Chapter 5

“Do you mean to tell me I’m expected to go out there in this hellish cold to chop down trees for man I don’t even care for?”

Joe looked at Dubois’s hands, his white neck, his clean red hair. “What’d you do for a living out there?”

“I’m a…I was a student. I was set up. I’m not supposed to be in here.” He looked out the bars again. “It’s all a sordid mistake. A plot for revenge.”

Joe half believed him. It didn’t really matter if Dubois was lying or not. Whatever he needed to tell himself to get through his first night in the Icebox was fine by him.

“Why are you in here?” Dubois asked. “Did you murder someone?”

“No, but I wanted to. I was drunk and he was lucky.”

“Will they ever release you from here?”

“Yeah, in four years.” He’d be twenty-five by then. The world would be a different place and his mother would be broken down from the washing and ironing she did for other people. People like Dubois. “How long d’you get?” Joe asked him anyway, though he knew he shouldn’t care.