Chapter 1: Anton
“Anton Thorne. Come with me, you’re out of here.” The large Hispanic guard named Gabriel that worked my block hit the front of the cell with his wooden baton and motioned for me to follow him when the door opened.
“Has it been five years already?” I lifted my head off the pillow and sat up.
“No, but you’re getting two years knocked off for good behavior—or overcrowding—yeah, it’s probably the overcrowding.” He grunted and waved his hand at me again. “You sure as fuck haven’t done anything to earn an early release for good behavior.”
“Well shit.” A devious smile spread across my face. “I guess the legal system works after all.”
I followed Gabriel down the row of cells filled with men that I had spent the last three years of my life with. I knew most of their stories and they were similar to mine. We were all small-time criminals that didn’t deserve maximum security, but were too poor to qualify for the posh white collar prisons upstate. If my family would have been wealthy I would have spent three years getting conjugal visits instead of jacking off. The scars on my knuckles were a result of making sure jacking off was the only form of sex I had while I was locked up. I didn’t mind a nice tight asshole, but I needed a pussy and some tits attached to it or it just didn’t the job for me.
Gabriel took me to the processing center and I quickly collected the few items I had when I was locked up. My wallet was empty, of course, but they gave me what was left in my commissary account in cash. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to buy a bus ticket. I got dressed and then I walked past the line of guards at the gate.
“You’ll be back, Anton.” A fat guard named Will, with jelly in his mustache from his latest donut raid, chuckled at me.
“They always come back.” The woman next to him named Glenda, who was of similar size but shorter, nodded in agreement.
“I might come back for you, sweetheart.” I winked at her. “Until then you can just think of me when you touch yourself.”
“That’s it, Anton. Get the hell out of here.” Gabriel pushed me towards the exit. “And don’t come back—otherwise I’ll kick your ass myself.”
I was so horny at that point, I probably would have bent Glenda over a table in the library and fucked her cunt until she screamed just to have something wet for my cock. The only reason pussy wasn’t priority one was because I needed to make sure I had somewhere to sleep. I got a bus ticket back to Atlanta and walked the two miles from the bus station to my favorite bar. I didn’t recognize anyone in the place after being away for three years, but the bartender agreed to let me borrow the phone if I ordered a drink. Drinking a beer after three years on a diet of nothing but water was like heaven. I started dialing every number I could remember—old girlfriends, friends—even a couple of girls I dated in high school. I got more go to hells than hellos, and none of them were willing to let an ex-con crash on their couch. There was only one number left to call and as much as I hated to do it, I had to punch it into the phone and swallow what was left of my pride.
AN HOUR LATER THE DOOR to the bar opened and my mirror image walked in—the mirror image of what I could have become if I liked going to school more than skipping class to get my dick sucked. My twin brother Sloane was a nerd, got good grades, and even managed to go to college. He was dressed in a suit and tie with slicked back brown hair that was neatly trimmed. If you stood us side by side at that point, you would have never known we were related with my beard and shoulder length hair—not to mention the tattoos that covered both of my arms from my shoulders to my wrists. Calling him was a last resort. He looked around the bar until he spotted me and started walking over. Three years had changed him as well. He no longer looked like he had the world at his feet. His eyes had dark circles and his hands shook when he took a seat next to me.
“Anton...” He let out a sigh. “I guess you exhausted all other options?”
“No way.” I shook my head and smiled. “The first person I wanted to see after I got out of prison was my twin brother!”
“Right...” He nodded and narrowed his eyes at me. “The fact you ruined my marriage by screwing my wife didn’t give you pause?”
“That was years ago, man. We’re family, right?” I motioned to the bartender. “Get my brother a drink.”
“Whiskey.” Sloane didn’t even look in the direction of the bartender. “Yeah, we are family—that’s the only reason I’m here.”
“It isn’t like I was the only one she was fucking, Sloane. I was just the only one you knew personally.” I scoffed and motioned for the bartender to refill my beer.
“How long do you think you’ll be out of prison this time? I need to know how long my couch is going to be occupied.” He turned towards the bar when our drinks were brought over and I noticed his hand shake when he wrapped it around the glass.
“I’m not going back. I’m going to get my life turned around this time.” I nodded and lifted my beer. “I did some stupid shit and I paid for it—well, I did most of my time.”
“I’d call three years for burglary a gift.” He drank the entire glass of whiskey and motioned for the bartender to bring another glass.
“Well, you know—good behavior and stuff.” I shrugged and sipped my beer. “You’re going at that whiskey a little hard. Since when do you drink whiskey anyway?”
“Since shit happens, Anton.” He took the second glass and downed nearly half of it with one gulp.
“I thought you were on your way to being like... teacher of the year or some shit.” I turned towards him and studied the expression on his face.
Over the course of the next two hours
and more drinks than I could count, my brother started to open up to me. We had never really talked but it seemed like he just needed an ear. Sloane had been offered a job as a principal, but when he took it, the job turned out to be less than conventional. The put him in a school for stuck up rich kids that flunked out of regular high school. It was a hybrid school which meant they offered the last two years of high school and the first two years of college all rolled into one. It was mainly just a way for rich families to dispose of their black sheep and tell people they were in college when they really couldn’t even pass the SAT. The rich folks paid a pretty penny to keep the mockery of a school going and the state was happy to keep all their problem students in one place—as long as the parents kept their donations coming.
“Shit man, so these kids are bullying you? You can’t put up with that shit.” I shook my head and put my empty beer glass on the bar.
“It’s way worse than that, Anton. It’s a complete nightmare—literally. Half the time I don’t know if I’m actually in a nightmare or living my life. They keep promising they’ll send me to another school, but every summer they tell me that they need me for just one more year.” My brother was so drunk that he was almost in tears.
“Alright, Sloane. We should get out of here. I think I should drive.” I held out my hand. “I only had a few beers—you’re wasted.”
“Yeah, okay.” He handed me his keys and I got him to pay the tab with his credit card before we left.