I must of taken longer than I figured to answer, ‘cause Lenny added, “Well, are you up for a third strike?”
I shook my head. “My first time, I was a kid. They wiped it clean when I met probation. Then came Mid-State.”
“Were you raped?”
That question came at me, low an’ quiet, from Wayne. Now I remember I’d already told these two I wasn’t, so now I knew they didn’t believe me. But I wasn’t gonna tell ‘em anything else. Problem is, he got my mind ripped back to my first time inside.
I wasn’t even eighteen. Just a dumb-shit kid who got too deep into pot an’ wound up havin’ to pay off his dealer by doin’ some transactions in “home room.” I got narc’d out by this little fucker named Anthony on the school’s varsity baseball team. Little “Mister Born Again” Boy Scout bought a joint off me an’ turned it over to the principal, who turned it over to Vice, who turned me over to the County Jail.
Now, I’d never been in trouble, before -- I mean, not where th’ cops had come down on me -- so it looked like it was just gonna be a smack the wrist time for this one. They put me in a holding cell an’ called my mother to come bail me out.
Good ol’ mom did just like she always did -- she bailed. Told ‘em to make me take care of it, myself; that she was “tired of dealin’ with me.” Like she ever had really “dealt with me.” Fuckin’ cunt. She could get stoned an’ blasted an’ knock me around -- till I got big enough to knock her back -- an’ leave me to fend for myself most of my life, but th’ second I get in copland trouble, she figures, “Well, he sneaks out at night an’ gets stoned an’ had a fight or two an’ my new husband doesn’t like him, so he’s on his own.” I hate her fuckin’ guts, an’ when I finished with that stint, I split. I’ve only seen my brother, since.
So there I was, this scared punk kid caught dead to rights an’ no one backin’ me up, with a public defender who had a thousand other cases to follow. He told me to plead guilty an’ he’d try to get leniency. I got lucky; the prosecutor offered a plea bargain of six months in county, an’ the judge said that if I was good, they’d wipe the slate clean. So in I went.
Since this was my first time in, I didn’t know what the fuck was goin’ on, but that didn’t stop the guards from actin’ like I should. They treated me like I was the devil’s disciple or some such shit. Anyway, I got transferred to a long-term wing an’ made it through bookin’ an’ th’ mug shot, okay. But then they strip-searched me. An’ then the pig that was doin’ it pulled on some rubber gloves an’ shoved his fingers up my ass. Didn’t say a fuckin’ word about what he was gonna do, first; he just poked ‘em in. I jumped an’ kicked him off me an’ the other guards smashed me ‘round the room for a few minutes. Then they shoved me over a table an’ held me down an’ let th’ fucker dig up inside my ass lookin’ for I don’t know what. When the finger-fuckin’ was done, he told me to wipe my ass an’ get dressed. I did. Then I started cryin’. Swear to God, I couldn’t help myself -- I just started blubberin’.
Well, that made the fuckers laugh an’ sneer. An’ this one motherfucker got down in my face an’ smiled an’ said, “You think you’re sorry now? We’re gonna show you what sorry fuckin’ means, cocksucker. We’re gonna teach you how to do time.”
Then they took me way in the back an’ down this block of cells. All of ‘em were packed with guys who looked like they could rip your heart out with their pinkies. The place reeked of piss an’ sweat, like six-year-old laundry, an’ the prisoners whistled an’ called out to me as I was escorted past. I was really gettin’ scared that I was gonna wind up in some cell with a dozen black guys an’ they’d spend the night beatin’ me up for bein’ white. I had no idea what could really happen. Then they stopped before this one that had two sets o’ bunk beds...an’ three gang-banger “Latinos.”
One of the guards, this big fat ugly Mex named Martinez, shoved me in an’ slammed the gate shut. Then he smiled an’ said, “Have fun,” an’ he an’ the other two guards walked away.
Those motherfuckers knew what was gonna happen. No question in my mind. They did it to punish me an’ his last crack was to let the vatos know it was okay. ‘Cause soon as they left the floor, my fuckin’ cell-mates were surroundin’ me, askin’ me questions like, “What you in for, ese?” an’ “You a maricon, pendejo?” an’ shit like that. I couldn’t get away from ‘em.
Now I wasn’t exactly a skinny-assed kid, back then. I’d been half-back on the football team a couple years -- when things were lookin’ up for us, just after mom got married -- an’ I pumped a little iron, though nothin’ regular. An’ I’d been in enough fights to know how to defend myself. But that don’t mean shit when you’re faced with three guys who’ve had more fights in a month than you had all your life.
I tried to stay calm, tell ‘em everything was cool, that I was down with their deal. But they kept circlin’ me an’ yankin’ me by my chin to make me look at ‘em an’ goin’ chest to chest with me. Then one grabbed my ass
