by Joan Barfoot
“Yeah,” Roddy said. “Wrong time, wrong place.”
“She die?”
“No. Still in the hospital, though.” He didn’t want to say paralyzed. It would make her sound too much a victim, himself too much someone who only really defeated the helpless. “My lawyer got the attempt murder charge dropped.” He tried to sound as casual as Dare. Word gets around.
Darryl likes to talk, but he could be a worse cellmate. At least he doesn’t go on and on about nothing. It’s not completely impossible, when they’re in the cell together, at the end of days that already feel endless when there’s months and months more to come, for Roddy to slip behind closed eyelids into the visions he needs to hold on to. He can still, if he tries hard, make out a flare of bright hair, the skin he could almost see through, most of all the eyes that saw right into him. The days are hard, and the nights, too. Not much silence. There’s so much yelling and other noise, practically round the clock, it’s kind of insane. Everybody seems angry, prisoners and guards, too, and not just about small day-to-day matters. Roddy’s kind of angry himself, but keeps in mind that quiet menace is the weapon he has, if he has any at all, if he needs one. It’s not so much that bad things happen here, although they do, but that everybody goes around as if they could happen, any second and for any reason, or for that matter for no reason. There is not a moment’s rest from knowing that.
He still has the dreams that wake him up, but even in sleep, he’s learned not to wake up upset in any obvious way. He’s trained himself already towards desolation — there’s a word he comes upon in English class and likes the sound of — and silence. The dreams of his mother come the same every time, but they’re still a surprise every time. He wakes up to the idea that, never mind what he thinks he remembers, he mustn’t have been very lovable. He must have had something about him that turned his mother’s heart away and took her to the railing of that bridge off which, night after night, he continues, sometimes gently, sometimes not, to finally push her.
Later in the day, occupied and fully awake, he can think, so what. Shit happens. To hell with it.
Only, not first thing in the morning.
Anyway, there’s better dreams to have.
He has some of those, too.
But you can’t count on dreams. The counsellor here, or therapist, or whatever she is, that he got dragged off to see once, more to come, asked him stuff like that: is he sleeping well here, does he have dreams, what are they. Like he’d tell her. Like he’d say anything about trying to hold a vision when he’s awake, and in his sleep having a completely different one. How in a dream he puts his fingertips onto the perfect round nipples of that Alix, that Starglow, and is wakened, those much happier times, by something like electricity.
Like some woman maybe in her forties should hear that? So she could tell him this and that about it that wouldn’t be right at all? No way.
She looks okay, but that’s likely her job, to look okay to guys here. He saw her his first full day here, but not since then, in a little grey office down a mile of long grey corridors. She stood up from behind a grey metal desk and stuck out her hand and said, “I’m Mrs. Shaw. Hello, Rod,” which was a good start. “I’ll be in charge of your counselling and education program. I mean setting you up in courses, not teaching them myself. I do personal and group counselling, though, so we’ll be spending a fair amount of time together, one way and another.”
He shrugged. She had one of those business-type leather briefcases that she slapped down on the table and opened with a sharp double click. It was jammed full, and messy. She was kind of jammed full and messy, too, but with a low voice and friendly eyes. People probably found it easy to tell her things, he figured, although he wouldn’t be one of them.
She said, “I’d say from those tests you did, and from your school records, that you have a lot of potential. That’s not as rare here as you might think, but it’s a very good start. It gives us something productive to work with. Hope that when you leave, you’ll be better off than you probably feel you are today.” He had nothing to say to that; although hope would be nice. Also he liked knowing that, same as Stan at the detention centre, she realized he wasn’t hopeless.
“And I have a copy of your pre-sentence report here. Comments from your family, some of your teachers and friends, a couple of people you worked for.”
He was startled into saying, “You talked to people?”
