do I know what I'm getting into? ...probably not.
I've been busy lately but now I'm restless and have the urge to post something.
(Rant ahead, jump to cut for a hit of fic)
Third person narratives have become hard for me -_- Years ago, everything I wrote was in thrid person. Now it feels like there are muliple personalities running around in my head as I try to pull different characters together. First person just seems so more peaceful. But I braved the muliple personalities for this one..
It's also hard for me to write much more than a drabble. I just want to go from one moment to another, screw whatever should have to happen to take me from A to B! Unfortunately for me, all that stuff I'd rather forget about is rather vital to making A connect to B -_- I fear that if I am bored writing scenes between the moments in time I am interested in, then they are also doomed to be boring. So I try to find something interesting in every moment. I don't know that I always succceed.
Finally, This is a work in progress. I have a nice little map which tells me exactly where I am going with this (...one that terrifies me with notes on scenes the like of which I have never tried before...), but there is a lot of work ahead. A lot. If that's going to bother you, turn back now. When I finish, I'll sing it from the rooftops, and maybe you'll come back~ In any case, the real reason I am posting what I have now is because if I don't, it'll just rot away on my harddrive while I second guess and doubt myself. If you've read this far, you might have gotten a sense of how my mind likes to run circles around itself. How I ever get anything done in my life is a mystery to me.
Did I mention how much I hate coming up with titles? Oh the hell with it~
title: Trials and Separations
notes: OZ AU, B/K, unbeta'd-- just me editting. If anyone who read this is interested in betaing other chapters, do leave a comment to that affect. I know I give the impression of someone who would fall apart at the first criticism or correction, but I'm more afraid of writing poorly and no one telling me about it than people saying I suck and why.
terrible summary: Beecher and Keller are separated when Beecher is arrested for vehicular manslaughter and sent to Oz-- leaving Keller on the outside, looking in.
“What the fuck?” Chris Keller was on his feet, shaking with rage. He knew the verdict would be guilty. He knew there was a chance Beecher would be sent away. Rehab, maybe. Prison, possibly. But not Oswald Maximum Security Penitentiary. Toby was a lawyer, for Christ sake! They’re supposed to baby him like all the other rich bastards.
Beecher had turned to look at the same time the judge’s eyes fixed on him, the ever present scowl on her face deepening. “What did you say, young man?”
“You fucking heard me.” Toby’s eyes were pleading with him to be quiet, but the words had already left his mouth.
“Another word-”
Chris knew what she was going to say, and he didn’t care to listen. “Fuck you.”
“Bailiff! Escort that man to a holding cell, he is in contempt of my court.”
Every one of his muscles tensed as the bailiff approached him. Beecher held Chris with his gaze, and he saw rather than heard his name on the blonde’s lips. Pleading. Don’t fight them.
But when a court officer grabbed his arm to turn and cuff him, Keller could not stop himself. No man could go without a fight. He shoved the first bailiff away as a second came up from behind him. The man caught Keller’s left arm and twisted it upward viciously, forcing Keller forward with a grunt of pain. Before he could recover, the first officer was there with the cuffs, catching his right wrist and forcing it back.
Even after he was restrained, Keller resisted. They had to drag him away as he screamed, “It’s not right, it’s not fucking right and you god damn know it!”
***
Chris, don’t make this any harder than it has to be.
The thundering of the gavel announced court was adjourned, and a bailiff approached him, handcuffs out. Beecher offered no resistance, but as the first cuff closed over his wrist it hit him.
This is really happening. I am going to prison.
His heart hammered in his chest. His mother was crying and his father was making empty reassurances that ‘this was not over’, though both of them knew that the chances of overturning the ruling were between zero and none.
As the bailiff tugged on his arm to lead him away, Beecher’s mind started to work again.
“Dad… dad, make sure he gets out.”
His father’s brows knitted together in confusion. “What? Who?”
“Chris-” Toby realized that name would mean nothing to his father. “Keller. The one thrown out of here.” The bailiff pushed now, and Beecher reluctantly took a step away.
His father must have seen the desperation in his eyes, because he did not hesitate to call out after his son as he was escorted from the courtroom, “I will, don’t worry!”
***
They brought Beecher into the same holding cells. The court only had so many as they waited for transports to move prisoners to processing then on to prison.
Chris was pacing the small cell when they brought Toby in and he froze, locking eyes with the blonde as they pushed him by. God, he looked terrified. Shit. He couldn’t walk into Oz looking like that. He couldn’t.
“Toby-“
“No talking!” snapped a court officer, and Chris scowled as they took Beecher to the furthest cell down the hall, so he couldn’t even see him.
"…fucking hacks…" Keller muttered and began pacing again. Being behind bars made him restless. Every instinct was thrown into overdrive. His eyes searched for hiding places for contraband, while his ears were sensitive to the slightest changes in the sounds of the room, and in the back of his mind he was sizing up every item in reach for its potential as a weapon. There was no need for any of that here, but a few minutes of incarceration found him slipping back into old habits.
Today he did not need a shank. What he needed was time… time to see if he had any favors left over, any contacts inside Oz. Toby was going to be behind Oz’s iron walls inside 48 hours, and that wasn’t much to work with. Even with time, he doubted he could get any help without getting indebted to some low life… and God only knew where that would lead.
He was screwed. But Toby was fucked.
Noise at the gate slowed his racing mind. More already? Must be a busy day for Judge Cunt.
Instead of gaining a neighbor in the cells down the hall, Keller found himself faced with an older man who had a familiar air about him. Before he could place the man or ask what was going on, the man told him, “You have to write an apology.”
“Fuck that,” Chris growled.
“It’s going to take more than a written apology. He resisted arrest,” the bailiff said, glaring. Chris wondered absently if it was the same one he had shoved off. He hadn’t really been paying much attention to faces at the time. Now that he was looking, he saw a young punk who was eager to make an incident out of nothing. A challenge was written in the way he was standing, his chest out and leaning ever slightly forward, brown eyes hard.
Chris met the bailiff’s glare with a smile. This brat wouldn’t last a day as a guard in a real prison.
“Where’d you get that knot on your head?” The older man was frowning disapprovingly after looking Keller over more carefully. “I don’t remember the officers hitting your head before they got you restrained.”
Chris knew better than to say anything, but his smile turned into a full grin and he looked pointedly at the court officer.
The bailiff opened his mouth but the older man stopped him. “Before you tell me he fell or any other nonsense, might I suggest we just stick with the apology and nothing else need come from this?”
Anger radiated from the court officer, but he clearly could not think of a way around the threat of an excessive force charge. After a few moments, the older man took the officer’s silence as agreement. “Let him out, then, and let’s get this over with.”
“No.” Their attention moved back to Chris, who stood with feet planted and arms crossed, clearly having no intention of going anywhere. “I’m not sorry.”
Now the older man’s jaw was set, and he said under his breath, for Keller alone, “Look, I don’t know who you are, or who you think you are, but my son asked me-“
It finally fell into place why this stranger would come to his cell and give a shit about what happened to him. Toby’s father. Keller hadn’t seen much besides the back of his head in court, but there was a touch of family resemblance.
