Falling In
By Maiyeko Singi

I’d fallen into house around 11 just after a late breakfast and helping out on the ward. My hours on the medical shift had decreased a lot after a situation with the doctor, and the riots due to heightened security. Units 14, 15, and 17 having been segregated, no longer had rec time together so that made for fewer fights. For a while, it seemed like I was doing nothing other than prepping injuries. The time I spent with the prisoners on watch had been cut in half.

Author was prisoner number 145896D. When I started, he’d been on watch for seven months but his condition hadn’t changed. Most in the program lasted only eight weeks before it became obvious that the true reason for them being there was to die. Author had been arrested on a string of petty crimes like theft and breaking and entering, but like so many of us without the right attorney, he’d ended up on the farm. He was young, more cute than handsome, and more soft than rugged - a boy like him never had a chance in this place. It wasn’t long before the taunts started, his first day in fact. By the third night an older gentleman in his 50’s approached him on the yard and told him to transfer into his house. “You just be sweet to me” he’d said “and no one will bother you.” Jackson was an old lifer and knew the game. No one would mess with him because of his age and two because he had connections for getting in the best shit from the outside. Fuck with Jackson and he’d fuck with your supply. Through that, he’d established himself as a man.

For whatever reason, Jackson had propositioned Author to crash in his place. There was something that he’d found attractive and wanted to protect. Jackson had never taken a wife so it was something of a surprise that he’d considered it. Maybe like me he’d just started feeling lonely. With the question being out, inmates backed off and Author had gained a false sense of security. I’d seen him before he’d come to the ward but he wasn’t someone I’d take a second look at. After a month, when no move was made to settle in with Jackson, Renaldo Padella made a different proposition and Author became a sperm bank for most of the men on unit 17.

It’s hard to not feel sorry. The guy came into the system young and played tough, but was too cute for his own good. What he failed to realize was that it didn’t matter how tough he was, he needed someone on his side, and guys like him rarely got to choose who’d have their backs. A typical story in this place, so it is of no consequence.

Around 2, some of the brothers from unit 14 braved the cold for rec and took to the courts. Their game of B-ball tended to get pretty intense and I wanted in figuring it was a good way to clear my head. I was being guarded by Jimmy the Jam who had the meanest cock on the block. “Better watch your ass College, I’d hate to make you my bitch!” Jam always liked to get in real close to intimidate other players with what he was packing. That bulge was always a prominent spectacle in our scrub like uniforms, especially since we only wore boxers or nothing at all underneath. Briefs for