Chapter Two: Hard Road to Ride
895 Words
Day Two
I survived day one.
That doesn’t mean anything heroically. It just means I didn’t die in my sleep or get stabbed over a plastic tray. Still, surviving felt like an accomplishment living in this hell whole.
Four years.
That’s the number that keeps looping in my head like a broken record. Four years of concrete, metal, and men who look at you like they’re measuring your bones. I tell myself if I made it through yesterday, I can make it through today. And if I can make it through today, maybe I can make it through the rest.
That’s what I keep telling myself.
I found a piece of paper and a pencil. They weren’t mine—nothing in here really is—but I needed them. If I don’t write this down, I’m afraid it’ll slip away or twist into something else. Things already don’t feel solid. Like I’m awake, but not fully here.
So I’m writing.
Dear Diary,
Day two feels worse than day one.
Yesterday was a shock. Today I am afraid.
I only know what a few of these guys are in for, and honestly, I don’t want to know the rest. Everyone looks dangerous when you don’t know their story. Especially when they look at you like they’ve already decided what yours is.
Somehow, she turned seventeen.
I keep replaying that part, trying to find the moment where reality glitched. I didn’t do anything wrong. I know that. The night before, she was twenty-seven. I would swear on my life. But now I’m here, and swearing doesn’t mean s**t.
I’m terrified I’m going to die in this place over something that doesn’t make sense.
Life threw a curveball so hard it feels like a dream. Not a normal dream—one of those deep ones where you’re convinced you’ve woken up, but you haven’t. Everything feels slightly off. The sounds echo too long. The lights are too bright. Time stretches and snaps back.
I feel like I’m drowning, but I’m not in water. My hair’s dry. My lungs work fine.
I slapped myself just to be sure.
Yeah. Still awake.
Dinner comes too fast.
The line feels longer than yesterday, or maybe that’s just my nerves. The food looks worse up close—gray, lumpy, smelling like regret. I debate skipping it, but hunger wins like it always does.
“Hey, what’s up, James?”
Eric.
“What do you want?” I ask.
“Tonight’s dinner is one of the best,” he says, smiling like that’s a joke.
I look back at the tray. “That looks like mashed potatoes mixed with someone’s leg muscle.”
He laughs. “Mashed potatoes and pork chops, bro. Hell yeah.”
“That’s not pork. That’s a crime.”
“Ehhh,” he says, shrugging. “Come sit with us, bozo.”
Against my better judgment, I do.
Sitting with them doesn’tand make me feel safer, but it makes me feel less alone, which might be worse. Alone, you can disappear. In a group, you get noticed.
Four years.
This is going to be a very long time.
But I tell myself I’ll make it through. I have to.
One Month In
Time doesn’t move normally in prison. Days blur together until weeks feel like one stretched-out moment.
I found someone cute.
And no—it’s not a prisoner.
It’s a guard.
Of course it is.
She’s gorgeous in a way that feels illegal to look at her. But she’s a guard, not an inmate, so I tell myself to forget it. To keep my head down. Don't be stupid.
I fail at that.
I talk to her.
“Hi, I’m James,” I told her one day.
She just looks at me and laughs.
“What’s so funny?” I ask.
“Why do I need to know your name?” she says. “But… hi.”
That was it. That was the moment.
We started talking more after that. Nothing big. Just words. Minutes stolen here and there. Somehow, those minutes becameameome months.
I think she likes me.
That thought scares me more than prison ever did.
Two Months In
Let me tell you about the last two months.
They were the happiest I’ve been in a long time, which feels wrong considering where I am. Maybe that’s another sign this is all a dream.
Her name is Amber.
The first time I really looked at her, it felt like something clicked into place. Her eyes caught the light, and for a second, the walls didn’t feel so close.
“How long have you been a guard?” I ask her one day.
“Twelve years,” she says, like that’s nothing.
Too much happened after that. Too much to explain all at once.
So let’s come back to now.
Two months in.
I’m sitting across from Amber at lunch, trying not to stare, trying not to hope.
She leans in and lowers her voice.
“James,” she says, “I have a way of getting you out.”
My heart stops.
“Really?” I whisper. “Because I didn’t do anything. I need out.”
She looks at me, and for the first time, I can’t tell what she’s thinking.
And that’s where things stop feeling like a dream—
and start feeling dangerous.
- Writer
