Words with Friends

"Fletcher? Get over here," one of the female COs called out. "You're going back with Jefferson. Both of you have heat exhaustion. You can spend the rest of the afternoon in bed in the infirmary with an IV in your arm. Understood?"

Thirty minutes later she was back at the compound. She was evaluated and ordered to take a cold shower and lay down in one of the ten beds in the facilities infirmary as they strung up a saline bag which drained down a plastic tube and through a needle inserted into a vain in her hand. Hallie wasn't aware that one of the privileges when in the infirmary was access to an iPad. She could lay there and watch TV, listen to music, read a newspaper, or use an iPad. Talk about a no-brainer.

She opened up WWF and started making her return moves. The last game was the one she'd started the night before with the cute guy who tended bees or whatever that user name meant. There was his pic and that amazing smile. He'd used all three of her letters to spell out a six-letter word on top of hers for 32 points. "Damn. Cute and smart," she thought as she looked for the right word to play. WWF accepted all kinds of two-letter combinations and her favorites were QI, JO, and ZA (for pizza.) She placed an I next to his T then put the Q on top on a triple-letter score for 31 points and hit 'send.'

Less than five minutes later, she saw he'd played again and there was a '1' in the chat box. Hallie's heartbeat picked up before she laughed at herself. "You're sick in bed in a federal prison. Get real," she said quietly before opening the chat box.

"Nice!" was all it said. She noticed he'd played Q-U-I-T-T-E-R through a double-word score off of her 'Q' for 35 points. She tapped out a message of her own. "Ha! Not bad yourself." She then had to play a smaller word for just 10 points. Minutes later, he was back again with another word and another message in chat. This time, he'd played a huge word off her hers in the triple-word score for 48 more points. His message said, "Thanks for setting me up like that. You must take pity on old guys like me. :-)"

Old guy? She began wondering how old his pic might be. She played another small word for 12 points then typed, "Old guy? Does driving bees around age a guy or something?" and hit 'send.'

This time, he only scored 14 points but replied to her again. "Driving bees? What am I missing?"

She played a double-word for 22 points and typed, "Hornet Driver. Are you a beekeeper or something?" and hit 'send.'

Two minutes later he replied after scoring 10 points on a two-letter word. "Ha-ha. Very funny. No bees. I fly F-18s—Hornets. So Hornet...Driver."

Hallie was not only surprised by his reply, she again thought of the hunky guy from Jag and wondered if this guy might be in the military. She went to Google and typed in "Who flies the F-18 Hornet" and seconds later found out it was a fighter/attack jet for both the Navy and the Marine Corps. "Hmmm. Interesting," she thought.

She did a four-finger swipe back to WWF, played her word, then typed: "Navy or Marines?"

A minute later she got her answer. "Marine. I'm a flight instructor at NAS Pensacola. What do you do, Hallie Berry with an 'F'? :-) "

Hallie sat there staring at the screen for a very long time reading and re-reading his message. She didn't know exactly where the Pensacola Navy base was, but she heard and saw military jets flying around the area all the time. She thought for a while then smiling, replied with: "Environmental beautification specialist" then hit 'send.'

His next reply was: "Sounds important!"

Hallie'd been on such a high until she got what seemed like such a short, curt reply. He probably saw right through her BS exaggeration of someone who picked up trash. Then she reminded herself they were just playing a silly game. This wasn't a dating site and again, she had no idea whether or not he was even single. He was probably just being friendly and that's all there was to it. She tried not to be too disappointed as she replied with: "Not as important as flying planes to keep us free!" She decided to take a chance and added: "Your wife is a very lucky woman!" She erased it once then told herself, "Why the hell not?" retyped it and sent it.

Her heart was beating faster again as she sat there waiting for his reply. Just then, the male nurse came over and told her, "Okay, Fletcher. You've had two bags of saline. Time to head back to the cell block." He smiled as he said 'cell block' knowing they lived in rooms. He didn't mean it in any kind of negative way. The hardest part was having him reach out his hand for her iPad knowing she had no choice but to give it to him without question. She wanted to beg for another five minutes—no, just two more minutes, but it would have to wait.