“Well, no, Rod, I didn’t, but other people did. A PSR goes to the judge before someone is sentenced, to help the judge figure out the best thing to do.” So people had conversations about him. Felt free to talk, give details, tell stories, maybe true, maybe not. Is just anybody allowed to start demanding this and that about his life now?
Would Mike have been asked questions about him? Could Mike talk about Roddy without faltering, without showing anything? Roddy was desperate to ask this Mrs. Shaw, “What did Mike say?” Also, “What’s he doing, does he still work at Goldie’s? Did anybody notice if he looks like he’s keeping a secret? Was he uncomfortable talking about me? Or sad? Or did he keep his mouth shut?”
Is Mike haunted? Does he feel guilty? Does he wonder how Roddy is doing, does he wonder at Roddy setting out to protect him?
Does he think about the woman at all?
There are no answers from Mike, who hasn’t called or written or visited, as far as Roddy knows. Maybe he tried. Maybe nothing gets through.
He must wonder, though. Except Roddy can’t be sure of that, not any more. They’ve gone off in totally different directions, him and Mike. One moment in Goldie’s.
“It looks to me,” Mrs. Shaw said, “as if you have a nice family. Your grandmother and your dad speak very highly of you.” They do? Even his dad? His dad spoke at all? “You and your father moved in with your grandmother when you were what, seven?” He nodded. “Can you tell me your first memory before then? What you recall from when you were very small? Where you lived, your home then?” She looked inviting; there was something shrewd about those blue eyes, though, something about how she widened them that didn’t look natural.
There was nothing to say. His mother laughing and playing, making up dramas and games, and days when she didn’t get dressed. “I don’t remember much. We lived in a house, it seemed big but I was only a kid, so I don’t know. Then we moved.”
“After your mother got sick.”
He shook his head sharply, felt his lips tighten. He had no words for this woman on that subject, none at all. At least she noticed. Or at least she didn’t push at him. “How did you feel about moving?” she asked instead.
Violently. He felt violently enough to scream and kick and resist the whole way. “Okay, I guess. My grandmother’s okay.”
“Yes, she sounds it. And your father?”
“Yeah, him too.”
She waited a few seconds. “Still, it must have been a big change for you, moving to a different house in a different place, without your mother. Did you find it very difficult?”
Not after he and Mike started hanging out, which was practically right away. Then it wasn’t so bad. “Not really.”
And so on: about school, about friends, about hobbies and habits, all questions he did his best not to answer. “Where did you get the idea for the robbery?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. TV, maybe.”
Finally she smiled slightly and looked at her watch and said, “I expect that’s enough for the time being. I’ll tell you what I think we’ll do next, and that’s assign you shortly to one of the groups that meet every week. Everybody takes turns discussing their questions and problems, things that have come up in their lives. Most people find it quite useful, although I bet you don’t think much of the idea right now. You’d be surprised, though, how often people learn they have a good deal in common, and how helpful it is to exchange points of view and experiences. So I’ll orga
nize that for you, and we’ll see how it goes. I really do think you’ll find it interesting. And of course it helps you get to know some of the others better, too.”
Oh no, that wouldn’t be happening. Exchange points of view and experiences? He didn’t think so. He’s not the kind of person, it turns out, who gets second chances. He sure can’t have guys knowing he has dreams, or for sure that he’s cried. He’d be really fucked then. Sit around in a circle of guys talking about backgrounds and crimes, motivations and hopes? Their feelings, like they should have any here?
Bad idea.
Still, maybe she meant well, maybe she truly had hopes.
More likely she figured he’s just an asshole. One among many.
“Now,” and she leaned forward, passing a sheet of paper over the desk to him, white paper grid-lined in day-blocks along the top, time-blocks down the side, “here’s your class schedule. Our goal, I think, will be to get you the high school credits you need to graduate by the end of your time here. That should be doable, if you buckle down. You’ll begin tomorrow. What do you think?”
It hardly seemed to matter what he thought, did it, if it was done, decided, and starting tomorrow? “Okay.”
