Hard Time (8 page)

More static assaulted my ears, followed by a voice crackling out of the public address system: ‘Chow’s in the house! Line up at the slider! Fully dressed with your IDs!’

Boyd sprung from his bunk, urinated, threw his clothes on, dashed out.

‘It’s breakfast time,’ David said, putting on his bee stripes.

‘Not more green baloney,’ I said, dreading going another day without food.

About 40 men were out for chow. Yawning. Rubbing their eyes. Cursing the place. Apprehensively, I trod down the metal-grid stairs and joined the queue. The sliding door opened, and Officer Kohlbeck, holding a clipboard, checked IDs while a trusty doled out Ladmo bags and small cartons of milk. As each inmate took a Ladmo bag, he yelled what he’d like to trade.

‘Meat for peanut butter!’

‘Jellies for cheese!’

‘Who said meat for peanut butter?’

‘Over here, dawg!’

‘I’ve got cheese. Who’s got jelly?’

‘I’ve got jelly!’

‘Over here!’

‘No! Take mine, dawg!’

‘Milk for tonight’s dinner juice!’

‘I’ll take it, dawg!’

Each race occupied one of the octagonal-shaped steel tables. The blacks called themselves kinfolk. The whites: woods. The Mexican Americans: Chicanos. The Mexicans: paisas. In the scramble for table space, the senior members of each race quickly took ownership of the four stools bolted to each table. Some prisoners took their Ladmo bags back to their cells.

I returned to A12. David was on the stool, Boyd the bottom bunk.

‘Park your ass there,’ Boyd said, nodding at the toilet. ‘The best seat in the house.’

Looking at the toilet, I shook my head.

‘Here, put this over it.’ Boyd threw me an old towel. ‘It’ll reduce the smell.’

Using the towel, I sat down on the toilet. Inspecting the contents of my Ladmo bag, I regretted not having had the nerve to yell what I wanted to trade. I found some crackers and devoured them.

‘I’m lactose intolerant. Anyone want another milk?’ David said.

I was on the letter Y of the word yes when Boyd’s arm struck out like a rattlesnake.

‘I’ll break bread, dawg,’ Boyd said, smiling at me.

‘Break bread?’ I said

‘Split the milk with you.’

I didn’t fancy sharing Boyd’s germs. ‘You’re all right. Keep it.’

Wolfing his down, Boyd eyed my food. ‘You gonna eat that, dawg?’

‘I can’t eat this crap,’ I said.

‘I’ll handle it for you.’

‘Mouldy bread! How can you eat it?’ I asked.

‘You just scratch the mould off. You’ll be doing it soon enough. Eating green baloney just like the rest of us.’

‘Here you go,’ I said, handing it to Boyd.

‘Good lookin’ out, dawg!’

I sipped my milk. A12 was towards the middle of the upper tier. There was an iron-railing balcony in front of it and the top of the stairs to one side. My view was almost as good as that from the control tower. I sat there intrigued by the inmates downstairs using sign language to communicate with those in adjacent pods. When the guards weren’t watching, the trusties passed items from pod to pod by pushing them under the sliding doors. There was no way two guards could monitor all four pods at once, so contraband was passed unnoticed.

‘What’re they passing?’ I asked.

‘Dope. Tobacco,’ Boyd said. ‘There’s usually only one syringe in each tower, so everyone has to share.’

‘What about catching diseases from sharing?’ I asked.

‘Most of them have hep C anyway. Why’d you reckon that guy’s yelling at the guard for bleach?’

‘To clean his cell?’ I asked.

‘Nope. So the fellas can bleach the needle before shooting up.’

‘So after green baloney everyone just moves on to doing drugs?’ I asked.

‘Pretty much. There’s more drugs in here than anywhere in the world.’

His answer surprised me.

David grabbed his towel, and started to walk out of the cell.

‘Where’re you going?’ Boyd asked with accusation.

‘Take a shower,’ David said and left.

‘Boyd, can you show me how to use the phones? I must call my girlfriend.’

‘Sure thing, dawg,’ Boyd said.

Downstairs, I followed Boyd’s instructions. I entered my booking number and repeated my name multiple times for the PIN-LOCK Speaker Verification Service. Claudia answered. My spirits surged to her voice. ‘You OK, love?’

‘I miss you,’ Claudia said.

‘I miss you loads,’ I said, pressing the phone to my ear to make her presence closer.