The rest of the day dragged on the way every day had at Broward County even though it was only two more hours until dinner and another hour until she could check her iPad out for an additional hour. When the CO in admin handed it to her, she nearly ran into the wall trying to get it turned on and open WWF. As she walked into her room, she read his reply: "No wife. At least not anymore. Too many deployments made her too lonely. :-( Are you married, Hallie Berry with a F?"

Hallie closed her eyes and held the iPad to her chest clutching it against her new, dry jumpsuit. "Nope. Never been. But a girl can always dream, right? I'm Hallie (duh) by the way. What's your name, Hornet Driver?" She wasn't sure how that would go over but then she had to admit she had no real experience with dating outside of the few guys she'd gone out with in high school before hooking up with Freddie the loser. "What the hell," she thought as she hit 'send.' She had no way of knowing what he might be doing so he may have been playing before dinner or even worse—maybe her comment scared him off. Either way, she didn't get a reply before her hour was up.

Even more agonizing than the three-hour wait that afternoon was having to wait almost 24 hours to get her iPad back and look for his reply the next day. Just like the day before, she couldn't get it turned on fast enough to see whether or not he'd answered her. She had one eye closed as she scrolled through her games to find his. There it was! Another '1' in the chat area. She opened it then opened her other eye. It said: "Hi Hallie. I'm Owen. You seem nice—for an environmental beautification specialist. :-)"

Her heart was once again racing as she re-read the words he wrote. Evidently, she hadn't said anything too crazy. "Thanks—I think. You, too. :-) " was all she wrote. She liked these little smiley symbols you could make. It was an easy way to let someone know you were being playful. She took her turn in several other games then to her delight, saw he'd played again, too.

This time he wrote: "Why is a single woman home playing WWF on a Friday night?"

Hallie smiled then worried about how to answer that one. She couldn't just tell him, "Oh, I'm in prison." Playing a mental game of devil's advocate with herself she thought that would be the right thing to do but knew it would also be the end of her...relationship...or whatever this was with Owen. She convinced herself she was just having some fun and as long as she didn't lie then....

She tapped out, "Exhausted from work. What's a handsome fighter pilot doing home on a Friday night?"

In less than a minute she read, "Waiting for his favorite three-year old. I have her all weekend. Her name's Holly, Hallie. :-)"

Single but with a daughter. Hallie sighed as she went from feeling on top of the world to feeling sorry for herself for the first time in a very long time. She'd finally 'met' a handsome, decent, single man but he had a child. A ready-made family for a girl with a dream, but not for a girl with a dream and a prison record. Hallie began wondering if her dream would ever come true. Could it even come true? She'd be on parole for the rest of her 25-year sentence even after her release. What man would allow his daughter to be around a woman like that? Even more so, what ex-wife would permit it? She blinked back a tear and fought off the urge to cry. She'd cried so many times those first few months before she finally vowed never to cry again. Years in prison had toughened her up. Crying just wasn't something she allowed herself to do. She was so close to being free or at least mostly free and yet she felt more imprisoned than she could ever remember. She was sitting here in prison fantasizing about something that would never happen. With a child, it just couldn't happen. Fortunately, the other girls hadn't seen her in her moment of weakness. She wiped the tear from her eye and thought about what to say.

"She sounds adorable" was all she could think of to say and let it go at that.

"She is. I'll send you her pic. What's your email address?"

Hallie froze when she read that. She didn't have an email address. She didn't even have an email account and why would she? Who would she send emails to? Who'd want to send them to her? "Owen, that's who," she told herself answering her own question.

She'd been emotionally up and down so may times the past twelve years, she felt exhausted. But persevering was all she knew how to do. Child or no child, she wanted to have some form of contact with this man so....

"Hey, Miriam? You got a sec?" she asked. Five minutes later, Hallie had an account on Hotmail and sent the address to Owen.

With just three minutes remaining on her time, Hallie saw a '2' in her email box. Her heart was racing again as she opened the first one only to find it was a 'welcome to Hotmail' waste of time. With two minutes left, she clicked on the second one and read:

"Hey there! This is my pride and joy, Stephanie Lynn Dickson. Owen."

