Reading behind Bars

by Jill Grunenwald

  I devoured the entire Shopaholic series of Sophie Kinsella, a “chick lit” series about a London woman with a spending problem. It was light fare, the kind of title often classified as beach reading, but it was fun and kept me entertained. Often to the point that I would take the long way just to give myself additional listening time.

  Through audiobooks I also discovered travel writer Bill Bryson. He is best known for A Walk in the Woods, his memoir about hiking the Appalachian Trail, but through his often hilarious books I also learned about his adventures in Australia and England, along with learning facts about cities in my own country here in the United States.

  Audiobooks also introduced me to David Sedaris. To this day, while I have read almost all of Sedaris’s books, I’ve never, technically speaking, “read” any of them. Instead, I’ve always opted for the audiobook version, which Sedaris usually narrates himself. Something about having the author of the memoir narrate the audiobook adds such a nuanced layer to the experience of reading the book. Reading words on the stagnant page required relying on my own background and voice. With memoirs, that reading experience is elevated when the author presents the inflections and tone just the way they wrote it.

  The prison owned a copy of Me Talk Pretty One Day, which I was delighted to discover when I perused the shelves one quiet afternoon shortly after starting at the prison. I pulled the title from the shelf and went back to my desk. Opening the familiar chalkboard green cover, I started to read the words on the page, but it all fell flat. Even when I tried to mimic Sedaris’s voice in my head, it wasn’t the same experience as hearing Sedaris narrate it.

  Audiobooks are a bit controversial in the literary community. My stance: whoever says they aren’t the same as reading a physical book is full of shit. It’s also ableist to suggest that it doesn’t “count” as reading. Audiobooks are certainly a different way of reading, but it’s still reading. For some individuals, audiobooks are the only way they can read and ingest books. It’s like arguing Braille books don’t count because the person uses their hands instead of their eyes.

  My current commute from my apartment in downtown Cleveland to Grafton meant that audiobooks were a must. There was no way I was going to get through such a long drive without them.

  That said, even with all of my reading, both physical books and audiobooks, I had nothing on the inmates at the prison. With little else to do but sit around and read, the library had a regular rotating group of inmates who visited on a daily basis, often in need of new books each day because they had already plowed through the ones they had checked out the day before.

  Other than their assigned job, which took up three or four hours a day, the inmates didn’t have much else to do. The rest of their day was essentially made up of free time. For the inmates, their idea of free time consisted of visiting the recreation room or the library or hanging out in the yard, weather permitting.

  But even as far as prisons go, that’s a privileged position. Because this was a minimum security camp, the inmates were free to roam during open hours. At other, higher-security facilities, every minute of the day is planned and organized. The inmates are herded from building to building, no choice given as to where or when they go. At maximum security prisons and super-max, inmates stay locked up for twenty-three hours a day.

  More than once, I had an inmate tell me he consistently came to the library because it kept him out of trouble. Back in the main house, there were too many opportunities for trouble. Being bored left a door open for situations to arise or conflicts to combust. But the library was only open for a few hours every day, so during those times when we weren’t open—often at night, when their only option was to hang out in the bunks—they needed something to occupy their time.

  So they read.

  They read James Patterson and John Grisham and V. C. Andrews. They read Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. They read Nora Roberts for the romance and J. D. Robb for the suspense, not always realizing they were the same author. They read fantasy and science fiction and historical fiction and romance. They read to remember and to forget.

  Through the ILL service they requested The Help and The Lost Symbol, because they had seen the titles on the New York Times Bestseller list. One inmate, an older white gentleman with a close clipped mustache, was determined to get The Shack because his family had recommended it to him. I also had multiple requests for The Secret, despite it being a few years old by that point. However, when your options are limited, you try to change what you can however you can.

  Men found religion among the pages of The Left Behind series. The pages were torn, spines cracked from so many times being read. The series was so popular, the individual titles impossible to keep on the shelf, that the prison chaplain kept the last book in the series under lock and key lest it be swiped by stealing hands.

