A/N: Well, This works as a stand-alone story, although is set in the same universe as my other fics (would fit immediately after 'These Streets' and before 'Back to the Start' in the timeline, so is post-book).

Fair warning, it's set in a prison with a bunch of guys so there's a fair amount of swearing, along with some inappropriate (but accurate for the period) attitudes on show from Tim and/or other characters at various times...

Tim Shepard and family, along with any other characters from the books belong to SE Hinton, the random others and the events are my own.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy reading and as always feedback would be much appreciated so please leave a review and let me know what you think :)


FIRST AND LAST

Day Five Hundred and Sixty.

It's my last day in this shit hole and I'm saying my goodbyes.

I guess I've only got one real friend left here and one other that you might call more of a casual acquaintance since Walt checked out, because I realised after all that happened that it's a mistake getting too close to anyone here.

Tommy doesn't say anything, just nods as he shakes my hand. But Ray, he's always got something on his mind that he don't ever try to keep to himself. "Don't ever let me damn well catch you back in here again, kid," he says, laughing at me.

"Don't worry, I promise you I ain't gonna spend one fucking second longer than I have to in this dump, old man." Grinning back at him I toss my last half pack of smokes in his direction before walking away, my hands in my pockets as I slouch a little, trying not to look too happy that this day has actually arrived. It still doesn't properly seem real.

Finally the forms are filled and the paperwork is finished, I've got my own clothes back and then they let me out the doors, through the gates and pretty soon I'm down the street waiting at a bus stop. It occurs to me as I stand there watching the traffic that it's possible for me to go anywhere, somewhere far away from being Tim Shepard. But much as the idea appeals to me, there's parole conditions to keep and going somewhere new ain't part of 'em, would no doubt be a sure fire way of getting myself sent straight back here if anyone ever found me, and I'm sick of spending all my time looking over my shoulder and worrying about what might go wrong every damned day.

So instead I begin to study the timetables and figure out exactly how long it's likely going to take me to get to Tulsa.

Realising it will take me most of the day to get back there I begin to wonder whether it would have been easier to have called my brother to come get me. Only then I'd have had to listen to all his dumbass stories and chat for two hours straight at least. And after having other people's company forced upon me for so long the fact that I can choose to have a little of my own space, do things my own way and get some peace for the first time since the day I arrived here, is pretty damn appealing. Course I'm looking forward to having a few proper beers instead of that prison homebrew shit, talking up how it ain't been no big deal being in here with the guys and then getting myself some female company soon enough, but right now the silence is real pleasant. For the first time in what feels like forever there's no one talking at me or telling me what to do or where to be.

There's another fifteen minutes left to kill waiting here, watching the world go by, and I'm starting to get a little restless and wish I hadn't given Ray every last one of my smokes.

So I pace around a bit, before settling myself, and as I lean against the side of the bus shelter my parting words to him come back into my mind. Near enough every fucker lucky enough to leave McAlester says there's no damn way they're ever coming back, although most of them do - and most of them sooner rather than later.

But despite the lousy odds, I aim to keep that promise and in order to do that I'm resigned to the fact that I'll have to do whatever it takes, jump through all their hoops and tell the parole officer exactly the things he wants to hear from me, if it means I don't ever have to set one foot back inside Big Mac.

Because after all that's gone down these past eighteen months, after every that's happened, I've got no wish to return.

xxxxxx

Day One.

"On your feet," the guard barks as he flings open the doors on the back the van—and I do what he says, because I've already seen what happened to some other guy when he took too long doing what he was told getting on here in the first place and I sure as hell got no wish to start my first day in McAlester covered in my own blood and looking like an easy target, like I can't fucking take care of myself.

Until we got here I've been kidding myself that I'm not all that worried, that being sent here's no big deal. But the minute we're in through the gates it's plain this ain't going to be nothing like the reformatory.

I knew it was big but the size of the place still takes me a little by surprise as I'm being led down from the centre building through the halls of the west block to my cell. I've already been given prison issue to wear, been talked at or, more accurately, shouted at, by the guards processing us new arrivals. I'm the youngest out of the new guys brought in today and apparently I'm in cell B47 which seems like it's in the middle of the block and as we get nearer I wonder if that's a good or bad place to be.

The other prisoners are in their cells right now, sitting around, looking restless. I'm kind of glad as at least it means I don't have to speak to anyone yet. Glancing around as we walk quickly through the corridor I wonder whether it'll be best to keep my head down and not draw attention to myself, or whether I need to find myself a place to belong—'cause I've never been all that good at being part of the crowd, fitting in never has been something I found easy to do. Whatever I decide though, somehow it don't seem likely that the advice I used to give Curly about going to the reformatory—get in a fight and show them you're tougher from the start—is likely to work in here. I might just about be alright one on one in a fight, be able to handle myself, but some of these guys look like they got nothing to do all day but work out and even if I could take any of them one on one then I'm pretty sure they've all got friends that ain't going to be happy.

As I'm shoved into my cell I notice there's already some old guy in there, seems around forty. He's sat on the bottom bunk, grinning at me as the door slams shut behind me.

"First time in here, kid?"

"Yep."

I study him a little more closely; he's a little shorter than me but more heavy set, tough looking. Beneath his rolled up sleeves there's a whole load of fading military tattoos all over his arms and taking in the hard look in his eye along with the receding hairline, I wonder if he's maybe a little older than I first thought.

"Well, use your head and you'll get through it." He laughs. "I'm Ray, and if you listen to me you'll do fine. Top bunk is yours; I'm getting too old for shit like climbing up there these days."

