Culligan’s eyes went wide. He ducked his head and hurried out of the room.

Chapter 23

Daffodils were erupting through the patches of old snow at the edge of the exercise yard. I was mystified that such a thing was possible. The concrete walls stored heat and created a microclimate that accelerated the growing season, I understood that much. What I couldn’t understand was who could have planted the bulbs. Valhalla was for short-timers only. Nearly everyone who was in Pod C when I first arrived was gone now. Some to trial, most to plea deals. Some to freedom, most to Bedford Hills or one of the other correctional facilities for women. Nina was gone; her lieutenant, Danita, was running the pod and organizing my evening consultations. Two of the three Malay women were gone, presumably deemed immaterial witnesses, just like Jingjing.

So whoever had dug these bulbs into the earth must have known they wouldn’t be here long enough to see them bloom. It was like the old man who plants a tree even though he’ll be long dead before it ever casts any shade. He does it for future generations. Some inmate must have planted these bulbs for the women who would come after her.

Or a bird dropped them.

THE ONE MALAY woman who remained in Valhalla was my new cellie, Bulan. Three years ago she’d traveled to a job fair in Padang. She spoke some English and hoped that might land her a good office job. Instead she landed in a shipping container with two dozen other women and girls, all bound for prostitution in the United States. Since then she’d been transported from sea to dingy sea, from one motel or pop-up massage parlor to another. Like Jingjing, she was happy to be liberated from the boss men, but unlike Jingjing, she wanted to go home. She couldn’t, though, because the government lawyers said she needed to be a witness against the boss men.

Bulan attached herself to me much the way Jingjing had. She followed me through the food line and claimed the seat beside me during meals. She hovered nearby in the exercise yard and sat at my elbow during my evening consultations. But I couldn’t warm to her the way I did with Jingjing. For every degree in temperature that rose outside, I grew a degree chillier inside. Once my only hope was not to make enemies in Valhalla. Now I tried desperately not to make friends.

Bulan couldn’t take a hint. After lights-out she lay in the bunk above mine and talked on and on into the night. She was like a twelve-year-old at a sleepover, spilling secrets in the dark. Jingjing never liked to dwell on the abuses and indignities her body had suffered, but Bulan recounted them in living color. She talked about the pimps and the johns and the other girls, she had a story for each of them, and I tuned her out when I could and clamped my pillow over my head when I couldn’t.