One by one the other girls were taken from the cell and led away to be processed. After three hours it was my turn. I was taken into a small office by a pleasant female officer who promptly took my photograph. She didn’t ask me to smile. I was given a towel from a washing basket on the floor that had my name on it, plus some blue tracksuit pants, a windcheater, bra, socks and a pair of prison-issue runners. Then I was directed to a screenless shower. Once naked, I was handed a lice treatment that smelled like rocket fuel and told to douse myself in it head-to-toe. Another female officer watched my every move but, given the monumental number of strip-searches I’d endured at the hands of the Tarantula, I was an old hand at public nudity.
Clean, deloused and dressed I was led to another office and interviewed. ‘How are you going, Kerry? Can I call you Kerry?’ the officer began, and pushed a packet of cigarettes and a lighter across the table towards me.
‘Yes you can and I’m doing OK, thanks.’
Over the next hour she took down administrative details including my next of kin, children, barrister’s details and medical history. ‘Well then, Kerry, the only other thing we need to talk about is protection. Do you need any?’ she asked. I was thinking sanitary pads but the officer noticed my confusion and saved me the embarrassment of asking for clarification. ‘Protection is a secure area for women coming in for crimes against children, or who are testifying against a co-offender, or who have major issues with any women already in prison,’ she said, before adding reassuringly, ‘I think you’ll be just fine.’
She closed the folder and looked at me earnestly. ‘OK, Kerry, a couple of bits of advice. Firstly, and most importantly, trust no one. Secondly, keep your cigarettes out of view of other women as they’re like currency on the compound. Most new girls are stood over for their cigarettes and usually just give them up to avoid the confrontation. I hope this doesn’t happen to you.’
‘Me too.’
‘And thirdly, Kerry,’ she continued, ‘trust no one.’
‘Trust no one. Got it.’
I was taken to an adjacent room and told to get naked again. I was about to find out that when doing strip-searches, Corrections Officers go the extra mile to try to stop any contraband slipping through their blue fingers and into the prison. Consequently they looked for drugs and weapons in my mouth, ears, nose, hair, on the soles of my feet, in between my fingers and toes and under my breasts. ‘OK, turn around and face the wall.’ I did as instructed. ‘Good, now bend over and hold each cheek with your hands, and pull them apart.’
Awful scenarios tore through my mind. ‘Are they going to do an internal search? I’m not prepared for this!’ I figured if anyone knew about the secret business of a woman’s internal bank it would be seasoned prison officers, and I reckoned they might just have the authority to go ‘in there’. But, much to my relief, no such invasion was launched.
I re-dressed and was taken for a medical. The doctor seemed pleased to see an inmate who was 100 per cent drug free and in excellent physical health. Next I met with a Corrections psychiatrist. ‘So, you’re here now?’ he said, not so much a question as a useless statement of fact.
‘It appears so,’ I replied.
‘Are you feeling suicidal?’
‘No, not yet.’
‘Have you ever attempted suicide in the past?’
‘No.’
‘No self-harm? Wrists? Something like that?’
‘No!’
By now a couple of the women from Moorabbin had been taken into the Remand Unit, known as A5, but there were no beds available for the rest of us. Kristy was going to stay in the medical division while Deb and I were to be taken to another unit. We picked up our washing baskets and were escorted into the freezing blackness of the night. Once inside our destination building, A6, we entered a long corridor with six large steel doors on either side: the cells. Before I was locked up, I was allowed to take a call from one of my sisters, Cheryl, at the front desk. She was anxious to tell me that Shannyn and Sarah would be coming to see me on Sunday, in just four sleeps.
‘Are you alright?’ Cheryl asked urgently. ‘We’re so worried about you.’
‘I’m fine, honestly I am. Please don’t worry so much. You know I’ll be OK. I’ve just arrived so I can’t tell you that much. I’m only concerned about the girls.’
‘Will you be able to ring them tomorrow?’ she asked.
‘Surely,’ I said, but I honestly had no idea.
Shannon with an ‘o’ from Ringwood cells had been right. The cells at Dame Phyllis Frost were waaaay better. I was put into a disabled cell – twice the size of a regular one. And it was warm! Tonight I would sleep between sheets on a mattress. I even had a pillow and a doona. I could use the shower when I wanted and I was armed with sachets of shampoo, conditioner and a comb. After I scrubbed the delousing pesticide from my hair and skin and replaced the toxic fumes with the reassuring scent of Palmolive, I climbed into the bed thinking of Shannyn and Sarah. ‘I’ll see you soon, darlings,’ I whispered into the darkness. That night I dreamed about giving birth to them and being happy.
