Hey Bubba. How you doing brother?
Yah, it looks like we both made it through the tunnel of shit. They threw me in the box for five days. How long was your vacation?
So, just you and me again. Just like the good old days. Good thing the good old days were last week. Any longer and I would probably forget them.
The brotherhood of suffering has been reunited. The days in the box never happened.
Yah. Maybe it is discrimination. Preferential treatment for the white bitch. I get dragged out of the Plaza first. Poor old Bubba has to wait his turn, and they throw him in the back of the box. Looks to me like nothing has changed since Selma.
No, Selma is not my momma. She is a bitch from Detroit.
Solitary ain’t so bad. You got nobody to talk to but yourself. That’s not so bad. You just talk and talk. Nobody listens and nobody cares, including the guy who is talking.
Like chasing your tail when you don’t have one.
It’s almost like a religion. We have rules, procedures and beliefs.
What do you say, Bubba? We can create our own religion. You can be the number two guy. I will be the Pope and you can be the Popette.
How's that?
We can collect all kinds of money and dress up like Kansas City faggots. You know, white suits and white shoes. We can even dye our hair white. We can get the holy look.
We can teach the faithful what we have learned. How to survive.
What’s that?
We can write a holy book and collect all kinds of money. That’s a good idea. We can call it The Book of Moron. Maybe not, let’s think about that for a while.
We can load up on bitches and bucks. We can be the authority in this joint.
The Chaplin would cry like a baby, with a diaper full of shit. His business goes down the tubes. Maybe he can get a job as a guard?
I’ll tell you. This has to be the best place on earth. No kidding, this is the cat’s ass.
What do you mean by that?
We got sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Yah, that’s what I mean. The more you want the more you get. Can you tell me what needs we have that are not met?
Yah, we can call it Zen-jailism. The one true religion of the faithfully incarcerated. Best of all, we have a captive audience. Where the hell are the meatheads going to go?
The Muslims preach control and accountability. About as appealing as an abscessed tooth. Certainly nothing designed for prison life.
The Chaplin tells you to reform, suck it up and believe. That will get you to heaven. Who cares? It sure won’t get you the hell out of here and back on the street.
What do you think? All we have to do is recycle what the meatheads already have. Sell them their own shit. Wall Street here we come.
That’s the key to everything. We sell them what they own. Just like every other successful religion.
The greasy leading the blind.
So, what was it like in the box?
I don’t know. Maybe my box wasn’t hot enough.
What’s your problem? Do you mind sweating?
Not me. I love to sweat. Just open up the pours and let the juices flow. Just like sex and preaching.
So, we paid our dues. The Great Spirit has been appeased. Zen-Jailism has brought about equilibrium in the universe. All is good in the world. Hallelujah!
Doesn’t it feel good to make all things right?
Screw you Bubba.
You know sometimes I think that you don’t pay any attention to me. Do you think I’m talking for my health? Here I am, sharing my knowledge and creativity with you, and you scoff. Since you only have me, I think that you would pay me some attention.
Never mind. Talking to a bowl of gumbo beats talking to myself.
That’s what makes us pals. A big mouth and a bowl of soup. If it works, don’t fix it.
One for all and all for one. True blue to the end. We rule.
Yah, I know our domain is twelve foot by eight foot. We do the best we do.
Fate has tossed us in a cell together. You could tell me what’s on your mind. You gotta have something on your mind. Even a bowl of oatmeal has a thought. Your brain works just fine.
It was functioning OK when you covered my ass. You know, I would have done the same for you.
We are a team. Like Abbot and Costello, Batman and Robin, syphilis and the clap.
2
Bubba, that was some fight. I have known a whole lot of people in my life. From yuppie to bum. You’re the only guy who ever put it on the line for me.
We were out manned and out muscled all the way. We could have been killed or worse.
Screw it. We fought our way out of that mess and right into stir. Given the choices, stir looked good.
Yah, I agree. Time in stir beats the hell out of a telephone pole up the ass, or a box in the ground.
