Cry Until You Bleed

24- New Rules

“Renée is back!” Mia exclaims during breakfast on Monday with a wide grin on her face. “I saw her come in yesterday when you were out on your break.”

“Really?” I wonder excitedly. “That’s so amazing, where is she now?”

“Well, they took her down to solitary. Wouldn’t even let me talk to her, but she waved to me. She seems alright, I guess. I’m not sure, I didn’t get to see her for very long,” She explains, beginning to nibble on her toast.

“At least she’s back,” I say optimistically. “How long do you think it’ll take for them to let her out?”

“I have no clue. They’ll start letting her come to common meals in a few weeks hopefully. I mean, it’s not ideal but at least we’ll be able to see her eventually. I can’t wait to see her face when you tell her that you went on a not-date with Niles the Nurse’s Brother. She’ll freak.”

“It isn’t a big deal,” I shake my head at her. “All we did was go ice skating and eat popcorn.”

“Sure. It’s nothing. It’s still more excitement than I’ve had in all of the months that I’ve been here,” Mia tells me, stabbing one of her sausage links before pushing it around the tray a little bit. “And I’m sure that Renée will agree with that.”

“That’s because this place is about as exciting as a sack of potatoes,” I tell her. “I could turn the TV to another channel and it’d be the most exciting thing to happen all month.”

“Yeah, that’s true. We’re lame like that,” She agrees with me with a small laugh.

I don’t know if I should agree with her or not without being offensive so I just laugh with her before finishing my last bite of toast. “Yeah. Well I have to go call my brother so I’ll see you in a little bit.”

“Does he know about Niles?”

“No,” I sigh. “And I probably won’t even tell him. He’d freak.”

“It’s what big brothers are for,” She chuckles as I throw my trash away, nod in agreement, and then walk away from Mia, saying goodbye first, and out of the cafeteria towards the phone bank so that I can call Penn. I haven’t talked to him in a few days so I guess now is a good time to call him. Especially since right now is about when he’s on break from teaching his classes.

When he answers the phone though, I suspect that I have my timing off because he answers with a “Did you just give birth to a potato? Because that’s what it looked like. Hello?”

“Um, bad timing?” I wonder.

“Oh, hey, no we’re almost done. Give me a second,” He tells me and then I wait on the line while he talks to his dance class again. “Okay, we’re done for today. I hope tomorrow goes better than today because that was disturbing.”

“You need to be nicer, Penn,” I tell him with a small laugh.

“And have a good day,” He adds for my benefit. “How’s that?”

“You’re so awful.”

“How are they going to learn if I baby them all summer?” He wonders. “I’m doing it for them, they just don’t realize it yet. Anyway, what’s up?”

“Nothing. I just got bored, which happens about every five seconds around here but that’s not the point. How was your weekend?”

“Pretty uneventful,” He tells me with a sigh. “I babysat Sienna’s sister for a while so that Sienna could go shopping but that’s about it really. How about your weekend?”