Chapter 11
"Honey, you're the loveliest creature I ever laid my eyes on."
Carol came awake suddenly, brought up from a dream in which Brad was drowning, pleading for help, but she could not save him because he looked like Herb, like Mort. She could not stand to touch him.
She was chilled. Her whole body was cold and for a moment she did not know where she was.
She opened her eyes stirring drowsily, stretching, protesting. Then she stared downward and saw the reason why she was cold. She was lying on her back, the prison sackcloth gown pushed up above the uprising mounds of her breasts and bunched under her armpits.
Her eyes flew open wider, and she saw her cell mate bending over her cot, staring at her nudity. "Maudie!" she whispered. "What's the matter?"
Maude Causey was in her twenties, but already going to fat because she no longer cared what she looked like. She had been Carol's cell mate for almost the entire ten months that Carol had been in the penitentiary for women.
"You," Maudie whispered. "Honey, let me lie down in your cot with you."
"You know what they'd do to us if they caught you in here with me."
"They won't catch us. If they punished all the gals that got together in this place, they'd be busy doing nothing else."
"What's happened to you, Maudie? You've never acted like this before."
"Let me lie down with you."
Reluctantly, Carol moved over on the cot. The stout girl lay down beside her, sighing. "I couldn't sleep," she said. "I felt like I was going out of my mind."
"If they catch you here like this, you'll wish you had gone out of your mind."
"Listen, honey, I know better than that now. I been talking to some of the other girls. Some of them sleep together from the minute after lights out. The guards know what's going on. But as long as there's no trouble, they don't check. They don't look, they don't catch anybody. And that's the way it is. All the girls say so."
Carol shook her head. "But Maudie, you've always said you'd never go like this. Remember the way you always talked about the girls who did, the way you called them man and wife?"
"I don't care. I've changed a lot since I've been in this place, honey. When I came here, it was you who talked about how rotten men were. Well, I'm in here because of a no-good fink of a man. At first I couldn't believe you that they were all no good. But I believe that now. The girls in this place are right stick with each other, and that way you won't get hurt so bad."
"Maudie, no."
"Oh, gee, honey, don't push me away. All I've said about men and hating them--that's just part of it. Lately, I've got to thinking about you, those lovely boobs and that firm little bottom, and I've been nuts just to lie close to you like this. Ohhh. This is so nice. Please don't push me away, baby."
"Maudie, we can't start this."
"Honey, what else have we got? What are we supposed to do in this place, just rot away? I can't stand it. I been lying in my bed every night thinking about you over here, wishing that you'd want me that you'd speak my name, call me, anything so I could come over here to you in the night finally it got so I just couldn't stand it any more without you. I had to come over here to you."
"Maudie, I've never done anything like this."
"Neither have I, baby, neither have !"
"I've never wanted to."
"I never wanted to, either, because there was always some no good rat-fink of a guy around wanting me. I never thought about whether I wanted this or not. But I know now, I do."
"But, Maudie, I don't."
"How do you know? You said you've never done it."
"I haven't."
"Then if you haven't tried it, don't knock it."
"Oh, Maudie, please go back to your bed."
"In a minute, baby. I'll go in a minute. Just lie still. Let me put my arm around you. Let me lie against your back, like this. That can't hurt, can it?"
Carol lay still, not answering.
Maudie's breath came faster. "You're so lovely. I'm the luckiest woman in this place. Not another girl here has got boobs as pretty as yours. They all sag, but yours stand up so lovely. I've got to touch them. Oh, I've got to, Carol, just once."
Carol tried to draw away, but Maudie's stout arm held her close. Carol felt Maudie's full breasts flattened against her back, felt the rise of Maudie's thighs thrust against her as Maudie vibrated her hips in a rapid circular motion.
Carol heard Maudie's increased breathing and felt the heat of her breath against the nape of her neck. But she could not respond to the excitement that was driving Maudie beyond reason, beyond caution.
Carol felt Maudie's hand push under her upper arm, seeking, almost timidly, for the resilient rise of her breast. The other girl's fingers closed on the soft globe and then Maudie was moving her hips faster, pressing herself harder upon the mounds of Carol's buttocks.
Maudie was talking, whispering, but the words were confused, breathless and incoherent. Carol recognized some of them, snatches of the things Maudie was saying it was like listening to a man driven to frantic poetry by desire.
Maudie's fingers worked swiftly, moving faster and faster upon her, manipulating her nipple, exploring the deep cleavage between her breasts.
Then Carol felt the other girl's right hand steal down across her hips and push between her legs. Maudie's fingers probed and touched and moved on her there.
Maudie whispered frantically, "Oh, you're so lovely, Carol. So beautiful. You like what I'm doing to you, Carol; say it, tell me you like what I'm doing."
