Halfway House
As Ellen Bodine was being ushered into the transport bus, she caught a glimpse of her reflection in the sideview mirror and turned her head away. She was well aware of the passage of time, but she still imagined herself as the pretty young girl who was sentenced to death sixty-six years ago. At nineteen, she had been defiant and cocky. Now, at eighty-five, all that piss and vinegar had long since evaporated.
I've spent more than three-fourths of my life behind bars, she thought as she took a seat next to Rona Pinder, a fellow inmate who had deliberately run over her cheating husband with a car.
"This is my first time before the parole board," announced the blond, blue-eyed killer who looked like a Barbie doll come to life. "What about you?"
"I've lost count."
"I hope the board approves my parole. I want to go home while my kids are still young."
Home. The word was bandied about a lot at prison—or, to use the politically correct expression, the women's correctional facility. Home meant different things to different people. To some, it was a modest dwelling in the suburbs. To those like Rona who came from more affluent backgrounds, it meant a grand house in an upscale development. To most, it was a cheap, bug-infested tenement in a crime-ridden ghetto.
Ellen herself attached no meaning to the word. The child of a career Navy man, she grew up on naval bases, never staying in one place long enough to plant roots. At sixteen, she ran away from home. It was while living on the city streets that she made friends with a group of delinquent vagabonds. Her association with them led to a life of drugs, sex, vandalism and petty acts of crime that eventually escalated from shoplifting to murder.
As Rona chatted on aimlessly about her life before prison, the old woman's attention wandered to the view outside the bus window. It was approximately a thirty-minute ride to the courthouse, and she did not want to miss a single moment of it, for the route down the heavily traveled highway was the only glimpse she ever got of the outside world. During these biennial trips, she took notice of every new building constructed and every old one renovated or torn down.
"Here we are, ladies," the bus driver called as he pulled his vehicle up to the rear door of the courthouse.
The dozen inmates, their hands and feet shackled to prevent them from running, shuffled off the bus and into the building. From the back door, it was a short walk down the hall and then up a flight of stairs to a waiting room where they would stay until it was their turn to face the parole board.
"I'm so nervous," Rona said, again sitting next to the longest-serving female prisoner in the state's penal system. "I hope I don't say anything to screw up my chances of being released. Do you have any tips for me?"
"You've got to be kidding!" Ellen laughed. "I don't even know why I'm put through this ordeal every two years. When I walk through the door and see the families of the people we killed, I know whatever I say or do is useless. They're never going to let me out."
"You have to think positive."
"I am. I'm positive I'll die in prison."
"Rona Pinder," a court employee announced. "You're first."
"This is it," the thirty-two-year-old blonde said nervously. "Wish me luck."
"Sure thing."
The remaining inmates leafed through magazines or talked quietly among themselves as they awaited their turns. Ellen remained distant from the others, quietly staring at the hideous pattern on the cheap carpeting.
I wish it was over and I could go back on the bus, she thought, fully knowing what to expect when her name was called. SHE'LL be there. She's always there, just like her mother was.
The "she" was Roberta Duchamp, sister of Marlena Fitzroy, one of the nine victims Ellen and her so-called friends had slaughtered during that drug-induced orgy of murder and mayhem that came to be known as the Devil's Night Massacre because it had occurred on the night of October 30. Marlena, a former beauty queen and trophy wife to the city's wealthiest man, was six months pregnant was she was killed. Although Ellen had not actually had a hand in the woman's death, all five perpetrators who entered the house that night were held accountable. From the day the state commuted the prisoners' sentence from death to life, Roberta and her mother, who passed away eight years earlier, made it their mission in life to see that Marlena's killers remained behind bars.
After Rona returned from her interview, five more women took their turns. Then Ellen's name was called. She kept her head down and her eyes averted when she walked into the room. Before taking her seat in front of the board, she used her peripheral vision to scan the people assembled there. One face was absent.
As the members of the board posed their questions, the octogenarian responded as best she could. However, her mind was not on her answers.