  Like all readers, men in prison read to escape. My love for George R.R. Martin’s sweeping fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire (the inspiration behind HBO’s Game of Thrones) isn’t just because of the dragons and magic involved. No, it’s because for the duration of my reading—which, given the length of each book, is a long while—I am temporarily transported to the world of Westeros.

  In prison, outsiders tend to think there is only one means of escape: up and over the razor-wire fence, or digging holes underground (or, if you’re Andy Dufresne, through holes in the walls hidden by posters of Rita Hayworth). But, in fact, like on the outside, if the situation is so dire, there are other means of escaping.

  I continued my weekly visit every Friday to the Segregation unit to see if anyone wanted any books, with a potential return visit on Saturday to fulfill any requests. The unit had a small black metal bookcase tucked into the corner near the recreation area that I kept stocked with paperbacks, rotating them out every month or so to make sure there was always fresh books for the inmates to read.

  On a particular September Saturday, as I was walking down the long hallway, a shiver ran down my spine. It was an austere hallway, empty of all staff because it was the weekend. Something about the silence unnerved me. Something was wrong.

  When Bolton opened the door for me, my eyes zeroed in on an unfamiliar correctional officer sitting in a chair in front of the closed door of a cell, a notebook balanced on his lap. The meal tray, usually closed, was open, the gap in the door at eye level with the officer.

  Bolton silently waved me in.

  I stepped into the space, shifting my basket of books to my other arm. I leaned down towards Lopez. “What’s going on?” I whispered.

  Lopez used his chin to gesture in the direction of the unknown correctional officer. “Connor is in there,” Lopez said, ‘in there’ being the cell. “Suicide attempt.”

  I gripped the basket to make sure I didn’t drop it and disrupt the silence. My own mental health was razor thin these days, although I hid it as best I could. It took all of my mental and emotional energy to keep my shit at the gate, to not bring it here to the library. But in doing so, I had no mental or emotional energy to spare. So when intrusive thoughts began to gather in my mind, climbing into the corners like cobwebs, I didn’t have any brooms left to sweep them away.

  “He was in the medical unit,” Bolton continued, not noticing the white-knuckle grip I had on my basket of books. “Used his bedsheets. One end tied around the bedpost, the other end around his neck.”

  Jesus. I didn’t know Connor well, but I knew who he was. He wasn’t an everyday visitor to the library, but he came by frequently enough. Just a few months ago, in fact, we had that conversation about the baseball game and now . . .

  “So the officer. . .” I asked.

  “Douglas,” Lopez said with a nod towards him. “Suicide watch.”

  Suicide watch in prison takes multiple forms, depending on the severity of the risk. Close watch requires a staff member to check in on the inmate at “irregular, staggered intervals not to exceed fifteen minutes.” Five minutes this time, eight minutes the next time; two minutes here, o
ne minute there. The officer can’t allow a pattern to happen, otherwise pockets of free time can be found and a plan can be executed.

  But I wasn’t witnessing close watch. I’d been standing there for two or three minutes and Correctional Officer Douglas hadn’t moved. His gaze hadn’t shifted, either: all of his energy was focused on Connor inside that cell. I was witnessing constant watch.

  Constant watch is just what it sounded like: for a period of time, as defined by the prison, Connor would be constantly watched. Whereas with close watch the correctional officer on staff could come and go for small intervals, the officer assigned to Connor had to sit close by. And watch. Constantly. The notebook he had balanced in his lap was there so he could write notes about anything Connor said or did while Douglas was monitoring him.

  “What happened?” I finally asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

  Somehow, Bolton knew what I wasn’t asking. “We had to strip his cell,” he said.

