Mad Cows by Kathy Lette

aloof and viscous.
    â€˜Some double-strength Fem-fresh?’ Maddy ventured, gagging.
    â€˜Body heat.’ Sputnik jerked her bony pelvis into Maddy’s frame, pinioning her back against the wall.
    â€˜Really? You could get equally warm by wetting your finger and sticking it into an electrical outlet,’ Maddy suggested.
    â€˜Do what?’
    Maddy rolled her eyes. ‘Oh well, at least the screws know that you’re not taking any mind-expanding drugs.’ Not just Alex, but the whole prison seemed to hold its breath. Sputnik tightened her pneumatic embrace on Alex’s former girlfriend.
    Now if Maddy hadn’t been walking around with two Ayers Rocks strapped to her chest; two huge, hard, insanely sensitive Ayers Rocks which were agony to the touch, she wouldn’t have done what she did next – at least not without protective head gear and a good surgeon on tap. Letting out a low roar, she landed a punch to the side of her tormentor’s head. Sputnik retaliated, forcing Maddy into a lop-sided waltz. They hydraulicked about, scratching, tearing at each other’s hair, sinking teeth into any bit of accessible flesh.
    From broad-side, Chanel appeared, seizing Sputnik’s head and buffeting it against the bench. Stacey let out a blood-curdling whoop and pug-slugged Chanel in the snoz. It split spectacularly open. Blood geysered over them all. Chanel ju-jitsued Stacey, who cannoned on to the floor. And then it was on. Caught in the eye of a tornado of Lycraed limbs, tattooed arms and shaven legs, Maddy lost sight of Alex.
    Fights were inevitable in a women’s prison. There was only a window of about one day a month in which they weren’t all either suffering PMT, the menopause, ovulation cramps or post-natal depression. Even the prison cat was a female. It was like ‘Welcome to Hormone World! Step right up! Ride the Emotional Rollercoaster of Your Choice!’
    Maddy was dimly aware of the harrowing pulse of the ‘aggro bell’. Through the human squall, she could see Mamma Joy flailing about in an ineffective semaphore. If she’d been ground staff, she’d have landed a whole fleet of jumbo jets by the time the herd of overweight officers lumbered along the jail’s concrete intestines. They ran heavily, as if trying to steam-roller the linoleum back into place, flattening a distraught Petronella and the directorless film crew against the wall.
    â€˜OK, girls, let’s talk it through,’ demanded the officer in charge.
    Sputnik and Maddy, in a gesture which made Pamela Anderson look articulate, were in a hair-lock, wincing with pain, both refusing to let go. A gnomic male screw pinned Sputnik’s arms up into the restraint position.
    Maddy was similarly half-Nelsoned. In her hand was a wodge of Sputnik’s purple hair. She could taste blood trickling down the back of her throat. Through eyes which were rapidly swelling shut, she noted that Alex was nowhere to be seen.
    â€˜Who started it?’ the officer in charge persisted.
    Maddy shrugged. ‘I don’t know her name.’
    â€˜Can you describe her?’
    â€˜That’s what I was doing when she walloped me, nong-brain!’
    The officer nodded to his off-siders and Maddy was woman-handled to the surgery on C wing.
    A doctor Maddy suspected had gained his degree from the Botswana Woodwork and Handicrafts Department was making a half-hearted daub with a disinfected swab at Maddy’s more serious abrasions with what looked like a recycled corn pad – when Dwina goose-stepped into view.
    â€˜Where’s Alex?’ Maddy asked desperately. ‘Did you talk to him?’
    â€˜Well,’ Dwina hhumphed. ‘This is certainly a unique method of obtaining bail.’
    â€˜He’s here! My baby’s father! He can straighten everything out.’
    Dwina, wearing her Hostess with the Mostest expression, patted Maddy’s hand. ‘You’re suffering from