Story code: ST-001486
Part 3: The Extra Icing
The tall inmate’s soft, dangerous hiss echoed off the concrete. “You’re late. And my boy in the storeroom says he didn’t hear you say the words.”
Mateo’s knees buckled. The heavy yellow mesh bags slipped down to his forearms, the plastic drawstrings biting violently into his fever-slicked skin. He tried to take a step back, but the tattooed man lunged, his large hands grabbing the collar of Mateo’s sweat-soaked gray shirt.
“You’re not passing out on me,” the inmate growled, twisting the fabric tight against Mateo’s throat. He hauled Mateo backward, dragging him the few feet toward the heavy metal door of the commissary storeroom. “You don’t walk away until the transaction is complete.”
The man slammed his fist twice against the steel.
The door unlatched with a sharp clack. It swung open, revealing the commissary manager standing in the dim light of the stockroom. The cheerful, weaponized smile he had worn at the window was entirely gone, replaced by a tense, irritated scowl.
“What’s the holdup?” the manager snapped, looking up and down the corridor. “I need the verbal confirmation. I’m not moving the inventory into the block’s ledger until he says it.”
“Tell him,” the tattooed man hissed, shaking Mateo. “Say the damn words, eighty-four-forty-two. I know your game, boss. If he doesn’t confirm, you void the trade, keep the cash, and put the bags right back on the shelf.”
“He knows the protocol,” the manager said smoothly, adjusting his pristine white collar. “Say the phrase, Mateo.”
Mateo’s stomach convulsed violently. The dense, cloying lump of artificial pastry and pure sugar he had just been forced to eat surged upward. A fresh wave of dizziness hit him like a physical blow. The edges of his vision tunneled into darkness.
His legs gave out entirely.
The tattooed man cursed and let go of his collar. Mateo collapsed, hitting the concrete floor hard. The mesh bags crashed down beside him, the sound of thirty-six Honey Buns and twenty bags of chips crunching loudly in the quiet corridor. Mateo’s shoulder took the brunt of the impact, his cheek pressing heavily against the cold, scuffed linoleum.
From the main corridor, a burst of radio static shattered the silence. Heavy, measured boots hammered against the floor.
“Hey! What’s going on back there?” It was Officer Barrett’s booming, gravelly voice. He was returning from his patrol.
The tattooed man didn’t hesitate. He kicked the mesh bags out of his way and sprinted silently in the opposite direction, disappearing into the shadows of the transitional hallway before Barrett could turn the corner.
The manager panicked. His eyes darted from the approaching sound of the boots to the expensive contraband sitting exposed in the hallway. He dropped to a crouch, frantically reaching out to grab the thick drawstrings of the mesh bags, desperate to yank them inside the storeroom and shut the door before the guard saw them.
As the manager bent over, the clipboard tucked under his arm snagged on the metal doorframe. A small stack of papers slipped from beneath the metal clip and fluttered to the floor, landing inches from Mateo’s face.
Mateo blinked through the stinging sweat in his eyes. The forms were bright pink.
*Medical Transfer Requests.*
They were completely blank, crisp, and fresh from the printer.
A jolt of pure clarity pierced right through Mateo’s delirium. Three days ago, he had begged the manager for one of those exact forms. The manager was the wing’s designated quartermaster; he controlled the paperwork. He had looked Mateo dead in the eye, smiled that awful smile, and claimed the forms were entirely out of stock. *No forms until next week,* he had said.
That lie had kept Mateo trapped on the cell block. It prevented him from going to the infirmary, leaving him to get sicker by the hour, vulnerable to the block’s debt collection. It had forced him to drain his wife’s account today just to survive the week. The manager hadn’t just facilitated the extortion; he had engineered it by locking Mateo out of medical care.
The manager’s face went completely pale as he realized what had dropped. He scrambled forward, his fingers snatching the pink forms off the floor, violently crushing them into a ball to shove deep into his pants pocket just as the heavy footsteps rounded the corner.
Officer Barrett stopped, his hand dropping to the baton on his utility belt as he took in the chaotic scene: the dropped bags of junk food, the manager crouching in the hall, and Mateo sprawled out on his side.
“I thought I told you to go back to your block,” Barrett growled, stalking forward. He shifted his pale eyes to the manager. “What the hell is going on here? Why are you out of the cage?”
The manager stood up quickly, plastering on a fake, nervous smile. He subtly kicked one of the mesh bags backward, trying to distance himself from the evidence. “The inmate just passed out, Officer Barrett. I opened the door to check on the noise. Looks like he bought way too much sugar. You know how they get when they binge.”
Mateo stared at the toe of the manager’s polished black shoe. He thought of the crumpled pink forms in the man’s pocket. He thought of his wife, her feet swelling in her cheap shoes, skipping their daughter’s choir recital to work a double shift at the diner. She had bled herself dry to feed this man’s engineered greed.
A surge of adrenaline burned through the fever. Mateo pushed himself up on one elbow. His arm trembled violently, but he reached out and wrapped his thick, clumsy fingers around the manager’s ankle. He gripped the fabric of the man’s trousers with every ounce of strength he had left.
The manager flinched, trying to yank his leg away, but Mateo’s grip was iron.
“Let go of him,” Barrett ordered, stepping closer, his hand tightening on his baton.
Mateo ignored the guard. He stared directly up into the manager’s panicked, wide eyes. He took a ragged, shallow breath, forcing his dry throat to work. He remembered the exact English phrase the manager had made him practice. The code that proved the commissary purchase included the manager’s secret blackmail fee-the toll that ensured the manager wouldn’t falsely report Mateo’s wife for smuggling contraband during visitation.
*Say it,* the manager had warned him yesterday. *Or I make one phone call, and she never sees you again.*
Mateo’s lungs burned. He opened his cracked lips and screamed the phrase, his hoarse voice echoing off the concrete walls, shattering the carefully constructed lie.
“The extra icing is for the diner!” Mateo yelled.
Barrett stopped dead in his tracks. The manager froze, all color draining from his face.
“What did you just say?” Barrett asked, his voice dropping its aggressive edge, replaced by a sharp, dangerous curiosity.
Mateo yanked on the manager’s pant leg, nearly pulling the man off balance, and screamed it again, louder, the truth breaking the code wide open.
“The extra icing is for the diner!” Mateo pointed a shaking finger directly at the manager’s pocket. “He charged me a hundred dollars not to flag my wife for smuggling! He hid the medical forms so I couldn’t leave the block until she paid it!”