  Lopez and Bolton went on to tell me that Connor had been in the medical unit. The medical unit at the prison worked a little bit like a hospital, where there are staff members who come and go, and check on the patients. But unless there is any indication that the inmate is at risk for harming himself, he isn’t watched more closely than any other inmate in there.

  While in his cell, Connor tied the bedsheet into a noose and attempted to strangle himself. He was found and rescued before any real injury could occur, but because of the suicide attempt he was moved from the medical unit to the Segregation unit where Bolton and Lopez could keep close watch on him.

  But, that apparently wasn’t enough to deter Connor. Whatever was going on with him was severe enough that he once again attempted to kill himself while in jail, this time from his Segregation cell. Segregation cells are quite bare, containing nothing but the most basic of necessities, like a bed and a toilet. In an effort to minimize the potential for more incidents, Lopez and Bolton had stripped everything but the absolute bare minimum of items required in the cell. Nothing else was allowed and now Connor was on constant watch: twenty-four hours a day, someone would be watching him and writing down everything. Every little thing was monitored and put on the record. As someone who already leans towards jittery, thanks to both anxiety and copious amounts of caffeine, just the idea of being constantly watched set my teeth on edge, while the thought of having every action, no matter how minor, recorded set off my fight-or-flight response. I was struggling with my own internal issues and this hit a bit too close to home.

  Not to put too fine a point on it, but figuring out a way to shuffle off this mortal coil had passed across the hazy dark fog of my brain more than once over the past few months. I had a support system of friends and family, but I was embarrassed to ask for help. To admit how bad things were. I didn’t know how to tell people I spent evenings crying over some asshole who cheated on me. It felt, well, pathetic. It had been several months since our breakup, so why was I still this upset? Why was I still struggling every morning just to get out of bed?

  I had thought about suicide, more than once. Connor, it seemed, had made an attempt to do so. And the prison, while perhaps not a person’s first choice of support system, wasn’t going to let him succeed.

  People’s feelings regarding suicide in prison can be complicated. In September 2013, Ariel Castro, the man guilty of holding three Cleveland women hostage in the basement of his home, was found hanging from a bedsheet. He wasn’t on suicide watch, but due to his notoriety, Castro was subject to frequent checks. Or he was supposed to be; later, it was discovered that two of the corrections officers had falsified their log documents. ODRC pushed back, suggesting his death had been accidental, the result of auto-erotic asphyxiation. But the coroner held firm to her suicide ruling.

  After the news of Castro’s death broke, reactions were mixed. Some people were happy he had killed himself. Happy that he was dead. On the other side, I remember discussing it with some of my now-former colleagues at the prison, and we entertained the idea that he had done it because he knew his life in prison was going to be hell, and he was looking for an out. I still think it was an easy out, that he had somehow cheated the long prison sentence he deserved for what he had done to Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry, and Gina DeJesus. More than once we called him a coward in regard to his death.

  For the prison, suicides—especially high-profile suicides—are a lot of red tape, a lot of paperwork, and a hell of a lot of bad press for the facility, so it would make sense that the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction would suggest an alternative explanation for Castro’s death. It also would explain why our prison worked hard to keep a man alive who clearly did not want to be.

  Was it just an effort to cover their own ass and avoid any negative publicity? Probably? Maybe? I honestly don’t know. I also don’t know how I would have felt myself in that moment, if I had made an honest attempt and ended up being saved and revived. Sure, now, a decade later I’m thrilled to be here and to have a thriving life. But I wasn’t in prison. I wasn’t struggling to make it day by day by day, minute by minute by minute behind bars.

  I also don’t know what happened, ultimately, to Connor. After his time in Segregation, he was moved back to general population and, eventually, was released. But I don’t know where he is now or if he is even alive. If he is, I at least hope he’s living a life that makes him happy that the staff and officers at our prison refused to let him die, even if it was just so they didn’t have to deal with a mountain of paperwork.