“Good. You’ll get your books and other supplies when you turn up for class. I expect you’ll do fine. It may sound strange, but in many ways it’s easier here. Not the courses, but the learning.”
That did sound strange, but it turns out she’s right. He’s taking math, history, and English, and one thing that’s different is that there’s no way to skip, there isn’t any kind of decision to make about that. Also that there’s only guys, and that every classroom has a guard as well as a teacher. The teachers come from outside. They probably like it that there’s no skipping, and that mostly the classes are pretty quiet, because of the guards. They maybe don’t like it that a lot of the guys are either really stupid or let on like they are, pretending they’re sleeping, some of them, or staring up at the ceiling, or just sitting there not lifting a pencil. Also different is that the desks and chairs are bolted down.
Classes take up a little over three hours a day. Some of the stuff he already knows from before. Sometimes he has to put an effort into not looking too smart. He doesn’t think that’s one of the good ways to get attention around here.
Everybody also gets assigned chores, really massive ones, not like weeding or trimming a hedge or vacuuming. He’s in the kitchen this week, next week the laundry. In the kitchen he peels bag after bag of potatoes, pile after pile of carrots. It’s stinking hot, there’s always a racket of pots slamming around, and mainly it’s mindless and his fingers hurt and he’s aware of how closely he’s watched, due to having knives in his hands. He has no idea why this work gets done here by prisoners, “clients,” they’re called, instead of getting shipped in from outside. Maybe it’s supposed to be discipline, or training, or punishment.
He doubts the laundry will be easier, or more interesting, and Darryl says it’s even hotter and steamier.
He and Dare aren’t assigned to the same jobs at the same time. “They like to keep everybody mixed up and moving around,” Dare says. “So there’s not too much buddy-buddy.” Dare reckons he can be out of here, himself, in eleven more months; just before Roddy, if Roddy also keeps his nose clean. That’s Dare’s goal, “keeping my nose clean, keeping them happy,” and he’s been here for a couple of years already, so he should know how that works. Roddy almost immediately figured out that Dare must have been only fourteen, maybe fifteen, when he stabbed the frat guy. Hard to know how different he’s gotten in here, but it’s pretty freaky, thinking of a kid that age out on the street in the middle of the night, so bad off he’d kill somebody. A kid who has grown older and stronger and is now Roddy’s cellmate.
He’s okay so far with Roddy, though, at least has been willing to point out the most basic customs and rules.
But the third night, something creepy happened that made Roddy think if Darryl got into a better state of mind here, it’d be some kind of miracle. Same thing happened the next night, then there was a break for a while until again last night, around midnight, one of the guards came and unlocked the cell door and gestured to Dare to get up and get out. Dare came back bleeding from the nose the first time, limping and bent over the second, and last night he vomited, mainly into the crapper.
No wonder Roddy sleeps lightly, dreams uneasily.
“What happened?” he asked the first time, and could have bitten his tongue, such a stupid, maybe dangerous, question. Still, how could he have avoided asking, “Can I do something?” thinking at least of stopping the blood that sprayed the cell when Dare shook his head.
Well, it’s not what Roddy figured at first, what he most feared, what everybody’s most scared of in jails. It’s more of a game, as Darryl finally explained it, but probably not one that’s going to bear down on Roddy “unless they decide to use you for bait. You know, like training fight dogs with puppies, shit like that.”
Okay, that was insulting, but being insulted is better than some of the things that can happen here.
Dare talked about it like it’s just something he does, just another thing to put up with, but what it is, is a middle-of-the-night boxing club, organized by bored, maybe greedy guards. They roust out their favourite inmates, and their unfavourites. They set them up inside a ring of tables and chairs in one of the rec halls. They place bets, and then the guys fight. “No rules,” Dare explained. “Except, don’t get killed, or kill anybody, because that’d be too hard to explain.”