The bastards would have passed me around to every lowlife in the block. The end would have been a blade between the ribs. The infirmary would have been a well-deserved vacation.
So what!
The drugs wouldn’t have been worth it. I talked to a guy who cut himself just to get painkillers. That guy had some real problems.
Did I ever tell you what they do to prisoners in the infirmary? They make lab rats out of them. The doctors give you a disease like VD or aids. They try to find a cure by experimenting with poisons. They fill you up with arsenic or hydrogen.
No, they don’t cure you.
Your dick falls off, and then you die.
They used to do it only to black guys. Now days everybody is game. Aren’t equal rights something great?
You have the right to life, liberty, and medical experiments.
Big joke, Mr. Comedian.
How about we switch places? You be me and I’ll be you. You walk around with your head pulled down between your shoulders for a while.
Your tune would change with the shoe on the other foot.
You don’t look so bad for a guy that had the crap beat out of him. Your good looks may be gone but you will always be a movie star to me.
Yah, Hannibal Lecter. Well at least he had his day. That’s more than you can say for us.
That beating was nothing. I have been beat a whole lot worse than that. One time I kissed a 2 X 4. Ever dance with a 2 X 4.
You did. Well, goddamn. We are brothers of lumber. There must be something cosmic about us being pals.
I’m OK. There is only one difference between my former life and this dump. In the old days, when I got the crap beat out of me, I went to a clinic or a hospital.
Here you let nature take its course. We mend the old fashion way. Just like primitive man cruising through the jungle.
So what? Scars give you character. Have you ever heard of anybody getting out of prison without scars? Some never make it out alive.
Brother, you gotta go with the flow.
Yah, it would be funny if they beat the crap out of you the first day in prison. Get it out of the way. That might be the key to state sponsored incarceration. We can make it part of our religion.
A Bar Mitzvah with a busted jaw.
How much longer you got?
I know, I ask you the same question every day.
That long.
You aren’t going to get any sympathy from me.
Some day you are going to be sipping a Canadian and porking a fourteen-year-old hooker, while I will be rotting away in this cell. I’ll be ducking the brothers and breaking in a new bubba.
Remember this, there isn’t a man that can take your place. I’ll always remember what you did for me. I wouldn’t trade you for a woman. Not even a good-looking woman. Not even an easy woman.
So, here is the deal. Come lunch, you hide some bread or something in your shirt. Bring what ever you can back to me.
I’ll stay here. I’ll tell the guard that my jaw hurts too much for me to eat. That way I’ll keep a low profile. I will stay out of sight for a while. Maybe the brothers will forget about me.
They can find a new bitch.
3
Look at you College Boy. You never looked better. Put on a few pounds?
You wear them well.
How is the wife?
Yah, I guess I am looking lean and mean. Maybe, more lean than mean.
So you want to interview me after all this time. Where was it last time we met, in an alley? No, maybe Dave’s restaurant?
Where was my best buddy when I was hanging from the hook? I could have used a familiar face back then. I felt like vampires surrounded me. They moved in for the kill. Me, with no benefactor. Who took my side?
That lawyer was no fiend of mine. If the state paid him minimum wage, they overpaid him.
Ever hear of teats on a bull?
An appeal? That’s what you get from an apple when you make pie.
No kidding. Do you think I would have a chance?
What can I do in here? I can’t even get Bob Dylan to write a song about me. I ain’t no Hurricane. I am not even a Catfish.
You are the only contact I have on the outside. If you were my real pal you would help me. The key to my survival is getting someone to go to bat for me. There is nothing I can do for myself. Around here even if you have some balls you can’t use them.
Find me a lawyer that is worth a crap. If you get me a legal aid mouthpiece, you may as well put a bullet in my brain. Why don’t you do a follow up story on me? Get your cheap paper to pay for a real lawyer. Do you know a mouthpiece that is competent? There must be one of them out there.
Sure, I believe you will do your best. Just like you did your best during the trial.
