Chloe in Prison Ch. 12

Day Twenty: Exercise

We did not have to wait long for Mrs Tiggywinkle to put in an appearance: she turned up next morning with Raymond for shaving inspection. She'd done something different to her hair: the spiky little stooks had been squared-off, and now stood up in a sort of stubbly, checkerboard crew-cut. Her face looked more than ever like a squashed hamburger.

"This is very smooth," said Raymond, running the back of her forefinger appreciatively over my mound. "They should have a competition for shaving: this cell would win first prize."

It was the first time a Warden had paid me anything like a compliment.

When Raymond was done I said nervously:

"Please may I speak to you in private Officer Causer?"

"Mrs Tiggywinkle looked surprised; Raymond, too, looked from me to Rose questioningly - before quietly leaving the cell and shutting the door behind her.

"What's this about?" said Mrs Tiggywinkle.

Although I had rehearsed several times, my nerve almost failed me.

"Did you enjoy your holiday?" I asked.

"Yes," said Mrs Tiggywinkle: "though I don't see that's any of your business."

"Did Jenny enjoy it?" I asked.

"What do you want Littlehayes?" demanded Mrs Tiggywinkle sharply.

I quailed under the look she gave me. I thought of Cradock, and Prana, and all the other anonymous women who had dared to confront prison officers.

"It's like this," I said. "You gave me some ideas in the broom cupboard. About pinching being the best form of discipline. I thought I'd sound out Officer Dawes about them."

"They've got nothing to do with Officer Dawes," said Mrs Tiggywinkle: "If you go wasting Officer Dawes' time you'll live to regret it."

"I wouldn't waste her time," I said. "But if I told her how you pinched me, and how contrite I felt afterwards, and how determined I was to behave better - well, I'm sure she'd be pleased with both of us."

Mrs Tiggywinkle stared at me. I could see doubt in her face.

"I don't think that's a good idea Littlehayes," she said, but I could tell she was starting to feel unsure of her ground.

Then Rose spoke:

"My cellmate would like a flannel and some shampoo," she said.

Mrs Tiggywinkle turned to Rose sharply. She seemed about to speak, but held her peace. After a moment she nodded slowly.

"And a bar of chocolate," said Rose.

Mrs Tiggywinkle looked on the point of revolt: she glared at Rose. Then she nodded.

Please stop now, I willed Rose, please don't push it any further.

But Rose too could read the signs:

"Thank you Officer Causer," she said politely.

Mrs Tiggywinkle turned on the heels of her black uniform boots and left the cell.

"Rose," I beamed, though I was still shaking: "we did it!"

"Looks like it," said Rose.

"I thought she was going to rebel when you asked for the chocolate."

"She almost did - but she knows where her best interests lie."

And about an hour later the door opened, Mrs Tiggywinkle entered, and without a word placed on my bed a blue flannel, a small bottle of shampoo, and a whole bar of chocolate.

The moment she'd gone I broke the chocolate in half.

"This is for you Rose," I said.

"No," said Rose: "it was you Mrs Tiggywinkle abused: you deserve the chocolate."

"Rose, if you refuse we are going to fall out: I mean it."

"I'll take two squares off you," said Rose, "to cover the squares I gave Prana. But that's all. So no more arguments."

I handed Rose two squares of the chocolate.

"It isn't laxative again is it?" I asked, though I had an instinct it would not be."

"No," said Rose, examining the design: "though even if it was I'm not at all sure I wouldn't eat it." And so saying Rose put a square of chocolate into her mouth, and for the next five minutes was lost in blissful sucking and chewing. The other square she slid under her pillow.

"Oh Chloe: that was so good," she sighed. "You really should eat some."

I was very tempted. But I did not need a maths degree to know that six squares of chocolate equated to three sessions with Prana.

I spent much of the morning just marvelling at the shampoo, the flannel, and the chocolate. I held them up, I smelt them, I turned them round in my fingers and I touched them to my cheek. It was as though Christmas had come. Eventually I put them under my pillow. But after lunch, when both Rose and I had settled down for a nap, I pulled out the flannel, and hugged it to my breasts, like an orphanage girl hugging a solitary teddy bear.

It was with a glad heart that I joined the queue of prisoners filing out to Exercise. Passing the door of Prana's cell I tried once more to memorise the name of her fellow inmate, but all I could retain of the unfamiliar combinations of letters was the ending: SKI. I had developed a great curiosity about this enigmatic person who had access to Prana day and night, and was keen to get a look at her and to find out about her.

