I have spent the last month and a half in the county jail. Fortunately for me, Clay has been taking a bit of a well-deserved vacation, so I wasn’t missing anything.

Considering it’s his fault I was locked up in the first place, you’d think he’d have the decency to call. But he didn’t. I wasn’t allowed to make phone calls so we haven’t spoken since that fateful night. However, I have had many conversations with Ryan Seacrest. And by conversations, I mean he would sing ‘Say My Name’ and I would hang up on him and be escorted back to my cell. I was put into solitaire confinement 3 hours after my incarceration, but I’d rather not relive the memory of that horrible night.

I spent my entire free time making mosaic quilts of Clay’s face. My first two attempts came out looking like Seacrest. I wrote him a long letter chewing him out for brainwashing me and then I burnt both of the quilts in a jail yard ritual.

Early last night I was working on my third attempt when a guard interrupted me by banging on my cell door. “Patricia!" He handed me a small white box. “This gift came from your friend Jebritnifer.”

“I don’t know any Jebri-…. Ah. Jennifer and Brittney.” I had met them at a strip club in Vegas and then at Clay’s book signing back in December. They had become close friends of mine since my arrest. Jenn and Britt have filled in my social circle since the departure of Alyssa and Maya. I got a phone call from Alyssa one day from Uruguay. The connection was bad so I couldn’t really make out what she was saying, but she had either joined the Peace Corps or had become a professional whore. I wish her well in either endeavor. That was the last time I spoke to her. Shortly after, Maya married JC Chasez and they now reside in LA, where JC will not allow her to have contact with me. Which is totally unfair. The blowing up of his jeep was entirely his fault. If he had just given me the keys I never would have had to hotwire it.

So this left me plenty of free time to build new friendships. And by build, I mean they forced their way into my lives. Then they held me down, pricked a hole in my fingertip, and forced me to become their blood brother. We kept in contact during my prison term via snail mail and had become quite tight. On Sunday mornings they would stand outside my cell window and perform the skits from the previous night’s episode of ‘Saturday Night Live’.

I opened the box and pulled out an oddly shaped pastry that had obviously seen better days. It smelled like the inside of a shoe, but I shoved the whole thing in my mouth anyway.

I pulled a piece of paper out of my mouth that had been hidden in the pastry. “Ooooh! A fortune!” I shouted with excitement as I unfolded the chewed up note. It was written on Official Brittney Letterhead that she had printed in Paint Shop. I read it aloud. “Dearest friend. Stop. The Aiken will be taping a live interview on Jimmy Kimmel tonight. Stop. Will be there to break you out at 01700 hour. Stop. Sincerely. Anonymous. Stop.”

I looked at my watch. Then I remembered they didn’t allow me to have watches, so I looked at the clock. Then I remembered I wasn’t allowed time telling devices of any kind. It all had to do with the reason I was isolated, but again, I don’t want to relive it.

“Hey! What time is it?” I yelled to the guard.

“4:50!”

That gave me 10 minutes to get ready, but it was more than enough. I tucked my mosaic into my pants and then I was ready. Everything else I owned was stolen, confiscated, or illegal. I had grown quite fond of the toilet, but couldn’t very well bring it with.

At exactly 5 o’clock I heard a shout from outside. I knew it was exactly 5, because I heard Britt yell “It’s exactly 5 o’clock!”

I climbed on top of my bed so I could reach the window to look out. They were on the ground two floors below motioning for me to come down and join them. I pointed out the bars on the window and asked how they expected me to come out.

They began to argue between themselves about how to get me through the bars. “We could cut her into pieces and slip her through the bars.” Brittney suggested. Jenn took off one of her shoes and started whacking her with it.

“Is she talking about cutting me into pieces again?” I yelled down. Jenn stopped her assault long enough to shout ‘yes’.

“Damn it, Britt! You had that idea when you tried to sneak me in to see ‘The Girl Next Door’!”

“Yeah!” Jenn agreed with me as she put her shoe back on. “Cause your cheap ass didn’t wanna pay for a ticket!”