You know, talk is cheap. It seems to be losing value by the minute.
Life here is just fine. Remember when I used to sweat my next meal? No more dumpster hopping for me. Three times a day I sit at a table and shovel it in. Although, the ambience has not improved.
Health care couldn’t be better. They have a doctor and nurses. All kinds of beds, shots, and restraining belts.
Ever hear of tranquilizers? Now days they call them antidepressants. The Doc passes ‘em out like M&M candies at Halloween.
The best part is the flowering of capitalism. The system works better in here than on the outside. I can purchase most anything, except for a woman. At least the female kind. Here we have the other kind.
Drugs are no problem. In cellblock D the whole bunch of them shoot up. Yah, they even have clean needles. The boys say it is much better than the outside. You don’t have to duck the man. He is your supplier.
Sure I use. What else have I got to do? It’s either that or read War and Peace.
No I don’t shoot up. It’s not that I wouldn’t. It’s a matter of finance. So, my poverty reduces me to powder.
The money? Not everything is exchanged for money. Sometimes a little body warmth is worth more than the green.
So soon? Am I freaking you out?
What about a series of follow up stories about me? How about shouting my side of this travesty to the public. Get me out of here.
All right, you come back any time.
Oh, bring cigarettes and don’t forget me.
4
Say Bubba. Where did you get the smokes? It looks like a full pack. I haven’t seen one of them in a couple of weeks.
How about that? I thought that guy had it in for you. Do I have to give you a history lesson? I told you to steer clear.
Go figure. Now we can do business. The triumph of capitalism over emotions. Ain’t America great?
Instead of the bone, we get Salem Lights.
Here is what you do. Tell Crunch that I have six R.G. Dunn cigars that I want to deal.
Yah, they are fresh.
None of your business where I got them.
Tell Crush that if he wants the cigars he has to meet me in the exercise yard, and negotiate with me. One on one.
What I want is a peace treaty. You know, an armistice. The Treaty of Versailles, like after WW II. You know, when the Czar gave up, and ended the war.
We can work out a tribute. You know, a bribe.
Peace always has its price. I’m willing to fork over my best treasure for a good deal.
No, I won’t give you one. I’m doing this for you as much as for me. Your butt means as much to me as it means to you.
What about the newspaper guy that came to see me?
This guy is a chunk of meat. I’m going to play him like a video game.
Because I hate the bitch. He is like all the other yuppie dogs out there. He thinks I am his ticket to a Pulitzer. He is going to play me until he uses me up. Well, the worm turns.
An old fishing saying. If we ever get out, I promise to take you fishing.
Yah, we can cook and eat the fish.
Sure, we can use corn meal.
Maybe he can get me an appeal. I’d give my left nut to get out of here.
The road to freedom requires an advocate.
Bubba, you learned a new word today. An advocate is a do-gooder who is straight, but wants your ass.
5
Yes sir, I know who you are. You are the prison shrink. Sorry, I mean psychiatrist.
I’m wrong again. Sorry, Mr. Psychologist. OK Dr. Psychologist.
What the hell is the difference? Sounds about the same to me.
We can start there, if you like. I got nothing to hide. You just ask away and the truth shall set me free. What will set you free?
I’ll talk about anything if it gets me out of my cell. If I see any more of Bubba’s face I think I am going to puke.
My old man? He had rough gnarled hands. The bones that made up the back of his hands and his knuckles stuck out like the metal caps on a bottle of beer. Us kids would call him Mr. Knuckles behind his back.
My brother came up with that name. That was the most creative thing he ever did. That and marrying a broad with money.
Anyway, when the old man threw a backhand, it was like getting smacked by a tire iron.
Whenever he felt like it. Come to think of it. It was usually when my momma told him to throw a punch.
She would start complaining about her nerves being shot. Then she would tell the old man to kill one of us kids. Sometimes she would yell, “Kill them all.” I think he bashed us kids just to get the old lady off his back.