‘Stand by your door for muster.’ The command blasted over the prison PA system at 7.45am. Muster was a count of every single inmate in the prison to ensure no one had escaped. It happened four times a day, every day. The first was in preparation for the en-masse release of prisoners from their cells at 8am, heralded by the command, ‘Movements may commence.’ When the officers unlocked my cell door, however, I didn’t move an inch. After ten minutes frozen to the spot, I finally worked up enough nerve to nudge it open a millimetre, and then another. Suddenly I got some help – the door was yanked wide open by possibly the largest woman I had ever seen. She filled the entire doorway as she nonchalantly stuffed half a sandwich into her massive mouth using fingers the size of hotdogs. Despite her alarming size and presence, I could see she had friendly eyes. She introduced herself as Robyn.
‘Oh, hi. I’m Kerry,’ I said nervously.
‘Come outside and have a smoke. I’ll introduce you to the girls,’ Robyn mumbled through a mouthful of bread. ‘Follow me. It’ll be the best thing for you, being new and all.’
Looking past her into the corridor I was reminded of the final scene in the film Who Framed Roger Rabbit when the brick wall around Toon Town is knocked down to reveal the chaos within: marching bands and crazy cartoon characters running about in every direction. It was obvious these were no ordinary women. I was spellbound and horrified at once. ‘Holy shit. Am I in a psychiatric unit?’ I wondered. Robyn handed me a cigarette and pulled me into an enclosed outdoor yard where two obese women – both dressed the same as me – were hunkered down at a table. ‘Kerry, this is Bomber,’ Robyn said, gesturing to the one who was sucking on a Red Skin.
‘What’s doin’ and all that?’ Bomber said, holding up her hand as if to high-five me.
‘Nice to meet you, Bomber,’ I said, opting for a toothy smile instead of a sticky hand slap.
‘And over here, Kerry, we have Sparky,’ said Robyn, turning to another woman in her forties with faded tattoos on her arms. ‘Sparky, meet Kerry.’
‘Gidday there! Welcome to the nut house,’ Sparky slurred.
‘Oh, hello. Thanks!’ I said brightly, although my internal voice urgently whispered, ‘You’re in the nut house. You’re in the nut house. You’re in the nut house …’
Robyn took me aside for a background briefing. ‘Now listen, Kerry. I thought I’d let you know that the girls here are really great, but some are real fucking head cases. Bomber threatens to blow up airports, judges, the prison – things like that. And Sparky, well Sparky likes to set fires. Big motherfucker fires.’
‘Oh, OK then,’ I said, bereft of what to say.
Robyn had issues too; borderline personality disorder, apparently, but I couldn’t see anything borderline about it – her affliction was full-on. One minute she was lighthearted and funny and the next she’d explode with rage. I was walking alongside her later in the morning when she tried to get the attention of an officer and was either not heard or ignored. In a flash Robyn picked up a plastic chair and hurled it against a wall with such force one of the legs snapped off. That got the officers’ attention; it took five of them to restrain her and one to cinch the handcuffs around her giant Christmas-ham wrists. They threw Robyn into her cell screaming blue murder all the way.
While Robyn was locked down, the officers helped me fill out my visitor and telephone contacts lists. I was told I could have ten visitors on my list at any time. Each person was the subject of a police check and also had to be approved by the prison. If they weren’t on the list, they didn’t get in. Same with the phone list: ten people could be programmed into the system once they’d been approved by the prison. To make a call, inmates had to lift the receiver of one of the phones stationed around the prison, enter their ID number and a four-digit pin code and then select a phone number from their list of ten. Every call was limited to twelve minutes, then the phone cut out. They were also monitored and taped.
Since my phone numbers were yet to be put into the system, an officer allowed me to ring my girls from the office. With my heart in my mouth, I dialled the number and Shannyn immediately picked up.
‘Hello sweetheart, it’s Mummy!’
‘Hi Mummy! Can we come and see you on Sunday?’ Shannyn squeaked excitedly, definitely happier than our last call.
‘You bet you can, sweetie. I can’t wait. I’m counting the sleeps until then. Are you OK, Shannyn?’
‘Yes, but I’m still really sad.’ Her voice was dropping.
‘So am I, sweetie. So am I. But it makes me really happy that I’ll be seeing you very soon.’
‘Me too, Mummy … um … Mummy, I cried last night because I missed you. So did Sarah.’
‘Sweetheart, it’s OK to cry,’ I said, trying to soothe her. ‘When you feel like crying just remember how much I love you and try to think that it’s only three more sleeps until we see each other. Then we’ll have lots of kisses and cuddles, OK?’
‘OK, Mummy, I love you. Daddy wants to talk.’
The girls’ father told me Sarah was in the bath but I could talk to her tomorrow. ‘She’s fine,’ he said. ‘They’re both a lot better now. I’ll bring them in on Sunday morning and they can stay for the afternoon visit as well.’
‘Thank you,’ I said. Then the line went dead. Twelve minutes flies when you’re dying inside.