When the guard left him alone in the cell, Poe drew the privacy curtain and found his toothbrush and rubbed the plastic handle on the cement until it was a sharp point. He tested the bars and windows for any metal he could pry off, make a real weapon with, but there was nothing. He lay on his bunk with his head to the toilet and his feet to the bars. It was a solution, was what it was. It was the way out. Free ticket. He could get up now and make a run for the guard station, demand protective custody. But he would be right back where he was yesterday.
It was him or Isaac there was not a middle ground. He was breathing very quickly and sweating, his clothes were soaked, it felt like he’d taken a shower. Then there were loud footsteps down the tier, he could hear people walking everywhere. He had told the guard he wanted protective custody. That would be his compromise, he had told the guard, if the guard told someone else they would come for him and take him back to the hole, but if the guard didn’t tell anyone they would not come. It was a fair chance either way.
He was still breathing but it was temporary, it always had been. Your life was on a fuse, it was set when you were born it was all people and all lives. It was inevitable, he had never thought about it that way, it was inevitable, that was the one thing you could be sure of there was no reason to be afraid of it, it was coming, a sure thing, it was cold in winter. Except he was still afraid. It was just fear. He would make it mean something, that was all he could do. He would save Isaac English. He hoped he would hold out. He would stop thinking about it.
He was hungry again, there was nothing to eat in his new cell, the third in four days. He wondered if they had really needed the space in the SHU or if the Brotherhood had worked something out, got him stuck back in the general population.
What would it have mattered, doing landfills or playing football. Just another guy doing those things. There was no one else who would do this, there was no one else who would give Isaac a helping hand in any way not even his own family. Even Lee, in the end, she lived only for herself. It would need to happen soon, though. He would not keep a clear mind very long, he knew that about himself. He’d always been fucked he was born that way, it was time to give in to that reality. He would give all he had like the heroes of the past. The higher calling. He was saving Isaac English, that was why he had been put here, there was a design to it, his whole life had led to this moment, he would prove himself the equal. He would be the protector.
He was hungry, he should eat something. Then he heard keys jingling and footsteps, it was definitely a guard coming up the stairs and then onto the tier, they were coming to take him to protective custody, he would be saved. He listened to the jingling keys get closer and there was a feeling of relief. I will be saved. Then he had another feeling, a feeling of being sick, a feeling of change coming over him, a feeling of the rest of his life stretched long in front of him it was despair. He was going to lose—his own legs would betray him, they would not let him die so soon, whatever he thought it didn’t matter, his own body would overpower him. He lay there.
But the guard didn’t stop at his cell. He kept walking. Poe sat up. The guard walked right past, heading to some other cell, he dropped something off and then turned and went back down the tier and down the stairs, his footsteps disappearing. I am a coward, he thought.
Before he could think about it more he stood up and unlocked the door, he was going to get a quick dinner, that was all, get a quick dinner and save his strength, he was walking quickly down the tier and onto the main floor of the cellblock and then out into the main corridor, he could smell the messhall, he saw the door and walked right through it.
Everyone sitting at the AB tables looked up. Clovis was there with all the younger lieutenants, Dwayne was there, he looked down and he pretended he hadn’t seen Poe but Clovis was already standing up, grinning like he’d been expecting him all along and Poe’s legs started shaking, he hesitated, then turned around and walked out of the cafeteria. There were only the squares of the hallway tiles in front of him, he made his legs move, the wide empty corridor, he didn’t know where he was going. His body felt very light, he thought he passed another inmate but he was no longer sure, he seemed to be moving in slow motion. He turned into his cellblock but then changed his mind, they would trap him there, he went back into the corridor, then turned down the hall toward the rec yard. It was very quiet. There were no other voices behind him. He reached the metal detectors and then the doors. There was no one at the guard station. He tried the doors and they were locked. He shook the doors but they didn’t open, then he kicked them as hard as he could. There was no chance.
When he turned behind him it was Clovis and several of the younger men. Clovis was not wearing his hat, and Poe saw for the first time that he had thin red hair that he combed forward, Clovis was very bald.
One of the lieutenants had a knife with a long blade and a handle made of blue tape. Poe tried the doors to the yard again, hit them hard but they wouldn’t open. Then he feinted and tried to break past the five men but one of them was too fast, he tackled Poe only Poe wouldn’t go down, he was running and dragging the man holding on to him when the others caught up. They were punching him only it hurt much more and then everything was blurry, when he finally went over he saw that his own blood was already all over the floor.
BOOK SIX
1. Grace
She was sitting on the porch, staring out over the Valley and watching the light change, she could feel the sun burning her skin but didn’t move out of the chair. She’d gone two days without eating now. Three times she’d decided to go inside and call Harris, to tell him not to do it, that she would rather face other consequences. Three times she had thought of Billy laid out on the mortuary table or in a drawer and how his face would look. She’d stayed in her chair. She could remember the first time he’d moved inside her, a schedule, every night around eleven. His kicking felt like a very strong heartbeat.
He hadn’t wanted to come out. Nearly ten months she had carried him and after that she hadn’t been able to get pregnant again. As if he had known he would be all she could handle, known he would need all her attention. Looking around now at the hills and soft pastures and clearness of sky it all seemed hostile and cold, an illusion, the land had always made her feel calm, seemed some inseparable part of her, but she saw now how unreal that feeling was. Those things never changed, they were not loving and suffering.
But she was not doing anything. She could not even be sure of what Bud Harris intended. No, she knew. That man, the former auto mechanic, had tried to kill her son once and now he was trying to do it again. But even that, she thought, that’s only a lie you’re telling yourself, the truth is you have no idea what that man did, or what your son did, but still you have to make this choice, innocent or guilty it has all stopped mattering. That seems like it can’t be true, she thought.
But what she wanted was Bud Harris out there right now, going to kill that man. That was what she wanted. She wanted that man dead who she knew only because he had seen her son do something. Or was lying about her son doing something. She wanted that man dead so her son would live. That was the truth. Any mother would want this, she thought. Anyone in your shoes would want this same thing.
No, I didn’t tell him anything, I did not actually come out and say that to Bud Harris. He will make his own decisions. Except it was a lie to think that. She didn’t have to say anything. They had both known. They knew right now. If Bud Harris does something to that man it will be the same as if you did it yourself. You cannot put this off on someone else. There is evidence you are choosing to ignore—that man who went to the police when your son did not. But that evidence does not change the truth. What would Billy have to have done for you to not want this?
You’re at the end, she said out loud. They’ll all know. In the past week, Cultrap, the farmer at the other end of the road, had looked right at her as she drove by but hadn’t waved, she had known Ed Cultrap twenty years. It was because of Billy killing that man. People forgave you your children but this was too much.
No, what had passed between her and Bud Harris was just as clear as if they’d spoken. And it would be just as clear to anyone else. They would run her out of town or worse, they had all known when Bud Harris got Billy out of his last scrape, that was supposed to be kept very quiet but, somehow, everyone had found out. Now, this—she could not even imagine. I don’t care, she thought. As long as it’s me and not him.
