Dream Tunnel Read Free

finger and her thumb.
    Tonya squealed.
    Her posse stepped back in horror.
    Tonya’s left shoulder went up, as though she was attempting to raise her fist and hit Conroe. But her arm just hung there at her side, limp.
    Tonya’s knees buckled. “Please let go of me.”
    Conroe released her, and she fell to the floor.
    Tonya’s new friends deserted her and went back to their table.
    Nurse Olive stormed up. “What’s going on here? Are you okay, Tonya?”
    Tonya stood up, rubbing her nose and checking the functionality of her arms. “I’m fine.” She walked away.
    Nurse Olive glared at Conroe. “You’re coming with me, young lady.”
    Conroe followed her out of the cafeteria, looking back at Crane, shrugging.
    He smiled at her.

 
     
     
     
     
     
    5
     
    A t 10:45 p.m., Nurse Olive came to Conroe’s room and gave her a sleeping pill. “Did you enjoy Solitary?”
    “No, ma’am. Eight hours is a long time in that place.”
    “That’s the punishment for a first offense. Next time you’ll get three days—like your roommate did.” She nodded to Martha’s empty bed.
    Conroe had explained to Nurse Olive that she was not the one who started the fight in the cafeteria—although it wasn’t much of a fight since Tonya never landed a punch. She placed the sleeping pill under her tongue and drank the water.
    “Goodnight.” Nurse Olive left.
    Conroe went into the bathroom, spit the pill into the toilet, and flushed.
    She turned out her lights just before the eleven o’clock Lights Out and lay in bed fully dressed, waiting. She knew it was too soon to make her move. The original plan called for waiting a few days to let things develop naturally. Hasty actions could lead to failure. Conroe understood all of the rational arguments for a slow and steady pace. But any time reason and emotion clashed, Conroe went with her gut.
    She slipped out of her room and walked down the long girls’ hallway. In order to get to the boys’ hallway, she would have to get past the glass-walled office where Nurse Olive sat working on a computer. Conroe waited for an opportunity.
    Ten minutes had passed when the phone in the office began to ring. Nurse Olive rolled across to the desk behind her and answered it. Her back was to the hallway. Conroe ran to the boys’ hallway, praying she had rounded the corner before Old Cracker turned back around.
    Earlier in the day she had studied the room chart on the wall in the office while waiting to be transferred to Solitary. She went to Room 157 and tapped lightly on the door.
    There was no immediate response, which was not surprising since nobody would be expecting a visitor after Lights Out.
    She tapped again—this time rhythmically.
    Crane cracked the door. “What are you doing here?”
    “Please let me in.”
    He opened the door, and she rushed inside.
    “This is crazy,” he said. “You’re gonna get both of us thrown into Solitary for a week.”
    With the lights off, her vision aided only by the moonlight, she could barely see him. “Not if we’re quiet. Believe me, I don’t want to go to Solitary any more than you do. I spent eight hours in there today.”
    “Because of your fight with that Tonya girl?”
    “Yeah.”
    “That was cool—the way you handled her.”
    “Thanks.”
    “How did you do that?”
    “I’ll explain later. Were you awake when I knocked?”
    “Yeah. I don’t sleep much,” he replied.
    “Then why don’t you take your sleeping pill?”
    “Because I want to be able to wake up—and I don’t think I could if I took one of those pills. If there was a fire, I’d sleep right through it and die.”
    “I hadn’t thought of that.”
    “Apparently, you didn’t take yours either,” he observed.
    “I like to be in control. And besides, I have my own method for getting to sleep.”
    “Some more of that magic like you used on Tonya?”
    “Sort of, yeah—but it takes two,” she said. “I need a partner.”
    Even in the soft glow of the moonlight,