Chapter Text
It was Homer’s turn, that day--to go wherever it was Hap took them, and come back, hours later, limp and lifeless. Prairie was almost numb to it by then; knew that, in time, he’d come back to and join her at their window.
(That’s what she’d say, anyway, if anyone asked; that it was fine. That she was fine.)
It was almost true, that day. If there was such a thing as a good day where they were, it had been one--Hap had brought them fresh stacks of books in the morning, and soap and razors to shave. “Feel almost like a fuckin’ human being,” Scott had said, and he wasn’t wrong. The air was clearer on days like that; less suffocating, if only by a little.
Perhaps that was why she did it. She’d thought about it before, of course--how many nights had she lain awake, wondering?--but opportunities had been few and far between, and when they’d come, the idea of following through--really asking, out loud--had done little more than bring a shameful heat to her cheeks, one she’d wondered, each time, if the others could see.
That day, though, Scott was dead to the world, hyperfocused on the dog-eared novel he’d chosen from the stack, and Rachel was idle--awake, but lying on her cot, motionless for hours. Bored.
It was time.
“Rachel?”
Her voice was soft as she said it, and shaky, but when she heard Rachel turn over to face her--heard her half-concerned “Mm?”--she pressed on.
“Can I ask you something? It’s...I don’t know. I just…”
Rachel must have picked up on the tension in her voice; Prairie heard the sound of cot-springs creaking, of Rachel standing and moving sit in her corner at the center of their wheel. Heard her tap the glass gently, indicating for Prairie to do the same.
So she did, moving quietly till she could hear Rachel breathing through the glass. She raised her hand; tapped once, and waited for Rachel to return the gesture. Then--only then--did she begin to speak.
“This is…” She sighed. “It’s...silly.”
Rachel huffed out a laugh. When she spoke, her voice was almost teasing. “I can handle silly,” she said. “Shoot.”
Prairie tapped the glass again, idly; lowered her sightless eyes to her lap, a vestigial gesture she’d somehow never lost. Couldn’t help but smile, just a bit, though her pulse beat loud in her ears. Opened her mouth to speak, once, twice, but shut it again each time.
Three short taps from Rachel, then. “Hey,” she said. “It’s okay. Scott’s in his own little world, and if he gives you any crap, I’ll handle him, alright? Whatever you...wanna ask...I won’t tell.”
Her voice was soft, and somehow conspiratorial. Prairie had never had a sister--had never even a friend close enough to pretend--but she knew, somehow, that that was who Rachel was, in that moment. She felt her smile growing; the heat in her cheeks this time wasn’t so bad; felt almost nice.
This time, when she spoke, her voice was steady; quiet, still, but strong. “What’s he look like? Homer?”
She heard Rachel fall back on her heels; heard her covering her laugh. Blood rushed in her ears, then, in time with her pulse; suddenly, she wanted nothing more than to retreat; to retract her words and wait out Homer’s absence alone.
“What? Is that…” She shrugged. Crossed her arms over her chest. “Is it so…bad, to be--”
“No!” Rachel’s voice was soft; Prairie heard her hand return to the glass, not tapping, just resting there. The mirth hadn’t left her voice, but it was gentle. “No, of course it’s not. I just…” She laughed again. “It’s…cute. I never...really thought about the fact that you...don’t know. That’s...god.”
Prairie shifted, then, to lean against the wall; let her arms uncross again. “It’s not...like it matters. I just...I’m curious. I could see, you know, as a kid; I know sight. And normally, I’d...touch, to learn that sort of thing, but here--”
“Hey.” Another tap to the glass beside Prairie’s right ear. “It’s okay. You don’t need to explain.” Prairie could hear the smile in Rachel’s voice. “I’d have asked way earlier. What do you wanna know?”
Prairie smiled; ran a hand through her hair as she fished for a single question to start. “Like...I don’t know. What color hair does he have?” She laughed. “I...I know nothing.”
“Brown.” Prairie felt Rachel shifting against the wall; turning to lean her back against it, a matching bookend to Prairie’s own stance. “But, like, a light brown. Straight. Mid-length.” She huffed out a laugh. “Honestly? It looks pretty goofy, if you ask me. Like a little kid whose mom still cuts it. Not to be rude, but...”
Prairie laughed, too; conjured an image in her mind, blank but for a head of brown hair. “Okay. And...what else? Is he...tall? Short?”
Rachel hummed a bit. “Not too tall. About your height...little shorter, maybe, but bigger. Football player, you know. Not, like, fat, but...what’s the word...stocky?”
Prairie nodded; added a layer of muscle and fat to the picture she was building. “And...what about his eyes? What color are they?”