Mr. Beecher was still giving him an earful when Chris turned his eyes on the young bailiff. Interrupting Mr. Beecher’s lecture he said, “Hey, you mind giving my lawyer and me a bit of privacy?”
The court officer looked dubious but backed off a couple of steps before turning around and returning to his post at the gate. Mr. Beecher got more red in the face.
“I am not your lawyer. I am just…”
Chris waved him off. “I know, I know, but I need to talk to you without anyone listening.”
Keller could tell Beecher’s father was stuck between curiosity and indignation. Being a lawyer, he went with indignation. “What could you possibly have to say to me?”
“Just hear me out,” Keller said in a harsh whisper, “I know you don’t know me, but you do know your son gives a shit about me, and whether you believe it or not, I give a shit about him, too. Now they’re holding him a few cells down, but there’s no talking between us jailbirds, so you need to pass him a bit of advice from me.”
Mr. Beecher was frowning, but he asked, “And what’s that, then?”
“Tell him to get into a fight in front of the guards first thing. Preferably with someone who’s not connected.”
The older man looked at him as if he’d just suggested that Toby walk into prison dressed in a pink tutu. “What good could that possibly serve?”
“He’ll get sent to the hole or solitary for a bit. He’ll be safe there.” It might buy me the time I need to make a more permanent solution. “He’s still too much in shock to be with the other prisoners. Look, just tell him what I said. Let him decide. But tell him.”
Mr. Beecher gave him a measuring glance. He had to have figured out by this point that Keller had done time. Chris just prayed he did not let that small detail get in the way of helping his son.
After what seemed like ages, Mr. Beecher made his decision. “You’re going to write a damned nice apology to the judge after this.”
Chris nodded. The words would be bitter in his mouth, but he’d do it so he could get out of here and start looking up old acquaintances. Besides, he owed the old man one for doing this. Least he could do was not be trouble. Well, too much trouble, in any case.
The guard was at his desk by the gate reading a magazine when Mr. Beecher looked over to check on him. Then he started walking towards the far end of the hall to where his son was being held.
***
“Dad,” Tobias said with shock, “What are you doing here?”
“Son…” Seeing Toby behind bars made the tears threaten, but his boy needed him to be strong. He cleared his throat. “How much did you overhear?”
“Besides Chris’s yelling? Nothing. Is he going to get out?” At least one of us can.
“I said I’d get it done, didn’t I?” His father’s smile did not reach his eyes. Tobias could see his father’s guilt that he could not free his own son as easily.
“Dad…” He stuck his hand through the bars to offer his father comfort, and a shaking hand grabbed onto his.
After a moment, his father said, “Look… he wanted me to tell you something.”
Tobias waited for his father to continue, but after a minute ticked slowly by in silence, he asked, “What was it?”
“He… He says to get into a fight in front of the guards when you get there. An… unconnected… prisoner.” His father squeezed his hand, “Toby, how do you know that man?”
Tobias held in a sigh. He knew one day he would have to explain to his parents, but today was not that day. Not on top of everything else. "He's a friend."
His father wanted more from him, but the look in his son’s eyes stopped him. “I have to get back now. God, I wish-“
“Don’t.” Tobias forced the words from his throat. “Just go. Don’t worry.” He tried to smile to reassure his father, but his mouth would not cooperate.
His father hesitated a moment longer. “I will come to visit you. Soon.” Then he was gone down the hallway.
A few moments later he heard a cell opening and Chris’s voice shout, “Trust me, Toby.” The bailiff yelled at him to be quiet, and after the rattle of the gate and some words he could not make out from his father, the room fell quiet.
His father’s visit had shook him up so much he didn’t even think about Chris’s advice until he was alone… terrifyingly alone. All he could hear was the sound of his own harsh breathing. His stomach rose into his throat and he feared he was going to be sick.
Oh god… Start a fight? Even if I wanted to… even if I wanted…
His stomach lurched and he fell on his knees in front of the stainless steel toilet, in case he couldn’t shake the nausea.
Oh god, what is going to happen to me?
***
It was the nausea that started it.
All the stress, the fear… his body couldn’t handle it. He’d watched a man get stabbed right in front of him, for Christ’s sake!
Going into the cafeteria, the sickly smell of whatever mashed vegetable they were serving proved to be thing that finally broke his hold on his stomach’s contents. There was no warning. One minute he was walking, the next he was reliving his last meal.
Unfortunately, when he regained control, he was looking into the eyes of an angry, muscle bound, tattooed white man. A man covered in Beecher’s previous meal.
“What the fuck!”
Beecher heard the words just before his world went white as the man threw his fist hard into the center of his face, shattering his glasses and, very likely, his nose.
“Fuck!”
Beecher wasn’t sure if that last obscenity came from him or the man, as he was too busy becoming acquainted with the floor, his legs failing to hold him up after a second blow to the side of his head.
Then there were hands on him, and he felt he should do something, but his limbs refused to move. It turned out not to matter, as the hands belonged to the guards scooping him up and dragging him off to the infirmary.
He did not realize the next stop after the infirmary would be the hole.
Now he was naked and alone, cradling his face in his hands in the corner of the bare, concrete room. It didn’t matter that he did not start the fight. It didn’t matter he did not throw a single punch. He was here. That was the end of it.
A whimper escaped the back of his throat. He’d lost everything. Everything. His career, his freedom, his dignity. It was all gone.
So was his family. But he’d lost them long ago, when he had not been paying attention. Geniveve was a stranger to him. He loved his children, but he did not know how to be their father. He felt the distance between them grew day by day. Less and less would they come to him for the answers to their questions or to read them stories at night. He could not blame them. He remembered being put off by the smell of alcohol on his grandfather’s breath when he had been a child. He remembered how lifeless his grandfather seemed after he’d been drinking.
Was I like that?
The marriage continued because it was not worth the effort to get a divorce. Gen did not care about him… and he was surprised to find out he did not really care about Gen. The children deserved a stable home, even if he could not provide an entirely happy one.
But now he’d wrecked even that, locked away here for four years minimum.
What did he have? His parents, his brother, Chris…
Chris.
Chris had come into his life like a storm… to put it mildly. Before Chris, another man had never so much as turned his head, much less made him hard with but a whisper behind his ear. Before Chris, he’d never considered taking a male lover. Before Chris, he’d never considered a lot of things.
Maybe that was why when Chris had found him, he was using alcohol to escape. He never realized there were other ways to get away from the soul crushing routine. He loved law, he really did-but his father always pitched him the easiest clients to work with. Any lawyer could do what he did in his sleep. Toby did not know if his father did it to keep his win ratio up, or if he simply did not trust Toby’s abilities, but the result was the death of Toby’s passion for the work. When it was gone, Toby did not know what to hold onto anymore.
What was certain was that when Chris had found him, he had been an easy mark. He had been stupid. And it was best, most painful thing to have ever happened to him. Chris took his heart and over 10 grand cash, not including various other expenses he incurred during his affair with Toby.
Chris took them. But legally, they were given, which was what made Keller such a skilled con artist. That, and he preyed on male victims who wouldn’t dare report the affairs anyway.
For Beecher, ten thousand was not a life shattering loss, but the betrayal cut him deep. Keller had turned gifts given freely into nothing more than stolen goods. When Keller thanked Toby for everything… when he told him he did not mean any more to him than he cared about the pig who became the bacon he ate, he was smiling. The bastard was grinning ear to fucking ear.