“That movie wasn’t worth 7.50!” Britt defended herself. We all nodded in agreement.

“You’re gonna have to get rid of your jail jumpsuit when you get down here.” Britt said.

“What am I gonna wear?” I hadn’t considered meeting The Aiken in the nude, but I wasn’t against it. In fact, I was quite open to it. But then Brittney said she’d brought me a change of clothes. I reminded her that before I could change into anything, I had to get through those bars and out of my cell.

“I’ve got a plan.” Jenn said. To Britt and my disbelief, Jenn grabbed onto the wall and climbed the two stories up to me. When she got there she pulled a bottle of acid out of her pocket and started haphazardly sprinkling it on the bars. A few drops landed on my arm and I screamed as it burned my flesh. “Relax! It’s just acid.” She said.

When the acid had done its job and the bars were gone, she scaled her way back down. When she reached the ground, she tried to coax me to do the same. “Just climb down like I did.”

“Hell no! What you just did was super human!”

“Just jump!” Britt shouted. “Humans always land on their feet!”

“That’s cats!” Jenn proclaimed as she whacked Brittney in the back of the head.

“Guys. Maybe this is a bad time to tell you, but I’m afraid of heights. So I’m just gonna go take a nap.” I backed away from the window and stepped off the bed.

“What about Clay?” Jenn asked.

“I don’t even think that show is taped live.”

“The show is called Jimmy Kimmel LIVE.” Jenn said.

“So? That’s just something they say. Like buffalo wings.”

The girls ran off, promising to return with a solution. While waiting, I laid down to take a nap. I had a dream that I was on a tour bus with Clay but I couldn’t bring myself to go over and talk to him. When he got off the bus, I noticed that he’d dropped his red matchbox car under the table, so I ran outside to give it to him. He looked really pissed off, so I just handed him the car without saying anything. Then I stroked Lindsay Lohan’s hair.

I woke up when I was pelted with pebbles. I stuck my head out the window and caught a bundle of cloth they had tossed up. I unrolled it to see it was dozens of panties tied together to make a rope. “These better be clean!” I shouted down. They looked at each other, but neither said a word. I put on a pair of rubber gloves before I tied one end to the bedpost and dropped the other end out the window. I slowly climbed down it until I reached the ground. As soon as I was down, they started grabbing at my jail suit.

“Excuse you!” I shouted. “This is private property!”

“You need to change.” Britt shoved a hooker outfit and a sombrero at me.

“You want me to wear this?”

“It’s all I could find!”

“Don’t you own any clothes she can wear?” Jenn asked.

“She’s not wearing my clothing! She’s a criminal! Besides, everything I own has Ryan Seacrest’s face on it and she refuses to wear it.”

As I was changing behind a tree, I heard a camera click and saw spiky highlights scurrying through the dark.

I heard Britt reminding Jenn of an incident where I went to midnight mass naked because I refused to wear her clothing.

“Patti’s not catholic. Why was she at mass?” Jenn asked.

“She said something about achin’. I don’t know. When I hear that word, I tend to stop asking questions.”

I left the orange jumpsuit behind the tree and followed the girls to our getaway vehicle. Which was a horse and carriage.

“Horse and carriage?”

“It’s a nice night.” Britt explained. “I thought it would be fun.”

“You don’t break people out of jail with a horse and carriage.” I hit her with my sombrero.

They insisted I drive because Jenn’s been afraid of horses ever since she fed one a Pringle when she was 12 and it smiled at her. Then afterwards she had to walk around her friend’s aunt’s house with no pants on for reasons she still can’t remember. Britt refused to do it without riding gloves and we don’t even know where to buy those.

As I struggled to control Chico and Guavay, Britt and Jenn fought in the seat behind me over a pair of sunglasses Britt insisted on wearing. “Do these glasses make my face look fat?”

“Your face IS fat!”

“But do they compliment my skin tone?”

“It’s night time!”

“Shut up! I’m trying to concentrate!” I yelled over my shoulder.

