Young Women Reform: Novella 1

Young Women Reform

Novella 1

By Candace Mia

Copyright 2014 Candace Mia

Smashwords Edition

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This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to
any person or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. All
characters depicted in this work of fiction are 18 years old or
older.

Novella 1

“I’ve been told you’ve become quite handy
while in prison, Mr. Wakefield.”

The woman across the table from Brody was
pretty. He estimated that she was a little older than him, and he
was 42. She had rich dark eyes and long dark hair. She was a little
big for a woman, but not fat. She just looked like she could hold
her own. He couldn’t believe they were letting him sit alone in a
room with her. He’d not been alone with a woman for twenty
years.

“Yes,” he said. “There’s not a lot to do in a
maximum security prison. I’ve taught myself a lot of things.”

“I’ve heard,” she said. Her voice was
powerful, condescending really. “I’ve also heard you’ve tutored a
number of your fellow inmates and helped them get their GEDs.”

“Yes. And I’ve helped some get more than
that. Some even have college degrees.”

“Yes. So I’ve heard. But it’s not your
ability to teach smart people that I care about. It’s your ability
to teach the dumber ones.”

He shook his head, slowly. “What does all of
this have to do with anything? I’m in prison for the rest of my
life. There’s no chance of parole.”

“No there’s not. You killed your wife and her
lover.”

“Yes, ma’am, I did.”

The confident woman smirked. “I wasn’t
asking. I was recapping. All questions about what you did were
answered a long time ago.”

Brody looked down. He’d grown to accept what
he’d done. But it still brought him shame.

“As you said, Brody. There’s no chance of
parole. You will be a prisoner the rest of your life. But I’ve
handpicked you to be in a different sort of prison, my prison.”

Brody stared at her. Was she for real?

“I could use a hand man at my little prison,
and I could use a man who can teach difficult concepts to dumb
people.”

He wondered about her prison. He supposed it
couldn’t be worse than this place.

“You will have an electronic tether, of
course. It will be put right under your skin. Our state is the only
state that allows such a thing. Should you try to escape, a jolt of
electricity will shoot through you that will only knock you out, if
you’re lucky.”

She was smiling at him, like she took great
pleasure in what she could do. She leaned over the table, though,
closer to him. “But there will be no walls. You’ll have your own
room. You’ll have a television and good food. You’ll even be able
to go outside and play. And I understand that you were an aspiring
writer years ago. I’ve been told you still write, that you’ve
filled up notebooks.”

Brody thought he felt is own eyes widen.
Could it really be possible that there could be more to it than
that, filling up notebooks?

As if she’d read him, she smiled and said,
“You’ll have access to a computer to type those stories out. You’ll
have access to the Internet, so you can send those stories to
publishers or put them out yourself. I’ll even let you keep the
money you make and let you buy things you want.”

This was all too good to be true. He even
entertained the idea that it was all a dream. “But what do I have
to do?”

She grinned. “Anything I say.”

He was a little afraid. But it was very
little. Not much could be worse living and dying in this place. It
still seemed too good to be true.

#

He was taken to the new prison in a
windowless Van. He was shackled to his seat. He was glad he could
lift his hand to his neck. It really itched where they’d put the
tracker. He had no clock to watch the time, but he felt like it
took hours to get there. He wondered if he was still in the same
state. Maybe they’d just circled around for a while to confuse him.
There was no way of knowing.

By the time they opened the doors he was very
thirsty, very hungry and needed to go to the bathroom. The light
from outside seemed bright and stung his eyes. There was a buzzing
sound, and the shackles came undone.

“Get out,” a deep voice said.

It was a hard thing to do. It was hard to see
with the light burning his eyes. But when you’d been in prison as
long as Brody, you learned that what you were able to do was what
they told you to do. He didn’t rush, though. He got a hold of his
duffle bag. It was full of nothing more than all the notebooks he’d
written in over the years. He let his feet lead him outside more
than his eyes. When he put a foot forward and it didn’t touch the
van’s floor, he hopped out.

His eyes were still trying to adjust but he
was so curious he had to look around. He could see well enough to
know what was right ahead of him and to his right. There were
trees, and a lot of them at that. The smell was kind of swampy. To
his left were two women. One was the woman he’d met in prison, Ms.
Pennington. She looked even bigger now that she wasn’t sitting
down. She wore jeans and an expensive looking blouse. His vision
was also good enough that he could see the pistol strapped to her
side.

Brody was about five-ten. She was a good four
inches taller than him. She still didn’t look fat, but it was very
clear she had meat on her bones. Beside her was another woman. No,
it was a girl. His eyes had adjusted enough to see she was a
Mexican girl. She was probably an inch under five feet tall. She
was small, with a head too big for her body. She wasn’t ugly. It
just looked like her head was kind of big for her. Her face was
cute, like an even littler kid. She was wearing a blue dress that
looked like the same material the people who worked in the prison
infirmary wore. It went down to the middle of her thighs. She was
holding a clipboard. Behind them was a big white house. This was
like no prison he’d ever heard of. It just looked like a big house
or maybe an apartment building.

The van drove off and headed down a dirt road
into the woods. When it was gone, Ms. Pennington spoke.

“This is what you need to know right off the
bat, Brody. If you enter the woods and walk out a quarter of a mile
you’ll find a fence. If you should cross that line, the devise
inside you will shock you hard enough to at least knock you out. It
might also stop your heart. The device also allows me to track you
at all times. Do you understand?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Brody replied.

