MARK’S FIRST NIGHT
With the closing of the doors, Mark moved to the slab and sat down. He looked around hoping to find something to wrap himself in to stop the shivering. There was nothing.
He had been in jail now for almost 8 months and hadn’t seen or heard from anybody in his family since he first went in. Before going to jail, he was very close to his family. He was Greek and had many brothers, cousins and uncles and they were a very tight knit family. That was part of the reason he was in jail. Now, no visits, no mail, no phone calls, it was like he didn’t exist anymore and he was confused and very lonely. His 12th birthday had just occurred two weeks ago and he thought he would get a visit. Maybe from his mother. Maybe she forgot.
Mark was very tired and very hungry. He was also very thirsty. He looked around to find the sink. There was none. But there was a toilet. He got up and went over to the toilet and looked inside. Someone had used the toilet and forgot to flush it. It looked like they forgot to flush it more than a few times. The toilet was half full. Mark flushed the toilet and it almost came back clean. He flushed it two more times when a voice from the next cell said “Knock it off you little bastard, I’m trying to sleep!” Mark didn’t realize anybody was in the cell next to his and the voice startled him. Then another voice came from the cell on the other side of Marks cell. “Back off Turk, he’s just a little kid!” The other man said nothing.
An arm came out from the cell and it held a mirror in it. Mark knew that the mirror was used by prisoners to see down the corridors and around corners. Everybody had mirrors in jail, it was a necessity. “Kid, why are you running the plumbing so much?” “I’m thirsty and the water is all dirty,” Mark told the man next door. “You’re figuring to drink from the toilet?” asked the man.
“It’s the only water I have,” Mark replied. “Hang on,” the man said and withdrew his arm. The man’s arm came back out of his cell with two containers of milk in his hands. “Take these kid, but check them first. Sometimes they go sour on me.” Mark couldn’t believe his eyes. He went over and took the milk from the man’s hand. “Thank you very much!” Mark said to the man. “Forget it kid.” Mark took the milk back to his bed and opened the first container. He smelled the milk. It wasn’t exactly sour, but it didn’t have curdles in it and Mark decided that it was good enough to swallow. Finishing the first one, he opened the second. The second one had big chunks in it and there was no question that it was inedible. Mark put the container down on the floor. He was still a little thirsty, but nothing like a few minutes ago. He could live with that.
“Did they give you any blankets kid?” the man asked. “No sir,” Mark told him. “Here, take this one, but the guards may not let you keep it. If they want to know where it came from, tell them it was there in the cell when you came in. I could get busted for giving it to you, so stick to your story.” With that the man held out a blanket end and Mark pulled it through the bars. Mark couldn’t believe his good fortune. Whoever the man next door was, he was the nicest person he had come into contact with for the past eight months. “Thank you very much!” Mark said as he started to cry. “Forget it,” the man said and Mark heard him go back to his bed and lay down. Mark curled up in the blanket that he folded in half and fell asleep almost immediately. The shivering had stopped and Mark felt like the luckiest boy in the world.
Two hours later with Mark sound asleep a CO did his rounds through the cell block. Passing each cell, he shined has flashlight into it. When he got to Mark’s cell, he stopped. “Larry. Larry.” he called to the man who gave Mark the blanket. Larry woke up and sat up in his bed. “What the fuck did you do that for?” the CO said to the inmate. “What Joe?” the inmate answered. “Don’t give me that fucking shit, you know god damned fucking well that Turk didn’t give that kid that fucking blanket!” the CO said. “Come on Joe, the fucking kid was freezing his balls off!” “I didn’t see the blanket Larry, and if that kid hangs it up, you’re going to be having an accident!” There was no response from Larry, the CO didn’t expect one. He moved on. Mark was correct: he was a very lucky boy.
Normally the prison lights came on every morning at 6 am. The boys were woken up at 4 by the cell doors opening and a voice down the corridor telling them to walk out onto the catwalk and stand there. The guards had thrown in more boxers and the boys put them on except for Alex. “Where the fuck is cell 26?” the voice said and a commotion started at the end of the corridor. Cell 26 was where Alex slept that night.