A shadow moved in the bushes along side of us. I thought it was the wind until Ryan stepped out dressed in camouflage, clutching something orange.

He spooked the horses and they both shot up in the air.

“Seacrest!” I shook my fist at him.

The rusty bars that held the horses to the cart broke apart and flipped the cart on its side. Chico broke free and ran off. Guavay ran straight towards Ryan. He screamed and grabbed onto the horses reins. It ran off with him screaming, “If loving you is wrong, I don’t wanna be right!!” His voice trailed off as he disappeared into the night.

We crawled out of the wreckage of the cart and limped our way to something with an automatic transmission. Which is something we should have done in the first place.

On the way, we stopped at a Hallmark store to buy some Valentine’s essentials. A bag of candy, a sappy card, 2 dozen roses, and a heart shaped balloon that was bigger than me. The balloon wouldn’t fit in the car, so I made Brittney sit on the roof with it. We almost lost her a couple of times, but she’s got a good grip. When we arrived at the studio, they dropped me off at the backdoor and created a diversion so I could sneak inside.

I walked quietly down a back hallway, dragging my gifts with me. I stopped to scribble some love fest inside the card. I continued down the hall, tip toeing with the balloon dragging behind me, knocking things off the wall and setting off the fire alarm.

I heard Clay and Jimmy coming down the hall, so I ducked into a nearby janitor’s closet and prepared to jump out as they approached. I was going to gently hand him my offerings of love while I sang ‘Sugar Daddy’.

As the voices got closer, I grabbed hold of the doorknob and started belting out my song. “I wanna be your sugar daddy. Give you honey, all my money.”

I stopped mid sentence when I realized the door was lock. I yanked and pulled, but it wouldn’t open. As Clay passed, I heard him say that he’d kiss the next girl who walked by in honor of Valentine’s Day. I screamed and kicked the door. Then I collapsed on the ground in hysterical sobs, mumbling the words to the song. “I’m gonna be your sugar daddy. Give you kissin’ when it’s missin’. I’ll do something something something, cause I’ve got a sweet tooth for you love.”

The room was small and the air was scarce. As the hours passed, I felt myself becoming weak from lack of fresh oxygen. I laid my head on my arm and felt the warmth of my forehead against my skin as I started to succumb to a deep sleep. The giant balloon that was taking up more than half the space in the tiny closet was bound to make its way to ground level and suck out my breath by morning. Kimmel would find my cold, tear-streaked corpse and he would weep for his sins. For having a closet without proper ventilation that locked from the outside and for leading Clayton down that hall when there was sure to be a fan hiding. May you repent on your deathbed, Kimmel. May you repent.

But morning never came and neither did death. As I felt myself drifting into a deep sleep, something came crashing through the door, landing on top of me. I inhaled the fresh air and wiggled out from underneath the pieces of broken door and whatever it was that had come crashing through it. When I stood up, I saw that it was Seacrest. He was dressed in a Hercules/cupid hybrid costume. Diaper, chest armor, long wig, and a bow and arrow. I looked closer and saw that he had a horseshoe imprint on his forehead. I tried to touch it, but he squealed in pain.

After he stopped convulsing with sobs, he helped me to my feet.

“Why is there cheese behind your ear?”

“This morning I challenged Martha Stewart to a bake-off. She made a crème dela crème cream puff with a light menthe coating. I made a grilled cheese sandwich.”

“I bet it tasted like heaven.”

“It would’ve, except it exploded all over me. Why do you think I have cheese all over my ear?”

He tried to lick the cheese off my ear, but I deterred him by shooting him with his own bow and arrow. Then I made him drive me home.

Thank god the girls have Tivo. But when we went to watch the Kimmel show, we found that Britt had accidentally TiVoed the news instead. I cried. In-between tears I caught a glimpse of news report on Seacrest being mangled by a horse. I heard him yelling, “Call me Seacrest again!” I saw a flash of orange tucked under his armpit as the horse flattened him to the ground and ran off.