The clatter of chains being unlocked and dropping to the floor, alongside cheers and rowdy shouting, echoed through the prison hallway. Archie waited, sat on his sleeping pad, passing week-old hunks of dried bread to his lips.
“Thank the Gods, thank you kind sirs.”
Archie smiled and shook his head. Sounded like his favourite cellmate, Greg Holborn, just got released in all this chaos.
Good for him, thought Archie.
Finished with his bread, he picked crumbs out of his long scraggly beard, placing them into his mouth one-by-one. Midway through his second meal, a well armoured figure appeared in front of his cell.
“Archie, that you?” The figure placed his hands on the bars, closing one eye to see through with better clarity. He could see Archie, painfully skinny with protruding bones and sunken cheeks, as well as a mop of brown hair and a beard as unkempt to match.
“Aye, who’s asking?” Archie continued eating the crumbs, staring at the wall in front of him.
A group jostled the figure as they moved passed him, full of energy and jubilance. “It’s me. Byron. Already forget about your partner?”
“Byron? Don’t know anyone by that name. Last Byron I knew died twenty years ago. ‘Bout the same time I wound up in this cell.” Done with the crumbs in his beard, Archie scanned the floor between his crossed legs, finding a few more crumbs he refused to let go to waste.
“Come on, Archie. You can’t still hold a grudge after what happened?” Byron glanced to his left, watching another prisoner get released.
“No grudge. Just don’t know any Byron.” Archie scratched his face, flecks of dead skin coming off in his blackened fingernails.
“You’re even more petulant in your old age. Come on,” Byron unlocked the cell door, an eerie smile draped in malevolence painted on his face. “It’s your lucky day.”
Today's prompt: evil smile
If you'd like to participate too, the contest can be found here: @mariannewest/day-1558-5-minute-freewrite-wednesday-prompt-evil-smile