Chapter 5 - Morning Routine
Day 22
I rolled out of my bunk with a yawn and a stretch — the thin plastic mat under me complaining noisily. I donned my forest green scrub pants and shirt, took three steps, and emptied my bladder into the stainless steel toilet bowl before pressing the button on the wall to initiate the most powerful flush known to mankind.
“You could flush a sheet down that thing,” said my cellie, Saget, from his bunk without opening his eyes.
I’d probably heard him say that exact sequence of words a dozen times since I moved in a few weeks ago, but I suppose it’s hard to come up with new things to say in a place like this.
I pressed the button on the stainless steel water fountain — er, sink — to initiate a weak stream of water to wash my hands. The water stopped flowing after five seconds, so I guess that’s all I needed. I grabbed the roll of toilet paper from the hole built into the stainless steel toilet-sink contraption and tore off a square — only one square, because only one new roll of toilet paper would be issued to me each week — to wipe the sink and the toilet seat before tossing it into the toilet. One of Saget’s weird quirks was that he didn’t like to see water spots on any of the stainless steel surfaces; a quirk that most other inmates had adopted and one that I would soon adopt as well.
“Funny that the flow of water in the sink is so weak compared to the toilet,” I said.
“It’s not funny,” said Saget. “It’s annoying.”
I guess he doesn’t appreciate irony, I thought.
I stepped over to the closed cell door and pressed my face against the small glass rectangle to look into the empty pod down below. I couldn’t see the clock from here, but I could see other faces pressed up against cell windows.
Breakfast will be here soon.
I could see the two CO’s sitting at the desk below, pretending to work. One was fat and the other was young.
I bet the young one will probably be fat too before I get out.
Not a moment later and both COs lifted their heads to the sound of someone at the door to the pod. The fat one stood up to walk toward the door while the young one started pressing buttons on the touch screen in front of him.
“Trays!” yelled the fat one.
POP. POP. POP.
With each button press on the touch screen, another cell door unlocked.
POP. POP. POP.
I watched from my window as an inmate in white scrubs pushed a cart of trays into the pod. There was one tray per inmate and two trays per CO.
The young one will definitely be fat too before I get out.
POP. POP. POP.
The white scrub inmate left the pod while the green scrub inmates on the bottom tier started crawling out of their holes and lining up at the tray cart.
POP. POP. POP.
Eventually, it was my lock’s turn to POP and I was able to push the door open to join the line.
I was still finishing my fruit loops when Cornwhistle approached me. “Eh yo. Chess today?” he asked. “They got new pieces behind the desk.”
The last set of chess pieces was too far gone to be useful. It looked like someone had put them all in a bag and then stomped them into smithereens.
“Uh, sure,” I said. “How’d you know I know how to play?”
“Just a hunch,” he replied.
After breakfast, most of the inmates returned to their bunks until lunch and I joined Cornwhistle at the usual table. The table was square and could seat four comfortably for a game of cards. The base of the table was a hard plastic that was probably full of sand and the tabletop had a chessboard and backgammon painted onto it. Cornwhistle had a spray bottle of green liquid in his left hand, and a roll of brown paper towels in his right hand. He sprayed the table with the green stuff, ripped off a square of paper towel, and started wiping it down.
“Where’d you get the cleaner?” I asked him.
“They got it behind the desk. You just gotta ask for it,” he said. He paused for a moment. “You didn’t know that? How’d you clean your mat when you moved into the pod?”
“Uh,” I said, a little embarrassed. “I didn’t know that was an option. I just figured it was cleaned before I moved in.”
“Yo dawg!” he said. “Take this shit right now and go clean your mat. Nobody cleans the mats after people move out, so you gotta ask for the cleaning supplies when you move.”
“Ok,” I said, grateful for the lesson.
I grabbed the cleaning supplies and returned to my cell while he started setting up the chess pieces.
“And take a shower!” he shouted to my back. And then a little bit quieter, “dirty-ass motherfucker,” he said to himself.
“I heard that,” I said.
“Eh. I’m just saying,” he held his hands up defensively.
Saget was already sound asleep when I returned to the cell and started pulling the sheets off my bed. I proceeded to strip the sheets, spray the mat, wipe it down, and remake my bed. In the process, I accidentally knocked something off of the desk in the corner of the cell. Saget’s pictures.
His girlfriend had just sent him a handful of photos. One of her face with a sweet look on it and another of a newborn child. He had somehow pasted the pictures to a piece of cardboard and leaned it against the wall on the desktop. I picked it up and put it back on the desk, thankful that I didn’t damage it.