"You seem distracted," one of her interrogators noted. "Is something wrong?"
"No. I ... Isn't someone ... missing from these proceedings?"
"You mean Roberta Duchamp? I'm afraid she died six months ago."
Given the woman's intense hatred of her, Ellen ought to have been pleased at the news. But she wasn't.
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"You are?" the head of the parole board asked with surprise.
"Yes. It should have been me."
The words had slipped out before she could stop them.
"What do you mean?"
"She and her family have gone through so much, and it was partly my fault. Mrs. Duchamp had a husband, children and grandchildren. What have I got? If there was any divine justice in this world, I'd be dead and she'd be alive. No. That's not exactly true. If there was a loving god, Marlena Fitzroy and the other eight people at her Halloween party would never have died."
Ellen could not hold back her bitterness, nor did she care if the board members saw it.
What difference does it make? They're just going to reject my request for parole anyway. Why not let them know how I really feel?
* * *
Rona Pinder was understandably upset when she heard the news. In a fit of temper, she stormed into the correctional facility's common room and overturned a snack tray.
"I don't believe it!" she screamed. "They're letting you out and keeping me inside!"
"Believe me," Ellen replied, "I'm just as surprised as you are."
"It's not fair! You're a cold-blooded murderer who carved up a pregnant woman like she was a Thanksgiving turkey, and yet you're getting paroled."
"I never touched that woman," the elderly prisoner said in her own defense.
"That's right. You were too busy butchering her husband and sister-in-law at the time."
"Look, I'm sorry your parole was rejected. If I could trade places with you, I would. But it's not my decision."
When Rona finally calmed down and left the room, Ellen's attention went back to the television set. A celebrity chef was demonstrating how to make low-fat versions of her family's favorite meals.
"Pretty soon, you're gonna be out there, cooking your own meals," a woman serving time for dealing meth teased the old woman. "Maybe when I get outta here, I'll come visit, and you can make me some low-fat fettuccini Alfredo."
"I'm afraid I'm not much of a cook."
"I'd be willing to bet anything you make would taste better than the shit they serve here."
Although Ellen laughed along with the other inmates, her good humor was a mask for the anxiety she felt. For sixty-six years, she lived according to a set routine and followed a strict schedule according to prison rules and regulations. How would she make the transition?
Three days later, wearing clothes provided by Good Will—a dress two sizes too big and ten years out of date and a pair of shoes half a size too small—she was escorted to the main gate.
"Uh-oh! We got company," the burly guard warned when she caught sight of a reporter waiting beside the guardhouse. "Someone must have tipped this guy off that you were being released today."
"Miss Bodine," the freelance journalist called, turning on his digital video recorder. "How does it feel to be a free woman after all this time?"
"I don't know yet. I'm still on this side of the fence."
"Why don't you let the poor woman be?" the guard asked.
"Are you kidding? Right now, I've got an exclusive on this story; but once word gets out that the last surviving Devil's Night killer is free at last, the paparazzi will be on her tail like she was one of the Kardashians."
The parolee remained inside the prison yard with the guard until the taxi pulled up to the gate. All the while, the reporter pointed his video camera at her and hounded her with questions about the murders and her long imprisonment. Some she answered; others she ignored. He zoomed in for a closeup of her face when the gate was opened and was surprised to see fear in her eyes.
On the way to the halfway house, Ellen sat quietly in the back seat. From time to time, she would catch the driver looking at her in the rearview mirror. The expression of revulsion on his face left little doubt that he knew the identity of his passenger.
"So, they finally let you out," he said gruffly.
The woman kept her mouth shut and her eyes on the passing cars. In the more than half a century since the Devil's Night Massacre occurred, she had gotten used to her notoriety. During that time, she was mocked, cursed at, spit upon and even physically abused. She did not delude herself into thinking that just because she was paroled all was forgiven.
With one last look at the aged killer, the man returned his full attention to the road ahead of him. Apparently, he did not think tormenting his elderly passenger worth the effort.
"Is this the place?" she asked, looking up at a towering brick building.
