Four Walls

Four

Mateo is on the floor when I wake up. He's not sleeping, but he's in the same position as before, sitting against the wall near the door. His head is down, resting against his knees with his arms wrapped around them.

I feel terrible. After all, this has been his bed for what seems to be a long time, and now I've kicked him out of the one and only comforting thing in the room.

"Hey," I say, hoping he's not mad at me.

He lifts his head up, and surprisingly, looks excited to see me awake. "Hey, you're up. How'd you sleep?"

"Pretty well," I respond, shocked he's even asking.

I hope he didn't see me crying last night. I don't want him to think of me as a weak girl who can't handle anything. But judging after my first encounter with him, I don't think I'll be able to recover from that image anytime soon.

"That's good," he says. "I had a hard time getting used to the lights in the beginning. Supposedly, they use it as a torture tactic in Guantanamo. At least the prisoners there get to leave their cells."

I'm mesmerized by some of the things he says. "I think I was too exhausted to notice them. But, uh, you really don't need to sleep on the floor. We could sleep back to back or something," I suggest.

"Okay," he says. "We can try that if it's okay with you. The floor kind of sucks."

I nod, glad I don't have to feel guilty about it anymore. "I think I'm going to shower now," I say, standing up.

"Sure, go ahead. The towel on the left hanger is clean," Mateo says, pointing to the shower. "I used the one on the right."

I head to the shower, deciding I should get this over with sooner than later. I go behind the brick tiles that separate the shower from the room and quickly strip, hanging my clothes over the tiles. They're an ugly green color that looks like moss. But a shower is a shower, and I guess I shouldn't complain.

I turn on the spray and revel in the fact that the water is not ice cold. It's lukewarm, just like Mateo said. He also said it runs out quickly, so I better hurry up.

There's a single, plastic bottle of shampoo on the floor. It's one of those family-sized two-in-one types, so hopefully we don't need to worry about it running out soon. Still, I make sure not to use as much as I normally would. I don't know how often they refill the limited supplies in the room. By the time I rinse out my hair, I can already feel the water turning cold. I grab the bar of soap from a small carving in the tiles and quickly wash my body.

I'm trembling when I turn off the water. Mateo wasn't kidding. It went from a nice temperature to almost freezing in no time. I'll have to figure out a better system next time.

As I'm toweling off, I notice bruising around my waist. It's a purplish color that covers both sides. I inspect the rest of my body, particularly my thighs, and I let out a huge sigh of relief when I don't see any bruising there. It still makes me wonder though, and paired with the bruises around my wrists, I fear that they might have touched me. I feel sick thinking about it. I wish there were a mirror in here so I could look at my back or my face.

I dress and exit the shower, unable to stop thinking about whether they did something to me. I find Mateo doing push-ups on the floor. He's shirtless too. It's rather impressive, especially when he switches to do a one arm push-up. Now I can see where he gets all those muscles from.

My eyes zoom in on the eagle on his back. It looks like it's flying as Mateo's shoulder blades flex back and forth. It's a welcome distraction, even though the irony of it isn't lost on me. That bird isn't going anywhere, and neither are we. We're all trapped in this cage. And the freedom it supposedly represents—it's all an illusion.