Angel 85 (Governor)

Two officers took her from the Segregation Unit to see the governor. Angel was glad to stretch her legs, to see other folk going about their business even if it was only a desultory cleaning the floors of the long corridors. She wanted to get back to her cell, back to normal. It was lonely being in The Seg alone with her thoughts  

Angel stared straight ahead, she’d learned not to show impatience with the usual rigmarole of standing, waiting, outside the Governor’s office. All they had inside was time.  

The Governor was sitting on an office chair behind her desk reading over the Adjudication Report when Angel was prodded forward through the door. The Number One was in her fifties, small, and immaculately dressed, her hair like a cloche hat made of grey feathers, the kind of woman Angel imagined never got drunk and her idea of a good time was singing in the church choir.  The girls had already filled her in what the new governor was like and Angel didn’t imagine she’d do her any favours.

She signalled that she should sit down on a polymer padded seat to the side of her desk and pushed against the wall. A Security Officer squeezed in on the seat next to her, blocking her in.  

The Governor’s voice was surprisingly guttural and working class when she read out the charges. ‘Challenging Behaviour, notably assault of a prison guard and MDT—’she flicked over the page and glanced at Angel with soft greenish-blue eyes—‘and positive tests for opioids, amphetamines and MDMA, how do you plead?’

The Duty Officer and Security Officer smirked at each other like schoolboys when the Governor mentioned ecstasy, but a sharp glance from the Governor and they straightened their faces.

‘Not guilty Miss, I mean, I’ve been under a lot of stress and had a lot to think about. And it wisnae me that done the assaulting. I was punched when I was on the ground. ‘Angel stopped speaking as she ran out of breath.

Angel looked over at the Duty Officer waiting to see what he would say. Sideburns, ex-army type, he had the straight back and bearings of a Sergeant Major, ‘It’s all been logged Ma’am, it’s there in your report.’

She nodded and turned her attention back to Angel. ‘So do you want to make an official complaint?’

‘Aye,’ said Angel.

The Security Guard shifted in his seat and glared at her and the Duty Officer furrowed his brows.

The Governor leaned across the desk and her accent became broader. ‘You completely sure about this?’ she asked Angel. ‘Whereabouts and how did the officer allegedly assault you?’

Angel felt her face blooming into a shade of candyfloss pink and she kept her eyes on the paperwork on the table. ‘Doesnae matter,’ she said.

The Governor’s tone became lighter. ‘You completely sure about this? – I don’t want you to think we’re putting you under any undue pressure.’ But she was already noting something down with a silver Parker pen on a piece of paper.

‘In that case then,’ she continued on, ‘I find the defendant guilt of the first charge with a three weeks loss of privileges.

Angel kept her mouth shut, the governor watching her to see how she would take it, before moving onto the next charge.   

‘As you know, we take a zero-tolerance policy to drugs in this jail,’ the Governor paused to let that sink in.

Angel could have spluttered with laughter, but she kept her head down and her hands folded in prayer in her lap as if she was contrite.   

The Governor droned on, ‘Yet you have tested positive not just for one, but for three different substances, which shows a lot of cunning and planning.’ Her voice went up a notich, ‘And yet you declare your innocence, how do you explain that?’

Angel didn’t want to put the new governor’s nose out of joint, but she met her gaze and replied with a note of defiance, ‘I must have been spiked’.

The Duty Officer snorted and shook his head as if was trying to erase from his memory the stupidity of what she’d said.

The Governor simply said, ‘Guilty, four weeks loss of privileges to run concurrently with the three weeks loss of privileges you already have.’  Her Parker pen was busy as she noted this down with a scrawl.

She turned a page of A4 typed paper and read from it a note she’d made earlier. ‘Other matters – I’ve had a request from a Vicar in Clydebank who wants to come and visit you.’ She smiled as if he was a personal friend.

‘Dunno who that is,’ mumbled Angel.

‘Really?’ the Governor squinted at her handwriting. ‘Oh, dear, I think he officiated at—’ the overbite of lips and closed mouth shaping into an embarrassed half-smile told Angel everything she needed to know.

‘Nah, don’t want to see him.’

Angel didn’t want to see anyone. She slouched in the chair, head bowed. She wanted more than anything for the charade of a hearing to be finished and to get back to her cell and remember Lisa – and Adam.

‘But there’s a more delicate matter—’

‘More delicate than my baby Lisa dying?’ Angel gazed across at the governor and spat out, ‘Get fuckin’ real, lady’.

The Duty Officer vibrated like a tuning fork. Angel was sure she’d have got a slap in the mouth if the governor wasn’t sitting primly in her seat. And the guard sitting next to her shifted in his seat as though he was going to make a grab for her. But she no longer cared.

The governor made light of it. ‘As you know Spot Checks for drugs is an ever-changing field. And I don’t understand all of it, but sometimes things show up that we’re not really looking for.’

‘I’ve got cancer?’ Angel blurted out.

The governor considered it, blinking rapidly. ‘No, at your age, I wouldn’t think so. But the medical staff have informed me.’ She stopped and started again. ‘They asked me to check with you to see if you think you may be pregnant and are willing to take a test?’

‘No, I cannae be,’ cried Angel.

 ‘Let me paint you a picture,’ said the Duty Officer, sniggering, only to be reprimanded by the governor.