‘I sleep at my mom’s or on the floor in the sweaty T-shirt you wore for kickboxing, with my foot touching the door ’cause I’m afraid someone’s gonna bust it in again.’

‘I’m so sorry, love. I just . . . I wish I was there with you.’

‘I’m gonna visit you—’

‘Yes, visit me! Please visit me! I must see you. This place is—’

‘It must be horrible. You OK?’

‘I’m fine so far. Well, kind of. Just stressed. It’s crazy in here. I don’t know where to begin.’ Not wanting to burden her, I changed the subject. ‘When are you visiting?’

‘Tomorrow.’

‘Great! Oh God, you don’t understand how much I really need to see you right now.’ Remembering her plight, I asked, ‘What happened to you with the cops?’

‘That Detective Reid told me I was going to jail for a long time, and that you’re never getting out, and—’

‘Never getting out! Why?’ I asked, squeezing the phone handle as if it were a stress ball.

‘’Cause you’ve got so many charges. He said, “It’s OK to talk about him ’cause he’s never getting out.” He really tried to threaten me to turn and talk. That time we went to your dentist in Tucson, he said we didn’t go to the dentist, we picked up drugs.’

‘That’s crazy!’ I said, hoping he was only trying to bluff her and not out to put me away for ever. ‘How long were you there?’

‘Close to dinner time. Ten to twelve hours. They kept telling me my mom was calling the jail asking if they’d fed me my vegetarian food.’

‘That’s funny,’ I said, smiling sadly.

‘She sent my brother to pick me up with bean burritos from Taco Bell. What’s gonna happen, Shaun?’

‘Don’t worry, love. They didn’t find any drugs, so they shouldn’t be able to hold me too much longer. The problem is my bond.’

Cries for help and thuds stopped the chatter in the day room.

‘Hold on,’ I said, craning my neck.

The commotion was in the shower area, about 15 feet behind me. Skinheads were attacking a naked figure on the floor. Inmates stopped what they were doing, gravitated towards the shower area and formed a sinister audience.

‘What is it?’ Claudia asked.

‘Looks like . . . er . . . some kind of disturbance.’

‘What? What’s wrong? You all right?’ she said, her voice starting to crack.

‘Sure . . . er . . . I’m fine. It doesn’t involve me,’ I said, distracted by the violence and proximity of the growing crowd.

The naked man raised his head, and I recognised David. There was a plea for help in his eyes as they briefly met mine – a look that froze me against the wall.

‘Er . . . I might need to get off the phone here soon.’

‘Die, you sick chomo fuck!’ Rob yelled, dropping his heel on David’s temple.

‘
Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh . . .
’

‘What’s going on? Are you OK?’ Claudia asked, her voice hitting some high notes.

The skinheads vied for stomping room. David arched his back in agony.

‘Yes. I’m fine,’ I said, struggling not to relay my fear. ‘It just gets crazy in these places, that’s all.’

The blows silenced David. Blood streamed from his nose.

‘I have to go now. I love you,’ I said, not wanting to worry her any further.

‘Love you too. Every time I go to my mom’s house, I take your sweaty T-shirt and Floppy.’ Floppy was a Build-A-Bear creation that played my voice saying, ‘Happy Valentine’s Day. I love you, Bungle Bee.’

One of the skinheads jumped up and down on David. I thought I heard his ribs snap.

‘I can’t wait to see you tomorrow. Bye, love.’ I hung up.

The spectators had adopted the safety-in-numbers survival strategy of the wildebeest. None of them dared venture from the herd. Mesmerised by the violence, they watched from a safe distance. Gripped by the same instinct, I joined the back of the herd.

As if they’d exhausted their supply of aggression on David, the skinheads stopped the beating and marched away in unison. David was a whimpering heaving mound of flesh, blood pooling around his head.

What kind of world am I in? I thought. This stuff really happens. It could have been me last night. How will I survive?

Just when the violence seemed to be over, a rhinoceros of a man with spider webs tattooed on his thick neck approached the skinheads. ‘How come we can still hear the little bitch?’

‘We fucked the chomo up good, dawg,’ Rob said.

‘Not good enough.’ The man went to the shower with the casual gait of someone going to the shop to buy a bottle of milk, grabbed David’s neck, and started slamming David’s skull against the concrete as if he were trying to break open a coconut.
Crack-crack-crack . . .