Outside it was another balmy spring day, with no hint of rain: nor, thankfully, was there any sign of the whipping horse. I was still basking in the afterglow of the tumultuous orgasms I had had in the shower, and I didn't plan to have sex with Prana - though I'd brought two squares of chocolate with me, just in case. Mindful of what had happened with Wilson, I had concealed them in my sock: but this time nobody accosted me.

Once inside the cage many of the prisoners resembled lambs, running and jumping and darting aimlessly about, not knowing quite what to do with their bodies other than exult in their freedom of movement. Without any prior thought I found myself running around the perimeter fence with a pack of other women, until one by one we dropped out of the race to nowhere, breathless.

I scanned the throng, trying to pick out familiar faces, and became aware of somebody standing against the wire, not far away from me. As soon as I caught her eye she came up to me, as though she had been waiting for me to notice her.

"Hello Chloe," she said: "isn't it good to be outside?"

"Wonderful Micky," I said. She looked young, like a gangly schoolgirl - or even schoolboy: though in short socks and prison sandals even the older, bulkier women looked the part of schoolgirls.

"I've brought your chocolate," Micky said.

"OK Micky," I replied. I hadn't forgotten my promise, and intended to keep it, even though I no longer had urgent need of chocolate. "Just give me a few minutes, there's someone I have to see first."

"I'll wait here," Micky said.

I set off on a search. Really I would have liked to see Prana before having to attend to Micky: but there was somebody I needed to see as a priority.

As usual they were together, with the little huddle of traders at one end of the cage.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't our favourite prisoner," said Brenda - or was it Freda, I suddenly couldn't remember, but whichever it was she imprisoned me in her arms and hugged me to her whilst mussing my hair.

"We thought you'd deserted us when you didn't come to say hello in Showers," said the other - Freda, I was now certain.

"I'm sorry," I said: "I was - preoccupied."

"Oh, we know dear," said Freda, who now took her turn to hug me: "we could hear you. Everybody in Showers could hear you."

"Look at her blushing," said Brenda. "You'd think butter wouldn't melt in her mouth."

"I know what does melt in her mouth," said Freda: and they, and the assembled company collapsed into giggles.

I put up with several more minutes of this, then I asked:

"Have you got my emery board?"

"And we thought you'd forgotten all about it," sighed Brenda. "We were just going to offer it to that new girl, weren't we sister?"

Somewhat to my surprise, for I'd begun to fear that the emery board would turn out to be lost, or missing, or entirely mythical, Freda hitched up her pullover and from some hidden cavity in the region of her breasts produced what I'd asked for.

"Kiss first," she said, holding it behind her head when I reached for it.

I dutifully planted a kiss on her lips - then went through the same process with Brenda.

"Would you like to earn another one next Showers?" asked Brenda lecherously.

"It's two squares of chocolate next time," I said.

"Hark at her!" said Brenda. "Two squares of chocolate indeed. What do you think we do in here, run a chocolate factory?'

"Each," I said.

Freda gave me a sharp get-away-with-you push on the shoulder, and they burst out laughing again. Before they could say any more I took off.

"Sorry I took so long," I told Micky. Truth to tell, now I had the emery board I wanted to find Prana as soon as possible, and half my attention was taken with scanning the Exercise Yard for her. But a promise was a promise.

"Will you hold me Chloe?" asked Micky.

I put my arms around her and we hugged one another.

"Can I ask you something Chloe?" asked Micky.

Of course you can," I said.

"Did you have a girlfriend before you came here?"

"No," I said. "I only ever had boyfriends."

"I always preferred girls," said Micky. "I had a few girlfriends: but no-one as pretty as you."

"Thank you Micky," I said: and though I should have felt flattered, this made me slightly uneasy.

"Will you play with my breasts?" Micky asked, after we had stood in this way for some minutes.

I ran my hands under her jumper and shirt: forgetting for a moment that she did not wear a bra, I was surprised how readily my fingers made contact with the tiny protuberances on Micky's chest. There was so little to get hold of: all I could do stroke her with my fingertips. When her nipples stiffened I tweaked them, and felt them spring back into place as I smoothed them from side to side. As I did this I was again surprised by the sensations between my legs: I'd grown to love and respond to Rose's generous, maternal body; Prana was beautiful by anybody's standards; now, perversely, it was as though the act of touching someone who wasn't naturally sexy was in itself a turn on.

