A Warm Welcome

Kyle Cutsman’s hands played across the guitar, his long fingers often too clumsy and puerile were now moving with the dexterity of a spider tweaking her newest web. Sunlight- warm and gloriously radiant spilled through the iron bars: a comfort that contrasted perfectly with the dormant greens that coated the walls of his prison cell.

Footsteps clanged harshly against the metal grill walkway outside making Kyle frown slightly: the ringing clash was a discord his music did not need. But he was too relaxed to care unduly. The warmth of the spring day; the blissful sensation of his musical creativity and his impending release all had transformed him into a picture of tranquillity. If things had gone differently, Kyle could well have become a musician and right now for one short minute he wished they had. But then he stopped thinking and allowed his hands to express himself.

Six years he had been inside- six long years of roll calls and swift marches around the exercise yard. As he played Karl reflected on what lay before him: a second chance. He was determined not to waste it.

The footsteps stopped outside the steel cell door and it swung open just as Karl struck a strong interrupted cadence. A grey-suited guard followed the door into the cell accompanied directly by another: drones of authority. Karl carefully placed the instrument down. He could finish the piece some other time.

“Follow me,” said one, betraying nothing.

Slowly Karl stood, stretching out as he did so.

“Hands behind your back,” said the other guard instantly.

Karl shrugged and stepped out of his cell into the long corridor flanked by his new friends. One of the guards took point, leading him on while the other followed close behind Karl, making sure he was unable to drop back. As he walked, many of his companions in jail called out to him in rough voices.

“Hey Kyle, give ‘em hell for me out there.”

“Do yourself a favour and get you a girl now you’re out mate.”

Kyle ignored them; he had no plans to return to criminal society any time soon. He continued his slow march out of the cell blocks and through offices, administration and the like before reaching a small cubicle.

Behind the desk sat a small man, hunched and shrewd looking but utterly forgettable. Another grey-man. A faceless parole paper-jockey. He looked up as they approached.

“Kyle Jacob Cutsman?” he said, his voice a monotone.

“Correct,” responded the leading guard.

The administrator reached into a draw in his desk and withdrew some papers and a collection of stamps. Turning them over, he stamped them in various places before reaching for a new stamp and stamping it again. Taking a ball-point pen he passed them to Kyle.

“Sign next to the stamp,” he said.

Kyle did so, though as he passed the pen back to the official his eyes caught the fourth stamp. It was not like the others which showed the business address of Abertawe prison governor, but instead was a symbol- a crescent moon with no lettering. So that was why he had been released so early.

The official breathed out as he scanned the papers, “Well that seems to be in order. Escort him out.”

Kyle turned and the guards moved behind him, directing him past several offices and into entrance hall. There they left him with four other guards who stood around one of the main doors. As Kyle reached them, one of the men inserted his security card into a reader next to the doors and they swung open.

Brilliant midday sunlight blared in, nearly blinding Kyle as he stepped out. Even as he did so the doors slammed shut behind him. He took a step, then another and another towards the barbed wire gates.

The world outside once he had been released was somehow not as impressive as it had seemed when stuck in the cell. Litter bounced across the cracked grey pavement, pushed along by the soft breeze and his view of the world that he had been unleashed upon was obscured by the dull walls of urban housing estates.

Outside the gates a suited man stood, leaning casually against a vandalised bus shelter. In one hand was a rolled up newspaper, though he was not even pretending to read it. Kyle smirked and wandered over.

“Spare a few quid mate?” he asked casually.

The suited man looked up before breaking into a thin smile.

“Welcome back.”