She clicked on the attachment and a photo loaded in that would have made her cry had she not needed to get up and head back to admin that very instant. It was a sweet little girl with a beautiful smile wearing the cutest little dress. But what she loved most was how her daddy was holding her as she sat on his lap, and Hallie couldn't help but notice how much they looked like one another. "Oh, my goodness," she said to herself. "They're both gorgeous." She looked at the pic all the way down the hall to admin then closed it and turned it off as she stood in line to turn it in.

All she could think of was what Owen must be thinking after sending her a picture like that. She hadn't even thanked him for it let alone sent him a pic of her own. Then again, she had no such picture to send to him. But...there was a way to remedy that.

The next day she signed up to have her own photo taken for the prison's dating site. She wouldn't be allowed to wear makeup, but she also wouldn't be required to wear the orange jumpsuit in the pic. She could wear a plain, pale-blue blouse and although she couldn't style her hair, she could make sure it was combed and as pretty as it could possibly be and she could wear it pulled back in a ponytail to highlight her high cheekbones and beautiful smile. Perhaps that might be enough to keep him from sending it to the trash can and forgetting about her. Then again, a guy like that could date pretty much anyone he wanted, so why would he even consider settling for a plain Jane looking woman like Hallie? Even more so, she was once again forgetting there couldn't even be a relationship because of her current um...living arrangement. And even worse, no matter what Owen might think, his ex-wife would never let Hallie with a country mile of her daughter, even if he would. Still, she was going to have her picture taken and send it to Owen. If he chose not to respond, she'd deal with the disappointment and move on the way she always did. After all, she'd had plenty of practice dealing with that emotion. Then she thought, "Yeah, but...what if?"

Once she had her picture and profile set up, that evening Miriam showed her how to copy the image and upload it to her email account which then required her to explain what an attachment to an email was. She'd noticed Owen hadn't said anything in the WWF game and there was nothing in her email inbox. Of course, why would there be? It was her turn to reply and she hadn't sent anything in 24 hours.

In terms of text, Hallie wrote: "She is totally adorable! You're a very lucky man. Handsome, too! I've attached my pic. Hopefully it won't scare you away. Hallie."

She read then re-read what she wrote, double-checked to make sure the pic was attached then hit 'send.' She played about half her games of WWF checking her Hotmail account every couple of minutes when she saw a big '1' next to her name.

She clicked on his reply and read:

"Thank you for the compliment about Stephanie. I think she's beautiful, too. Oh, and thank you for the personal compliment. That was very nice of you. And for the record, you definitely did not scare me away. Most women can't pull off the natural thing, but you have that fresh-faced look with beautiful eyes and a killer smile so it works for you. You're a very nice-looking woman, Halle F. Berry. :-)

Are you currently dating anyone, by any chance??? Owen."

Hallie's heart was thumping so hard she was sure the other girls could hear it. She looked and saw that they were all buried in their own iPads so it must not be audible. Even so, the surge of adrenaline and endorphins reminded her of the first time she'd snorted coke, but this feeling might have been even better.

She looked at it again and thought, "Now what?" She knew she couldn't tell him the truth. She also knew if she ever lied to him, she'd blow any possibility, no matter how remote, of ever actually meeting him. Hallie suddenly realized she didn't even have a phone number if he were to ask for it. "Think!" she told herself. "Clear your head and think. And relax, for heaven's sake."

Both were a lot harder to do than she thought. She saw no way around this conundrum except to maybe string him along by playing hard to get until she got out on parole which was hopefully now just over a month away. And then what? She imagined their first date. "So, Owen? I was wondering if maybe we could swing by my parole officer's on the way to dinner. It'll just take a few minutes!"

After running through the gamut of emotions from frustration to anger (at herself) she finally said, "You made this bed, Hallie, and you have to keep on laying in it. Stop feeling for sorry yourself and deal with it."

She wrote him a short reply that read:

"Thank you! I do like makeup, I just haven't used it in a very long time. To answer your question, I'm not dating anyone. But...I am looking. :-) Hallie Fletcher (not Berry)

To her delight, she got another reply minutes later:

"You sound really nice. What's important to Hallie Fletcher? What are her dreams? Mine are—is—-to find a women I can trust, who loves me as much as I love her. Pretty simple, right? Maybe we could talk sometime. Looking forward to your reply, Owen."

