The End of Marking Time

by CJ West

  That may not sound like much. It worked out to about four days in jail for every house I robbed. I was fortunate considering the judge could have sentenced me to forty years, twenty for the DA and twenty for the couple from Westwood. Five years might not sound like much next to forty, but it’s significant because anything over two and a half is the difference between hanging out in the house of correction and doing hard time in state prison. I should have known I’d end up there. The judge had intense pressure to hand down a heavy sentence. Getting five years wasn’t bad.

  I wasn’t excited to bunk in the house of correction. Most people wouldn’t be, but living there wasn’t much different from living back in the projects with my mom. It was dangerous, but all you did was hang around and watch TV until someone fed you. I didn’t have anyone on the outside waiting for me. I didn’t have a job I could lose by going away. The food was free, so it wasn’t that terrible being locked up while my trial was going on. There were some rough characters inside, but a lot of them were in for DUI or drug possession and just wanted to serve their time. The hard core criminals, the murderers, rapists, and gang leaders who would shiv you for looking at them the wrong way, they got sent to state prison. Now that my trial was over, that’s where I was headed.

  The whole night before my transfer I kept going over the stories I’d heard. Guys got raped in the showers and beaten if they didn’t go along. Lifers spent all day making weapons out of pens, toothbrushes, and anything they could steal from the kitchen. Gangs governed life inside. I’d spent my entire life avoiding gangs in my neighborhood and now that I was old enough to be free of them on the outside, I was getting sent to a place where they were unavoidable.

  At five-nine and one seventy-five, I was a lightweight inside. Feminine to some of those brutes behind the wall. Every time I closed my eyes that night I dreamed of a three-hundred-pound, hairy monster who’d be sharing my cell for the next five years. By the time morning came my eyes were bloodshot, my head buzzed, and my cheap prison shoes felt like they weighed ten pounds each.

  Breakfast went on as usual, but when I was finished, they led me through the maze of locked corridors and made me dress in an orange jumpsuit. A chain around my waist threaded through the loops in my suit and kept my cuffed hands from leaving my sides. My feet were shackled so I could only shuffle my way into line with the others bound for MCI Cedar Junction. The officers took our court clothes from storage and stowed them underneath the bus. Like the wealthiest of travelers, we weren’t allowed to touch our bags, though the reasoning in our case was quite different.

  The correction officers scrutinized checklists.

  They processed paperwork for each prisoner at a painfully slow pace while we stood in a line of orange. I watched the guards as I waited and soon understood that they were leery of the men in line with me. They controlled men that society could not and yet they gave a wide berth to the nine inmates chained in a line against the concrete wall. The discovery made my stomach turn. There would be hundreds of men like these at Walpole. If the guards were afraid of them while their hands and feet were locked, how would I survive among them for five years? I was smart, but I didn’t have anything to bargain with. Nothing that I wanted to share anyway.

  The man in front of me had shoulders that blocked out the six men ahead of us. Standing there, I tried to think of anything I might have in common with the other guys in line, some way to strike up a conversation and make a friend who might help me later. I checked his neck and his arms for tattoos. Looked at his dark hair and wondered about his heritage. A big guy like him would be a good friend to have. I could promise him cash when he got out. Everything in my safe deposit box would be cool enough to sell in five years. I had some fine jewelry stashed in there. Maybe he had a lady.

  I didn’t say anything in line. Just waited, hoping for an opportunity to make a connection with the big guy on the bus and save myself a lot of trouble later. Pretty soon they moved us ahead single file.

  The first two prisoners loaded one at a time, up the steps, through the grated door and back to a seat. They were locked to chairs rather than seat-belted. The officers pulled aside a nasty-looking guy with a thick chain tattooed on his neck. Three officers surrounded him, while another led the remaining prisoners onto the bus one by one. I didn’t know what was so special about the guy they pulled out of line, but I didn’t even consider striking up a conversation with him. When I got to the head of the line, I kept my eyes focused straight ahead on the dirty steps until they led me all the way to the back and chained me down.

  I was glad to be on the opposite end of the bus when the guards coaxed the last prisoner to the front seat and locked him in behind the grate. The three guards locked the door and took up positions behind the driver, two facing us, the other facing forward. Sitting in my own row at the back I felt secure even if I’d lost the opportunity to make a friend during the ride.

  Two sheriff’s cruisers escorted us out onto the roadway. I couldn’t see the cars through the windows, so I watched the guards sneer at the prisoner in the first seat. I was sure he’d be leading a huge gang by the time we reached the prison. He would order men killed and control the guards with bribes. I thought I was enjoying my last twenty minutes of safety, but it didn’t turn out that way at all.

  The bus driver slammed the brakes and we all flew forward, our chains clinking as we reached their limit, our shoulders and heads hitting the seats ahead of us.

  “What the hell?” the bus driver hollered.

  The crack of gunfire sounded outside, muffled by the closed windows.

  The bus started up again, turned hard to the right, and leaned over as it climbed the curb and lumbered away. Behind us a Chevy pickup slammed into the sheriff’s cruiser, wedging it against a parked sedan. Men jumped out of the pickup and opened fire with automatics. The driver frantically worked his radio, but he was dead in seconds.

