Prison Friday

“Do you know Chidi?” my friend asked me, “You know, from that show The Good Place?”

“The guy who can’t decide which lead to his death?” I say

“Yeah, you’re EXACTLY like him” she says

“Hey, first off, I’m not a man” I say, “Women are better decision makers than men, so I beg to differ” I say munching on my burger.

“If you say so” she sips on her drink

I’m not indecisive. I just want to keep my options open and hope for the best. I believe I’m versatile, fluid, go with the flow. Decision making isn’t really a big deal because in the end of the day, what happens will happen. It’s easy to decide on what to have for dinner and what to drink but major decisions like taking a job up, adopting a puppy, getting married? If it’s meant to be, it will be, as Bebe Rexha would say.

Okay but like, it’s hard to everyday have the anxiety of deciding. My mother would always tell me that it’s either I choose, or life chooses for me and it’s synonymous for the easy way or the hard way. I think life’s choices is not really the hard way, sometimes, it’s better.

I drive to work today with my radio on and the radio DJ just asked, “What do you value the most in life?” It got me questioning too while I parked and head to my desk. What do I value the most? I love my parents, but someday, they’re bound to leave me. My boyfriend, Paul, is well, still uncertain due to how young our relationship is. Aha! I know. I value my freedom. I don’t like being controlled, but I want to be guided. I don’t want my options limited. I love being free.

It’s like sailing off without a map. I depend on the tide; the end of my journey is uncertain. That’s what makes life so interesting because you never know what’s coming. The people who plan their life out end up being tired and anxious all the time. When they don’t get their expected outcome, they beat themselves up and struggle to jump back up.

Today is me and Paul’s second anniversary and I’m meeting him. I drive again and retouch my makeup. I’m excited to see him, he said we will do something exciting tonight. I look around me and these inspirational billboards are up. No one will get inspired in those unless you’re desperate or dying. I get to his place and he’s well dressed. I feel a little bit underdressed.  

“Are you ready?” he asks

“Ready for what?” I say, “You look rather dashing, sire” I do a curtsy

“Why thank you, lady” he says and brings me in his place. He hands me an outfit similar to his. “We’re going hunting”

“Hunting?” I ask, “For what? Deer? Moose?”

“Humans” he says casually while fixing his bag.

“Paul” I say

“I’m kidding,” he chuckles, “We can do deer, if we’re lucky, we can do a tiger”

“Babe, are we going to hunt in a zoo? Why would there be tigers” I ask

“Because, we’ll be going deeper into the forests” he says and points to the back. “I brought us guns” he says casually

“What? Are you crazy?” I’m a bit alarmed.

“Don’t worry, they’re not registered to me” he says as if that’s supposed to be reassuring. “If we get caught, we can leave the gun and it’s named to someone else”

“You sure?” I ask again

“I wouldn’t put us in danger, okay?” he takes my hand and kisses it.

“Okay, I trust you” I tell

We ditch the road and proceed to drive on dirt. The sun is setting but our day has just begun. We pass by many trees until we can’t pass anymore. We needed to go by foot. He takes down the guns and carries it as we hike.

Deeper and deeper inside, we heard many rustling and branches brushing against each other. We camp out in what seems to be the middle and he sets up a small fire. He takes out one rifle and shoots out randomly. It made a loud sound and birds began to fly away.

“Wooh!” he yells right after shooting, “Warming up my rifle, baby”

“Shouldn’t you be more silent when shooting?” I say, slightly covering my ears. “It scares away animals, you know”

“Right, right” he screws on a suppressor. “That first sound is very satisfying though”

He hands me over my own rifle, and it was heavy. It would definitely leave a strain on my arm. He tells me the mechanics of the rifle, the scope, magazine, stock, and so on. I place the sling around my shoulder and aim. I take a few shots around the area, aiming on some crows in the area. I was getting a hang of it.

The night grows darker and we begin to search for targets. We come across this lake and wherever there is water, the animals are more likely to be there. We set down on one of the logs and play the waiting game.

It took around 30 minutes before we found a small deer drinking from the water. Of course the mother would be around here somewhere. I’m not inhumane to kill a deer’s child. I watch it drink water for about 10 more minutes until there were more rustling behind it. I observe it look around and it begins to call out. But then it suddenly falls to the ground.