“Good. Now there’s a big rock near your feet.
I want you to pick it up.”

Brody looked down to see a stone nearly as
big as his hand. It was the only one there. He put his bag down and
picked the rock up.

“Now, Brody. Throw that rock as hard as you
can toward the road over there.”

He wasn’t sure why she would ask him to do
this. Maybe she wanted to test his strength. He was very hungry and
tired, but he’d built up a lot of muscle working out in the yard.
He wasn’t going to be asking any questions right. He reared back
and launched the rock toward the road.

A loud crack gave him a jolt. The rock
exploded in mid-air.

He looked gingerly toward Ms. Pennington,
who’d already holstered the pistol.

“Understand?” she said.

“Yes.”

“Good. Now, I would like for you to get
cleaned up and ready for dinner. Penny will show you your
quarters.” She looked at the girl.

The girl nodded. Then she moved toward the
house. Brody followed her. She led him inside the big house. They
entered a foyer.

“Take off your shoes,” Penny said.

Her accent was only slightly Hispanic. Her
voice was rather squeaky, which really matched her small size.

She took off her own shoes. She had a smile
that looked rather embarrassed to him. He thought he sensed trouble
already. He’d have to avoid contact with this girl.

He removed his shoes.

It was a long foyer. It was more of a hallway
really. She led him to one of the doors in that hallway and opened
it.

Inside was a room with bare white walls.
There was a bed at least three times the size of the one he’d had
in prison.

Penny moved to the center of the room, where
she motioned around. “This is your room. This is your bed.”

He’d already seen the bed and the room. He
was looking at her, at her expression. He was stunned that he’d be
allowed to be alone with this girl. He wouldn’t do anything with
her, but Ms. Pennington couldn’t know that. She’d have to know that
most prisoners would. Hell, a large proportion of the prisoners he
knew would settle for a boy the age of Penny. In maximum security,
there were no conjugal visits.

Penny moved to another door, which she
opened. “This is your bathroom.”

He couldn’t believe it. Having this nice room
was amazing to him. But was he really going to have his own
bathroom. He was thrilled to see it. Besides being excited about
having a personal place to do his business, he figured there would
be a faucet in there, and he was very thirsty. He walked that
way.

Penny just stood there, right between him and
the bathroom.

He didn’t know what to do. He wasn’t going to
ask her to move. He was afraid to ask anybody for anything at this
point.

“Don’t you want to see your bathroom?”

He hesitated and then said, “Yes, ma’am.”

She giggled. “You don’t have to call me
ma’am. I’m only eighteen.”

He squinted, like he’d be able to see it. He
supposed she was eighteen. She was just small and would probably
look younger than that for many years to come. At least, she would
to him. It had been a long time since he’d seen women on a regular
basis and would be able to judge such things.

“Okay,” he said.

“Oh,” she said. “Would you like for me to
move?”

He hesitated again. “Yes, please.”

She giggled again. “No. I think I’ll
stay.”

He still didn’t know what to do. This place
was already a thousand times better than the place he’d come from.
It didn’t really matter if she was of legal age. He didn’t have a
legal life. What was legal here was what Ms. Pennington said was
legal. And he doubted she’d brought him here to make physical
contact with the women.

She giggled again.

Then there was a stern female voice.
“Penny!”

His head shot to the doorway to the room.
There stood Ms. Pennington. “Is this anyway to treat the man who
will be your teacher?”

“No, Ma’am,” Penny said in a voice that
shook. He looked at her. Her head was down.

“Is this what you were instructed to do?”

“No ma’am.”

He looked back at Ms. Pennington. She had
that look on her face, a look of confident superiority. “Leave Mr.
Wakefield alone, so that he can become accustomed to his new living
quarters alone, seeing that you can’t seem to show him
appropriately.”

“Yes ma’am,” Penny said and started to leave
the room.

“Go ahead and go into my office,” Ms.
Pennington said. “We’ll have a talk about manners.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the little woman said, sobbing,
then left them there.

Ms. Pennington looked at him. “I know this
will be a difficult adjustment for you, Brody. I will have a
certain amount of patients with that. But one thing you’ll have to
learn is to be stern with these young women and not let them run
over you. Do you understand?”

He did not. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. Dinner will be ready in half an hour.
I will send someone for you.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Good,” she said, smiling. Then she left him
there.

#

He drank water from the bathroom tap. He was
so thirsty that it was wonderful. There was a combination shower
tub. It was stocked with plenty of shampoos and soap. It had been
so long since he’d had a bath. The prison didn’t have a bath. And
you only got a few minutes to take a shower. Was it okay to indulge
in this?

Before he’d gone to prison he’d had baths. It
hadn’t been a big deal then. He did it. The prison soaps had
smelled sterile, but not good. Every bottle he opened smelled good.
He wanted to stay in the warm water of that tub for hours. But he
settled for fifteen minutes. He found towels in the bathroom
closet. They were big a fluffy, not scratchy. He went into his
bedroom and looked in the dresser there. There were new looking
jeans and a variety of shirts. He got dressed to find the clothes
fit well. It was as if whoever got them knew his sizes. He sat on
the bed and waited. There was a tv on the wall. It was a flat
screen. He’d known they existed, but he’d not seen one before.
There was also a PC. He’d had very limited access to computers in
prison and no internet. He wondered if he could use that one to get
online. He wouldn’t do it now, though. He wouldn’t watch tv either.
Instead, he just waited.