Lady Behind The Wall

"If we click, you should be prepared to deal with public displays of affection because I'm very direct about what I need. There's a wild, spontaneous, sexual side of me I'm anxious to share with you. I also have a pair of 38Ds that are eager for a man's touch. Tell me what you'd do with them if you had them to play with! I know what sensuality is and I revel in it. Do you think you can handle me?

"I have a lot of love to give. My letters will be open and honest. If you are interested in me, please tell me about yourself. Not just the usual things like height, weight and looks. I want to know the things that are important to you. What are you looking for in a friend, a woman and a lover? What do you do for fun? What is your favorite food? Do you like sports? If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go and why? What about your family? Anything you'd like to share with me.

"There is nothing left for me in Texas. I 'm open to relocating. I'm very unattached.

"If you would be so kind, please enclose a photo so I can see what you look like (you can send up to ten at a time), but not Polaroids; they aren't allowed. A book of stamps would speed my reply to you.

"If you are serious about having a lifetime of devotion and love through the good times and the bad, of unconditional acceptance and support, don't waste any more time. Take a deep breath, put pen to paper or put your fingers on the keyboard and tell me about you. Don't worry about that first letter; it's only an icebreaker. We can start there and see what the future holds for us. Hope to hear from you soon."

Her ad carried an 'additional photos' icon, which I clicked. There were five additional pictures. One showed her standing on the porch of a rustic cabin in a pair of daisy dukes and a man's shirt tied under those spectacular boobs, leaning on the rail with her hair in a ponytail, laughing. The next one showed her nude in a swimming pool, hair floating loose in the water, a nymph out of folklore. Another had obviously been snapped at a party. She was seated at a table, a little drunk, leaning back in her chair with a drink in hand and her dress open almost to the navel, exposing a half cup brassiere with her tits spilling out of it down to the nipples. In another, obviously a publicity shot, she was done up as a showgirl, high cut, tight fitting sequined bodysuit covering her just enough to avoid a morals charge, with a transparent silk cloak flowing off her shoulders and ruffling in the breeze as she stood hipshot on impossibly high heels wearing a feather and pearl headdress that made her look eight feet tall. The last photo was a nude study, one knee figleafing her as she toyed with a kitten lying on her breasts while reclining on a pile of pillows. Apparently innocent, it was one of the most erotic pictures I had ever seen.

I reluctantly backed out of Deirdre's listing and went on to my other two finalists.

Lulu was a plush blonde with a body built for sin and according to her listing, a high sex drive that amounted to perpetual horniness. The three pictures she included made it clear she was an honors student in the School of Sexual Pleasure. However, none of the pictures was less than four years old. Rechecking her records raised questions about the disparity between the weight and height she claimed and what the official record stated, and not just a matter of an inch or a few pounds either. Her listing was silent on what she had done to earn her sentence, but the inmate records site told me this was her third trip through the system, and she wouldn't even be up for parole for another three years on the assault charge that had landed her behind bars. Not a good candidate despite her looks and frank sexuality, assuming the photos were actually of her and not of someone else.

Maria was a cute little thing, five foot two, petite and well proportioned, with big boobs, bedroom eyes, a stated preference for high heels, leather and spankings, and a come-closer-you-interesting-man look on her face. Only a state away, she said she would be out in less than six months. But on rereading her listing carefully I noticed that she was evasive, providing no information on how many children, if any, she had. I reflected that this lack of honesty might extend to other things as well. Back to the prisoner records website I went in search of further information. Sure enough, there it was. Maria had three kids by three different fathers, all living with their grandmothers. She had been divorced twice. The information on her activities in prison was not reassuring. It was all sports and social activities, with no sign of self-improvement classes, correspondence courses or anything that might help her turn her life around once she got out. Bottom line was that she didn't seem all that stable and looked to be husband-hunting with an eye toward sitting at home all day and partying all night, preferably without kids in the picture. She lacked the kind of integrity and loyalty I was looking for. Scratch her off the list.

Very well, then; Deirdre it would be. I returned to her page and clicked the Order button, then went to Checkout to complete the transaction.