  Chapter 13

  Something Wicked This Way Comes

  Inmate library aides shall be utilized to assist in providing services to the inmate population. Inmate library aides shall be utilized to provide support services to the library including, but not limited to, book processing, shelving, and maintenance of the library itself.

  —ODRC Policy 58-LIB-02

  October had arrived. The prison was surrounded by a forest of trees, leaves ablaze with the colors of late fall. Every drive to and from work was a rising spectrum of sunsets and sunrises, the language of late autumn translated through a blend of reds and oranges.

  As Lucy Maud Montgomery once wrote, “I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”

  Halloween fell on a Saturday that year, the perfect culmination of the celestial calendar. Halloween is my favorite holiday and my favorite part of autumn, which is saying something as I was born in November. My friends and I had plans to go out that evening, and our costumes had been planned months in advance. First, though, I had to get through my shift at work.

  Unfortunately, dressing up was not an option. In grad school I was able to at least get away with a pair of devil horns and a red shirt (although I would often get double takes from colleagues. I can still envision the looks on their faces when it suddenly dawned on them why the quiet librarian was sporting red horns). The prison, however, had a strict dress code: business casual, and no denim (not even skirts or jackets). Even our shoes had to be professional. No open-toed shoes allowed.

  However, about once a quarter, the prison did hold a staff dress-down day for charity. If we wanted to dress down, we had to pay $1 upon arrival, which would go towards that quarter’s charity. The charities were always personal, usually benefiting the school of one of the staff members’ kids, or helping with a family member’s medical expenses. Correctional officers were exempt from being allowed to dress down, although they could still always donate to the charity.

  Unfortunately, Halloween was not one of those days, and while the skeleton crew of staff members meant I could probably get away with a slightly more casual look, I didn’t want to risk it and opted to maintain the standard business casual dress code.

  When I arrived that morning, I noticed an eerie silence lay thick and heavy like a fog. In this weather, the fitness equipment looked like the skeleton of some yet unidentified creature of a science fiction movie, the bleak clouds rolling in behind it a dire warning. Blackbirds
perched and bounced along its metallic bones, their sharp caws cutting through the still air. A storm was minutes from breaking, the clouds opening up and flooding the yard. I knew rain was in the forecast for the evening, which would be a serious damper on my Halloween festivities.

  As I unlocked the door of the library, I kept peeking over my shoulder to watch the fitness equipment, wary. I knew my Hitchcock films. The last thing I wanted to deal with was a flock of blackbirds attacking me outside the library.

  “Good morning, Ms. G.,” Booker said as he walked into the library for his morning shift. I stood in the foyer, erasing the whiteboard and putting a new historical fact up. Shortly after deciding to start utilizing the whiteboard in this way, I had taken the extra step of coming up with an interesting “On This Day in History” selection for every single day of the coming year. That included February 29, for those leap years. From now on, I no longer had to scramble to pick a fact every morning and, in my absence, even my coverage could update the board, too.

  “Morning Booker,” I responded. I uncapped the black dry-erase marker and held the tip to the board. The open binder was balanced in my left hand as I began writing with my right: October 31, 1926: Magician Harry Houdini died.

  I put the cap back on the marker and closed the binder. Stepping back into the main part of the library, I settled myself back behind my desk. I glanced at the schedule on my desk and frowned. Carlton was running late, although I knew the prison’s administration had switched the order of the housing units for meals, so it’s possible he got stuck back at the house and the officers wouldn’t let him leave to come to work.

  It was a balancing act, managing the schedule, while still adhering to the rules of the prison. It didn’t help that the hours of the library provided an overlap that made it easy for the inmates to exploit and bypass the rules themselves. The housing units went down to meals one house at a time: if they were on the first shift, they would have to go back to the housing unit before the library was opened and while some would walk very, very, veeeeeeeery slowly to wait the time out, most of the time they were ushered along by correctional officers. Loitering was not allowed, and if an officer was feeling particularly ungenerous, the inmate could be written up for it.