Just my damn luck, ending up with someone who thinks they're the prison wise guy, who doesn't get when to shut the fuck up. But I don't say anything, just nod at him, because I don't want to piss him off today. And actually he seems at home, comfortable in here, and I suppose he might have been here a while, so he must have something useful to say. At any rate he's got to know more than me and as I'll need all the allies I can get in this place there's no sense in making an enemy of the first guy I meet in here, especially seeing as we'll be stuck in this room together for a good portion of every day for the foreseeable fucking future.

"Sit yourself down, boy." He points to the hard narrow bench along the opposite wall. "So what's your name?"

"Shepard, Tim Shepard," I mutter as he looks me up and down, focusing on the scars on my face. I can recognise that expression anywhere, that one when people look at me and speculate on how I got 'em.

"A bit of a fighter then, Shep?"

"It's been known," I reply trying to sound friendly even though I'm not entirely sure I like him calling me that, but at least he hasn't gone for Timothy or fucking Timmy. I mean Christ only knows why my mother picked such lousy names for me and my brother.

He laughs, "Well, at least with all them scars you ain't too pretty. Bad enough in here if you're young, but if you look good too...like Bobby over there..." He nods over at some skinny, nervous kid sat in the opposite cell, and it seems he takes my frown for me not getting what's going on as he continues, "Hell, Shep, you gotta be careful, watch out for the Queens in here, they like their bitches young...unless maybe you like that kind of thing, boy?"

"Fuck off, I ain't no queer," I snap. I mean you hear shit about what goes down in here, but I don't exactly know how much of it is true and how much is made up and I've got no wish to find out.

"Nah, didn't suppose you really were, only you can never tell these days. Some the guys been here a long time and screwing anything is better than having nobody to some of them. And then on the other hand some of 'em have always been into kicks like that."

I'm starting to wonder if he's one of 'em, if I need to be watching my back even in here but he's grinning at me again, laughing, as he carries on talking, like he's reading my mind.

"Me, I like my girls over there, learnt to get by with entertaining myself a long, long, time ago." He nods at some faded pin-up pictures taped up by his bunk. "Now, that little redhead on the end's my current favourite..."

Glancing across at his pictures, I reckon most of them have been cut from skin mags and there's one in particular that catches my eye, reminds me a little bit of someone I used to know, someone I've been doing my best not to think about ever since getting arrested, and so I drag my eyes off her and force myself to focus all my attention on the busty brunette in the next pic along. "Yeah? She's pretty cute too," I shoot back at him, with all the bravado I can muster.

"Sure is. Tell you what, any time you're feeling lonely, you tell me and you can have her on your wall." He reaches for his pack of cigarettes, lighting one up and laughing at me a little as I feel the colour rising up my face, although I don't get why exactly; it ain't like I'm some innocent who's never been with a girl or talked dirty with the guys about broads, so maybe it's just a bit weird when someone old enough to be my father is thinking the same thing about some good looking young chick as I am.

Ray carries on talking at me on and off through the rest of the afternoon, telling me shit that I hope will be some use for me getting settled in this dump when a bell rings. "Come on, kid, chow time, I'll show you where to go."

Mess hall is a goddamned fucking nightmare. A noisy, chaotic nightmare. Following Ray, I keep my head down and grab a tray and I'm real glad when we get out of there unscathed, that we were far enough away from all the fights that break out that we don't attract the attention of either other inmates or the guards.

Only I really shouldn't have been so dumb as to think things were going to be that easy, when I feel the hand on my shoulder, stopping me from heading back towards my cell. Ray's stopped a while back to chat to some other guy so I'm on my own 'cause I don't want to hang around following him about like some tag-along kid, but there again having to watch my own back isn't exactly nothing new to me.

"What's your name, kid?"

It sure is going to take some getting used to, being the youngest least significant, guy in the place, after being used to being top dog on the outside, that's for sure. The guy is big, strong looking, in his twenties if I had to take a guess at it, so I go along with it for now.

"Shepard. You?"

"Wilson. Where you out of then, Shepard?"

"Tulsa."

"Yeah? Might have guessed." He glances at the other guys with him before continuing, smirking and sneering at me as he speaks, "Heard all you Tulsa boys were fucking fags."

I realise as soon as the words come out my mouth I haven't got the patience for shit like this. "Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I guess you heard wrong, asshole."

"Jesus, boy, you got no manners?" he snarls.

But honestly right this second I don't give a shit if I have pissed him off, so instead I simply shrug, which apparently hacks him off even more because the next minute he's punching me—and after witnessing how little the guards did about the trouble in the mess hall I'm well aware that that there ain't no one but me to rely on to help me out of this situation.

I'm fighting back and doing alright, holding my own against him, until his friends decide to join in too and really, there's not all that much you can do when two guys have got you pinned back against the wall while the third one pounds you senseless.

"That all you got?" Tasting the blood in my mouth, I still can't give in, find myself mouthing off to him, remind myself a little of Dally Winston and all his smart ass comments, even as this Wilson guy carries on laying in to me. Too late for it to make much difference, the guards eventually stroll over and break things up and I finally slope away, make it back to the cell without any more bother.

"Jesus, Shep, I wondered where you were, what the fuck happened to you? You do understand that it's gonna be a hell of a drag in here if you can't even get through the first day without getting yourself caught up in shit. You need to keep a low profile, kid, 'cause getting beat up gets real old real quick."

Sinking back down on the bench, I shrug at him, not ready to admit that I'm bothered to someone I only met today.

"Hell, I'll be fine, had plenty worse than that."

Only inside I'm not exactly feeling sure I will be fine.

Three fucking years I'll be here if I don't get parole and right now it feels like I've got no chance of making it, being as I barely managed to make it through the first day.