ve arrived. FLORIDA STATE PRISON: UNION CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTION. I know he’s inside, somewhere within this maze of low buildings that looks more like a school campus than a prison.
For the first time, he and I are in the same place. We are two people living on the same coordinates, breathing the same atmosphere. I lean my face out the window and inhale as deeply as I can.
I see an observation tower in the distance, the kind you see in prisons in the movies or on TV, where a guard can watch the inmates while they exercise in the yard. The yard is surrounded by tall metal fencing, barbed wire coiled at the top just in case anyone tries to escape. The idea seems ridiculous at first—why would anyone risk scaling a fence and getting stabbed by barbed wire just to emerge on the other side, bloody and bawling, into the clutches of an armed guard or the jaws of a police dog? But then I remember—when you have nothing to lose, what’s one more risk, one more crime, one more chance at freedom? Perhaps your own two legs can take you farther than you thought.
I park the car and walk to the entrance, where a guard asks me to state my business. “Visiting an inmate,” I say, and my voice sounds younger than I want it to. I want to sound brave and mature, not like a scared child who’s never stepped foot inside a prison, who’s never even seen a gun up close like the one that’s snug in its holster on the guard’s belt.
He motions toward a cluster of people waiting to see a woman behind a glass window. “You’ll head over there and wait in line. She’ll give you paperwork and get you through to processing.” I start to walk away, but he puts his hand up to stop me. “Hang on,” he says. “Folks, just a reminder,” he says. I look behind me and see about a dozen people lined up and waiting. The guard addresses us as a group, using a voice that’s louder than before. “Each visitor is only allowed fifty dollars in cash on them and one car key. Anything else should be secured in your vehicle at this time. You will be subject to pat-down searches and metal detection. No exceptions.” He says it all without smiling and finally puts his hand down so I can go.
When it’s my turn at the glass window, the woman hands me a form to complete and asks for my ID. I retrieve it from my pocket, sliding it through the small opening to her. I try to steady my hand as I fill out the paperwork, but the woman can see my shaking. She examines my ID and then makes eye contact with me for just a second.
I hand the paperwork back to her. She signs it and then pushes a stamper onto a soft black ink pad, making a dark mark at the bottom of the page. She clicks her mouse a few times, and then a small printer spits out a yellow visitor sticker with my name on it. She hands it to me along with my ID.
“Attach this badge to your person, above the waist, please.” I peel the sticker from its backing, pressing it onto my shirt just above my heart. “Walk through that blue door on the right for search procedures,” she says. “Don’t worry, one of the female guards will search you.” I nod that I understand, and she flashes a closemouthed smile as if to say she’s sorry in advance for all of this trouble.
Through the blue door, I enter a large room where a woman counts and records the cash I have on hand, catalogs the jewelry I’m wearing, records the color and style of my shoes. She writes it all down on a yellow legal pad attached to a clipboard. She dons blue rubber gloves and searches through my hair. She asks me to move my bra around, to see if anything is hiding there. She motions for me to stand with my feet hip-width apart and my arms extended. I turn my body into a star while she runs her hands over me and pats my pockets. She grabs a security wand and waves it all around me, scanning my skin for hidden metal objects. She asks me to open my mouth, shining a small flashlight inside.
Once I’m cleared, I walk through green double doors and step onto the cracked concrete of a fenced-in walkway. The chain link creates a tunnel between buildings, ensuring that visitors stay on the approved path and don’t make a break for it or try to access a restricted area. Before my body can adjust to the humidity, I walk through another set of double doors, back into the chill of the air-conditioned building.
I am met by three armed guards and a metal detector.
“Right hand,” one of them says to me, and I offer it to him. My fingers flutter as he stamps FDC onto my skin in fat blocky letters. Another guard motions for me to walk through the metal detector, and I do. The machine doesn’t make a sound, and I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding in.
“Clear,” the third guard says in an urgent tone, like a doctor on TV about to shock a cardiac patient with paddles, asking everyone to take their hands off the body so they don’t feel the jolt. “Booth seventeen. Through that metal door.”
I walk through, find my numbered spot, and sit down. I lean one elbow on the stainless steel counter in front of me, my bare skin temporarily shocked by the cold surface. Everything is shiny and metal here—the counter, the stool I’m sitting on, the walls of the privacy booth. The glass in front of me is bulletproof, cross-hatched with thin wire. I stare at my feet and start counting the specks of blue and green on the tile floor. A woman cries softly somewhere. I can’t see her, can only hear her muffled sobs, as if she’s covering her face with a handkerchief or her shirtsleeve.
Across the glass from me, the seat on the other side is empty. I hear an analog clock ticking loudly on the wall behind me and feel the presence of the armed prison guard breathing as we wait.
Will I recognize him when he’s finally in front of me, his face in flesh and bone instead of pixels through a computer screen? I silently ask the universe for a signal, some way to know it’s really him.
Then, as if by magic, he appears on the other side, wearing a white jumpsuit with short sleeves and a pointed collar, yellowed buttons fastened all the way to the top. He moves more slowly than I thought he would and sits down gently. His lips curl into a half smile. I feel a flutter in my chest and then tears welling up, as if someone has found my lost pet and I just have to prove I’m the owner by making the dog answer to its name when I call.
I study the patches of dark hair on his forearm, the patterns they make against his pale skin. He reaches for the telephone on his side—an identical smooth black handset on my side that looks heavy but feels light in my hand when I pick it up. I mirror his movements and bring the receiver to my lips.
Enough standing at the edge, peering down into the darkness below. It’s time to jump. My body breaks the water like a coin dropped into a fountain. I dive down, down, down, until I reach the bottom. I find the words, gather them in my arms, and come up for air at last.
“Hi, Dad.”