by Jace Killan
“What have you got there?”
“Just my socks, sir.”
“You’re wearing your socks, chief. Give it here.”
What could he do? He passed it over to the guard and prayed it wasn’t anything damning.
Fischer tossed the ball in the air and shook his head. “I’m going to ask you one more time, kid. Did Burke send you?”
Joaquin shook his head and lowered his gaze.
Fischer unrolled the socks revealing a small wad of cash. “What is this?”
Joaquin shrugged.
“What the hell is this?” Fischer’s face burned red and his fist swung up before Joaquin could react.
Joaquin’s view turned black and he fell to the floor. He fought to regain his faculties. Slowly, his vision returned. It was blurred and mobile at first, and then the pain hit him, his head hurt, bringing him back to full consciousness like a cold shower.
Fischer stood over him, shaking the wad of cash. “There’s not even a hundred bucks here. You tell that lying sack that if I don’t get the full grand within an hour, he’s dead. Got that?”
Fisher extended his hand to help Joaquin to his feet, though Joaquin readied himself for another blow. It didn’t come. Fisher helped him up then withdrew a cell phone and handed it over. “Tell him he needs to call whoever he needs to call, get me cash, or deposit it in my PayPal. He knows the drill. One hour.” Fischer held up a single finger to illustrate the point. “One hour.”
Joaquin waited for the short but stalky guard to leave before heading back to his bunk. There he found Burke, sitting, waiting. Joaquin relayed what had happened, except for his throbbing jaw and fat lip.
As it turned out, Burke just wanted to use the phone. He actually had the cash to pay Fischer but needed to make some calls for reasons Joaquin would never know. After Burke had finished his business he handed Joaquin the phone and another sock ball. “Take this...” Burke paused and a sly smile revealed a metal-capped tooth. “Better yet.” Burke took back the sock. “Use that phone to call whoever you got to call to get a thousand dollars. And you better hurry because the hour is almost up.”
Joaquin understood what was going on. Burke thought he’d found a way to save a grand, by making Joaquin’s family and friends pay for it. Only Burke didn’t know that Joaquin didn’t have any friends, and his family wouldn’t give him a dime if his life depended on it, not after all the crap he pulled.
“No,” Joaquin said.
As quick as the protest came, a right hook followed, cutting across his nose. He fought to sneeze.
“Do it or I’ll kill you myself.” Burke’s eyes glowed with anger.
“No.” Joaquin closed his eyes, expecting another punch.
It didn’t come. Instead, gut-wrenching pain tore into Joaquin’s thigh. Burke had produced a shiv that he buried into Joaquin’s leg. Burke held it down, blood oozing from beneath. “When I say to do something, Maxie, you do it.”
Maybe he wanted to die. Maybe he deserved to die. He’d tried to end his life several months ago after finding and using meth in county. He’d been unsuccessful. Or a coward. The thought of death teased Joaquin like a swimming pool mirage to a thirsty desert traveler. In death he’d find finality.
Joaquin took the cell phone and threw it across the room. It smashed against the wall and exploded.
Burke flipped. At first the fear showed through his gruffness, surely worried about Fischer’s reaction to his bashed up phone. But that fear quickly turned to anger. He withdrew the shiv and stabbed it down, again and again. Joaquin had never felt so much pain. He nearly passed out.
Burke directed the shiv at Joaquin’s neck. Instinctively, Joaquin fought back, catching Burke by the wrist and pushing him away. The two ended up on the floor, rolling around, wetness, blood, all over making the linoleum floor slippery. Burke lost the shiv, but that didn’t stop him. He punched Joaquin in the head making his world spin. After several more hits he slipped into unconsciousness.
When he awoke, he could hardly move. His head throbbed, his eye was swollen, and his throat too dry to muster a swallow. No, he had a tube shoved town it.
That wouldn’t be the last time he woke up in the infirmary. After many beatings, Joaquin found protection. Guzman. The cartel jefe took Joaquin under his wing. It seemed Guzman needed an appreciative son, and Joaquin needed a protecting father. The two would spend most of Joaquin’s remaining stay together and the visits to the infirmary ceased entirely.
18
No amount of money could be worth enduring a sexual assault. He hadn’t ever calculated that risk into his plan as he always assumed he’d end up in a white collar, minimum-security prison. While Ericson was in the infirmary, Jones, a black lengthy inmate visited him each day.
It didn’t appear as though Jones wanted anything, other than he genuinely seemed to care about Ericson’s well-being given what he’d endured.
“You want them dead?” Jones said, on his third visit. “Just let me know and they’re dead.”
Ericson considered it. He wanted them dead. He wanted them to suffer. Simon, that low life S.O.B. didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as he.
He expressed this to Jones, who smiled and told him not to worry—he’d handle it.
That night, just after dinner, the four men involved with Ericson’s assault were attacked by a mob of inmates belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood. Two died before the guards arrived. One other died in the infirmary soon after admittance, and the forth, Brother Simon, lost a kidney and had a nasty concussion, but later Ericson found him lying in the bed next to his.