I was revolted but compelled to watch. The big man had increased the stakes, and I didn’t doubt the code of these people included killing anyone who interfered or flagged down a guard. Even walking away would be a show of disapproval, an invitation to be attacked next. I was terrified.

David’s body convulsed. His eyes closed. Then stillness. Silence. He remained on the floor until a guard walked the pod ten minutes later.

‘Everybody, lockdown! Lockdown right now!’ the guard yelled.

Shouting at the guard, the inmates returned to their cells, slamming their doors behind them. Guards rushed into the day room. Pressing myself to the cell door, I watched them remove David on a stretcher. There was fluid other than blood leaking from his head. A yellowish fluid.

‘Cells A5, A7, A12, roll up!’ announced the guard in the control tower.

‘What’s he mean, roll up?’ I asked.

‘They’re moving a bunch of us out,’ Boyd said. ‘Roll your mattress around your shit. We gotta go downstairs.’

‘But we only just got here!’ I was afraid and exasperated. I’d arrived at Towers jail hoping for relief from the mayhem, but seeing David get smashed had affected me more than the violence at The Horseshoe. Images of him on the stretcher, unconscious, possibly dead, were replaying in my mind.

‘They roll people up all the time. They might think we had something to do with what happened to David ’cause he was our celly. We might be going to lockdown.’

Great,
I thought.
I’m a suspect in a possible murder. And what the bloody hell’s lockdown? Are there places worse than this?
Afraid of what Boyd might say, I didn’t ask. I figured I’d just tough it out when I got there. I coiled my mattress around the bedding and carried my belongings onto the iron-railing balcony.

‘Where ya moving us to?’ yelled a black prisoner on the metal-grid stairs, windmilling his arms at the guards in the control tower. I stopped behind him, hoping he’d get out of my way. The guards ignored him. He waved again. His short sleeves fell back, exposing triceps protruding like thick horseshoes. When he gave up, I followed him down the stairs. I parked my rolled-up mattress by the sliding door that allowed us in and out of the pod.

‘Where’re you from?’ I asked.

‘Kingston,’ he said, greeting me with a raised fist.

‘I’m Shaun from England,’ I said, bumping his fist.

‘Just call me Kingston, Shaun,’ he said in a friendly Caribbean voice, making me feel a bond with this fellow foreigner.

‘How’d you end up in Arizona?’ I asked.

‘Got busted at Sky Harbor Airport. Shoulda never got off the plane. Was going from LA to New York. The plane stopped in Phoenix, so I figured I’d take a look around. They stopped me before I got back on the plane, found $100,000 cash in me carry-on. They took the money and arrested me.’

It seemed unjust. Was he telling the truth? He didn’t look the criminal type. I believed him but decided against asking why he had so much money. Too personal. ‘They robbed you,’ I said, suspecting it was drug-related.

‘Yeah, man. They ran my name, figured out I wasn’t a citizen, took the money, and now they’ve started deportation proceedings against me, so I’ll never be able to get the money back. It’s kinda my fault for getting off the plane. I never knew Arizona was this bad. This state’s the worst, Shaun. New York and LA don’t fuck with you like that. I’m telling ya.’

‘You won’t be able to get your money back from the state?’ I asked, thinking bringing drugs into Arizona wasn’t one of my brightest ideas either.

‘That’s the thing: it’s not my money,’ he said, shaking his head.

‘Oh no.’ I pegged him as a smuggler for a yardie gang.

A pair of arms sleeved in white-supremacy tattoos threw a mattress next to mine. ‘Wattup, wood!’ They belonged to a stocky man with cropped ginger hair and an all-American square jaw. He was a few inches shorter than me, with a freckly face, a bulbous red nose and a collection of red marks on his forehead and cheeks that could have been acne or small lesions.

‘I’m Shaun,’ I said, bumping his fist. ‘From England.’

‘I’m Carter. Us woods gotta stick together in here.’ He squinted at Kingston. ‘Know what I’m saying, dawg?’

I didn’t like being told who I could talk to, but I didn’t want to make any enemies either.
Better play on my ignorance.
‘I’m new here,’ I said, in a light-hearted way.

Carter leaned towards me, gazing without blinking. ‘Well, learn fast if you don’t wanna get smashed.’

Talking to Kingston had distracted me from the dangers of the environment, but Carter restored my stress. I didn’t know what to say. Was he giving me advice or threatening me? I felt sweat trickle down the hairs in my armpits.

An announcement interrupted our conversation: ‘Pill nurse in the house! Come to the sliding door with your IDs and a cup of water. Pill nurse in the house!’