“Mother fucker!” said the first guard that reached cell 26. Alex was lying on his slab and blood was all over the place. His ear was still dripping blood, but it was a whole lot thicker than normal blood and a whole lot darker. The guard put on Alex’s boxers and called out. “You two get the fuck over here and pick him up!” said one of the guards to Mark and Jimmy and both boys followed the guard to the infirmary holding Jimmy up as they walked. Aaron looked at Alex. Alex was walking with them, but Aaron felt he wasn’t really there. “Alex, are you OK?, Are you OK?” Alex looked at Aaron, but not really. The nurse looked in Alex’s ear and said “His eardrum is busted, what happened?” “He slipped on a bar of soap” said the guard. Neither Mark nor Jimmy looked at each other when the guard said that. They were just turning around and facing the wall. You do a lot of that in prison.
The nurse took some cotton out of a jar and stuck it in Alex’s ear. “Have them look at it when he gets to wherever he’s going”. Before the nurse was finished, he told the boys to stand Alex back up, he needed to check for “contraband”. After a complete check, he was satisfied that Alex didn’t have a hernia, dislocated penis or any drugs in his rectum.
Following the guards the boys arrived back in the same room they were in the night before. A guard reached into a box and picked out orange jump suits and threw one at each one of the boys feet. “Dress” he said. Alex was sat down on a chair and Jimmy and Aaron put his suit on. Alex’s eyes were open and he was awake, but the boys knew he really wasn’t.
Like the boxers the night before, the jumpsuits were completely filthy. The suits all stunk like piss and Alex’s suit also stunk of vomit as well. Now, his ear was dripping blood onto it. The guards brought out chains and shackles and once again they were chained up almost to the point of not being able to walk or stand up straight.
Feeding time at Danamora was 7 am. They were on the road at 6. Now heading back down the Northway for Albany and then on the Thruway to Downstate Correctional Facility to pick up inmates for transport to Auburn Correctional. The boys arrived at Downstate at 11:00, feeding was at 10:00 and they unfortunately missed it. Pm. feed was at 1:00; the boys were back on the road at 12:00 and unfortunately missed it. The boys arrived at Elmira at 5:00 and they were 4 hours late for pm feed unfortunately. Unfortunate things happen very often in prison.
Elmira “Reformatory” was as warm, cozy and appealing to look at as Danamora was. The entire place is surrounded in 3 rows of razor wire because American children are fantastically dangerous animals and the guards needed a great deal of protection from them. The prison contains its own cemetery to house those boys who were the most dangerous and needed special reforming by the guards. If Aaron had a knife, he would have slit his throat as he entered through the gates for the first time.
Part Two
At Elmira the boys were led into a room that had about 8 adults in it, half of the men were COs, the other half were trustees. All the boys knew what trustees were: they were guards without power, but almost as ruthless as the guards. With chains clanking, the boys came into the room with Aaron and Jimmy holding onto Alex by both arms. “What the fuck is this?” the sergeant sitting at his desk asked the guards bringing the boys in. “Danamora” said one of the guards. “Those stupid mother fuckers cost us more money than everybody else put together. When the fuck are they gonna learn?” said the sergeant. “Find out the name of the prick who did this, if he enters the system, charge back 10 grand to his account!” “OK sarge,” said a CO sitting at a desk.
Aaron and Jimmy were standing there holding up Alex who was getting heavier by the minute. Alex still had his eyes open but both boys noticed they really weren’t moving or looking around much. Aaron was happy to see that he did blink now and then, but not very often. Alex didn’t speak a word on the entire trip, he just stared at his lap. “Brett, Pete, get this kid to the Doc. I want his ass back here in half an hour,” said the sergeant to two COs. The guards got up and took Alex from Aaron and Jimmy and took Alex’s chains off. The first guard who took Alex’s arm looked over directly at Alex. “I don’t think so boss, this kid looks pretty fucked up!” “Mother fucking stupid fucking assholes!” the sergeant repeated and banged both fists on his desk.
“Sir, I think I’d more helpful if I gave Doc a hand. I think there are some serious problems.” The request was coming from a trustee. The sergeant didn’t say anything for a little while; he just sat back in his chair. Finally he sat back up, “What do you think Michael?” The trustee answered “Maybe concussion.” The sergeant said nothing for a long time then just said “Go.”
All the boys knew they had a small problem on their hands. Not only were they facing a guard, they were facing a pissed off guard. Alex looked like a zombie because the guard in Danamora got angry, they were now in a very dangerous place and they knew it. “Let’s get this bullshit over with, I’ve got a Pop Warner game tonight,” the sergeant said and the guards took the chains and shackles off the remaining boys. “Strip,” was the next thing the boys heard and all four of them were very happy to comply. Once all the boys were standing before the sergeant’s desk, he began speaking to them like he was on a tape machine.
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