Fish: A Memoir of a Boy in Man's Prison

by T. J. Parsell

  The deputy leaned on the edge of the open door and tapped his key on the surface. He faced the other way, as if to avoid eye contact or the smell of my body.

  "Where'd the sergeant go?" he asked the other deputy.

  I stepped inside and couldn't hear the response as he slammed the door and locked it.

  As it turned out, this was not an attorney visit after all. It was the Probation Officer who sat at a small table attached to the wall. He was there to complete the Pre-Sentence Investigation Report.

  "Give a yell when you're ready," the deputy said to him through a small opening in the door. His footsteps faded up the hall, followed by the sound of a crashing gate.

  The probation officer was a large man, with clammy white hands, who appeared unusually chipper. He held mine for an awkward moment as we shook. "Your hands are soft," he said.

  I sat down, and he grabbed my right hand again, facing it palm-side up.

  Inside the cramped space, there were two stools on each side of the table. The man was so large, his body spilled over the stool.

  "No calluses at all," he said. "That's amazing." He rubbed my fingers with both thumbs. "Do you do any manual labor?"

  "No." I took my hand back and placed it under the table.

  There was a kindness in his voice that I wasn't expecting.

  "Hey! What's this?" he said, looking at me as I started to shake.

  I was still trying to process what had just happened with Nate and Loud Mouth. As if I were trying to deny it-but couldn't. I wanted to run, but my feet wouldn't move, so all I could do was sit there and tremble.

  "Are you OK?"

  I nodded.

  "Are you sure?"

  I shrugged. At least the first time it happened, I was drunk and drugged with Thorazine, so I didn't have to feel everything.

  He sat silently, and I couldn't speak.

  "Kind of rough in here, huh?"

  I nodded, beginning to cry.

  He handed me his handkerchief.

  I couldn't believe I was crying in front of him, but I couldn't help it.

  "Do you want to talk about it?"

  I shook my head.

  "Well, you don't have to," he said.

  He pulled out a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket and offered me one.

  "Thanks," I managed to say, but my voice was choked.

  The side of my face hurt from when Nate smacked me, and the blood in my mouth tasted like metal. He lit my cigarette and put the pack away. I had left mine in nay cell, which I was sure were already stolen. "You're not having one?" I asked.

  "I don't smoke." He smiled, gently. "I keep them handy, because I know what a commodity they are in here." He reached in his pocket and placed the pack on the table. "Keep 'em. I have more in the car."

  All I could do was nod.

  He let me finish my cigarette before he spoke again.

  For a moment, I started to blame myself again-like what had happened was my fault, but this time it was different.

  There was no way to avoid being attacked. It was like what had happened that morning, when Nate asked the guy with the food tray if he would buck for his food. He was damned if he did, and fucked if he didn't. At least I wasn't beaten up, but it felt like they had taken more than sex from me. It was as if Nate and Loud Mouth reached in and stole something more. I couldn't explain it. And no matter what, I couldn't say anything about it. Not then, and probably not ever. Not if I wanted to stay alive.

  "You're up for sentencing on Tuesday," he said, "and I have to get this report to the judge." He tapped the blue file on the table with his pen.

  I nodded. I was grateful that he'd given me time to pull myself together.

  "So what did you rob?"

  "A Photo Mat."

  "A Photo Mat? Why did you do that?"

  "For fun." I shrugged.

  He chuckled. "Was it worth it?"

  "No."

  I still couldn't look at him, and I wondered if he could smell what was soiling the inside of my pants. I couldn't tell if the smell was real or imagined, but I was sure I would never forget it. And the pain down there was unbearable. I shifted in my seat.

  "Well, if I ever got caught for some of the things I did when I was your age," he said. "I would be in here, too."

  Judging by how large he was, I doubted he'd have the same problems. I wondered if the rest of him was as wet and clammy as his hands, but I appreciated how nice he was being. "When will I be sentenced?" I asked.

  "Next Tuesday."

  "That's right. You said that, didn't you?"

  "I see you're serving time for larceny. You stole something from a hotel?"

  "I use to work there," I said. "Some friends and I would sneak there at night to find an empty room to sleep in."

  "Why didn't you go home?"

  "Because if we woke our parents up-they'd beat us for coming home late."

  "So what happened when you didn't come home?"

  "They wouldn't notice, mostly."

  "Have you been here in the county jail the whole time?"

  "Riverside," I said.

  "Riverside. Isn't that maximum security?"

  "I had to go there until I got sentenced for the Photo Mat."

  "Why did they send you to Riverside?"

  "Because Armed Robbery carries up to life, and until I was sentenced, they had to treat me like I had been given life."

  "Did you plea bargain?"

  "My lawyer said I'd get two and half years. It's supposed to run concurrent with the time for the hotel."

  "We'll that's not too bad. You'll be home in no time."

  "No time soon," I said.

  "How was Riverside?"

  I shrugged.

  "Anyone give you a hard time?"

  Again, I shrugged. In spite of how nice he was being, there was no way I could say anything. If I snitched, my life would be worthless. Then I thought about the look on Nate's face when I told him that I would.

  "Do you think I could be moved to another cellblock?" I asked.