For once, Hallie knew exactly what to say:

"I'd like that, too, Owen. But I think I'd rather try getting acquainted via email for a while. Maybe we could stick with this and see how things go. Would that be okay? If it is, I'll share my dream with you, too. :-) Hallie Fletcher Berry"

The last email from him she had time to read said:

"That sounds great! It's worth waiting to get to know the right person. I thought I knew her once upon a time, but as it turned out, she needed other men more than she needed to wait for me. I don't want to make another mistake like that. I've dated several different women since my divorce, but no one else has caught my attention—and my eye—like you have. So going slow sounds fine. You set the pace, okay? And I can't wait to hear about your dream. :-) Owen Dickson"

She was yet again down to under two minutes when she got his reply. All she had time to say was:

"Thanks for understanding. Gotta run for now but I'll share the dream next time we 'talk.' And this is probably none of my business, but shame on your ex-wife. I'd have waited as long as it took. Hallie"

That night, as she lay in bed, she couldn't sleep. She couldn't remember the last time she'd felt hopeful—really hopeful. She couldn't see how things could ever work out with Owen, but just being able to 'talk' to a nice guy who was single made her believe she might be able to one day act on her hope. So even if it wouldn't be him, there had to be someone out there who could see past this one terrible error in judgment made in her youth and find the good qualities she knew she had to offer.

She hadn't been in contact with her parents since she left home but thinking about her better nature helped her to decided then and there to write them a letter and apologize for her behavior, her attitude, and to thank them for doing their best to instill in her a sense of moral values. She wanted them to know—she needed them to know—she didn't blame them for anything that had happened. This was all her fault and even if they wouldn't forgive her, she had to tell them how she felt.

The next evening, Hallie's world came crashing down when Miriam told her, "Don't worry about checking out an iPad today."

"What? Why not?" Hallie asked with fear welling up inside her.

"The prison is getting all new units and we have to turn these in first," she explained.

"How long will that take?" she asked. She felt like she might be sick.

"Oh, less than a week," Miriam told her trying to sound reassuring.

"A week?" Hallie said incredulously.

"No, not a whole week. Five days is what I heard. So no big deal, right? And we'll get a better product so this is a good thing. Come on, Hallie, cheer up. It's all good!"

Five days. It may as well be five months. How would she explain a delay that long after promising Owen she'd write him back the next day? The only possible answer was the truth. Well, most of the truth. She'd have to tell him she'd had a problem with her iPad and that it took several days to get it um...fixed. That was honest, wasn't it? Okay, mostly honest though, right?

Crestfallen, she went back to her room and laid in bed staring at the ceiling as minutes turned into hours and hours slowly rolled into days. One, two, three, four. Four days that drug on for what seemed like a lifetime. But in one more day, the new iPads would be in and Hallie was counting the minutes until she could pick one up.

"Fletcher? You've got a visitor." The CO was standing outside her room. Her voice startled her out of her pity party. She shot straight up and said, "Me? I have a visitor?"

"Are there any other Fletchers in this room?" she asked with a bit of an attitude.

"No, boss," she said out of years of habit.

"Follow me," she said as she waited for Hallie to put on her shoes.

As she approached the visitation area, she looked up and saw a white-haired lady and her throat went tight. She hadn't seen her in 13 years—since the trial. She'd aged terribly and she looked small and frail, but Hallie could recognize her own mother anywhere. The CO had her sign the log, then opened the door and let her into the waiting room.

The lady was looking up as Hallie approached the table where she was sitting. In spite of her best efforts, she couldn't keep herself from crying as she said, "Mom?"

The small woman turned around and stood up. Her eyes also filled with tears as she said, "Hallie! Oh, honey—I'm so sorry!"

"No, Mom, I'm sorry. I'm the one who put you...and Dad...through all of this. Can you ever forgive me?" she said as tears streamed down her face.

"I never blamed you, honey. But your father...he still can't let it go." She was holding her daughter's hands as she said, "We read your letter and...he...he through it in the trash. When I told him I was coming to see you, he was furious. But I couldn't let another day pass without seeing my baby. So no apologies, okay? Let's just sit and talk."