  The bus picked up speed, but it didn’t take long for the pickup to catch us. The guards had guns drawn and pointed at the inmate in the front seat. We all knew they couldn’t shoot him. We also knew that once his friends freed him, he wouldn’t show the same kindness to the guards. I never imagined this was a chance to escape. I’m not sure why, but once I heard the gunfire, my only focus was staying alive. I kept my head down, expecting the shooting to be directed at the front of the bus and hoping that my position in the rear might save my life.

  I was half right.

  The pickup truck raced by on the opposite side of the bus and opened fire at the driver. I should have had my head down, but I couldn’t resist peeking over the seatback. The bulletproof glass repelled the attack.

  We’d only driven about a mile, so it was too soon for the police to respond to the guards’ calls for help. Gunfire clattered outside. The tires on the driver’s side blew out. The crippled bus lurched that way and rammed into the cars parked along the opposite curb.

  We jolted out of our seats. I jammed my shoulder so hard I thought I dislocated it. I sat low, in agony, unable to steady my shoulder with my other hand because it was chained down.

  I heard gunfire and screaming, but I couldn’t tell how they got the door open. It was clear when they did. Gunshots blared and the bus driver’s blood splattered all over the inside of his window. The guards refused to open the gate until the intruders shot two of them point blank.

  I should have ducked. It was stupid to watch and see these men’s faces, but I couldn’t help myself. My eyes hovered just above the seatback as the guard offered up the key to unlock the inmate in the front seat. When the chains were off, they chained the guard down and the inmate fired a single shot from the steps.

  The bullet should have blown his head apart, but there was no blood.

  A horrid crack traveled through me, not in through my ears as if I’d heard it next to me, but through my bones as if the pain was being transmitted by gut-wrenching vibrations.

  All I could see was white. The brightest white I’ve ever see
n in my life. It was accompanied by intense pain and absolute silence. I felt myself falling back to my seat, but I never touched down.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Obviously I recovered because I’m standing here telling you my story, but while I was sleeping the American criminal justice system was completely revamped around me. Everything I knew about getting along was outdated. Every new rule, every new procedure was foreign to me. It was almost impossible for me to adjust. The changes would have been easier to take if I had lived through them like everyone else. I’m not making excuses for what I did later, I just want you to understand how completely my world changed in what, for me, was a single moment.

  Ironically, the next thing I remember seeing after the blinding light on the bus was another sort of light. It was muted and fuzzy. When I blinked a few times, I could see I was in a small room under dim fluorescents. The pain in my head was completely gone. I was comfortable, but my arms and legs were pinned to the bed and I couldn’t lift them. The last thing I remembered was being on the bus and getting hit in the head. I assumed I’d been brought to the hospital and was strapped down so I couldn’t escape.

  I tilted my head a few inches and saw an old man asleep in a bed next to mine. He wasn’t moving either, and other than him I was alone. A plastic oxygen mask covered my nose. As soon as I saw it, my skin itched underneath. I tried to raise my hand and lift it off, but my hand wouldn’t budge. I tried to yell for a nurse, but I could barely hear the hum that escaped the mask. I desperately wanted a drink. I wanted to sit up and pull off the oxygen mask, but most of all, I wanted to know where I was and how soon I could get out of bed. I hoped someone would come soon.

  I listened. I moved my eyes back and forth, straining at the limits of my vision. I tried to call but couldn’t even hear myself. I lay there for hours like that—watching and waiting for someone to come. Disturbing thoughts wandered into my head. The longer I lay there alone the more terrified I became. A bullet had struck me in the head. Was I paralyzed?

  I tried to wiggle my toes for several minutes, but I couldn’t see them moving under the blankets. I tried the same with my fingers with no success. I could see the fingertips on my right hand because I was angled that way, but couldn’t see if I was handcuffed or even strapped down. I knew better. Nothing was holding my fingers and yet I couldn’t move them at all.

  I tried to calm myself, but I could hear my heart beating faster with worry. Would I be stuck in bed forever? Would I be one of those people who uses their eyes to move a wheelchair? I thought about how unjust that would be. I’d never hurt anyone. I did what was necessary to survive, but I’d been kind to my fellow man. I’d avoided gangs, guns, and violence my entire life. I didn’t deserve this.

  I couldn’t move and there was no one to talk to, but eventually I started thinking this bed might be an easier place to serve out my sentence than locked behind bars with violent criminals who were ready to tear my arms off. I considered playing dead when the nurse came to check on me, but I had to know why I couldn’t move and if it was permanent or not. When she finally came I did everything I could to get her attention.

  “Good morning, Michael. How is everything with you today?” she asked in a faraway voice, not expecting a response.

  I hadn’t seen her until she spoke. She breezed around the bed, working on something I couldn’t see. Then she stepped over to me and asked, “Ready to go to the gym?” She must have been thinking about something else or she would have seen my eyes shifting left and right, signaling her that I was awake. She followed her routine with no reason to expect me to wake up on that particular day. That’s why she wasn’t really looking at me.

