The Woman in Cell 47

Noise is the first thing you notice in Duval Pre-trial Detention Facility. It’s a dull roar filled with the chatter of women’s voices, dry shuffling of flip flops sliding across the floor, and shrill voices of officers hammering out orders through the intercom. I lived here for three years waiting for trial.

I hardly notice her when she comes into the dormitory because there are too many just like her. All I remember is a bedraggled figure slumping off to cell 47. Tee-tee and I engage in the only exercise allowed, walking in endless circuits around the dorm. We play the Better or Worse game. Tee-tee goes first. What would be better, an ice cream or a cold Coke? I claim ice cream, defending my choice with description of childhood summer days spent licking Mickey Mouse Ice Cream Bars. What would be worse, sunburn or mosquito bites? Tee-tee and I go back and forth like this for hours. Over two years, we’ve learned a lot about each other.

The most important rule inside is to be as quiet as possible. There is no TV and no radio, no magazines or newspapers, no books. So being quiet is impossible. Inmates can’t stop talking. Everyone is too nervous and too frightened of the future. In turn, this causes the officers to scream and lock us in our cells for being too loud. There is always noise of one kind or another until late in the night. The lights are turned off at eleven.

Shrieking jolts me awake. No idea what time it is, I just know it is late. A woman’s voice is calling for her mother then pleading with God begging for help. Screaming, screaming, screaming. Sounds of vomiting. The smell of blood and shit is pungent. Other women are already at their doors, faces pressed against the safety glass that makes up the cell walls.

“What you see?” Tee-tee calls from her cell next to mine. I peer down and can just make out the edge of the door to cell 47. Sounds of violent retching and heaving continue, then the dull thump of a body hitting the combination sink and toilet. I bend down and yell through the slot in the steel and glass door. “Think it’s cell 47, sounds like she’s in trouble!”

Tee-tee bangs a fist against her door; other women start banging and shouting. One emits a high piercing scream that reverberates around the dorm. Thudding begins as cell 32 beats her hands against the hollow combination sink toilet in her own cell. The rhythm sounds like war drums. Abrupt white light floods the dorm and Captain storms through the door to the day room carrying a bull horn. Four officers follow, two clutching Black Jesus, immense canisters of pepper spray filled with chemicals that burn the eyes and skin.

Captain depresses the siren button and screams into the mike. “Shut up, bitches!” The officers stride up to the lower tier of cells aiming the nozzles towards the slots in the doors. Slowly our cries die down. Captain waits until we are silent then announces through the horn that we are keeping the men on the other floors awake. “Those men have to work every day, unlike you whores lying around up here.”

Tee-tee call out, “Sir, cell 47, sound like she sick real bad, maybe dyin.” Captain purses his lips a moment. “You women need to go to sleep. Medical knows all about cell 47.” A collective hiss from us fills the air. Cell 35 shouts, “You killing that girl!” Captain is suddenly pelted with paper balls, empty sanitary pad boxes, toilet paper rolls and items of clothing. He ducks and dodges as if they could actually hurt him, then steps back, out of range. The siren blasts again.

“I’m gonna say this one time only, you don’t quiet down, I’m gonna take away your phone. Keep on and we’ll take the water. You’ll be on lock down, any of you want shit or...