Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: BUG (04/06/17)
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TITLE: Big Tilly's Little Problem | Previous Challenge Entry
By Jennifer Champion
04/07/17 -
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It was a scorcher of a day. The skinny room we were in was really only large enough for eight to sit comfortably but they crammed all twelve of us in for class because our usual room was being used for an inmate assessment. We were all sweating from the heat; the jail could care less if the inmates had air conditioning. Tilly, the murderous woman that I had my eye on that day was sweating worse than the rest of us. She couldn’t stay focused on the lesson and kept darting her eyes around the room as though she was scanning it for something. It was there at the end of the class when I found out what had her attention.
It was a bug.
Tilly was a large woman. She stood at least six feet tall and had to weigh every bit two-hundred thirty pounds. She wore this constant angry scowl on her tattooed face as if to say, “Try Me. I dare you.” She had been charged and convicted of stabbing to death her own mother. She said she doesn’t remember doing it but according to the files, she had planned the horrible event out for weeks leading up to it. She had a reputation in the jail for being the meanest woman in Dorm 6C. Other inmates and guards had told me that she didn’t take anything off anyone and had been in more fights than any other woman inmate since the jail opened ten years ago. Her rap sheet is long and violent. Yet, there she stood near the back of room looking at a tiny brown bug on the floor.
No sooner than she saw it, she jumped on the table with both feet and started hollering. The other women turned and looked at her wondering what was going on and then started to laugh when they realized “Big Tilly” was scared of a little insect.
“Ya’ll better move because when the guard opens that door, I’m out of here!” Tilly was on all fours at this point and telling me to stomp on it and it kill the “monster”.
By that time all I could do was laugh and pick at her about it. Then we heard the door disengage and swing open. Tilly ran down that table faster than any Olympic Gold Medalist and about knocked over Officer Campbell. He then automatically pulled out his Taser. This sent the women into a frenzy and put me on red alert to get it calmed down quickly. Soon, more guards were called to chase Tilly as she ran down the corridor shouting about the monster she saw.
Well, I heard that a few weeks later a new woman was brought in and she had heard about the incident. She didn’t like Tilly and so every day when they were let out in the courtyard to smoke, she would find a bug and bring it back into the dorm with her. Tilly’s reputation was ruined that day in June when she saw the bug because now everyone knew about the really small thing that scared her. Sometimes, that’s all it takes for any of us; a really small thing to ruin a reputation.
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