Fish: A Memoir of a Boy in Man's Prison (48 page)

When I came back out in the hall, Black Diamond and Josh were waiting for me.

"It worked!" I said. "I got off."

Josh seemed even more thrilled than I was. "Information is power, Squeeze." Inmates love getting over on The Man. "Now let's hope it helps you to keep your job."

"Did Sherry say anything about my being fired?" I asked. I hadn't been officially notified that I was losing my job.

"It doesn't look good, Tim."

"But now that I beat the ticket, I should be OK. Right?"

"I'm not sure that will be enough for the warden, since it was on a technicality."

"I'll file a grievance," I said.

"I doubt it'll do you any good, but you can always try. Stop by and see me this afternoon in the law library and I'll see if I can come up with something."

"Thanks," I said.

He nodded.

I smiled at Black Diamond. "Maybe you two can hook up."

"I'm already ahead of you," Josh said.

"Well, all right," I said, imitating Black Diamond. "Go make it happen, girl."

"See!" Black Diamond said. "You're catching on."

I sat outside Sherry's office, waiting to go inside. Her door was closed, which meant she was probably in a staff meeting. It was nice of Josh to help me, but I was still suspicious of him. He was smart, but nobody does nothin' for free. Not inside anyway.

I hoped he was wrong about Sherry and the warden, but when her door opened, she told me right off that she had to fire me. I tried to object, but Sherry held up her hand. "I'm going to hire you as my clerk," she said. "If that's OK with you?"

I smiled from ear to ear.

"Good," she said, "then it's settled. I'm having a desk and a typewriter moved outside my office first thing tomorrow morning."

But little did I know what lay ahead for me later that day.

That afternoon, when I returned from school, Reese grabbed my ass. "Now go back and get your little bitch," he said, "so I can grab some of her ass, too." The two guys that were standing with him laughed.

When I told Paul about it, he just nodded coolly and stared at the opposite end of the cellblock. "OK," he said, after a minute. "It's gonna be like that is it."

He looked at me. "Listen to what I tell you, and do exactly as I say."

I sat up in my chair. I was scared, but Paul's confidence reassured me.

"Before you come down to chow tomorrow, I want to take your padlock and put it inside a sock. I'll show you how to tie it, but make sure it's the longest sock you've got."

My eyes widened. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm not going to do anything. We're gonna do what we have to do," Paul said. "These motherfuckers have to learn we're not playing."

The next morning, we returned from the chow hall early and ducked into the shadows of the door to the infirmary. It was still dark outside and unseasonably warm, but I was still trembling as if it were below zero.

Paul had me stand behind him, with my sock dangling in my right hand. It was heavy from the padlock secured at the bottom by a tightly tied knot. Paul peered out from the edge, trying his best not to be seen. He had brought his lock in sock as well. Yet for all his bravado, he was shaking as much as me. For the first time, I thought maybe he was in over his head.

Reese came up the walkway alone. He didn't see us standing there. Nor did he see Paul come up behind him when he cracked him on top of his head. The sound of the lock bouncing off his crown let out a loud smackrattling the tumblers inside the lock. Reese staggered backward, and Paul hit him with a left hook and then again with the lock in his right hand. Reese ducked and then slipped and fell, scrambling to catch his footing up the walkway that led to the control center. Stunned, but emboldened by his falling, I lunged forward and swung, just missing him. Aside from that early night in the barracks, this was the first time I was really fighting back-and it felt terrifying. I took another swing, knowing that Paul would be pissed if I didn't try. I hit him across his ear, though the lock bounced off his shoulder breaking the impact. Paul came around my left and brought his lock crashing down on top of him, hitting squarely on the head just as he tried to bolt up the walk. Reese fell to the pavement. Paul and I each hit him again and then ran into A-unit, before anyone saw us.

By mid-morning, most of the inmates had heard what had happened. Reese was taken to Riverside, where he was kept in the infirmary for several days before he was transferred to another prison in Muskegon, which was often the case when inmates were assaulted.

And for a little while, at least, Paul and I were left alone. But there were a few who let me know, that if were it not for Paul-they'd "take that" nodding toward by ass.

"These ho's ain't gonna do a motherfuckin' thing," Paul said. "They ain't gonna do nothin' but sell wolf tickets." Wolf tickets were when inmates talked about what they were going to do to somebody, but they rarely backed it up unless they were traveling in a pack, and even then-Paul said, loudly, "many of these bitches are cowards."

I smiled, proudly, because he had empowered me. I had not felt so good since I came to prison, even though I knew Paul was doing the very thing he was accusing them of doing. He was just showing off and bluffing, like we were playing poker. Paul said, "That's a big part of it, you know. It's not whether you're going to something or not, the game is-in making them believe that you will. But every now and then, you have to show a good hand. Most of these guys are too short to do anything in here." He was referring to the fact that most were within a few months of parole-so they weren't going to do that much. "But I don't give a fuck," Paul said. "I've been down too long to put up with these knuckleheads. I'm liable to haul off and take off their motherfuckin' heads."