“Gotcha!” Paul says and I am in shock.

“Paul!” I exclaim unaware.

“Shh!” he whispers, “Our first kill of the night, why are you mad?”

“It’s a child!” I whisper back, “Why would you kill a young deer?”

“They’re all the same! Come on” he says

A little over half an hour when the bigger deer goes there and finds its young lying on the ground, bleeding out on the water. It exclaims too and looks around. It tries to carry its young but it’s over.

In a swift motion, we see a tiger pounce towards the mother’s spine and breaks it. The mother dear is paralyzed and the tiger begins to have its meal. I look towards Paul and he’s aiming. His brows are in a V and his breathing is steady.

“You could’ve gotten that mother deer” he whispers to me, “could you even go faster?” his tone is kind of getting mad

“I can’t do that, not after you just killed a young” I say

“Well, there’s an adult tiger, be my guest” he says

There’s nothing losing when I kill a carnivore anymore. I take an aim. I copy what he is doing and take deep breaths. My focus is on the tiger, and I pull the trigger. The tiger bleeds out but it’s not dead. I shot its arm. I take my focus again, but I hear rustling behind me.

“Are you aware that what you’re doing here is illeg—” someone says but Paul shoots to kill!

Before I could fully turn, I see a policeman has been shot dead, his flashlight shining on his corpse. I look toward Paul and his face has fallen pale. He tries to utter something but the radio of the policeman is sounding.

“Anderson, clear?” the radio speaks and we both see the flashlight waving through the trees.

“Paul! What the hell??” I whisper

“I’m sorry! It was a reflex!” he whispers back

“We killed a man! A policeman, of all people!” I’m sweating a lot

“We need to go” he says, fixing our stuff up, “Now.”

“What are we going to do with him?” I stay low

“We leave him! What else would be the most reasonable thing to do right now?” he ducks down as the beam of light gets nearer.

“We can’t just leave him here, they’ll find out” my heart is pounding

“Besides them, we are the only ones here with a gun, we’ll be in bigger trouble, make a decision” he is pressuring me and I froze up. I can’t think straight

“Paul, wait, I…” I don’t know what to do.

“If you can’t decide right now, I’m sorry” he drops the guns beside me, and he runs away.

The other policemen shine their flashlight on my direction as their heard Paul’s footsteps run away. I stay low beside the fallen bark, which is the only thing that separates me from the dead policeman.

“Requesting all units” one says, “Officer Anderson is down, gun shot to the chest, no pulse” I can hear them rustling around me. I can see the light just above my bark.

“Any suspects?” the other one says. “Did you see anyone? Anything?”

“Those deer over there and that injured tiger look like they were shot too.” Another one says

I hear their footsteps move farther and towards the deer. I’m getting ready for my escape but they saw the rifles on the ground, they pick it up and unknowingly, it was still strapped to me. They pull it up and I was pulled with it.

“Over here!” he yells. I put my hands up in surrender. It’s over for me. They rush back.

“Did you kill Anderson?!” the other yells. “Did you?!” he aims his gun at me

“It wasn’t me…” I say, almost the words choking me

“Did you kill this officer!” more of them arrive

“I didn’t, sir!” I say with all my strength.

“Bullshit!” the cop cars arrive, and I was pinned down on the hood. “You’re the only one here and the gun was still attached to you!” they cuff me

“I was with someone…” I say breathless, “I can witness…”

No one listened to me. They shove me in their car and treat me like I’m some dirty, nonhuman object. They held me so tightly my arms are numb. They drive once more towards the road and I saw the police interviewing Paul and he already has a different set of clothes. The car stopped there and the cop driving rolled down the window on my left side.

“Can you identify her?” the policeman says but I couldn’t help myself. I tried to pounce out, tapping on the door and window but I couldn’t. I was screaming and cursing at Paul and this jerk of a police closed the window.

“Yes, officer, it’s her. I saw her carrying a huge duffel bag, in this all black suit, it seemed suspicious” he tells them and I’m furious. He’s lying!

As we drove off, I see him mouth sorry. It’s useless at this point, asshole. I’m going to prison. I’m being accused of something I didn’t do. It was supposed to just be a simple TGI Fridays for this anniversary, why did it become Prison Friday?