Carol did not speak. She did not feel any excitement at what Maudie was doing, and she knew now that she never would.
She made no effort to stop Maudie or to discourage her in what she was doing. Maudie was sick with need and loneliness and frustration. Maudie had told her of the wild orgies she had had with her lover and once with several lovers. She was crazy for men, she said, and she could not even understand the frigid ones who did not like them. For ten months now, Maudie had been penned up in here, left where no man could satisfy her or raise her excitement. She had begun by viewing the lovers among the other inmates with contempt, but now she knew what drove them the need, the unsatisfied yearning.
Maudie's hand covered her breasts, pressing the nipples until at last they stood marble-hard for her.
With her other hand she caressed Carol's lower body, stroking with her fingers around and around, faster and faster, getting as frantic as if it were she who was being touched like that.
Carol felt her heart pound faster. There was at least some response in her. Maudie's desire ignited a spark within her and, when Maudie pulled her over on her back, she no longer protested at all. She lay still, her eyes closed and one arm across them. She breathed through her parted lips, aware of what Maudie was doing to her with her mouth and tongue, and knowing that she was being lifted out of herself, taken to that wild moment of fulfillment. She reached down suddenly, grabbing Maudie's head, and pressing her tighter against her while the entire prison seemed to explode into fire.
For a long time after Maudie, sated at last, had crept back to her own cot. Carol lay wide-eyed, staring into the darkness. Maudie had been able to elicit a response from her. She had been unable to let herself go with any man, though she had pretended the wildest kind of abandon and satisfaction.
She stared at Maudie's lumpy form in the darkness under the covers of the other cot. She knew that she would not go this way with Maudie again.
She had had enough of things that were wrong, that led down dead-end streets.
She knew she would never talk about this with Maudie. It seemed to her that she could see the way that Maudie would go. After tonight, Maudie would be happier in institutions like this than she would be in the world outside where the rules were different.
Maudie had started out wild about men, but she had strayed far from that. She hated them now, not as Carol had, needing vengeance, but coldly, contemptuously, because they were no longer what she wanted.
Carol shivered. At least Maudie's life lay straight ahead for her, even if it was a dead-end street.
It was her own life that remained confused, troubling, because though she had responded to Maudie, she did not want an affair with her, or any woman. But could she ever respond to a man?
Carol shuddered, colder than ever. She pressed down under the prison blanket and closed her eyes tightly, trying to shut out her bitter, hurting thoughts.
When Carol walked out of the prison, the first person she saw was Laura, waiting for her.
Her sister had brought her baby with her. Crying out, they ran toward each other.
Even as Laura gathered her in her arms, Carol glanced past her uneasily, apprehensively looking for Herb.
Laura seemed to read her thoughts. She said, "Herb isn't here, Carol. You don't ever have to be afraid, not of Herb. Not any more. When I returned from the hospital with the baby and found you were gone, I kept after Herb until he told me the truth. He had lied to me while I was in the hospital. He said you had caught a cold from the rain the night the baby was born, and that you were staying away from the hospital for fear you might give me your virus. But when I got home, I saw that you were gone, and that you had been for a long time. I frightened Herb. I threateaed to go to the police."
"Oh, Laura, I'm so sorry."
"No, don't be. I had to have my eyes opened to what Herb really was, sooner or later. I think I knew all along. It was just that I wouldn't let myself believe it."
Laura led Carol toward a late model Falcon parked at the curb. Laura said, "Herb knew you were only seventeen. He was so afraid that I would go to the police that he broke down. He was worried, too, because you'd run away in the storm. He told me everything that happened. Of course, he tried to blame you at first, but I told him I couldn't believe that. If you had led him on, you wouldn't have run away in a storm. You would have stayed with him. So again, I threatened to have the police question him. He told the truth, finally."
"I didn't want to break up your home."
"You didn't. You were the innocent victim, Carol. That's all. You must not blame yourself. Herb and I have been separated almost a year and we've been divorced for over six months. I feel like I live in a new, clean world without him."
Carol stood on the curb. Laura laughed and said, "Well, get in. We can't just stand here."
Carol frowned. "Where are we going?"
"Why, home, of course! I've met this wonderful man, Carol. In fact, I work for him, and we're going to be married. I've told him all about you. He wants you to come and stay with us, for as long as you want to."
Carol touched Laura's hand. "Thanks, Laura. You don't know how good it makes me feel to know that I have somewhere I can run for comfort, if I have to."
"If you have to? I want you with me."
Carol shook her head. "But I can't Laura. At least not now. Not yet."
"What will you do?"
"Try to find work. Try to make something of myself. Try to find out what I want, what I believe, if anything."