All Toby’s love turned to hate in that moment, and he clung onto that hate like a lifeline. With Keller gone, it was the only thing he had left of the fires of passion Chris had ignited in him. It was the first taste of being alive he’d had since college, and he could not let it go so easily.
But even the hate he couldn’t keep burning all by himself. He tracked Keller down and found him in a run down apartment. He went there to confront Keller, to dig deep and find the worst of his rage and throw it all in Keller’s smug face… to remember what it was to hate so fiercely he felt like he could kill the man. But when Keller opened the door, all those ideas fled. Then he did the most pathetic thing imaginable: he begged Keller to give him another chance.
Chris, for his part, did not seem surprised to see him when he had opened his door. He did seem surprised when he heard what Toby had to say. When Toby’s mouth finally stopped moving against his will, saying things he did not want to admit to himself much less want Keller to know, Chris was quiet for a long time. Then he let Toby inside.
He learned a lot of things he had not known about Keller that night. Things, perhaps, he would rather not have known. But he did not waiver. Feeling alive was more important to him than anything Chris may have done.
The affair resumed. Perhaps the pace was slower, but it was no less intense. Chris wasn’t treating him like a mark anymore, and the result was fights that could have shaken mountains.
It was after one of these earth moving events that he had gotten wasted, gotten into a car, and killed a little girl.
God, what was that fight about, again?
He wanted to blame Keller for it. He did, at first. But Chris stayed with him despite his shitty attitude. He showed up for the trial, just at the edge of Toby’s sight, away from his family. He’d gotten thrown into a cell during sentencing.
He told me to get into a fight. He wanted me here, in this awful place.
He had his parents, his brother… did he have Chris? Shivering on the dirty concrete for 72 hours had given plenty of time for doubts that had been hidden deep away to come crawling forward… and he still had eleven more days to go.
Was he getting played a second time?
Did Chris want to get him killed?
Beecher shuddered. Right now, here, in this place… he believed Chris was capable of it.
***
This is where you should cut and run, a voice in his head whispered.
There was no good news to be had. People he had known in Lardner were dead, still inside but behind the wrong walls, or were Vern Schillinger.
Of all the scum fucks in the universe he knew (and there were plenty), why was the only god damn one inside Oswald Vern Schillinger?
Fuck, fuck, fuck. Chris slammed the keyboard down and a few people inside the café turned to look at him, but he was too lost in his own head to notice them. He could not approach Vern about Toby. He knew exactly how Vern would ‘protect’ him.
Take off now and Oz will solve your problem for you. Beecher won’t last long enough to tell anyone about you, and life will go on… the voice insisted.
“That’s a shit thing to do,” Chris mumbled to himself. But that’s never stopped me before. Why should it now?
He knew why. Toby wanted him, needed him. Toby needed him more now than he ever had before. And that need, it gave Chris a rush… like he might be worth something, even if it was only to one person for a brief moment in time.
But like all highs, it was dangerous. This one more than most. He did not know anyone inside of Oz already. He would need to make a contact and hire someone to get Beecher settled. Costs would be high, and the quality of his contact’s service would likely be questionable. But he had limited options, and it was the best he could do with the resources he had.
***
It took a concentrated effort to step through the gates as the guard waved him through. Something in the back of his head told him that once he was inside, they weren’t going to let him out. He did his best to ignore it.
Keller signed the sheet the CO handed him once he was through the metal detector and had declared he had no firearms, drugs, explosives or other contraband. “I’m here to see Tobias Beecher.”
The grey haired guard checked one of the clipboards littered behind the counter. He scanned the names. “Can’t. In the hole.”
Chris smiled. So he had gotten the message. Chris had worried the lawyer wouldn’t have enough balls to start anything, but maybe he had underestimated him… something he did not often do. “So, does fighting still get you three weeks in the hole?”
The guard regarded him suspiciously now. “First offenders we let get by with two.”
Damn. The more time Beecher spent there, the better. But it was still enough time to get his plan in action. “How about Ryan O’Reily? He in the hole, too?”
After flipping a few pages on his clipboard, the guard replied, “Not today.” Then he waved Keller in the direction on the visitation rooms.
Keller felt like he’d stepped into his past, and it was not a good feeling. On the surface, Oz didn’t seem so different from Lardner. The stench of the place was the same: cheap, sterile cleaning solution with a distinct aftertaste of sweat and fear. If one got out of these hallways where civilians roamed, Chris imagined it’d be the smell of sweat and fear with only a lingering hint of cleaning solution. There was a constant hum from the overhead lights, which blended with the echoing sounds of metal on metal and the drone of prisoners off in the distance.
He turned to reach the visitation room and passed a CO who did not give him a second glance.
Keller sat down in one of the plastic chairs behind glass that was meant, for the first time, to protect him, rather than protect others from him. He felt a certain uneasiness being back inside. The ever present paranoia he had lived with when he had been a prisoner awoke inside him once more.
More bizarre and unsettling than that was a sense of comfort he’d started to feel one he’d gotten past the front desk. Perhaps comfort was not the exact word for it… but he knew this world. He understood this world. It felt more like home than any of the places he’d ever lived.
How sick is that?
Luckily, he didn’t have much time to think about it before a lean man slid into the chair across from his and picked up the telephone handset.
Keller reached for his. “You O’Reily?”
The voice on the other end of the line was angry, impatient. “Yeah.”
Keller took his time looking O’Reily over. He did not have the body of a brawler, but his eyes were quick and calculating. Keller could recognize another manipulator and survivor when he saw one. Question was, was this one up for sale as he’d been told? “Garret O’Hannon over in Lardner says you might be interested in making some extra cash.”
“O’Hannon should be a little less free with my name,” O’Reily growled, “Why should I believe you’re anything but some undercover rat trying to set me up?”
Keller smiled. If a simple name drop wasn’t enough to convince O’Reily he was not police, then perhaps the Irishman was not entirely incompetent. A good sign. “I don’t want you to kill anyone. I want you to look out for someone.”
O’Reily scoffed, “I’ve got enough of my own problems.”
“I didn’t expect you to help out of the goodness of your own heart.” Keller flashed a small wad of one hundred dollar bills, “You gonna keep listening?”
O’Reily’s eyes were immediately drawn to the green. “Depends. What do you want from me exactly, and how much you gonna give?”
Chris leaned back in his chair, pocketing the money again to get O’Reily’s eyes back on his. “Teach a new guy who’s who, how to hide a weapon, and how to keep a low profile. I don’t expect you to be his bodyguard, but you keep your eyes on him, and any major shit that goes down, I want to know about it. One thousand wired to your account every month.”
Keller could see O’Reily weighing the deal behind those brown eyes of his. “Who?”
And here came the moment of truth. “Tobias Beecher.”
O’Reily broke up into laugher. “Beecher? Are you kidding me? I mean, I expected it to be bad if you need someone to look after his ass, but everyone knows about that pansy after he puked all over Reinhardt on his first day. Nothing’s going to keep his ass safe.”
