Half Lies by Sally Green

hope that she’ll help me get back to my true self. Whatever happens, I doubt I’ll ever come back here.
    So much of this breaks my heart, and I know yours is broken too.
    Gabriel x

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The routine is okay.
    Waking up to sky and air is okay. Waking up to the cage and the shackles is what it is. You can’t let the cage get to you. The shackles rub but healing is quick and easy, so what’s to mind?
    The cage is loads better now that the sheepskins are in. Even when they’re damp they’re warm. The tarpaulin over the north end was a big improvement too. There’s shelter from the worst of the wind and rain. And a bit of shade if it’s hot and sunny. Joke! You’ve got to keep your sense of humor.
    So the routine is to wake up as the sky lightens before dawn. You don’t have to move a muscle, don’t even have to open your eyes to know it’s getting light; you can just lie there and take it all in.
    The best bit of the day.
    There aren’t many birds around, a few, not many. It would be good to know all their names, but you know their different calls. There are no seagulls, which is something to think about, and there are no vapor trails either. The wind is usually quiet in the predawn calm, and somehow the air feels warmer already as it begins to get light.
    You can open your eyes now and there are a few minutes to savor the sunrise, which today is a thin pink line stretching along the top of a narrow ribbon of cloud draped over the smudged green hills. And you’ve still got a minute, maybe even two, to get your head together before she appears.
    You’ve got to have a plan, though, and the best idea is to have it all worked out the night before so you can slip straight into it without a thought. Mostly the plan is to do what you’re told, but not every day, and not today.
    You wait until she appears and throws you the keys. You catch the keys, unlock your ankles, rub them to emphasize the pain she is inflicting, unlock your left manacle, unlock your right, stand, unlock the cage door, toss the keys back to her, open the cage door, step out—keeping your head down, never look her in the eyes (unless that’s part of some other plan)—rub your back and maybe groan a bit, walk to the vegetable bed, piss.
    Sometimes she tries to mess with your head, of course, by changing the routine. Sometimes she wants chores before exercises but most days it’s push-ups first. You’ll know which while still zipping up.
    “Fifty.”
    She says it quietly. She knows you’re listening.
    You take your time as usual. That’s always part of the plan.
    Make her wait.
    Rub your right arm. The metal wristband cuts into it when the shackle is on. You heal it and get a faint buzz. You roll your head, your shoulders, your head again and then stand there, just stand there for another second or two, pushing her to her limit, before you drop to the ground.
     
one
Not minding
two
is the trick.
three
The only
four
trick.
five
But there are
six
loads of
seven
tactics.
eight
Loads.
nine
On the look-out
ten
all the time.
eleven
All the time.
twelve
And it’s
thirteen
easy.
fourteen
’Cause there ain’t
fifteen
nothing else
sixteen
to do.
seventeen
Look out for what?
eighteen
Something.
nineteen
Anything.
twenty
N
twenty-one
E
twenty-two
thing.
twenty-three
A mistake.
twenty-four
A chance.
twenty-five
An oversight.
twenty-six
The
twenty-seven
tiniest
twenty-eight
error
twenty-nine
by the
thirty
White
thirty-one
Witch
thirty-two
from
thirty-three
Hell.
thirty-four
’Cause she makes
thirty-five
mistakes.
thirty-six
Oh yes.
thirty-seven
And if that mistake
thirty-eight
comes to
thirty-nine
nothing
forty
you wait
forty-one
for the next one
forty-two
and the next one
forty-three
and the next one.
forty-four
Until
forty-five
you
forty-six
succeed.
forty-seven
Until
forty-eight
you’re
forty-nine
free.
     
    You get up. She will have been counting, but never letting up is another tactic.
    She