Her Prison Pen Pal (Love Behind Bars)

I’m mumbling affirmations of control when I get to the front door and see it’s open a few inches.

Stick to the plan. Sit the basket down and leave.

The voice in my head sounds like my mother’s. So sensible. And so, as usual, I ignore it. And peek inside the little house.

I don’t see him anywhere.

Maybe he left.

Maybe he really didn’t want to be here.

Maybe I wasn’t what he imagined.

Maybe he just needed a ride then a chance to get away.

Maybe he has a hundred other pen pals, like you hear about sometimes in the news.

Wonderful. So now I’ll be one of those women. I saw a special on them on 20/20 once.

Lifers and the Women Who Love Them.

Women fall for criminals while they are still behind bars all the time. They even marry them. Murderers, serial killers, rapists, they all get their share of admirers. It’s not a stretch to imagine Dutch with a sackful of love letters from women all over the country.

Fuck. Did I read him all wrong?

Is this some kind of long-con and I just got played? Or, not just me, but my whole family?

I pull the basket against my center, trying to keep my belly from doing cartwheels as I stand frozen to the ground, shivering, an internal battle raging as I decide what to do.

Heavy footsteps answer my thoughts. From the gap in the door, I see a flash of indigo-covered torso toward the back of the small house where the kitchen leads to the bedroom and bathroom. A warm burst of wetness spills out of me.

I desperately try to be practical. If he’s going to shower, he needs these towels. Because just imagine—he gets out of jail, gets welcomed into our home. Only to be left standing dripping wet and naked in a house with no towels.

I’ll do it like an Uber Eats delivery. Drop, knock, and run.

I start to lower the basket onto the worn welcome mat outside the door and knock when the boom of rock music thrums to life inside.

It makes me think of a particularly sad part of one of his letters. Something he missed the most about being out in the world was being able to listen to music.

He wrote in that letter, something I don’t think people know, when you’re in prison, there’s no music.

Can you imagine? Going months—years—without music?

“Dutch?” I ease the door open another inch with my shoulder.

Then another and another, until I’m standing inside, still holding the basket, the music muffling my voice.

“Dutch?” I call out, but it’s half-hearted. I don’t want him to know I’m here.

I’m not fooling myself. I shove the door closed with my rear end and cross the small living room toward the hall on tiptoes.

I ease the basket to the floor as I come to the corner of the short hallway and take a shaking breath.

No risk, no reward.

Stepping forward, I see the bathroom door open, but inside it’s empty. There’s no steam coming from the shower. My legs feel boneless as I urge myself to move forward, the loud music pulsing around me as I approach the bedroom.

The burning in my lungs reminds me to breathe as I press my body against the wall just to the right of the open bedroom door. Bands of tension snap around my chest and throat, my mouth dry as I ease one eye over the door frame and choke back the yelp of surprise at the sight before me.

I press my fingers onto my lips until they burn from the pressure.

There’s Dutch.

It’s not just his torso that’s bare now. It’s all of him.

Every.

Magnificent.

Inch.

Inches, I mean. So many inches…

I’ve imagined him naked a thousand times. But this, oh praise baby Jesus, this is so much better.

He’s laying on the bed, surrounded by envelopes and colorful open pages covered in what I recognize as my writing. He’s holding one of my letters in front of his face with one hand as the other rasps up and down on the length of hard steel standing up nearly to his belly button.

I watch in mesmerized silence as he reads, his lips moving silently as he does while he strokes himself, making these pained, tortured sounds. His body is lean but muscular. His legs are bent slightly, knees raised, giving me a view of not only his Guinness World Record dick but balls nearly the size of my fists resting on the bedding below.

His legs are free from tattoos, but his torso, arms and abs are covered in words and images.

I want to explore them all with my tongue, ask him the meaning of each and hope I can soothe the pain that put them there.

I squeeze my legs closed, pressing the flesh of my inner thighs tight, pulsing my core muscles in time with the movement of his hand as my belly flutters and I choke back the moans that bank in my throat.