It was the third time they had come. The bloodred lights, the klaxon wail that signalled the start of that horrific nightmare that was the nightly visits of the Wheezers – I would probably never get used to them, but I recognized them now, and could tell the difference between when they had come to collect, and when they had come to return.
As always I could hear no movement from the bunk above me, just the shallowest of breathing, tightly controlled. The cell, all those cells out there, were rank with fear, even as they were silent as graves. I had learnt to do what Donovan did: cover myself with a sheet, and hope for the best. No more getting out of my bed and acting like a fool in the darkness. No more close-ups with those devils.
I couldn't see anything, but no shadow passed across the cell, and within one hour it was all done; the wails and shrieks of inmates as the wheezers marked their targets, and the terrified sympathetic cries from other inmates as they were dragged away by the blacksuits. Then the bloodred lights were switched off, and we were all plunged into darkness once more, except now wails filled the prison as the other boys finally let loose.
Still no sound from the bunk above. I clambered out, my heart thudding, a large part of me still fearful of the dark.
"Donovan?" I called, just to have the comfort of his voice.
"Yeah," he replied, trying to sound annoyed, but the tremble of his voice matched mine in its shakiness. He always did that nowadays, ever since that night. During the day he was fine – in fact, more than fine – but the moment night fell, he would lapse into this grumpy, unpenetrable fortress-like mood.
"Can I come up?" I whispered.
"No," he replied almost instantaneously. His back was toward me; he was facing the wall.
"Please," I asked. I wanted to feel something other than fear, something other than the horror of what had just happened, the horror of that realization of what was going to happen to those five boys tonight, or tomorrow.
He said nothing in reply, not moving. I sat back down, and although my heart was heavy, I made to get back under my sheet. Just as I was about to lie down and try to get the few shreds of sleep that were possible after all that happened, I felt him shift, and soon he was clambering down, the bunk creaking slightly. Wordlessly I made space for him, and he slid in next to me.
For a while he said nothing, and I could feel him just staring up into the metal rungs that formed the base of his bed. We could still hear the cries of the other inmates, even as it was starting to hush as fatigue took over.
"What's wrong?" I whispered, and I reached out to find him, my fingers landing on his arm. Although he didn't move it away, I could feel the tension in his whole body, wound so tight it was like it would snap any moment.
"You don't get it, don't you?" His voice was odd, almost distant.
I didn't say anything, knowing he would continue.
"One day it's going to be us, Alex."
My heart sank. I knew where this was going. Maybe I always had.
"It's not." I obstinately persisted.
"It is," he said, that voice still so empty and hollow. "One night those things are going to mark our cell, and it's going to be one of us. Probably me." He continued talking, but all I could feel right then was my heart sinking, a sort of dull wrenching pain spreading through my chest. "… and it's going to be us screaming as they try to find that syringe, and then…" his voice choked. "Jesus, Alex, I'm so sorry, I should never have-"
Somehow in the darkness I had fumbled, our limbs heavy in the darkness, but my mouth met his anyway, stopping his next few words. Words that were too late anyway. "You listen to me," I mumbled hoarsely, once I'd pulled away, my voice full of bravado – true, false, I didn't know. I didn't care. "We're not going down without a fight. We have our escape plan. And if they do come for us, for one of us, then the other one is going to get out of here somehow, and we're going to get help. I'm not abandoning you, ever, so just shut up about saying sorry or all of that, because it's too late, and I love you." I stopped there, not for dramatic effect, but because I felt the shock of what I had just said run through me. The shock of the truth, anyway. I turned it over in my head, running through those words over and over again. I meant every one of them.
He was crying now, soundlessly, but I felt the liquid of his tears run down his face. Donovan, the boy who had the buff entry rights to the gym, the boy with the vicious strokes of his pick against the red rock, the boy who knew it all, the boy who had to put on a fierce face the moment the cell doors were open.
Those few nights over the past week that we'd spent with each other, he'd always been the one hugging me, the one with the snarky one-liners that put me to sleep with a smile and that swift calm. But tonight, he cuddled within me, and for once, I was his protector. He said nothing, but the gentle slowing of his heart told me he was finally letting go to sleep.
He was right, of course. But he wasn't right that night. And beggars can't be choosers. And even as his heart slowed against mine, I could feel mine speeding up whenever I thought of what he had said to me, in the darkness, just the hot breath of his voice in my ear, the tremble of his skin under my touch. It would stay with me forever, the way he had said those words back to me.