by Tom Swyers
“Didn’t you have one?”
“Not really. He died when I was young. The state was really my father. I spent a lot of my younger years in youth detention centers. I skipped school way too much. In those places, they tried to treat me as a man when I was just a boy. It’s like I was going in a different direction from you when I was your age. Then again, when I was in the box they treated me like a boy when I should have been treated like a man.”
Annie called from the back porch, “Christy, Phillip, it’s dinner time.”
“Okay, Mom. We’re coming.”
Everyone sat down at the dining room table. They held hands and David said a prayer. Dinner was marked by long stretches of silence surrounded by the aroma of fresh biscuits, Niblets corn, and fried chicken.
David was deep in thought, trying to figure out what happened that day and trying to formulate a plan for tomorrow’s hearing. Christy was deep into his overflowing plate. Phillip was picking at his plate contemplating the meaning of dreams. Annie was watching the men pick at the meal she spent an hour preparing.
“Don’t worry, Phillip,” Annie said, “if anyone can figure this barbershop thing out it’s David.”
When she said this, her smile warmed Phillip just as it always did. He nodded, but guilt then rushed through his brain. His stomach knotted. Here he sat enjoying the hospitality of a wonderful woman whose husband he had very nearly killed. He hadn’t thought about the impact killing David would have on her either.
Annie added, “Thank you, Phillip, for all of your help around the house these past few months.”
“You’re welcome,” Phillip said, putting down his knife and fork. He wasn’t hungry anymore. “It’s the least I could do with David trying to help me set up the barbershop.”
Annie beamed, “It’s nice having you as a part of our family, Phillip.”
Phillip lowered his head and spoke softly, “Thank you for having me.”
“You know,” Annie continued, “I didn’t know what to expect when you first joined us. But then I realized that sometimes you need the perspective of someone outside the family to appreciate what’s on the inside.”
“How’s that?” Phillip wondered.
“Well, for one thing, I didn’t know how much David was involved in helping people in solitary. I never gave the issue much thought. But now that I know all about it, I’m proud of all he’s done.”
“You should be,” Phillip declared. “Without people like him, nobody would stop to think about us. He helped raise public awareness about the Mandela rule—no more than fifteen days in solitary. They’ve made changes. No youths or pregnant women in solitary. But guys like me are the forgotten ones.”
Annie leaned over to put her hand on his arm as she assured Phillip, “You’re not forgotten here.”
Phillip’s eyes began to get misty. He had a family now but he had almost destroyed it that morning. Phillip choked up, and when he tried to speak his voice quavered, “Again, thank you for having me. I have to excuse myself now.” Phillip got up and headed into the kitchen with his half-full plate in one hand. As soon as he was out of sight through the doorway, he used his napkin to dab at his eyes with the other hand.
Looking up at his retreating back from the table, Annie called out, “I’ll wrap that up and you can take it back to your motel room. No sense letting good food go to waste.”
David eyed Annie as she twice motioned her head in Phillip’s direction. Finally, David got the message. He excused himself from the dinner table and asked Phillip to join him on the back porch. The sun had not yet set, and the filtered light through newly emerged leaves gave the backyard a golden glow.
David eased into a rocking chair with a glass of fruity red wine. Nothing like a little Sweet Walter Red to cap off a good meal. Phillip sat beside him on the front edge of an old, peeling Adirondack chair with a can of Genesee beer. After a long winter, the crickets had finally come to life. A late-breaking spring peeper sang in the distance. The family’s two cats, Ritz and Oreo, stood with their faces almost implanted in the porch door screen. Their feline tails wagged a slow beat as they scanned the darkness for the rabbit they’d seen that morning. Christy had disappeared upstairs to do his homework. Annie was far enough away in the kitchen doing dishes that she couldn’t hear the two men talk.
“It’s been a long day,” David said.
“Yes, for sure,” Phillip said. Only half listening, he was frantically searching for the words to tell David that he had almost murdered him that morning.