The sick and mentally ill emerged from their cells bearing paper cups of water. They crowded our area, changing the dynamic of the day room. There was too much going on for Carter to bother me now.

A few seconds of static were followed by the guard’s voice: ‘Get away from the day-room door! Form one straight line!’

The sick lined up. The door slid open.

A Bulgarian shot-putter of a nurse stepped inside the day room and scowled at the men. ‘Name?’ she yelled at the first in line.

Holding up his ID, he replied, ‘Washington.’

‘Here’s your lithium, your Prozac.’ She watched him mouth the pills and drink water. ‘I hope to God you swallowed them!’

‘Yeah,’ the man said, rubbing his left eye.

The nurse was furious. ‘I don’t believe you! Open your mouth. Raise your tongue. OK. Next!’

Each prisoner received the same treatment. Then as soon as she left, those who’d pretended to swallow their medication offered them for sale: ‘Drugs for thugs!’

‘Seroquel for one item!’

‘Who wants Thorazine?’

‘Gimme the Thorazine, dawg!’

‘The best sleeping pills over here.’

The day room bustled like a marketplace. I was still admiring the barter, trying to decipher the terminology, when the control guard hit the button to activate the sliding door. I picked up my mattress and walked out. Being on the move again increased my anxiety.

A plump middle-aged guard with a blond flat-top streaked down the corridor. ‘Pick your shit up! You’re going to
my
tower – Tower 6!’ he yelled, leaning into his stride as if he couldn’t wait to take control of us. He spotted Boyd and smiled slyly. ‘Oh no! Not you again!’

‘Why Tower 6, Officer Alston? ’Cause that’s where lockdown is?’ Boyd asked.

Lockdown. David’s dying. We’re going to lockdown. I did nothing to save him. When he dies, I’ll be charged with murder. It might even get pinned on me by the skinheads, and if I say it wasn’t me they’ll kill me too. Must stop thinking about David and the way he looked at me.

‘None of your beeswax,’ Officer Alston said. ‘All that matters is you troublemakers behave in
my
tower. That includes not lying to me. Ever! I detest liars. So if you wanna stay off my shit list, don’t lie to me. Now head down that corridor!’

Only just got here, I thought, and I’m lumped in with the troublemakers. Or is this guard crazy? Some kind of military nut? Bracing to deal with a pod full of troublemakers, I shouldered my curled-up mattress and set off.

‘Mordhorst still your shift partner?’ Boyd asked.

‘Yeah. I bet he just can’t wait to see you again,’ Officer Alston said.

Why’s Boyd so cheerful? I thought. He knows where we’re going. Maybe it’s not so bad after all.

‘Mordhorst ain’t nuthin’ nice,’ Boyd announced. ‘He just loves his job. He’s the most grieved guard at Towers.’

‘And he’s proud of it,’ Officer Alston said. ‘He collects grievances. Wallpapers his home with them.’

As we walked down the cement-block corridor, the Tower 6 inmates mobbed the Plexiglas at either side of us. Afraid to stare directly at them, I flicked my eyes from left to right. Some of the whites nodded at Carter, which I took as a bad sign. In the control tower was Officer Mordhorst, a squat man with a round ruddy face, a bulldog eager to bite someone for no reason. I made a mental note to stay out of his way.

‘C’s lockdown. B’s max security,’ Boyd said, pointing at those pods. ‘We must be going to D or A.’

Not lockdown? I thought. The relief distracted me momentarily. Until I realised I was about to be plunged into a new mob and who knew what danger. I had the jitters of a child stepping onto a roller-coaster for the first time. Would I be accepted? Would I be smashed? We stopped at the foot of the control tower. Tower 6 was identical to Tower 2, except in C pod the inmates were all locked down for violating jail rules. I noticed a group of prisoners in D pod looking at me.
What’s going on? Have I lost it again or are they looking at me? Yes, they are. I must be a target.
One of them pointed at me. I felt my body heat rise. He was a buff hippy and looked familiar. Friend or someone I’d crossed?

Officer Alston read our cell assignments – mine was upstairs – and radioed Officer Mordhorst to activate D pod’s sliding door. Taking some deep breaths, I planned to rush to my cell, and take it from there like yesterday. Hope for the best. Boyd dashed in first with a theatrical manner. Good old Boyd. My guinea pig.