After remaking my bed, I dropped the cleaner off at the CO’s desk with a “thanks,” and returned to the chess table. Cornwhistle had given himself the white pieces and he’d already made the first move — pawn to e4.
“You feelin’ better?” I asked him as I sat down. “I heard you were sick.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Not really. The DA offered me a plea deal for 16 years. Jesus fucking Christ, 16 years for this shit, man. It was just a tiny bag of dope! I couldn’t believe it. I told my lawyer no way I’d sign that, they’re gonna have to take me to trial.”
I didn’t have any idea how much dope corresponded with how much time, so I just said, “damn.”
“After I heard that, I was fucking sick,” he continued. “Had to lay it on down for a few days. But I can’t lay down forever, so... let’s play some chess.”
I wanted to ask him more questions, but I didn’t know where to start. In my case, I wasn’t offered a plea deal. I wrecked my car and my friend died. I was driving 120mph. There was no way I could say, “they’re gonna have to take me to trial,” so I plead guilty immediately and then had a sentencing hearing.
But Cornwhistle seemed set on changing the subject. “What if this was a real army,” he said. “How do you think this guy would feel?”
He pointed to the pawn in the center of the board.
I gave him a solid sounding “uh” before he continued.
“I bet the king be like, ‘Ensign Elliott! March forth into battle’ and then Ensign Elliott be like, ‘yo, all these motherfuckers to my left and right and you chose me. You coulda’ at least sent out the cavalry first.’”
I picked up my e pawn and pushed it forward, playing along. “Private Parker! The white army has made the first move. March forth, and claim some territory for black.”
“Yo,” Cornwhistle continued, “and then Elliott and Parker just have to talk it out cuz they can’t capture each other.”
“Would you two shut the fuck up!” someone shouted from behind a closed cell door.
Cornwhistle struck back with a, “yo, if the sun’s up, I’m up. And I don’t give a fuck what you think about it.”
I gave Cornwhistle a questioning look, as if to ask, “you looking for a fight?”
But he simply said with a shrug, “eh, it’s just Scout. I ain’t scared of Scout. If it was someone else, like Griffin, maybe I’d say sorry instead.”
Cornwhistle and I played chess for an hour or so before we were interrupted by the sound of a long whistle.
“Count time!” yelled the fat CO before putting the whistle back in his mouth and blowing it again. “Inspection count!”
“Jesus Christ,” said Cornwhistle to the CO. “You gotta blow that thing so loud?”
The CO turned to face Cornwhistle and yelled once more, “count time! Inspection count!” He blew the whistle an extra time for good measure.
POP, POP, POP, went the cell doors again while the young CO pressed all the buttons. Some people chose to lock themselves down to go back to sleep, so their doors needed to be reopened. Plus the pops were loud enough to wake everyone up.
Cornwhistle and I left the pieces on the table and returned to our cells. The pod was full of moans and groans, but every single inmate got out of bed, put on their green scrubs, and stood against the wall outside of their cell doors. I fell in line.
POP. went the outside door to the pod as well and then the brass walked in. A sergeant or two, and perhaps a lieutenant. The kinds of COs who have too much power and don’t play any games. Even Cornwhistle shut his mouth and lined up for count without further complaint.
Fat CO took one half of the pod while one of the sergeants took the other. They walked up to every cell, looked at every inmate from head to toe, walked inside every cell, made sure beds were made, and walked out again to inspect the next cell.
I was standing outside my cell door with my back to the wall next to a sleepy Saget when one of the sergeants approached. She was a large woman with what looked like a can of bear spray holstered on her hip. The COs didn’t carry weapons except for pepper spray, but this can of pepper spray was much bigger than any I had seen before.
“Oh shit, she got the OC spray,” said Saget quietly.
She gave him a wry look and then entered our cell. She lingered a bit. When she had inspected other cells she was pretty much in and out, but she spent at least twice as long in our cell. I couldn’t see in so I didn’t know what she was doing, but eventually she returned. In her hand was Saget’s picture board.
“Who’s is this?” she asked.
Saget made a bit of a “tsk” sound before saying, “mine.”
“You can’t have this up. Take it down.”
“What!?” he said defensively. “It’s not against the rules.”
“You can’t have pictures on the wall,” she said curtly.
“But they aren’t on the wall. They’re on a piece of cardboard,” he said with a little bit of sass.
But she wasn’t having it. “I said, take them down! Or I’ll confiscate them instead.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said facetiously.
She paused for a moment while she looked at him. Her eyes flicked toward me for a moment before settling back on him. She didn’t know him well enough to know whether he was being serious or flippant, but she gave him the benefit of the doubt. This time.
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