Keller kept his face neutral. Damn it. He hadn’t thought Beecher was tough enough to start his own fight, but he had thought Beecher would have enough control to keep his food down. “Then I guess you’d get a month’s pay for a week’s work. Going to take it?”
O’Reily shrugged, “Why the hell do you care what happens to Beecher? You a fag, or something?”
Keller eyes glittered dangerously even as his mouth was drawn upward in a smirk. “What does it matter to you, O’Reily? Or shall I offer this money to someone else?”
O’Reily suddenly didn’t seem very comfortable, but the allure of cash kept him sitting in place. “I’ll do it for fifteen hundred,”
“I don’t have any interest in playing any fucking haggling games. One thousand or zero. Your choice.”
“Fine. I’ll do it.” O’Reily’s voice lowered. “But what do you want me to do when someone makes him their bitch?”
Keller’s jaw set. He did not want to admit it, but it was a reasonable question. “I want the bastard’s name.” Keller considered his next words carefully. “And if you can’t stop it, at least help him… escape… the pain.”
O’Reily lifted an eyebrow, but nodded slowly in understanding. “I know just the thing.”
With that, O’Reily stood up. “One thousand in my account by Wednesday.” He set the phone back into its place. As Keller watched him leave, he hoped he didn’t just blow a thousand dollars for nothing.
***
Two weeks.
Two weeks with nothing but himself for company. Two weeks of coming to understand how fully and completely he had fucked up his life.
The metal door swung open and his clothes fell on the ground in front of his face. “Get dressed. After you get cleaned up, you got a visitor, so hurry up.”
After the solitude and sensory deprivation, returning to Emerald City hit Beecher as hard as Reinhardt’s fists had. A few of the inmates were laughing at him, but he could not hear them; all the sounds of Oz somehow seemed harsher, louder, and more unbearable than before he had gone into the hole. The noise deafened him.
Get to the pod, get to the shower, get to the visitation room. Pod, shower, visit.., pod, shower, visit…
Two weeks and Beecher still had not met his cellmate. Beecher did not meet him now as he ventured inside the pod to grab his towel. When the door shut behind him, muffling the sound from outside enough so he could hear himself breathe, he felt his muscles relax. He had not even realized how tense he had been until the weight was lifted.
It had been just two weeks in the hole, and he could barely walk across a busy room.
Chris had wanted this?
Gathering his things, Beecher had to steel himself before he could open the door and step back out into the chaos.
Shower, visit… shower, visit…
***
Beecher had thought he had gotten himself put back together when he entered the visitation room and walked down the line of chairs, searching for a familiar face. He should have known who it would be. There was Chris, leaning forward with his face only a couple of inches from the glass, worried eyes trying to see every part of Toby at once. When Beecher sat in front of him and picked up the phone, his hand was shaking. He wanted to hit Keller in the jaw. He wanted to forget everything in his kiss.
“Toby...”
Christ, Beecher looked like hell. The man before Keller was thin and trembling, dark circles around his eyes and fading bruises across his face. But he was alive and relatively unscarred, and, considering the circumstances, it was the best he could have hoped for.
“Chris.” Beecher’s voice was rough with disuse. It rose in accusation. “Chris, how could you?”
That hadn’t been the response Keller had been expecting, but he could adapt. “How could I what?”
The anger Toby had been nursing the hole was rising to the surface. “Tell me to start a fight. You must have known where I’d end up.”
“Of course I knew,” Keller said evenly. “You weren’t ready to face the realities of prison life. You still aren’t.”
Anger felt good. It made Beecher feel powerful again. “You bastard, you nearly got me killed.”
Chris scoffed. “I’m sure it hurt, but I doubt you were in mortal danger. You haven’t had time to make proper enemies.” He smirked. “You’ll just have to work on your ducking.”
Keller’s dismissal only sent Beecher’s anger to new heights. “Bastard. What did I do to you that you’d want me sent to the hole?”
Chris held in his sigh. Toby’s naivety was wearing thin. “Nothing. I wanted you in the hole for your own good.”
“My own good?!” Beecher shouted, causing a CO to look his way. Beecher’s voice lowered, “My own good? I was left naked and alone to wallow in my own filth for two weeks. I nearly went mad… Hell, I don’t feel quite sane right now.”
“That’s normal. I’d start to worry if you came out of the hole feeling sane.”
Toby slammed the glass that separated them, wanting to wipe that smug look off Keller’s face.
Keller awaited a beat before asking, “Feel better?”
“What?”
Chris was looking straight into Toby’s eyes. He said carefully, “Do you feel better?
“Look, I know what a shithole the hole is, and I know you’re pissed at what a shithole Oz is.” He leaned forward. “I also know that you’re too damn scared to take it out on anyone here, so scared you can’t even hold your stomach.”
Toby paled. “You know about that?”
Chris nodded. “Now I can take your anger, baby, but you can’t stay scared, or they’ll eat you alive.”
“But, Chris, why the hole?” Toby paused. Even he heard the whining tone in his voice, and he took a moment to collect himself. “I don’t understand.”
It’s best you don’t understand… Chris thought. “Toby, there are worse things than the hole. A lot worse things. At least in the hole, you’re safe.”
“Safe?”
“No one can get to you when you’re there.”
“But the guards-“
Keller hit the desk in front of him hard, the sound of it through the phone cutting Toby off. “The guards don’t give a shit. You can’t trust them more than the liars, murders, and thieves you live with.”
“Liars, murders, and thieves…” Toby repeated, tilting his head slightly. “Like you?”
Keller looked like he’d been slapped, and Toby immediately regretted the words. He opened his mouth to say something… anything… to make it better, but Keller silenced him with a cold stare. “Yeah, like me. Scum of the universe.”
“Chris-“
Keller smiled, though the bitterness had not quite left his eyes. “No, I can take it. You’re still angry at life for putting you here, and you’ve got every right to be. You have to hold onto that anger. In prison, being angry is better than being sorry.”
“Chris…” Unspoken in Toby’s mind was the question, Is that how you got through it?
Keller ignored the look in Toby’s eyes and pressed forward. “You have to start another fight.”
Toby recoiled. “What?”
“You need to get sent to the hole again.”
Beecher scowled. “No. No way.”
“Toby, the guards won’t protect you from the other inmates.” Chris met Toby’s eyes with his own, trying to will him into believing his words. “And the other inmates will target you.”
Toby shook his head. “No. The guards stopped Reinhardt from doing worse to me. They’re here to keep order.”
Beecher’s continued belief in the criminal justice system would have been funny had it not been so terrifying. “You have to trust me. At the end of the day, they don’t care if you’re alive, so long as they are.”
Toby did not look convinced. “Fine. Let’s say I do what you suggest. Let’s say I start a fight every two or three weeks to get back to the hole. How would that look to the parole board? I would never get out.”
“Toby, you have to survive for four years until you even get a hearing.”
Toby drew away, stricken. “How could you even say that?” Before Keller could get in another word, he set the phone down.
Damn. Chris had realized that he couldn’t keep Beecher in the hole for his entire sentence, but he was desperate to shield Toby even if only for a day longer. Toby’s back disappeared out the door, and Keller was again left hoping he didn’t waste a thousand dollars… that O’Reily might be able to make some kind of difference. If Beecher did not wake up to reality and his place in it soon, he was not going to last.
