all god's orphans

“You three can have a seat right here.” Said the matronly potato in an ill-fitting sheriff’s deputy uniform. She ushered them into a tiny holding cell just off the main room of the police station. There were two doors of iron bars on opposite sides of the small square. On one side, there was the office and an intake door that led to the front of the building. The other door opened to the back and a short distance from it, a much heavier, solid door led to the proper cells in the back. There were two small benches, one against the cinder block wall, and one against the bars. Millie and Kite sat down and leaned against the wall while Wallace sat alone on the other side.

“What are you going to do to us?” Kite asked, her accent making it difficult for the potato to understand her.

“Judge Michaels will be back tomorrow afternoon.” She informed them as the door slid to a clanky shut, locking them inside. “Until then, you’ll wait here. In a few minutes, I’ll take you through to the back and put you in a more comfortable cell with beds. Just sit quietly for a while.” After she was sure they weren’t going anywhere, the potato made her way across the station to a small office enclosed in bulletproof glass. It was slightly elevated, and the bottom was more cinderblocks, but Millie could see that there were phones, computers, and monitors in the little room that probably controlled the entire station. She turned her attention to Wallace.

“You fucking asshole.” She typed as hard as she could. “Because of you, we’re going to die. Brian is going to die.” Wallace didn’t react, which only angered her further. “You fucking asshole.” She repeated. “What did you think would happen?” Wallace simply sat in silence as she berated him. “Did you think we were going to just walk up and ask nicely to get inside?” His placid exterior enraged her. “Answer me.” She typed as forcefully as she could. She wanted to scream. Instead, she stood, crossed the small cell and slapped him as hard as she could. Wallace barely noticed. He looked slowly up at her and then pointed at the bench behind her.

“Sit down.” He commanded, his training as an officer coming to the forefront of his personality. Millie did not move. Wallace narrowed his eyes and repeated it slowly and methodically. “Sit. Down.” Millie backed away and let herself all onto the bench, defeated. Not just by Wallace, but by the entire situation. “You need to get your shit together.” Wallace told her. “What do you think is happening here? This isn’t a goddamn game, do you understand?” Millie looked away from him and he waited patiently for her gaze to return knowing that she couldn’t “hear” him if she wasn’t looking directly at his lips. “This is a fucking war.” He finally said. “We all have to make sacrifices.” She scoffed.

“You sound like the general.” Wallace took umbrage at that.

“No I don’t.” He sneered and then summoned a belch, letting it erupt into a rank mushroom cloud in the small space. ”Now I sound like the general.” He smiled, and despite herself, Millie allowed herself a smile, too. Kite was still too worried to find anything funny. “Don’t worry.” Wallace assured her. “We’re going to get out of here.”

“How?” She typed, her large eyes opening wide.

“Oh, I don’t know.” Wallace made a face of mock surprise. “I thought you knew.” Millie smiled again and Wallace got slightly more serious. “We’ll think of something.” He told her.

Millie began to scan the space for a possibility of escape, but nothing was obvious. There were only a few guards, but this was a jail. Getting out was either difficult or impossible. Mrs. Potato was still in the control booth, doing what looked like paperwork, which Millie found odd. Paperwork? With everything that was going on, paper still needed to be worked? A few times, she would answer the phone that sat beside her and make notes.

At one point, a male deputy emerged from the larger across the room to her right, the one that led deeper into the jail. Before it closed, Millie could see cells off to both sides, all seemingly empty. She caught a glimpse of something on the wall at the far end of the corridor. There, in another cell, was a payphone.

“I have an idea.” She said, suddenly brightening. It was insane and frankly dumb, but it was still a plan.

She sat back against the cinder blocks and watched as Wallace took in everything she had just said. He turned around in his seat to look at the woman in the bulletproof fishbowl.

“Are you serious?” He asked her just to make sure. Millie nodded. “You can read her lips all the way from here?” Millie nodded again. Wallace blinked twice and then decided to just accept it. “Okay, tell me the numbers again.” Millie quickly ran through three sequences of numbers that Wallace would have to remember if they were going to have any chance of getting out of this.

When she was younger, Millie had told them, her parents rarely ever let her out of their sight. If she even went to visit her cousin, they would make her call their house and check in as soon as she arrived there. Just in case that wasn’t an option, they had also set up a prepaid phone number. Of course, it would have been easier to just buy her a goddamn cell phone, but hey, that’s what happens when your parents are weird, anti-technology fundamentalists.

Millie had long had the first number memorized. It was a toll-free 800 number that would take her to an automated system. Even though she couldn’t hear it, she knew to press one, count to three, then enter her PIN number and press star. After that, she could dial her parent’s home phone where another machine could spell out words she typed on the phone keypad. So much simpler than just texting, she’d always thought to herself.

“And you’re sure I can dial any number I want?” Wallace asked her. “You parents didn’t make it so that it only worked with their number.”

“No.” Replied Millie. “After you enter the pin, you can call anyone.” Wallace considered this for a moment.

“What makes you think the phones still work? Or this number still work?”

“The number I don’t know about.” Admitted Millie. “But older payphones carried their own electricity in the line. I doubt jails would have upgraded any time in the past few decades.” Wallace chuckled to himself. She was right. This was crazy and dumb. “Remember.” Millie said. “When the potato answer, tell her that you are calling from the stake president’s office. That’s where most of her calls seem to be coming from. Tell them that Bill, make sure you say ‘Bill’, has heard that she has us locked here. Tell her he said to let us go.” Wallace nodded as Millie caught sight of the other male deputy approaching their cell.

“Let’s go.” He told them and opened the door that led to the back part of the station. They followed him through there to the other, heavier steel door that buzzed open at his approach and into the cells beyond.

It was as Millie had seen it before, but inside, the cells were much larger than she thought. The corridor led straight to the back and then turned right towards another steel door. On all sides, walls of bars held row after row of empty bunk beds. Televisions were bolted onto the walls and protected by Plexiglas. The bathroom was separated from the rest of the space by nothing more than a low wall only three feet high. As they made their way towards the back, Millie could see the phone she had glimpsed earlier. It hung on the wall in the largest cell, the one that took up most of the back section where the hallway turned right.

“Wait here.” The deputy told Kite and Millie as he took out his keys. Millie and Wallace exchanged a knowing glance as the deputy turned to unlock the door. To her horror, he opened the cell behind them and showed Wallace in. There was no phone in that section, just bunks and picnic tables.

“I like the view from that cell better.” Wallace said, pointing to the one across the corridor and trying to be charming.

“Very funny.” Said the deputy. “Watch your fingers.” He said, shutting the gate. Millie’s eyes held panic as the guard led them away further down the hall and through the other steel door to the women’s section. She turned and saw Wallace slowly bang his head against the bars in frustration. When he looked at her, she could see the defeat in his eyes and her heart broke.