"Nah. It's that dilapidated house across the street."
The four-story wooden structure had probably been a nice home once, back before this particular section of the city succumbed to urban decay. Now it was the type of neighborhood where people kept their doors locked all day long and rarely ventured out of their homes after dark.
Ellen picked up her small bag of personal belongings and opened the door of the cab. As she was crossing the street, the driver called to her.
"You know, they should have executed you and your friends back in the Sixties when you butchered those poor people instead of letting the taxpayers support your asses all this time."
Again, she remained silent. The best way to deal with such people was to ignore them.
Hedda Strang, who ran the halfway house, met her at the door.
"Your room is on the third floor, at the end of the hall," the former prison guard said after going over the house's rules in great length with the new parolee. "There are some clothes and shoes in the closet, donations from various charities. You've got the rest of the day to get settled in. Tomorrow, you'll start work."
"Work?"
"Yes, work. Did you think you were going to retire? All the women in the house hold down paying jobs. You've got to earn a living and save enough money to get your own place. You can't stay here forever. Now, according to your records, you worked in the prison kitchen. Is that right?"
"Yes. I washed dishes."
"Well, now you're going to be a prep cook. Think of it as a step up: going from scrubbing pots and pans to peeling potatoes and slicing onions."
Hedda smirked, seeming to take pleasure in pointing out Ellen's lowly station in life.
Does she hate me personally or is she this nasty to everyone? the old woman wondered.
"Lunch is at noon—for those who work the second and third shifts. You're welcome to join them today. Dinner is served between the hours of six and seven. No exceptions. If you get home late, you miss out. Got that?"
"Don't worry. I'm used to living on a tight schedule."
"Good. Just follow the rules, and you shouldn't have any trouble."
* * *
Ellen Bodine was living at the halfway house for less than a week when word got around that the Devil's Night killer was a resident of the old four-story wooden structure. People began to gather outside the place, hoping to catch a glimpse of the notorious murderer. Every morning and evening, on her way to and from the bus stop, at least one person pointed a cell phone at her to take her picture. Thankfully, few found the courage to speak to her.
At the restaurant where she worked, things were worse. It only took two days for her identity to become known.
"That's her!" one of the waitresses whispered to the sous chef.
"It can't be," the cook argued. "What would she be doing working here?"
"I tell you it is. I saw her picture on the news last night."
"She's right," a third employee confirmed the waitress' claim. "Ellen Bodine got paroled. She's living in a halfway house about three miles north of here."
"Considering what she did to those poor people, I can't believe they allow her to work with knives," the server said. "What if she should go postal and start stabbing everyone?"
"All I can say," the sous chef suggested, "is that you stay out of the kitchen."
The waitress was not the only person at the restaurant to avoid the new prep cook. Everyone from the bartenders to the busboys treated her like Typhoid Mary. Only a handful of the kitchen staff spoke to her and only when their job demanded it.
By the one-month anniversary of her prison release, it seemed everyone in the neighborhood knew her. Every time she got on the bus, people changed their seats so as to avoid sitting near her. Spectators with iPhones—the "poor man's paparazzi"—still hounded her on her way to and from the bus stop. One brave soul even summoned the courage to asked if she would take a selfie with him. She reluctantly agreed, but only after he explained to her what a selfie was.
"Aren't you afraid of me?" she asked the teenager.
"Nah., I figure you're old enough to be my great-grandmother. If you were to pull a knife on me, I could easily fight you off."
She hated to admit it, even to herself, but she had it better in prison. There, among drug dealers, thieves, con artists and prostitutes, she had friends, or at least people to talk to. On the outside, not a single person had a kind word for her.
Maybe I should do something to violate my parole so that I can go back, she thought as she got off the bus one evening.
On her two-block walk back to the halfway house, she passed by a duplex where above one of the doors a sign reading WELCOME HOME, MAURY was hung.
Home. There was that word again. The only real home Ellen had ever known was the women's correctional facility. And despite being out for only one month, she was homesick.