(Rant ahead, jump to cut for a hit of fic)
Third person narratives have become hard for me -_- Years ago, everything I wrote was in thrid person. Now it feels like there are muliple personalities running around in my head as I try to pull different characters together. First person just seems so more peaceful. But I braved the muliple personalities for this one..
It's also hard for me to write much more than a drabble. I just want to go from one moment to another, screw whatever should have to happen to take me from A to B! Unfortunately for me, all that stuff I'd rather forget about is rather vital to making A connect to B -_- I fear that if I am bored writing scenes between the moments in time I am interested in, then they are also doomed to be boring. So I try to find something interesting in every moment. I don't know that I always succceed.
Finally, This is a work in progress. I have a nice little map which tells me exactly where I am going with this (...one that terrifies me with notes on scenes the like of which I have never tried before...), but there is a lot of work ahead. A lot. If that's going to bother you, turn back now. When I finish, I'll sing it from the rooftops, and maybe you'll come back~ In any case, the real reason I am posting what I have now is because if I don't, it'll just rot away on my harddrive while I second guess and doubt myself. If you've read this far, you might have gotten a sense of how my mind likes to run circles around itself. How I ever get anything done in my life is a mystery to me.
Did I mention how much I hate coming up with titles? Oh the hell with it~
title: Trials and Separations
notes: OZ AU, B/K, unbeta'd-- just me editting. If anyone who read this is interested in betaing other chapters, do leave a comment to that affect. I know I give the impression of someone who would fall apart at the first criticism or correction, but I'm more afraid of writing poorly and no one telling me about it than people saying I suck and why.
terrible summary: Beecher and Keller are separated when Beecher is arrested for vehicular manslaughter and sent to Oz-- leaving Keller on the outside, looking in.
“What the fuck?” Chris Keller was on his feet, shaking with rage. He knew the verdict would be guilty. He knew there was a chance Beecher would be sent away. Rehab, maybe. Prison, possibly. But not Oswald Maximum Security Penitentiary. Toby was a lawyer, for Christ sake! They’re supposed to baby him like all the other rich bastards.
Beecher had turned to look at the same time the judge’s eyes fixed on him, the ever present scowl on her face deepening. “What did you say, young man?”
“You fucking heard me.” Toby’s eyes were pleading with him to be quiet, but the words had already left his mouth.
“Another word-”
Chris knew what she was going to say, and he didn’t care to listen. “Fuck you.”
“Bailiff! Escort that man to a holding cell, he is in contempt of my court.”
Every one of his muscles tensed as the bailiff approached him. Beecher held Chris with his gaze, and he saw rather than heard his name on the blonde’s lips. Pleading. Don’t fight them.
But when a court officer grabbed his arm to turn and cuff him, Keller could not stop himself. No man could go without a fight. He shoved the first bailiff away as a second came up from behind him. The man caught Keller’s left arm and twisted it upward viciously, forcing Keller forward with a grunt of pain. Before he could recover, the first officer was there with the cuffs, catching his right wrist and forcing it back.
Even after he was restrained, Keller resisted. They had to drag him away as he screamed, “It’s not right, it’s not fucking right and you god damn know it!”
***
Chris, don’t make this any harder than it has to be.
The thundering of the gavel announced court was adjourned, and a bailiff approached him, handcuffs out. Beecher offered no resistance, but as the first cuff closed over his wrist it hit him.
This is really happening. I am going to prison.
His heart hammered in his chest. His mother was crying and his father was making empty reassurances that ‘this was not over’, though both of them knew that the chances of overturning the ruling were between zero and none.
As the bailiff tugged on his arm to lead him away, Beecher’s mind started to work again.
“Dad… dad, make sure he gets out.”
His father’s brows knitted together in confusion. “What? Who?”
“Chris-” Toby realized that name would mean nothing to his father. “Keller. The one thrown out of here.” The bailiff pushed now, and Beecher reluctantly took a step away.
His father must have seen the desperation in his eyes, because he did not hesitate to call out after his son as he was escorted from the courtroom, “I will, don’t worry!”
***
They brought Beecher into the same holding cells. The court only had so many as they waited for transports to move prisoners to processing then on to prison.
Chris was pacing the small cell when they brought Toby in and he froze, locking eyes with the blonde as they pushed him by. God, he looked terrified. Shit. He couldn’t walk into Oz looking like that. He couldn’t.
“Toby-“
“No talking!” snapped a court officer, and Chris scowled as they took Beecher to the furthest cell down the hall, so he couldn’t even see him.
"…fucking hacks…" Keller muttered and began pacing again. Being behind bars made him restless. Every instinct was thrown into overdrive. His eyes searched for hiding places for contraband, while his ears were sensitive to the slightest changes in the sounds of the room, and in the back of his mind he was sizing up every item in reach for its potential as a weapon. There was no need for any of that here, but a few minutes of incarceration found him slipping back into old habits.
Today he did not need a shank. What he needed was time… time to see if he had any favors left over, any contacts inside Oz. Toby was going to be behind Oz’s iron walls inside 48 hours, and that wasn’t much to work with. Even with time, he doubted he could get any help without getting indebted to some low life… and God only knew where that would lead.
He was screwed. But Toby was fucked.
Noise at the gate slowed his racing mind. More already? Must be a busy day for Judge Cunt.
Instead of gaining a neighbor in the cells down the hall, Keller found himself faced with an older man who had a familiar air about him. Before he could place the man or ask what was going on, the man told him, “You have to write an apology.”
“Fuck that,” Chris growled.
“It’s going to take more than a written apology. He resisted arrest,” the bailiff said, glaring. Chris wondered absently if it was the same one he had shoved off. He hadn’t really been paying much attention to faces at the time. Now that he was looking, he saw a young punk who was eager to make an incident out of nothing. A challenge was written in the way he was standing, his chest out and leaning ever slightly forward, brown eyes hard.
Chris met the bailiff’s glare with a smile. This brat wouldn’t last a day as a guard in a real prison.
“Where’d you get that knot on your head?” The older man was frowning disapprovingly after looking Keller over more carefully. “I don’t remember the officers hitting your head before they got you restrained.”
Chris knew better than to say anything, but his smile turned into a full grin and he looked pointedly at the court officer.
The bailiff opened his mouth but the older man stopped him. “Before you tell me he fell or any other nonsense, might I suggest we just stick with the apology and nothing else need come from this?”
Anger radiated from the court officer, but he clearly could not think of a way around the threat of an excessive force charge. After a few moments, the older man took the officer’s silence as agreement. “Let him out, then, and let’s get this over with.”
“No.” Their attention moved back to Chris, who stood with feet planted and arms crossed, clearly having no intention of going anywhere. “I’m not sorry.”
Now the older man’s jaw was set, and he said under his breath, for Keller alone, “Look, I don’t know who you are, or who you think you are, but my son asked me-“
It finally fell into place why this stranger would come to his cell and give a shit about what happened to him. Toby’s father. Keller hadn’t seen much besides the back of his head in court, but there was a touch of family resemblance.
Mr. Beecher was still giving him an earful when Chris turned his eyes on the young bailiff. Interrupting Mr. Beecher’s lecture he said, “Hey, you mind giving my lawyer and me a bit of privacy?”