  "Why? Is someone bothering you?"

  I didn't respond.

  "Did you ask the deputies?"

  I shook my head.

  "Well, I doubt they'll listen to me any more than they would to you. Why don't you ask them?"

  I couldn't answer him. I remembered reading about a prison riot in New Mexico, where the inmates broke into the protective custody wing using blowtorches they'd taken from the machine shop. Once inside, they turned the blowtorches on the faces of all the snitches. I'd also heard that if you asked to be moved, you had to tell the deputies who it was that was bothering you, and it was doubtful that the deputies would protect me.

  "What made you do it?" He asked.

  "What?"

  "The robbery of the Photo Mat. You knew you were being placed on probation for the hotel thing, so why risk going to jail?"

  "I didn't think I would get caught," I said.

  "But still, why risk prison?"

  "I didn't think they would send me to prison."

  I thought of telling him that I robbed the Photo Mat before the hotel and that I got caught for it later, but it didn't matter now. "DeHoCo maybe," I said, referring to the Detroit House of Detention, "but I never thought I'd go to prison."

  "Yeah, its kind of hard to believe with you being so young and good looking."

  I moved to the other stool. It was cramped inside the cell, and I thought I felt his knee lean against mine.

  "Do you see a lot of action in here?"

  "Huh?"

  He looked embarrassed. "I mean fights, bloodshed. You know, violence."

  I shrugged. It seemed strange coming from him.

  "A little," I said. I pulled another cigarette from the pack.

  He struck a match and cupped it with his hands. I leaned forward and lit it.

  He New out the flame and held the match between us as we watched the blue and gray smoke rise slowly from the tip. "You have blues eyes," he sa
id. "It almost matches."

  His kneecap touched the inside of my thigh again, but this time it stayed there.

  I jumped up and looked at him. "Are you finished?"

  His eyes darted between the small opening in the door and me.

  "Sit down," he said. "I have a few more questions."

  "That's all right. I'll stand."

  "Sit down, cowboy." He glared. "I'm the one in charge here."

  I sat back down, and he finished the interviewed.

  He didn't bother me again, but his whole demeanor had changed. He picked up the cigarettes from the table and placed them back inside his pocket.

  When the deputy came to take me back to my cell, I asked him if I could be moved. "Why?" he asked.

  I didn't answer at first.

  He unhooked his keys and opened the sliding gate at the end of the hall.

  "Because some guys are pressing me," I said. I stepped past him and waited as he closed the gate.

  "Who?" He asked.

  I said nothing.

  "You have to tell me who, if you want to be moved."

  He continued up the hall.

  I struggled to catch up with him. I thought about telling him what had just happened with the probation officer, but I doubted he would believe me.

  "I can't," I said. "They'll kill me if I say something."

  He shook his head, but then stopped suddenly to look at me. "How old are you?"

  "Seventeen."

  His face softened, but then he let out a sigh.

  I stood in front of him, shaking.

  "Let me get the sergeant," he said, sounding exasperated.

  I thought about Coach Kelly and how he yelled when I missed too many baskets, or passed the ball by accident to the opposing team. He'd blow his whistle and shake his head. "Hug the bench," he'd say to me, as he looked down at his clipboard and waited for everyone to notice. "What a dork," one of the kids on the sideline would say.

  When the deputy opened the holding cell door and told me to have a seat on the floor, I thought about gym class and how the guys used to call him Coach Nelly, because of the way he came into the locker room to see who was undressed with their dick hanging out-jotting it down on that fucking clipboard of his-those of us who had showered from those who had not. But looking back on it, I would have given anything to be there again, to have the chance to shower with boys my own age in high school where the worse that could happened was someone called you a fag.

  The deputy turned the key in the lock and then tapped it against the bars. He asked if I had anything in my cell that I needed.

  "No," I said.

  I was too afraid to go back for my cigarettes, where Nate and Loud Mouth were waiting for me.

  "Are you sure?"

  "My smokes," I said. "But I don't want to go back there."

  "I'll get 'em," he said. But when he returned, I wasn't surprised to hear him say they weren't there.

  As he walked away, I watched his keys dangling from the side of his belt. The simplicity of those small metal objects-just beyond my reach-that fit inside the locks and turned the cylinders to freedom and safety and to the outside world. If he'd just tossed me his keys-I'd never be back here again.

  When I was kid, my brother Rick tried to teach inc how to pick a lock. He said I had to feel and listen for the sound of the tumblers triggering inside. "It's like having sex," he said. "You stick your little pin inside the slot and jiggle it around until you feel the cylinder release." But his analogy was lost on me.

  I just wanted to get to a shower. I wanted to wash away what had happened earlier. The smell of shit lingered in the air, but I still couldn't tell if it was real or remembered. Perhaps the preoccupation was just another attempt to escape what had happened. My head pounded with a band of pressure and I felt nauseous.

  From inside the holding cell, I felt the rumbling vibration and clatterclack-clack of the approaching meal cart. "That's him there," one of the inmates said to another, pushing the cart past. He nodded toward me, but the deputy wouldn't allow them to stop.

  "I hope they put her up on my block," the inmate said.