It’s like street fighting, he said; wild wrestling, no gloves or timed rounds or real regulations. “It’s complicated, though. Like if you’re the betting favourite, but you lose, you’re in all kinds of shit. Not right then, but later. Or I guess if you win when you’re not supposed to, but that hasn’t happened to me.”
“Doesn’t anybody notice the next day when you’re all smashed up?”
“Oh shit, everybody knows, except maybe the top brass, those kind of people. And you know, people fall down. They trip over stuff or bang into things, who’s to know? They can think all they want, but they’re not going to know.”
It would be dumb to even wonder why guys who are tough and have real serious records — like Darryl, for one — go along with this. It’s because this place is all about power. Who has it, who doesn’t. At the high end there’s the guards, who are up close, with immediate or invisible powers. Administrators, those “top brass,” don’t count. Sure as shit therapists don’t. It’s useful to see power stripped down, no camouflage or extra flesh, so he sees how it really works.
“I’m good,” Dare said, like even if it wasn’t his choice, he was still proud of himself. “I don’t hardly get beat.” Quick grin through battered lips. “At least not when I’m not supposed to get beat.”
“So you were supposed to this time?”
“Shit no, why’d you think that? You should see the other guy.” All this confirms Roddy’s belief that going unnoticed is best. He also has a feeling that because Darryl was chosen, Roddy doesn’t need to be; like he’s somehow hiding, or hidden, behind Dare’s in-demand fists. The idea of just-one-from-a-cell doesn’t make sense and is not likely true, but it seems like it might be. He feels a little bad about that, but safer.
Besides classes and chores, there’s workshops in this and that. It’s amazing how many sharp tools get into the hands of guys who might want to use them. Not just the kitchen, with its knives; Roddy signed up for woodworking, and is learning about chisels and lathes. So far he’s made a salad bowl set, one big one, four small, all a bit tipsy and rough, but still real-looking and useful, although the wood is donated and is obviously not the best grain. It’s kind of cool, feeling it turn and shape in his hands and become something.
He gave the bowls to his grandmother to take home with her. She’s been once, on her own because his da
d was working. She caught a bus north, and said she’d try to make the journey at least once a month, maybe twice. It wouldn’t be easy for her to do that. For one thing she’s so big, it has to be really uncomfortable on a bus. She took the bowls and said, “Oh, Roddy, these are lovely. You do have an eye. I’ll take very good care of them.” He knows she will; she’s sentimental that way.
She also said, “Will you be all right here? Do you feel safe?”
“Sure, it’s not as bad as it looks, honest.”
She was nervous; out of place and unfamiliar, of course, with the customs. She chatted on for a while about people in town, little events, keeping the air filled, as best she could. It wasn’t very interesting. He didn’t know the people she spoke of, her acquaintances or his dad’s, very well. A minor accident involving one of her friends and a transport going through town was as good as it got. Roddy understands that of course the most interesting of the town’s news is bad, and so falls too uncomfortably close to his own bad news. Which will have been a huge deal, and humiliating for her and his dad, no need to say it out loud.
Just before she left, she got tears in her eyes, and started shaking her head back and forth. She looked even sadder right then than his mother, in his dreams, up on the bridge. “Oh, Roddy,” she said, “I’m so sorry all this has happened. I never dreamed such a thing, never once.”
Well, he could have said, but did not, you can’t count on dreams anyway. Dreams don’t mean shit.
What he did say was “You don’t have to come visit, Grandma, I’m fine. It’s a long way on a bus and it’s not for a whole lot more months. I’m okay.”
“Of course you need visitors, Roddy, and I don’t mind a bit. I miss you, I want to see you. Anyway, most times your dad will be driving, it’s just, this time he couldn’t. And you know, the bus is quite interesting. Lots of interesting people.”
Yes, he imagined: others coming this way.
“So by bus or by car, dear, I’ll be back very soon. You won’t be forgotten, believe me. You’re very precious to me.”