A Fly On The Wall

Once I was a fly on the wall, I was a prison attendant and for an hour everyday I went to the visitors area to watch them. She visited him daily with a box bearing different cut-outs of alphabets, a box he only opened when he got to his bunk, I knew because I was a fly on the wall, literally.

The weird thing was they never spoke to each other, they would look at each other with the box between them but they never reached out for one another, no hug was offered, not even a sigh. Once, I saw a smile from her lips and he replied with a twinkle in his eyes. That was the last time I saw her.

I should have known that something was up, that those cut-outs were not just alphabets, and the games he played on the wall beside his bed were not ordinary puzzles but an arrangement of some sort. However, the thought didn’t occur to me. Afterall, I was only a fly.

The day he went missing, I was the taxi driver who drove him to the airport. He paid me handsomely, and told me to keep the change. I watched as he ran into the airport, I watched him go through check-in, I watched him go through security screening and somehow he got through without a blip. Finally, he got to the last stage, customs check. I was so scared for him but I couldn’t do anything with my tiny wings. I fluttered and fluttered, buzz buzz, I got swiped at, I could only mutter sorry, I couldn’t help it. I kept waiting for the alarm to sound, for the police to come running towards him, for the declaration that he was an escapee and that he’d been found, but nothing happened. He passed through easily.

Then I saw her, she was waiting for him by the gate. For the period of time I saw her at the prison, she’d been a quiet beauty but today, there was an excitement about her, a charge. They walked towards each other, as easy as you please, and hugged for a spell. And as they stood there getting reacquainted, I fought the urge to shoo them on. This was their moment, they deserved it for all those times they held back. Her voice was like music to my ears as she laughed at his murmurs, like the sweet tinkling sound of a wind catcher. Together, they held hands and boarded the plane.

They said his name was Roy McAdams, an English teacher who taught at Montessori High where the assault took place. He’d been arrested for sexual assault and attempted murder which could not be proven as the victim, a fifteen year old girl, died before they reached the hospital. He was arrested based on the account of two high school boys who had supposedly witnessed the whole thing but couldn’t call for help until it was too late and couldn’t confront the burly man they had seen assaulting their friend.

But there was a suspicious stain on them, a tear in their uniform where none had been before, and several bleeding scratches on the hands of one of the boys. When questioned about these, they claimed to have checked on her after watching their English teacher leave the scene. One of them said they had fallen on the way and sustained scratches, and they couldn’t continue the interview because their parents arrived and took them away.

“Our boys have suffered enough trauma without you asking them to revisit it over and over again. They’ve told you who did it so why don’t you go ahead and arrest him. Leave our boys alone!”

That was the outcry of a mother to the judge on the day of the court hearing. It was also the nail in the coffin for one Mr Roy McAdams. He was sentenced to life in prison, as a predator like him shouldn’t be allowed back on the streets. That was the end of him.

After his escape, the police searched all over, went through his visitors’ list, questioned everyone that ever visited in the 8 years he spent in prison. Everyone except the woman. Apparently, she did not exist because no one had ever seen her outside of the prison, the name she’d written on the visitors’ register was false as it did not exist. But she did, for an hour, everyday for eight years, Allison Parks existed. And the boxes she gave him were later found to contain certain codes, blueprints of the prison and other information that aided his escape.

Eight years ago, Roy McAdams was found guilty for a crime he did not commit. I know because I was there; I was a fly on the wall. Today that name no longer exists, he has taken on a new name and so have I.

Once I was a fly on the wall, I was a prison attendant, I was a taxi driver, I was Allison Parks, now I am a sales attendant in a mall where my husband works as a translator.

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