"Hi, there," a cheerful voice called when she opened the front door of the halfway house and stepped inside.
A middle-aged woman suddenly appeared at the top of the staircase.
"You must be Ellen Bodine," she announced, her smile every bit as friendly as her voice. "My name is Verna Mancini. I'm the new girl here."
"Nice to meet you."
The grandfather's clock chimed six, which—since it ran fast—meant it was 5:57.
"It's almost time to eat," Ellen said, making her way toward the dining room. "Aren't you coming?"
"No. I don't like spaghetti and meatballs. I'll just have a Cup-a-Soup in my room."
"You don't know what you're missing. Back in prison, the food was ...."
Ellen turned around only to discover the other woman was gone and she was talking to herself.
She did not see Verna again until she went up to her third-floor room later that evening. After a hot shower, she got into bed with a crossword puzzle book. While writing down a seven-letter word meaning "sovereign head of state," she heard a soft knock on her door.
"I'm not disturbing you, am I?" the visitor asked.
"No. What do you want?"
"I'm nervous about starting my job tomorrow," Verna confessed. "I was hoping we could talk for a while."
Since there was no rule forbidding the women from socializing in their rooms, Ellen opened the door wider so that the other woman could enter. She then took a seat on the end of her bed while her visitor sat on the chair.
"How long were you in?" Ellen asked.
"Twelve years. Not nearly as long as you! You served over sixty, didn't you?"
"Sixty-six to be precise."
"Damn! How did you do it?"
"At first, I had a chip the size of the state of Texas on my shoulder. What did I care about breaking the rules? I was on death row. Then my sentence was commuted. Realizing I was in for the long haul, my attitude changed. I settled down and followed the rules. I took it day by day and hoped against hope that I would eventually get released. Year after year, I waited. I was called before the parole board every two years, only to be repeatedly rejected."
"But you're finally out."
"Yeah," Ellen said with a bitter laugh. "Talk about being careful what you wish for!"
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means that I was better off on the inside."
"I find that hard to believe."
"It's true. Out here I'm a pariah. Those people who don't hate me fear me."
"Things might improve. Look, you've already made one friend: me. I'm sure others will eventually come around."
"That may be true, but at my age, I don't have too much time ahead of me."
The following evening, when Ellen returned from the restaurant, Verna was not at the house. She naturally assumed that, like several other residents, the woman's work schedule did not allow her to be home between six and seven. The assumption was confirmed when her newfound friend knocked on her door later that night.
"How did your first day on the job go?" Ellen asked.
"It was okay. Stocking shelves at a grocery store isn't glamorous, but it's not the worst job I've ever had. You know, we can't stay here at the halfway house for the rest of our lives. Maybe if we both save some money, we could get a place together. That way we can share expenses and split the household chores."
"Sounds good to me."
"Besides, I don't think either of us is likely to get married."
"You might," Ellen said. "But I'm way too old."
"Do you ever wish you had?"
"If you asked me that question fifty years ago, I would have laughed in your face. Now ...."
Tears filled the old woman's eyes, and she turned her head away.
"I suppose all those years in prison gave you lots of time to think about how your life might have been different."
"I think about it every day," the Devil's Night killer confessed. "If I could only go back and relive my life."
An enigmatic smile spread across Verna Mancini's face, and she announced, "I can arrange that."
"Sure, you can. What are you, my fairy godmother?"
"Something like that."
"Well, it's near midnight," Ellen announced, looking at the clock beside her bed. "This Cinderella had better get some sleep if she doesn't want to turn into a pumpkin."
"You've got it wrong. It was the coach that turned into a pumpkin at midnight, not Cinderella. Oddly enough, though, the glass slippers remained. I wonder why they didn't vanish like everything else."
"I never really thought about that, but then I'm not one for fairy tales."
* * *
Before the annoying buzz of the alarm clock could penetrate her sleep, Ellen's eyes fluttered open. She immediately sensed something was not quite right. As she reached out her arm and turned on the lamp, she saw that something was definitely wrong. The hand was not her own! Confused, she pulled the covers away. Her body was no longer that of an eighty-five-year-old woman. The skin and muscle tone were that of a nineteen-year-old girl.
