Page 30 of Homebound
“How about you hold on to this one for a little while longer, and I find out for you?” She’d start by asking Ruby.
The Sakka nodded and moved away looking disappointed.
Gemma resumed her humming and began to waltz back to her bucket when an unmistakable smell of fresh smoke caught her attention. She stopped, sniffing the air. Her gaze sharpened.
Sure enough, a butt of a rolled-up cigarette was wafting a thin stream of smoke from the corridor floor. It hadn’t been there when Gemma mopped it mere minutes ago.
She surveyed the crime scene. Judging from the rollie’s location, it had been flicked from one of the cells after the perpetrator had had his fill. That meant five, maybe six cells nearby.
“I am going to find out who smoked and I am going to report him.”
Her announcement was summarily ignored.
Slowly, Gemma walked by the cells in question squinting at every suspect in turn: Xosa, Tana-Tana, Tarai, Birdie 1, Birdie 2, Arc the Perali, and Simon.
The last one couldn’t have done it, she knew that.
Birdies could also be scratched off her list - a conjecture, of course, but the two just didn’t strike her as avid users of weed.
The Xosa was sleeping. Taking naps during the day went against the rules, but she refused to harass inmates for transgressions that meaningless. So not him, either.
Tana-Tana, old and tired-looking, sat cross-legged in the middle of his cell, presumably in deep meditation. It could’ve been him, sure, but for the moment she dismissed him as an unlikely maybe.
She planted her feet firmly in front of the Tarai, gearing up for a confrontation. Heavy bars separated them, but she could vividly recall his meaty fingers circling Simon’s throat, his small moss-green pupil-less eyes cold and unfeeling. If not for her, he would’ve killed Simon and given it no more thought than squishing a cockroach. She resented this alien.
“You.”
He looked up and saw her standing there. His ridiculous and repulsive ears flickered, fluffing the tufted fringe decorating the inner rims of the shells.
“Come up to the bars and exhale. I want to smell your breath.”
In no hurry, he approached the door but did nothing more than stand there looking at her with impersonal hostility she remembered from the courtyard.
“Blow out,” she ordered sternly.
His eyes never blinked. “You can’t make me,” he said in an accent so thick she barely understood.
She took a small step forward. “Fine. Then I’ll say I saw you smoke it.”
He sneered. “Your threats are empty. Stupid human whore.” He spat at her feet and moved deeper into his cell, turning his back on her.
Gemma narrowed her eyes at him. He hadn’t fallen for her bluff. Yet his reluctance to engage with her told her he was the likely offender. Either him or Number 34.
She left the Tarai and moved to take a look at the Perali.
“What? I didn’t do it.” He was standing by the bars, waiting for her. “Why risk it? Besides, I don’t like weed.”
“Did you see who smoked it?”
“Ah, no. I didn’t.”
“I will find out,” she promised ominously. “Eventually.”
“Beautiful Gemma, this blunt is a small business, not worth worrying your head about. Pretend you never noticed.”
“It’s contraband,” she countered.
He didn’t deny it. “It’s part of prison life.”