  She picked up my arm and stretched it up high. I wasn’t cuffed to the bed. I just couldn’t move. She was exercising my muscles to keep them in shape. Was there hope I could move them again?

  I hummed loudly under my mask. The nurse jumped back off the bed with her hands shielding her face. My arm dropped with a thump. I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t even slow it down, but I felt my palm hit the blanket.

  “Doctor Pearson!”

  The doctor didn’t come.

  She leaned closer again. This time she was intently focused on my face. I shifted my eyes back and forth until it made me dizzy. I turned my head just a little bit toward her and I saw her smile in amazement.

  “I’ll be right back,” she said and then she ran off.

  It took a long time for Dr. Pearson to get to my bedside. When he arrived, everyone was a floating head to me because I couldn’t see anything unless it was right in front of my face. He had thin gray hair and he looked heavy by the folds of skin hanging down from his neck and jaw line. By the way he grumbled, I could tell he was skeptical about my awakening.

  He flashed a light in my eyes and it felt like he stabbed me deep inside my head. I blinked them shut.

  “That’s a good sign,” he said, with more energy in his movements.

  He didn’t say anything, but I felt him tapping the fingertips on my left hand. He saw me trying to look that way to see what he was doing.

  “Can you feel that?”

  I blinked.

  He moved to my toes and pretty soon he learned that I had feeling in all my extremities. I just couldn’t move them. He read my chart for a few minutes and then said, “You really hit the jackpot, didn’t you?”

  I had no idea what he meant. I grunted.

  He shifted my arm and sat on the edge of the bed. “This is going to be hard for you to understand,” he said. “You were hit by a stray bullet four years ago on your way to MCI Cedar Junction. The trauma caused your brain to swell and you’ve been in this bed ever since.”

  Four years? That’s why I couldn’t move. I hadn’t used my arms and legs in four years.

  “The medical community gives up on most people after two years. You were lucky enough to be in the Massachusetts prison system. They get sued so much they didn’t dare pull the plug.”

  I had no idea what he meant, but I tried to follow along.

  “There are only two people left in the whole system. You,” he pointed to the man in the bed next to mine, “and your friend over there.”

  What? I blinked. He couldn’t really know how confused I was, but he seemed to understand how odd his last statement sounded.

  “The whole system was shut down just after you came to us. The Supreme Court decided that long-term incarceration was cruel and unusual punishment and that rehabilitation efforts by the states and even the federal prison system were entirely ineffective.

  “So, in a way you didn’t hit the lottery. If you hadn’t been shot, you would have been released with everyone else three years ago. It was madness when it happened. I don’t know what the heck they were thinking, but we seem to be getting a handle on it now.”

  I’d spent four years in bed when I could have been back in my apartment. I’d escaped countless torments inside prison, but I’d lost four years of my life in the process.

  “We’re going to start you on therapy, Michael. It’s going to take some time and a lot of hard work on your part, but we’ll have you walking again. When you leave this bed will be up to you.”

  If I knew how hard recovery was going to be, I might have just given up, but I was excited. I’d be released as soon as I was able to go home on my own. Unfortunately, I was still in that bed months later.

  They asked me if there was anyone I could call, but I couldn’t dial a phone. I couldn’t talk. I couldn’t even give them a name and number.

  CHAPTER TEN

  When you can’t make a muscle, it’s impossible to exercise on your own.

  Every morning for the next two weeks, Debbie, my nurse, wheeled in a machine with a bunch of wires sticking out of it. She attached the wires to my skin, and when she turned it on I started to twitch all over. The machine shocked my muscles into working. I have no idea how many hours I sat with my muscles jiggling. It seemed like forever, but then one morning when she was done I could make
a fist. Pretty soon I was lifting my hands, then my arms, and eventually my legs.

  I spent two more months exercising before I felt a little coordination coming back. That was the day Double strolled into my room. When I saw him coming I realized how helpless I was. I couldn’t run away. I couldn’t even get out of bed on my own. Had the cops busted him and Crusher with the Mercedes? As Double came closer I realized Crusher wasn’t with him. Double looked chill as ever. He wasn’t there to hit me. He looked thinner than before, like he’d lost thirty or forty pounds.

  “What’s up?” I said, proud to have most of my voice back.

  “Hey, Tin Man, I thought you were toast.”

  I raised my hands, a feat for me, but it didn’t impress Double.

  “You getting out soon?” he asked.

  “A few weeks they tell me.”

  Double got all serious and came right up to the edge of the bed. “Things is different.”

  “Yeah, my doctor said some crap about no more prison. Is he for real?”

  “Legit man. Things are whacked. You won’t believe it.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Cops and robbers, man, it’s over.”

  “What?”

  “Some judge decided we can’t go to prison no more.”

  “We?”

  “Nobody.”

  “So what happens when you get busted?”

  Double pulled up his pant leg and showed me the tracking device on his ankle. It was loose enough so he could slip it off.

  I shrugged and he could tell I wasn’t getting it.

  “It’s all high tech now. If there’s a heist and you’re anywhere near it, cops’ll know.” I asked him why he couldn’t just take it off. “Guys have tried. They’ve got it connected to your heartbeat or something. You take it off and they know. You’ve got to keep it on.”