"Am I dreaming?" she cried.
She jumped out of bed and peered at the mirror above her dresser. A young face looked back at her.
"Verna wasn't kidding! She must really be my fairy godmother."
Once she got over the initial shock of the transformation, she considered the implications. How was she to explain this miracle to anyone else when she could not understand it herself?
I have to talk to Verna. Maybe she'll know what I should do.
Ellen, still in her pajamas, ran barefoot to her door. No sooner did she wrench it open, though, than the world as she knew it vanished; and she found herself back in the time when Lyndon Johnson sat in the Oval Office of the White House and American boys were being shipped off to fight in Vietnam.
"What the ...? Where am I?"
A long-haired, bearded young man with a bad case of body odor, wearing ripped jeans and a stained tee shirt, suddenly jumped out of a garbage dumpster and landed less than a yard away from her.
"Hey, look, Queenie," he said. "I found an entire loaf of bread, and there's not a bit of mold on it anywhere."
Queenie. No one had called her by that nickname since the Seventies.
None of this is real! I'm eighty-five, not nineteen. And Ace Stoller here died in a prison riot back in the early Nineties.
"Why are you just standing there?" Ace asked. "Why don't you help me look for something to put on this bread? Maybe we can find a near-empty jar of peanut butter or some cheese."
Ellen was about to tell him that her days of dumpster-diving were long over when three more youngsters appeared in the alleyway: two girls and a boy, all with equally long hair in need of a shampoo. They dressed (and smelled) like Ace.
"I hit the jackpot!" the girl who went by the name Poppy exclaimed, proudly showing off a full bag of Halloween candy.
"Reece's peanut butter cups? Where did you get them?" Curly, the second bearded young man, asked.
"I stole it from the drug store on the corner."
"I love these things!" Curly cried, tearing open the package and popping an entire candy bar into his mouth.
"Let's get going," Ace said. "We can eat them along the way. Aren't you coming, Queenie?"
"Where?" Ellen asked, feeling a strong sense of foreboding.
"It's Mischief Night. Have you forgotten?"
Mischief Night. October 30. In the small New Jersey town where her parents came from, it was known as Goosey Night. In Detroit and around the Great Lakes area, it went by another name: Devil's Night. It was to be a day associated with the brutal murder of nine people, including the pregnant Marlena Fitzroy, who was hosting a Halloween party at her home.
This is it! Ellen thought as she stared at the unwashed faces of her four companions. This is what I wished for: the chance to do it all over again.
"No. I don't want to go. And you shouldn't go either."
"You've got to be kidding?" Poppy laughed. "I've been looking forward to this night for weeks now."
"Yeah," Curly agreed. "Mischief Night comes only once a year. We don't want to miss it."
"Why don't we just do the usual things then, like putting toilet paper in the trees, soaping people's windows or throwing eggs at their houses and cars?"
"That's kids' stuff!" Ace cried. "I say let's crash that party Poppy told us about."
Ellen's mind screamed "no," but her body did not listen. Against her will, her feet followed in her companions' footsteps.
Maybe this is what's meant to be, she mused. Perhaps I can change what happened once we get to the party. This is my opportunity to save the lives of those nine people.
The band of unkempt hippies walked for forty minutes. When they arrived at the upscale high-rise, they took the freight elevator to the top floor where the party was being held in the penthouse.
"Here, put these on," Poppy instructed, handing out stolen Halloween masks to her friends. "They won't be able to identify us if we wear them."
Ellen felt a chill race through her body when she looked down at the plastic black cat mask.
No, don't put it on!
Again, her body ignored the brain's advice. She put the mask on her face and ran the thin strand of elastic behind her head.
"Let's go have some fun," Poppy said.
The Fitzroys were not immediately alarmed when the masked trespassers entered the apartment. Being wealthy, sociable people, they frequently had unannounced guests.
