Cages by David Mark (reading fiction TXT) 📗

will take your stuff but we can’t offer the discounts to make you attractive alongside the established names, so …’

Rufus licks his lips. Feels a prickly heat all over his skin. He’s not an established name, apparently. Can’t help wondering what that makes him. He starts picking up empty bottles. Moves some dirty plates around on the floor by the dishwasher. Reaches up and picks at a cobweb that dangles from the dried herbs pinned to the dark oak timbers in the ceiling. Half trips on something sticking out from beneath the table, and falls out of his deck shoes. Treads in something wet. He feels like crying.

‘… so we’ll see if that has any impact and maybe take it from there, yes?’

He realizes he hasn’t been listening. Pretends he has. Pretends he’s fine.

‘Anyway, stay safe tomorrow, yes? You never know, there might be a decent story to be found there. A big market, true crime. Never did Capote any harm. And hopefully it will lead to some more work.’

It takes him a moment, but he catches up. A firework of panic starts to spin in the centre of his chest. Was that this week? Tomorrow? The prison thing? Fuck!

‘Oh yeah, yeah. Looking forward to it. Not sure what they’ll be handing in after I help them unlock their imaginations, but it should certainly be interesting.’

Rufus wonders if he means it. He took the gig teaching creative writing to inmates at HMP Holderness, because the lady who approached him had said lovely things about his books, and because they were willing to pay the figure he plucked from the air. Six sessions in the education wing of a Category B prison that even the Daily Mail has likened to something from the nineteenth century. It’s been the subject of endless damning reports and the governor has gone on record saying that he can no longer guarantee the safety of either staff or inmates. He supposes he would have been excited about the opportunity, had he even remembered he was meant to be doing it. He hopes they’ll be happy listening to him prattle on about the same stuff he delivers to libraries, reading groups and Women’s Institutes on the rare occasions when he is in demand. But how to stretch out a one-hour talk to six full days? He slips back into the chair, feeling as though he has been given a dustpan and brush and told to help clear up after an earthquake.

‘Anyway, hope the weather picks up. Do keep your spirits up. We’ll get there.’

And then she’s gone, and he’s a middle-aged man, half-dressed, in a kitchen full of unpaid bills and unsold books, trying to work out how to pay for the petrol that will get him out to East Yorkshire in the morning. He drags the laptop back onto his knee. Calls up the email correspondence he’s enjoyed with the chatty prison officer who’d first contacted him through his website and told him how very much she loved his work. Types her name into the inbox of his cluttered email account. Annabeth Harris. Skims their conversations. Feels a little better for it. She’s friendly, but not gushing. Sounds competent and thoughtful. He’s no doubt she will hold his hand through any unpleasantness. He considers what the day may bring. Wonders if he will be chatting with murderers and rapists. Rather hopes so. East Yorkshire is a long way to go for the company of a low-level drug dealer or a cat burglar.

He types HMP Holderness into Google and is greeted with a raft of critical news stories. Flicks through the various articles, focusing on ‘controversial and outspoken’ Governor Laicquet Hussain, who made the mistake of being honest with journalists when questioned on the state of British prisons. As a thank-you for that, the tabloids eviscerated him: turning HMP Holderness into the emblem of a system unfit for purpose. The same newspapers that gloried in likening British jails to holiday camps printed lengthy opinion pieces demanding that the outdated, understaffed and downright dangerous old prison be closed down at once. When three serving prisoners used mobile phones to post videos of themselves getting out of their minds on spice, the Home Secretary told the rabid press pack that the jail was ‘on its last warning’.

Rufus fumbles around beside his chair until he finds a bottle that makes a pleasing splish when he shakes it. Takes a mouthful of vinegary red wine. Winces and swallows. Tries to make the best of it. There might be a book in it. Maybe he could get pally with Hussain and offer to ghostwrite his memoir when the poor bastard inevitably loses his job. Or there could be a good-lad-gone-wrong or a bad-lad-going-right that he could fictionalize and turn into something with mass market appeal. He shrugs. Doesn’t really mind if it’s just a day out and a new experience. He’s rather looking forward to meeting Annabeth Harris. He hasn’t been able to find very much about her online. Mid-thirties, new to the job, degree in Criminology and Psychology. Single mum, as far as he can recall. Worked for a couple of charities for a while. No pictures, much to his dismay. He lets himself imagine her. Sketches a picture in his mind. Feels his spirits fall. She’ll see the truth of him at once, he knows that. Will be looking at him the same way that Shonagh does before the first session has reached its end.

He settles back in his chair. Calls up something soothing on the laptop: his ears filling with the tinny lullaby of Brahms dribbling out of broken speakers. Types ‘HMP Holderness’ and ‘murder’ into Google.

Starts to read the top story. Something about police digging up farmland in Lincolnshire. It doesn’t grab him. He skips on. Skim-reads something about a teenager taken from a posh school in the north east. Feels a sudden surge of sadness as he considers his daughters. His wife. The pitiful specimen he has