Ericson had learned of the three deaths, and though he hadn’t been a religious man, called out to God, Karma, the elements, Mother Earth and whoever else would listen, pleading for justice upon his rapists. Someone had answered that prayer and like a wink from the universe the guard wasn’t around, leaving Ericson alone with his assailant.
Taking a life was much easier than Ericson would’ve expected. First, he secured the leather straps around Brother Simon’s chest, arms, and legs. Then he plugged the bastard’s nose and held a hand over his mouth.
Simon’s eyes opened and filled with panic. He tried kicking and screaming, and all the while, Ericson stared into those dark eyes and smiled.
“Go visit Jesus,” Ericson whispered. “Tell him what you did.”
Simon fell unconscious after a couple minutes, but Ericson held his grip for another ten. Then he undid the straps and crawled back into his bed.
“Revenge is sweet,” Jones said.
“Yes. It is.” Ericson filled his mouth with a baloney sandwich.
Jones waited for Ericson to finish eating. “Tell me again what you did. Spare no detail.”
Ericson relayed the story once more. The tale had grown since his prior delivery, but Jones didn’t seem to mind, nodding his head, even laughing.
“Vindication, my friend,” Jones said. “You know it was God who gave you that opportunity.”
Ericson hadn’t told him about his plea to a higher power for revenge, but now he did.
“I could tell,” Jones said. “It was God.”
“Don’t you call him Allah?”
“Allah means God. Like Dios.”
“So it’s the same guy? He doesn’t have a bunch of arms or something like that?”
Jones laughed. “No, man. It’s God. The same God the Jews claim to worship and the Christians. Only they don’t worship him. They worship money and power. They twist God’s words into their own. Then they fill the world with their B.S. They use their God to oppress the less fortunate, to run people from their homes and their lands because they claim it is God’s will. It’s greed, not God. Capitalism does nothing for the poor and needy.”
Ericson grew uncomfortable with the discussion. Raised in capitalism, he’d studied business at Stanford and had made his living, albeit crooked, on the back of capitalism.
“I know your past,” Jones said. “And I’m not judging you. It wasn�
��t your fault what you did. The western world and their need for bigger houses and faster cars is to blame. Let me ask you something.”
Ericson sipped water from his paper cup. Nodding for Jones to continue.
“What do you really want? Right now, if you can have anything at all, what would you ask for?”
“Freedom.” Ericson didn’t even have to think about it.
“Like before you were caught?”
Ericson shrugged. “No. Maybe like I hope it’ll be after. I couldn’t enjoy it before. I was worried that I was going to get caught.”
“I’m sure that was stressful, but can you remember back to when you were righteous? Before you started robbing banks?”
Ericson hadn’t considered himself a bank robber, but the title fit. According to the FBI, he had stolen around 260 million dollars from over forty banks, though most of that had been paid back voluntarily.
He hadn’t robbed anything. He lent the funds to his clients. A matter of paperwork. Had the loans all been paid back, he wouldn’t have been arrested. So technically his clients had been the bank robbers, not Ericson.
“Sure,” Ericson said. “I remember being poor, fresh out of college with a mortgage, a wife and a child on the way.”
“That’s my point. Were you happy?”
“Not particularly.”
“Were you happy when you got all that money?”
“No.”
“Has there ever been a time when you’ve been happy?”
“When my son was born.”
Jones smiled and nodded. “Family. Especially a son--your namesake, right? Money didn’t make you happy. Your son did.”
“Yeah,” Ericson shrugged.
Jones leaned in. “When else have you been happy?”
“Dunno.” Ericson shook his head. “When my daughter was born, I guess. When I watched my son play soccer.”
“Exactly. You don’t need money for that stuff.”
“Kind of. Money pays the bills.”
“See, you’ve bought into this B.S. What bills? Why should you have to pay to live? Pay to be happy?”
Ericson looked at Jones, trying to figure out his angle. He had been nice enough, and his actions earned respect, even gratitude, but he sounded like some crackpot communist.
“Think on this,” Jones said. “Ever hear of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.”
“Yeah, I had a psych class in college.”
“So, do you remember the basest of needs?”
“Not really.” Ericson could see the triangle diagram in his mind, but hadn’t a clue what the levels were.
“Physiological. Like air, food, water. Everyone needs that to survive.”
“Okay.”
“Without that stuff, we’re dead.”
“Got it.” Ericson grew tired of the conversation, but out of respect and gratitude, allowed it to continue. Though he wanted to push it along so he could go take a nap.
“Then you’ve got safety needs. You’ve got to know that you’re not going to get raped at night or worse.”
Ericson grunted. “That’d be nice.”
“But these two needs, the most basic of needs are what capitalism preys on. They make trillions off the fear of others, selling them land that isn’t theirs to sell, polluting the water and air and food supply.”
Ericson hadn’t ever thought of it that way before.
“That’s what I’m saying,” Jones continued. “You’ve been trained to think that you have to pay for those most basic needs.”
“Well,” Ericson answered, “it costs money to put in water wells. Or to build a house.”