OK, the old man. Yah, we can talk about Mother Theresa some other time.
He loved to eat. When he came home from work, the first words out of his mouth were, “What’s for dinner?”
That reminds me. No one was allowed to talk during dinner. He was worried about biting his tongue while he chewed. So, not a word was allowed at the dinner table. We would just reach or point to what we wanted. If you wanted something from the refrigerator, or off the counter, you had to get up and get it.
If you were trapped, and couldn’t get out, too bad. You learned to live without jello.
That was the quiet time. It was the best time. The key to dealing with my old man was to be quiet and invisible.
He had a knife and fork in his hands at all times. He even picked up his bread with his fork. He was a surgeon at the kitchen table.
He would fill up his plate first, because it was his house and his food. Then he would go to work. That was the signal for the rest of us to fill our plates.
If anyone acted up, the old man would pound the shit out of him with the back of his hand. His knife or fork would still be in his claws. The man could chew and smack at the same time, without missing a beat.
Did you ever see a stamping machine in a factory? The old man could have come from the same womb as a stamping machine.
Sure I believe it. Remember I lived with him and I lived with a stamping machine. I like the stamping machine a whole lot better than my old man. The damn thing never punched me.
One time I was eating a piece of sausage. I can’t remember what I did, but the old man threw one of his patented punches into my shoulder.
I dropped my fork and got sausage and mustard all over my shirt.
My brother thought that was the funniest thing he had ever seen. Righty, my kid brother, started laughing with a mouth full of soda. He started choking and the soda sprayed out of his nose.
It was spontaneous anarchy. All us kids busted out laughing.
The old man reached across the table to throw a punch and drops his knife in the baked beans bowl. The bowl broke, beans and tomato sauce splashed all over the table. Us kids were covered with sauce and laughed ourselves sick.
At that point WW III broke out. My momma starts screaming at everyone. She starts crying about how hard she works and what a bunch of animals we were.
That was the only time I ever saw my old man put down his fork before he finished eating. He tried to grab me but I was too fast for him. My brothers were also laughing and moving out of the line of fire.
He came after me and cracked his leg on the chair I had been sitting on. That brought out a curse that started us laughing even harder.
The old man finally spoke at the table and it was a curse.
At that point his face was beet red with anger and he had tomato sauce drooling down his chin.
He reached down and pulled the belt off his pants. He saved his belt for special occasions. It was brown patent leather, all cracked and worn out.
So, he takes a couple of steps toward me and his pants start to slide down. He had to grab them with his free hand. I fell on the floor laughing.
Do you get it? That was the best beating I ever had
Sure there could be a best beating. It was worth it. The lumps are gone but I still laugh when I remember the old man standing in front of us kids holding his pants up, ready to explode. The only thing that would have been funnier would have been if he had a heart attack.
I remember what I told my brother at the old man’s funeral. “Lets pull his pants down around his knees, that’s the way I want to remember him.”
6
God damn. It was another tough night. I must have been in a sweat most of the night. I hate when I wake up and I don’t have any idea where I am. It takes me a while to recognize home.
Yah, I remember, it was the snakes. The snakes again and again and again.
This time they were yellow and blue. Just like the tank of the Harley I’m going to buy when I get the hell out of here.
Didn’t we work that out?
I promise to chrome the hell out of it. Just like you like it.
OK, can I finish my story? You know I feel better when I tell you about my dreams.
There was this guy. The world’s first shrink. His name was Jung, Sigmund Jung. He invented head shrinking.
Anyhow, he believed that all mental problems could be understood by analyzing dreams.
Maybe that’s what I need. You know I got my share of mental problems. I probably could have kept that guy busy for his whole career.
So, you never heard of him. It would do you some good to pick up a book. They are good for more than smashing roaches.
No, I’m not badmouthing smashing roaches.
Yes, the only good roach is a dead roach.
Yah a shrink, like the jerk I’m working.
You know, all those guys are easy. The whole bunch of them are mush heads. If they weren’t shrinks they would be cheap whores. Maybe they would give it away.