"That's nice," said Micky, purring.

I carried on fondling her breasts, trying to touch them with tenderness: in my mind I was striving to compensate for what I imagined was the lack of love with which they had been touched before. I wondered how Micky really felt about them: if she herself ever touched them with love, or only self-loathing. If she had not told me their history, I could almost have fancied they were the result of some punitive mutilation carried out by Dawes and Hardiman.

"Will you play with my pussy now Chloe?" asked Micky.

I took my hands off her chest, and slid them up her skirt, teasing the elastic of her prison knickers. I slid my hands inside, down over her buttocks, then round her hips, and eased the knickers down a few inches. With my left hand I groped between her legs, which she opened as best she could, for we were not allowed to remove any clothing at Exercise. Her mound was prominent and well-defined, a little inverted hummock, and I began to finger her, gradually sliding my finger deeper along her crevice as she grew wetter. She was making purring noises, and I found myself supporting more of her weight as she draped herself limply around me. When she came she came softly, sighing and exhaling deeply.

"That was so nice Chloe," she said, still with her arms draped around my shoulders. "You know just how to touch me."

I eased her against the wire mesh, and tried to disentangle myself.

"Do you have to go yet?" she asked.

"In a few minutes," I said. Eager as I was to find Prana, I sensed that if I left too soon I would leave Micky crying. I pulled her knickers back up and tucked her shirt into her skirt. Then I gave her a peck on the cheek.

"I really do have to go now," I said.

"Wait Chloe - I haven't given you your chocolate," said Micky.

She, too, had secreted the chocolate in her sock: one square of it, just as she'd promised.

"Can we do this again?" she asked, turning her earnest brown eyes on me.

"Of course we can Micky," I promised her.

I gave her another kiss, smoothed down her rumpled brown hair - and left her.

I found Prana examining an orange hair-band.

"What do you think Chloe?" she asked, pulling her hair behind her and slipping on the elastic hair-band.

"I like it best hanging loose and free," I said.

"So do I Chloe," said Prana.

She handed the hairband back to a skinny, elderly woman, and together we walked across the Exercise Yard.

"I've got something for you," I said: and I handed her the emery board.

"Oh Chloe, no," said Prana: "I have emery boards - please, you keep it."

"I promised it Prana," I said: "please take it."

Instead Prana took one of my hands and held it up:

"Look at your nails, Chloe: they are so long: they will hurt me. Please keep the emery board."

"I know," I said: I snapped the emery board in half. "You take this, and we'll think of each other each time we use them."

"Chloe, you are such a romantic," said Prana, and she held up the emery board as if she were admiring some beautiful ornament, before sliding it down her sock.

"Do you want to have sex today Chloe?" asked Prana, turning her irresistible eyes on mine.

"You know Prana," I said: "I'm still high on last time. Shall we just talk: there's so much I want to ask you?"

"That would be nice," said Prana: "I too had such beautiful orgasms in Showers."

We sat down, leaning our backs against the mesh, our faces soaking up the sunshine. Everywhere women were forming into couples, haggling over small items, or chasing noisily after the foam football.

"Prana - will you tell me about the massage parlour?" I asked.

"What is there to tell? I suck and fuck men all day."

"All day every day?"

"No Chloe: I worked two sometimes three days a week. Any more than that you go crazy."

"What were the men like?"

"All different sorts, all the same. They are young, old, rich, poor, single, married, handsome, ugly, shy, cocky. They are all desperate to shoot their load. All day, up my vagina, in my mouth, in my hand, between my breasts, up my arse: 'I need to come; I need to come; I need to come.' All I hear. At the end of the day I reek of spunk. That is men."

"Was it safe? Weren't you afraid someone would hurt you?"

"We heard about these things, but it never happened to me. I only worked in the daytime, so not many drunks. Also there was always another person there. A bigger problem was men who wanted to marry me. 'Marry me, come on holiday with me' - I heard this so many times."

"You were never tempted?"

"No Chloe, never.

"You must have had some weird customers?"

"All men are weird Chloe. But I'll tell you one funny thing that happened - it's funny now anyway, not so funny then. One day I was waiting in the massage room: I was wearing this silly little negligee, all black lace, only not real lace. I heard a customer, the Receptionist came to my door to show him in: and it was my boyfriend."

"No!"