“Yes. But how much? And how much house does one really need? And when you can’t afford that house, you borrow from the bank and pay them interest on money that they borrow from the government for next to nothing. And where does the government get the money?”
“From us—the taxpayer.”
“Damn straight. So let me break it down for you. The US Government taxes a man for trying to earn enough to pay for something he can’t afford. Then the government gives those taxes to an institution that lends it back to that same man at an interest rate he can’t afford on a house he can’t afford. All when it was his money to begin with. The banks make off like bandits while we buy into the B.S. and call it man’s pursuit of happiness.”
Jones made more than sense now. Ericson sat in awe. Like seeing a sunrise for the first time.
“That’s why I think you’re a hero,” Jones said. “You stuck it to those banks.”
He had. Suddenly he felt justified in his personal pursuit of happiness.
“So, Maslow’s third level of needs are those personal connections to others: your wife, son, daughter. And I suspect that’s as high as you’ve travelled because you’ve spent so much damn time trying to satisfy the first two levels of needs, you probably didn’t have the time to spend with your family. And now, you got no time for it at all.”
Guilt swept over Ericson’s mind. In his pursuit of happiness, he had abandoned his family often, and definitely for the next several years.
“The following level comes from within. It’s the perception of who you are. Most base this off of what others think. Their usefulness to society. But basically you’ve got to have some confidence to progress past this part.”
“To self-actualization,” Ericson said. The only thing he remembered from the Maslow Hierarchy.
“That’s right. To become who you were meant to become.”
“And what is that?”
“Happy. That’s what life’s about.”
Ericson considered it. Had he ever actually been happy? Would he ever be? “Are you happy, Jones?”
“Every day.”
“How?” How could anyone be happy in prison?
“Easy. I’ve got food, water, air. My brothers protect me so I feel safe. I’ve got my brothers who also care about me and I them. I know my strengths and weaknesses. All of those things allow me to do what I want to do.”
“And what’s that?” Ericson asked.
“Help others be happy too.”
19
Ericson had been in Oklahoma for almost three months when he received his first correspondence from home. He hadn’t heard from his wife, son, or daughter since before his arraignment.
The letter was short.
“I continue to uncover more lies. I know about Vanessa, you cheating piece of... We’re done. You’ll never see the kids again. Please stop sending your letters. I throw them away, so don’t waste your time. And we changed phone numbers, if you’re still trying to call.”
Ericson didn’t make any sudden motions, no tantrums. He folded the letter and walked to the corner of the room. He wanted to scream. He wanted to fight and kick and scratch. He wanted to run away. He wanted to kill again. And that is where his mind settled. Killing Brother Simon had been so gratifying and healing, especially days, and weeks later when his mind processed the incident. Others had reason to fear him. He had taken someone else’s life.
He needed to feel that power again and soon. The rage he had just swallowed wouldn’t stay buried for long.
At dinner, nearly an hour later, Ericson sat with Jones and others of the Muslim Brotherhood. Ericson hadn’t joined the movement despite multiple invitations.
He didn’t know about God, any God. He had been agnostic most his life and hadn’t planned on changing that now. But if associating with the Muslim Brotherhood, kept him safe from another sexual assault, he’d get baptized or initiated or whatever the hell they did.
Jones greeted Ericson and asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“C’mon brother. I can read you like a book. What’s wrong?”
Ericson looked around the table at the others. Jones motioned with his head and the others left. Ericson pulled the letter from inside his orange jumpsuit and passed it to Jones. Jones’s facial expression didn’t change though his eyes darted back and forth. Then he lowered t
he note.
“That’s rough.” Jones said.
“Bitch.”
“What can I do?”
“Nothing.”
They finished eating the instant potatoes and processed turkey. Then Jones suggested they walk in the yard.
“It isn’t right,” Jones said. “You’ve provided for this woman. You’ve given her children. And she shows no appreciation for you or your sacrifice.”
Jones could read his mind.
“You need to get centered,” Jones said. “Before you do something that will hurt yourself.”
Ericson lowered his eyes to the ground.
Jones continued, “The Quran teaches that God, Allah, is in control of everything. He lights the way. He is in charge.”
“So God told my wife to leave me?”
“Allah allowed it to be so. The Quran says that sometimes He guides us like lightning flashes the sky. If you stare at it, you’ll be blinded for a while. So don’t look too hard and you will see your path for a short time. Then it goes dark until lightning flashes again.”
Ericson forgot about the walk, though his legs continued stepping. They circled the chain-link wall as Jones continued, “But don’t worry, because if He really wanted to, He could take away your sight and your hearing.”
“I don’t see anything but bars and walls, Jones.”
“God showed you the way to revenge with that redneck pee-dub.”
Yes He had.
“That was His lightning. And now, it’s dark. But I promise you that He is about to show you another flash of lightning. Don’t look too close and you will see what He would have you do. And in that moment, you will know that He oversees all.”
“Alright, Jones. I’ll tell you what. If your Allah shows me a sign, then I’ll join your Brotherhood.”
“He has chosen you, my brother. He has brought you here to become his soldier. He has shown me the way and soon He will show it to you too.”