Blood Sisters(14)

Johnny was looking back over his shoulder as he lumbered down the corridor with the tall blonde woman. Barbara had noticed too. ‘Maybe he’ll be a friend for you.’

‘We’re … not … allowed … boyfriends … here,’ chipped in Margaret.

‘But boys can be friends,’ said Barbara, more sharply this time.

Kitty’s skin prickled. Boys?

The words reminded her of something. Something bad.

‘Stop banging your head like that!’

But it was the only way to stop the nasty feeling which was sucking her up like a deep black cloud. Even though Kitty couldn’t, for the life of her, understand why.





7


November 2016


Alison


WELCOME ALISON BAKER. YOU’RE HERE AT LAST.

CAN’T WAIT TO MEET YOU.

My hand is shaking. The note it is holding is made up of letters that are cut out individually from a magazine.

I’d arrived early for class so I’d gone to my staff pigeon hole to check for post. Normally, I don’t have anything. But today was different.

A brown envelope. Internal mail.

For a minute I stare at the words. Try to think my way around it. Could it be something innocent? But no one knows my surname, apart from the staff.

There’s a knock on the door. My men have started to arrive. I stuff the note in my pocket and I open up. Ready for business.

‘What made you come here, miss? Most of us want to get out.’

The question comes from Barry, a small man with a head like a light bulb. Big on top and narrow at the chin. His mug has BEST GRANDAD IN THE WORLD written on the side. Everyone calls him Grandad. Until now I’ve found his questions a diversion – even flattering – but right now I am a mess.

I glance up at the window. I know that officers walk past the art room every quarter of an hour. But the main office is a good ten minutes’ walk from here.

‘Because I want to be able to help people enjoy art as much as I do,’ I say briskly, rifling through the stationery cupboard in the corner. Anything to keep my hands busy.

Barry nods, apparently satisfied. I shiver, recalling Angela’s latest advice. ‘Don’t give away anything personal,’ she’d told me. ‘They can use it to get at you. Once we had a teacher who told her class she was getting married. One of her men kept stalking her round the prison, promising her the world if she married him instead.’

‘That’s awful!’ I’d been appalled.

‘She reported him to the governor but he kept on doing it. So he got sent to another prison. Freaked her out, it did.’

Angela had made a what can you do? face. ‘The blokes here can do odd things when there are women around.’

YOU’RE HERE AT LAST. CAN’T WAIT TO MEET YOU.

Could one of my students be the culprit? I only have two. Barry and Kurt.

Yes, Kurt is here too. Grinning at me with those stained teeth. Watching me as I bend over his sheet of paper. The thing about teaching art is that you have to get quite close physically to your students when helping them with a drawing. Not ideal in a prison situation. But Angela likes him, and I trust her.

Today we’re working on cartoon cats. It’s not my speciality but Barry wants to post a picture to his grandchildren. ‘They love kittens,’ he says with a sad voice.

I try to focus on the image of him and his grandchildren instead of the note burning a hole in my pocket. I do a ‘cat demo’ on the whiteboard with a felt pen, using circles for the body and head with straight lines for whiskers.

‘Is mine better than his, miss?’ asks Kurt. He’s putting me on the spot and he knows it.

‘Art isn’t like that,’ I say. ‘You judge each piece of work on its own merits.’

‘Like breaking the law?’

I try not to be spooked by his grin.

‘Grandad here got off lightly, if you ask me. Want to know what he did?’

‘Fuck off, Kurt.’

The older man’s voice comes out as a low growl. I prickle with nerves.

‘Come on, Grandad. You’re scaring our artist lady. Be nice now.’

‘Artist lady’ is the tag which Kurt has recently ascribed to me. It manages to convey a mixture of amusement and sarcasm without being out-and-out offensive. I don’t correct him because I suspect this is just what he wants.

It’s a relief when class has finished. Kurt leaps up to hold open the door for me. ‘Thank you,’ I say, ‘but you need to go first so I can lock up.’

He smiles that horrible grin. ‘Want any help tidying up?’

Is it Kurt I should be afraid of?

‘No thank you.’ I breathe a sigh of relief as he finally saunters away.

At lunch I’m desperate to confide in Angela about the note. But something – I’m not sure what – stops me.

Instead, I tell her about the class. About the man they call Grandad and my cat lesson. Try to eat my macaroni cheese without thinking too much about what might be in there.

‘You mean Barry?’ My new friend pauses mid-mouthful. Her face suddenly looks white. ‘He’s in your group? And he’s drawing cats?’

‘Isn’t that allowed?’ My heart is suddenly hammering. What have I done?

‘You weren’t to know.’ Angela shakes her head and puts the fork down. ‘That man was put away for – murdering children.’ She shudders. ‘Three of them. You might have read about the case. It was in the mid-sixties.’