Jenni Fagan - The Panopticon

‘I drove it intae the wall both times.’

‘Something was different the second time, Miss Hendricks?’

She raises her eyebrows, stops, like she’s asking a pub-quiz question. The other three panel members look to see what I’m gonnae say.

‘The second time it was on fire,’ I respond after a minute.

‘Correct.’

Brilliant. A correct answer. What do I win? The woman’s running her eye up and down the charges again, looking for something. I hate. This chair. Their faces. That shite gold clock on the wall.

What I don’t get is this: if they’re gonnae lock me up, they should just do it. This pissing around is stupid. She knows I’m accused of it anyway. I keep thinking about that morning, near Love Lane. I was going down by the bus stop, totally fucked, had been out all night and I saw something; it’s been niggling and niggling at me, and you know what, I can see it, I fucking can — it was a squirrel. It was a fucking squirrel, half-run-over in the middle of the road, and the morning commuters were driving down from the roundabout and they’d hit it again, but I walked out into the middle of the road and stuck my hand up to stop them. I was already high as fuck. I mind floating down the road in front of the cars, and none of them could get by me, cos it was that narrow bit of road near the bridge.

‘And you have just been placed in the Panopticon, Miss Hendricks, is that right?’

‘Uh-huh.’

The squirrel wasnae dead. Cars were beeping at me like fuck as I scooped it up, walked over to the green gate and sat down with it in my lap. I cannae believe I couldnae mind that squirrel. I took my cardigan off, and scooped it up off the road. Cradled it like a wee baby. I folded it up right cosy, then I walked up the woods. The cars were still beeping at me as they drove away. I knew I’d remember that day, I knew I’d remember something.

‘Yes, Anais moved in a few days ago and is settling in well,’ Angus verifies.

‘Really?’

‘Yes, she has made several friends already, and she has volunteered to take part in the therapeutic arts group.’

What a liar.

‘Miss Hendricks was placed in the Panopticon for the suspected grievous bodily harm of a police officer, is that correct?’

The squirrel wasnae dead. It must have been about 8 a.m., so the drivers in the cars were all pissed off, beeping, trying to get to the motorway for work. I sat down on the wall and ignored them, and I opened up the cardigan to check that the squirrel was okay.

‘Anais’s not been charged for that,’ Angus snaps.

The woman chairing the panel looks over her notes. ‘Anais has been detained and questioned — is that correct, Mr Everlen?’

‘That has no relevance tae our appearance today.’

‘Really? You have been detained and questioned for the suspected grievous bodily harm of a police officer who is now in an acute coma, is that right, Anais? I think that is exceptionally relevant. Is that why you are in the Panopticon without permission to return to school — while the police department complete their investigation?’

Her mind’s made up.

If I was on death-row — just me and a dead squirrel that couldnae vouch for me — I’d ask for three last things.

First: to fly.

Second: to achieve something.

Third: to look my real mum, or dad, or granda in the eyes, so I’d know the experiment werenae really what made me.

Imagine knowing that you came from people with hearts and souls? That Chairwoman’s uptight; she doesnae like me, she cannae stand me actually, I bet she’s never loosened up in her life.

‘Do you have anything to say about the case, Miss Hendricks?’

Angus sticks his hand out. ‘This goes completely against all protocol,’ he says.

‘Miss Hendricks?’

‘No.’ Angus holds his hand up. ‘Anais is not here to answer questions about any other cases today. I’m not having this.’

The Chairwoman smiles tightly at him. She looks at me. I bet she’s never had a threesome. Me and Jay had a threesome once, we couldnae get right intae it, though; well, I couldnae, he could. I’d thought it would be like the best sex ever, but it wasnae really. It was better after, when I thought about it and made it up in my head.

The Chairwoman settles a sheaf of papers back down and sighs. I bet if she saw that squirrel she’d have run it right over.

‘Miss Hendricks, I have seen you here more times than I can count. In fact, if there was a place available for you in a secure unit today, we would have you put there right now.’

‘You cannae use an unproven case to affect this one!’

‘I hope you are not questioning my professionalism, Mr Everlen?’

‘If you continue to use an unproven case that should not even be mentioned here, then yes, I will — officially, if necessary.’

‘You will be tagged tomorrow morning, Anais, at your local police station. And I’m putting you on a curfew pending further review of your charges. Do you have anything to say?’

Aye. Aye, I do. It’s this: here is what you don’t know — I’d lay down and die for someone I loved; I’d fuck up anyone who abused a kid, or messed with an old person. Sometimes I deal, or I trash things, or I get in fights, but I am honest as fuck and you’ll never understand that. I’ve read books you’ll never look at, danced to music you couldnae appreciate, and I’ve more class, guts and soul in my wee finger than you will ever, ever have in your entire, miserable fucking life. I wonder if I should tell them about the squirrel?

‘Do you have anything to say, Anais?’ she asks again.

Paris.

Paris it is.

Paris and its cobbled streets, and a beautiful mother who wears headscarfs and big Jackie O sunglasses and drives barefoot without a seatbelt on. She’s a burlesque star. Or a brain surgeon. She’s let me drink wine since I was seven. I never get drunk. Just mellow. She reads me poetry and we bake fairy cakes.

‘We are aware that the Panopticon has a secure wing opening soon?’ she says to Angus.

Maybe a mansion. Maybe a dad who is in government. Maybe he has a mistress, but probably not, because the headscarf mother is so beautiful he is madly in love with her, like every day.

The Chairwoman stares. Fuck off, cunt-pus. Your mind is made up, and I’ve got absolutely fuck-all to say. I’ve so much nothing to say that I can feel my throat closing up. It happens like that sometimes. Once when I was four I stopped speaking for six weeks. They said it was a protest but it wasnae.

‘It is my belief that you cannot stop yourself, Miss Hendricks. Everything in your record tells me that you will keep offending.’

Angus sits forward and the Chair holds her hand up and continues.

‘And, should you be tried for one single offence more, then we have a court order to have you placed in a secure unit and detained until you are eighteen years old, without review.’

‘I thought you said you would tag her first?’ Angus is standing up and his hands are a wee bit shaky. She is really pissing him off.

‘Anais will be tagged, and if she is charged again, then she will be automatically detained for a three-year minimum.’

‘For any single further offence?’

‘Yes, Mr Everlen, for any single further offence — can you sit down please? Thank you. Furthermore, she will offend again very soon; in fact it is my opinion that is exactly what’s going to happen. Miss Hendricks can’t stop herself, and nobody else appears to have any influence to stop her, either. She is clearly a danger to those around her.’

‘No, she’s not.’

‘With all due respect, Mr Everlen, I’ve known Miss Hendricks a lot longer than you have. I will personally advocate that she graduates to the maximum-security wing in the Panopticon at the earliest possible opportunity. We have pages,’ the Chairwoman brandishes a thick sheaf of papers, ‘pages and pages of charges, and this isn’t even half of them. Anais, do you want to respond?’