Mean Woman Blues Read Online Free PDF Page B

told her it was the only alternative to paying the check herself, but she’d always felt guilty about it. Had the chickens now come home to roost? Had someone signed an affidavit against her, as the result of a clerical error? At least it was an explanation.
    She felt frozen in more ways than one. She thought later that she must have been in shock. She sat immobile and shivering, trying to take in her surroundings, comprehend her situation. She really didn’t want to put her mind to what to do next.
    They called her for pre-booking, and she felt a shock of betrayal. How could they hold her without booking her? Forgetting the question prohibition, she blurted it out. The deputy laughed. “We can hold you seventy-two hours without booking you.”
    Seventy-two hours!
    “You’ve got to be kidding! You can’t do that.”
    The woman smiled, not a worry in the world. “Sure can.”
    She was so damn smug and superior, like she enjoyed making Terri miserable.
    Every cell in Terri’s body protested.
But I’m a good citizen. I pay taxes. I vote. I’m a
good
girl
. She knew better than to say it.
    When she came back to the lockup, one of the phones was free, so she grabbed it. But she didn’t do anything, just stood there and dithered some more. Finally, someone said, “You gonna use it or not?”
    Timidly, Terri moved away.
    There was a toilet of sorts in the holding tank, a toilet partly shielded by a waist-high concrete wall, but from certain angles everyone could see you sitting there doing your business. Someone was sitting there now and hollering for toilet paper.
    “Goddammit!” one of the deputies hollered. “You bitches are out of control. Get off the phones. Up against the wall.”
    And then he locked them all in the holding tank, where they stayed for the next twenty or thirty minutes.
    Terri was terrified. “What’s going on?” she asked no one in particular. Most of the women ignored her, but one of them shrugged. “Never did figure it out. Think they go on break.”
    A woman deputy was standing outside the holding tank, in plain view of everyone, eating a small pack of chips. Eating it slowly. Very slowly. One chip at a time.
    She was either talking to herself or to someone just out of Terri’s sight. “Ain’t had a minute to myself all day. I’m going to enjoy my snack.” She spoke almost as slowly as she ate.
    Terri was becoming increasingly panicked. All bets were off in jail. She might be furious with Isaac, might never be his girlfriend again, but she could worry about that later. Right now, she needed him to bail her out.
    Eventually, another guard came along and unlocked the cell. With access to the phones once again (and with the fear of God in her), Terri dialed Isaac’s number, fingers flying, before she talked herself out of it. He came on the line.
    A recorded voice said, “This is Orleans Parish Prison…”
    Isaac hung up.
    That was the last thing Terri expected. He wouldn’t even talk to her. She sat back down, humbled, and shivered some more. Gradually, she realized the hang-up wasn’t personal, Isaac just wasn’t used to getting calls from prisoners, which, when you thought about it, spoke well for him. Finally, she got up the nerve to try again, and this time he heard the recording out “This is Orleans Parish Prison. Will you accept a collect call from…”
    “Terri,” she said, almost shouting. “Terri!” She’d nearly missed her cue.
    “Terri?” He spoke as if he’d never heard of her, and the phone disconnected itself.
    A guard came in again. “Okay, everybody off the phones. Up against the wall.”
    It was a long time before Terri got a chance at a phone again, and in the interim she debated once again the wisdom of calling this man who’d betrayed her. But every time, in spite of what she’d seen, Isaac won the argument simply because the thought of him was so comforting. She knew she’d be putting him out in a way that wasn’t right. With great