David put his wine down on the section of ash stump they used for an end table and began to rock slowly. “Phillip, you know your business license and your barber license weren’t hanging on the wall today. I can’t imagine why we forgot to put those up.”
Phillip ducked his head as he cringed. He felt horrible. No way out now, he had to come clean. “Maybe it’s because I didn’t have them.”
David stopped rocking and turned his head to stare at Phillip. “What are you talking about? I gave you the checks. All you had to do was to fill out the forms and send it all to the Bureau of Licenses. You didn’t do that?”
“Yes, I did. Two days ago.”
David’s slammed the back of his head on the chair. “I gave you the checks and the forms almost three weeks ago.”
“I’m sorry. It slipped my mind.”
David looked at the ceiling fan slowly spinning a breeze overhead. “When are you gonna learn, Phillip, that this isn’t like doing time in the box out here? Every day means something on the outside; every completed task means something.”
Phillip took a sip of his Genesee, pausing to lick the foam off his upper lip. It tasted the same to him now as it did back in 1984, the year before they raised the drinking age from 18 to 21. “I’m trying, David. I really am. It’s just that I’m not used to having so many things to do. I don’t know how to do them all. I think I’ve gotten better at it.” Phillip’s head drooped inches away from the beer. He rotated the can slowly with both hands.
David looked over at him and sighed. “Yes, you have gotten better. That’s for sure. But this is a big miss. You can’t operate a business without the proper licenses. That comes before everything else, Phillip. It’s got to be a priority. It’s right there at the top of the list. Do you understand, Phillip?”
“Yes, I do now.”
“Geez, opening up shop without the licenses is just asking for trouble. No wonder the inspector showed up this morning.”
“How did he know we were opening up shop today, though?” Phillip wondered.
David started to rock again. “I don’t know. It takes two days for the mail to get to Albany from here. So I guess they couldn’t have seen the paperwork before he showed up this morning.”
Phillip looked up from his beer and locked on to David’s eyes. “I think they’re watching us. I think they are watching our every move. It’s just like the CO said when they pulled us over: ‘When you guys make a move, we’ll be there to take you down.’”
David was rocking faster now, picking up speed as the tension mounted. “You’re right, but this guy wasn’t a CO.”
“How can we be sure?”
“You said you didn’t recognize him.”
“But there are COs all over the state.”
“It doesn’t add up. We have a hearing date tomorrow, before an administrative court judge. COs can’t do license inspections as peace officers. If COs did do the inspection, this thing will be thrown out of court. No, this all looks legit on the surface. But you’re right to ask about how they knew to hit us today. That’s a good question.”
Phillip sipped his beer, convinced in his core that it was probably a CO raid. He had seen them get away with far worse things. They’d attacked him and then accused him of assaulting them first. Not only did he have the broken bones and missing teeth to prove it—they used that as a reason to keep him in solitary.
David’s rocking slowed again as he stroked his chin thoughtfull
y. “I don’t get it though.”
“What’s that?”
“Well, he wrote us up for everything under the sun, but the one thing he didn’t do was to write us up for failing to have a business license and a barber license.”
“So he missed something. He’s human.” Phillip knew COs sometimes looked the other way when they saw certain violations. There was an unwritten code of what offenses to enforce and what to let slide. Some actions just generated too much paperwork to make it worthwhile to write up a ticket.
“Maybe, but perhaps he meant to skip those violations. He might have done it on purpose.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, but that’s something I’m going to have to check out before the hearing tomorrow.”
David gently rocked with the back of his head resting against the chair, as the moon slowly rose over the batting cage in the backyard.
Sitting quietly, Phillip wiped the condensation from his can with his pants. Finally, he squirmed on his seat and turned slightly toward the rocker. “There’s something I need to share with you, David,” Phillip whispered.
“Sure. What’s on your mind?”
