life had become a confused blur filled with too-sharp details : the duty sergeant scratching his nose and signing him in - `` cell six is free '' - through a green door and then the smell of the cells , a low-level stench he had never before encountered but which was immediately and horribly familiar , a pervasive fug of yesterday 's vomit and disinfectant and smoke and stale blankets and unflushed toilets and despair .