The court officer looked dubious but backed off a couple of steps before turning around and returning to his post at the gate. Mr. Beecher got more red in the face.
“I am not your lawyer. I am just…”
Chris waved him off. “I know, I know, but I need to talk to you without anyone listening.”
Keller could tell Beecher’s father was stuck between curiosity and indignation. Being a lawyer, he went with indignation. “What could you possibly have to say to me?”
“Just hear me out,” Keller said in a harsh whisper, “I know you don’t know me, but you do know your son gives a shit about me, and whether you believe it or not, I give a shit about him, too. Now they’re holding him a few cells down, but there’s no talking between us jailbirds, so you need to pass him a bit of advice from me.”
Mr. Beecher was frowning, but he asked, “And what’s that, then?”
“Tell him to get into a fight in front of the guards first thing. Preferably with someone who’s not connected.”
The older man looked at him as if he’d just suggested that Toby walk into prison dressed in a pink tutu. “What good could that possibly serve?”
“He’ll get sent to the hole or solitary for a bit. He’ll be safe there.” It might buy me the time I need to make a more permanent solution. “He’s still too much in shock to be with the other prisoners. Look, just tell him what I said. Let him decide. But tell him.”
Mr. Beecher gave him a measuring glance. He had to have figured out by this point that Keller had done time. Chris just prayed he did not let that small detail get in the way of helping his son.
After what seemed like ages, Mr. Beecher made his decision. “You’re going to write a damned nice apology to the judge after this.”
Chris nodded. The words would be bitter in his mouth, but he’d do it so he could get out of here and start looking up old acquaintances. Besides, he owed the old man one for doing this. Least he could do was not be trouble. Well, too much trouble, in any case.
The guard was at his desk by the gate reading a magazine when Mr. Beecher looked over to check on him. Then he started walking towards the far end of the hall to where his son was being held.
***
“Dad,” Tobias said with shock, “What are you doing here?”
“Son…” Seeing Toby behind bars made the tears threaten, but his boy needed him to be strong. He cleared his throat. “How much did you overhear?”
“Besides Chris’s yelling? Nothing. Is he going to get out?” At least one of us can.
“I said I’d get it done, didn’t I?” His father’s smile did not reach his eyes. Tobias could see his father’s guilt that he could not free his own son as easily.
“Dad…” He stuck his hand through the bars to offer his father comfort, and a shaking hand grabbed onto his.
After a moment, his father said, “Look… he wanted me to tell you something.”
Tobias waited for his father to continue, but after a minute ticked slowly by in silence, he asked, “What was it?”
“He… He says to get into a fight in front of the guards when you get there. An… unconnected… prisoner.” His father squeezed his hand, “Toby, how do you know that man?”
Tobias held in a sigh. He knew one day he would have to explain to his parents, but today was not that day. Not on top of everything else. "He's a friend."
His father wanted more from him, but the look in his son’s eyes stopped him. “I have to get back now. God, I wish-“
“Don’t.” Tobias forced the words from his throat. “Just go. Don’t worry.” He tried to smile to reassure his father, but his mouth would not cooperate.
His father hesitated a moment longer. “I will come to visit you. Soon.” Then he was gone down the hallway.
A few moments later he heard a cell opening and Chris’s voice shout, “Trust me, Toby.” The bailiff yelled at him to be quiet, and after the rattle of the gate and some words he could not make out from his father, the room fell quiet.
His father’s visit had shook him up so much he didn’t even think about Chris’s advice until he was alone… terrifyingly alone. All he could hear was the sound of his own harsh breathing. His stomach rose into his throat and he feared he was going to be sick.
Oh god… Start a fight? Even if I wanted to… even if I wanted…
His stomach lurched and he fell on his knees in front of the stainless steel toilet, in case he couldn’t shake the nausea.
Oh god, what is going to happen to me?
***
It was the nausea that started it.
All the stress, the fear… his body couldn’t handle it. He’d watched a man get stabbed right in front of him, for Christ’s sake!
Going into the cafeteria, the sickly smell of whatever mashed vegetable they were serving proved to be thing that finally broke his hold on his stomach’s contents. There was no warning. One minute he was walking, the next he was reliving his last meal.
Unfortunately, when he regained control, he was looking into the eyes of an angry, muscle bound, tattooed white man. A man covered in Beecher’s previous meal.
“What the fuck!”
Beecher heard the words just before his world went white as the man threw his fist hard into the center of his face, shattering his glasses and, very likely, his nose.
“Fuck!”
Beecher wasn’t sure if that last obscenity came from him or the man, as he was too busy becoming acquainted with the floor, his legs failing to hold him up after a second blow to the side of his head.
Then there were hands on him, and he felt he should do something, but his limbs refused to move. It turned out not to matter, as the hands belonged to the guards scooping him up and dragging him off to the infirmary.
He did not realize the next stop after the infirmary would be the hole.
Now he was naked and alone, cradling his face in his hands in the corner of the bare, concrete room. It didn’t matter that he did not start the fight. It didn’t matter he did not throw a single punch. He was here. That was the end of it.
A whimper escaped the back of his throat. He’d lost everything. Everything. His career, his freedom, his dignity. It was all gone.
So was his family. But he’d lost them long ago, when he had not been paying attention. Geniveve was a stranger to him. He loved his children, but he did not know how to be their father. He felt the distance between them grew day by day. Less and less would they come to him for the answers to their questions or to read them stories at night. He could not blame them. He remembered being put off by the smell of alcohol on his grandfather’s breath when he had been a child. He remembered how lifeless his grandfather seemed after he’d been drinking.
Was I like that?
The marriage continued because it was not worth the effort to get a divorce. Gen did not care about him… and he was surprised to find out he did not really care about Gen. The children deserved a stable home, even if he could not provide an entirely happy one.
But now he’d wrecked even that, locked away here for four years minimum.
What did he have? His parents, his brother, Chris…
Chris.
Chris had come into his life like a storm… to put it mildly. Before Chris, another man had never so much as turned his head, much less made him hard with but a whisper behind his ear. Before Chris, he’d never considered taking a male lover. Before Chris, he’d never considered a lot of things.
Maybe that was why when Chris had found him, he was using alcohol to escape. He never realized there were other ways to get away from the soul crushing routine. He loved law, he really did-but his father always pitched him the easiest clients to work with. Any lawyer could do what he did in his sleep. Toby did not know if his father did it to keep his win ratio up, or if he simply did not trust Toby’s abilities, but the result was the death of Toby’s passion for the work. When it was gone, Toby did not know what to hold onto anymore.
What was certain was that when Chris had found him, he had been an easy mark. He had been stupid. And it was best, most painful thing to have ever happened to him. Chris took his heart and over 10 grand cash, not including various other expenses he incurred during his affair with Toby.
Chris took them. But legally, they were given, which was what made Keller such a skilled con artist. That, and he preyed on male victims who wouldn’t dare report the affairs anyway.
For Beecher, ten thousand was not a life shattering loss, but the betrayal cut him deep. Keller had turned gifts given freely into nothing more than stolen goods. When Keller thanked Toby for everything… when he told him he did not mean any more to him than he cared about the pig who became the bacon he ate, he was smiling. The bastard was grinning ear to fucking ear.