“Please understand that I’m real uncomfortable talking about the topic. I’m afraid I might say the wrong thing and offend you. I’m not so good with words here, on the outside. I know what I’m thinking on the inside but sometimes now the words don’t match my feelings and I think it comes off wrong.”
“I think that’s probably happened to everyone, including me. When I was younger, I had a difficult time expressing my feelings for Annie in words. I told her that and she understood. It was easier to express my love through my behavior.”
“Hold that thought, David.” Phillip didn’t want to go down David’s path. He didn’t know where it was leading. It was like David was taking him on one of his field trips to some place potentially uncomfortable. It was probably innocent enough. But it didn’t make it any easier for him to talk about how he was tempted to kill David while David talked about how much he loved his wife. “You need to let me take the lead on this topic.”
David was taken aback by Phillip’s forthright tone. On the one hand, he was pleased to see Phillip’s confidence. On the other hand, his mind raced as to what he might have said or done to bother him so much. “Okay, sure, what’s on your mind?”
“It’s a difficult topic for me to discuss. I don’t want you to react until I’m done.”
“Is it something I said or did, Phillip?”
“That’s the thing. I don’t know. Just promise you won’t have a reaction.” Phillip heard the music coming from Christy’s bedroom and the clanking of dinnerware from the kitchen as Annie loaded the dishwasher. The last thing he wanted was for them to hear that he had an urge to kill David. Phillip wondered if he should wait for a better time and place. But he also thought that with Annie and Christy around, perhaps David would be less likely to fly off the handle. He needed to tell David before he went to bed. Maybe then the demons would leave or at least take a long vacation so he could sleep. But how do you tell your best friend—your only true friend—that you want to murder him?
“Okay, Phillip—”
“Just don’t react tonight. We can talk about it some more later. I think that would help us both if we kept talking about it. I know it would help me.”
“All right, Phillip, I promise already. What’s on your mind?”
Phillip took a deep breath. “Look, David, I know I might be screwed up in the head. I think I was doing okay inside the box. I mean, I adjusted to the box. I really didn’t have any choice but to adjust to it. If I didn’t adjust, the walls, the ceilings, the COs—they all would have crushed me. You see, once you bug out, once they break you, you don’t come back. I’ve never seen anyone come back. I knew deep down inside that I wasn’t much better than the bug-outs and the only thing separating me from them was one bad day, one bad moment. Do you understand?”
“Yeah. I mean, I’ve tried as best I can to comprehend your living situation. I know that I can never fully stand in your shoes. Oh, sure, I did some time in protective custody. I have a feel for solitary. But I did thirty days, not thirty years.”
“Well, I had to make some adjustments to survive on the inside and I’ve discovered—you’ve helped me discover—that a lot of those adjustments don’t apply to life on the outside.”
“Right. I think you and I have talked about that over the past few months.”
“Yes, but I’ve got to talk about this on another level. I have to talk about things going on in my head—deep inside it—things I can’t control.”
“You mean like your subconscious?”
“Yeah, and it takes place most of the times when I sleep or after I wake up. You see, I think these adjustments to the outside are causing me to have crazy dreams. At first, I thought they were just dreams and, you know, I’d just blow them off. But they have gotten more intense, and more real every day.”
“What are the dreams about?”
“You.”
“Me?” David’s eyes almost popped out. He froze in his chair and studied Phillip’s stance. His companion was leaning over, forearms resting on his knees, his head drooping almost between his legs. He couldn’t—or wouldn’t—make eye contact with David. “What am I doing in your dreams?”
“Nothing. You’re dead.”
“Really? So how did I die?”
“I murdered you.”
Silence.
David’s eyes bulged and his head bounced around like a bobblehead in slow motion as he tried to process it all. Yeah, he didn’t like the idea of being offed by Phillip—even if it was in a dream. But it was only a dream. And Phillip wasn’t a murderer in real life. Christy dreamed the same things, and David knew Christy wasn’t going to off him. “Any particular reason why you killed me?”