"Is that you, Daisy?" Marlena laughingly asked. "You're a day early. Trick-or-treating is tomorrow."
It was only when Poppy took a knife out of her pocket and began to slash the living room sofa that the homeowners objected to the teenagers' presence.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Gerald Fitzroy screamed. "Get out or I'm calling the police."
Poppy walked away from the couch and toward one of the dinner guests, a prominent attorney who had just emerged from the bathroom. To everyone's horror, she plunged the knife into the man's side. Marlena's piercing scream was the harbinger of the pandemonium that followed. Ace took out his own knife and stabbed a woman sitting at the end of the table.
"You three," Poppy called to her unarmed companions, "get yourselves a knife from the kitchen and come play with us."
By this time, Ellen's brain was completely divorced from her body. Her arms, legs, hands and feet had a mind and will of their own.
No! her inner voice shrieked when she saw the knife block on the counter. STOP!
Her fingers encircled the wooden handle of the stainless steel carving knife.
I don't want to do this! All those poor, innocent people!
She returned to the living room where Gerald Fitzroy was valiantly trying to defend his wife and unborn child.
No! No! NO!
She knew all too well what would happen next. She had relived this moment over and over again for more than half a century. The feel of Gerald's blood spurting up onto her face when she plunged the knife into his chest had haunted her dreams for five decades. As she felt her arm rise above her head, she tried to close her eyes. Miraculously, she was back in control. She opened her fist, and the knife slipped out of her hand. Before it could fall to the floor, Ellen found herself back in the halfway house.
"What just happened?" she asked aloud, believing herself alone in the room.
"I granted your wish," Verna Mancini said, emerging from the shadows of the dimly lit bedroom. "You wanted a second chance."
"Yes, but when I wished for it, I wanted things to be different. I wanted a normal life—a job, a husband, children."
"The same things you took away from my sister."
The woman in front of her no longer looked like a paroled convict. She rapidly aged two decades and took on the appearance of a well-to-do, elderly matron.
"Roberta Duchamp!" Ellen exclaimed. "But they told me you were dead."
"I am. While I was alive, I kept the promise I made to my mother."
"What was that?"
"That you would remain behind bars for the rest of your life. But neither of us ever realized how long you would live."
"Then if you died, you must be a ... a ...."
"A ghost. You can say it. We're not much for political correctness here."
"Here?"
"In purgatory. That's where you've been all this time. Ironic, isn't it?" Roberta laughed. "You were in prison for sixty-six years, and the very day you get paroled, you kick the bucket!"
"You mean I'm ... dead?" Ellen asked, trying to make sense of the whole mess.
"As the proverbial doornail."
"And I'm here at the halfway house ...."
"Purgatory."
"Right. I assume this is only temporary and that I will remain here until such time that I atone for my sins, and then I go on to heaven."
"Not exactly."
The smile that spread across Roberta's face attested to the profound satisfaction she felt as she suddenly produced a blood-stained carving knife. It was the same one Ellen Bodine (aka Queenie) had used to kill Gerald Fitzroy. The stainless steel blade of the weapon was still stained with her brother-in-law's blood.
"This state is temporary, all right, but you won't be going on to heaven. Divine justice dictates you have a different destination."
Despite being dead, Ellen felt excruciating pain as the knife entered her body. Nine times she was stabbed, one wound for each of the nine victims she and her friends had killed that long-ago October night. When the blade slid out of her body after the ninth stab, her soul left the confines of the halfway house and joined those of her four fellow murders.
"My work is done now," the avenging ghost announced once the last perpetrator of the Devil's Night Massacre was sent to hell. "I kept my promise, Mom. I can rest at last."
The gates of heaven then opened up, and Roberta Duchamp entered. At long last, she was able to enjoy a peaceful eternity with those she had loved in life.
Every year on Mischief Night Salem liked to hang toilet paper from the neighbors' trees. This year, with the shortages due to COVID-19, he's been hoarding his toilet paper and paper towels instead.