The checkout page stated that Deirdre's information had been ordered once before. Did I wish to proceed?

I thought about it. On the other sites, when I had looked at the general catalog pages I had noticed boxes where the thumbnails should have been, with either "Sorry, She's Taken" or "Removed on [date]." I didn't know if ladiesbehindthewalls.com followed the same practice, given that I'd gone straight to the search engine, but it seemed likely. I used the mouse to complete the transaction, noting with approval that the site accepted PayPal and used it to send the payment.

The next screen stated the information I had purchased would be sent to me within 48 hours. I was suddenly eager to see what might come of this. Illogical; but as Mr. Spock once observed, sometimes wanting is actually better than having.

I checked my email before I went to work next morning. Nothing. I got the same result when I came home that night and again in the morning. As I worked that day, I wondered at odd moments if maybe the whole thing was a scam. Back home, I showered and changed, made dinner and cleaned up, and dealt with the monthly bills before I faced my fear and switched on the computer to check my emails again.

There was an email from ladiesbehindthewalls.com in the in-box. There it was: all the information I needed to contact Deirdre. I opened the word processor, thought for a minute and started to write.

"Dear Deirdre:

"I got your name and address through the ladiesbehindthewalls.com website. Your entry intrigued me, as did your pictures, so I am writing to you. It feels as though I already know you a little bit, so I'll start by telling you something about myself. As you said, the first letter is only an icebreaker. So let's break some ice.

"My name is John Middleton. I'm 40 years old, a college graduate and a licensed master plumber. I own and operate a small plumbing company a couple of states away, which ought to suit you if you really want to get out of the Lone Star State. JM Plumbing & Heating isn't the biggest dog on our block, but I'm not a one man show, either. We do both commercial and residential plumbing and HVAC, split about 60 – 40 at the moment if you count the subcontract from Marion & Pickens LLC for a new estatelet housing project they're building as commercial.

"Plumbing isn't a glamour job. It's not being a lawyer in a three piece suit arguing cases before a judge, nor a doctor saving lives in the emergency room, nor being a stockbroker and making big wads of money by shuffling paper from hither to yon. But its honest work and my men and I are good at it. There is one good thing about it: we don't need to worry about our jobs getting outsourced to India or China or some other place where the capitalists don't pay the workers a living wage. As a matter of fact, the biggest thing we have to worry about is the home handyman with delusions of adequacy who tackles his own remodeling job. The way that works out, about seven times out of ten we get a frantic call from his wife pleading for us to send someone right away because darling hubby is flooding out the house, so we make more money from the job than we would have if they'd just come to us in the first place!

"As far as hobbies and such go, I like to hunt and fish. I keep a bass boat on a trailer at the shop and during the season I'll camp out in some remote spot where they're biting, or at least I hope they are. I'm not one of those trophy addicts but I do enjoy the tussle with a fighting largemouth on light to medium gear, and they taste real good pan-fried in lemon butter with mushrooms. Some of the folks I grew up with own farms, and if they have a varmint problem they call me because I hit what I point at, not their livestock. In return for keeping the varmint population down, they let me hunt over the fields and the borderlands in season. It's a rare year I don't manage to take enough game to keep the freezers fully stocked with venison, pheasant, quail and goose; wild turkey, too. If I can't use what I shoot, I give it (cleaned and dressed, of course) to the local food pantry. Hunting must not be done solely for pleasure, in my opinion. If you aren't going to eat it or wear it, don't shoot it, is my motto.

"That tells you a little about me. But you asked what I was looking for in a woman. Let me give you an idea, and then you can decide if you want to initiate a correspondence with me.

"I'm looking for a woman who is willing to devote herself to me, to make our happiness her top priority. I'm not looking for Suzy Homemaker, who deals with the house and entertaining and nothing else. She has to have a brain in her head and not be afraid to use it, and mustn't be afraid to work outside the home. Like you, I don't need any players or hustle artists in my life. I want a woman who can pull her own weight.

