Waking Up in Detention

You wake up disoriented, trying to remember what happened yesterday. The days had grown so long and laborsome that they all started to meld together. But when you see the chain-link fence walls of the cell and feel the cold metal of the shackles cut into your skin, it all comes racing back.

The man who rescued you in the desert, who told you he would get you to safety, let you climb into the back seat of his car, and you slept most of the two hours that it took you to come to this place. This prison. You had done nothing wrong, but you were here. This was detention, the ice box, the Hielera. It was cold and crowded, and it had taken you hours to fall asleep against the backdrop of the blaring television.