"Yes Chloe. He looked at me, his jaw dropped like a fish: 'Prana' he said: 'what are you doing here?' I'd told him I worked as a Chambermaid in a hotel, never that I worked in a massage parlour.

"'Robert'," I said: "'what are you doing here?'

"We were both shocked. We had both found each other out, of course. Then we started to laugh: later we would row and argue, but just then we laughed. I saw him looking at me in my negligee, and he said: 'Prana, let us have sex now we are here' and I said 'OK but you have to pay'. Then he said 'Prana you are my girlfriend, why do you say I must pay?' I said: 'here I am not Prana I am Yasmin - if you want sex you must pay.'"

"And did he pay?" I asked.

"He paid. This is men. He fucked me very hard too, it was a turn on for us - I made so much noise the Receptionist came in, she thought I was being hurt."

"Prana, that's priceless," I said.

"Wait Chloe: you haven't heard all. Later at home we argued. 'Why do you take money for sex? Why do you pay money for sex? Why do you lie to me?' On it goes. I was angry, I went to bed. Next day we still quarrelled. Then at night he came to bed: 'Let's make up Prana,' he said: he was pushing his dick against me you understand. 'You only want to make up because you want to fuck me,' I said. I was still angry. 'If you want to fuck me you can pay again: why should everyone else pay and you go for free?' Perhaps I didn't mean this, I don't know. 'But I love you Prana,' he said: he was trying to rub up against me as he was speaking. 'You are my girlfriend'. 'What does that mean?' I said: 'boyfriend, girlfriend - this just means you want someone you can fuck for free'. 'But we live together', he said: 'we go out together'. 'This is worse' I said. 'This means you want to have me here to fuck all the time or to fuck me in some place different. I am available too much: everybody at the massage parlour wants me to be their girlfriend, but they must pay: from now on you'll pay too.'

"Well, he did not like this, and he grumbled, and I went to sleep, and then next day I came home from the parlour and had a bath, and then he came home from work and he threw fifty pounds at me and told me to take off my knickers. When I have been at the parlour all day I do not want to have sex in the evening, I want to have a bath and wash away the smell of spunk and then sit by the television. But I have told him he can have sex if he pays, so I took off my knickers, and he fucked me on the floor in front of the radiator. It was not good sex, he was rough and he did not attend to me, but I could not complain because he was paying me. But I was resentful. For some days nothing happened, we went to bed we went to sleep. Then one night he was randy again. 'Please let us have sex,' he said. I was tired, I did not want sex, so I said 'you must pay me.' 'I don't have enough money,' he said. 'No sex then,' I said. On and on he went, please, I'm so desperate: in the end I took pity on him so I could get to sleep.

"So it went on: sometimes he paid me, sometimes he said he had no money; sometimes when he said he had no money I took pity on him, sometimes I refused him. One day when I refused him he said I was a prick tease: I should not walk naked in the house if I am not willing to have sex with him. I said: 'this is what rapists say: the girl is at fault because she looks sexy.' He said it is not same thing, dressing sexy is OK, being naked is provocative. I said: 'so now I can't go naked in my own flat?' He said I can but I must expect him to be turned on and then I should have sex with him. I was cross: I said I will do whatever I want, if he can't control himself he can go and sleep on the sofa. From then on I did not spare his feelings: I went around naked all the time: one time I told him I was going to masturbate: he can stay or he can leave the room, but I will not have sex with him.

"We argued much. Sometimes we threw things: one day I smashed a teapot his mother had given him. But all couples do this I suppose."

"I never do," I said.

"You never argued with your boyfriend Chloe?"

"Argue, yes: but never smash teapots."

"It was a horrible teapot Chloe, it was better smashed. Anyway, we were both frustrated, but by now we were too far down the road of antagonism to find a way back. One day he came home from work, gave me fifty pounds and said he wanted to fuck me. I said OK, he fucked me quickly, and I thought, good, now I can have bath. Then he started to get hard again. 'I want to do it again,' he said. I looked at the clock: I said: 'fifty pounds is for half an hour: if you want more you must pay again.' He was upset and crying, so I gave in and let him have me again.

"I knew how much he earned: he could afford to have me twice a week, no more. This is difficult for a man: men like to come every day, or every other day. Then one week he had me once, then few days later said he had no money, he'd lost it on horses. This happened sometimes, but I was very angry. I decided to teach him lesson. I told him I needed to masturbate. Do your boyfriends like to watch you masturbate Chloe?"