“No.”
David shrugged. “I don’t know what to say. I mean, it’s just a dream. I wouldn’t worry about it.”
“But I’m afraid I might carry out those thoughts in real life. I’m afraid I might really kill you.”
Now David looked at Phillip like he was staring down the barrel of a gun. The thought that the man he was trying so hard to help might kill him was hard to accept. David was tired. He wanted to dismiss Phillip’s dream and call it a night. But the horror on Phillip’s face was a wake-up call. The dream threatened to become reality in Phillip’s head and that’s all that mattered.
David now saw Phillip in an entirely new light. Phillip wasn’t just someone in dire need of help; he was also a threat. Phillip was not only a threat to him, but also a threat to his family. Why did I bring him into my life? Why did I bring him into our lives? I should know better. This man is a ticking time-bomb and I invited him into our home. What was I thinking? I should have seen this coming a mile away. No good deed ever goes unpunished.
David had to probe, but he was afraid to hear the answer. “Why do you think you might act on these dreams?”
Phillip was going to tell David that he was seconds away from killing him that morning. He was going to spill the gory details. That was the plan he promised himself he’d follow after the inspector left and they closed the shop. Make a full confession to cleanse the soul. But the terrified look on David’s face, the afterglow of a wonderful meal, Christy’s dream lecture, and the simple passage of time had made him reconsider. Maybe I’ve said enough already. Maybe I just had a bad morning. There were a lot of new things going on today and maybe I’ll handle it better once I get used to the job. I don’t have the urge to kill him. It’s the farthest thing from my mind. The thought of killing him now is repulsive. I might have said enough to relieve my guilt—to get my mind on a better path. My God, look at all he’s done for me. If I tell him any more details, I might lose him. Without David, I’d be dead or back in prison. Maybe that’s where I should be anyway. My brain is so scrambled after what they did to me. I need to patch the thing up; I can’t fix it alone. He swallowed
hard and said, “It’s just that the dreams seem so real.”
David rocked a bit and looked skyward. There was a full moon rising and David thought that was fitting for the horror show playing out on his porch. Afraid was the word that kept coming to mind. Phillip was afraid he might act on his dreams in real life. He was afraid he might really kill David. Maybe so long as a person is afraid to live their dreams, they won’t act on them. When is a killer afraid to kill? When does a killer pre-announce that to his next victim? Maybe this is a lot like Christy’s dreams. “Did you have these same dreams in prison too?”
Phillip wasn’t going to lie. He thought himself incapable of it. If there was one thing that Phillip owed to his father—or more specifically, his belt—was his unwillingness to lie, though bending the truth could happen. That had been a necessity to survive the box. “Yes, I’ve had similar dreams.”
“About killing me?”
“Yes.”
“Did you talk to anyone about them at prison? A psychologist, a psychiatrist?”
“Impossible,” Phillip said shaking his head. “The system is so messed up.”
“What do you mean?”
“When the demons had me by the throat in the box, I wanted to talk to someone, anyone. But I couldn’t. If asked to see a psychologist, he’d give his therapy right outside my cell, my gate. Same with the chaplain. They wouldn’t take you to a private room. That is by design. Inmates all around me could overhear anything they talked about with me. And once some of these guys sense a weakness in you, they’ll exploit it 24/7, and they’d spread the word to everyone. Then they’d all talk trash all the time. Try and get you to bug out. Reaching out only causes you more pain. And if they found out I was taking pills, they’d yell all day that I was a medication-taker, couldn’t handle the box, was going to bug out. Nope, no privacy for you. It’s easier to break you then. The COs want to break you so they can control you. Control is always the goal. But once you’re broken, it’s all over for you. You’re a vegetable. But it’s a new day for the mental health department—they will have a long-term patient. And the pharma companies will have a long-term income stream.”