All Toby’s love turned to hate in that moment, and he clung onto that hate like a lifeline. With Keller gone, it was the only thing he had left of the fires of passion Chris had ignited in him. It was the first taste of being alive he’d had since college, and he could not let it go so easily.
But even the hate he couldn’t keep burning all by himself. He tracked Keller down and found him in a run down apartment. He went there to confront Keller, to dig deep and find the worst of his rage and throw it all in Keller’s smug face… to remember what it was to hate so fiercely he felt like he could kill the man. But when Keller opened the door, all those ideas fled. Then he did the most pathetic thing imaginable: he begged Keller to give him another chance.
Chris, for his part, did not seem surprised to see him when he had opened his door. He did seem surprised when he heard what Toby had to say. When Toby’s mouth finally stopped moving against his will, saying things he did not want to admit to himself much less want Keller to know, Chris was quiet for a long time. Then he let Toby inside.
He learned a lot of things he had not known about Keller that night. Things, perhaps, he would rather not have known. But he did not waiver. Feeling alive was more important to him than anything Chris may have done.
The affair resumed. Perhaps the pace was slower, but it was no less intense. Chris wasn’t treating him like a mark anymore, and the result was fights that could have shaken mountains.
It was after one of these earth moving events that he had gotten wasted, gotten into a car, and killed a little girl.
God, what was that fight about, again?
He wanted to blame Keller for it. He did, at first. But Chris stayed with him despite his shitty attitude. He showed up for the trial, just at the edge of Toby’s sight, away from his family. He’d gotten thrown into a cell during sentencing.
He told me to get into a fight. He wanted me here, in this awful place.
He had his parents, his brother… did he have Chris? Shivering on the dirty concrete for 72 hours had given plenty of time for doubts that had been hidden deep away to come crawling forward… and he still had eleven more days to go.
Was he getting played a second time?
Did Chris want to get him killed?
Beecher shuddered. Right now, here, in this place… he believed Chris was capable of it.
***
This is where you should cut and run, a voice in his head whispered.
There was no good news to be had. People he had known in Lardner were dead, still inside but behind the wrong walls, or were Vern Schillinger.
Of all the scum fucks in the universe he knew (and there were plenty), why was the only god damn one inside Oswald Vern Schillinger?
Fuck, fuck, fuck. Chris slammed the keyboard down and a few people inside the café turned to look at him, but he was too lost in his own head to notice them. He could not approach Vern about Toby. He knew exactly how Vern would ‘protect’ him.
Take off now and Oz will solve your problem for you. Beecher won’t last long enough to tell anyone about you, and life will go on… the voice insisted.
“That’s a shit thing to do,” Chris mumbled to himself. But that’s never stopped me before. Why should it now?
He knew why. Toby wanted him, needed him. Toby needed him more now than he ever had before. And that need, it gave Chris a rush… like he might be worth something, even if it was only to one person for a brief moment in time.
But like all highs, it was dangerous. This one more than most. He did not know anyone inside of Oz already. He would need to make a contact and hire someone to get Beecher settled. Costs would be high, and the quality of his contact’s service would likely be questionable. But he had limited options, and it was the best he could do with the resources he had.
***
It took a concentrated effort to step through the gates as the guard waved him through. Something in the back of his head told him that once he was inside, they weren’t going to let him out. He did his best to ignore it.
Keller signed the sheet the CO handed him once he was through the metal detector and had declared he had no firearms, drugs, explosives or other contraband. “I’m here to see Tobias Beecher.”
The grey haired guard checked one of the clipboards littered behind the counter. He scanned the names. “Can’t. In the hole.”
Chris smiled. So he had gotten the message. Chris had worried the lawyer wouldn’t have enough balls to start anything, but maybe he had underestimated him… something he did not often do. “So, does fighting still get you three weeks in the hole?”
The guard regarded him suspiciously now. “First offenders we let get by with two.”
Damn. The more time Beecher spent there, the better. But it was still enough time to get his plan in action. “How about Ryan O’Reily? He in the hole, too?”
After flipping a few pages on his clipboard, the guard replied, “Not today.” Then he waved Keller in the direction on the visitation rooms.
Keller felt like he’d stepped into his past, and it was not a good feeling. On the surface, Oz didn’t seem so different from Lardner. The stench of the place was the same: cheap, sterile cleaning solution with a distinct aftertaste of sweat and fear. If one got out of these hallways where civilians roamed, Chris imagined it’d be the smell of sweat and fear with only a lingering hint of cleaning solution. There was a constant hum from the overhead lights, which blended with the echoing sounds of metal on metal and the drone of prisoners off in the distance.
He turned to reach the visitation room and passed a CO who did not give him a second glance.
Keller sat down in one of the plastic chairs behind glass that was meant, for the first time, to protect him, rather than protect others from him. He felt a certain uneasiness being back inside. The ever present paranoia he had lived with when he had been a prisoner awoke inside him once more.
More bizarre and unsettling than that was a sense of comfort he’d started to feel one he’d gotten past the front desk. Perhaps comfort was not the exact word for it… but he knew this world. He understood this world. It felt more like home than any of the places he’d ever lived.
How sick is that?
Luckily, he didn’t have much time to think about it before a lean man slid into the chair across from his and picked up the telephone handset.
Keller reached for his. “You O’Reily?”
The voice on the other end of the line was angry, impatient. “Yeah.”
Keller took his time looking O’Reily over. He did not have the body of a brawler, but his eyes were quick and calculating. Keller could recognize another manipulator and survivor when he saw one. Question was, was this one up for sale as he’d been told? “Garret O’Hannon over in Lardner says you might be interested in making some extra cash.”
“O’Hannon should be a little less free with my name,” O’Reily growled, “Why should I believe you’re anything but some undercover rat trying to set me up?”
Keller smiled. If a simple name drop wasn’t enough to convince O’Reily he was not police, then perhaps the Irishman was not entirely incompetent. A good sign. “I don’t want you to kill anyone. I want you to look out for someone.”
O’Reily scoffed, “I’ve got enough of my own problems.”
“I didn’t expect you to help out of the goodness of your own heart.” Keller flashed a small wad of one hundred dollar bills, “You gonna keep listening?”
O’Reily’s eyes were immediately drawn to the green. “Depends. What do you want from me exactly, and how much you gonna give?”
Chris leaned back in his chair, pocketing the money again to get O’Reily’s eyes back on his. “Teach a new guy who’s who, how to hide a weapon, and how to keep a low profile. I don’t expect you to be his bodyguard, but you keep your eyes on him, and any major shit that goes down, I want to know about it. One thousand wired to your account every month.”
Keller could see O’Reily weighing the deal behind those brown eyes of his. “Who?”
And here came the moment of truth. “Tobias Beecher.”
O’Reily broke up into laugher. “Beecher? Are you kidding me? I mean, I expected it to be bad if you need someone to look after his ass, but everyone knows about that pansy after he puked all over Reinhardt on his first day. Nothing’s going to keep his ass safe.”
Keller kept his face neutral. Damn it. He hadn’t thought Beecher was tough enough to start his own fight, but he had thought Beecher would have enough control to keep his food down. “Then I guess you’d get a month’s pay for a week’s work. Going to take it?”