"Oh, Carol .You've been so unhappy ... "
"Part of it was my own doing. At least, it won't be like that any more. If I have any more emotional accidents, I'll at least recognize them for what they are."
"Where will you go?"
"I don't know. Some new place. A town where I don't know anybody, where nobody knows me. I've got to start all over, because it's like I'm being born all over again."
The bus pulled into the city of Carol's choice at ten o'clock the next morning. Carol sat a moment, looking out the window at the bustling metropolis. It was all new to her, filled with strangers. It wasn't as large as New York, but it was much larger than Bluetown, and she knew no one. She was completely on her own, and this was what she wanted.
She left the bus and claimed her suitcase. In it was all her worldly belongings, and she had fifty-eight dollars to her name. That wouldn't last long, and so it meant she had to move swiftly, find something to do.
In the bus station she inquired for addresses of quiet apartment houses that were not too expensive, and in less than two hours she had found what she thought she wanted, at least temporarily.
The way she was living now, everything was temporary.
She was doing it one day at a time. Each new day would have to take care of itself.
She intended to spend the first day looking around, but after she paid her first week's rent, the amount of money remaining frightened her. She took a shower, put on a dress that wasn't too far out of style.
In an hour she was downtown, the unseeing, uncaring crowds pushing past her on both sides. She entered a mortgage and loan company and applied for a job. They gave her a typing test. She sat nervously before a typewriter, flexing her fingers, frightened because she had been away from this kind of work for so long. But when the woman started dictating, she found it all came back to her at once. Soon she was working smoothly, fluently, the clatter of the keys reassuring. She was going to be all right. She did not know yet how she would make it, but she would.
The woman said, "That's very good. No doubt about it, you are experienced in this sort of work, and we can use a girl like you. When could you start to work?"
"Would tomorrow morning be all right?"
And then she was in the street again. One more hurdle had been passed. She had the security of employment, the promise of regular pay. Lack of finances was no longer a threat.
She put her head back, looking at the city. Everything moved at such a rapid pace, it was troubling after having been so long caged away from all this frantic hurrying.
She decided to celebrate. She went into the nicest restaurant she could find and ordered a steak dinner. She took her time eating it, luxuriating in the elegant atmosphere. She felt the eyes of men. touching at her admiringly. At least here was something that had remained constant while she was in prison. Men had not changed.
She shivered slightly, wondering if she had.
But she knew she was not going to force the issue. She had spent seven years of her life afraid of men, and several months obsessed and possessed by her fear. She was going to try to glide into her new life one step at a time, one day at a time, without forcing anything.
She walked to her apartment house in the early evening. In her room, she wrote a letter to Laura, telling her the good news and making it all sound even better than it was. On the streets she had noticed that the hems on all the skirts were at least an inch shorter than hers. She spent the evening altering her dresses and skirts so they would not seem as old and dated as they were. She set her hair, hoping she would look nice the next day at work in this new world she had found for herself.
She got into bed but sleep did not come to her. She could not say why she was troubled, only that she was. Her mind was whirling, sleepless, even though her body was tired.
What was wrong? She was doing what she wanted, wasn't she? She was making a new life where no one knew her, among strangers in a strange town. It was the chance she had to give herself and the people she met. She had to learn to like them all the men and the women. She had to begin by liking them, by not being afraid, by not thinking about hurting or being hurt. She must try to adapt as a stronger human being.
She was a different girl from the one who had gone into that prison a year ago. She was wiser, more mature, less ridden by hatreds. Still, this did not mean she could not foul up in this town. She knew in her heart that she was still afraid of men. Perhaps she always would be. She hoped not. She longed for love. It was only that she did not know where to find it, or how to accept it when it came. She was so confused about love, so completely ignorant. And so afraid.
She fell asleep finally, deciding only one thing. She would make the effort to build a useful life. She had destroyed a man named Nat Collins, a man who truly thought of others ahead of himself. She owed this much to him.
She was at the office the next morning at eight-thirty. The new day went smoothly. The people in the office accepted her casually, and they smiled in friendliness. She was frightened, but she smiled back at them, all of them.
In the next few days she wondered if it was not too smooth, too easy. She did not want trouble, but everything was like glass; there was an unreality about a world in which there were no problems, no men made passes, none even asked for dates. They were all friendly, but casual.
One night, walking out of the office alone, she saw a man standing near the front doorway. She frowned because at first she thought it was Brad. This was impossible, and yet there was something familiar about that smile "Carol."
She frowned staring at him. He came toward her a handsome man, smiling and that smile reminded her of Brad.
"Don't you remember me, Carol?" She stared at him. "Ed Bailey."
"That's right, the drinking boy from the Embers Hotel lounge in Bluetown."
"What are you doing here?"
"I'm looking for you," Ed said. "What else?"