If the exterior of the building was uninspired, the interior didn’t offer much more in the way of aesthetics. Dirty beige walls, dirty beige floors, gunmetal gray desk where I had to show my ID and be checked into the visitor’s system. Then a guy who looked like he could just as easily be on the locked-down side of the prison bars instructed me to empty my pockets and turn my purse inside out. After ascertaining that I didn’t have any files baked into cakes with me, and after making me remove my shoelaces (the ultimate weapon), he let me into the visiting room, which consisted of two rows of tiny little cubicles with telephones on each side, between a layer of bulletproof glass.

I sat down at the station the guard indicated on the end of the first row. The glass was smudged with something I did not even want to speculate about. Instead, I clasped my hands in front of me, trying hard not to touch anything.

I waited, listing to the muffled sounds of the other conversations in the room. A man telling his brother that Mom was not sending any more gum unless he took his GED course seriously. A woman telling a prisoner that if he didn’t start writing every weekend, she was gonna start seeing Joaquin, and there ain’t nothing he could do about it.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, a figure in an orange jumpsuit approached my window. Hunched over, shuffling, gray skin, pronounced wrinkles, three days past needing a good shave.

Pines.

He sat down slowly, then gave me a long look as if trying to decide if he should know me, before picking up the telephone extension on his side of the glass.

I did the same, listening to his ragged breath on the other end.

“Hiya,” I said, doing a little wave.

He stared at me just long enough to hammer home what a ridiculous greeting that was, then answered back, “Who the hell are you?”

I cleared my suddenly dry throat. “Uh, I’m…Daisy.”

“Daisy what?”

“Moses.”

“Bullshit.”

“Excuse me?”

“Daisy Moses was the granny’s name on The Beverly Hillbillies.”

I was impressed. He knew his classic TV.

“Okay, fine. I’m not Daisy.”

“Obviously.”

“But it’s not important who I am. It’s important what I can do for you.”

He narrowed his eyes. “And that would be?’

“Look, I…have a friend…who works for a major publication here in Los Angeles.”

“Great, a fucking reporter.” He pulled the phone away from his ear and moved to get up.

“Wait!” I shouted, banging on the glass.

“Don’t touch the glass!” the guard behind me boomed, prompting both the gum-less brother and Joaquin’s new lover to glance my way.

“Sorry,” I said, holding both hands up.

But, luckily, it had gotten Pines’s attention, too. He sat back down, putting the receiver to his ear again.