"She will have to be prepared to put up with a somewhat limited social life because of my personality. I'm something of a solitary sort. You'll have to get to know me better before we get into that, however. She also must either like the outdoors, learn to like the outdoors, or be willing to be a hunting and fishing widow during the seasons. We could talk about that.

"I'd prefer her to be experienced in the bedroom and open to anything we agree to try. As you said, those are indeed a nice pair of 38Ds and there are many things I can imagine doing with them, but I'm not going to be more specific until I know A) to what extent the institution you're in censors your mail and B) whether you like explicit mail or not, and C) how explicit you'd care for me to be. Answer those questions and I'll respond appropriately.

"In short, I'm looking for someone who can walk side by side with me into the sunset with our fingers intertwined, not two steps behind me with her head lowered at the end of a leash – unless she gets off on that sort of thing. Anything more detailed than that depends on what you say.

"I'm ready to try and make a new start in the personal relationship department. Are you? Meanwhile, knowing that there's a lag in communications between here and there, I will write a couple of times a week until and unless you tell me to cease and desist. I look forward to your reply.

"John."

I went back to the beginning and reread it. I added a postscript.

"PS: Enclosed please find a couple of pictures and a book of stamps."

I went and rummaged in the desk I used for paying the bills and found the book of stamps I keep as backup to the 100 stamp rolls I buy at the post office. It was still sealed. In the right hand drawer I dug out a box of photos and looked through it. They were mostly digital prints taken either at company parties and cookouts or leftover shots from promotional literature I'd had made up for homeowners thinking about remodeling. I selected one that showed me standing by the (then) latest addition to the company fleet and a candid my office manager had snapped of me futzing around at the grille that showed a bit of the formal garden Mother had put in and a corner of the swimming pool. I reasoned Deirdre might like to see the flowers. On reflection, I tossed in one of those record shots they take when you land a big ocean fish and then sell you as a memento of the occasion. I'd spent a week last summer at Boothbay Harbor chasing tuna, billfish and sharks. This tuna had been big enough to pay for the day's charter after I sold it to a local restaurant. It also was the closest thing to a Charles Atlas-type shot I had, being that I was wearing just a tan, swim trunks and a pair of boat shoes. Deirdre might as well get some idea of the kind of physical shape I was in.

On my way to the shop next morning, I pulled into the post office. I got out and walked over to the mailbox. The envelope was still unsealed and I thumbed through it again, peeking to make sure the photos and the book of stamps were all in there. I licked the envelope and sealed it, but I still couldn't bring myself to mail it. I just stood there, tapping the letter indecisively against my palm. Did I really want to do this? Was it the right thing? Was I being an idiot? What would happen if she told me to fuck off? Then I heard an ad on the radio over the idling motor:

"You can't win it if you aren't in it!"

"What's the worst thing that can happen? She says, 'No thanks.' So what if she does? Give it a try, you gutless wonder!" I said to myself. Suiting deed to word, I tipped the envelope into the slot and watched it disappear.

"And so the game begins," I said aloud.

True to my word, I sent off a short note or a postcard every other day, writing of inconsequentialities mostly. What I wrote were the sort of things that a dedicated diarist might scribble in the daily record of his or her passage through life, of no possible interest to anybody except perhaps a biographer; yet according to the FAQ pages of all three of the women inmate websites I'd found, this sort of trivia was exactly what these women missed the most. When I wrote a postcard, I always made sure it was a colorful one with flowers or brightly colored birds, both North American and tropical. Research told me that Deirdre's lockup was up in the Panhandle, home of the blue norther and the summer scorcher, not what you'd call the most colorful place in the world. The tones tended to sand, brown and at best dark green. Institutions as a group tend toward drab, boring shades. They may cost the least and be easiest to keep clean, but lord! do they suck the spirit out of those forced to be there.

