I suppose I teased you a little bit earlier. I said you would be getting the real story, of everything that went down without the cops knowing about it. Without any station running a story on it. I didn't tell you the story then. But I'll tell you now, I swear.

I planned the entire thing from my cell. I planned it with the ample time I found myself enjoying; I didn't quite enjoy socializing with the other inmates. Or the guards. I was in fact relying on my lack of socialization to jumpstart my plan.

I'm starting to hate the word 'plan.' Maybe I'll call it something else. A scheme? A plot? A strategy? The entire thesaurus page for the word 'plan?' That was how I wrote all of my papers in high school.

But I digress.

There were dozens of ways that this plan could go awry, and I believe both Rebecca and myself were well aware of all of them. Every single tiny strand that could be pulled out of place by forces and people completely out of our control. I've never liked not being in control, as I'm sure everyone has figured out by now. I didn't like that this plan left me with little control of the situation, but it was difficult to pull the puppet strings from inside a prison.

Where most of my other plans had failed, this was the one that needed to work.

><><><

December 31, 2020

5:57 PM

6 Hours & 3 Minutes Until the New Year

Dinner was coming soon.

Dinner was the catalyst to jumpstart the plan.

Kennedy was simultaneously excited and terrified for dinner on New Year's Eve. Agitated. She was agitated about dinner on New Year's Eve. She didn't even know with 100% certainty that Rebecca would bother showing up for her part. She wouldn't blame her if she didn't show. But it would most definitely put a damper on everything.

"It's dinner time, Abrams."

Hannah, a guard who Kennedy had come to almost-like during her time in that cell, unlocked the door and motioned for Kennedy to go out into the hallway. Everyone else was filing down the narrow, yellow-tinged floors in the direction of the cafeteria.

Kennedy hated the cafeteria. It smelled like rats.

She kept her eyes on the back of Hannah's head while they walked, convinced that if she made direct eye contact with anyone, they would be able to see right through her and her plan. So, the back of Hannah's head it was.

Kennedy followed everyone else into the cafeteria, lining up to get her food. The nerves bouncing around in her stomach wouldn't allow her to eat anything, but she didn't want to look suspicious.

She sat down with her tray at a relatively empty table and began to look around at the women who had yet to take their seats. The ones who could possibly sit down across from her. She prayed whoever it was wouldn't be too strong. Or too much of a murderer.

A tray slammed down onto the table and someone sat in the seat across from Kennedy. She didn't need to look up to know who it was. She had studied the sleeve on the woman's right arm from across the hall for hours upon hours.

Nel.

Kennedy took three deep breaths.

In. Out. In. Out.

In. Out.

And then the plan began.

"What the hell is your problem?" Kennedy yelled, and the entire cafeteria went deathly silent. She was looking at Nel, who was staring at her with narrowed eyes and one arched eyebrow.

"Excuse me?"

Her voice was quieter than Kennedy had expected it to be, in her daily imaginings of what Nel's life must have been like before this.

"I said," Kennedy stood from her seat, trying not to trip over herself, "what the hell is your problem?"

Nel stood up, both hands on her hips. It made her look bigger than she had before.

"I don't think you want to go there, copout."

Copout?

"I think I do," Kennedy replied, every ounce of strength in her body going towards keeping her voice level, "I think I want to know why you decided that sitting down at my table without my permission was alright."

Two guards were starting to walk up to the two women. But this wasn't enough. Kennedy needed to go bigger if she had any chance of making this work.

Without waiting for Nel to respond, Kennedy took her year-and-a-half of gymnastics training into full swing and leapt over the table head-first, arms outstretched. Her head butted Nel's chest and both women crashed to the ground.

Kennedy was immediately cognizant that her initial reading of Nel had been incorrect.

Nel had most definitely not been a starving artist before showing up here.

Without missing a beat, Nel pushed Kennedy off of her while keeping her hands firmly on Kennedy's shirt. She flipped her over and Kennedy found herself lying with her back on the cafeteria floor and Nel's fist flying straight towards her face.

Kennedy whipped her right hand up to soften the impact, but didn't feel anything touch her face. The weight of Nel's body was gone and a different pair of hands were forcing her to stand up.

Shit. The guards.

Kennedy started flailing her limbs in every direction. She could hear the guard yelling at her to stop moving, but she didn't pause until she heard the sentence she had been waiting for.

"She's going to the warden."

Kennedy slowed her thrashing as the guard behind her—she was pretty sure it was Hannah—dragged her out of the cafeteria and in the direction of the warden's office.

The thing was, the only way to access the warden's office was through the room where Kennedy had had her bail hearing. She had dubbed it the bail room. Because it rhymed with mail room. And that made her laugh.

She let Hannah walk her through the different hallways until she saw the door to the bail room come up in front of them.

All Kennedy could picture was the little side door she had seen when she had her bail hearing. The little side door filled every inch of her mind, as if she were manifesting that it would hold the answers to all of her problems. Which, if this plan worked, it would.

They walked up to the door and Hannah went to turn the handle. Once the door opened and Kennedy saw the little side door, an odd, calming sensation washed over her. As if the universe knew this would work. If the universe were on the side of breaking the law.

Hannah walked through the door first and pulled Kennedy behind her. As she walked through, Kennedy swung her ankle towards the side of the door with as much force as she could muster.

A loud smack sounded through the bail room and Kennedy dropped like dead weight to the ground, forcing Hannah to let go of her. She grabbed her ankle in her hands and started screaming.

"My ankle!" She yelled, "I think I broke it! Somebody help me! Somebody help me!"

Hannah was on her knees beside Kennedy, trying to calm her down, but Kennedy continued her inaudible screeching until she watched the guard standing in front of the little side door start to walk towards the scene.

Before he reached them, Kennedy rolled onto her stomach, still screaming at the top of her lungs as she tucked her legs underneath her torso. She saw the guard's shoes beside her head, and then everything else just...worked.

Kennedy propelled herself straight up and off of the floor, keeping her chin tucked into her neck. She felt the male guard's head hit her back and he stumbled, leaving the little side door completely vulnerable.

Kennedy raced to the door; her hands still cuffed in front of her. She found it already ajar.

Nice foresight, Rebecca.

She shot through the door and out into the parking lot, where a dark blue car was waiting with its headlights turned off.

"Stop!"

Both Hannah and the male guard were rushing towards the little side door and Kennedy slammed it shut before she could think of anything else. She felt a twinge of guilt sting her chest as the male guard screamed out in pain, his fingers smashed in the doorframe.

Kennedy turned and sprinted to the car, diving through the wide-open door behind the driver's seat.

"Drive!"

She slammed the car door shut behind her and the screeching of tires sounded in her ears. The car lurched into high gear and Kennedy heard people running into the parking lot and yelling at each other to get into their cars. To chase the girls. To bring Kennedy back to her cell.

Kennedy struggled to sit up in the backseat while the car tore into the night, and she could hear the cop cars starting up behind them.

"Did you get rid of the license plates?"

"Yes, I got rid of the license plates, I'm not an idiot." Rebecca muttered out of the corner of her mouth, "Now shut up before my conscience catches up to what we're doing."

We don't want that.