  I was hoping no one would find out about me and thus increase the chance of it happening again, but the inmates who delivered the meals were also the guys who carried the information. All food came from the same kitchen. So the food carts, as they rumbled past, were the lines of communication to every corner of the jail.

  I started to feel there was nothing I could do to avoid what was happening or what might happen again. Sitting on the floor and waiting on the sergeant to decide what to do with me, I wanted to sleep forever, to lie down and not wake up again. But I couldn't bring myself to close my eyes. I'd never be able to close them again it seemed. All I could do was sit there and think. Inside the cell was a rnop bucket, which I threw up in twice.

  Where was the fucking key that would keep me safe?

  24

  You Never Know Where It's Coming From

  "I fucking hate _vou," I screamed at Sharon through the torn screen door.

  The temperature was in the single digits, and no one had bothered to put in the storm windows. It was just as well, they would have shattered, given how hard I'd slammed the door. I was thirteen and vowed never to come back again.

  There was snow coming down, and the wind chill made it feel even colder. With nowhere to go, I wandered the streets all night, ducking in and out of convenience stores and twenty-four-hour supermarkets to keep warm.

  Early the next morning, crossing the parking lot of Farmer Jack's, I felt someone following me. When I turned around, my dad was about fifteen feet behind. Though he looked relieved, his eyes were tired and sad-like he had been up all night, and I could tell that he hadn't been drinking.

  He didn't say much, but what he did say were the kindest words he'd ever spoken to me. "C'mon home, Son."

  "I have to say, this court is extremely disturbed by some of the statements made by the defendant, as indicated in the Pre-sentence Investigation Report." The judge looked down at me, over the rim of his black-framed glasses. "Would you care to explain?"

  "I'm not sure what you mean, Your Honor?"

  My attorney shrugged. He looked as puzzled as me.

  "Well, for someone so young," the judge said. "I find it troubling that your level of calculation and knowledge of the system would be so advanced."

  "I'm sorry Judge, but I still don't understand?"

  "Did you tell the Pre-sentence Investigator that you figured on probation?"

  "Huh?"

  "It says here, you didn't believe you'd get caught, but even if you were, you'd probably get probation." He held the report up. "You were expecting a free ride, it says."

  "That's not what I said, Judge." I turned to my attorney for help, which wasn't coming. I'd met him only two minutes before the sentencing hearing began. I'd have had better luck with the other lawyer, from the Public Defender's Office, but he was tied up in another court. This lawyer just stared at me with an embarrassed grin.

  "Did you make that statement?" The judge asked.

  "No. Well, sort of ... It's not exactly what I said."

  "Well, I'm sort of disturbed by your calculative savvy," he said. "Counselors?" He motioned the two lawyers to the side of his bench.

  That fat fuck of a probation officer! He must've misrepresented what I'd said to him, right before he started rubbing his knee along the inside of my thigh. But how could I say that? He was the adult and I was a kid-a criminal with no credibility.

  I turned to the back of the courtroom. My dad and Sharon sat in the last row. Sharon seemed to be frowning at the judge while my dad glanced up and nodded at me.

  I shrugged and raised my hands in the air.

  The lawyers came back to the front of the bench, and the judge asked if I had anything to say before he passed final sentence.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing would come out. I wanted to explain what I'd said to that probation officer, and w
hat happened right afterward, but it seemed hopeless. I wanted to say what a horrible mistake I'd made, that it started as a joke, a stupid opening line to the pretty girl inside, and that it wasn't until she handed me the money and smiled that I grabbed it and ran. I wanted to tell him how sorry I was and how I'd give anything to go back to the Photo Mat and undo that impulsive moment. Or explain to the judge, how some people were strong enough for prison, while others-like me-were not. But all that came out was, "No, Your Honor."

  The courtroom was still in the silence that followed. Only then did I realize my whole life was in the hands of that judge and how powerless I was to say or do anything.

  "Very well," he said. "Having accepted your plea of Guilty to Armed Robbery, and having reviewed all the circumstances in this case, including assessment of the Pre-sentence Investigation documents as prepared by the Department of Probation, this court will follow the recommendation of the Probation Department and remand you to the State Department of Corrections for a term of not less than four and a half years and no more than fifteen years to be served in the state penitentiary." He smacked his gavel and handed my file to the clerk.

  My attorney whispered something about violent crimes and capital offenses and judges having latitude in sentencing, but I didn't hear him.

  "Wait a minute!" I screamed. "What happened to the two and half years?"

  "Bailiff," the judge called out. He looked down over his glasses at the two sheriff deputies who quickly handcuffed me.

  "I'll come see you in lock-up," my good-for-nothing lawyer said. "There was nothing I could do. Armed robbery carries up to a life sentence, and the Probation Department ..."

  I cut him off. "Can I see my parents?" It was all too much to absorb. I just wanted to talk to my parents.

  "Your Honor?" the lawyer asked. "May the defendant speak to his parents?"

  "That's up to the deputies," he said. "Next case!"

  When we stepped from the courtroom, the sheriff deputies gave me a few minutes with Dad and Sharon. I stood in the corridor, my hands cuffed in front of me, while the two deputies waited nearby.