scored a couple of dozen books before they threatened to garnishee my salary. I wrote to religious organizations - they sent me books too. I covered hundreds of pages with notes, calculations. Figuring the odds.
When I got out, things didn't work like I planned. It took me another couple of falls to get things down to where I have them now. But I always kept reading, listening. Watching for the crack in the wall.
It was during my second bit that I started reading psychology. I never knew they had sweet words for some of the freakish things people did. The Prof said, if I read the books enough, one day they'd talk to me. I knew what I wanted to be, just not what to call it.
Ice-cold.
Stone-hard.
And I worked at that too.
One day, I was reading a psychology book and a word jumped out at me. 'Sociopath.' It called to me. I read it over and over. 'Sociopath. The essential characteristic of this disorder is a lack of remorse, even for violent or criminal behavior. The sociopath lacks the fundamental quality of empathy.'
I ran to the battered old dictionary I kept in my cell. 'Empathy: the intellectual identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.' I puzzled it out. A sociopath thinks only his own thoughts, walks his own road. Feels only his own pain. Yeah. Wasn't that the right way to live in this junkyard? Do your own time, keep your face flat. Don't let them see your heart.
A couple of weeks later, I watched the hacks carry an informant out on a stretcher, a white towel over his face. A shank was sucking out of his chest. 'That's a nice way for a rat to check out of this hotel,' I said to the guys around me. They nodded. I knew what they'd say - Burke is a cold dude.
I kept my face flat. I never raised my voice, never argued with anybody. Practiced letting my eyes go slightly out of focus so I could look in a man's face for minutes without turning away.
Sometime, alone in my cell at night, I'd say the word softly to myself. 'Sociopath.' Calling on the ice god to come into my soul. Willing to be anything but afraid all the time.
I listened to the freaks. Listened to Lester tell us how he broke in a house, found some woman taking a bath. Put his gun to her head, made her suck him off. Then he plugged in her hair dryer, tossed it in the water. I kept my face flat, walking away.
Lester grabbed a young boy who'd just come in. 'Shit on my dick or blood on my knife,' he told the kid, smiling his smile. I took him off the count the next night. He never saw me coming. I hooked him underhand in the gut with a sharpened file, ripped it upward all the way to his chest. I dropped the file on his body, walked away. A few guys saw it - nobody said anything. I let them think it was over a gambling debt.
I read the psychology books again and again. They have some of us pegged. Michelle is a transsexual. A woman trapped in a man's body.
But I never got it to feel right for me-never found the name for what I was. And the number they gave me upstate didn't tell me a thing.
53
The phone woke me. I snatched it off the hook on the first ring.
'Yeah?'
'Your friend call,' Mama said. 'He say come to Saint Vincent's Hospital. Room 909. Visiting hour at nine o'clock. You ask for Melvin, okay?'
'Thanks, Mama.'
Belle was awake, still twisted like she was when she fell asleep, looking up at me.
'He called?'
'Sure did.' I got up. 'I'm going to take a shower, okay?'
'Let me use the bathroom for a minute first.' She padded off. I lit a smoke. Melvin was the Prof's brother, a semi-legitimate dude who worked the post office. He must be in the hospital for something or other. If we had to meet in the daytime, Saint Vincent's was as good a place as any.
'All yours,' Belle said, giving me a kiss.
I didn't sing in the shower, but I felt like it. Pansy's the only one who likes my singing.
I slipped into my shirt. It smelled of Belle. She was bustling around the little house, a smile on her face. 'You're going?' she asked.
'Yeah. I got to be downtown at nine.'
'It's not quite six, honey.'
'I got to hit my office, grab a shave, change my clothes.'
Belle went over to the bed, bent from the waist, looking back at me, her big beautiful butt trembling just a little bit. 'You've got some time,' she said.
I went over to her.
'This has got to make you think of something,' she said, her voice soft and sweet.
I slid into her smooth. She dropped her shoulders to the bed, pushed against me. 'Come on.'
Belle locked her elbows tight as I slammed into her from behind, my hands on her waist. I was lost in her.
'I'm coming,' she said, her voice calm.
'Try not to get so excited about it,' I told her. She giggled. Her whole body shook. 'I mean I'm coming with you. To the hospital . . . oh!'
I blasted off inside her, fell on top of her on the bed. I lay there, catching my breath until I got soft and slipped out of her. 'You want a smoke?' I asked her, lighting one for myself.
'No, I have to get dressed,' she said, bouncing off the bed.
I didn't argue with her.
54
The morning was bright and clear. Like I felt. We pulled off the West Side Highway just past the Battery Tunnel. I motored quietly up Reade Street, heading for the river and my office. A mixed crew of blacks and Orientals were taking a break from unloading a truck. The black guys were eating bowls of steaming noodles, working with chopsticks like they'd been doing it all their lives. One of the Orientals yelled something in Chinese to a guy standing in the doorway with a clipboard in his hand. The only word I caught was 'motherfucker.'
Pansy was glad to see me. She always is, no matter what's in my hands. I love my dog. Guys doing time promise themselves a lot of things for when they hit the bricks. Big cars. Wall-to-wall broads. Fine clothes. Who knows? I promised myself I'd have a dog. I had one when I was a kid and they took him away from me when they sent me upstate. I'll never go to prison again over anything money can buy. Wherever I have to run, I can take Pansy.
The beast took my signal and let Belle inside. I gave her a couple of the bagels we'd brought with us and went inside to shave. When I came out, Belle was sitting on the couch, holding her paper cup of coffee with both hands, her arms stiff as steel. Pansy was lying on the couch, happily slurping from the cup, spilling coffee all over Belle.
'Pansy, jump!' I yelled at her. She hit the floor, spilling the rest of the coffee in the process. 'You miserable gorilla,' I told the dog.
Belle looked at me, appealing. 'I didn't know what to do - I was afraid to push her away.'
'It's not your fault - she's a goddamned extortionist.'
Pansy growled agreement, always eager for praise.
Belle's white sweatshirt was soaked. She pulled it over her head. 'I'll wear something of yours,' she said, smiling.
I knew none of my shirts would fit her, but I kept my mouth shut. I found a black turtleneck sweater in a drawer, tossed it to her.