‘Look who it is, everyone!’ someone yelled in the day room. ‘Jack Nicholson’s back!’

Boyd drew their attention. Good. He bowed and they laughed. Even better. That’s exactly what I wanted to hear: laughter. Not the sound of someone getting smashed in the shower.
Keep them laughing, Boyd, at least for the ten seconds it’ll take me to get to my cell.

I stepped onto the metal-grid stairs. Seven seconds. Six. I was almost at the top, a mere three or four seconds away from my cell, when someone came up behind me. Fast. My back muscles clenched as I braced to be attacked.

‘Shaun! English Shaun!’

I craned my neck, but kept going. It was the buff hippy. What did he want?

‘It’s Billy! Remember?’

‘You look familiar, but I don’t remember.’ I tried to search my memories. Nothing registered. My mind was too congested with fear of the present to travel back to the past.

‘I’m Billy,’ he said, tapping his broad chest. ‘I was in your limo with you outside the Icehouse that night you got Larry the Limo Driver so high he had to call out another limo driver. You stole my glitter girls, Samantha and Aubrey.’

I stopped at the top of the stairs.
Billy! Fellow raver!
My relief gushed.
I actually know someone in here. Surely this will help.
‘No shit! It is you. But you’ve doubled in size.’ I wanted to hug him.

‘Fellas, this is English Shaun!’ he announced to the day room. ‘I know him from the streets. He’s a good fucking dude.’

Members of all four racial groups clustered around their separate tables looked over, and a few of them actually nodded and smiled. I couldn’t believe it.
These men are smiling. They don’t want to kill me
. I’d shown Billy a good time the night we’d partied and never expected to see him again. I walked along the balcony feeling a bit safer. He followed me into D10 and closed the door to almost-shut.

D10 was to the left of the top of the stairs, at the same height as the control tower it faced. It was a standard Towers’ cell: six-by-nine foot, illegally triple-bunked. There was a mixture of unclean smells hanging in the hot air. The toilet stank as if tomcats had marked their territory on it. The short podgy man perched on the bottom bunk was giving off body odour with a vinegary tang to it. Scrutinising me with amused curiosity, he looked like a pocket-sized Henry VIII. He had Henry’s features, but his long unkempt beard made him seem deranged. ‘Wattup, dawg! I’m Troll. One of your new cellies.’

‘I’m Shaun, Troll.’ I placed my mattress down, and we bumped fists. There was something endearing about this crazy-looking little guy. I was hoping to get more acquainted, but the door swung open and banged against the wall, making me jump.

A topless man with WHITE PRIDE tattooed across his midsection barged past Billy. Everything about him screamed king of the jungle. Size. Aura. Blond mane. ‘Wattup, dawg! I’m Outlaw, the head of the whites.’

‘I’m Shaun, a friend of Billy’s.’

‘Hey, dawg, you need any hygiene products, anything like stamps, envelopes?’ Outlaw asked.

‘I’ll sort him out, dawg,’ Troll said.

‘Hey, you wanna go smoke, dude?’ Billy asked.

‘I don’t smoke.’ Being offered their kindness and saying no felt weird. I was tempted to start smoking just to bond.

‘Everyone in here smokes,’ Billy said. ‘The more you get to smoke, the more important you are.’

Troll cackled like one of those fantasy-movie creatures who never causes any real harm. ‘Good lookin’ out on not smoking, dawg. We’re trying to keep this a smoke-free cell. There’s not many in here who don’t smoke.’

I was relieved Troll didn’t smoke.

‘Are you sure you don’t wanna jump in the car?’ Billy said

‘The car?’ I asked, confused.

‘Come smoke with us.’

‘Thanks, but I’ll pass.’

Billy and Outlaw darted out.

‘I guess I’m on the top bunk,’ I said.

Troll stood up. ‘You start at the top and work your way down as your cellies leave,’ he said, his frown exuding the authority of a teacher over a pupil. ‘Look, I gotta go play spades. Catch you later, dawg.’

I was surprised he’d left so fast. Everyone seemed to be rushing to go somewhere in this place that went nowhere. Strange. After making my bed, I sat on the stool and tried to unwind. Impossible. I’d seen and been through so much, my nervous system wouldn’t calm down. Although glad of the move to Tower 6 and Billy vouching for me, I still expected someone to attack me at any moment and couldn’t take my eyes off the doorway. They’d let David settle in before pouncing on him. That could easily happen to me. I wondered if my heartbeat would ever return to normal.