O’Reily shrugged, “Why the hell do you care what happens to Beecher? You a fag, or something?”
Keller eyes glittered dangerously even as his mouth was drawn upward in a smirk. “What does it matter to you, O’Reily? Or shall I offer this money to someone else?”
O’Reily suddenly didn’t seem very comfortable, but the allure of cash kept him sitting in place. “I’ll do it for fifteen hundred,”
“I don’t have any interest in playing any fucking haggling games. One thousand or zero. Your choice.”
“Fine. I’ll do it.” O’Reily’s voice lowered. “But what do you want me to do when someone makes him their bitch?”
Keller’s jaw set. He did not want to admit it, but it was a reasonable question. “I want the bastard’s name.” Keller considered his next words carefully. “And if you can’t stop it, at least help him… escape… the pain.”
O’Reily lifted an eyebrow, but nodded slowly in understanding. “I know just the thing.”
With that, O’Reily stood up. “One thousand in my account by Wednesday.” He set the phone back into its place. As Keller watched him leave, he hoped he didn’t just blow a thousand dollars for nothing.
***
Two weeks.
Two weeks with nothing but himself for company. Two weeks of coming to understand how fully and completely he had fucked up his life.
The metal door swung open and his clothes fell on the ground in front of his face. “Get dressed. After you get cleaned up, you got a visitor, so hurry up.”
After the solitude and sensory deprivation, returning to Emerald City hit Beecher as hard as Reinhardt’s fists had. A few of the inmates were laughing at him, but he could not hear them; all the sounds of Oz somehow seemed harsher, louder, and more unbearable than before he had gone into the hole. The noise deafened him.
Get to the pod, get to the shower, get to the visitation room. Pod, shower, visit.., pod, shower, visit…
Two weeks and Beecher still had not met his cellmate. Beecher did not meet him now as he ventured inside the pod to grab his towel. When the door shut behind him, muffling the sound from outside enough so he could hear himself breathe, he felt his muscles relax. He had not even realized how tense he had been until the weight was lifted.
It had been just two weeks in the hole, and he could barely walk across a busy room.
Chris had wanted this?
Gathering his things, Beecher had to steel himself before he could open the door and step back out into the chaos.
Shower, visit… shower, visit…
***
Beecher had thought he had gotten himself put back together when he entered the visitation room and walked down the line of chairs, searching for a familiar face. He should have known who it would be. There was Chris, leaning forward with his face only a couple of inches from the glass, worried eyes trying to see every part of Toby at once. When Beecher sat in front of him and picked up the phone, his hand was shaking. He wanted to hit Keller in the jaw. He wanted to forget everything in his kiss.
“Toby...”
Christ, Beecher looked like hell. The man before Keller was thin and trembling, dark circles around his eyes and fading bruises across his face. But he was alive and relatively unscarred, and, considering the circumstances, it was the best he could have hoped for.
“Chris.” Beecher’s voice was rough with disuse. It rose in accusation. “Chris, how could you?”
That hadn’t been the response Keller had been expecting, but he could adapt. “How could I what?”
The anger Toby had been nursing the hole was rising to the surface. “Tell me to start a fight. You must have known where I’d end up.”
“Of course I knew,” Keller said evenly. “You weren’t ready to face the realities of prison life. You still aren’t.”
Anger felt good. It made Beecher feel powerful again. “You bastard, you nearly got me killed.”
Chris scoffed. “I’m sure it hurt, but I doubt you were in mortal danger. You haven’t had time to make proper enemies.” He smirked. “You’ll just have to work on your ducking.”
Keller’s dismissal only sent Beecher’s anger to new heights. “Bastard. What did I do to you that you’d want me sent to the hole?”
Chris held in his sigh. Toby’s naivety was wearing thin. “Nothing. I wanted you in the hole for your own good.”
“My own good?!” Beecher shouted, causing a CO to look his way. Beecher’s voice lowered, “My own good? I was left naked and alone to wallow in my own filth for two weeks. I nearly went mad… Hell, I don’t feel quite sane right now.”
“That’s normal. I’d start to worry if you came out of the hole feeling sane.”
Toby slammed the glass that separated them, wanting to wipe that smug look off Keller’s face.
Keller awaited a beat before asking, “Feel better?”
“What?”
Chris was looking straight into Toby’s eyes. He said carefully, “Do you feel better?
“Look, I know what a shithole the hole is, and I know you’re pissed at what a shithole Oz is.” He leaned forward. “I also know that you’re too damn scared to take it out on anyone here, so scared you can’t even hold your stomach.”
Toby paled. “You know about that?”
Chris nodded. “Now I can take your anger, baby, but you can’t stay scared, or they’ll eat you alive.”
“But, Chris, why the hole?” Toby paused. Even he heard the whining tone in his voice, and he took a moment to collect himself. “I don’t understand.”
It’s best you don’t understand… Chris thought. “Toby, there are worse things than the hole. A lot worse things. At least in the hole, you’re safe.”
“Safe?”
“No one can get to you when you’re there.”
“But the guards-“
Keller hit the desk in front of him hard, the sound of it through the phone cutting Toby off. “The guards don’t give a shit. You can’t trust them more than the liars, murders, and thieves you live with.”
“Liars, murders, and thieves…” Toby repeated, tilting his head slightly. “Like you?”
Keller looked like he’d been slapped, and Toby immediately regretted the words. He opened his mouth to say something… anything… to make it better, but Keller silenced him with a cold stare. “Yeah, like me. Scum of the universe.”
“Chris-“
Keller smiled, though the bitterness had not quite left his eyes. “No, I can take it. You’re still angry at life for putting you here, and you’ve got every right to be. You have to hold onto that anger. In prison, being angry is better than being sorry.”
“Chris…” Unspoken in Toby’s mind was the question, Is that how you got through it?
Keller ignored the look in Toby’s eyes and pressed forward. “You have to start another fight.”
Toby recoiled. “What?”
“You need to get sent to the hole again.”
Beecher scowled. “No. No way.”
“Toby, the guards won’t protect you from the other inmates.” Chris met Toby’s eyes with his own, trying to will him into believing his words. “And the other inmates will target you.”
Toby shook his head. “No. The guards stopped Reinhardt from doing worse to me. They’re here to keep order.”
Beecher’s continued belief in the criminal justice system would have been funny had it not been so terrifying. “You have to trust me. At the end of the day, they don’t care if you’re alive, so long as they are.”
Toby did not look convinced. “Fine. Let’s say I do what you suggest. Let’s say I start a fight every two or three weeks to get back to the hole. How would that look to the parole board? I would never get out.”
“Toby, you have to survive for four years until you even get a hearing.”
Toby drew away, stricken. “How could you even say that?” Before Keller could get in another word, he set the phone down.
Damn. Chris had realized that he couldn’t keep Beecher in the hole for his entire sentence, but he was desperate to shield Toby even if only for a day longer. Toby’s back disappeared out the door, and Keller was again left hoping he didn’t waste a thousand dollars… that O’Reily might be able to make some kind of difference. If Beecher did not wake up to reality and his place in it soon, he was not going to last.