The snakes. Well, they were coming out of a cloud that was floating above me.
I could tell I was asleep, but I couldn’t wake up.
I just sat back and enjoyed the show until I saw their eyes.
Yes, I know snake eyes make you a loser.
So are you Bubba, so shut the hell up.
Anyhow, I’m looking at the snakes and their wormy bodies change to women’s bodies.
I don’t know. Can a woman turn into a snake? Can a snake turn into a woman? Can you turn into Sigmund Young?
7
So, what would you like to talk about today? Perhaps I can expound upon my time on the Seine. You know, art plays an important part in the advancement of civilization. I might even say that art is civilization.
No, well then how about you? Let’s see. I can bare my soul to you. You can write a best seller and get the hell out of here. The state can kill me.
That’s a good plan
This place is beginning to smell like death.
Is your plan to have me dissected and sell my body parts to a rich Arab? If you are into necrophilia you can write a follow up book about my liver or spleen and love.
Any idiot can write a book. Why not you?
All right, I’ll sit down. Sorry I got carried away. You don’t have to call the guard.
A cup of coffee would help me get a grip.
Yes, I understand you are not in the catering business. I can wait until lunch. The cappuccino machine in my cell is out of order.
My momma. I don’t know if she is dead or alive.
Sure, I care. I care about as much as she cares about me.
I don’t remember getting any Christmas cards from her. I never sent her a card. I didn’t ever remember her birthday.
My years with my momma remind me of how I view life.
It’s like I always say. I got some good news and some bad news. The good news is that I have Alzheimer’s. The bad news is that it’s going to take a while to kick in.
Maybe her brain is fried. I figure she may have forgotten everything and everyone.
That would be the upside. More likely, she got herself a Puerto Rican stud and porked herself silly.
You know that industrial strength drilling makes you forget about everything else. I figure I am just one more thing to forget.
Yah, we both figure she didn’t love me a whole hell of a lot.
I’ll tell you why. She was stoned around the clock. She had an amphetamine jones.
Can you believe that her complaint was that her “nerves were shot.” All she did was shoot her own frazzled nerves.
Remember those fat doctors? My aunts and her made those quacks rich. Not just one. Over the years she went from doctor to doctor.
I remember her taking diet pills all the time and screaming at us kids and the old man. I remember lots of screaming and no talking.
They must have been powerful because it seems like she never slept. I thought she was having an affair with Johnny Carson.
She would wash the pills down with buckets of coffee. Just like I like it, hot and black.
There was this electric coffee maker on the kitchen counter. The damn thing was always on. I remember because once I burned my fingers on it. She screamed at me. She called me a fat cow.
How do I know why? She called everyone a fat cow, even my skinny brother.
Funny, you make me remember. She was the fat cow.
Anyways, besides the pills, she would wash down pastry with the coffee. Cookies, cake, and donuts. I don’t think it mattered. When she was out of pastry it was toast with butter and jam.
The last part of her health food diet was two packs of cigarettes a day. Remember L&M soft pack, without the filter?
My job, in the summer and after school, was to take thirty-five cents to the gas station and feed the cigarette machine.
No, I never saw her without a pack of smokes.
Screaming, smoking, and guzzling coffee. You call that a fine environment?
The final pieces that made up the mosaic that I called my mother were the telephone and the tube. She always had the receiver up against her head. When I was a little kid I thought the phone was part of her skull. She was always on the phone. She could smoke, drink coffee, and eat Twinkies, while talking on the phone and watching a soap opera.
I doubt if she knew who our mayor was. She knew the characters in a whole lot of soaps. I could almost see her doing her “jones” while on the phone. Talking about one soap while watching another. Doing everything but paying attention to me.
I’ll tell you this. I’d rather see Lucifer than my momma without her jones.
She was pretty bad, but she could have been a whole lot worse without her stuff.
The only thing worse than being wound tighter than a watch spring is getting unstrung.
