They Thought I Was Dead: Sandy’s Story

77 Autumn 2011 — Roel Albazi

They called it ‘doing time’, and Prisoner Number FF276493 still had plenty more of the stuff to do. A minimum of six long years. Or to put it the way it was marked out on his wall chart, 2,163 days.

His last girlfriend had a grumpy teenage daughter, Izzy. Whenever he’d asked Izzy how her day had been she would yawn a reply, invariably, ‘Same old, same old.’

If she wanted to know what same old, same old, really felt like, she should do a spell in prison, Roel Albazi thought. Every single one of the days inside would really be the same. Get up, shower, eat breakfast, keep out of trouble. Go to woodwork class, keep out of trouble. Eat lunch. Go to the gym. Keep out of trouble. Then visiting time, except he rarely had visitors. Followed by association half-hour with his fellow prisoners. Then he would be locked in his cell until 7 a.m. the next morning.

The only regular visitor he’d had was Skender Sharka but now that had stopped. The idiot, only recently released from prison, had been busted at Manchester Airport with enough Class A drugs in his carry-on to ensure he wouldn’t be free again until pretty much around the time he himself was out. Occasionally he’d get a visit from one of his friends in the local Albanian community — mostly one of his team members from the regular Sunday football knockabout they had in St Anne’s Well Gardens.

He went straight to his cell at the start of association. He had no interest in associating with any of his fellow prisoners. He didn’t want to have to listen to their tales of woe, of how they were fitted up by the police, or just generally had screwed up.

He only wanted to do his time, the very minimum time — 2,163 more days before he would be freed on licence, provided he ‘kept out of trouble’.

And he was utterly determined to keep out of trouble.

This morning, a new day, one day fewer to go, he picked up the black Sharpie marker pen and put another cross on the chart. Now it was only 2,162 days.

He was proud of his beautifully framed chart. He had made that frame in his daily woodwork class. His instructor there told him he had real promise, that when he got out he would be able to get a decent job in the joinery department of a building company.

Albazi went along with the guy, playing the game. ‘Keeping out of trouble’. There were plenty of assholes in here, and not just the prisoners who were spoiling for a fight, it was some of the screws, too. No way was he going to risk adding one single day to his sentence.

No way was he going to let Sandy Grace, or whatever the bitch’s name was now, live for one extra day longer than was absolutely necessary.

He put the marker pen down on the small table, then stripped off and pulled on his shorts, singlet, socks and trainers, all set for his daily session in the gym. Strength work and aerobic, keeping up both his ripped muscles and stamina. Crunches, pull-ups, planks, the rowing machine, the treadmill — concentrating, sweating, stopping prison from breaking him the way it broke so many people.

But the part of his daily sixty-minute workout he most looked forward to was pulling on the boxing gloves and attacking the punchball.

And imagining it was a certain person’s face.

Turning round, about to head out of his cell, he saw a letter lying on the floor that he could have sworn wasn’t there two minutes ago. One of the screws must have put it there. Thanks, pal, you could have said something pleasant, something like, ‘Hi, Roel, you’ve got mail!’

Instead of just tossing it on the floor.

But not smart to get angry. Anger led to fights and fights led to your time in here getting longer and longer. Which meant letting Sandy Grace live longer.

He picked it up. A white, letter-sized envelope that felt bulky, with his name and address on a printed label, opened by one of the screws as all mail, except letters from his solicitor, was.

Inside was the folded page of a newspaper. Puzzled, he removed it and spread it on his bed, flattening it out. It was the front page of a paper called the Jersey Evening Post.

The headline, above a photograph of a smart-looking boat, read: MISSING SAILOR’S PARTNER QUESTIONED IN MUNICH.

Below this photograph were two more. One was of a swarthy-looking man, with short hair and hooded, brooding eyes. The other a woman with short, wavy hair. Despite the grainy photo, different hairstyle and the fact that it had been four years since he’d last seen her, he recognized her instantly, even before reading on.

The newspaper reported her as Sandra Jones from Jersey.

Albazi didn’t care what name she went under.

He cared only about one thing. She was the face he punched every day, without fail — except on rare occasions when the prison was short of screws and he wasn’t allowed to leave his cell.

Oh yes!

He punched that ball so damned hard every day.

And in 2,162 days, when he was out of here, her face wouldn’t be on a punchball, in his imagination. It would be on top of her neck.

‘Hi, Sandy,’ he said quietly, not that anyone was listening. ‘Just so you know, it doesn’t matter what you call yourself. The day I get out of here, I’m coming to find you. So you’d better hide really well. Because I promise you one thing. If and when I do find you, I’m going to kill you. With my bare hands.’