There was a piece of buttered bread, which Kell ate, along with the milk, his stomach protesting the whole time. It wanted a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and it wanted chocolate cake and it wanted fries with ketchup. Specifically McDonald’s fries with McDonald’s ketchup. None of this, none of what he wanted, was to be found anywhere.
After dinner, inmates lounged in the break room, waiting for their time in the showers. Kell did not go to the shower; he’d seen enough TV to know better. He was fine. He’d showered the night before, in his own private shower, in solitary. There was no way he was going to participate in a group shower because if looking pretty while standing in a prison yard invited an offer of protection, anything that happened in the shower was going to be worse. Way worse.
His cellmate turned out to be an older guy named Griff, grizzled and seamed, who looked like he’d been in prison so long he didn’t know any other life. He also ignored Kell, except for pointing to the top bunk and the stack of supplies waiting there. A roll of toilet paper, a bar of soap. A towel. A pair of white socks.
Kell climbed up to the top bunk, pushed all these aside and, yanking the blanket over him, pretended he was going to sleep. Except he did not sleep. Amidst the odd yelps and squeaks, and the constant hum from somewhere, he stared at the pale yellow cement blocks along the wall until his eyes were burning, and then he closed them.
The next day brought a repeat of the first, which, except for the echo of farts from the metal toilet bowl as the old guy sat on it, started out peacefully. It was when Kell arrived once more in the yard that trouble started like a house suddenly exploding into flames.
Ryan came up to him again, heading for Kell in a beeline, his two boys following close behind. The sun wasn’t quite out yet from behind the clouds, so Ryan’s pink scalp was a bit more subdued, but Ryan came up close to Kell, almost in his face.
“You going to be with me?” asked Ryan. “You gonna let me step up for you?”
“No.” Kell shook his head, a spare back-and-forth motion because, for some reason, his body wanted to keep things tight and under control in a place where everything seemed like it could become out of control in a heartbeat. “Listen, thanks, but I don’t need anything.”
“You need me, newbie,” said Ryan. “You just don’t know it yet. Half the guys in this yard have checked you out, and most of them want to fuck you whether you want them to or not. Stick with me, and I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen. Stick with me and I can protect you.”
“I don’t need your fucking protection.” Kell jerked back as Ryan’s hand snapped out and slapped him.
“Don’t you ever talk to me that way,” said Ryan through his teeth, a snarl meant to intimidate.
Kell was intimidated, but he wasn’t going to show it. He stuck out his chin, all his wise words to lie low and stay out of trouble flitting around in his head like unwanted moths who couldn’t find a bright light to cling to.
“Then quit asking the question. The answer is no. It’ll always be no.”
That wasn’t his first mistake, and it most definitely wouldn’t be his last. When Ryan grabbed Kell’s shirt collar and yanked him close, his heart was pounding in his chest, sweat springing up along the back of his neck, beneath his arms, along the top of his ass.
On TV it always looked as if the inmate could simply walk away from an encounter like that, that it was all just some kind of drama to attract viewers, to keep an audience riveted. But in real life, it was as scary as if the ground had suddenly dropped out from beneath him and, pinwheeling, realizing the only safe harbor was to grab hold of Ryan and say yes.
Other inmates were gathering around, circling, eyes bright, like they wanted to see blood. Of course they did. They were criminals.
Kell was a criminal too, but he’d only ever stolen so he could eat and stay warm and dry in harsh weather. He’d stolen rides on trains because it was the fastest, most direct route to wherever he was headed, but he’d never hurt anyone. Not even close.
Worst of all, the realization that he wasn’t tough enough for any of this hit him, hard, and he flinched. Ryan saw it and the glimmer in his eyes told Kell that Ryan figured the battle was won. That he had his prize, and now all he had to do now was enforce his conquest. So he shook Kell and then shoved him into the dirt.
Kell’s not-very-fancy slip-on sneakers slipped, and he went down hard, in an ungainly sprawl amongst comments likeJeez, will you look at that tight assand, jokingly,I’ll fight you for him, Ryan. None of which Ryan responded to. He simply hauled Kell up for a good close look, a hard grip on his chin, hot breath on his face.
“You’re mine now, newbie,” said Ryan, in a voice that he probably thought was scary and sexy at the same time.
It was scary, but not sexy, though as Kell tried to get a grip on Ryan’s wrist, to signal that Ryan shouldn’t grip him so hard, he wasn’t about to say anything. Not yes or no or fuck off. Not anything. His mouth had gotten the better of him and now he was going to pay for it.
“Maybe he doesn’t want to be yours,” said a voice from behind Kell, coming up around to be in full view, pulsing with muscles in a sudden shaft of sunshine, dark-haired, dark eyed, a tattoo of something along his neck, his eyes on Kell like he was something good to eat.
“He doesn’t want to be yours, Bede, that’s for sure.”
The response from Ryan came like a lazy feint, as if Ryan wasn’t worried that Bede could take what Ryan considered his, and all of a sudden, Kell didn’t want to be fought over like the last package of organic chicken breasts.
He tugged on Ryan’s wrist and stepped back. Unbalanced, Ryan let him go and now Kell was pinwheeling through the air—caught by Bede at the last second. Bede’s hands were warm along Kell’s ribs and let him go almost right away.
“It’s not right to force a guy,” said Bede, in a nonchalant way, like he and Ryan had this conversation more than once. Only Ryan was too stupid to remember it. Ryan lunged, and they were grappling in a heartbeat, inches away from Kell’s face, and it was all he could do to stagger out of the way.
The fight was on, dust kicking up beneath Bede and Ryan’s slip-on sneakers, fists flying, and up in the midst of this came Griff, half-balding, gray-haired, and slow.
He shook his head, and every single inmate moved out of the way.
“No,” he said. “That won’t do in my yard.”
A second later, Ryan and Bede stood apart, fists at their sides, looking at Griff with wide eyes.
