I was in a prison on a perilous cliff. I have my own little quarter, pictures of flowers, and plants on the wall, in front of my creaking wooden desk. Two steps to the right is my folding bed. No sheets, but in this place I don't really need them anyway. It's even hotter than Faust over here.

The exit and entrance of my cell is a solitary steel door with rusty metal fortifications and rivets the size of an egg.

7 paces directly from the door is the only window in this place, I should be happy there even is one. Not to mention the view.

The view lights up the atmosphere, I can sapphire color ocean changes the flow of waves with the season.

Distant islands by the horizon, a single palm tree on a reef directly under my window, a patrol speedboat with guards fishing on them on every sunset, when the chances of catching yellowtail snappers or Barracudas are better.

It's a peaceful sight, I have been staring at it for almost a year now. Thankfully, I haven't got sick of it yet.

I didn't bother bribing the guards, I don't really need favors from them in here.

One of the prisoners used his shitty Spanish to hint that he could bring me some grass or a pipe even newspapers while I was in the yard. When I ask him about a burned phone he laughs, next time in the shower the guy picks the spot next to me.

Under the sound of inconsistent water splashes and men shouting in some foreign language which I doubt they invented themselves. He told me he could theoretically get it in his equally crappy English, but it's going to cost me.

I used six different languages to tell him I'll cut his dick off if he tries anything.

Not sure if he gets it, since he just carries on talking about how my 'cousin's brother' will visit me next Thursday, and he's going to be conveniently wearing the exact same shoes that I'm wearing now. And since he's my relative, I can meet him in the big room instead of talking behind iron-bared windows.

Guessed he run out of favors or got caught before, the guards are on him 24/7 lately.

I agreed, but just as he was leaving, I noticed a tattoo of female genitalia under his armpit, on his ribs.

The guy was positively in a Russian prison before, and he’s a thief.

It doesn't really bother me. Everyone was a thief once or twice, just happen to steal from the wrong guy and got caught. But it did make me rethink how to approach him in the future. If needed.

Thursday came. I met my 'cousin' in the open guest room. An inmate is staring at the table while a middle-aged woman glares at him with watery eyes, a woman in one piece is talking about how her shop's doing this season while the plump of her pregnant belly slowly deflated while her hands move under the table every time guards moves away their sight. I sat down in front of the only Asian face in this room except me.

He got into the action immediately, bullshiting a bunch of Japanese words while kicking off his sneakers under the table. I do the same while returning him with Chinese since I can make out more words that way.

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Pretending was like second nature of me. I laugh, squint, twitch the corner of my lips, and even made my eyes red while nodding to his gibberishes.

We keep this going for another ten minutes after we traded shoes under the table. He hugged me before going through the security check.

The guy with a vagina tattoo came walking by my side with his hand on my shoulder before I get back to my block. Gave me a few instructions about how to get his cargo out of it. Patted my shoulder as I walk back to my cell.

It was meth, unsurprisingly. Along with some needles that seems more suitable for knitting than whatever the fuck he's about to use it for. And of course, I don't give a fuck.

I spend an hour getting all the stuff in the layers of leather uppers. At least he's not stupid enough to hide it in the sole or insole, where the guards check first. And would make me look like I'm wearing a flip-flop afterward.

I hid the stuff in the tube of the front legs, the place was supposed to be completely sealed but the last inmate in this cell did god knows what to it and opened the bottom, there are even tape marks inside them.

The motherfucker definitely knew the guard would do a surprise inspection on cells the second Thursday of cardinal months, and I would not rat him out even if I got caught. There's a code for this kind of thing, you just don't talk to the 'authorities'. You deal with whoever fucked you over after you got out of the box and got three more years on top of whatever you were on.

The guards came as expected, but since I'm a model prisoner in their eyes for the past 10 months. (some guy tried to 'confiscate' my dessert at the dining hall, he got to breathe fresh air outside for about two hours before he was declared clinically dead)

So they didn't bother me, one of them check the back of my pictures and the inside of my mattress, the other tried to see if I'm writing some sort of code on my letters but gave up when he realized he can't understand English.

The next time I'm in the yard the guy came straight at me with the biggiest smile I've seen since I got in. He even got two ripped fuckers with him to make sure I kept my word and didn't shoot all the batch into my vein last night, the idea did came over my mind. But the side effects of those shit were too obvious, and I'm not planning to extend my stay in this place.

I gave him the stuff while I was 'spotting' for him in the gym area.

He was good at this, twiddling his fingers for a single second and he knew I didn't cut his stuff short.

Then came the exact scenarios I foresee the moment I saw his tattoo. The cocksucker act like he doesn't know me when I ask for the phone.

Usually, this kind of scenario would never happen in Faust of my reputation and the fact that I've been a merc for more than a decade and am still alive. But I'm not in Faust, and I've acted like a model fucking inmate ever since I got in, this guy doesn't know better.

So a few days later, I bribe the guard on duty that night because I know he understood Spanish better than anyone, I gave him all the cigarettes, coins, and bills of six different nationalities I won in card games on movie nights with some cellmates who doesn't like "the sound of music" either.

I ask him to ignore some whimpering at night on the second floor of block C and take his time on the first floor's morning inspection.

That night, I came with nothing but my bare hands. But it's plenty enough. The timing where inmates could moves around with freedom between their cells I'm not going to specify what I did that night. Let's just say I should've paid the guard's double for all the whimpers that night from a certain place on second floor, cell 40152.

The next day, the guy with a vagina tattoo was walking in a very strange manner. And for the first time, he was wearing the prison-issued jacket.

A week or two later, he spot me in the gym area. And gave me a flip phone.

Took a bit longer than expected, but it felt damn good when I get to talk without worrying about getting shanked or bugged while talking.

Lying on the squeaky folding bed, my fingers move on their own as I dial her numbers, at the sixth digit do I realized what I was doing, but I continued.

Steady, almost rhythmic beeping came as my heart hardened and sinks, like a peddle for stone skipping. As far as it goes, tip toeing on its fate. It will eventually of the lake in the end like anything else.

"The number you dialed is not in service... El número marcado es incorrecto o se encuentra fuera de servicio......"

The peddle reached lakebed.

I'm in an undisclosed prison somewhere at the Caribbean, on a cell overlooking a gorgeous view of distant boundaries between bleeding sky of twilight and the shining sea of cerulean.

And my mind still decided to drift back to the same place.