Did you ever get yelled at for just being?
I thought not.
Would you like to hear about the calm time?
OK, I can tell you about it.
Have you ever heard of mahjong?
Yah, this goofy Chinese game where the women bang tiles and yak.
So, my momma and a gaggle of her pals would play at two tables in our living room. Smoking cigarettes, banging tiles, and talking non stop.
All this mayhem while I’m trying to sleep in the room next door.
Do you think I could sleep?
I would lie in bed fantasizing about violence, until I fell asleep.
In my fantasy, first I would jump out of bed and take my pajamas off. Then I would run into the living room and kick the tables over. The room would burst into screaming and mayhem. I would calmly pee on the mahjong tiles and slap my mother. Go to the kitchen, get milk and cookies, and then go to bed.
So, I ain’t so crazy about women. Could you blame me?
I don’t feel bad about those years. They were the dues I had to pay in order to become the fine citizen you see before you.
Life could have been tougher. I could have lived in Detroit.
Should I tell you about my stupid relatives? How about my momma’s brother? Yah, Uncle Mo, he was something.
In a family of droolers, this guy shined. He was the moron at the top of the heap.
Do I sound proud?
Yah, well I am. You don’t reach the top of the mountain by accident. The climb requires hard work and concentration.
There is something to be said about being that stupid.
Because I used to work for him.
He was a plumber. Over summer break I would work for him. He had a service truck and a crummy little business. Most of the time he would do half assed repairs in rental houses. “Ignore the roaches and get it working,” was his favorite saying.
That and “I gotta go check the plumbing” at a bar. I sat in the truck while he drank himself sloppy. I didn’t care and either did the roaches.
He wasn’t just an incompetent drunk. He was also a crook. Not just an over billing blue-collar contractor. What ever wasn’t nailed down belonged to him. He would steal things and then throw them away. I guess he just helped himself to keep in practice.
I was a kid that hauled around tools for drooling idiot with sticky fingers and a dry throat.
The son of a bitch would have me carry his stolen stuff to the truck. I was part of the crime but I never got to keep any of the loot.
Let me tell you about the best job he ever got.
We had to install new supply lines in a drug store. Can you see what I’m getting at?
We could only work at night. We were all by ourselves in a drug store. Mo had gone to heaven.
I would cut and thread pipe while he read dirty magazines and sipped beer. Once, when I was working on a scaffold, I saw him use the pharmacist’s tray to count out pills.
I think he studied the porn magazines so that he could steal the best filth.
I just kept cutting and threading pipe.
Working for that guy taught me all about management. It’s the golden bridge to the good life.
8
Well Bubba, we did it. It has been just one hell of a fine day. The best I can remember in the joint.
This morning I did the dance with the shrink. That guy is as dumb as a rock. Maybe dumber.
All I have to do is convince him that I am the victim. Just another person that went bad because of a horrible environment. They warped me into what I am today.
Blame the women and the family. They are all dead anyways.
What do you mean, what am I today?
Bubba, I’m a monster. Through no fault of my own.
I thought you knew that.
Well, now you know.
Anyhow, all I have to do is convince the shrink that I have no free will. He has to believe that I had no choices. Get it, no choice. I can’t be held responsible for what I did. I couldn’t help myself.
This is the best plan since Mussolini invaded Russia.
Listen to me. That’s the heart of the appeal.
With a little luck and my plan, I may yet be a free man.
Judgment day is rolling down the pike. Bubba, old buddy, you gotta position yourself. You gotta be ready for what’s around the corner. You gotta create your own reality.
Yes sir, when you are on a role you gotta roll with it.
That bitch Crunch was in the right spot at the right time. Paybacks came around and he didn’t have a plan. Remember what I just said? You gotta have a plan. A plan, you empty headed bastard.
Try to pay attention or I will devise a plan for you.
The fool comes around for six cheap cigars. Six damn cigars, not even a box.
He walks right on over to us, all alone. What the hell does he think? Are we his pals?
Right in the throat.