Rachel paused, as though pulling up her own mental image, trying to recall. “Green, I think. I never looked closely, but...I think so. Sort of dark, but definitely not brown.” She let out a laugh, then. “They’re nice, I’ll give him that.”
Prairie turned toward the glass again; raised her eyebrows, half laughing herself. “What do you mean? ‘Give him that’? Something wrong with the rest of him?”
Rachel’s “no” came out on the tail end of a laugh, but Prairie could hear the sincerity there. “Nothing!” she said. “I didn’t...he’s...honestly kind of adorable. Not my type, but I can’t exactly blame him for that.” She sighed. “He’s like...earnest. In a good way. Like a...like…”
“Like a goddamn labrador retriever.”
Prairie jumped at the sound of Scott’s voice, echoing from his orange-slice cell to her left. “Boy looks like a dog. Eager little puppy dog. Does that give you a pretty good picture?”
“Scott!” Prairie heard what sounded like a fist hitting glass; not hard, but enough to punctuate a point. “Stay the hell out of this. Why would you--”
Prairie, though, was smiling; felt a laugh bubbling up in her chest without warning, and couldn’t help but let it out. “It...it does. I can…see it. And…it fits. God, why does that fit?”
Scott’s bed springs creaked, then, as he moved to where they sat; crouched to their level, sighing at the cracking of his joints, and fell to the floor with a grunt. “Damn right it fits,” he said. “I mean, listen to him talk, sometimes; boy-wonder boy scout in love. ‘Course he looks like a dog. Or maybe a...what’s it called…” He paused for a moment, then snapped his fingers. “Chipmunk. He got those...big cheeks, like a baby, or--”
Rachel smacked the glass again, then. “Stop.” She laughed. “Leave him be! Jesus. Don’t listen to him, Prairie, he’s just…” More laughter. “Just jealous. God, what animal does Scott look like? I went to a petting zoo once with these...big, angry llamas, and--”
“Aw, fuck you.”
“No, really! They had your hair--all matted up, never washed--and”
“Yeah, and you’re some kinda...owl, then, how’s that? Eat pellets and everything. How’s that for ‘fits’?”
“They don’t eat the pellets, dumbass. They...ugh, I think they throw them up? With the bones, you know, from the mice--”
“They do!” Prairie laughed again. “We dissected them once in school, and fished the bones out. If you’ve never tried to pick apart owl vomit, blind, well…” She shook her head. “Consider yourself lucky.”
God, it was good to hear them laugh. Good to picture them smiling, though said pictures were still tragically under-formed. Good not to think, if only for a minute or two, about where they were, and what was happening to the one who was missing.
Just then, though, a familiar door slammed, somewhere out of sight; heavy footsteps approached, accompanied by the squeak of unoiled wheelchair wheels. Scott’s voice petered out first; Prairie heard him stand and retreat to his cot. Rachel, too, stifled the tail end of a laugh, though she stayed close, one foot tapping anxiously against the stone below as Homer’s door slid open and Hap pushed the chair inside.
Prairie turned in that general direction; listened as Hap hauled Homer’s inert body onto his cot, grunting with the effort. He didn’t leave right away, as he normally would; Prairie didn’t hear the door again, and anyway, she felt his presence, too close, somehow, despite the glass.
“Oh, carry on,” he said. “Don’t stop on my account.”
Prairie wished, then, more than anything, that she could glare properly, right into his eyes. She settled on a scowl, though, and took some small solace in Scott’s grunted-out “Fuck you.”
Finally--after what felt like half an hour of stony silence--the door slid shut again, and Prairie heard retreating footsteps, echoed against the cavernous walls.
A beat of silence, two, before Scott spoke again. “Guinea pig motherfucker.”
There was humor in his tone, still, but somehow, it wasn’t the same.
Some time passed, then, silent, heavy. Prairie didn’t move; felt, somehow, that doing so meant letting Hap win. Her legs ached from the stone floor beneath, but she wasn’t ready to do that. To end, once and for all, whatever these moments had been.
It shocked her a bit to hear Rachel’s voice once more, quiet, and softer, even than before.
“I never noticed his face much, to be honest,” Rachel said. “Until you got here. The way he looks at you, though…” She chuckled. “It’s somethin’ else. There’s…hope there, now. In his eyes. Hope, and...and love. It’s...nice. To see that. Sad, but nice.”
Prairie smiled. Nodded. Felt warmth across her cheeks that she didn’t even think, this time, to hide. “Thank you.”
A final tap on the glass, then, and the sound of Rachel shuffling to her feet. “You’re welcome,” she said. “Thank you.”