*****

Deirdre swung down from the Department of Corrections bus, wiping sweat from her forehead with a manicured hand. She and her seven student beauticians had spent the day in a nursing home washing and setting, doing perms and dye jobs, and styling the hair of sixty-plus elderly ladies. It was good for morale on both sides and good practice for the cons that were looking to start new lives with a saleable skill when they were released. Neatly folding the white coats that they wore over the civvies they were permitted, the group ambled from the front of the Administration Building toward their barracks. Camp Jackson had been an Army Air Force gunnery training school and she reflected that the place hadn't been changed much by its reincarnation as an honor camp. The inmates still wore khaki, things still ran to bugle calls, and you still couldn't wear civilian clothes except under special conditions. Get right down to it, she thought, the biggest difference is that back then it was a stag camp and today it's a hen house.

She had just finished changing back into khakis when Assembly sounded over the PA. Hastily tying her shoes, she took her place in line in front of the barracks for roll call. It was a technical point, but the camp administration took pride in its 'humanization of the prison experience.' They didn't have 'head counts' here, they had roll calls, and then only three a day; and at that the lights-out count was on the honor system.

Roll call was pro forma. Sergeant Jo Carter, known behind her back as Jarhead because of her name, one hitch as a Marine and her rank's coincidence with Frank Sutton's character fromGomer Pyle, USMC, had already swept the ranks with her eyes and found everyone present. After the verbal count and the military-style report to the watch commander standing at the end of the company street, she about-faced and dug into the mailbag hanging from her shoulder.

"Mail Call! Pass 'em along if they're not for you! Moorhead ... Kelly ... Martin ... Smith ... O'Connor ... Little Fox ... Talliferro..."

To her great surprise, Deirdre found herself holding a letter with a return address she didn't recognize. Her heart sped up. Mechanically she passed two more letters back to the last rank.

"Barracks Chief, take the formation," ordered Carter when the last letter had been distributed. "Dinner in five minutes. Carry on!"

Ronelle Talliferro, a lanky black woman who like Deirdre was doing a misdemeanor deuce for DUI and who was grimly determined to go straight, right-faced the platoon and calling cadence, marched them to the dining hall. She fell into line behind Deirdre as they moved down the steam tables to collect their food and sat next to her at the table.

"So who's writing you, Dee-Dee? A fan from the old days?"

Deirdre grinned at her. Talliferro was one of the few women in the barracks who got mail regularly and shared the good parts with the others, and she was the next bunk to Deirdre's. The two had made friends because of their common military-brat background despite their racial difference, something that was not as usual as the authorities wanted the public to believe.

"Let me open it and see." She tore the envelope open with a finger and was surprised to see three photographs and a book of stamps fall out. She hastily scanned the letter.

"It's a guy who got my address from that website you had me send my name to. He's a plumber with his own business. He likes the outdoors. Seems a little formal. Maybe he's shy."

"Well, he's not bad-looking," Ronnie said, picking up a photo of a man in better than decent shape standing next to a huge fish. "Nice pecs. Strong arms and legs. You know, Dee, if you decide not to keep him, throw him my way. He looks like he knows what it's about."

"Don't be greedy," chided Deirdre. "I'll write him back tonight and we'll see what happens." She retrieved the picture, tucked pictures, stamps and letter neatly back into their envelope, and resumed eating.

*****

Ten days after mailing my letter to Deirdre, I arrived home to find a plain white envelope with a TDCJ Camp Jackson return address in the mailbox. I was surprised at the shiver that ran down my spine at the sight of it. Tossing the rest of the mail onto my bill-paying desk, I set the letter on the table beside my easy chair before I went to wash up. Showered and in clean casual clothes, I poured myself a drink before I took out my pocketknife and slit the envelope open.

"Dear John:

("No, I'm not blowing you off! But that's the traditional way the letter from the girl who is ending the relationship is always referred to in the Army. Do you have a nickname? Maybe I should give you one. Let me think on it.)

"I was thrilled when your letter arrived today. It's been weeks since I last received mail, and that one was from my lawyer. Not the same at all. Mail means so much to gals in my situation. Even though this is a minimum security camp for trusties, we don't have internet access or cell phones or any of the things I used to take for granted. Even telephone calls are restricted to just 30 minutes a week, and that is subject to being in good standing and if we are able to schedule a call. We have to get approvals for them.