He saw Derreiro heading towards him again, as he was still frozen in place in his bed. This man would never leave Ethan alone. Ethan had taken Derreiro as his big brother for the way he liked to hang around him and vouch for him whenever some issues came up that he thought were too hard for Ethan to handle on his own. In two weeks, Derreiro would go away and the fact that he was going to miss such a great friend shivered him when he tried to remember the coming years and how they were going to be hard and difficult without someone like him.
"Papi," he had one formality for him. "Happy birthday man!" Derreiro brushed his hand on Ethan's hair. "Man, you really need to get a haircut."
"Funny Derreiro. Thank you." Ethan answered, struggling to smile at the thirty-seven-year-old guy. Why Derreiro usually called him kid baffled him sometimes. He was older, but in comparison to Josiah, Derreiro was just another kid. "What are you doing here?"
"It's your birthday man, I can't stay all alone in the yard knowing that you're still here all alone. So at least, I had come to give you some fun."
"Fun?" Ethan shrugged. "From the looks, I can say that I'm in no position to have fun." He groaned from the pain.
"Hey, shh," Derreiro told him before he started singing the happy birthday song in Spanish and a Mexican accent. Ethan nodded in sync with the way Derreiro sang for him as he understood the rhythm but not the words. Derreiro could sing! He never knew that. At the end of their nursery rhyme, Ethan and Derreiro laughed out together in harmonious guffaws that ended up hurting his aching body in the end.
"Thank you man," Ethan told him smiling so wildly. "I can't imagine that my parents are not yet here, or are not coming at all... I have this bad feeling something has happened to them."
"Uh," Derreiro tried to speak something encouraging before the speakers on the edge of the wards caught their attention with their loud voices.
"Attention! Attention! Ethan Purcell and Derreiro Fernando are required in the visiting bay. Ethan Purcell inmate number C20027 and Derreiro Fernando inmate number A19145 are required immediately in the visiting bay."
"Wait! That's us!" Derreiro shrieked out as they stared at each other strangely.
"Talk of the devil! They've made it." Ethan squeaked up happily as he tried to get off the bed, struggling with his aching body.
"Who the hell has visited me?" Derreiro asked, eyes in confusion. "No one has visited me in four years!"
"I don't know man, come on let's go!" Ethan's joy couldn't be hidden. "Wait..." he touched his face and felt discouraged immediately. His mojo dropped instantly.
"What's wrong man?" Derreiro asked him.
"How do I look?" Ethan asked him.
"Eeerm?" Derreiro said as he squinted his eyes and nudged his eyebrows closer. He scratched his black hair. "Eeerm?"
"It's bad? Isn't it?" Ethan asked, a frown forming on his face.
"You two! Would you hurry up?" A strong black male voice knocked their ears from behind. They turned back and saw two prison guards by a door closer to where they were. They looked at each other in the end.
"This is ridiculous!" Ethan muttered and took off the bandage from his eye. The eye was still sore and fresh. Derreiro's eyes widened to the shock before him. He felt pity for Ethan.
"Either way man, they're your parents. They'd still manage to know that you were hit. They'll love you either way." He soothed him.
"Hey you two come on, let's go!" The first man spoke again, unveiling handcuffs from his duty belt. Ethan got off the bed, while Derreiro was being taken into the locks. He reached for his crutches and walked towards the other male officer who had been waiting for him. With Derreiro and the first officer in front of them, Ethan walked in tow with the other one as they snaked their way out of the infirmary, and into the cell block F where PTSD patients were held, so far from the main cell blocks. Cell block E was the solitary block where Zayn was currently being held for causing the riot five weeks ago, with some other companions. They got out of the building finally and made their way through a series of checkpoints and gates that the officers had to speak into their radios each time they passed one gate and before they got into the next. There were about four gates from the cell block F to a building that Ethan instantly concluded was the visiting bay. A couple of officers had been positioned on its outside walls and fences and more along the way. All four of them got in, and finally, the last security clearance was done. Derreiro was released from the cuffs.
They entered the hall all on their own. There were about a hundred round tables if not more in the long hall. It was noisy too with many people talking about their own issues with loved ones and lawyers perhaps, trying to find comfort in the people that had come to pay them some visit. Ethan and Derreiro tried to look around in a bid to catch their visitors. Some officers came and directed them to where their visitors had been stationed at. Derreiro branched off sooner when he was directed to a table where an old woman sat. Not that old perhaps, just enough to be his mother or aunt. From the way Derreiro squeaked happily, Ethan quickly deciphered his lad had been visited by his mother. What a lucky bastard you are Derreiro! He thought.
Still on his crutches and the right plastered leg suspended in the air, Ethan was led forward with the other officer. He walked for about five hops before the guard pointed to the table his visitors had sat. And when Ethan grazed his eye at the alien table all too jolly, his face dropped! He gulped when the visitor's eyes caught his and his heart pounded in his chest threatening to break all hell loose and skip away. Seating on a chair by the table was a woman, dressed in some nice dress with patterns of art of various colors on it. Her black hair was stylized well from root to their relative ends. He turned around immediately fearing to face her.
"Ethan!" She called out his name. He heard it loud and clear and that sent a pulsating rush of fear and embarrassment down his cold hurt spine. He turned back and looked at her. He was all alone as the officer had excused himself. He took the control of his crutches once again and darted towards the table with his head facing down, hopping instead of walking. When he got to the table, he took a while before he sat down still avoiding her eye contact. After some silence, he found the courage to look at her, his eyes burrowing tears hostage. His dark eye was well pronounced and the elastoplast on the corner of her lips spelled out farther that he was not having a good time in prison. She wasn't in a perfect shape too as he could see the sadness written all over her face, probably that had resurfaced when she saw him in the condition he was. She wanted to cry but she muffled her lips to avoid the tempting emotions.
"Hey." Elena Stenfield began.
"Hey..." He replied back...