What terrified me most, was how good it felt to attack Reese. Once I got beyond my fears, I actually enjoyed it. There was one moment in particular, when I swung at Reese that I wanted him to pay for everything awful that had ever happened to me. "This is for Chet and Red and Nate and Moseley and every other fucker who's ever messed with me," I thought, slugging away at him. And as the lock came crashing down into his skull, I felt an odd sense of relief. Paul was teaching me how to survive in there. What he showed me that day, however, was the most valuable lesson of my entire stay. And it took a boy-not a man-to teach me this.

33

Broken Promises

Next Month. Next Year. Next Season. As soon as the school year is over.

For eight years I believed what she had to say. I was sixteen before I realized I was never again going to live with my mother. Yet after a while, I was too afraid to complain to her, because she might cut me offlike she had already done to my brother and sister.

Once, when Rick and Igot into trouble together, she told me I could forget her phone number.

Were it not for the 4:30 count, I would have slept all afternoon. Paul shoved me as the stampede of feet came up the catwalk. "You better hurry up," he said. "You don't want another ticket."

I couldn't afford any more, since Simon was looking for a reason to separate us. Simon was the ARUM, the Assistant Resident Unit Manager, or Ahole as Paul called him. I didn't know where he was, during the first part of my stay, when I was having all kinds of problems-but now here he wasand busting our balls.

I slipped out of Paul's room and fought the tide of bodies as I made my way up the hall then down the other wing to my cell.

"Parsell," Goodman yelled. "Where've you been, boy?"

"Nowhere," I said.

Goodman was the counselor-the Resident Unit Manager. He was Simon's superior. Simon had been on our case because of how close Paul and I had become. As if our closeness were a problem. And so now what did Goodman want?

"Come to my office when count is cleared," Goodman said. He was black, and Simon was white but they shared the same office on the second tier.

After count, I went to his office and stood in his door.

"Well, if it isn't Timothy, the disciple of Paul," Goodman joked, hanging up the phone. He pointed to a chair next to his desk. "We need to talk about you and your friend."

"What about it?" I sat down.

"Well, there's concern you two are spending too much time together."

"I really don't give a fuck," I said. I could feel my anger rising, but it felt good to talk back like that. I wouldn't dare do that with any of the inmates, and there wasn't much he could do to me-other than write me a ticket. Besides, no one ever intervened when an inmate was being taunted or abused.

"There's no need to get belligerent," he said. "I'm not the enemy."

"I didn't say you were. It's just that it's not anyone's business what Paul and me do-unless we're breaking the rules."

"Is that so?"

"That's right," I said, imagining Paul being proud of me for standing up for us.

"OK," he said. "Then we don't have anything else to discuss."

"Fine." I got up and walked out, fairly pleased with myself for putting him in his place. Though it did occur to me, that it seemed to have ended too easily.

Back in my room, Paul said, "You shouldn't have done that. He was trying to befriend you."

"Well, I didn't know that," I said, disappointed that he wasn't proud of me. Far from it. "What was I supposed to do?"

"I think we need to go back there and clean it up," Paul said. "He's is the only thing standing between us and that A-hole Simon."

Goodman listened quietly as I groveled in his doorway, Paul at my side. "I'm sorry, I didn't know what to say, and I was nervous you were going to move us. We didn't do anything wrong, and Simon has been busting our balls. And ... I'm sorry I cursed at you."

"I tried to befriend you," he said. "And you shit all over me."

"But what about all these other motherfuckers?" Paul said. "It's a bunch of shit and you know it." Paul was incensed because they weren't questioning anyone else about how "close" they had become.

"I don't know what to say," Goodman said. "Simon's gone to the commander."

Paul jumped in, "You know what'll happen if they separate us, Mr. Goodman."

"Divide and conquer," he said, nodding, "but you two guys have been fronting yourselves off by spending too much time together-and disappearing."

I couldn't understand what was happening, "You mean because we spend a lot of time together, but don't get into trouble-that we're a problem?"

It was bullshit, and he knew it. If we had been hanging out with a man, they wouldn't have said a thing. But because we were two queers who stuck together they wanted to break us up. It wasn't fair. Besides, they knew that if they split us up, we'd be vulnerable to being attacked.

"I'll file a grievance!" I challenged.

"And say what?" Goodman said, looking at me. "That you can't be with your boyfriend?This is prison, boy. You got no right to be with anyone."

"And you call this befriending me?" I said.

"It's too late for that now. Simon's taken it out of my hands."

Paul and I went to chow together, but neither of us had an appetite.

"It's not your fault," Paul said. "Simon was going to have us separated no matter what Goodman said."

"I hate both those motherfuckers," I said.

The next afternoon, the guard told Paul to pack his belongings. He was being moved to D-unit. "Maybe I can get over there too," I said.

Paul shook his head. "There's no way. Our best bet is to wait a week or two and then you should asked to be moved to E- or F-unit. I'll wait a week or so and do the same. Maybe the housing officer will forget you and I aren't supposed to be in the same housing unit. In the meantime, we'll have to hook up at chow and at yard."